Space Industry Analysis
Mar 04, 2013
New poll shows big support for going to Mars, for surprising reasons
Mar 04, 2013
Competitive demonstrations are providing valuable returns for modest outlays
Mar 04, 2013
Is there life after the prize?
Mar 04, 2013
The fact that large-scale aerospace and defense manufacturing is no longer as prominent in Southern California as it was in the Cold War-era is not news. But the region still leads the nation in the number of small suppliers and many are trying to come up with new ways of doing business, especially as they see ominous headlines about defense cuts from Washington.
Mar 04, 2013
Power beaming system conceived as a way to drive a space elevator in a NASA competition.
Mar 04, 2013
Dennis Tito's plan to send a crew of two around Mars is getting a big assist from NASA via a Space Act Agreement (SAA) with its Ames Research Center (see page 24). While Tito will repay NASA for its work, the agency's inspector general and a powerful member of Congress are examining SAAs—which are less restrictive than standard federal business arrangements—to see if they are being abused. That is one of the charges in a whistle-blower report on alleged malfeasance at Ames (AW&ST Feb. 18, p. 19). Rep.
Sep 16, 2020
NASA is removing a planned secondary payload from the August 2022 launch of its Psyche asteroid probe, leaving a pair of small satellites without a piggyback ride to Mars.
Sep 16, 2020
The FAA’s plan to amend the collision-avoidance methodology it uses in licensing commercial space launches will support safer operations with more flexible launch windows as space at low Earth orbit becomes increasingly congested, the agency says.
Sep 16, 2020
Working with Nanoracks, LLC, NASA is about to mark a milestone in its push to transition oversight of human scientific research and tech development in low Earth orbit to the private sector as it sets its sights on the Moon and Mars.
Sep 15, 2020
The new 11-year solar cycle is expected to match its extremely quiet predecessor, which concluded in December 2019.
Sep 14, 2020
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, the FAA is busier than it has ever been licensing commercial space launches, officials said Sept. 14.
Sep 14, 2020
California-based Astra, a startup vying to get into the small-satellite launch business, conducted a flight test of its Rocket 3.1 booster, but the mission ended prematurely when the vehicle started to head off course due to a guidance system problem.
Sep 14, 2020
Work stoppages due to Hurricane Laura, the Category 4 storm that came ashore in Louisiana last month, will delay the long-awaited static test fire of the Space Launch System (SLS) core stage at NASA’s Stennis Space Center until late October or November.
Sep 14, 2020
A British-led research effort has caught a possible low probability hint of biological activity in the high altitude cloud layers of neighboring Venus.