Space

DARPA and NASA’s nuclear thermal propulsion project will miss its scheduled 2027 testing time frame, as its development has proven trickier than anticipated.

Moon dust and other characteristics of the lunar environment are due for closer inspection if two newly launched landers can make it safely to the lunar surface.

Survivability and increased standoff head the list of priorities for long-term Air Force modernization.

SpaceX’s Starship program saw mixed results on Jan. 16: tthe second recovery of the booster.but the loss of the first upgraded Block 2 upper-stage variant.

Derek Tournear, the director of the U.S. Space Development Agency (SDA), has been placed on administrative leave, “pending the results of an investigation.”

Defense Research and Development Canada has launched three formation-flying microsatellites as part of its Arctic surveillance technology demonstration mission.

See the cover of the Dec. 20, 1965 issue of Aviation Week & Space Technology , which shows the tip path of a 43 -ft. antenna displaced from the vertical and allowed to swing freely in a vacuum chamber at Goddard Flight Center.

India has achieved another first in its efforts to build its space capabilities, with the country’s first in-orbit docking of two spacecraft.

India plans to build a third launchpad at its Satish Dhawan Space Center to accommodate the ISRO's Next-Generation Launch Vehicle (NGLV).

The Department of the Air Force, in a report released Jan. 13 that looks at its future, paints a picture of space as becoming a cold or potentially hot battlefield.

The rocket company plans to fly its launcher from the SaxaVord Spaceport in Scotland.

Blue Origin has achieved its goal of becoming an orbital launch player, even as it failed to recover its first-stage booster in the ambitious inaugural flight of its New Glenn rocket.

Led by France’s Tikehau Capital, the late-stage funding round was also joined by a trio of other venture capital (VC) firms.

The connection took place Dec. 18 and is the only optical link attempted thus far, an SDA spokesperson said in a Jan. 15 email.

Funds are also to be used to accelerate the development of Nova, as well as enhancements to private testing and manufacturing facilities, the company said.

So far codenamed L4, the undertaking will include flybys and culminate with a landing on the icy moon Enceladus.

ESA is prepping for launch of the Planetary Transits and Oscillations of Stars (Plato) mission, with the telescope to lift off on an Ariane 62 late next year.

Two pioneering commercial lunar landers, Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost Mission 1 and Japan's ispace's Resilience, successfully launched early Jan. 15.

To make up ground it is losing to SpaceX, China and others, Europe is looking to infuse greater competition into its space launch industry.

The El Segundo, California-based company’s W-2 capsule carries a spectrometer from the Air Force Research Laboratory.

After waiting out high seas downrange of its Cape Canaveral SFS launch site, Blue Origin fueled the two-stage rocket late Jan. 12.

Qantas has had to incur significant delays on some of its flights across the Indian Ocean due to the re-entry of SpaceX rocket launches in the area.

Starlab Space is a U.S.-based joint venture between Airbus and Voyager Space, a Denver-based space station, robotics and satellite development startup.

Launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is planned for Jan. 15 at 1:11 a.m. EST.

An undisclosed vehicle subsystem issue on the New Glenn heavy-lift rocket prompted Blue Origin to scrub the launch shortly after 3 a.m. EST.