Europe’s Euclid space telescope launches to map the dark universe

On late Saturday morning, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the European Space Agency’s Euclid spacecraft successfully lifted off Cape Canaveral, Florida. The near-infrared telescope, named after the ancient Greek mathematician who is widely considered the father of geometry, will study how dark matter and dark energy shape the universe.

In addition to a 600-megapixel camera astronomers will use to image a third of the night sky over the next six years, Euclid is equipped with a near-infrared spectrometer and photometer for measuring the redshift of galaxies. In conjunction with data from ground observatories, that information will assist scientists with estimating the distance between different galaxies. As The New York Times notes, one hope of physicists is that Euclid will allow them to determine whether Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity works differently on a cosmic scale. There’s a genuine possibility the spacecraft could revolutionize our understanding of physics and even offer a glimpse of the ultimate fate of the universe.

“If we want to understand the universe we live in, we need to uncover the nature of dark matter and dark energy and understand the role they played in shaping our cosmos,” said Carole Mundell, the ESA’s director of science. “To address these fundamental questions, Euclid will deliver the most detailed map of the extra-galactic sky.”

With Euclid now in space, it will travel approximately a million miles to the solar system’s second Lagrange point. That’s the same area of space where the James Webb Space Telescope has been operating for the past year. It will take Euclid about a month to travel there, and another three months for the ESA to test the spacecraft’s instruments before Euclid can begin sending data back to Earth.

A shot of the Euclid space telescope against the dark of space.

NASA launches powerful air quality monitor to keep an eagle-eye on pollution

NASA has launched an innovative air quality monitoring instrument into a fixed-rotation orbit around Earth. The tool is called TEMPO, which stands for Tropospheric Emissions Monitoring of Pollution instrument, and it keeps an eye on a handful of harmful airborne pollutants in the atmosphere, such as nitrogen dioxide, formaldehyde and ground-level ozone. These chemicals are the building blocks of smog.

TEMPO traveled to space hitched to a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launching from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. NASA says the launch was completed successfully, with the atmospheric satellite separating from the rocket without any incidents. NASA acquired the appropriate signal and the agency says the instrument will begin monitoring duties in late May or early June.

TEMPO sits at a fixed geostationary orbit just above the equator and it measures air quality over North America every hour and measures regions spaced apart by just a few miles. This is a significant improvement to existing technologies, as current measurements are conducted within areas of 100 square miles. TEMPO should be able to take accurate measurements from neighborhood to neighborhood, giving a comprehensive view of pollution from both the macro and micro levels.

This also gives us some unique opportunities to pick up new kinds of data, such as changing pollution levels throughout rush hour, the effects of lightning on the ozone layer, the movement of pollution related to forest fires and the long-term effects of fertilizers on the atmosphere, among other data points. More information is never bad. 

NASA

TEMPO is the middle child in a group of high-powered instruments tracking pollution. South Korea's Geostationary Environment Monitoring Spectrometer went up in 2020, measuring pollution over Asia, and the ESA (European Space Agency) Sentinel-4 satellite launches in 2024 to handle European and North African measurements. Other tracking satellites will eventually join TEMPO up there in the great black, including the forthcoming NASA instrument to measure the planet's crust.

You may notice that TEMPO flew into space on a SpaceX rocket and not a NASA rocket. This is by design, as the agency is testing a new business model to send crucial instruments into orbit. Paying a private company seems to be the more budget-friendly option when compared to sending up a rocket itself. 

The NASA TEMPO launch seen at night from a distance, with the rocket blazing as it takes off.

SpaceX’s Crew-5 mission safely returns to Earth after five months in space

SpaceX’s Crew-5 mission has safely returned to Earth. On Saturday evening, the company’s “Endurance” Dragon spacecraft splashed down off the coast of Florida following a five-month stay at the International Space Station. The capsule was carrying NASA astronauts Josh Cassada and Nicole Mann, Japan’s Koichi Wakata and Russian cosmonaut Anna Kikina.

The four spent 157 days in orbit during an ISS rotation that was one for the history books. As Space.com points out, the Crew-5 mission saw Mann, a member of the Wailaki people, become the first Native American woman to fly in space. It was also the first time a Russian cosmonaut flew aboard a private American spacecraft, a milestone made possible after NASA and Roscosmos signed a seat-sharing agreement last year amid increasing US and Russian tensions due to the war in Ukraine.

For Wakata, the flight was his fifth return from space, a Japanese record. The mission also marked the second orbital trip for Endurance after the capsule successfully carried the Crew-3 crew back to Earth last fall. The spacecraft will now return to SpaceX’s Dragon Lair facility in Florida for safety checks and refurbishment ahead of its next flight.

Not on the flight was NASA astronaut Frank Rubio, who flew to the ISS on MS-22, the Russian Soyuz spacecraft that sprung a coolant leak late last year following an apparent micrometeoroid strike. The Endurance crew temporarily retrofitted their ride to carry Rubio in case of an emergency evacuation from the ISS after Roscomos determined MS-22 could only safely transport two people. They later removed those modifications after Russia sent a replacement Soyuz spacecraft to bring Rubio and cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin back to Earth.

Roscosmos cosmonaut Anna Kikina, left, NASA astronauts Josh Cassada and Nicole Mann, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Koichi Wakata, right, are seen inside the SpaceX Dragon Endurance spacecraft onboard the SpaceX recovery ship Shannon shortly after having landed in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Tampa, Florida, Saturday, March 11, 2023.

Relativity Space's 3D-printed rocket fails to lift off during second launch attempt

Another day, another scrub for the world’s first 3D-printed rocket. On Saturday, Relativity Space’s Terran 1 rocket failed to get off the ground after two launch attempts. It was a day of false starts. Following Wednesday's scrub, Relativity Space initially set its sights on a 1:45PM ET launch, a window the company later pushed back to 2:45PM ET due to "upper-level wind violations." 

After the countdown restarted, all was going well until a boat entered the spacecraft’s range. Once the countdown resumed again, the company called a launch abort at t-minus zero after the spacecraft’s nine first-stage Aeon engines roared to life and then cut off almost immediately after. After blaming a "launch commit criteria violation" for the 2:45PM abort, Relativity Space said it would attempt to fly the rocket again at 4PM ET, just as its launch window was about to close for the day. Unfortunately, the second time around Relativity called an abort before Terran 1 could even ignite its engines. As of the writing of this article, the company did not provide a reason for the decision, but said the rocket was "healthy" and that it would have more information to share soon.  

Provided it can get off the ground, Terran 1 would represent a significant milestone for spaceflight technology. While the rocket isn’t completely 3D-printed, 85 percent of its mass is – including its entire structure and 10 first- and second-stage engines. In theory, Terran 1’s manufacturing process produces a spacecraft that is cheaper and faster to make. Relativity Space claims it can build a Terran 1 rocket in about 60 days, and that exclusive missions will cost around $12 million to complete. With future spacecraft, the company hopes to make around 90 percent of the vehicle from 3D-printed parts. 

Relativity Space's Terran 1 rocket against a background of blue sky, clouds and palm trees.

Japan's H3 rocket self-destructs in space during failed launch

JAXA's second attempt at launching the H3 rocket has ended up becoming a major setback for Japan's space ambitions. While the rocket was able to leave the launch pad, the country's space authorities were forced to activate its flight termination system a few minutes later after its second stage engine failed to ignite. In an announcement, JAXA said the self-destruct command was transmitted to the rocket at 10:52 AM Japan time (8:52PM ET) "because there was no possibility of achieving the mission." The agency is still investigating the incident to figure out what went wrong.

The H3 was built by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries after the program was first approved in 2013, and it cost the country over 200 billion yen ($1.5 billion). JAXA was hoping to launch the rocket in 2020 — and it did complete a functional test for the H3 that year — but had to delay its inaugural flight due to engineering problems. Its first actual launch attempt on February 17th this year was aborted before the vehicle was able to lift off due to an electrical interference issue in the first stage. 

According to Nikkei Asia, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida sees the H3 as "crucial to the nation's business and national security ambitions." It was created to put a lot more Japanese surveillance satellites in orbit and to become the key component of a business that will offer launch services to clients. JAXA and Mitsubishi were apparently able to halve its original launch costs to $50 million, which they believed is lower than the launch costs of SpaceX's Falcon 9. In the future, it's also expected to ferry cargo to support the NASA Artemis program's Lunar Gateway project.  

The destroyed H3 rocket was carrying ALOS-3, a satellite with disaster management tools that can be quickly deployed to observe affected areas. Reuters says it was also equipped with an experimental infrared sensor that was created with the ability to detect North Korean ballistic missile launches

Japan's next generation "H3" rocket, carrying the advanced optical satellite "Daichi 3", leaves the launch pad at the Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima, southwestern Japan on March 7, 2023. - Japan's next-generation H3 rocket failed after liftoff on March 7, with the space agency issuing a destruct command after concluding the mission could not succeed. (Photo by JIJI Press / AFP) / Japan OUT (Photo by STR/JIJI Press/AFP via Getty Images)

NASA's DART spacecraft took out over 1,000 tons of rock from its target asteroid

Last year, NASA's DART spacecraft successfully completed its mission: To collide with an asteroid called Dimorphos to see if it was possible to change the trajectory of any potentially planet-killing space rock. Scientists from the DART team have been analyzing the data collected from the mission since then, and they've now published five papers in Nature explaining the details of DART's results. They've also decided that, yes, the method can be used to defend Earth if ever an asteroid big enough to kill us all heads our way. 

Apparently, one of DART's solar panels hit Dimosphos first before its body fully collided with the rock at 6km per second (3.7 miles per second). The spacecraft smashed into the asteroid around 25 meters (85 feet) from its center, which was a huge factor in the mission's success, since it maximized the force of the impact. According to the studies, the collision had managed to eject 1 million kilograms or 1,100 tons of rock from Dimorphos. That spray of rubble flew outwards away from the asteroid, generating four times the momentum of DART's impact and changing Dimorphos' trajectory even further.

While NASA has only tested the mission on one space rock, scientists have concluded that for asteroids as big as Dimorphos (around 560 feet across), we don't even need to send an advance reconnaissance mission. As long as we get at least few years of warning time, though a few decades would be preferable, then we will be able to intercept future asteroid threads. Franck Marchis at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, told Nature: "[W]e can quickly design a mission to deflect an asteroid if there is a threat, and we know that this has a very high chance of being effective."

We're bound to get an even better look at the mission's effect on the asteroid after European Space Agency's Hera spacecraft arrives at Dimorphos in 2026. The mission will study the binary asteroid system Didymos and Dimorphos to further validate DART's kinetic impact method or future use. 

An artist's depiction of NASA's DART spacecraft approaching asteroids.

Russia's replacement Soyuz spacecraft arrives at ISS to bring back MS-22 crew

MS-23, the Soyuz spacecraft Russia sent to bring cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin and NASA astronaut Frank Rubio back to Earth, has arrived at the International Space Station. Per Space.com, Russia’s Roscosmos Space Agency announced early Sunday morning that the unmanned vessel docked with the ISS at 7:58PM ET on Saturday evening. As expected, the flight launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on February 24th.

MS-23 was originally scheduled to launch later this year, but Roscosmos was forced to push up the flight after MS-22 – Prokopyev, Petelin and Rubio’s original return craft – sprung a coolant leak in December following a micrometeoroid strike. The incident put Roscosmos and NASA in a tricky spot. If an emergency broke out on the ISS and the entire crew had to evacuate, it wasn’t clear whether MS-22 could carry its crew safely back to Earth. Roscosmos and NASA eventually settled on a contingency plan that would have seen MS-22 transport Prokopyev and Petelin, while Rubio would have hitched a ride on the SpaceX Crew-5 Dragon. Thankfully, the two agencies weren’t forced to put that plan to the test.

With MS-23 safely docked with the ISS, Prokopyev, Petelin and Rubio will remain at the space station until at least September. The three were originally due to complete their mission in March. In the meantime, Roscomos plans to bring MS-22 back to Earth sometime next month.

The Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft blasts off from the launchpad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan February 24, 2023, in this still image taken from video. Roscosmos/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT.

Russia targets February 24th for Soyuz MS-22 crew rescue launch

Russia has set a new date for when it will send a rescue ship to the International Space Station to retrieve the three astronauts whose Soyuz return craft was compromised in December. The country’s Roscosmos space agency told AFP on Saturday it is targeting a February 24th launch for MS-23, the uncrewed Soyuz spacecraft that is scheduled to bring back cosmonauts Dmitri Petelin and Sergey Prokopyev, as well as NASA astronaut Frank Rubio, from the International Space Station.

Roscosmos delayed the mission last Monday after Progress 82, a supply ship that had been docked with the ISS since last October, began leaking coolant over the weekend. Petelin, Prokopyev and Rubio flew to the space station in September, and they were supposed to return on the same Soyuz spacecraft that brought them there. In December, however, the spacecraft sprung a leak, due to an apparent meteoroid strike. One month later, Roscosmos announced it would send a second Soyuz craft to retrieve the three astronauts. The timing of the leaks lead to some speculation that a manufacturing issue was at fault for the Soyuz leak, not an errant space rock as Roscosmos had said. Earlier this week, the agency shared images (seen above) showing the location of the coolant leak and reported micrometeoroid strike. 

On Saturday, Roscosmos said it had carefully inspected the rescue ship to ensure it was undamaged and ready for flight. One day earlier, Progress 82 separated from the ISS. Per Space News, video broadcast during the undocking procedure failed to show any obvious signs of damage to the resupply craft. According to NASA, Progress 82 will initiate a deorbit burn at 10:15PM ET tonight. Provided Roscosmos doesn’t delay MS-23’s launch, the spacecraft will arrive at the ISS two days before Space X’s Crew-6 mission is scheduled to launch on February 26th. That flight will bring two NASA astronauts, a United Arab Emirates astronaut and a Russian cosmonaut to the space station.

A view shows external damage believed to have caused a loss of pressure in the cooling system of the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft docked to the International Space Station (ISS), in this image released February 13, 2023. Roscosmos/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. MANDATORY CREDIT.

A second Russian spacecraft docked at the ISS is leaking coolant

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before, but a Russian spacecraft docked with the International Space Station has sprung a leak. On Saturday morning, Russia’s Roscosmos space agency disclosed on Telegram that a Progress cargo ship docked with the ISS had lost cabin pressure. NASA later said the depressurization was due to a coolant leak.

“The reason for the loss of coolant in the Progress 82 spacecraft is being investigated,” NASA announced. “The hatches between Progress 82 and the station are open, and temperatures and pressures aboard the station are all normal. The crew, which was informed of the cooling loop leak, is in no danger and continuing with normal space station operations.”

Per Space.com, Progress 82 arrived at the ISS on October 28th. Before Saturday's announcement, the spacecraft was scheduled to leave the station on February 17th. It’s unclear if Roscosmos will move forward with that timeline as originally planned. Russia’s Progress spacecraft are designed to burn up in the Earth’s atmosphere after they complete their resupply missions, meaning there’s no way for Roscosmos to investigate the leak on the ground. The timing of the discovery comes on the same day that a second Progress spacecraft docked with the ISS, and less than two months after another Russian spacecraft sprung a leak at the space station.

In December, Russia’s Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft began leaking coolant just as cosmonauts Dmitri Petelin and Sergey Prokopyev were preparing for a nearly seven-hour spacewalk. Roscosmos later blamed the incident on an apparent meteoroid strike. Unless there’s an emergency at the ISS, Roscosmos has deemed the spacecraft unfit to transport humans. The agency will launch another Soyuz craft later this month to bring Petelin and Prokopyev, as well as NASA astronaut Frank Rubio, back to Earth.

Ars Technica’s Eric Berger points out, the Progress incident raises doubts about whether Soyuz MS-22 was actually hit by a micrometeorite. Russia never released images of the impact, and the country’s space program has a history of recent issues. In 2021, for instance, Roscosmos blamed a software bug on the Nauka misfiring that temporarily moved the ISS out of its usual orientation.

Image of a Russian Progress supply craft docked with the International Space Station, with the black of space in the background.

NASA picks Blue Origin's New Glenn to fly a science mission to Mars

NASA has selected Blue Origin's New Glenn, the company's heavy-lift orbital launch vehicle that has yet to go on its first launch, for a science mission to Mars. As Reuters notes, it's also the company's first interplanetary NASA contract. The mission is called Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers or ESCAPADE, and it was designed to study the planet's magnetosphere using twin spacecraft. NASA is targeting a late 2024 launch for the mission, which means we won't have to wait too long to finally see the New Glenn in action — if the Jeff Bezos-owned space corp can prevent further development delays, that is.

The New Glenn vehicle is the company's answer to SpaceX's Falcon Heavy and other company's heavy-lift vehicles. Blue Origin initially targeted a 2020 date for its first launch — and NASA approved it for future unmanned scientific and exploration missions that year — but the event kept getting pushed back. It was moved to 2021 and then to 2022. By the end of March last year, Jarrett Jones, Blue Origin's SVP for New Glenn, admitted that the vehicle wasn't going to fly for the first time in 2022 and that the company was in the process of setting a new date. 

NASA has granted Blue Origin the contract for ESCAPADE under the Venture-Class Acquisition of Dedicated and Rideshare (VADR) program, which was designed to foster the growth of commercial launch services in the US. The agency intends to use launch vehicles from program participants specifically for "small satellites and Class D payloads" that can tolerate higher risk. In other words, VADR contracts are meant for lower-cost missions. "By using a lower level of mission assurance, and commercial best practices for launching rockets, these highly flexible contracts help broaden access to space through lower launch costs," NASA said in its announcement of New Glenn's selection. 

The ESCAPADE mission will launch from Space Launch Complex-36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. It will take about 11 months for the mission to reach the red planet. After that, it will take a few more months for the twin spacecraft to reach the orbit ideal for gathering information about the Martian magnetosphere. The data it will provide can help give scientists a better understanding of space weather, so that safeguards could be put in place to better protect astronauts and satellites in our continued exploration of outer space. 

A computer render of NASA's ESCAPADE mission showing a spacecraft with Mars in the background.

SpaceX will attempt Starship orbital test in March, says Elon Musk

SpaceX could attempt to complete Starship’s long-awaited orbital test flight as early as next month, according to Elon Musk. Responding on Saturday to a question from one of his Twitter followers, Musk said the private space firm is targeting a March launch attempt. “If remaining tests go well, we will attempt a Starship launch next month,” he wrote.

While the date of Starship’s orbital test flight has been a moving target for much of the past year and a half, there’s reason to believe next month could see the rocket finally fly. In January, Starship successfully completed its first-ever stacked fueling test. The “wet dress rehearsal” saw SpaceX load both stages of the vehicle with more than 10 million pounds of liquid oxygen and methane fuel. Critically, the company also ran through some of the countdown procedures it will need to complete on launch day.

Among the tests SpaceX still needs to carry out, the most crucial is a static firing of all of the Super Heavy stage’s 33 Raptor engines. To date, the company has never ignited more than 14 of the engines at once. That will need to change for SpaceX to obtain the go-ahead for an orbital test flight from the Federal Aviation Administration. As of the end of January, there were signs SpaceX was preparing to carry out the static test fire as early as the first week of February. That didn't happen. However, Musk's comment would seem to indicate SpaceX will attempt the test sooner rather than later.

Starship prototypes are pictured at the SpaceX South Texas launch site near Brownsville, Texas, U.S., May 22, 2022. Picture taken May 22, 2022. REUTERS/Veronica G. Cardenas

SpaceX astronauts will receive the Congressional Space Medal of Honor

Vice President Kamala Harris will today award the Congressional Space Medal of Honor for the first time since 2006. The recipients are Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, who became the first astronauts to fly to space on a crewed SpaceX mission in 2020. The pair, who traveled to the International Space Station and stayed there for almost two months, will receive the honor for their bravery.

Hurley and Behnken were part of the first crewed spaceflight from US soil since the last Space Shuttle mission in 2011. They both also flew on the Space Shuttle, and Hurley was on the program's final flight.

Hurley and Behnken's Demo-2 mission was the first crewed flight under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. Five other SpaceX crews have since flown to the ISS.

The Congressional Space Medal of Honor is typically given to mark a first in space travel, as The Washington Post notes. Previous recipients include Neil Armstrong, Alan Shepard (the first American to travel to space), John Glenn (the first American in orbit) and Frank Borman (commander of Apollo 8, the first lunar orbit mission). The award was also granted posthumously to the crew of Apollo 1 and those who died aboard the Challenger and Columbia shuttles.

NASA astronauts Douglas Hurley and Robert Behnken head to launch pad 39 to board a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket for a second launch attempt on NASA?s SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station from NASA?s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, U.S.  May 30, 2020. REUTERS/Joe Skipper