Spacewalkers have to switch out already changed battery on ISS
In a new extra vehicular activity (EVA) session on 8 April, more colloquially known as a spacewalk, two astronauts had to change a recently fitted battery on the International Space Station (ISS) which was proving defective. The Lithium Ion battery which had been...
read more
Bridenstine notes public-private partnerships in NASA push to develop crewed lunar landers
At the 35th Space Symposium in Colorado on 9 April 2019 NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine hung some meat on the bare bones of a plan to return humans to the Moon by 2024 - an challenge made last month by Vice President Mike Pence and accepted by Bridenstine on behalf...
read more
Stainless Starhopper test rocket makes static firings and tethered hops as SpaceX destroys large composite tank tooling
While it might be sans its "pointy" nose cone after it fell off and was damaged in windy weather, the Starhopper test rocket has nevertheless begun to make static firings and short tethered hops at its Boca Chica test site in Texas. This was announced SpaceX founder...
read more
Soyuz 2-1a launches Progress MS-11 on fast track to ISS
A Progress 2.1a rocket was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome near Tyuratam in Kazakhstan at 1101 GMT on 4 April. Aboard was the Progress MS-11 cargo spacecraft which followed a "very fast" approach set of manoeuvres ahead of its docking with the International...
read more
Hayabusa 2 delivers explosive charge-armed impactor to asteroid as it retreats leaving remote camera to observe the bang
The Japanese space probe Hayabusa 2 has released an explosive-charge armed impactor called Small Carry-On Impactor (SCI) It was released at 0156 GMT on 5 April to deliberately explode on the asteroid 162173 Ryugu to carve out crater. Before the explosion, a small...
read more
Soyuz ST-B launches four O3b satellites
At 1703 GMT on 4 April, four O3b satellites for the European SES satellite operator were launched by a Soyuz 2-1B rocket from the "European Space Port's" Sinnamary launch site near Kourou in French Guiana. The rocket was operated by Arianespace. Built by Thales...
read more
New four booster PSLV-QL version launches 29 satellites plus its own converted upper stage…but not everything went to plan
A new version of India's PSLV rocket made a launch of 29 satellites plus its own repurposed upper-stage spacecraft. This new version was the PSLV QL which carries four solid rockets instead of the more normal six. The launch took place at 0357 GMT on 1 April 2019...
read more
China launches its Tianlian 2-01 relay sat on Long March 3B
China has launched the latest version of its Tianlian data relay satellites which are broadly equivalent to NASA's TDRS types. The Tianlian 2-01, which uses the DFH-4 bus design, was launched at 1551 GMT from Xichang aboard a Long March 3B-G2. Before this flight...
read more
STOP PRESS: The Earth needs you to spin your discs – Update: OK its an April Fool joke
French space and geophysics expert, Professor Avril Fou, has warned that the Earth's rotation rate is slowing down, with long term implications for the seasons* and the weather. "To ignore this slow down would be foolish," Avril Fou warns. So can anything be done?...
read more
On a sadder note: we say goodbye to Vostok and Soyuz cosmonaut Valery Bykovsky and to US actor and voice provider Shane Rimmer
We are sad to note that real life early cosmonaut Valery Fyodorovich Bykovsky has passed away at the age of 84. He flew on his first spaceflight on Vostok 5 in 1963 as well as on Soyuz 22 and Soyuz 31 in the second half of the 1970s. Meantime, in the fictional world,...
read more