PARIS and HOUSTON -- France has repaired a vacuum-chamber leak in a key science instrument that will fly aboard the NASA-led InSight lander mission slated to launch to Mars in early 2016. Engineers at French space agency CNES are now testing the repair to the InSight lander’s SEIS (Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure) instrument to ensure it will maintain the degree of vacuum necessary to carry out its mission.
India is likely to sign an agreement with France to buy 36 Rafale fighter aircraft off the shelf during a visit here by French President Francois Hollande in January.
JAXA experts are assessing the orbital characteristics of the Akatsuki/Venus Climate Orbiter spacecraft following a 20-min. firing of reaction control system thrusters.
The French Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure, one of three key instruments planned for launching aboard the NASA-led 2016 InSight Mars lander mission, has experienced a vacuum chamber leak.
The U.S. Navy’s proposed Ship-to-Shore Connector program reached a production milestone recently when the first hull, LCAC 100, was turned over at Textron Systems Marine & Land Systems.
The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency needs to do a better job of managing its Materiel Returns Program at the wholesale level, the Pentagon Inspector General says in a recent report.
Mission managers scrubbed launch of an Orbital ATK Cygnus commercial cargo vehicle carrying 7,300 lb. of supplies for the International Space Station for the third day in a row Saturday, setting another attempt for a 30-min. window that opens at 4:44 p.m. EST Sunday.
A Moroccan F-16 and a Saudi AH-64 Apache have been shot down while operating over Yemen yesterday. It is understood that the Moroccan Air Force pilot was killed but the two crew of the Saudi aircraft have been captured by rebel forces.
Weather forced a second delay Friday in United Launch Alliance’s effort to launch an Orbital ATK Cygnus spacecraft with a load of supplies for the International Space Station.
The fallout from Turkey’s shootdown of a Russian combat aircraft may have a wider and unexpected impact on the U.S.-led coalition air power arrayed against the militants of the self-proclaimed Islamic State/Daesh.
A constellation of satellite hosted payloads equipped with infrared sensors is being developed that could deliver almost-instantaneous warnings of wildfires, oil spills on dry land and other “thermal events” worldwide.
A demo showing that unmanned aircraft systems can be integrated into national airspace without the need for a major infrastructure program has been conducted by Lockheed Martin using its unmanned Kaman K-Max helicopter and fixed-wing Stalker XE.
