Small Explorers – Spaceflight Now

October 25, 2025

Breaking News

[ October 24, 2025 ] Live coverage: SpaceX to surpass 2024 orbital launch record with Saturday Starlink mission Falcon 9
[ October 24, 2025 ] Airbus, Leonardo and Thales agree to form new European company News
[ October 23, 2025 ] SpaceX expends Falcon 9 booster to launch Spainsat NG 2 communications satellite Falcon 9
[ October 22, 2025 ] SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites on 550th Falcon 9 mission Falcon 9
[ October 18, 2025 ] SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Falcon 9

SpaceX wins NASA contract to launch X-ray telescope on reused rocket

July 8, 2019 Stephen Clark

NASA has selected a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket — flying with a reused first stage booster — to launch the Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer mission from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida in April 2021, bypassing Northrop Grumman’s air-launched Pegasus rocket for the task.

NASA selects missions to observe the sun and its impact on Earth

June 26, 2019 Stephen Clark

NASA has selected two satellite missions for launch on the same rocket in 2022 to investigate the origins of the solar wind and explore the interaction between magnetic fields around Earth with those from the sun.