SpaceX – Page 174 – Spaceflight Now

LIVE COVERAGE: Dragon cargo capsule returns to Earth

October 25, 2014 Stephen Clark

Closing out a five-week mission, a SpaceX Dragon cargo craft departed the International Space Station on Saturday. The spaceship will dive back into Earth’s atmosphere, deploy parachutes and splash down in the Pacific Ocean at 3:39 p.m. EDT (1939 GMT) about 265 miles west of Baja California.

Return of SpaceX’s Dragon cargo craft delayed

October 21, 2014 Stephen Clark

Rough seas in the Pacific Ocean will keep SpaceX’s Dragon cargo capsule in space a few days longer than planned, with the unpiloted supply ship’s return to Earth now set for Saturday hauling a load of research specimens from the International Space Station back to the ground.

NASA clears commercial crew contractors to resume work

October 9, 2014 Stephen Clark

Boeing Co. and SpaceX, selected by NASA last month to carry astronauts to the International Space Station, can resume development of their human-rated spacecraft after officials ordered a work stoppage prompted by a protest by Sierra Nevada Corp., the company left out of the contracts.

Boeing, SpaceX told to stop work under crew contracts

October 1, 2014 Stephen Clark

NASA has directed Boeing and SpaceX to halt activities under contracts awarded last month to build commercial space taxis to ferry astronauts to the Space Station while the U.S. Government Accountability Office reviews a protest of NASA’s decision filed by Sierra Nevada.

Construction of Texas launch site to begin next year

September 28, 2014 Stephen Clark

SpaceX broke ground on a new commercial spaceport on the shores of South Texas, committing to the construction of the world’s first privately-owned satellite launch pad scheduled to be operational as soon as late 2016.