May 13, 2026 Quick space links

2:45 pm

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.

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Corroding glacial features inside Martian crater

11:25 am

Overview map
Glacier country in the Martian northern mid-latitudes.

The corroding glacial floor of a Martian crater
Click for original image.

Today’s cool image gives us another nice example of the ample availability of near surface ice on Mars, even if it might take a bit of processing to extract it from the dust and soil. The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on March 31, 2026 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

The picture captures in detail most of the floor of a 5.8-mile-wide unnamed crater, located in the northern mid-latitudes of Mars, in a 2000-mile-long strip I like to call glacier country, because practically every image taken there shows extensive glacial features. The white dot on the overview map above shows the location within that strip, with the inset showing the full crater, as well as the surrounding terrain.

The softness of this landscape strongly suggests a topsoil well impregnated with ice. The crater’s rim is itself very soft and subdued, suggesting melting and sublimation over time.

The material in the floor of the crater resembles peeling paint, which in this case suggests the ice there has been sublimating away as well. Nonetheless, there remains a lot under the surface. Future Martian colonists will certainly come to this region to gather ice for their own purposes.

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Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

New cost estimate for Trump’s Golden Dome exceeds $1 trillion over 20 years

10:15 am

According to the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) new estimates, the cost to build Trump’s proposed Golden Dome defense plan will be about $1.2 trillion over the next 20 years, double what the CBO predicted last year and more than six times what the program’s head has predicted.

The Congressional Budget Office issued an updated estimate today of the cost of President Trump’s Golden Dome missile defense system. Lacking detailed data from the Administration, CBO based its analysis on the capabilities called for in Trump’s January 2025 Executive Order and concluded the total cost over 20 years is $1.2 trillion, about twice its estimate last year, with the bulk of it for Space-Based Interceptors.

Trump issued the Iron Dome for America Executive Order on January 27, 2025, seven days after his second term began. He soon renamed it Golden Dome in part to distinguish it from Israel’s Iron Dome system which has more limited capabilities. Trump appointed Gen. Michael Guetlein to lead the project and in an Oval Office meeting on May 20, 2025, said it would cost $175 billion and be completed in three years, before he leaves office.

By then CBO had estimated the cost at $524 billion based on information available at the time.

Guetlein has since raised his estimate to $185 billion, but it is widely viewed as far too low.

Several important points: First, the CBO’s cost estimates are usually wrong, in either direction, which means the cost could be a lot less, or a lot more. Odds are that in this case its estimate is trending in the right direction. Guetlein’s cost estimate is absurdly too low.

Second, the high cost helps explain why a lot of investment money is pouring into a lot of new space startups, for both rocket and satellite companies. Wall Street sees the federal government spending a lot of money on Golden Dome, and wants to get into the action. For the same reason this is why a lot of space companies have shifted their focus from civilian projects to the military.

Finally, the idea of Golden Dome is perfectly reasonable, as its concept has already been proven both by the U.S.’s Patriot missile system and Israel’s Iron Dome. The implementation however is going to be bad, because the people in Washington being asked to do it have a terrible track record. They routinely waste money and manage projects badly.

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ESA announces new round of funding for new rocket companies

9:28 am

Capitalism in space: The European Space Agency (ESA) yesterday announced a new round in its Boost! program to provide new startup rocket companies funding.

The new round will accept new submissions through 2028. The program is designed to encourage the development of private and independent rocket companies, competing for market share, with the added ability to provide ESA its needed launch services. What makes this ESA program different than all its previous rocket programs is that ESA does not own or control the rockets. It is helping to get these companies started, and will simply then be a customer buying the product from them once operation. Ownership will belong to the companies, not ESA.

To emphasize the ownership point, to get funding under this program “requires private co-funding. For every euro invested by ESA in commercial space businesses, often more than five euros are leveraged from private investors.”

So far ESA has provided funding to eleven different European startups, including Isar Aerospace, Rocket Factory Augsburg, and PLD, all three of which hope to make their first orbital launch this year. This new round is being offered to these companies and any new ones that might come forward. Of the 110 million euros so far allocated 20 million euros remains available for distribution.

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Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

 

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

AST SpaceMobile reaffirms its goal to launch 45 Bluebird satellites by the end of ’26

8:59 am

Despite the launch failure last month by Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket, causing the loss of its satellite, AST SpaceMobile in its most recent quarterly report this week reaffirmed its goal to get 45 Bluebird satellites into orbit by the end of 2026.

In AST SpaceMobile’s 10-Q filed with the SEC on Monday, the company said the loss is expected to be in line with the carrying value of the satellite, in the range of $155 million to $160 million. The company plans for an asset write-off in the second quarter of 2026. The company also said in the 10-Q it had launch insurance coverage that covered a portion of the satellite and launch costs and has filed claims.

“At the end of the day, remember, we have 33 satellites in advanced stages of production at the factory. So it was a loss, we’re on to the next,” Wisniewski told investors. He added that the company is working closely with Blue Origin and is “optimistic” about New Glenn returning to the launch pad soon.

The company’s next launch is with SpaceX on a Falcon 9 rocket that will launch three satellites — BlueBirds 8, 9 and 10. Wisniewski confirmed the company has contracted launch capacity to meet its target of deploying 45 satellites by the end of this year. He also mentioned that five BlueBirds would fit in a United Launch Alliance Vulcan configuration, mentioning the company has been developing other heavy launch providers outside of SpaceX and Blue Origin.[emphasis mine]

The highlighted sentence suggests the company is also negotiating new contracts with both Arianespace’s Ariane-6 rocket and India’s LVM3 rocket. It has already used the latter on one launch successfully.

Nonetheless, the only company with the capability of ramping up enough launches quickly this year to meet this goal will be SpaceX. Expect that company to get more Bluebird launches in 2026.

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The 12th Starship/Superheavy test orbital flight now scheduled for May 19, 2026

8:46 am

Starship/Superheavy (version 3) on launchpad
Starship/Superheavy (version 3) on launchpad

SpaceX yesterday announced that the 12th orbital test flight of its Starship/Superheavy rocket is now scheduled for May 19, 2026, with a launch window opening at 5:30 pm (Central).

The mission will be also be the first flight of what SpaceX calls Version 3 of both the booster and the spaceship, will include the first use of the Raptor-3 engine, and the first use of a completely redesigned launchpad.

The flight test’s primary goal will be to demonstrate each of these new pieces in the flight environment for the first time, with each element of the Starship architecture featuring significant redesigns to enable full and rapid reuse that incorporate learnings from years of development and test.

The booster’s primary test objective will be executing a successful launch, ascent, stage separation, boostback burn, and landing burn at an offshore landing point in the Gulf of America. As this is the first flight test of a significantly redesigned vehicle, the booster will not attempt a return to the launch site for catch.

The Starship upper stage will target multiple in-space and reentry objectives, including the deployment of 22 Starlink simulators, similar in size to next-generation Starlink satellites. The last two satellites deployed will scan Starship’s heat shield and transmit imagery down to operators to test methods of analyzing Starship’s heat shield readiness for return to launch site on future missions. Several tiles on Starship have been painted white to simulate missing tiles and serve as imaging targets in the test. The Starlink simulators will be on the same suborbital trajectory as Starship. A relight of a single Raptor engine while in space is also planned.

As an added potential test-to-failure, the company has also removed a single heat shield tile to test how Starship performs under this failure scenerio. The flight plan will be the same as the previous flights, designed to come down in the Indian Ocean.

A detailed description about the upgrades to Starship, Superheavy, and the ground systems can be found here.

The company will broadcast the launch live, which I will embed on Behind the Black once available.

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Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

 

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

SpaceX kind of confirms rumor it is considering purchasing 136,000 acres in Louisiana

8:01 am

Pecan Island SpaceX facility?

In a tweet yesterday SpaceX sort of confirmed the rumor reported here last week that it is considering purchasing a giant 200-plus square mile plot (about 136,000 acres) on the south coast of Louisiana near the unincorporated town of Pecan Island.

It’s no secret that we intend to launch Starship a lot, targeting thousands of flights per year. That cadence will require the ability to launch from many different locations, so we are constantly exploring to find viable sites to expand Starship operations in the future, both domestically and internationally

This comment was in response to a tweet touting this rumor. Note that SpaceX’s comment is somewhat vague. It says the company is searching for additional launch locations for Starship, but does not say specifically if this Louisiana plot is one of them.

I suspect it is, based on all the known facts. The company is just being coy, likely because negotiations are still on-going. If so, the tweet tells us that if purchased SpaceX intends to use the site as a future spaceport. And because of its size, it will likely also install Raptor-3 engine test stands as well as its planned data-center satellite manufacturing, consolidating some operations in one location.

Hat tip BtB’s stringer Jay.

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May 12, 2026 Quick space links

2:45 pm

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.

3 comments

Curiosity looks closely at the broken slab that had been stuck on its drill bit

12:37 pm

The rock Atacama
Click for original image.

As expected, the science team for the Mars rover hasdecided before moving on it would take a close look at the 28 pound slab of rock that had been stuck on its drill bit and when finally dropped free broken into several pieces when it hit the ground.

The top picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, shows that entire rock, labeled Atacama by the science team. The two insets below are close-ups of the delicate layering at the rock’s left edge as well as the drill hole itself. From team’s update today:

The highest-priority activities after liberating the drill included imaging the drill with Mastcam and ChemCam RMI, and imaging into the now-empty drill hole with MAHLI (the image above). The science team made the most of the freshly-broken surfaces created when Atacama fell back to Mars, and the freshly-exposed sand once hidden underneath Atacama.

The exposed sand is off camera, to the right. Expect a paper published about that sand, buried likely for millions of years, sometime in the next year or so.

The delicate flutes at the rock’s left edge are somewhat common rock features seen by Curiosity, made possible by Mars’ thin atmosphere and its one-third Earth gravity. On Earth the gravity and weather generally destroys such things. On Mars the lack of violent weather and light gravity allows them to form, and the thin wind even helps in their formation.

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SpaceX and Google negotiating deal to launch data centers into space

11:56 am

Though few details have been confirmed, according to the Wall Street Journal SpaceX and Google are in advanced negotiations to launch data centers into space.

We don’t know if these data centers will be part of a SpaceX/Google partnership, or whether Google is merely negotiating a SpaceX launch deal to place its own data centers in orbit. Nor do we know if this deal will use SpaceX’s Falcon rockets, or is aimed at using Starship when operational. Neither would surprise me. Nor would it be surprising if both occur.

The story is in linked to SpaceX’s impending initial public stock offering (IPO), expected to the biggest in history.

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OHB joins Dassault’s project to build a reusable mini-shuttle

9:28 am

Vortex
Vortex-S with service module attached. Click for original image.

The German aerospace company OHB has now joined with France’s Dassault Aviation in its project to build Vortex, a reusable mini-shuttle that could be used to supply cargo to the future commercial space stations presently under development.

An initial subscale demonstrator of the spaceplane, called the VORTEX-D, is being developed by the company with support from the French Ministry of the Armed Forces. During a 25 June 2025 hearing of the French National Assembly’s Committee on National Defence and the Armed Forces, it was revealed that the demonstrator is expected to be launched in 2028 and has a total project cost of €70 million, with Dassault providing more than half of the funding and the remainder coming from the French government.

The VORTEX-S is expected to follow the VORTEX-D demonstrator. This larger, more complex variant will be developed in partnership with OHB following the finalisation of the 11 May agreement, as the companies seek to secure ESA backing for the project. According to the release announcing the partnership, discussions are also underway with other major European space companies to “expand the team.”

Dassault will remain the lead contractor, building the mini-shuttle. OHB will build the service module. The hope is that later versions of Vortex could also ferry crews to and from space.

This project started in 2023, and initially hoped to do the first test mission to ISS in 2026. That test flight is now targeting 2029, with later missions slipping beyond 2031 and now targeting missions to one of the new stations replacing ISS.

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Two overnight launches from SpaceX and China

9:15 am

Both SpaceX and China successfully completed launches since yesterday. First, SpaceX launched a new group of satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office, its Falcon 9 lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. For security reasons, the number of satellites launched was not revealed.

The first stage completed its 9th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.

Next China launched another set of Qianfan (SpaceSail) internet satellites into orbit, its Long March 6A rocket lifting off from its Taiyuan spaceport in northeast China. Though China’s state run press did not reveal the number of satellites launched, past Long March 6A launches of this constellation have placed 18 satellites into orbit. If so, there are now 155 Quinfan satellites in space, out of a planned constellation of as many as 10,000. The first phase of the constellation however only requires 648, which China hopes to reach before the end of the year.

The state-run press also did not reveal where the rocket’s lower stages (using very toxic hypergolic fuels) crashed inside China.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

56 SpaceX
25 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 56 to 46.

SpaceX hopes to complete another launch later today, carrying a Dragon cargo capsule to ISS (on its sixth flight), but weather might force a scrub. UPDATE: Scrubbed due to weather, rescheduled for May 13, 2026.

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May 11, 2026 Quick space links

2:45 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. Reader Nate P also sent me the second link. 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.

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Springtime on the residual icecap of the Martian south pole

11:42 am

Weird hatchwork at the Martian south pole
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and rotated so that north is to the top, was taken on March 28, 2026 by the high resolution camera of Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

It shows what the science team labels a “south polar residual cap site.” The location is about 200 miles from the Martian south pole, well within the south polar ice cap. A second picture of this same spot was taken only a few days later, and was labeled “bright and dark fans on patterned ground.” With the second image the science team added their nickname for this location, “Troy,” which makes referencing it easier.

The hatchwork is the mystery here. In fact, the scientists have been monitoring this geology since 2020 to see if there have been any changes, either long term or seasonally. Almost certainly they have spotted seasonal changes, as indicated by the hatchwork itself and explained below, but I don’t access to the higher resolution images that would show any major modifications on a larger scale.
» Read more

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Psyche approaches Mars

8:30 am

Mars as seen by Psyche
Click for original image.

The asteroid probe Psyche is now approaching Mars for a May 15, 2026 fly-by that will slingshot it out to the metal asteroid Psyche in 2029.

The image to the right, cropped and expanded to post here, was taken on May 3, 2026 when the spacecraft was still about three million miles away.

The observation was acquired by the multispectral imager instrument’s panchromatic or broadband filter, with an exposure time of just 2 milliseconds. Even with this very short exposure time, the crescent is extremely bright and parts of the image are oversaturated. The light seen here is sunlight reflected off the surface of Mars and also scattered by dust particles in its atmosphere. Because the quantity of dust in the atmosphere can vary rapidly over time, the anticipated brightness of the crescent was hard to predict before this early image was acquired.

The dustiness of Mars leads to sunlight being scattered by its atmosphere, making the crescent appear to extend farther around the planet than if it had no atmosphere (as with our Moon).Of note, on the right side of the extended crescent, there appears to be a gap, which coincides with the planet’s icy north polar cap. The cap is currently in winter and mission specialists hypothesize that seasonal clouds and hazes may be forming in that region, possibly blocking the atmospheric dust’s ability to scatter sunlight like it does elsewhere around the planet.

Though the spacecraft had had a thruster issue last year, all seems well at this time.

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China launches Tianzhou freighter to Tiangong-3 station

8:33 pm

China today (May 11th in China) successfully launched the tenth Tianzhou freighter to its Tiangong-3 space station, its Long March 7 rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport.

China hopes to keep this cargo freighter in orbit for a full year, as part of its effort to reduce the number of cargo missions per year while expanding the capabilities of its spacecraft and station.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

55 SpaceX
24 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 55 to 45.

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Vast signs deal with Lithuania

10:03 am

Haven-1 with docked Dragon capsule
Artist rendering of Haven-1 with docked
Dragon capsule

The space station startup Vast earlier this week signed an agreement with Lithuania to work together on future space missions, either to ISS or its Haven-1 single-module station scheduled for launch next year.

Under the agreement, Vast and Innovation Agency Lithuania will explore opportunities for joint scientific research activities either in the International Space Station National Lab or Haven-1, scheduled to be the world’s first commercial space station, launching in 2027. The partnership also includes plans to further develop educational programs in Lithuania and deepen engagement with local industry.

This deal is similar to Vast’s earlier deals with the European Space Agency, the Czech Republic, Colombia, Uzbekistan, Japan, and the Maldives. All are structured so that should Haven-1 reach orbit and be proven operational and safe for occupancy, these countries could consider sending their own astronauts on missions there. All thus show there is an international market for a private space station, a market that Vast is working hard to capture.

In other space station news, Voyager Technologies, the lead company building the Starlab station, released its 2026 first quarter fiscal report, indicating a solid financial position resulting from its diversification into military-based space applications. Though the report notes that “Starlab does not generate revenue today, nor is expected to generate revenue in the near term,” the company’s overall strength lays a strong foundation for that station’s eventual construction.

In my rankings below of the five stations under development, these two stations remain essentially tied for first place, with Axiom a close third.
» Read more

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Katalyst completes final ground testing of its Swift rescue spacecraft

8:01 am

Katalyst's proposed Swift rescue mission
Katalyst’s proposed Swift rescue mission.
Click for original image.

The orbital servicing startup Katalyst has now successfully completed the final ground testing of its Swift rescue spacecraft, dubbed LINK, that it hopes will be able to catch the Gehrels-Swift Telescope and raise its orbit, thus saving the telescope.

During vibration testing at NASA Goddard, engineers mimicked the shaking the spacecraft will experience during its launch from a Northrop Grumman Pegasus rocket. In the footsteps of Swift itself and NASA’s upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, the Katalyst team also used NASA Goddard’s Space Environment Simulator for thermal vacuum testing.

Once the air was pumped out of this 27-foot-wide chamber, LINK experienced space-like hot and cold temperature extremes. The team also practiced firing the satellite’s three xenon-powered ion thrusters and deployed one of the arms.

After some more testing in Arizona, the spacecraft will be integrated in June onto Northrop Grumman’s Pegasus rocket — the last one in its inventory — and launched later that month.

Katalyst has never done this before. It was preparing LINK as a demo mission when NASA requested bids for saving Swift. It proposed reconfiguring LINK for that purpose, and won the contract in September 2025, only eight months ago.

If this mission succeeds it will be a big feather in Katalyst’s cap.

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May 8, 2026 Quick space links

2:49 pm

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.

5 comments

Rover startup Lunar Outpost raises $30 million in investment capital

10:08 am

The lunar rover startup Lunar Outpost revealed yesterday that it has raised $30 million in private investment capital in its latest funding round.

Lunar Outpost, the leader in off-planet mobility and in-space infrastructure, today announced a $30M Series B led by Industrious Ventures, with participation from Type One Ventures, Eniac Ventures, Promus Ventures, Reliable Equity, and others. The capital injection accelerates production and deployment of the company’s advanced robotics and mobility platforms as it scales the critical industrial layer required for a permanent human presence in space.

The company started out competing for NASA’s initial planned contract to build a manned lunar rover, proposing its “Eagle” rover and even signing a contract with SpaceX to deliver it to the Moon on Starship. Since then it has developed and successfully tested an autonomous excavator, dubbed Owl, while expanding its product line beyond rovers.

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Rocket Lab gets big launch contract for both its Electron and new Neutron rocket

9:19 am

Artist's rendering of the Neutron first stage deploying its second stage
Artist’s rendering of Neutron’s first stage fairings opening
to deploy the payload with the second stage engine.

Rocket Lab announced yesterday that it has won a big new launch contract with an undisclosed customer for three launches of its Electron rocket and five launches of its new Neutron rocket.

The multi-launch agreement includes five dedicated Neutron launches and three dedicated Electron launches baselined to launch between 2026 and 2029. The missions will lift-off from both Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand and Rocket Lab Launch Complex 3 in Virginia. Pricing for these launches aligns with Rocket Lab’s average selling price for Neutron and Electron. The remaining terms of the deal are undisclosed.

Based on the known average launch prices for these rockets, this deal is likely worth somewhere between $250 million to $300 million. That a customer was willing to purchase five launches of Neutron before the rocket has even launched is also a strong statement of confidence in Rocket Lab itself. The company hopes to do the first test launch of Neutron before the end of this year.

Rocket Lab also made a slew of other announcements yesterday. The company will be partnering with Anduril as part of its 20-launch contract with the War department to use its suborbital HASTE version of its Electron first stage for hypersonic testing. The deal involves three of those twenty launches.

The company also announced a partnership with Raytheon to “demonstrate advanced capabilities for the United States Space Force’s Space Based Interceptor program.” Rocket Lab also revealed it is acquiring the California robotic company Motiv Space Systems that has built equipment used on the Mars rover Perseverance.

Rocket Lab might not be as big as SpaceX, but it has unquestionably been as successful in its own way.

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Louisiana state senator: Two unnamed aerospace companies are bidding for major land purchase

8:55 am

Pecan Island SpaceX facility?

In response to the story earlier this week that SpaceX might be acquiring a 200-plus square mile patch of land near Pecan Island on the southern coast of Louisiana, a state senator has now confirmed that two unnamed aerospace companies have been talking with landowners about a possible purchase.

State Sen. Bob Hensgens, R-Abbeville, said he knows of two companies — he did not reveal if it is Elon Musk-owned SpaceX or Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin — that have reached out to landowners in coastal Vermilion and Cameron parishes about a possible acquisition. “I know both companies are trying to find property in southwest Louisiana,” Hensgens said. “I know from people in the parishes that the companies have made outreach in the area.”

If so, we might actually have a bidding war for this property. Note however that nothing has yet been confirmed, including the names of the companies involved. The article at the link however provides some background into the 136K acre plot owned by Exxon, and how it might now be for sale. It also reports that a number of legislators (not Hensgens) have signed non-disclosure agreements about the negotiations.

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Testing new high speed rotors for the next generation of Mars helicopters

8:28 am

Ingenuity with missing blade
Ingenuity with its missing blade, at its final resting place on Mars.
Click for original image.

Engineers from JPL and the aerospace company AeroVironment have been testing a new set of high speed rotors that they hope to use on the next generation Mars helicopters, designed to increase their payload capacity by as much as 30%.

The rotors of Ingenuity — the first helicopter to fly on Mars — never spun faster than 2,700 rpm, because at faster speeds it would be approaching the speed of sound (on Mars), when unpredictable things could happen. Engineers are pushing those limits with these new rotors, in a chamber mimicking the thin Martian atmosphere.

The test engineers had taken the precaution of lining part of the chamber with sheet metal in case the blades broke apart during the supersonic experiment. From a control room a few yards away from the chamber, the team watched displays showing data and a view inside the chamber as the rpm climbed as high as 3,750. At that rate, the tips were traveling at Mach 0.98 [just under the Martian speed of sound]. Then the engineers activated a fan inside the chamber that pelted the rotors with headwinds. After each run, they increased in wind velocity for the next run.

The team pushed rotor tip speeds to Mach 1.08, boosting the Mars vehicle’s lift capability by 30%. This breakthrough allows future missions to support heavier scientific payloads, including advanced sensors and larger batteries for extended flight. Next the team tried their luck with the two-bladed SkyFall rotor. Because it is slightly longer than the three-bladed version, only 3,570 rpm was needed to achieve the same near-supersonic speed at the rotor tips prior to introducing the headwinds.

NASA administrator Jared Isaacman has said he wants to send a fleet of helicopters to Mars in 2028, on that first nuclear-powered mission. Whether or not that mission happens as he proposed, there is ample evidence scientists plan on sending more helicopters there in the next few years (see here, here, here). These tests lay the groundwork for those future missions.

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Paraguay becomes the 67th nation to sign Artemis Accords

8:01 am

Artemis program logo

Paraguay yesterday became the 67th nation to sign Artemis Accords, continued the flood of smaller third world nations that have signed up in the last few weeks following the completion of the Artemis-2 mission around the Moon.

The remarks of NASA administration Jared Isaacman in connection with this event I find most tantalizing:

“They join an ever-growing coalition of like-minded nations committed to the peaceful, transparent, and responsible exploration of space. Established by President Trump in his first term, the Artemis Accords provided the principles for how we explore the Moon, Mars, and beyond. Now, with his national space policy, we are putting the Artemis Accords into practice with our Moon Base. We are creating opportunities for all Artemis Accords signatories, including Paraguay, to join us on the lunar surface and advance our shared objectives in this next era of exploration.” [emphasis mine]

While that national space policy [pdf] accepts the Outer Space Treaty’s limitation on establishing American law on other worlds, including property rights, it also makes its first goal that of promoting private enterprise.
» Read more

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