Archive for the ‘Space News’ Category
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June 29th, 2025
Moon to Mars?
Image credit: NASA
Look for a NASA Headquarters Budget protest on Monday outside the space agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.
As noted in the eagle-eyed NASA Watch website, according to the protest organizers: “This is NOT a picket line. We will not attempt to prevent or dissuade anyone from entering the building.”
“The intent of this protest is to raise public awareness and provide information about present and near-future cuts at NASA, and to demand that the Trump administration, including OMB and DOGE, cease all pressure on NASA to make cuts until Congress has had an opportunity to pass the next budget,” the posting notes.
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China’s roadmap for a Mars Sample Return mission to be launched in 2028.
Image credit: The University of Hong Kong/Zengqian Hou, et al.
While NASA’s Mars Sample Return initiative is in political hot water, China is moving ahead on plotting out its rendezvous with the Red Planet.
New details of China’s aims are emerging. Just how impactful could their success be is now at play within the U.S.
Given the value of Mars samples, not just for science but also to bolster plans for future crewed missions to Mars, robotic return of bits and pieces of the planet is seen by many as mandatory.
The University of Hong Kong’s Yiliang Li and his collaborator conduct fieldwork to identify and recommend potential landing sites for the upcoming Chinese Mars Sample Return mission.
Image credit: The University of Hong Kong
“Returning the scientifically selected samples that await us on Mars, as part of a balanced portfolio, will help to ensure the US does not cede leadership in deep space to other nations, such as China.”
For the unfolding details, go to my new Space.com story – Is the US forfeiting its Red Planet leadership to China’s Mars Sample Return plan? – at: https://www.space.com/astronomy/mars/is-the-us-forfeiting-its-red-planet-leadership-to-chinas-mars-sample-return-plan
During the test, the 156-foot-long BOLE solid rocket motor produced upwards of 4 million pounds of thrust.
Image credit: Northrop Grumman
A full-scale static fire of NASA’s Booster Obsolescence and Life Extension (BOLE) solid rocket booster for the Space Launch System (SLS) coughed up a surprise anomaly.
The June 26 first firing of the enhanced five-segment solid rocket motor made use of over 700 data channels that appraised the 156-foot-long solid rocket motor as it fired for just over two minutes, churning out more than 4 million pounds of thrust from a single booster.
Anomaly
“While the motor appeared to perform well through a harsh burn environment, we observed an anomaly near the end of the two-plus minute burn,” said Jim Kalberer, Northrop Grumman’s vice president of propulsion systems.
“As a new design, and the largest segmented solid rocket booster ever built, this test provides us with valuable data to iterate our design for future developments,” Kalberer added in a press statement.
Image credit: Boeing
Composite case
The booster features a composite case design, updated propellant formulation and advanced components, observes the company, designed to increase booster performance by more than 10 percent compared with the current five-segment SLS booster design.
That carbon fiber composite case is to enable better booster performance, faster manufacturing, “and aligns with commercial standards by providing commonality among our infrastructure, supply chain, and manufacturing operations,” explains Northrop Grumman.
“Compared with its predecessor, this evolved booster provides another five metric tons of payload to lunar orbit, a capability critical to supporting deep space missions,” a company statement adds.
Image credit: Watch U.S. Fly
Old shuttle parts
Developing a new large solid rocket motor for the SLS is driven in part by assuring the SLS program doesn’t run out of the old shuttle parts they’re using, points out Scott Manley on his YouTube video link.
“Rather than simply building new boosters they’re removing all the bits that were needed for the shuttle but no longer make sense for SLS. They’re using a new casing, new fuel and new support systems,” Manley says. “But their first test did not go as planned.”
For a look at the issues found in the aftermath of the BOLE test, go to Manley’s report at:
Dash camera image of the fireball in South Carolina.
Image credit: Newton County Sheriff’s Office
Just in time for Asteroid Day!
That bright fireball that skimmed through the midday skies on June 26 shook-up folks in Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Tennessee.
According to experts, the fireball was produced by an asteroidal fragment three feet in diameter, weighing over a ton.
That’s the word from Bill Cooke, lead of NASA’s Meteoroid Environments Office at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
Image credit: Lowell Observatory
Camera, satellite, infrasound, and radar data
“Our analysis of eyewitness accounts and camera, satellite, infrasound, and doppler weather radar data yielded the following information about the event,” Cooke states.
The meteor was first seen at an altitude of 48 miles above the town of Oxford, Georgia, Cooke adds, moving southwest at 30,000 miles per hour.
“It disintegrated 27 miles above West Forest, Georgia, unleashing an energy of about 20 tons of TNT. The resulting pressure wave propagated to the ground, creating booms heard by many in that area,” Cooke notes.
Image credit: U.S. National Weather Service/Peachtree, Georgia
Home encounter
It appears that a piece of the meteor may have fallen through a roof in Henry County, Georgia.
Meteor damage from the event to a home has been reported by the U.S. National Weather Service in Peachtree, Georgia. It posted on its Facebook page that there were reports of roof damage, seemingly caused by the fireball.
Image credit: U.S. National Weather Service/Peachtree, Georgia
The Henry County Emergency Management Agency adds that the suspect cosmic debris “broke through the roof, then the ceiling, before cracking the laminate on the floor and stopping.”
Image credit: NASA OIG
It is a given there there are many unknowns regarding NASA’s science budget in the upcoming years, including funds to continue NASA’s progress in planetary defense.
However, the NASA Office of Inspector General (OIG) has made six recommendations about charting the near-term future:
(1) commit to providing stable funding levels for the Near Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor mission;
(2) develop a plan to assess how current ground-based observatories can prepare for NEO detection, follow-up, and characterization efforts;
(3) develop a detailed strategy and long-range roadmap for a sustainable planetary defense program;
NASA’s NEO Surveyor. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
(4) develop an appropriate governance structure for the space agency’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) within the NASA Planetary Science Division;
(5) update NASA’s planetary defense strategy to address missing leading collaboration practices; and
(6) review Deep Space Network service agreements to ensure they meet Near Earth Object (NEO) Surveyor’s telemetry and transmission requirements.
Go to this informative NASA OIG report – “NASA’s Implementation and Management of Its Planetary Defense Strategy” – at:
Image credit: Dassault Aviation
At the Paris Air Show last week, Dassault Aviation, announced the signing of an agreement to support the development of a spaceplane demonstrator.
This demonstrator is seen as the first step in developing a family of spaceplanes called VORTEX, which stands for Véhicule Orbital Réutilisable de Transport et d’Exploration.
These demonstration objectives are an essential step in reducing technological uncertainties and preparing for future decisions on operational space capabilities, both military and civilian, stated Dassault Aviation.
Image credit: Dassault Aviation
Crossroads of aviation, space technologies
“Like Dassault Aviation’s civil and military aircraft,” Eric Trappier, Chairman and CEO of Dassault Aviation, “the VORTEX spaceplane is designed to be highly versatile. It will contribute to transforming the uses of the space sector and opening up new fields of application.”
Trappier said the Vortex is at the crossroads of aviation and space technologies, and will “undoubtedly pave the way for a new generation of space aeronautics, consolidating France’s strategic position as a leading space power.”
Dassault Aviation is a French aerospace company that designs and builds military aircraft, business jets and space systems.
Image credit: Dassault Aviation/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Phased approach
The VORTEX spaceplane is designed to be highly versatile, drawing on an incremental, phased innovation process to initiate, adapt and accelerate the development of spaceplane capabilities.
Phase 1 : VORTEX – D – Flight Demonstrator Scale 1:3
Phase 2: VORTEX – S – Smart Free Flyer Scale 2:3
Phase 3: VORTEX – C – Cargo Scale 1:1
Phase 4: VORTEX – M – Manned Scale 1:1
Array of missions
Among VORTEX objectives is control of hypersonic flight, developing advanced thermal protection technologies and flight control capabilities.
Designed to operate in space and return to Earth like an aircraft, these dual-use vehicles would support an array of missions, including: transport to space stations; retrieval of objects; payload delivery; as well as in-orbit servicing, policing and intervention.
Go to this video at:
https://www.dassault-aviation.tv/en/theme_0/2334/VORTEX__2025_Paris_Air_Show.html
Image credit: Dassault Aviation
Venera 8 artwork shows the landing capsule on the cloud-veiled world on July 22, 1972.
Image credit: NPO Lavochkin
The recent reentry of a mis-fired Soviet Union Venus probe to Earth from the 1970’s has become a detective story of when, where and what happened during its downfall.
Different computer models were used to predict the reentry. But why were they divergent, and how best to improve our ability to nail down the “whereabouts and when” as a space object topples into Earth’s atmosphere?
It turns out that being off “even a little bit” means a whole lot of Earth in determining the final whereabouts of an incoming object.
Image credit: CORDS
For more details on this decelerating detective story go to my new Space.com article – “A failed Soviet Venus probe from the ’70s crashed to Earth in May — why was it so hard to track?” – at:
The splashdown area of the Kosmos-482 descent module on May 10, 2025.
Image credit: Roscosmos
Image credit: CCTV/CNSA/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Following a recent escape flight test of China’s next-generation crewed spacecraft, Mengzhou, Chinese engineers are focusing on a flight test of the transport craft.
Image credit: CCTV
Mengzhou means “Dream Craft” and has previously completed a number of tests, including verification of the electronic system and testing of the entire ship. “A flight test will be conducted in [the] future to comprehensively verify its overall performance,” explains a China Central Television (CCTV) report.
Airbag cushioning system
The escape flight test was carried out June 17 at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. The spacecraft’s escape engine propelled the capsule-tower assembly upward.
Image credit: CCTV
Image credit: CCTV
Escape test.
Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
About 20 seconds later, the return capsule separated from the escape tower at the predetermined altitude. Two minutes later, the capsule landed safely in the designated area using an airbag cushioning system.
Focus shift
“The Mengzhou manned spacecraft is in the final stage of prototype sample development,” Yu Kang, a crewed spacecraft designer with China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) told CCTV.
Yu Kang, a crewed spacecraft designer with China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC).
Image credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
“After completing this zero-altitude escape test, our entire development team will shift all focus onto the prototype development, targeting the maiden flight of the Mengzhou manned spacecraft,” Yu added.
Two assignments
CASC is the contractor for development of the Mengzhou spacecraft.
According to CASC, the Mengzhou spacecraft is also scheduled to conduct a maximum dynamic pressure escape flight test later this year, as part of the China Manned Space Program.
Mengzhou consists of a return capsule and a service module.
The spacecraft is being designed to support two key efforts: the low-Earth version is capable of carrying up to seven astronauts to and from China’s space station.
Image credit: China Manned Space Agency
A lunar version would be able to support three astronauts to the Moon.
Go to this video at:
Image credit: Mars Guy/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Sometimes our robotic exploration of another world doesn’t go as planned…
Sometimes a Mars rover drilling operation fails to collect a rock sample…
And sometimes this can lead to a discovery that no one anticipated.
Mars Guy details a drilling failure of the NASA Perseverance rover at Jezero Crater that leads to new discovery.
Go to this new video at:
https://youtu.be/R4qhM72IJXY?si=EqQiR6otAb9VFfhF
Wait-a-Minute!
Image credit: Barbara David
Lagrange points are special locations in space where the gravitational forces from a pair of large celestial bodies interact in out of the ordinary ways.
Lagrange points are named in honor of Italian-French mathematician Josephy-Louis Lagrange.
They offer unique advantages for human-made space objects to loiter indefinitely with minimal expenditure of propulsive energy. These locales are increasingly populated by spacecraft of many nations.
Enter a legal question in wait-a-minute style: should those locations be treated as “the common heritage of mankind?”
Image credit: NASA
Professor David Koplow of the Georgetown University Law Center makes the case in an article just published by the Michigan Journal of International Law. The paper is titled “Pave Outer Space and Put Up A Parking Lot: Lagrange Points Should Be the Common Heritage of Mankind.”
L-point use
But first a few “pointers” about L-points.
For example, the L1 point of the Earth-Sun system affords a continuous view of the Sun and is home to the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) satellite – a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA).
Then there’s the outward looking James Webb Space Telescope nicely parked in Sun-Earth L2, roughly 1 million miles (1.5 million kilometers) from Earth.
Image credit: NASA, STScI, CSA
Also the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) is stationed at the Sun–Earth L1 Lagrange Point
Lastly, in the Earth-Moon system, five Lagrange points are numbered from L1 to L5. The L5 point was popularized by the late Gerard O’Neill and the L5 Society, seen as perfect for establishing a space colony.
Suitable rules
“Lagrange points are scarce and potentially very useful for commercial, civil, and military applications,” Koplow tells Inside Outer Space. “This is a rare opportunity for the international community to develop suitable rules in advance of the rush for the scarce ‘parking places’ in space.”
Lagrange points constitute a limited resource that is just beginning to be occupied, Koplow points out in the paper. “Existing international law is inadequate for optimal governance of their future occupation and use,” he states.
Koplow points out that not all sectors of space are equally valuable for all applications. The most desirable venues can become crowded, “affording a premium for those who gain access first and impeding the development of a fair and efficient all-inclusive international legal regime.”
Image credit: NASA Ames Research Center/Rick Guidice
First come, first served?
In Koplow’s view, space is a venue for multiple forms of competition, and some of that may spread to the Lagrange points. The question, to be resolved sooner or later, he adds, is what will be the rules for allocating access and use – first come, first served, or some more equitable system for sharing the benefits?
“The concept of the ‘common heritage of mankind’ refers to a system that allocates control over a scarce resource to the entire world, instead of to the countries and companies that happen to get there first,” Koplow told Inside Outer Space. “The concept has been applied – always with great controversy – in other shared spaces, and I argue that it should be extended to the Lagrange points,” he concludes.
The Michigan Journal of International Law (MJIL) article — “Pave Outer Space and Put Up a Parking Lot: Lagrange Points Should Be the Common Heritage of Mankind” — is available (for free) on-line at:
https://repository.law.umich.edu/mjil/
MJIL is a student-run law journal published by the University of Michigan Law School in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Wait-a-Minute!
Image credit: Barbara David
