NASA obtained data from its latest observation campaign of the Ball Aerospace-built Kepler spacecraft, despite the observatory having only a little amount of fuel onboard. The space agency said Friday it put the space telescope on hibernation mode after NASA found that the craft’s tank was running on low fuel. Kepler was roused from sleep Aug. 2, […] More

Northrop Grumman CEO Wes Bush has said he would be open to making the company’s award fees from the James Webb Space Telescope development contract depend on the successful commissioning of NASA’s space observatory following launch, SpaceNews reported Thursday. “As a mechanism to ensure we are all aligned on mission success, Northrop Grumman has actually […] More

Cameron Chehreh, chief technology officer and vice president of presales engineering at Dell EMC’s federal business, has said mission agility, cost savings and massive amounts of automation are the three reasons why federal agencies adopt software-defined storage, MeriTalk reported Tuesday. “We are seeing government in a variety of areas, adopting not only software-defined storage but software-defined data […] More

Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos said during the International Space Development Conference in Los Angeles that he supported the government’s call for manned lunar missions and believes establishing a lunar base is necessary for sustained missions to Mars, SpaceNews reported Tuesday. Bezos said he would be willing to work with other countries to build facilities […] More

Aurora Flight Sciences has helped the U.S. Marine Corps deliver cargo through an autonomous flight platform during the service branch’s recent integrated training exercise. A UH-1H helicopter equipped with the Aurora-built Autonomous Aerial Cargo Utility System delivered 520 pounds of water, gasoline, ready-to-eat meals, communications equipment and a cooler that contained urgent necessities to the California-based Marine Corps Air Ground Combat […] More

The U.S. Air Force has wrapped up a factory mission readiness test on the first Lockheed Martin-built GPS III satellite along with the launch-and-checkout system of a Raytheon-developed ground control platform. Lockheed said Tuesday the GPS III SV01 satellite received and processed commands from the Next Generation Operational Control System’s LCS component during the FMRT demonstration […] More

Raytheon provided a common ground system and a space sensor technology to support the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration‘s next-generation polar satellite that NASA launched Saturday from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The company said Saturday its common ground system for the Joint Polar Satellite System and the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite sensor will function […] More

Aerojet Rocketdyne has tested an engine for NASA‘s second exploration mission at the space agency’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. The RS-25 engine, dubbed as E2063, was fired up for 500 seconds in a move to evaluate the system’s capacity to support the EM-2 exploration mission, Aerojet Rocketdyne said Thursday. RS-25 engines will continuously fire […] More

Aerojet Rocketdyne has developed four engines that will support NASA‘s maiden flight for the Space Launch System. The company said Wednesday that the RS-25 engines are now ready to be integrated on the SLS rocket’s core stage in preparation for the Exploration Mission-1 mission. “These four EM-1 engines have … powered 21 shuttle flights with the […] More

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said he wants to send at least two cargo ships to Mars by 2022 in an effort to determine hazards, establish life-support infrastructure and identify potential water resources, CNBC reported Friday. Musk plans to carry out that plan through the development of a 42-engine rocket system called BFR designed to […] More

“This threat that legacy equipment poses across all of our industries is truly one of the things that keeps me up at night.” EM: How has your work experience prepared you for your current position? Stephen Marker: My current role is director of product strategy within cyber and electronic warfare systems, focusing on which markets […] More

SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk has said the company plans to use its Falcon Heavy rocket to send two passengers to the moon in 2018 via a private lunar mission, Space.com reported Monday. Musk told reporters in a teleconference the two individuals will fly aboard SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft to travel around the moon for a week, […] More