Space

Our roundup of the main aerospace and defense stories making the news this week.

NASA reports all systems with the Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission spacecraft are “go” for its planned Sept. 26 collision with a small asteroid named Dimorphos.

An SES-led consortium of 20 European companies plans to develop and launch the Eagle-1, a communications satellite that uses quantum key distribution for end-to-end encryption.

Dynetics says it has matured its technology and plans to compete in a follow-on program for additional crewed lunar landing services.

Axiom Space plans to train and fly two Saudi astronauts on a flight to the International Space Station as early as next year.

After the loss of Soyuz, Amazon helps buttress Arianespace’s manifest.

NASA on Sept. 21 released a picture of distant Neptune, taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, that reveals a system of rings not seen since NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft flew by in 1989.

Just as they did on Sept. 3, NASA’s Artemis I Launch Control Team members encountered hydrogen leaks while initiating a Space Launch System (SLS) propellant loading demonstration test on Sept. 21.

Dawn Aerospace plans to start test flights of its rocket-powered spaceplane technology demonstrator before year-end.

Russia’s Soyuz MS-22 soared into a two-orbit launch to docking with the International Space Station on Sept. 21.

The European Commission has chosen Thales Alenia Space to lead the next phase of the European Robotic Orbital Support Services program, slated to culminate with an in-orbit demonstration in 2026 and potentially follow on with commercial missions.

SpinLaunch, a startup looking to commercialize a centrifuge-based mass accelerator for space access, said Sept. 20 it has closed $71 million in a Series B round of venture-capital funding.

Europe and the U.S. are pursuing a powerful pair of infrared telescopes that, taken together, could help provide rapid warning of an asteroid hitting the planet.

NASA has released an updated exploration framework to guide the budding Artemis lunar program toward human missions to Mars and beyond.

Using a cadre of advanced technologies, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission is closing in on executing the world’s first-ever attempt at demonstrating whether a spacecraft can slam into an asteroid with enough force to prevent it from destructively colliding with the Earth given adequate warning.

Brian Binnie, who clinched the $10 million Ansari XPrize for the Paul Allen-Scaled Composites team that built the SpaceShipOne reusable suborbital spacecraft, has died, his family announced on Sept. 18.

NASA launch controllers will implement new procedures as they head into a Sept. 21 launch demonstration test of the repairs to a hydrogen propellant leak that prompted a delay in a second attempt to launch the uncrewed Artemis I test flight of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion crew capsule.

Astroport Space Technologies is developing a system of baking Moon dust into bricks to create a landing pad on the lunar surface.

In a little more than a year, a moratorium on new safety regulations to protect people onboard space vehicles is set to expire,

NASA has formally requested proposals from the space industry for long-running, evolvable Human Landing Systems able to support a steady cadence of Artemis-era astronaut missions to the lunar surface.

The government of Turkey has signed an agreement with Houston-based Axiom Space to fly its first astronaut to the International Space Station.

Hungary is restarting its human space program, with eight finalists undergoing evaluation for a planned flight to the International Space Station.

The spacecraft, a reusable upper stage that would replace the payload fairing of an Ariane 64, SUSIE is an attempt by European industry to respond to a variety of competitors.

Although Russia remains a key and committed partner in the International Space Station program, the country is absent from the International Astronautical Congress.

The test, slated for Sept. 21, will determine if technicians at Kennedy Space Center have successfully repaired a hydrogen leak that scuttled the last launch try.