California company sees 5% workforce reduction

U.S. commercial imagery provider DigitalGlobe posts electro-optical images of eastern Ukraine's Donetsk region.

"Once we have completed the orbit raise, we look forward to procesing and analyzing the scientific data collected onthe atmosphere," says Patrick Martin, ESA's Venus Express mission manager.

"This is sort of new territory we were in," said NASA Low Density Supersonic Decelerator engineer Dan Coatta. "Our test goals were to inflate the balloon, launch, get up to altitude successfully, drop off the balloon, have the rocket motor fire and get up to speed."

But will they webcast it?

The U. S. Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility has cleared launch attempts for June 28, 29 and 30, July 1 and 3.

"When you are exploring another planet, you expect surprises," notes Jim Erickson, NASA's Curiosity project manager.

How likely is human flight to Mars? In this week's Check 6 podcast, longtime space editors Jim Asker and Frank Morring discuss this week's cover package.