Tag: politics

Two orbital launches today by China and SpaceX, plus a suborbital hypersonic launch by Rocket Lab

10:45 am

The beat goes on! Since last night both China and SpaceX successfully completed orbital launches.

First, China used its most powerful operating rocket, the Long March 5, to place what its state-run press called “a new communication technology test satellite” into orbit, the rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport. As the Long March 5 can haul very large payloads into orbit, it suggests this one satellite is unusually heavy.

Next, SpaceX successfully placed another 24 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

The first stage (B1071) successfully completed its 34th flight (38 days after its previous flight), landing on a drone ship in the Pacific. With this flight the stage moved past the space shuttle Atlantis, putting it in third place in the rankings for the most reused launch vehicle:

39 Discovery space shuttle
35 Falcon 9 booster B1067
34 Falcon 9 booster B1071
33 Atlantis space shuttle
32 Falcon 9 booster B1063
31 Falcon 9 booster B1069
28 Columbia space shuttle
28 Falcon 9 booster B1077
28 Falcon 9 booster B1078

Sources here and here.

Though it was not an orbital launch and thus isn’t added to my launch totals, Rocket Lab also launched last night, using its HASTE suborbital version of its Electron rocket to do a suborbital hypersonic test for the War Department, as part of its $190 million contract to do twenty such test flights. This appears to be the first of those launches.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

69 SpaceX
36 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab (plus three suborbital HASTE launches)

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 69 to 61.

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Another unsuccessful suborbital launch from proposed Nova Scotia spaceport

9:44 am

Proposed Canadian spaceports
Proposed Canadian spaceports

For the second time in less than seven months the Canadian startup company T-Minus unsuccessfully attempted a suborbital test launch from the proposed Spaceport Nova Scotia, owned and operated by the company Maritime Launch Services and funded mostly by a major $200 million lease by the Canadian government.

The launch was conducted from Spaceport Nova Scotia under approved regulatory and safety frameworks. The demonstration strengthened coordination among launch site teams and partners while refining launch operational procedures and the safety and security systems that govern all activities at the spaceport.

While two suborbital flights had been planned for today’s demonstration, the decision was made to conclude operations following the first flight in order to review mission data and incorporate lessons learned into future testing activities. The demonstration featured the launch of the Barracuda, a hypersonic, single-stage, solid-fuel suborbital vehicle capable of carrying payloads of up to 40 kilograms to altitudes of approximately 80 kilometres.

Full analysis of the flight data will continue over the coming weeks. However, initial data indicate that the vehicle operated nominally during the powered phase of flight before experiencing an anomaly late in the boost phase.

In other words, the first launch did not operate as expected, which forced the cancellation of the second launch. T-Minus had a similar result in its November 2025 test, making its record 2-for-2 in failures.

This launch was really designed as a PR event, not a space launch. Maritime invited numerous government officials and celebrities to watch, even as the leftist Carney government has tried to falsely sell its spaceport lease as a way to establish a sovereign launch capability for Canada.

Maritime itself has been trying to get this spaceport off the ground since 2016, with no success. Only in the last year it has come back to life due to that $200 million government lease. With that financing, Maritime has been able to sign up two different rocket startups to consider launching from Spaceport Nova Scotia, the German company Isar Aerospace and the South Korean company Innospace.

However, no orbital launches are presently scheduled, and it is likely none will occur before 2028. And when or if it happens, it will not be by a Canadian rocket company.

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A look back at a significant moment in human history: the first picture of the Moon’s far side

12:14 pm

The first picture ever taken of the Moon's far side, by Luna-3
Click for original image.

Today’s cool image is being posted not because of its beauty or high resolution, but because it was a significant first that shined a light on a mystery that had baffled all humanity since the first time a human being in Africa looked up and observed the Moon.

The picture to the right, reduced slightly and smoothed to remove some camera artifacts, was the first picture ever taken of the hidden far side of the Moon, captured by the Soviet Union’s Luna-3 probe on October 7, 1959, one day after it had passed less than 3,900 miles above the surface. As it moved away, it looked back, and took this picture from a distance of about 40,000 miles.

The picture ain’t what we are used to nowadays from space, but you need to put yourself back in time to truly appreciate it. For literally the entire history of humanity, this view had been hidden. Dreamers, philosophers, scientists, and ordinary people would look at the near side of the Moon almost nightly, but no one knew what was on the other side. Whole religious myths grew up about this unknown. Some science fiction writers of the 19th century fantasized there was air and water there and thus housed an alien civilization, purposely positioned so we couldn’t see it.

Suddenly, with this picture, that side was no longer hidden. This one Luna-3 picture showed humanity that the Moon’s far side was not much different than the near side, though much more cratered with fewer dark mare regions. It had no air or water. Nor were there alien civilizations.

But that age-old mystery was now solved. For those living in the 1950s, it was something of a revelation to see this picture. For those who came after, it is important to try to imagine the significance of that revelation. Suddenly, the mysteries of the universe were no longer unsolvable. Suddenly, we had the ability to solve them.

This picture, like all new knowledge, also brought with it new mysteries, based not on a hidden view but on real data and real questions. Now the goal was understand that data in order to solve the history of the Moon’s geology and how it fit into the formation of the Earth and the entire solar system. That endeavor is still on-going, with its solution not yet entirely in sight.

One last point: Though this picture is woefully inadequate compared to modern planetary images, it also carries a remarkable amount of good information that has since been confirmed by other spacecraft. To get an idea, compare it with a similar global view produced using Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO)’s full dataset. The features match quite well, and a close look at the Luna 3 picture reveals many details not immediately evident that match well with the LRO image. The Russian engineers who made this happen should be rememberd and honored for their achievement.

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Mitsubishi gets subsidy from Japan to develop its own orbital tug

9:52 am

The Japanese aerospace company Mitsubishi today announced that Japan’s Space Strategic Fund has awarded it a subsidy of an undisclosed amount to its develop its own orbital tug.

The goal is to develop an OTV [orbital transfer vehicle] that can respond flexibly to user needs, navigate between orbits, and load and release payloads in space without being limited to specific applications or transport routes. The company also aims to verify the feasibility of autonomous rendezvous, proximity operations and docking (RPOD) using physical AI and robotics for the safe and effective capture, handling and release of payloads in space.

The Space Strategic Fund was created by the Japanese government in 2023 as a ten year $6.6 billion program to encourage the growth of a private Japanese space sector, to essentially transition Japan from a government space program run and owned by its space agency JAXA to a independent and competing private sector, following the capitalism model.

That fund however was given to JAXA to manage, and so far it appears it has not moved aggressively to promote an independent sector. Inside, the awards it has given out so far have mostly been to either fund its own programs, or help its big space partners, such as Mitsubishi. This could change of course as privately-owned spacecraft begin garnering customers outside of JAXA. It is however taking a long time, and meanwhile Japan’s space industry continues to trail badly both China and India, and even South Korea. While these Asian companies are developing multiple rockets and spacecraft, Japan presently has no operational rockets, and its commercial space sector is barely alive.

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India takes first step to privatize its largest rocket, the LVM3 or Bahubali

9:21 am

LVM3 launching a set of OneWeb satellites in 2022
LVM3 about to launch a set of OneWeb satellites in 2022

IN-SPACe, the agency assigned the job for shifting India’s space effort away from its space agency ISRO and to the private sector, yesterday released an Expression of Interest (EOI), asking India’s private aerospace industry for bids to take over operations of ISRO’s LVM3 rocket (also called Bahubali), its most powerful rocket that ISRO plans to use for its future manned and interplanetary missions.

The invitation for EOI, released on Tuesday, invites eligible Indian private companies or industry consortia to acquire and operationalise LVM3 technology from ISRO. The LVM3, often referred to as ISRO’s ‘Baahubali’ rocket, is the agency’s heaviest operational launch vehicle and is behind key missions including Chandrayaan 2 and 3. The selected private entity will receive technology transfer and extensive support from ISRO to absorb the technology and begin manufacturing and launching LVM3 vehicles commercially.

The EOI invitation also lays down the eligibility criteria for the applicable private entities. ISRO’s handholding and infrastructure support is proposed for a defined period of 42 months or until the realisation and launch of two LVM3 vehicles by the selected entity, whichever comes earlier.

The eventual goal is for the private sector to market LVM3 for commercial purposes, outside of ISRO’s Gaganyaan and space station manned program. While ISRO will continue to operate the rocket to launch manned missions as well as the country’s proposed Bharatiya Antariksh Space Station (BAS), the private company that takes over LVM3 will sell it to the international market for profit. As this is a powerful rocket, it can compete directly with SpaceX’s Falcon 9, ULA’s Vulcan, Blue Origin’s New Glenn, and Arianespace’s Ariane-6.

IN-SPACe has already begun this process with ISRO’s smallsat SSLV rocket, transferring operations in June 2025 to Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). There are also indications it is trying to do the same with ISRO’s mid-sized PSLV rocket. If all three transfers go through, almost all of ISRO’s rockets will be operated by the private sector.

Don’t expect this transition to the private sector to happen quickly. As we have seen in the U.S., the shift away from a government-run space program to a chaotic free capitalist space industry can take many years, decades even. And its eventual success is never guaranteed, as government agencies fight hard to protect their turf, and they have the power of government coercion to back them up.

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China picks four of its pseudo-companies to launch its new Qingzhou cargo freighter

8:54 am

China's Qingzhou unmanned cargo freighter
China’s Qingzhou unmanned cargo freighter

China’s government has now chosen four of its pseudo-companies to allow them to bid on launching its new smaller and less costly Qingzhou freighter to bring cargo its Tiangong-3 space station.

Launch firms Galactic Energy, CAS Space, OrienSpace and Landspace were shortlisted to launch the Qingzhou cargo spacecraft, following the launch of a prototype of the supply vessel March 30. The four were named in a public notice posted to China’s national tendering platform June 5, with the notice period closing June 9. The notice does not indicate the selection of a final provider.

The full scale Qingzhou cargo spacecraft is tentatively scheduled for launch in January 2027, subject to the final launch window, according to the tender information. The mission is intended to dock at Tiangong to provide supplies for the first time. Qingzhou is developed by the Innovation Academy for Microsatellites of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IAMCAS), and is one of two low-cost space station resupply spacecraft being developed under a program initiated by China’s human spaceflight agency, CMSEO, to support Tiangong. The prototype completed rendezvous tests in April.

Of these four pseudo-companies, CAS Space and Landspace are most likely to get the first Qingzhou launch contracts. CAS Space is wholly-owned by a government agency, giving it a distinct political advantage. Its Kinetica-2 solid-fueled rocket has also flown a number of times successfully, including one mission that launched the first Qingzhou prototype in March 2026.

Landspace’s rocket, the Zhuque-2, has also flown successfully a number of times (with one failure). As an independent pseudo-company with no direct ownership by the government, its political connections are not as good. At the same time, all these pseudo-companies are essentially owned by the communist government, which recognizes private property only at its convenience.

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NASA announces crew and flight plan for Artemis-3 Earth orbit mission next year

12:22 pm

Artemis logo

NASA today unveiled both the four-person crew that will fly its Artemis-3 Earth orbit mission next year as well as the mission’s basic plan, assuming both SpaceX and Blue Origin can get their respective lunar landers ready in time.

Crew assignments are as follows:

  • NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik, commander
  • ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Luca Parmitano, pilot
  • NASA astronaut Frank Rubio, mission specialist
  • NASA astronaut Andre Douglas, mission specialist

… NASA astronaut Bob Hines was named as a backup crew member.

Except for Douglas, all are veterans.

The mission details were also announced:

Artemis III includes launching the world’s most powerful rockets in short order. Blue Origin’s lander pathfinder, which is able to stay in orbit for multiple weeks, will launch first and await the crew. NASA will send the astronauts aboard Orion by SLS to orbit Earth, before rendezvousing in space with the company’s lander test article and spending about two days docked together for tests and technology demonstrations, including entering the lander.

After completing docked operations with Blue Origin, Orion will detach and await Starship. SpaceX’s Starship pathfinder will launch and meet up with Orion to spend about a day connected for checkouts and testing. After that, Orion and its crew will undock and return home, splashing safely down in the Pacific Ocean where a team from the U.S. Navy and NASA will recover the astronauts.

In total, the crew is expected to remain in space for about two weeks, with exact mission length to be determined in real-time based on launch, rendezvous, and docked operations.

All of this assumes that New Glenn has been fixed and is operational by late 2027 and can launch the Blue Moon Mark-2 manned lunar lander. It also assumes the lunar lander version of Starship is ready and operational and man-rated. It also assumes NASA can get SLS stacked and ready for launch much faster than previously expected.

All are big assumptions.

Other issues: Orion will be testing its docking system and its newly redesigned heat shield for the first time, with humans on board. As the return will be from low Earth orbit, the stress on the heat shield will be relatively light, reducing the risk considerably. Similarly, if the docking system fails they simply won’t dock, and can return to Earth instead. Both should work, however, as neither is cutting edge technology.

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Orbital tug startup Quantum raises $300 million by merging with a SPAC

10:40 am

Quantum's proposed Ranger tug
Quantum’s proposed Ranger tug

The orbital tug startup Quantum Space has gone public by merging with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), raising $300 million in the process.

Quantum Space announced June 8 that it will merge with Inflection Point Acquisition Corp. VI, a SPAC traded on the Nasdaq exchange. The companies expect the deal to close in the fourth quarter, with Quantum Space then trading on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol QSPC.

The deal includes a $300 million investment, known as a private investment in public equity, or PIPE, by Inflection Point into Quantum Space. The SPAC also has $253 million in trust that would go to Quantum Space, assuming none of its shareholders redeem their shares. The deal would value Quantum Space at more than $1.1 billion if there are no SPAC redemptions.

The company’s press release is here. Quantum gets extra press because its CEO is Jim Bridenstine, former NASA administrator. The company is developing a tug it labels Ranger, designed with the War Department in mind, capable of not only moving satellites around but also maneuvering to other satellites for reconnaissance and surveillance.

The company however is a latecomer to the orbital tug field. There are several tug and satellite servicing companies (Impulse, Starfish, Momentus, to name just three) that have already flown their tugs and done actual missions. Another, Katalyst, will be launching its first mission in about a month, to rescue the Gehrels-Swift space telescope.

It will be interesting to see if Bridenstine can succeed in playing catch up.

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Chinese pseudo-company Landspace launches two satellites

9:16 am

The Chinese pseudo-company Landspace yesterday successfully launched two satellites, its Zhuque-2E rocket lifting off from the Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China.

The Zhuque-2E is an upgraded version of Landspace’s Zhuquie-2 rocket, apparently using a larger fairing with an increased payload capacity. The two satellites were both for communications. One was for the Qianfan (Spacesail) internet constellation, which now has approximately 200 satellites in orbit out of a planned 12,000, with the constellation’s first phase targeting 648 by the end of the year. The second satellite was for a different constellation, and is a experimental satellite testing cell-to-satellite technology.

China’s state-run press provided no information about where the rocket’s lower stages crashed inside China.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

68 SpaceX
35 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 68 to 60.

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NASA’s X-59 completes first no-boom supersonic flight, more than a year after a private company did it

10:28 am

NASA yesterday made a big deal about the first successful supersonic test flight of its X-59 test plane, built by Lockheed Martin for $247.5 million to demonstrate quiet no-boom supersonic flight.

And as usual, our uneducated propaganda press played along, touting the wonders of this new NASA achievement. A few examples:

Poppycock. Not one of these news articles made mention of the fact that the private commercial company Boom Supersonic accomplished the same feat eighteen months earlier, its XB-1 supersonic airplane breaking the sound barrier with no boom three separate times. And it did so using private funds for significantly less and getting the job done faster and in a manner that it can quickly convert into its planned commercial supersonic planes.

The X-59 is a typical NASA test project, designed to test a technology in a manner that is generally too specific and expensive for commercial use. Without doubt the engineering and the data from these flights will be helpful to companies like Boom, but to use it will require major changes and revisions to bring the cost down. It is for this reason Boom did its own engineering and test.

That I appear to be the only news outlet aware of this important background information — that puts a significantly different light on this government project — illustrates the bankruptcy of our modern media. They don’t know anything, and can only rewrite press releases.

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Australia’s Southern Launch range gets another re-entry capsule customer

9:44 am

Proposed Australian spaceports
Australian spaceports: operating (red dot) and proposed (red “X”)
Click for original image.

The Australlian spaceport Southern Launch, which also controls the Koonibba Test Range where a variety of government and commercial capsules have landed since 2020, has signed another American company building its own re-entry capsules.

Southern Launch has signed a new agreement with US-based SpaceWorks Enterprises, Inc. to host multiple re-entry missions at the Koonibba Test Range in South Australia.

The agreement enables SpaceWorks to advance its growing portfolio of atmospheric Re-Entry Devices (RED) and further demonstrates confidence in the Koonibba Test Range as the leading global location for the safe and reliable return of spacecraft and high-value payloads.

This is the third American re-entry capsule company to sign with Southern Launch. Varda has already landed I think five capsules at Koonibba, and has a deal to land up to 20 through 2028. In 2025 the American startup Lux Aeterna signed a deal as well.

Two take-aways from this story: First, SpaceWorks as a re-entry capsule company appears to be a new project, joining the host of other re-entry capsule companies that have obtained investment capital since Varda demonstrated its success, including three U.S. and five European startups. It really appears the financial community sees profits here, and are committing money to this effort.

Two, the red tape by multiple U.S. government agencies in 2023 that delayed the return of Varda’s first capsule to the Air Force’s test range in Utah for six months has driven all this business out of the U.S.

That red tape was part of the Biden administration’s general policy aimed at hindering private enterprise, but it also is systematic to the existing administrative state that dominates and impedes American industry across the board. The result here is the business went elsewhere.

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NASA clarifies air leak situation yesterday on ISS

8:27 am

Figure 3 from September Inspector General report
Figure 3 from September 2024 Inspector General report, showing Zvezda’s location on ISS, as well as the station’s leak rate at that time.

According to a NASA update posted late yesterday, the agency had cause to order its astronauts to shelter in place within their Dragon capsule due to planned repair work proposed by the Russians.

The week of June 1, during Progress 95 spacecraft cargo operations, Roscosmos noted an increase of the previous leak rate to two pounds per day and identified new suspected leak areas in the PrK. Following this observation, Roscosmos made the decision to begin work toward a more extensive inspection and structural repair effort Friday morning. This revised approach involved cutting a bracket to better access an area identified as a possible leak source for further inspection, using a method that could have resulted in elevated risk to the structure in the area. In response, NASA directed the four SpaceX Crew-12 members and NASA astronaut Chris Williams, who flew to station aboard the Soyuz MS-28 spacecraft, to take a heightened safety posture, known as a safe haven, inside the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft during the procedure.

Later Friday morning, Roscosmos paused and did not perform the structural repair work in favor of conducting additional measurements and data assessments, which included inspection of suspected areas of interest and review of areas where sealant was previously applied. NASA strongly supported that decision, and as a result, following that decision, Crew-12 and Williams ended their safe haven activities and returned to normal operations aboard the orbiting laboratory.

In other words, the leak rate had increased to match the high rates seen from 2019 to 2025, and the Russians were planning work that threatened the structure of the module. It appears NASA objected, and eventually the Russians acceded to those objections.

What happens next however remains unclear. If the leak rate has suddenly jumped from one pound per day to two pounds a day, that suggests the situation is worsening, and doing so at an alarming rate. As this new leak occurred shortly after a Progress freighter docked at Zvezda, it suggested the docking instigated it. It also suggests any further dockings there are likely to worsen the situation even more.

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FCC grants waiver to Amazon Leo constellation, despite its failure to launch on time

8:07 am

Amazon Leo logo

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) yesterday granted [pdf] a license waiver to Amazon, allowing it to continue deploying its Leo constellation even though the company will fail to meet its license requirement to get half its constellation (1,616 satellites) into orbit by July 2026.

While granting the waiver, the FCC also made it clear Amazon still needs to meet the license’s deadline for full deployment of all 3,232 satellites by July 30, 2029.

In the event Amazon Leo fails to satisfy the final milestone on July 30, 2029, this will result in reduction of the total number of Amazon Leo’s authorized satellites to the total number of satellites that are operational on that date.

In other words, the Leo constellation will be truncated if Amazon fails to get the full constellation up on time.

To further encourage Amazon to meet future deadlines, the FCC also stated that the satellites of Amazon’s first-half constellation that are launched late — after the July 2026 deadline — will lose certain spectrum rights for the next 20 months, “or until 50% of the constellation is launched and operational, whichever occurs first.” This order is expressly designed to encourage the company to accelerate its launch pace.

Finally, the FCC declared that Amazon will forfeit its surety bond for not meeting its July 30, 2026 launch obligation.

Launching almost 3,000 satellites in the next three years is still going to be challenging. Right now Amazon is dependent mostly on two grounded and as yet unproven rockets (Vulcan and New Glenn) and a third (Ariane-6) that cannot launch at a very quick pace for at least another two years. And its additional a ten-launch contract with SpaceX won’t be sufficient to get the entire constellation in orbit on time.

In other words, unless Vulcan and New Glenn get fixed quickly and resume launches, Amazon is going to have trouble meeting the FCC’s final deadline.

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NASA admits mismanagement and human errors caused 2025 Goldstone antenna damage

4:53 pm

NASA today released its completed investigation into the November 2025 incident that severely damaged its Goldstone antenna in California when workers allowed the antenna to “over rotate” beyond its acceptable limits, putting it out of commission.

In its final report, the board found the mishap primarily stemmed from software weaknesses, human error, and an undetected failure in the antenna’s hydraulic limit system. Investigators determined an electrical issue at the antenna the previous day caused the control system to misreport the antenna’s rotation state, an issue that went unnoticed and triggered multiple limit-stops during the Juno track on Sept. 16. While working to identify the limit-stop problem, operators performed several troubleshooting steps that inadvertently bypassed software and hardware safeguards, which ultimately led to the over-rotation incident. After flooding in the antenna base was observed, operators attempted to stow the antenna as a safety precaution, however, because the system had already passed the rotation limits, this action drove the antenna further into over‑rotation, causing additional damage.

Additionally, the investigation found the antenna’s hydraulic limit system, its final mechanical safeguard, was inoperable on Sept. 16 after being damaged in an undocumented prior incident. The system also had not been adequately tested for an undetermined period of time.

Investigators also concluded workplace culture pressured operators to work as expeditiously as possible, often stretching beyond their usual roles, expertise, and training, to keep the antenna operating. The board states the cultural conditions observed at Goldstone were not present at the network’s other sites, where roles and responsibilities are followed more consistently. Other contributing factors outlined in the report include inadequate procedures, reliance on undocumented practices and tacit knowledge, and gaps in the antenna’s control logic. [emphasis mine]

You can read that report here [pdf], but be warned that large sections are redacted, apparently in an effort to protect the identities of those responsible.

Nonetheless, it is very clear from the highlighted text above that the management and work situation at Goldstone was a mess, and that the mishap was caused not by faulty engineering but by faulty work practices and bad management. Unfortunately, nowhere in the report is it said that there will be any management changes. This fact might have been redacted, but I suspect not. It is typical of government agencies like NASA after incidents like this to whitewash the investigation, concluding simply that “we should have done better and we now we will!”

The repairs will cost NASA about $4.6 million, and will likely not be completed until 2028.

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China completes two more launches

9:55 am

Since yesterday China has successfully completed two launches from two different spaceports using two different types of rockets, with both launches placing more satellites in orbit for its Qiafan (SpaceSail) internet constellation.

First China yesterday placed 18 Qianfan satellites in a polar orbit, its Long March 6B rocket lifting off from its Taiyuan spaceport in northeast China. The state-run press provided no information as to where the rocket’s lower stages (using very toxic hypergolic fuels) crashed.

Next, China today placed another batch Qianfan satellites into orbit, its Long March 8 rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport. Though the state-run press did not specify the number of satellites on this launch, based on past launches the total was likely 18 also.

The constellation presently has roughly 200 Qianfan satellites in orbit, out of a planned constellation of as many as 12,000. The first phase of the constellation however only requires 648, which China hopes to reach before the end of the year.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

66 SpaceX
34 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 66 to 59.

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Russia will charge about $27 million for future tourist flights

9:26 am

According to Dmitry Bakanov, head of Roscosmos, it will likely charge about two billion rubles, about $27 million, to fly tourists in space in the future.

The cost of a space tourist trip will be approximately 2 billion rubles, Roscosmos CEO Dmitry Bakanov said in an interview with VK Video on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. “It’s still an expensive project. The costs include the rocket divided by the number of participants. There must be two professionals, because they can guide it, so it’s about two billion rubles,” Bakanov noted.

The report of his remarks in Russia’s state-run press is not entirely clear as to whether this number is the price per tourist, the price for the entire flight, or Roscosmos’ cost for the flight, excluding its mark-up. Assuming it is the price for the entire flight, it is about a quarter of what Russia was charging NASA during the last few ferrying trips to ISS before SpaceX’s Dragon capsules became operational. This makes sense, since Russia was milking NASA for as much as it could get during those last flights. Future private tourists won’t have as much money as a spend-thrift government, so Roscosmos is now forced to charge a realistic price.

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NASA astronauts ordered to shelter in Dragon while Russians repair air leak

8:53 am

For somewhat unclear reasons that seem at first glance to be an over-reaction, NASA officials today ordered all five non-Russian astronauts on ISS to shelter in the Dragon capsule docked there while the two Russian astronauts did repair work on the new air leak in the Zvezda module on the Russian half of the station.

Following new leaks, Roscosmos has elected to proceed with a more extensive repair operation on Friday, June 5. Out of an abundance of caution, NASA has directed all four of the agency’s SpaceX Crew-12 members and NASA astronaut Chris Williams to assume an elevated safety posture in the Dragon spacecraft while the repair is underway.

As it turned out, the Russians only did “measurements” today, no actual repairs, and so NASA then canceled its “shelter in place” order.

This new air leak, first detected in May, has been estimated to be equivalent to the loss of about one pound of air per day, which is relative low compared to the loss rates seen from 2019 through 2025, as shown in the lower right corner of the graphic below, taken from a 2024 inspector general report. In late 2025 the Russians were able to stop those leaks, only to have this new one return last month.
Figure 3 from September Inspector General report
Figure 3 from September 2024 Inspector General report, showing Zvezda’s location on ISS, as well as the station’s leak rate at that time.

Unless the Russians planned some radical repair plan (unlikely), sheltering in Dragon seems overkill. For several years NASA’s policy has been to simply close the hatch between the American and Russian sections of ISS during dockings to Zvezda. It likely also did this during earlier repair work. For the agency to now escalate its safety precautions suggests either the repair work was more risky, or NASA administrator Jared Isaacman wanted to make a political and engineering point that would be noticed by the mainsteam press.

If the latter, Isaacman got what he wanted, as there have been numerous stories today from many mainstream outlets, with some misreporting the story as if the leak was suddenly new and required an emergency evacution (see here, here, here, and here).

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German rocket startup HyImpulse signs deal to consider launching from Oman

8:49 am

Active and proposed Middle East spaceports
Active and proposed Middle East spaceports

The German rocket startup HyImpulse has signed an agreement with Oman to study the possibility of launching its rockets from Oman’s proposed Etlaq spaceport located near the town of Duqm.

Under the proposed collaboration, HyImpulse will evaluate both near-term mission opportunities and the feasibility of establishing a longer-term operational presence at Etlaq Spaceport. Beyond offering an alternative launch base outside northern Europe, the arrangement is expected to capitalize on Oman’s advantageous geographic latitude, enabling access to a broader range of orbital inclinations and enhancing mission flexibility for customers across the GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council], Asia and, potentially, emerging African markets.

The two sides also plan to assess the possibility of supporting future launch campaigns involving HyImpulse’s SR75 and SL1 launch vehicles from Oman. Etlaq would provide access to launch infrastructure, operational facilities and mission-support capabilities as the European company studies deployment opportunities in the Sultanate.

HyImpulse is now the second European rocket startup to sign such a deal. In 2025 the Spanish company PLD agreed to use Duqm as well.

At the same time, Oman had previously said the spaceport would see a number of suborbital test flights in 2025, none of which happened.

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Axiom’s CEO provides update on corrosion and the timetable for its space station

8:01 am

Axiom's module assembly sequence
Axiom’s module assembly sequence

Jonathan Cirtain, the CEO of the space station startup Axiom, this week gave an interview where he provided a short update on the status of their station’s construction, including the present launch timetable as well as the corrosion issue known to exist on the two module hulls that Thales-Alenia is presently building for the company.

It [the corrosion] was actually observed during ISS using a similar manufacturing technique. They mitigated it.

Now it’s come back. … We’re going to fix it the same way they fixed it for the International Space Station, the Columbus module, which has been operational now for eighteen, nineteen years. Had that same challenge. So we’re working our way through that. That should get resolved by the end of the month of June.

Because this interview took place just prior to NASA’s announcement yesterday that it has abandoned its core module concept proposed last month, Cirtain describes how the company was considering some design and construction changes to deal with it. That issue however has now vanished.

Cirtain added that the module’s hulls will next be shipped from the Thales-Alenia factory in Europe to the U.S., where Axiom will then begin installing the interior and exterior components of each, with a planned launch of the first, dubbed the PPTM, by 2028, the same target date the company announced in January 2026. That the date has not changed six months later suggests either the corrosion issue did not delay things, or it was the cause of that delay.

As I noted in January, Axiom’s schedule margins for getting its station launched, docked to ISS, loaded with ISS equipment, and then separated before ISS retires in 2030 are extremely tight. It cannot afford any further delays.

In other Axiom news, the company announced yesterday that it has established a a wholly owned subsidiary based in Switzerland, dubbed Axiom Switzerland, thus establishing itself within the Europe to facilitate future contracts with the European Space Agency, the European Union, and the member nations of both.

Below are my updated rankings of the five American space stations presently under development:
» Read more

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Spanish rocket startup PLD raises the budget for its launch facilities in French Guiana to €35 million

11:18 am

French Guiana spaceport
The French Guiana spaceport. The ELM-Diamant launch site
is labeled “B.” Click for full resolution image. (Note: The
Ariane-5 pad is now the Ariane-6 pad, and the now destroyed
Soyuz pad is now controlled by rocket startup MaiaSpace.)

The Spanish rocket startup PLD, preparing for the first orbital launch of its Miura-5 rocket before the end of this year, has significantly raised its investment in its leased launch facilities in France’s spaceport in French Guiana, from about €11 to €16 million to €35 million, with much of the planned construction aimed at shared facilities that other European rocket startups can use.

PLD Space, an international space transportation company, has announced a €35 million investment in the development and deployment of its Launch Complex at the Guiana Space Centre (CSG) in Kourou (French Guiana) over the 2025-2026 period. This investment positions PLD Space as the first private operator to deploy capital expenditure at this scale at the ELM-Diamant site, contributing to the diversification and strengthening of Europe’s historic spaceport.

Of the total investment, €22 million is being executed within the French industrial ecosystem, with €13 million directly allocated to more than 20 companies based in French Guiana, including a significant number of SMEs. This approach reinforces PLD Space’s commitment to embedding its industrial activity within the local territory and strengthening the regional space ecosystem beyond established players.

France, which owns French Guiana, decided in 2024 to refurbish the long-abandoned ELM-Diamant launch site as a common pad for the many small European rocket startups. It appears it has strong-armed PLD to pay for much of that joint infrastructure. “You want to launch first? Then pay for this work that others will use.” It is possible PLD will be able to recover this investment from those other companies, but its press release does not say so.

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