Three years ago, NASA tossed a massive pallet of old batteries from the International Space Station (ISS), hoping that it would burn up through Earth’s atmosphere.
In a tense moment for space safety, two satellites—NASA’s TIMED spacecraft and the defunct Russian Cosmos 2221—came alarmingly close to smashing into each other above Earth, prompting concerns about the risks of space debris.
An unspecified defect in early model Starlink satellites has prompted SpaceX to preemptively deorbit the units before they potentially fail and become hazards in low Earth orbit. While the company remains confident that the deorbiting of these problematic units will prevent any issues, this incident underscores the…
After 13 years of slow orbital decay, a legacy satellite will finally be put out of its misery by plunging through Earth’s atmosphere where it will burn up into tiny fragments.
Earth’s orbit will be monitored by a watchful set of robotic eyes, the first commercial constellation of satellites with the ability to keep track of objects in space to avoid collisions between spacecraft.
Zipping far above Earth, it’s not exactly easy for satellites to find a corner gas station when the fuel gauge gets low. To tackle this cosmic conundrum, a Space Force-funded initiative is working on an innovative solution to refuel distant satellites on-the-fly.
The surface of the Moon is littered with defunct hardware from past missions that are now buried amongst the lunar regolith. A recent crash site left a distinct and curious mark, creating two impact craters of equal size. Scientists examining the collision believe that there may have been an undisclosed object that…
Earth’s orbit can be a chaotic place, with defunct spacecraft darting aimlessly across the dark skies. In order to tackle the growing issue of space debris, Airbus created a new device designed to keep satellites from tumbling around after they’re no longer of use.
Amazon’s space venture, Project Kuiper, is making good progress, with a pair of prototype satellites executing controlled maneuvers in low Earth orbit. The ongoing Protomission, as it’s called, sets the stage for the company to further develop its internet satellite constellation, one that could eventually compete…
In space, misplacing a bag of tools is hard to recover from. A tiny mishap during a recent spacewalk outside the International Space Station (ISS) has led to a new object in the night sky, with a tool bag now orbiting Earth ahead of the space station, temporarily taunting the astronauts who dropped it.