CHINA LAUNCHES CORE MODULE OF NEW SPACE STATION TO ORBIT - The construction of China's space station is underway. The core element of the Chinese Space Station launched to Earth orbit tonight (April 28), lifting off at 11:23 p.m. EDT (0323 GMT on April 29) atop a heavy-lift Long March 5B rocket from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site on the island of Hainan. The 59-foot-long (18 meters) module, known as Tianhe ("Harmony of the Heavens"), is the first space station component to launch.   More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 29)

RETURN OF SPACEX CREW CAPSULE DELAYED BY HIGH WINDS - High winds predicted off the coast of Florida this week will keep SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft and its four-person crew in orbit until Saturday, three days after their previously scheduled return to Earth from the International Space Station. NASA announced Monday that the return of the Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft would be delayed.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 28)

CHINA LAUNCHES LONG MARCH 6 WITH NINE SATELLITES - China’s lightweight Long March (Chang Zheng) 6 rocket has successfully launched nine small satellites in a rideshare mission Tuesday. The launch took place at 11:20 China Standard Time (03:20 UTC) from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Centre in China’s northern Shanxi province. Tuesday’s launch was a rideshare mission, dubbed 长征快车 – Chang Zheng Kuaiche or “Long March Express”.    More
(Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - Apr 28)

STARTUP AND ESTABLISHED IOT SATELLITE OPERATORS EXCHANGE BLOWS IN REGULATORY BATTLE - U.S.-based startup Swarm Technologies and 28-year old Orbcomm, both pursuing the fast-growing market for connecting Internet of Things (IoT) sensors to satellites, are locked in a regulatory tussle over plans to expand overseas. Orbcomm is challenging a letter the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) sent March 10, which aimed to clarify how it and Swarm would share spectrum in Very High Frequency (VHF) bands worldwide.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Apr 27)

HUGE DELTA IV HEAVY ROCKET LAUNCHES US SPY SATELLITE TO ORBIT - A new U.S. spy satellite launched into space Monday afternoon (April 26) on the mightiest rocket built by the United Launch Alliance (ULA): the massive Delta IV Heavy. The behemoth blasted off at 4:47 p.m. EST (2047 GMT) from Space Launch Complex 6 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, carrying the classified NROL-82 satellite into orbit for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).    More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 27)

ONEWEB ADDS 36 MORE SATELLITES TO INTERNET NETWORK - A Soyuz rocket lifted off Sunday from Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East with 36 internet satellites built on Florida’s Space Coast for OneWeb, bringing the company’s fleet to 182 spacecraft, more than a quarter of the way to building out a constellation of nearly 650 orbiting relay nodes. The 151-foot-tall (46-meter) Soyuz rocket climbed off its launch pad at Vostochny, Russia’s newest spaceport, with nearly million pounds of thrust. Arcing toward the north, the Soyuz-2.1b rocket dropped its four first stage boosters about two minutes after liftoff.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 26)

THE US AIR FORCE WANTS TO BEAM SOLAR POWER TO EARTH FROM SPACE (VIDEO) - Space-based solar power won't be just a sci-fi dream forever, if things go according to the U.S. Air Force's plans. The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is developing a project called SSPIDR ("Space Solar Power Incremental Demonstrations and Research"), which aims to mature the technology needed to harvest solar energy in space and beam it down for use on Earth.   More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 26)

SOYUZ ROCKET SET TO LAUNCH MORE ONEWEB INTERNET SATELLITES - A Soyuz rocket is standing on a launch pad at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East for liftoff Sunday with the next 36 satellites for OneWeb’s internet network, the sixth Soyuz mission dedicated to the commercial broadband constellation. The 36 satellites, built on Florida’s Space Coast by a joint venturer between between OneWeb and Airbus, are stowed inside the nose cone of a Soyuz-2.1b rocket at Vostochny, Russia’s newest spaceport in the far eastern Amur Oblast near the Chinese border.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 25)

SPACEX'S FIRST REUSED CREW DRAGON DOCKS AT SPACE STATION WITH FOUR CREW-2 ASTRONAUTS - A used SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule carrying four astronauts to the International Space Station as part of the company's Crew-2 mission docked successfully at the orbiting lab early Saturday (April 24). The Crew Dragon Endeavour, which launched SpaceX's first crewed flight for NASA in May 2020, linked up with the station's U.S. built Harmony module at 5:08 a.m. EDT (0908 GMT) as both spacecraft sailed 264 miles above the Indian Ocean.    More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 24)

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