Behind The Black – Robert Zimmerman

South Korean rocket startup Innospace signs up another American satellite launch manager

May 29, 2026 8:20 am Robert Zimmerman

Hanbit-Nano less than five seconds after launch and
just prior to its failure in December 2025.

The South Korean rocket startup Innospace has signed a deal with the American company Ensemble Commercial Services to help obtain satellite contracts and manage the integration and deployment of these payloads.

This marks INNOSPACE’s second launch service distribution agreement in the U.S., following its agreement signed in August last year with Texas-based Arrow Science and Technology, LLC. By securing multiple local partners in the U.S., INNOSPACE plans to enhance customer accessibility in the North American market and accelerate its efforts to identify satellite launch demand and expand sales activities.

Under the agreement, Ensemble will identify potential customers in the U.S., including satellite companies, space startups and research institutions, and connect them with launch service opportunities offered by INNOSPACE for small satellites. Ensemble will also provide regular market updates on the U.S. satellite industry, launch demand trends and potential customer activities, supporting INNOSPACE’s sales activities in the U.S. market.

…With this agreement, INNOSPACE has now secured launch service distribution partners across nine companies in seven countries, including Taiwan, Japan, Italy, the Netherlands, the U.S., Germany and the United Kingdom.

Innospace has made one failed attempt in December 2025 to launch its Hanbit-Nano rocket. It hopes to try again in the third quarter of this year.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.

2 comments

Hundreds of NASA-funded researchers violated the law that bans working with China

May 29, 2026 7:45 am Robert Zimmerman

ASU, apparently one of many universities filled
with people now hostile to America

According to a just completed House investigation, hundreds of academics and universities have routinely violated the law by taking NASA funding for their research but then working hand-in-glove with Chinese individuals or institutions.

A House investigation has identified hundreds of scientific publications in which NASA-funded U.S. researchers appear to have conducted joint work with Chinese institutions, potential violations of a federal law that has barred such collaboration for more than a decade.

The report, released on Wednesday by the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, also found that, in several instances, some of that research involved collaboration between National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) scientists and institutions that are part of “China’s defense research and industrial base.”

You can read the full report here [pdf]. Among its numerous findings for example it notes that Arizona State University and Stanford University both filed false certifications, stating that they were not working with Chinese individuals, agencies, or institutes, even though their later published papers blandly listed such individuals, agencies, and institutes. The report lists numerous other similar examples.

During Trump’s first administration the Justice Department made a concerted effort to enforce this law. Under Biden that effort ended (with many prosecutions abandoned), to be replaced with a zealous effort to ignore it, an effort enthusiastically supported by the partisan leftist academic community. This new report essential outlines the violations that began during the Biden era.

China is aggressively working on all levels to steal technology from the west. Sadly, it is more and more aided by America’s university system and the administrators, professors, and researchers based there, a large majority of whom are now outright hostile to our country and wish to sabotage it.

9 comments

Blue Origin’s next New Glenn rocket explodes during static fire test on the launchpad

May 28, 2026 8:30 pm Robert Zimmerman

New Glenn explosion

During a static fire test of the first stage tonight in preparation for the next launch scheduled for June 4), Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket exploded just as the test began, destroying the first stage and much of the only launchpad the company has to launch this rocket.

The link above is cued to just before the explosion, shown in a screen capture to the right. BtB’s stringer Jay just sent me a link to a different video view, from farther away but is in some ways as spectacular. According to Blue Origin’s statement, all workers are accounted for, so fortunately there were no fatalities.

The rocket was to launch 48 Amazon Leo satellites. As those satellites were not on the rocket during this test, they are safe and can be launched elsewhere.

The failure will likely prevent any further New Glenn launches by Blue Origin for at least three to six months. Not only does the company have to determine and fix the cause of the failure, it will need to rebuild the launchpad. At best I expect the company will at best manage one test launch before the end of the year.

As for Amazon, this puts it in a big bind. It has only 302 satellites in orbit, but is required to have launched 1,616 by July, according to its FCC license. It has requested a waiver but the FCC has not yet responded. At the moment of the four companies it has hired to launch the satellites, two are now grounded:

ULA’s Vulcan rocket: 39 launches [GROUNDED]
Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket: 24 launches (reduced from 27) [GROUNDED]
Arianespace’s Ariane-6 rocket: 18 launches (2 completed)
SpaceX’s Falcon-9: 13 launches (3 completed)
ULA’s Atlas-5 rocket: 8 launches (6 completed)

There is no timeline for when Vulcan and New Glenn will fly again. Arianespace hopes to do four to six more launches in ’26, but only one is an Amazon Leo launch, in June. ULA has six additional Atlas-5 rockets in stock, purchased by Boeing to launch its Starliner capsule to ISS. It is very possible a deal could be arranged with Boeing to switch some of those flights to Leo, since at present there are no plans to launch Starliner in the near future.

All in all, Amazon’s only remaining option is SpaceX. Of the ten unflown launches in the SpaceX contract, none are as yet scheduled. It is now likely Amazon will negotiate a deal with SpaceX to accelerate that schedule. While SpaceX’s own launch manifest is quite crowded (launching its own Starlink constellation), making such a deal difficult, the company has also demonstrated its willingness to help competitors. It launched OneWeb satellites when that company’s deal with the Russians fell through. And it quickly launched those first three Leo missions, faster than anyone else.

This also will impact NASA’s just announced unmanned lunar lander program. One mission planned for this year, Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark-1 unmanned lander, was scheduled to launch on a New Glenn. In addition, a second New Glenn was set to launch NASA’s Viper rover next year. Neither will happen as scheduled.

68 comments

Tuba Skinny – Jubilee Stomp

May 28, 2026 6:01 pm Robert Zimmerman

An evening pause: Performed with real joy, on the streets of New Orleans.

Hat tip Doug Johnson.

1 comment

May 28, 2026 Quick space links

May 28, 2026 2:35 pm Robert Zimmerman

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

Amazon touts the first Leo launch of 48 Leo satellites on Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket
That launch is presently targeting June 4, 2026.

Webb data suggests an exoplanet bigger than Earth is scorched like Mercury
All together now: “There is much uncertainty in the data.”

Japanese startup Ispace touts further testing work on its upgraded Ultra lunar lander
It has two contracts with Japan and one with NASA for three different Moon missions, flying from ’28 to ’30.

On May 28 1971 the Soviet Union launched Mars 3 on a Proton rocket
It was the first spacecraft to achieve a soft landing on Mars (2 December 1971), but failed 20 seconds later.

18 comments

My two appearances on The Space Show this week

May 28, 2026 12:41 pm Robert Zimmerman

David Livingston has now archived for download or listening or watching the two Space Shows this week in which I participated.

On Sunday, May 24, 2026 the show was an open discussion focused on reviewing SpaceX’s 12th Starship/Superheavy test flight on May 22, 2026. The show can be viewed here, here, and here. You can also download the audio here to listen at your pleasure.

On Tuesday, May 26, 2026 I was the Space Show’s main guest, with the discussion avoiding SpaceX almost completely. First I outlined NASA’s just announced new lunar missions and its overall plans for the Moon, adding some commentary amid the discussion with other participants. Then I outlined the state of development of the five American space stations being developed to replace ISS. As always, the discussion was made more interesting by the participation of others. The show can be viewed here, here, and here. You can also download the audio here to listen at your pleasure.

Both shows are definitely worth your time, if you are at all interested in the on-going commercial renaissance now taking place in the aerospace industry.

1 comment

An icy Martian crater filled with brain terrain

May 28, 2026 11:42 am Robert Zimmerman

Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on March 26, 2026 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists label an “ice-rich crater fill.”

And yup, that’s what we got. The floor of this 2.8-mile-wide unnamed crater is filled with what planetary scientists have labeled brain terrain, a feature found only on Mars that they associate with the sublimation of near surface ice, but as yet do not fully understand its entire formation process. In the upper right is a full resolution inset of that brain terrain, to give a good sense of its strange nature.

On that floor there are also several small fresh impact craters, as well as older small impacts that have faded almost to obscurity due to that mysterious process forming the brain terrain.

Its iciness of the terrain is also indicated by the rim of the crater, which is distorted as well as blobby. At impact or subsequently the ground here was soft like mud, and thus easy to shape into these cushioned features. Thus, though the rim was almost certainly circular after impact, time and the muddy nature of this ground allows it to get bent and warped.

Nor is it surprising there is near surface ice at this location. We are at 41 degrees south latitude, well away from the dry Martian tropics. This picture simply provides more evidence that once you get above 30 degrees latitude, it will not be hard to find water on Mars.
» Read more

0 comments

New long term analysis of solar activity suggests the Sun is undergoing some form of internal structural change

May 28, 2026 9:36 am Robert Zimmerman

NOAA’s chart of sunspot activity.
Click for the most recent update.

The uncertainty of science: Scientists doing a new analysis of more than forty years of solar data have concluded that some form of “subsurface structural changes associated with successive 11-year [sunspot] cycles” are taking place, with those changes “ever more progressively confined just beneath the solar surface.”

Using almost 40 years of helioseismic data from six telescopes around the world in the Birmingham Solar Oscillations Network (BiSON), the researchers uncovered a gradual change in structure just beneath the surface that has spanned multiple cycles, with the current solar cycle 25 showing particularly strong signatures of these changes.

Lead author Professor Bill Chaplin, from the University of Birmingham, said: “The Sun has its own ‘active biorhythm’ creating rising and falling magnetic activity that shapes space weather. However, traditional surface measures don’t capture the full story – that the Sun may be entering a different mode of behaviour unfolding over decades.

“We have uncovered evidence of systematic changes in the solar activity cycle. Crucially, magnetic activity is becoming more tightly confined near the surface with each cycle.”

The confinement appears to be within the first 600 miles below the surface, which for the Sun is barely skin deep.

In reading the paper [pdf], it is very clear they have detected these changes, but are as yet unable to apply them to any larger fundamental processes. They are observing the Sun change, but don’t know why. It could be simply random fluctuations of behavior, or it could be part of the Sun’s normal behavior related to its magnetic field and the nuclear fusion that makes it burn.

In either case, this lack of deeper understanding means it is impossible as yet to predict what will happen next, or how those future changes will impact us here on Earth.

1 comment

New study using Chandrayaan-2 data again suggests ice in crater near Moon’s south pole

May 28, 2026 9:06 am Robert Zimmerman

The Moon's south pole region

The uncertainty of science: A new study by scientists in India using data from the Indian lunar orbiter Chandrayaan-2 has once again found evidence strongly suggesting the existence of water ice in several permanently shadowed craters near Moon’s south pole.

The findings are based on observations made by the Chandrayaan-2 orbiter’s Dual Frequency Synthetic Aperture Radar (DFSAR), a sophisticated microwave imaging instrument capable of probing beneath the lunar surface.

Among the craters examined, scientists found particularly strong evidence of subsurface ice in a 1.1-kilometre-wide crater located within the larger Faustini crater near the Moon’s south pole. Researchers said the crater displayed a distinctive “lobate-rim morphology”- a flow-like structural pattern that may indicate the impact event penetrated an ice-rich subsurface layer.

On the map above the green dot to the right of the south pole marks the location of the small crater inside Faustini Crater. Their conclusions were based first on microwave data suggesting subsurface ice, and second on the lobate shape of this crater’s rim, which has a kind blobby look implying the material is muddy and impregnated with ice.

Increasingly the data from all sources seems to suggest that if there is ice in these permanently shadowed craters, it is likely impregnated in the soil, and will require processing to extract.

3 comments

More opposition to the EU’s new space law, this time from European companies

May 28, 2026 8:39 am Robert Zimmerman

This label would be more accurate if it read
“NOT made in the European Union”

At a conference this week officials from a number of European aerospace companies expressed strong opposition to the European Union’s (EU) space law, adding their voice to the opposition that already exists from a number of European nations, at least one left-leaning think tank, and the U.S.

Speaking at SmallSat Europe, panelists said they did not oppose regulation itself or the idea behind a common European framework. However, the words most frequently used to describe the first and second drafts of the EU Space Act were “monopoly,” “slow,” “rigid” and “micromanaging.”

Chiara Manfletti, CEO of Neuraspace, argued the current draft misunderstands how fast-moving commercial space operates. “The idea of having an EU Space Act is absolutely good. The problem is the proposal currently on the table,” Manfletti said during a panel. “If it takes 12 months to get a license, that is ancient history for the commercial space sector.”

A recurring concern among panelists was that Europe already moves more slowly than the United States and that the proposed legislation could institutionalize additional delays.

My sense of the situation is that there is enough opposition that in a rational world the EU would scrape the present draft of this law and start over. Sadly, European governments — especially the EU — no longer function rationally. There is no way to predict what its bureaucrats and power-seeking political leaders will do.

1 comment

FAA grounds Starship/Superheavy pending completion of SpaceX’s investigation

May 28, 2026 8:01 am Robert Zimmerman

According to an announcement yesterday by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Starship and Superheavy are presently grounded pending the completion of SpaceX’s investigation of the engine failures in the Superheavy booster.

After a thorough assessment of the operation, the FAA has determined the May 22 SpaceX Starship Flight 12 launch resulted in a mishap. The mishap involved the Super Heavy booster as it flew back to the Gulf of America after stage separation. There are no reports of public injury or damage to public property. 

The FAA is requiring SpaceX to conduct a mishap investigation. The FAA will oversee the SpaceX-led investigation, be involved in every step of the process, and approve SpaceX’s final report, including any corrective actions.

The propaganda press will make of more this than it should. Based on the FAA’s procedures since Trump took over from Biden, the agency is not going to slow things down. It mostly just observes closely the investigation after any mishap, and as soon as the company is itself satisfied with the solution and has instigated its planned fixes, the FAA issues its stamp of approval and allows flights to proceed immediately.

For example, it acted in this manner for the Starship/Superheavy tests in 2025. It also did the same for Blue Origin in its investigation of its recent New Glenn failure. In both cases there were no delays waiting for the agency to retype the company’s conclusions. The approval was immediate. Expect the same now.

3 comments