A partnership between Sierra Nevada Corp. and the United Nations’ Office for Outer Space Affairs aims to launch microgravity payloads from UN member states aboard the company-built Dream Chaser spacecraft by 2021. The U.N. said Tuesday the collaborative effort aims to give developing nations an opportunity to build and deploy payloads into orbit and that all member nations will have the chance to propose payloads […] More

United Launch Alliance has submitted a bid to compete on a contract to launch the U.S. Air Force’s third GPS III satellite in 2019 and reiterated its concern about price as a deciding factor in contract competition, Florida Today reported Tuesday. “As recent launch failures have shown, rockets are not commodities,” the Boeing–Lockheed Martin joint venture […] More

NASA has given the Lockheed Martin-built Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer spacecraft the go-ahead to launch on Sept. 8 after the space vehicle passed a launch readiness evaluation Tuesday, Space News reported. Jeff Foust writes the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is scheduled to take off from Cape Canaveral in Florida onboard the United Launch Alliance-developed Atlas […] More

United Launch Alliance is developing a reusable rocket stage that would stay in low Earth orbit and support activities in space, Quartz reported Saturday. Tim Fernholz writes ULA CEO Tory Bruno said a fleet of the company’s future Advanced Cryogenic Evolved Stage will work to support large-scale LEO activities as the company envisions a future in which humans […] More

Iridium CEO Matt Desch has said prospective customers of the company’s next-generation satellites want to see quality of data that the new constellation could provide before making commitments through contracts, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. Andy Pasztor writes Desch told the publication in an interview that customers such as the Federal Aviation Administration are running a cost-benefit […] More

SpaceX has launched a Space Systems Loral-built communications satellite for Japanese company SKY Perfect JSAT into orbit aboard a Falcon 9 rocket. The U.S. Air Force‘s 45th Space Wing supported the JCSAT-16 payload launch Sunday from the Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral AF Station in Florida, the service branch said Monday. JCSAT-16 is designed to serve as a […] More

NASA has awarded Southern Research a five-year, $10 million contract renewal to continue to support a video imaging system used on the space agency’s WB-57 research aircraft. The Airborne Imaging and Recording System is attached to the WB-57 nose cap and designed to process full motion videos of rockets that ascend into space at a distance of more than 25 miles, Southern Research […] More

Orbital ATK has transported the first two next-generation Iridium satellites to Vandenberg Air Force Base in California as part of preparations for the scheduled liftoff on Sept. 19, Spaceflight Now reported Wednesday. Stephen Clark writes the satellites were shipped via truck from an Orbital ATK-run manufacturing facility near Phoenix to Vandenberg, where eight additional message transmission […] More

Sierra Nevada Corporation has awarded Aerojet Rocketdyne a contract to provide an electrical power system for the former’s Dream Chaser commercial spacecraft designated by NASA to transport cargo to and from the International Space Station. Aerojet Rocketdyne said Tuesday it will design, create, test and install the electrical power system onto Dream Chaser as well as provide power conversion and […] More

Sierra Nevada Corp. has received approval from NASA for its strategy to launch and send the Dream Chaser spacecraft’s cargo system to the International Space Station. The approval marks the completion of the second integration certification phase for the space vehicle that will perform at least six cargo flights to the ISS from 2019 through […] More

Satellite operators have sent opinions to the Federal Communications Commission after an agency ruling that aims to make frequencies above 24 gigahertz available for fifth-generation wireless services, Space News reported Friday. Peter de Selding writes Boeing, EchoStar, Hughes Network Systems, Inmarsat, Intelsat, Iridium, O3b Networks, OneWeb, SES, SpaceX and ViaSat are among the companies that have submitted their opinions to […] More

Orbital ATK aims to launch a company-built Cygnus spacecraft for its sixth cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station by Aug. 22 under the Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA. NASA said Friday that Cygnus will lift off from Pad-0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at the agency’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia onboard an Antares rocket. The […] More