• Space Quote: Starliner a Money Pit for Boeing?

    “The Boeing Starliner is contracted to fly just six crewed missions to the International Space Station compared to 14 for the SpaceX Crew Dragon. If Boeing has any hope of earning back a return on its investment, it has to sell commercial flights of the Starliner, just as SpaceX has the Crew Dragon.” –Editorial by…

  • NASA Exploring Mars Sample Return Options

    With the pending budget cuts at NASA, the space agency is exploring new options for getting soil and rock samples back to Earth from MARs. To do this, NASA is setting it sights on 10 studies to identify new approaches to accomplish this mission, 7 of which come from private contractors and the other 3…

  • Video: Cool Worlds Labs Emphasizes the Need for Greater NASA Funding

    Even with a good space week in hand, we still need to keep an eye on NASA’s budget to maintain a robust set of programs to explore the cosmos. A recent Youtube video by Cool Worlds Labs, “NASA’s in Trouble,” highlights those budgetary issues and focuses on what individuals can do as well, such as…

  • RIP: Bill Anders, Apollo 8 Astronaut

    This week Apollo astronaut Bill Anders, age 90, passed away. He died during a plane crash in Washington state. He was part of an Apollo team that was the first humans to leave low Earth orbit in 1968. He was best known for his Christmas Eve photo of the Earth rising over the surface of…

  • Not Everyone Needs to be Part of the Space Age

    With the recent success of Boeing’s Spaceplan and SpaceX’s Starship, we need to remember that not every country needs to be part of the space age. Fortunately, less that two weeks ago we learned that lesson when North Korea flubbed it launch of a spy satellite that was sure to cause problems. The rocket did…

  • Pic of the Week: Forth Starship Test is a Success

    This week’s image shows the launch of the forth test of SpaceX’s Starship, which went further than any of the tests to date. In it’s summary of the flight, SpaceX noted: Flight 4 ended with Starship igniting its three center Raptor engines and executing the first flip maneuver and landing burn since our suborbital campaign,…

  • Successful Launch of the CST-100 Starliner

    Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner launched earlier today (June 5) on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are now safe in orbit on their way to the International Space Station (ISS). They will dock at the ISS tomorrow…

  • Space News: Extending Hubble’s Life, Another Step for the Habitable Worlds Observatory, and Asteroid Breakups

    Here are some recent stories of interest. —NPR: “Hubble will Change How it Points, But NASA Says ‘Great Science’ will Continue“ The Hubble Space Telescope is suffering the kinds of aches and pains that can come with being old, and NASA officials say they’re shifting into a new way of pointing the telescope in order to…

  • Television: New Star Wars Series Acolyte

    Do we really need one more Star Wars television series? Not really, but we will get one anyway. It starts tomorrow (June 4) and is called Acolyte. It reminds me of the movie Solo, which was made for no other purpose other than to mine the diminishing appeal of the Star Wars empire (financial empire,…

  • China Lands Chang’e 6 on the Far Side of the Moon

    Yesterday, China successfully landed on the Moon again, this time on the far side with its Chang’e 6 mission. The probe is now in the unexplored South Pole region where it can study the lunar surface. If all goes well, collected samples from this area will be returned to Earth for additional study. The Chang’e-6…