NASA will land its Mars 2020 Rover on the red planet's Jezero Crater for a mission to search for past microbial life and gather rock and soil samples. The space agency said Tuesday it evaluated over 60 potential landing spots before selecting the Jezero Crater, a former location of an ancient river delta.
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NASA has completed the ground-based laser testing of the ICESat-2 satellite’s altimeter instrument at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The completion of the Advanced Topographic Laser Altimeter System‘s testing sets ICESat-2 for launch on Sept. 12., the space agency said Tuesday. Previously, Northrop Grumman integrated the ATLAS with a spacecraft bus built to serve as the instrument’s …
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Kelly Garehime, associate general counsel of regulatory affairs at United Launch Alliance, has said ULA believes the Federal Aviation Administration should re-engage with the aviation rulemaking committee in developing new launch licensing regulations in order to ensure public safety during space launches. “The Streamlined Launch and Reentry Licensing ARC was conducted …
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A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather satellite on Monday reached geostationary orbit and is set to carry out the second deployment phase for solar array components Tuesday. The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-S officially adopted the name GOES-17 following its arrival at the geostationary orbit and is scheduled to enter the post-launch calibration …
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The Defense Department‘s Office of Inspector General has called for a root cause analysis and implementation of corrective measures to address contractor nonconformities identified during a review of quality management practices under the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle program. DoD OIG made the recommendation to the heads of the EELV System Program Office …
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The House Appropriations Committee’s transportation, housing and urban development bill would allocate $21.6 million in fiscal 2018 funds to the Federal Aviation Administration’s commercial space transportation office, Space News reported Tuesday. The proposed budget in the draft appropriations bill reflects a $1.7 million increase from AST’s funds under the omnibus …
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The Senate voted 98-2 Thursday to pass a bill that would enact new sanctions against Russia and require the White House to secure congressional approval before lifting any current sanctions, Reuters reported Thursday. The proposed legislation seeks to penalize Russia for its interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections, involvement in …
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Col. Walt Jackim, vice commander of the U.S. Air Force‘s 45th Space Wing, has projected the Space Coast in Florida to deploy as many as 32 launches from five different rockets in 2017, Florida Today reported Tuesday. James Dean writes the projected 32 launches will surpass 2016’s record of 23 …
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The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration officially named its first geostationary weather satellite GOES-16 nearly 10 days after it launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida aboard a United Launch Alliance-built Atlas V rocket on Nov. 19. Lockheed Martin-built GOES-16, previously known as GOES-R, has started to move into its geostationary checkout orbit after the satellite …
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NASA aims to achieve a twofold increase in the International Space Station’s data flow rates through hardware updates to the Space Network’s ground terminals. The Space Network works to provide communications services to the ISS and uses a constellation of Tracking and Data Relay Satellites to gather data from the …
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Executive Gov
