“Not the decision we wanted, but we respect the court’s judgment, and wish full success for NASA and SpaceX on the contract.” This was the response of Blue Origin founder and leader Jeff Bezos, via Twitter, to a court judgement against the firm’s plea that NASA should...
Having achieved a major success with its Hope probe mission to orbit Mars, the United Arab Emirates is to launch another unmanned space probe, this one going to the planet Venus, and beyond to the asteroids between Mars and Jupiter. The plan is for the spacecraft to...
An Atlas V 401 rocket from ULA (United Launch Alliance) has launched a Lockheed Martin-built, NASA Discovery-class spacecraft into orbit. Lift-off took place at 0934 GMT on 16 October from Cape Canaveral, USA, and utilised the “401” Atlas V configuration with no...
Blue Origin’s disagreement with NASA over its failure to win a contract for the Human Landing System (HLS) finally reached its apogee on 13 August when the company filed a suit in the US Court of Federal Claims. The nub of the company’s claim is that NASA failed to...
Planet, the operator of an LEO CubeSat constellation numbering over 200 units, has designated SpaceX as its “go-to-launch provider” until the end of 2025. The announcement, made on 5 August, was light on specifics but did highlight SpaceX’s reliable and low-cost...
Some years ago this column started its annual analysis called “The Great Space Race”. The idea was that while the original “Moon race” ended in 1969 when the USA beat the Soviet Union onto the lunar surface with its Apollo 11 human landing, a new one has...
