Video: Liftoff of Atlas 5 with X-37B on program’s fourth flight

Investigators probing the sudden failure of the Boeing-built Intelsat 29e geostationary relay station in April have concluded an electrostatic discharge, aggravated by a harness flaw on the spacecraft, or a micrometeoroid strike prematurely ended the satellite’s mission, resulting in a $382 million hit to Intelsat’s quarterly financial report.

United Launch Alliance will salvage the main engines through a mid-air recovery plan and reuse them again aboard the company’s new Vulcan rocket, saving 90 percent in booster propulsion costs, the company announced Monday.

NASA cited the complexity of Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser space plane and an uncertainty of when the proposed crew transport craft would be ready to fly astronauts to the International Space Station as the primary reasons the agency picked Boeing and SpaceX for lucrative contracts to develop commercial space taxis.