Watch as NASA holds a briefing at the Kennedy Space Center on the four agency technology payloads that are part of the STP-2 mission flying into orbit aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.
Video: NASA TV.
Watch NASA’s STP-2 technology briefing
Mission Reports
Rocket Lab to begin booster recovery experiments later this year
Rocket Lab’s next launch from New Zealand, set for Friday, will carry a data recorder to measure the aerothermal environments encountered by the Electron launcher’s first stage during descent back into the atmosphere, information engineers say is crucial to successfully achieving the company’s newly-announced plan to recover and reuse the booster.
News
NASA has no plans to buy more Soyuz seats, and it may be too late anyway
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.
Mission Reports
NASA, Rocket Lab partner on successful satellite launch from New Zealand
Rocket Lab’s commercial Electron booster fired into orbit from New Zealand on Sunday, carrying a flock of 13 CubeSats on the company’s first mission chartered by NASA, and closing out a landmark year for the new smallsat launch provider as Rocket Lab aims to grow its flight rate to at least one per month in 2019.