Q&A with Keith Gendreau, principal investigator of the first X-ray space communications experiment (members only)

A day after commercial satellite images revealed a smoke plume over an Iranian launch pad, President Trump tweeted a remarkably high-resolution aerial photograph of the remote satellite launch facility Friday — apparently from a classified satellite or airborne drone — and denied U.S. involvement in the accident.

This was SpaceX’s 51st Falcon 9 launch of 2024. Liftoff from Space Launch Complex 40 happened at 8:32 p.m. EDT (0032 UTC).

Japan has lost contact with the newly-launched Hitomi space telescope, and ground observations indicate the satellite has shed debris and may be tumbling in orbit more than 350 miles above Earth.