News – Page 281 – Spaceflight Now

June 4, 2026

Breaking News

[ June 4, 2026 ] NASA head urges new launcher for Blue Origin’s moon landers to meet Artemis mission deadlines Moon Base
[ June 3, 2026 ] SpaceX launches 24 Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Falcon 9
[ June 3, 2026 ] Blue Origin vows to resume New Glenn flights by year’s end Mission Reports
[ June 3, 2026 ] SpaceX launches sunrise Starlink mission following weather scrub Falcon 9
[ May 30, 2026 ] SpaceX launches 50th Starlink mission of 2026 Falcon 9

Photos: NASA’s Perseverance rover buttoned up for launch

June 17, 2020 Stephen Clark

NASA’s Perseverance rover has been closed up inside its protective aeroshell, the structure that will protect the spacecraft when it plunges into the Martian atmosphere, in preparation for launch no earlier than July 20 from Cape Canaveral.

NASA’s space station program manager retiring from agency

June 17, 2020 Stephen Clark

Kirk Shireman, NASA’s program manager for the International Space Station, is retiring from the space agency later this month to take a position in private industry.

China launches Earth observation satellite

June 17, 2020 Stephen Clark

A Gaofen Earth-imaging satellite and two secondary payloads launched Wednesday aboard a Chinese Long March 2D rocket.

Fitted with super-clean sample tubes, NASA’s next Mars rover nears launch date

June 16, 2020 Stephen Clark

The Perseverance rover’s sterilized sample tubes — designed to seal Martian rock and sediment for eventual return to Earth — are installed on the spacecraft as teams at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center prepare to enclose the rover inside the payload shroud of its Atlas 5 launcher for liftoff July 20.

NASA says JWST won’t be ready for launch in March 2021

June 16, 2020 Stephen Clark

The launch of the James Webb Space Telescope will not happen in March 2021 — the mission’s previously-scheduled launch date — after the coronavirus pandemic forced a more than 50 percent reduction in staff levels at the observatory’s assembly and test facility.

Intelsat, SES buy 10 C-band broadcast satellites from U.S. manufacturers

June 16, 2020 Stephen Clark

Intelsat and SES, operators of the two largest fleets of geostationary communications satellites, have ordered 10 spacecraft from Maxar, Northrop Grumman and Boeing for launches beginning in 2022 to replace C-band capacity being transitioned to 5G cellular network services.

Last Beidou satellite launch postponed by rocket trouble

June 15, 2020 Stephen Clark

Ground crews at the Xichang launch center in China postponed the launch of a Long March 3B rocket into orbit Tuesday that was to complete the deployment of the Beidou navigation fleet, a project approved by the Chinese government in 1994 to end reliance on the U.S. military’s GPS network.

Starlink satellite deployments continue with successful Falcon 9 launch

June 13, 2020 Stephen Clark

Breaking a SpaceX record for the shortest span between two missions from the same launch pad, a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off Saturday from Cape Canaveral carrying 58 more Starlink broadband satellites and three Earth-imaging spacecraft for Planet.

University-built CubeSat launched with swarm of auroral science nodes

June 13, 2020 Stephen Clark

Rocket Lab successfully launched five small satellites from New Zealand Saturday for customers in the United States and Australia, including a CubeSat with a novel swarm of tiny magnetometers to measure the plasma currents that shape colorful auroras.

Live coverage: Falcon 9 rocket lifts off on first Starlink rideshare mission

June 13, 2020 Stephen Clark

Another batch of Starlink Internet satellites shared a ride into orbit with three of Planet’s SkySat Earth-imaging satellites on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket Saturday. The Falcon 9 lifted off at 5:21 a.m. EDT (0921 GMT) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.