News
Rocket Lab begins new countdown with fix for propulsion system glitch
With a fix in place for a propulsion system alarm that cut short a countdown in the final seconds Monday, U.S. time, Rocket Lab readied an Electron rocket for another try Wednesday night, but unfavorable upper level winds kept the booster grounded. The Electron rocket is awaiting launch on a test flight aiming to deliver three small commercial CubeSats to orbit from a remote New Zealand launch pad.
Photos: Upgraded New Shepard booster flies from West Texas
Blue Origin’s third New Shepard suborbital booster lifted off on its first brief up-and-down test flight Tuesday, soaring to an altitude of 322,000 feet over West Texas to prove out the rocket and its automated crew capsule, which flew with a dummy dubbed “Mannequin Skywalker” to simulate the conditions passengers riding the rocket will one day experience.
Four more Galileo navigation satellites ride Ariane 5 rocket into orbit
Unimpeded by rain showers and a dark gray blanket of low clouds, an Ariane 5 rocket thundered away from a European-run space base in the jungle of French Guiana Tuesday to place four Galileo navigation satellites in orbit, an on-target deployment that should improve the location accuracy of new smartphones around the world.
Live coverage: Ariane 5 blasts off with Galileo satellite quartet
Four European navigation satellites fastened on top of an Ariane 5 rocket lifted off from Kourou, French Guiana, at 1836:07 GMT (1:36:07 p.m. EST) Tuesday to propel the Galileo navigation network closer to global service. The Ariane 5’s upper stage delivered the spacecraft to a circular orbit more than 14,000 miles above Earth around four hours after launch.
Live coverage: SpaceX cargo ship arrives at space station
Two days after lifting off aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Complex 40 launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, a commercial Dragon supply ship loaded with more than 4,800 pounds of supplies and experiments arrived Sunday at the International Space Station. Capture of the robotic cargo craft occurred at 5:57 a.m. EST (1057 GMT).