Space

By Irene Klotz
NASA is removing a planned secondary payload from the August 2022 launch of its Psyche asteroid probe, leaving a pair of small satellites without a piggyback ride to Mars.
Commercial Space

By Bill Carey
The FAA’s plan to amend the collision-avoidance methodology it uses in licensing commercial space launches will support safer operations with more flexible launch windows as space at low Earth orbit becomes increasingly congested, the agency says.
Commercial Space

By Mark Carreau
Working with Nanoracks, LLC, NASA is about to mark a milestone in its push to transition oversight of human scientific research and tech development in low Earth orbit to the private sector as it sets its sights on the Moon and Mars.
Commercial Space

By Irene Klotz
The new 11-year solar cycle is expected to match its extremely quiet predecessor, which concluded in December 2019.
Space

By Thierry Dubois
France’s fledgling Space Command launches major effort in Earth-orbit surveillance and satellite defense.
Space

By Bill Carey
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, the FAA is busier than it has ever been licensing commercial space launches, officials said Sept. 14.
Space

By Irene Klotz
California-based Astra, a startup vying to get into the small-satellite launch business, conducted a flight test of its Rocket 3.1 booster, but the mission ended prematurely when the vehicle started to head off course due to a guidance system problem.
Space

By Irene Klotz
Work stoppages due to Hurricane Laura, the Category 4 storm that came ashore in Louisiana last month, will delay the long-awaited static test fire of the Space Launch System (SLS) core stage at NASA’s Stennis Space Center until late October or November.
Space

By Mark Carreau
A British-led research effort has caught a possible low probability hint of biological activity in the high altitude cloud layers of neighboring Venus.
AFA Air Space and Cyber Conference

By Vincent Chappard
ASECNA, NIGCOMSAT Ltd and Thales Alenia Space take a crucial step towards the provision of satellite navigation services in the Africa & Indian Ocean region.
Space

By Irene Klotz
Mars exploration advocates tackle racism and diversity.
Space

By Joe Anselmo, Jen DiMascio, Graham Warwick
Our roundup of the main aerospace and defense stories making the news this week.
Emerging Technologies

By Irene Klotz
NASA on Sept. 10 released a solicitation to buy 50-500 grams of lunar regolith, at a price of $15,000-25,000, a mission not for science but to set the legal precedent for owning resources extracted from the Moon and other bodies in the Solar System.
Space

By Irene Klotz
After repeated attempts to sell a solid-propellant, heavy-lift space launcher to the U.S. national security community, Northrop Grumman is discontinuing work on its Omega rocket, the company said Sept. 10.
Space

By Mark Carreau
Charles Bolden, a retired U.S. Marine Corps major general, former NASA administrator and four-time shuttle astronaut, has been selected to receive the National Aeronautic Association’s (NAA) 2020 Wright Brothers Memorial Trophy.
Space

By Steve Trimble
SIREN appears to share similar objectives with the National Security Space Architecture launched by the Space Development Agency (SDA), except the AFRL initiative is limited to potential demonstrations and experiments.
Space

By Thierry Dubois, Irene Klotz
Arianespace enters smallsat ride-share service while Rocket Lab debuts Photon satellite.
Commercial Space

By Bill Carey
The air navigation service provider of Hong Kong will introduce satellite-based surveillance of aircraft in its flight information region beginning early next year, data provider Aireon announced Sept. 9.
Space

By Mark Carreau
NASA is turning to its Commercial Lunar Payload Services providers to bid on the delivery of 10 science investigations and technology demonstrations to a nonpolar region of the Moon in 2022.
Space

By Mark Carreau
Catherine Koerner has assumed management responsibility for development and operations of NASA’s Orion program headquartered at Johnson Space Center.
Space

By Irene Klotz
U.S. agency is expanding partnerships, adding new weather-monitoring technologies and moving to cloud-based data services.
Space

By Mark Carreau
While NASA strives through the Artemis Accords to promote peaceful efforts to explore the Moon, the Vienna-based Moon Village Association is assessing how to achieve a similar outcome through its Best Practices for Sustainable Lunar Activity.
Space

By Steve Trimble
The mission adds China to an exclusive club of countries that have landed an orbital, reusable spacecraft.
Space

By Lee Hudson
The White House has issued a new space policy directive designed to improve the cybersecurity of space systems.
Space

By Irene Klotz
Ask the Editors: NASA has continued its exploration blueprints by building support among both Democratic and Republican legislators.
Space