CHINESE ROCKET COMPANY SUFFERS THIRD CONSECUTIVE LAUNCH FAILURE - An orbital launch attempt by Chinese startup iSpace suffered failure early Friday, following on from two failures last year. The fourth Hyperbola-1, a four-stage solid rocket, lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert at 3:09 a.m. Eastern May 13. Apparent launch footage appeared on a Chinese social media site shortly after launch but a period of silence followed, extending well past the time at which a similar launch could have been declared successful.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - May 16)

SPACEX LAUNCHES 53 MORE STARLINK SATELLITES, LANDS ROCKET AT SEA AGAIN - SpaceX launched 53 Starlink satellites and landed the returning rocket on Saturday (May 14), its second such effort in less than 24 hours. A two-stage Falcon 9 rocket carrying 53 of SpaceX's Starlink internet satellites lifted off Saturday at 4:40 p.m. EDT (2040 GMT) from Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The rocket's first stage came back to Earth and landed at sea on the SpaceX droneship Just Read the Instructions about 8.5 minutes after liftoff.   More
(Source: Space.com - May 15)

BOEING'S STARLINER IS 'GO' FOR CRUCIAL MAY 19 LAUNCH TO THE SPACE STATION - Boeing's Starliner capsule is ready to launch again. During a flight readiness review Wednesday (May 11), NASA cleared Starliner to launch on Orbital Flight Test-2 (OFT-2), a crucial uncrewed mission to the International Space Station. The decision keeps the Boeing spacecraft on track to launch on May 19 at 6:54 p.m. EDT (2254 GMT) from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 41 in coastal Florida — assuming no weather or technical issues arise.   More
(Source: Space.com - May 14)

BOEING, NASA TEAMS GIVE STARLINER FINAL GO FOR OFT-2 MISSION - NASA, Boeing, and ULA teams, along with international partners, have finished the agency Flight Readiness Review (FRR) ahead of the Orbital Flight Test 2 (OFT-2) for Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. Following the valve issues that scrubbed OFT-2’s launch attempt in August of 2021 and the communication and software issues that caused Boeing’s first OFT mission to end prematurely, Boeing hopes to demonstrate the physical and software changes made to the spacecraft on this mission.   More
(Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - May 13)

NOAA REVEALS FIRST IMAGES FROM NEW WEATHER SATELLITE - NOAA released the first imagery from the new GOES-18 weather satellite that launched March 1 from Cape Canaveral, and confirmed the spacecraft’s main camera doesn’t suffer the same cooling system problem that caused degraded vision in an earlier satellite. The first images from GOES-18 were captured May 5 from a position in geostationary orbit more than 22,000 miles (nearly 36,000 kilometers) over the equator. GOES 18’s primary camera, called the Advanced Baseline Imager, recorded the views in 16 channels, each tuned to see clouds, dust, smoke, and water vapor in different wavelengths of light.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 13)

NORTHROP GRUMMAN SAYS IT HAS BACKUP PLAN FOR ISS RESUPPLY, BUT SILENT ON DETAILS - Northrop Grumman says it has a backup plan to fulfill the company’s contract to resupply to the International Space Station if the war in Ukraine continues to disrupt the supply of Russian engines and Ukrainian booster cores for the company’s Antares rocket. The company has hardware in its inventory for two more Antares resupply launches — currently scheduled for August and early 2023 — but needs engines and booster tanks imported from Russia and Ukraine for additional Antares flights.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 12)

MAXAR DELAYS FIRST WORLDVIEW LEGION TO SEPTEMBER - Maxar Technologies is pushing the first WorldView Legion launch to September after encountering a test configuration anomaly, the manufacturer and Earth observation provider announced Monday. The highly anticipated WorldView Legion constellation will provide a boost to Maxar’s Earth observations capacity The first satellite was originally set for a September 2021 launch, but has been pushed back multiple times after issues with hardware and work delays. Maxar had reserved a launch window with SpaceX from May 15 to June 13, but CEO Dan Jablonsky announced the further delay during Maxar’s first quarter 2022 financial results on May 9.    More
(Source: Via Satellite - May 12)

FIRST EVER SATELLITE LAUNCH FROM UK TO TAKE PLACE IN COMING MONTHS - The first satellite launch from the UK will take place this summer, the government has announced, as Prometheus-2 takes off from Spaceport Cornwall in Newquay. Built by In-Space Missions, based in Hampshire, and designed with Airbus Defence and Space, Prometheus-2 is a collaboration between the UK Ministry of Defence and international partners, including the US National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).   More
(Source: Aerospace Manufacturing - May 12)

SPACEX TRAINING BEGINS THIS MONTH FOR FIRST COMMERCIAL SPACEWALK MISSION - The four-person crew who will fly on the all-private Polaris Dawn mission — set to include the first commercial spacewalk and the debut of SpaceX’s extravehicular spacesuit — will begin training this month for their ride on a Dragon spacecraft to an altitude more than three times higher than the International Space Station.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 11)

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