Q&A with Joe Anderson of Space Logistics LLC (members only)

NASA awarded Northrop Grumman a contract worth as much as $84.5 million earlier this month to supply rocket motors for a first-of-its-kind launch vehicle to fire a capsule of rock samples off of Mars on a journey back to Earth.

A European Ariane 5 rocket is scheduled for blastoff  Tuesday from a jungle launch pad in South America with two geostationary telecom payloads — one owned by a Saudi Arabian operator and built in Colorado by Lockheed Martin, and another for India’s space agency.

Fifty-six more Starlink internet satellites lifted off early Sunday atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral on SpaceX’s 32nd launch of the year.