March 2022 – Spaceflight Now

German imaging satellite gets top billing on next SpaceX rideshare launch

March 31, 2022 Stephen Clark

A $330 million German hyperspectral Earth-imaging satellite will hitch a ride to orbit from Cape Canaveral with 39 smaller commercial payloads on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket set for blastoff Friday.

Blue Origin flies fourth suborbital crew mission

March 31, 2022 Stephen Clark

Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital launcher lofted six passengers, including the rocket’s chief designer, on an up-and-down flight to the edge of space Thursday.

NASA astronaut back on Earth after record-setting flight

March 30, 2022 William Harwood

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei joined two Russian cosmonauts aboard a Soyuz spacecraft, undocked from the International Space Station and plunged back to Earth Wednesday, landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out a U.S.-record 355-day stay in space.

Live coverage: NASA astronaut returning home today with two Russian cosmonauts

March 30, 2022 Stephen Clark

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, wrapping up nearly one year in orbit, rode a Russian Soyuz spaceship back to Earth on Wednesday with Russian commander Anton Shkaplerov and flight engineer Pyotr Dubrov. The crew returned home from the International Space Station and landed in Kazakhstan at 7:28 a.m. EDT (1128 GMT).

NASA astronaut, two cosmonauts set for Wednesday return to Earth

March 29, 2022 William Harwood

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, launched by Russia to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz spacecraft last April, returns this week to a world torn by war in Ukraine and escalating superpower tension as he closes out a 355-day stay in orbit, the longest single flight by a U.S. astronaut.

White House requests $26 billion for NASA in ’23, adds funds for second moon lander

March 28, 2022 Stephen Clark

The White House’s fiscal year 2023 budget request for NASA totals $26 billion, including $7.5 billion for the agency’s Artemis moon program, a boost over this year’s budget to help pay for development of a second human-rated lander to ferry astronauts to the lunar surface.

NASA gives priority to Artemis ground test over commercial astronaut launch

March 25, 2022 Stephen Clark

NASA officials gave the green light Friday for the first all-commercial astronaut launch to the International Space Station on a SpaceX rocket as soon as April 3. But the astronaut launch could be delayed a day, or longer, to give priority to a countdown test for NASA’s Space Launch System moon rocket on a neighboring launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center.

Hydrazine loading operations conclude at the SLS launch pad

March 25, 2022 Spaceflight Now

Technicians wearing protective self-contained suits loaded toxic hydrazine fuel into the Space Launch System’s hydraulic power units Friday on pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center. NASA is gearing up for a countdown dress rehearsal which could start as soon as April 1.

SpaceX’s new Dragon spaceship named ‘Freedom’

March 25, 2022 Stephen Clark

SpaceX’s fourth human-rated Crew Dragon spacecraft has been named “Freedom” by the first team of astronauts who will ride it into orbit next month.

Russian military communications satellite launched on Soyuz rocket

March 24, 2022 Stephen Clark

A Russian Soyuz rocket delivered a military communications satellite to orbit Tuesday in the first space launch for Russia’s military since forces invaded Ukraine last month.