Launch

Arianespace successfully launched a dual-satellite Ariane 5 mission from Ariane Launch Complex No. 3 (ELA 3) French Guiana on Tuesday. The mission placed JCSAT-17 for the Japanese operator Sky Perfect JSAT Corporation, and GEO-KOMPSAT-2B for Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) into Geostationary Orbit (GEO). It was Arianespace’s third mission of the year. JCSAT-17  separated 27...

SpaceX launched its fifth batch of Starlink satellites on a Falcon 9 on Sunday, but did not complete the booster landing, which would have been its 50th successful landing.  SpaceX lead manufacturing engineer Jessie Anderson said it in the live broadcast that it appeared  the first stage made a soft landing on the water next...

Blue Origin opened its rocket engine production facility in Huntsville, Alabama on Monday. The company plans for this 350,000 square-foot engine manufacturing facility to conduct high rate production of the BE-4 and BE-3U engine, which will undergo testing at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. The company is investing more than $200 million into this facility...

Made In Space has selected small satellite manufacturer and mission services provider Blue Canyon Technologies (BCT) to support the development of the spacecraft platform for the company’s upcoming Archinaut One mission. With the flight demonstration mission, Made In Space plans to demonstrate how robotic manufacturing and assembly can enable new structures and assemblies on orbit,...

Virgin Galactic Holdings has relocated SpaceShipTwo, VSS Unity, to its commercial headquarters at Spaceport America’s Gateway to Space building in New Mexico. VSS Unity, attached to the carrier aircraft, VMS Eve, made the journey from Mojave, California, where the company’s manufacturing facilities are based. The move of the spaceship to Spaceport America is a step...

Spaceflight Industries is selling its satellite rideshare launch business Spaceflight to Mitsui & Co., in partnership with Yamasa Co. Spaceflight Industries plans to leverage the capital from this agreement to focus on BlackSky, its geospatial intelligence business. Mitsui & Co general manager of manager of aerospace systems & rail leasing division called the acquisition is...

A United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket carrying the Solar Orbiter lifted off from Space Launch Complex-41 in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Sunday at 11:03 p.m. EST. Solar Orbiter is a joint mission between the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA to study the Sun. At 12:24 a.m. Monday, mission controllers at the ESA...

Lockheed Martin has delivered its third next-generation GPS III satellite to the U.S. Space Force ahead of an expected April launch. Last week, Lockheed Martin shipped the GPS III space vehicle to Cape Canaveral from the company’s GPS III Processing Facility near Denver aboard an Air Force C-17 aircraft. Lockheed Martin nicknamed the GPS III...

Arianespace has successfully launched 34 new satellites for global network operator OneWeb on a Soyuz rocket. Liftoff took place at approximately 4:43 p.m. EST from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The satellites are now on their way to their intended transfer orbit, and then eventually their final intended orbit 750 miles, or 1,200 kilometers, above...

Rideshare launch provider Spaceflight will send 10 additional nanosatellites into orbit for Internet of Things (IoT) network developer Astrocast in late 2021, the companies announced Feb. 6. The new contract represents Astrocast’s sixth launch order from Spaceflight, which is now slated to launch 30 of the 100 planned satellites all in late 2021. “Access to...