NASA has returned to Space X to launch the second Sentinel-6 satellite. In a contract announced on 20 December SpaceX will launch Sentinel-6B/Jason-CS B satellite in November 2025 using a Falcon 9 rocket. This contract is valued at US$94 million. The mission will...
While maiden flights of new rockets are known to be risky, with a failure rate of around 40 per cent according to the Seradata SpaceTrak database, second flights are considerably less so. Nevertheless, they still have a failure rate of around 19-20 per cent. And so it...
SpaceX successfully launched a Falcon 9v1.2FT Block 5 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA at 2248 GMT on 16 December 2022. The vehicle was carrying O3b mPOWER 1 & 2, a pair of 1,200 kg Boeing 702X bus communications satellites, on their way to medium Earth...
Lithuanian smallsat manufacturer NanoAvionics – now known as Kongsberg NanoAvionics – has been awarded satellite contracts from two French companies. ONERA On 30 November 2022 ONERA ordered two CubeSats from Kongsberg NanoAvionics, the first 8U and the...
At 0617 GMT on 16 December a Long March 11 (CZ-11) rocket placed the Shiyan 21 test satellite into LEO. The mission took place from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China. “Shiyan” translates to English as “experiment” and these satellites are routinely described...
At 1825 GMT on 14 December China successfully launched its fourth Yaogan 36 triplet of the year. The mission saw a Long March 2D (CZ-2D) rocket lift-off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China, and place the three satellites into their planned low Earth...
