October 2016 – Page 6 – Spaceflight Now

Antares rocket raised on launch pad for station supply run

October 14, 2016 Stephen Clark

Engineers erected a commercial Antares rocket vertical on its launch pad on Virginia’s Eastern Shore Friday, positioning the 13-story booster for liftoff Sunday night with more than 5,000 pounds of supplies and experiments for the International Space Station.

Orbital ATK books Proton rocket for first commercial satellite servicing mission

October 14, 2016 Stephen Clark

Armed with capital and an anchor customer for a trailblazing satellite life extension service, Orbital ATK has signed a contract to loft its first robotic servicing tug aboard a Russian Proton rocket in 2018 on a shared launch with a Eutelsat communications satellite.

NASA has no plans to buy more Soyuz seats, and it may be too late anyway

October 13, 2016 Stephen Clark

NASA is sure enough that Boeing and SpaceX can safely launch astronauts to the International Space Station by early 2019 to hold off paying Russia to keep flying U.S. crews to the research complex, and one official says a deadline to order parts for new Russian Soyuz crew capsules may have already passed.

Hurricane Nicole prompts Antares launch delay to Sunday

October 11, 2016 Stephen Clark

The threat from Hurricane Nicole churning toward a tracking station in Bermuda will keep Orbital ATK’s Antares rocket from launching on a space station cargo run until at least Sunday, officials said Tuesday.

‘Great relief’ the worst of Hurricane Matthew stayed away from space center

October 11, 2016 Stephen Clark

Kennedy Space Center officials said Tuesday that Hurricane Matthew knocked out the main cooling system for the iconic Vehicle Assembly Building and surrounding structures, but they expect no lingering effects from the storm on NASA’s Space Launch System and Orion spaceship scheduled for their first full-scale test flight around the moon in 2018.

Study suggests Saturn’s moon Dione has underground ocean

October 11, 2016 Stephen Clark

Scientists crunching data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft believe Saturn’s moon Dione has a liquid ocean buried 60 miles under a thick icy shell, potentially adding to a growing list of ocean worlds in the frigid outer solar system.

SpaceX still expects to resume launches by the end of the year

October 11, 2016 Stephen Clark

Strong winds from Hurricane Matthew stripped exterior panels from SpaceX’s payload processing facility at Cape Canaveral last week, but the damage is not likely to affect the company’s plans to launch Falcon 9 rockets again by the end of the year, officials said.

Cape gets back into rocket business after Hurricane Matthew

October 11, 2016 Justin Ray

Taking delivery of the Atlas 5 rocket that will boost an advanced weather observatory into space next month, United Launch Alliance and the Air Force are back at work following disruptions from Hurricane Matthew.

Critical Antares rocket launch set for Friday night

October 10, 2016 Stephen Clark

The debut launch of an upgraded version of Orbital ATK’s Antares rocket has slipped to Friday after ground teams resolved a minor vehicle issue and made emergency preparations for Hurricane Matthew, which bypassed the Antares launch site on Virginia’s Eastern Shore this weekend.

Stratolaunch announces plan to fly with Pegasus rockets

October 10, 2016 Stephen Clark

Stratolaunch Systems, a company backed by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, will launch Pegasus XL rockets produced by Orbital ATK from the world’s largest airplane as officials shift focus toward deploying lighter satellites into orbit.