Mission Reports – Page 170

Core of NASA’s first Artemis moon rocket towed into Vehicle Assembly Building

April 29, 2021 Stephen Clark

A decade in the making, the core stage for NASA’s first Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket rolled into the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center Thursday to join up with twin solid rocket boosters and an Orion capsule for an unpiloted test flight around the moon.

SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink spacecraft; FCC clears SpaceX to fly satellites at lower altitudes

April 29, 2021 Stephen Clark

SpaceX deployed 60 more Starlink internet-beaming spacecraft into orbit after a fiery late-night blastoff of a Falcon 9 rocket Wednesday night from Cape Canaveral, surpassing the 1,500-satellite mark since Starlink launches began. Another Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to haul the next batch of Starlink satellites to space next week.

Assembly of Chinese space station begins with successful core module launch

April 29, 2021 Stephen Clark

Chinese officials confirmed the successful launch of the first element of the country’s space station early Thursday, laying the keystone to a permanently-inhabited orbiting habitat that could welcome its first astronauts this summer.

“Big relief” as Europe’s Vega rocket returns to service with successful launch

April 29, 2021 Stephen Clark

A European Vega rocket deployed six commercial satellites in orbit, including a new Airbus-built eye-in-the-sky for high-resolution Earth-imaging, on a successful launch from French Guiana on Wednesday night after two of the last three Vega missions failed.

Live coverage: Arianespace launches Vega rocket from French Guiana

April 28, 2021 Stephen Clark

After two of the last three Vega rocket launches ended in failure, Arianespace launched another Vega launcher from French Guiana at 9:50 p.m. EDT Wednesday (0150 GMT Thursday) with Airbus’s Pléiades Neo 3 commercial Earth observation satellite and five secondary payloads.

Vega rocket’s return-to-flight launch set for Wednesday night

April 28, 2021 Stephen Clark

Six satellites are set to ride a light-class European Vega rocket into orbit from French Guiana on Wednesday night, the first Vega launch since a failure last year that officials attributed to human error.

Live coverage: SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites

April 28, 2021 Stephen Clark

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at 11:44 p.m. EDT Wednesday (0344 GMT Thursday) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station with the next 60 Starlink internet satellites. The Falcon 9’s first stage booster landed on SpaceX’s drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean nearly nine minutes after launch, completing its seventh trip to space and back.

First element of Chinese space station ready for liftoff

April 28, 2021 Stephen Clark

The core module of China’s space station is packaged inside the nose cone of a heavy-lift Long March 5B rocket for liftoff late Wednesday (U.S. time), the first of 11 launches to deliver astronauts, supplies, experiments, and new laboratory modules to build out the orbiting complex before the end of 2022.

Apollo 11 astronaut Mike Collins dies at 90

April 28, 2021 William Harwood

Michael Collins, the man who stayed behind aboard the Apollo 11 command module while crewmates Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin descended to the moon and walked into history, has passed away after a battle with cancer, his family announced Wednesday. He was 90.

NASA barge delivers first SLS core stage to Kennedy Space Center

April 27, 2021 Stephen Clark

The core stage of NASA’s first Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket arrived at the Kennedy Space Center on Tuesday evening aboard a specially-built barge, completing a voyage by sea from a test site in Mississippi to begin final preparations for the first flight of NASA’s Artemis Moon program. Ground crews plan to transport the core stage into the Vehicle Assembly Building beginning around 5:30 a.m. EDT (0930 GMT) Thursday to join its two solid rocket boosters.