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Japan’s ambitious mission to explore the two mini moons of Mars could be facing a lengthy delay. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) is scheduled to launch in September 2024, taking advantage of a once-every-26-months launch window to the Red Planet. Arriving in Mars orbit in August 2025, coinciding with the […]

SpaceX is poised to launch another batch of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit. A Falcon 9 rocket topped with 22 Starlink spacecraft is scheduled to lift off from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base on Friday (Dec. 8) during a roughly two-hour window that opens at 3:03 a.m. EST (0803 GMT; 12:03 a.m. local California

The U.S. Space Force’s mysterious X-37B space plane is just about ready to take flight for the seventh time. The Space Force and SpaceX “are making final preparations” for the planned Sunday evening (Dec. 10) launch of the robotic X-37B, Space Force officials said in an emailed update today (Dec. 7). The space plane is

Chinese startup Galactic Energy is flying high again after a successful satellite launch on Monday (Dec. 4). The company’s Ceres-1 solid rocket lifted off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China at 6:33 p.m. EST on Monday (2333 GMT; or 7:33 a.m. Beijing time on Dec. 5). The rocket rose into a dark, predawn

Australia’s first lunar rover will be called “Roo-ver” following a public vote to name the space vehicle. The Australian Space Agency is building a semi-autonomous rover that will launch to the moon as early as 2026 in partnership with NASA and the agency’s Artemis program. Roo-ver will collect lunar soil samples, from which NASA will

SpaceX launched yet another batch of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit early Thursday morning (Dec. 7). A Falcon 9 rocket topped with 23 Starlink spacecraft lifted off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 12:07 a.m. EST (0507 GMT), on SpaceX’s 90th orbital mission of 2023. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage

Astronomers have used the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) to paint a picture of burger-shaped, planet-forming material around a young star. The tasty investigation conducted by the James Webb Space Telescope‘s Ice Age team has led to the creation of the first detailed 2-dimensional inventory of ice in a so-called protoplanetary disk  —  the type

NASA has set a provisional launch date of July 2028 for its Dragonfly mission, meant to explore Saturn’s largest moon Titan, with budgetary uncertainty cited as the reason for the project’s one-year delay. The Dragonfly team can now move forward with the next stage of development  —  Phase C  —  for the car-sized, nuclear-powered rotorcraft

On the sidelines of the ongoing COP28 in Dubai, UAE, the Rwanda Space Agency has signed a memorandum of understanding with the UAE Space Agency to establish collaboration frameworks in civil space activities, fostering research and development, space technologies, geospatial data sharing, and initiating joint space sector projects. Furthermore, the agreement offers opportunities for capacity

Japan will make moon-exploration history in the middle of next month, if all goes to plan. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) announced today (Dec. 5) that it’s targeting Jan. 19 for the lunar landing of its robotic SLIM (“Smart Lander for Investigating Moon”) spacecraft. The newly revealed plan calls for SLIM to begin its