SpaceX

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 551 rocket stands at Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC-41) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station ahead of the Kuiper Atlas 2 (KA-02) mission launch. Image: Will Robinson-Smith/Spaceflight Now It’s round two for both United Launch Alliance and its customer, Amazon. Monday, June 16, will be ULA’s second Atlas 5 launch of the year and the second batch of Amazon’s Project Kuiper satellites launched to date. Liftoff for the 205-foot-tall (62.5 m) rocket is currently set for 1:25 p.m. EDT (1725 UTC) from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. This is the opening of a 30-minute launch window. Spaceflight Now will have live coverage beginning about an hour prior to liftoff. On Sunday, the 45th Weather Squadron forecast a 75 percent chance for fa...

SpaceX rolls its newest Crew Dragon spacecraft along with the rest of the Falcon 9 rocket stack out to the pad at Launch Complex 39 on June 7, 2025, ahead of the launch of Axiom Mission 4. Image: SpaceX The forthcoming private astronaut mission to the International Space Station managed by Axiom Space is not only its fourth such flight, but it also marks the swan song for a key part of the manufacturing side of SpaceX’s business. The mission, dubbed Axiom Mission 4 or Ax-4, features the debut of the Crew Dragon spacecraft, tail number C213. This has been billed by SpaceX as its fifth and final Dragon capsule. “This is the first flight for this Dragon capsule and I can’t think of a better way for this capsule to enter the fleet than by flying this international crew,” said William Gerstenma...

The four astronauts of Axiom Mission 4 pose together amid a dry dress rehearsal of launch day activities. Left to right: Mission Specialist Tibor Kapu, Pilot Shubhanshu Shukla, Commander Peggy Whitson, Mission Specialists Sławosz Uznański-Wiśniewski. Image: SpaceX Update June 9, 7 p.m. EDT: Added comments from SpaceX on the readiness of the Falcon 9 rocket and the latest launch weather outlook Axiom Space is on verge of its fourth private astronaut mission to space in as many years. The flight, dubbed Axiom Mission 4 (Ax-4), will see the astronauts from India, Poland and Hungary reach the International Space Station for the first time. The four crew members, led by Axiom Space’s Director of Human Spaceflight, Peggy Whitson, will embark on a roughly two-week mission to the orbiting outpost....

The ispace Resilience lunar lander is pictured after it was integrated into the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle adapter about a week ahead of its launch on Jan. 15, 2025. Image: SpaceX via ispace In a horrible case of deja vu, Japan-based company ispace got to the finish line with its robotic lunar lander, but was unsuccessful in safely touching down on the Moon’s surface. The landing attempt came about 4.5 months after the lander lifted off on a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. It was part of a rideshare mission alongside the Blue Ghost lander from Firefly Aerospace. Mission teams in Japan made the call at about 8 a.m. JST (7 p.m. EDT, 2300 UTC) that due to the lack off communication from the lander, named Resilience, likely suffered what’s referred to as a “hard la...

The Boeing Starliner spacecraft is lifted at the Vertical Integration Facility at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on Tuesday, April 16, 2024. Image: NASA/Kim Shiflett One year ago today, Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft docked with the International Space Station to begin its long-awaited Crew Flight Test with NASA astronauts Sunita “Suni” Williams and Barry “Butch” Wilmore onboard. A year later, the future of the Starliner program remains uncertain as NASA announced late Friday that the next flight of the spacecraft was being delayed from no earlier than late 2025 to now early 2026 at the soonest. The agency said the timing of the next launch is “pending system certification and resolution of Starliner’s technical issues.” Repeating what it sa...