It’s been an unusually busy week in spaceflight, with the chatter restricted to rockets still on the ground. In a particularly festive update, United Launch Alliance (ULA) is gearing up for the launch of its Vulcan Centaur rocket on Christmas Eve.
NASA is gearing up to start a crucial series of tests on the updated RS-25 engine, which will power the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket for upcoming Artemis missions to the Moon.
The Ukrainian space agency is not too happy with the results of an investigation into the Vega-C rocket anomaly, which blamed a faulty part made in Ukraine for the mission failure.
The European Space Agency (ESA) announced the results of a months long investigation into the failed launch of its Vega-C rocket back in December, pinpointing a malfunction with a motor component as the reason behind the catastrophic anomaly.
Last summer, Astra’s Rocket 3.3 came crashing down after failing to reach orbit and deliver a pair of shoe-box sized satellites. Following a six-month investigation, the California-based startup identified the culprit: fuel injector blockage that resulted in combustion chamber burn-through.
As NASA gears up for a return to the Moon with the Artemis missions, the administration has announced that its researchers have successfully developed and tested a new type of supersonic rocket engine called a rotating detonation rocket engine.