Axiom-1 is the first all-private mission to the International Space Station, chartered by Axiom Space through SpaceX in the hopes of funding a private space station.
Category: space travel – Page 181
The space economy is ready for lift-off: First into orbit, and then to the Moon
2022 is set to be a major year for the space economy. According to the Space Foundation, 15 new launch vehicles are set to debut this year, more than any other year in space history. Last year, US spaceports had more launches than any year since 1967, and the number is climbing. Meanwhile, employment in the core US space industry employment is at a 10-year high.
The momentum is there for a flourishing space economy that, according to NASA leaders, could in 20 years take public and private missions beyond low Earth orbit (LEO), with services and infrastructure on the lunar surface and in cislunar space. It’s a fast-growing economy, NASA leaders said at the 37th Space Symposium, that offers promising opportunities for young people who want to get their foot in the door.
The space economy is already a $400 billion industry “and on the way to $1 trillion, and I suspect it’ll get there faster than we think,” James Reuter, associate administrator for the Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) at NASA, said during a panel this week at the 37th Space Symposium in Colorado Springs.
SpaceX Mars City: Why, when, and how Elon Musk wants to build his ambitious plan
Musk plans to build a self-sustaining city on Mars.
Here is what you need to know about Musk’s mission.
What is the Mars city?
Musk plans to build a full-size city on the surface of Mars. This would be a city open to regular people, not just scientists and researchers.
People interested in moving to Mars could pay for their flight with a loan. Once there, people would be able to pay off the loan by working in anything from iron foundries to pizzerias. Musk declared at a 2016 conference that there would be labor shortages for a long time.
Space Perspective unveils lavish interior of balloon-borne tourist capsule
Spaceship Neptune will start carrying customers to the stratosphere in 2024, if all goes according to plan.
Space Perspective wants its passengers to fly in style.
The Florida-based company is working to send paying customers (as well as research payloads) to the stratosphere aboard its “Spaceship Neptune,” a pressurized capsule that will cruise high above Earth beneath an enormous balloon.
SpaceX rapidly constructing Starship’s first Florida launch pad and tower
After restarting work on the project a few months ago, SpaceX appears to have gotten back up to speed and begun to make rapid progress on the construction of Starship’s first Florida launch pad and tower.
Located at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Launch Complex 39A facilities, SpaceX has intended to construct a Starship launch site there for several years. A serious attempt was made in late 2019 but SpaceX soon abandoned the effort and redirected its energy towards Starship prototyping and a much different launch pad design. Two years later, SpaceX’s second attempt shares only a little in common with the first. Both are to be located within the eastern half of Pad 39A’s shield-like footprint, although the specific location of the tower and launch mount has been modified. If this attempt comes to fruition, Starship’s first East Coast launch facilities will still sit just a few hundred feet away from the only SpaceX pad capable of launching Crew Dragon, Cargo Dragon, or Falcon Heavy.
Beyond those two characteristics, SpaceX’s second attempt is almost entirely different.
Moog opens spacecraft-integration facility
COLORADO SPRINGS — Moog Inc. is quadrupling the size of its Colorado space vehicle production capacity as the New York-based company long known as a spacecraft component supplier expands its role as a space vehicle integrator.
“It’s a proud moment for our company,” Maureen Athoe, Moog Space and Defense Group president, told SpaceNews. “This step takes us to the mission level. We’re going to hear from our customers about what they need not just with components, but with the actual mission.”
This year, Moog is scheduled to integrate nine space vehicles in its new 8,800-square-meter facility in Arvada, Colorado, and its existing 3,000-square-meter plant nearby.
Elon Musk has a ‘very human side to him,’ according to a NASA astronaut who completed a SpaceX mission
NASA astronaut Doug Hurley reminisced on what it was like working with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk before he flew on a historic flight to space and back in 2020.
In an interview with Fox News, Hurley spoke about his impressions of Musk, the billionaire space race, and a new Netflix documentary, “Return to Space” which follows Hurley’s journey and that of fellow astronaut Bob Behnken as they embarked on the first human SpaceX mission to the International Space Station.
In May 2020, Musk and SpaceX made history after the company successfully launched two astronauts into space aboard a Crew Dragon spaceship. Shortly after, the astronauts’ ship docked at the International Space Station.
Space station’s first all-private astronaut team welcomed aboard orbiting platform
April 9 (Reuters) — The first all-private team of astronauts ever launched to the International Space Station (ISS) were welcomed aboard the orbiting research platform on Saturday to begin a weeklong science mission hailed as a milestone in commercial spaceflight.
Their arrival came about 21 hours after the four-man team representing Houston-based startup company Axiom Space Inc lifted off on Friday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, riding atop a SpaceX-launched Falcon 9 rocket.
The Crew Dragon capsule lofted into orbit by the rocket docked with the ISS at about 8:30 a.m. EDT (1230 GMT) on Saturday as the two space vehicles were flying roughly 250 miles (420 km) above the central Atlantic Ocean, a live webcast of the coupling from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration showed.