SPACEX LAUNCHES AI-ENABLED ROBOT COMPANION, VEGETATION MONITOR TO SPACE STATION - A commercial SpaceX Dragon cargo capsule packed with a robot assistant for the International Space Station’s crew, pouches of extra strong coffee, and a NASA science instrument designed to track the health of plants on Earth left Cape Canaveral aboard a Falcon 9 rocket Friday on a three-day pursuit of the orbiting research lab. Riding a plume of orange rocket exhaust, the Falcon 9 launcher climbed into a clear pre-sunrise sky after liftoff from Cape Canaveral’s Complex 40 launch pad at 5:42:42 a.m. EDT (0942:42 GMT), roughly the moment Earth’s rotation carried the spaceport under the International Space Station’s orbital track.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Noow - Jun 30)

CHINA LAUNCHES TECHNOLOGY DEMONSTRATION SATELLITES ATOP LONG MARCH 2C – SPENT STAGE FALLS ON TOWN - China launched a Long March 2C rocket carrying two technology demonstration satellites designated XJSW A and XJSW B on Wednesday, June 27. The mission took to the skies at 3:30 GMT (11:30 p.m. EDT on June 26) from the Launch Complex 3 at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center (XSLC) in China’s Sichuan Province. Mission success was confirmed by the state-run Xinhua press agency some two hours after liftoff had taken place. “China successfully launched new-tech experiment twin satellites on the Long March-2C rocket from southwest China’s Xichang Satellite Launch Center Wednesday morning. The twin satellites were launched at 11:30 a.m., [local time] and entered their intended orbit,” Xinhua informed.    More
(Source: SpaceFlight Insider - Jun 29)

COMMERCIAL SPACEX CARGO CAPSULE READIED FOR LAUNCH FRIDAY - A Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon supply ship, primarily using previously-flown hardware, are scheduled for liftoff before dawn Friday at Cape Canaveral on SpaceX’s 15th cargo launch to the International Space Station under contract to NASA. The 213-foot-tall (65-meter) liquid-fueled rocket will take off from Cape Canaveral’s Complex 40 launch pad at 5:42:42 a.m. EDT (0942:42 GMT), around 45 minutes before sunrise on Florida’s Space Coast.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 29)

WILL CHINA'S SECOND SPACE STATION FALL OUT OF THE SKY SOON? - China's recently abandoned space station did a big, unexplained wobble in orbit this month. And the event left observers outside the China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSE) guessing about the country's plans for the long-term future of Tiangong-2, the middle child of China's space station family. Tiangong-2, the successor to the Chinese space station Tiangong-1, which slammed into Earth's atmosphere back in March, dived more than 50 miles (nearly 100 kilometers) on June 13. At the time, most observers assumed that this movement was the first step in a plan to junk the station.    More
(Source: Live Science - Jun 28)

TECHNICAL GLITCH AGAIN DELAYS 1ST COMMERCIAL LAUNCH OF ROCKET LAB'S ELECTRON BOOSTER - Rocket Lab's Electron small-satellite launcher will have to wait a bit longer to take to the skies on its first commercial flight. The 57-foot-tall (17 meters) Electron rocket was scheduled to lift off today (June 26) from Rocket Lab's New Zealand launch site, during a four-hour window that opened at 8:30 p.m. EDT (0030 GMT and 12:30 p.m. local time on June 27). But Rocket Lab called the launch off at about 9:45 p.m. EDT (0145 GMT), citing a technical issue with a key engine part.   More
(Source: Space.com - Jun 27)

CHENNAI LADS TO SEND 'WORLD'S LIGHTEST' SATELLITE TO SPACE - Four city students build a satellite weighing 33.39 grams, probably the world’s lightest and cheapest Harikrishnan KG clutches the small box in his hand carefully. He nimbly opens it, revealing a concealed black cube, and props it on the table in front of us. It is just about double the size of the sugar cubes in the coffee shop we’re sitting in. But this isn’t just any trivial cube. It is a satellite.   More
(Source: The Hindu - Jun 27)

CHINA'S SPACE STATION GOT WEIRDLY CLOSE TO EARTH FOR A FEW DAYS AND THE GOVERNMENT ISN'T TALKING - China's Tiangong-2 space station just spent 10 days much closer to Earth than its usual orbit, a manoeuvre that seems to have baffled experts - and China's government isn't talking. From June 13, it dipped from its usual altitude of around 390 kilometres (242 miles) down to around 295 kilometres (183 miles), according to Harvard-Smithsonian astronomer Jonathan McDowell, and orbital information published by the US Strategic Command's Joint Force Space Component Command, reports Space News.   More
(Source: ScienceAlert - Jun 26)

ELECTRON ROCKET LAUNCH DELAYED TO TUESDAY - The launch has been delayed another day to wait for improved weather at Rocket Lab's launch site on New Zealand's North Island. "Forecast poor weather continues tomorrow, so we're going to take it as a rest day to give us wider windows later in the week. Currently targeting no earlier than 12:30 pm (00:30 UTC) Wednesday 27 June for launch," Rocket Lab tweeted.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 25)

INTERNATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHY SATELLITE MARKS ITS TEN YEARS IN SPACE - Tracking the rise of global sea levels and initially designed for a mission that will suppose to last for a span of three to five years, the International Oceanography Satellite marks its ten years of operations this week in orbit. On Sunday, the Xinhua news agency reported that - Jason-2 satellite was launched in space on June 2008, on an US-European Ocean Surface Topography Mission. It is since then that the satellite has taken more than 47, 000 rounds of the Earth in its mission.    More
(Source: News Spaceflight - Jun 25)

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