Rocket Lab and Stoke Space have been added to the U.S. Space Force's list of launch providers eligible for lower-risk National Security Space Launch missions.
The USAF is debating whether to cancel a series of current and future contracts for the Space Development Agency and to use SpaceX-built assets instead.
Optical cross-link technology is maturing at a critical juncture, with government and commercial customers pouring billions into proliferated constellations.
Success was all the sweeter when Firefly, with its debut spacecraft, not only landed on the Moon, but operated for more than 14 days on the lunar surface.
NASA says it wants to stick with the Boeing CST-100 Starliner to give the space agency options in case the SpaceX Dragon system were to encounter problems.
The returning astronauts included the Boeing CST-100 Starliner extended Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission’s Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams.
The demonstrator consists of two 6U cubesats designed by NRO’s advanced systems and tech directorate to support an “experimental technology research mission.”
The SpaceX Dragon capsule, designated Endurance, autonomously docked to the forward docking port of the ISS U.S. segment’s Harmony module at 12:04 a.m. EDT.
