Q&A with John Shannon, Boeing’s SLS vice president and program manager (members only)

Curt Blake, president of Spaceflight Industries, spoke with Spaceflight Now’s Stephen Clark on Sept. 29 about the Seattle-based company’s purchase of a dedicated rideshare mission on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, and various trends and strategies in play in the small satellite launch market.

A United Launch Alliance Delta 4 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 8:26 p.m. EDT Friday (0026 GMT Saturday) with the U.S. Air Force’s tenth Wideband Global SATCOM satellite, extending the reach of the military’s highest-capacity satellite communications network.

Ground controllers have lost contact with an Indian communications satellite launched last week, and Indian news reports suggest engineers believe the spacecraft’s power system is at fault.