Stephen Clark – Page 140 – Spaceflight Now

Live coverage: Soyuz lifts off from French Guiana

December 28, 2020 Stephen Clark

A French military spy satellite lifted off Tuesday atop a Soyuz rocket from French Guiana. Launch of Arianespace’s final mission of 2020 occurred at 11:42 a.m. EST (1642 GMT). Officials called off a launch attempt Monday because of unfavorable high-altitude winds over the spaceport in South America.

China launches secret military spy payload

December 27, 2020 Stephen Clark

A secret Chinese military payload, believed to be a surveillance satellite, successfully flew into space Sunday aboard a Long March 4C rocket on China’s 39th and final scheduled orbital launch attempt of the year.

Two payloads orbited by SpaceX’s launch of NRO mission

December 27, 2020 Stephen Clark

Tracking information released by the U.S. military indicates two government payloads rode a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket into orbit Dec. 19 on the NROL-108 mission, a dedicated launch for the National Reconnaissance Office.

French military spysat set for launch Monday

December 26, 2020 Stephen Clark

A sharp-eyed French military surveillance spacecraft is set for launch aboard a Soyuz rocket Monday from French Guiana into a 300-mile-high orbit, where it will collect the highest-resolution imagery ever produced by a European reconnaissance satellite.

China’s Long March 8 rocket successful in debut launch

December 26, 2020 Stephen Clark

A new Chinese launch vehicle, the Long March 8, has successfully placed five payloads into orbit on its first mission, debuting an expendable booster intended to eventually be outfitted for recovery and reuse.

Canadian astronaut to join NASA’s first crewed Artemis mission around the moon

December 21, 2020 Stephen Clark

A Canadian space flier will join three NASA crew members on the first piloted flight of the Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft around the moon, becoming the first non-U.S. astronaut on a lunar voyage, officials announced last week.

Lockheed Martin to buy rocket engine-builder Aerojet Rocketdyne

December 21, 2020 Stephen Clark

Lockheed Martin, the largest U.S. defense contractor, announced late Sunday that it has reached a deal valued at $4.4 billion to acquire Aerojet Rocketdyne, a supplier of engines to NASA’s Space Launch System moon rocket and United Launch Alliance’s Atlas, Delta, and Vulcan rockets.

SpaceX closes out record-setting year of launches from Florida’s Space Coast

December 19, 2020 Stephen Clark

SpaceX hurled a secret cargo into space for the U.S. government’s spy satellite agency Saturday, the 30th rocket launch to fly into Earth orbit from pads on Florida’s Space Coast in 2020. The Falcon 9 flight broke an annual record for missions to reach orbit from the Florida spaceport that stood for 54 years.

Arianespace targets early 2021 for Vega return-to-flight

December 18, 2020 Stephen Clark

Presenting the results of an inquiry into a European Vega rocket failure last month, officials said Friday that misleading instructions and inadequate preflight checks caused teams to overlook wrongly-installed cables on the launcher’s upper stage steering system. Arianespace aims to resume Vega launches before the end of March.

OneWeb resumes deployment of 650-satellite broadband network

December 18, 2020 Stephen Clark

The next 36 satellites for OneWeb’s broadband internet network fired into orbit from Russia’s Far East Friday on a Soyuz rocket, giving OneWeb 110 of a planned fleet of 650 spacecraft after the company emerged from bankruptcy earlier this year.