RUSSIA MAY ABANDON THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION IN 2025: WHAT HAPPENS NEXT? - The announcement blazed across the headlines of The Moscow Times on April 19: "Russia to Quit Int'l Space Station in 2025 "! Citing "a senior government official" (Vice Prime Minister Yury Borisov), MT reported that Russia will soon officially inform the United States and its other space partners of its withdrawal from the International Space Station (ISS) effective in 2025, and its plans to "deploy a next-generation national orbital service station" of its own instead. More (Source: Motley Fool - May 10)
SPACEX LAUNCHES 60 STARLINK SATELLITES IN RECORD 10TH LIFTOFF (AND LANDING) OF REUSED ROCKET - A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched 60 Starlink internet satellites into orbit early Sunday (May 9) and then stuck a landing at sea to cap a record 10th flight for the company's reusable booster. The veteran Falcon 9 rocket blasted off before dawn from Space Launch Complex 40 here at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 2:42 a.m. EDT (0642 GMT), marking the company's 14th launch of the year. It was also one for the record books as the flight was this particular booster's 10th launch and landing attempt. The rocket's once pristine exterior was almost black, charred by its many trips to orbit and back. More (Source: Space.com - May 9)
SPACEX READY TO BREAK ANOTHER ROCKET REUSE RECORD WITH LAUNCH EARLY SUNDAY - A Falcon 9 rocket and 60 more Starlink internet satellites set for launch early Sunday at Cape Canaveral will mark the first time SpaceX has flown a first stage 10 times, reaching a milestone that the company once said could be a limit for reusing boosters. Now SpaceX plans to keep flying reused rockets on Starlink missions until one fails. The mission Sunday is set for liftoff at 2:42 a.m. EDT (0642 GMT) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 9)
CHINA ROCKET HAS REENTERED THE EARTH'S ATMOSPHERE, SAYS CHINA'S SPACE AGENCY - An out-of-control Chinese rocket plunged out of orbit Saturday night ET and reentered Earth's atmosphere, according to China's space agency. The Long March 5B carrier rocket had an estimated landing area of 72.47°E longitude and 2.65°N latitude, just west of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean, China's National Space Agency said in a post on WeChat. Most of the rocket was "destroyed" on reentry to the atmosphere, the space agency said. More (Source: CNN - May 9)
A HUGE CHINESE ROCKET WILL CRASH TO EARTH THIS WEEKEND JUST AS CHINA’S NEW SPACE STATION BECOMES VISIBLE IN THE NIGHT SKY - China’s new space station can now be seen in the night sky from Earth. Although it’s the tumbling booster rocket from its launch that grabbed all the headlines—and is set to crash on Sunday, May 9—what’s been missed is that “Tianhe-1” is safely in orbit and now visible from Earth at night. Set to become a fixture of the night sky, this first module of China’s new space station has already been seen from Middle America this past week, reports SpaceWeather.com. More (Source: Forbes - May 8)
SPACE JUNK FROM 2007 CHINA SATELLITE ATTACK STILL POSES RISK - Space debris from a Chinese experiment 14 years ago in which Beijing destroyed one of its own satellites continues to orbit Earth, a senior U.S. military commander has told Congress. "In 2007, we saw the Chinese conduct a very irresponsible test. We continue to have about 3,000 pieces of debris on orbit that we continue to track," Lt. Gen. Stephen Whiting, the commander of Space Operations Command at the U.S. Space Force said in testimony to subcommittees of the House Armed Services Committee on Wednesday. "That's about 10% of the total amount of objects that we track on orbit." More (Source: Nikkei Asia - May 7)
ROCKET DEBRIS FROM CHINA'S SPACE STATION LAUNCH IS HURTLING BACK TO EARTH — AND SCIENTISTS AREN'T SURE WHERE IT WILL LAND - A huge piece of space junk is about to make an uncontrolled re-entry back into Earth's atmosphere, threatening to drop debris on a number of cities around the world in the coming days. It's leftover from China's first module for its new Tianhe space station — and no one knows where it will land. The 46,000-pound Chinese rocket Long March-5B recently launched the first module for the country's new space station into orbit. After the core separated from the rest of the rocket, it should have followed a predetermined flight path into the ocean. More (Source: CBS News - May 7)
NASA'S NEW FLEET OF SATELLITES WILL OFFER INSIGHTS INTO THE WILD CARDS OF CLIMATE CHANGE - NASA is about to announce its next generation of Earth-observing satellites. As soon as this month, it will lay out preliminary plans for a multibillion-dollar set of missions that will launch later this decade. This “Earth system observatory,” as NASA calls it, will offer insights into two long-standing wild cards of climate change—clouds and aerosols—while providing new details about the temperatures and chemistry of the planet’s changing surface. The satellite fleets also mark a revival for NASA’s earth science, which has languished over the past decade compared with exploration of Mars and other planets. More (Source: Science Magazine - May 6)
EUROPE PROPOSES ORBITING SATELLITE TELESCOPE THAT WILL KEEP AN EYE ON SPACE DEBRIS - The European Space Agency (ESA) has proposed a plan to build and launch a satellite with a telescope that can monitor space debris. If the member nations approved the funding, the space agency hopes to complete the project by 2025, reported Space.com. It will be the first of its kind space junk monitoring satellite.ESA is an intergovernmental organization made up of 22 member states. More (Source: Firstpost - May 6)
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