SpaceX

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, Boeing’s Crew Flight Test Commander and Pilot respectively, inspect safety hardware aboard the International Space Station. Image: NASA NASA is at a crossroads when it comes to the conclusion of the Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test. The agency is set to announce its decision on whether or not to return NASA astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams on Starliner as originally intended or on a SpaceX Crew Dragon. The choice will be formalized after an agency-level meeting called a flight readiness review wraps up on Saturday. A press conference is tentatively set for 1 p.m. EDT (1700 UTC). Spaceflight Now will have live coverage of the decision beginning about 30 minutes prior to the start of the news conference. The review...

A streak shot of the Starlink 8-6 mission showing the Falcon 9 rocket flying away from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Aug. 28, 2024. Image: Michael Cain/Spaceflight Now SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket has been grounded by the Federal Aviation Administration for the second time in less than two months, following the failed landing of a first stage booster, which had earlier helped launch a batch of satellites for the Starlink network. The booster, serial number B1062 in the SpaceX fleet, suffered a hard landing, at the tail end of its record-setting 23rd flight. It was consumed in a fireball on the deck of the drone ship ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean about 250 miles east of Charleston, South Carolina. The mishap was the first...

File: A Falcon 9 rocket stands at the ready to support the Starlink 10-4 mission, which will launch from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on July 28, 2024. Image: Adam Bernstein/Spaceflight Now Update 1:46 a.m. EDT: SpaceX pushed back the liftoff time of the mission. Weather may have stymied the launch of four astronauts on the Polaris Dawn mission, but SpaceX is planning to take advantage of their range reservations, both in Florida and California. The company aims to launch back-to-back batches of Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 rockets from both Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and Vandenberg Space Force Base Wednesday morning. First up is the Florida mission, dubbed Starlink 8-6, which will launch from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at 3:48 a.m. EDT (07...

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft stand ready to launch the Polaris Dawn commercial astronaut mission from Launch Complex 39A. Liftoff from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center is set for no earlier than 3:38 a.m. EDT (0738 UTC) on Aug. 27, 2024. Image: Michael Cain/Spaceflight Now Update 8:19 p.m. EDT: SpaceX stood down from a launch opportunity Tuesday morning and is pivoting to a 24-hour backup window on Wednesday, Aug. 28. A commercial astronaut mission of historic firsts is set to launch in the predawn hours of Wednesday morning. The four members of the Polaris Dawn flight will climb aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon to embark on a roughly five-day, free-flying mission orbiting the Earth. The crew, led by billionaire-entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, will go further than humans have ven...

Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft that launched NASA’s Crew Flight Test astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, seen from a window on the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft. Image: NASA. After weeks of debate, NASA has ruled out bringing two astronauts back to Earth aboard Boeing’s Starliner capsule because of lingering concerns about multiple helium leaks and degraded thrusters, both critical to a successful re-entry, officials said Saturday. Despite successful tests of the Starliner’s maneuvering thrusters, detailed analyses and confirmation the known propulsion system helium leaks are stable and have not worsened, NASA concluded there is no way to prove the systems will continue to operate normally, ensuring a safe de-orbit, re-entry and landing. The decision means two of four “Crew 9” ...