Space Missions

UK-based spaceflight company Orbex, has unveiled the first full-scale prototype of the Prime orbital launch vehicle on its dedicated launch pad. Prime is designed to launch small satellites to orbit and it is the first microlauncher developed in Europe to reach this stage of technical readiness. Orbex is now preparing for the first vertical rocket launch in history from UK soil.

The Republic of Colombia signed the Artemis Accords at NASA Headquarters where Vice President and Foreign Minister Marta Lucía Ramírez signed the agreement on behalf of the country. The countries also celebrate the 200th anniversary of the US–Colombia diplomatic relations.

US/UAE space tech company Precious Payload announced the acquisition of German space tech company HOSTmi, to fast-forward the commercialization of the European space industry. The partnership will utilize Precious Payload’s developer tools and smart solutions to strengthen existing HOSTmi services and lead joint projects.

Space4Impact, EPFL’s Space Center eSpace, E2MC Ventures, and Space Innovation joined forces to launch an online course on the New Space Economy. The program is available on edX as a free EPFLx course. Learners can watch more than 30 video lectures by space experts from various domains within startups, academia, the private sector, and public institutions in Switzerland.

The United States’ National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) is partnering with the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) on the historic first commercial rocket to be launched from the UK, the MOD announced. The launch will be carried out by Virgin Orbit, sending 9 multinational rideshares to orbit aboard its LauncherOne and a modified Boeing 747 aircraft.

Small satellite manufacturer Terran Orbital, primarily serving the United States aerospace and defense industry, announced it has shipped its CAPSTONE satellite to a launch site in New Zealand. The satellite will launch on Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket using a Lunar Photon satellite upper stage to deploy the spacecraft on a lunar transfer trajectory. 

Startup AST SpaceMobile, announced it has received an experimental license from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) supporting its US-based testing of the BlueWalker 3 satellite. The company is building the first space-based cellular broadband network designed to be accessible directly by standard mobile phones, SpaceMobile said.

The Near Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec), a key instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope (Webb) has successfully passed all its functional tests including subsystems and mechanisms, Airbus said. The NIRSpec commissioning team, including experts from Airbus, performed the required tests as Webb continues cooling down to cryogenic temperatures.

UK-based space situational awareness specialists Northern Space and Security Limited (NORSS), and Australian Nominal Systems, have been awarded a contract to develop ARTSIM a spacecraft and missions simulator solution to support the UK Ministry of Defence’s (MoD) future satellite operational plans, NORSS said. to provide a modular, data representative satellite simulation architecture.

Australian space company, Gilmour Space Technologies, announced that is has been selected to develop and launch a new sovereign surveillance satellite for the Department of Defence, as part of the government’s AU $7 billion investment in new space capabilities. The AU $15 million partnership is in line with Australia’s recently released Defence Space Strategy.