Space News & Blog Articles

European Space Agency astronaut Matthias Maurer and NASA astronauts Thomas Marshburn, Raja Chari, and Kayla Barron pose for a photo during training at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California. Credit: SpaceX

The astronauts who will ride SpaceX’s newest Dragon spaceship into orbit later this month said Thursday they named their spacecraft “Endurance” as a tribute to the human spirit and a historic sailing vessel used by Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton.

A crane raises the Lucy spacecraft, encapsulated inside its payload fairing, atop an Atlas 5 rocket Thursday. Credit: United Launch Alliance

Teams at Cape Canaveral transferred NASA’s Lucy asteroid explorer to a United Launch Alliance integration building Thursday and mounted the robotic science probe atop an Atlas 5 rocket for liftoff later this month, using a booster originally built to send astronauts into space.

NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada view the rollout of a Boeing Starliner spacecraft before a test flight in December 2019. Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky

NASA has reassigned two rookie astronauts from missions on Boeing’s troubled Starliner crew capsule to a SpaceX crew mission to the International Space Station late next year, a move agency officials said will allow the astronauts to gain spaceflight experience for future lunar expeditions.

SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Resilience spacecraft docked at the International Space Station on May 1, 2021. Credit: NASA

SpaceX is about to double the size of its fleet of Crew Dragon spaceships. The company is debuting a new spacecraft for a NASA launch later this month, and is building a fourth human-rated capsule that should be ready for flight early next year, a SpaceX official said Wednesday.

Live coverage of the countdown and launch Japan’s Epsilon rocket with nine small Japanese and Vietnamese technology demonstration satellites. Text updates will appear automatically below. Follow us on Twitter.



NASA’s Lucy spacecraft is prepared for encapsulation last month inside the payload shroud of its Atlas 5 launcher. Credit: NASA/Ben Smegelsky

Fueled up for a 12-year mission of exploration, NASA’s Lucy science probe is nearly ready for launch Oct. 16 from Florida’s Space Coast to begin a journey through the solar system to visit eight asteroids, a record number for a single mission.

A SpaceX supply ship blazed a trail through the atmosphere over the southeastern United States Thursday night and splashed down in the Atlantic Ocean east of Florida, returning home with 2.3 tons of research specimens and cargo from the International Space Station.

A view of the International Space Station captured Sept. 28 by a cosmonaut on the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft. Credit: Roscosmos

Photos taken by a Russian cosmonaut Tuesday from a Soyuz spacecraft show new exterior views of the International Space Station, with two SpaceX Dragon spaceships, a Northrop Grumman Cygnus supply craft, and the lab’s new roll-out solar arrays visible.

Actor William Shatner. Credit: NASA

Blue Origin confirmed Monday that actor William Shatner, who played Captain Kirk on “Star Trek,” will fly into space on a suborbital launch Oct. 12 from West Texas.

File photo of the most recent Falcon Heavy launch in June 2019. Credit: SpaceX

The next flight of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket, previously scheduled for this month, has been pushed back to early 2022 after more delays caused by its U.S. military payload, a Space Force spokesperson said.



STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS & USED WITH PERMISSION

Live coverage of the Expedition 65 mission on the International Space Station. Text updates will appear automatically below; there is no need to reload the page. Follow us on Twitter.

File photo of a Falcon 9 launch. Credit: Michael Cain / Spaceflight Now / Coldlife Photography

The Italian Space Agency says it has booked a launch with SpaceX as soon as November for a COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation radar remote sensing satellite, shifting the spacecraft from a European Vega C rocket to a Falcon 9 flight from Cape Canaveral.

STORY WRITTEN FOR CBS NEWS & USED WITH PERMISSION



EDITOR’S NOTE: NASA TV’s live coverage of the Soyuz MS-18 relocation begins at 8 a.m. EDT (1200 GMT).

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket blasts off from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, with the Landsat 9 satellite. Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

NASA and United Launch Alliance deployed a new Landsat satellite in orbit Monday after liftoff on an Atlas 5 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, marking the 2,000th launch from the West Coast spaceport since 1958 and extending a series of Earth observations used by farmers, urban planners, and climate scientists.

A United Launch Atlas 5 rocket is set for launch with the Landsat 9 satellite, a joint project between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, and four small CubeSat rideshare payloads.

Live coverage of the countdown and launch of an Atlas 5 rocket with the Landsat 9 Earth observation satellite for NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. Text updates will appear automatically below. Follow us on Twitter.