A classified National Reconnaissance Office mission due for launch from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., just after midnight Aug. 2 has been scrubbed until at least Aug. 4 because of a downrange calibration issue. NROL-36 is to be lifted into orbit by a United Launch Alliance Atlas V flying in its simplest configuration, with a 4-meter payload fairing, a single-motor Centaur upper stage and no boosters. That suggests a relatively small payload. Launch officials said there are no issues with either the rocket or the payload.

HOUSTON — A sprint to the International Space Station (ISS) may not suit everyone. On Aug. 1, Russia’s Progress 48 resupply mission lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 3:35 p.m. EDT on an ISS first: a four-orbit, 6-hr. trajectory that was to end with an automated docking of the unpiloted capsule at 9:24 p.m. EDT.

ATLANTA — With NASA wrapping up a decision on its next round of seed-money grants to help private companies develop vehicles to take its astronauts to the International Space Station, several of the bidders provided progress reports at the AIAA Joint Propulsion Conference here this week. NASA plans to announce its selections for Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) Space Act Agreements at 9 a.m. EDT Aug. 3.

LOS ANGELES and WASHINGTON — The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa) has awarded an array of contracts for the Phoenix program, which aims to demonstrate the salvage and reuse of components, such as antennas, from dead satellites. The cost-saving concept is based on creating new space resources by repurposing equipment already in geosynchronous orbit. To demonstrate the scheme, Darpa plans to piggyback payload orbital delivery system (PODS) devices on a sample commercial communications satellite in 2015-16.

Time is ripe for the privately funded development of an all-new, liquid-fueled engine in the 500,000-lb.-thrust class

WGS AWARD: Boeing has been awarded a contract for the 10th Wideband Global Satcom spacecraft by the U.S. Air Force in the last award of the current series of high-bandwidth communications spacecraft. The contract is valued at $338.7 million and continues an X- and Ka-band communications constellation that began in 2000. There have been four WGS launches thus far. The latest to reach orbit, WGS-4, was orbited in January and is currently undergoing acceptance testing. Boeing is building WGS-5-9 in a pulsed-line production process at its El Segundo, Calif., factory.

Companies may not have to send employees a warning of potential layoffs because of possible across-the-board budget cuts next January

HOUSTON — After Russia’s Mission Control turned up the heat aboard the Progress 47 resupply craft, warming the erratic upgraded KURS-NA rendezvous system, the unpiloted freighter successfully re-docked with the International Space Station (ISS) on July 28. With a trouble free re-docking at 9:01 p.m. EDT, Russia’s federal space agency, Roscosmos, and contractor RSC Energia will aim for operational use of the KURS-NA on Soyuz crew transport as well as Progress cargo missions as soon as 2014.