News Archive
Browse every article published on Spaceflight Now, from launch reports and mission previews to spacecraft development coverage. Use the filters to narrow by topic or search by keyword.
Matching Articles
1,130 articles
NASA astronaut Don Pettit makes fourth trip to the International Space Station
Pettit will fly to the orbiting outpost alongside Russian cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner on the Soyuz MS-26 mission. Liftoff from the Baikonur Cosmodrome is set for 12:23 p.m. EDT (1623 UTC).
VideoStarliner lands safely in New Mexico
Despite NASA's concerns about earlier thruster problems and multiple helium leaks in the ship's propulsion pressurization system, the Starliner had no trouble undocking and moving away from the station at 6:04 p.m. EDT and executing a critical 59-second deorbit braking maneuver at 11:17 p.m. to drop out of orbit.
VideoAs it happened: Boeing’s Starliner returned to Earth, marking the end of the Crew Flight Test mission
The spacecraft will journey back to Earth without the two astronauts it launched with back on June 5. Undocking is set for 6:04 p.m. EDT (2204 UTC) with landing just after midnight on Saturday.
VideoNASA to announce final determination on how to conclude Starliner Crew Flight Test
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson is set to discuss the agency’s decision following a rare mid-mission, agency-level flight readiness review. A press conference will begin no earlier than an hour following the conclusion of the discussion.

Rocket Lab’s Mars-bound twin satellites – Blue and Gold – hit the road ahead of Blue Origin launch
The twin spacecraft, named Blue and Gold, left Rocket Lab’s Long Beach facilities on Thursday to begin the trip to Florida. The EscaPADE mission will launch aboard Blue Origin’s first New Glenn rocket.
VideoAs it happened: NASA officials discuss latest on Boeing Crew Flight Test
This media briefing comes as NASA is potentially within a week of making its final decision on how to bring the Starliner CFT crew home. The agency is debating on if Starliner is determined to be safe or if NASA astronauts Barry "Butch" Wilmroe and Sunita "Sunni" Williams will return on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.
VideoNASA sends final command to its NEOWISE spacecraft, ending more than a decade of asteroid observations
The spacecraft launched in 2009 as the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission before making the pivot to become NEOWISE (Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) in 2010. NEOWISE is expected to safely burn up in the atmosphere by late 2024.

As it happened: NASA discusses ISS schedule shuffle, SpaceX Crew-9 launch delay, Boeing Starliner questions
The media briefing came after the agency formally pushed back the launch of the SpaceX Crew-9 mission to the International Space Station from mid-August to late-September.

NASA pushes Crew-9 launch to September amid uncertainty of Starliner’s return timeline
The adjustment of the launch manifest is in line with NASA’s desire to have a direct handover between its two long-duration crews on the International Space Station.

Cygnus completes two-day journey to the International Space Station
Northrop Grumman engineers were able to create a new burn plan for the spacecraft after it missed two attempts to perform its “targeted altitude burn.” Capture using the robotic Canadarm2 happened at 3:11 a.m. EDT (0711 UTC) on Tuesday, Aug. 6.