For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM NASA WALLOPS FLIGHT FACILITY, VA – The commercial Antares rocket put on an awesome display of flawless rocketry and fireworks as it thundered aloft under picture perfect skies from the Virginia shore on NASA’s Wallops Island launch base last weekend delivering the Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo craft to orbit Saturday, Nov. 2 and successful arrival at
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – A missing pin connecting lines between a pilot parachute and a main parachute caused the clearly visible failure of the 3rd parachute to deploy from Boeing’s Starliner space taxi during the Pad Abort Test with a test version of the vehicle this week on Monday, Nov. 4 – a critical test of
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM NASA WALLOPS FLIGHT FACILITY, VA – A pair of NASA’s female American astronauts successfully grappled the Cygnus commercial cargo freighter using the Canadian-built hi tech robotic arm Monday morning, Nov. 4 after its flawless and beautiful blastoff from NASA’s mid-Atlantic launch base on Virginia’s shores on Saturday, Nov. 2 and two day voyage from the Earth
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM TITUSVILLE, FL- SpaceX engineers completed a lunchtime static fire test of their Falcon 9 rocket today Tuesday, Nov. 5 on Cape Canaveral and are now targeting Monday morning Nov. 11 for launch of the second batch of 60 Starlink broadband satellites to LEO – the mission also marks a major new milestone in rocket recycling by
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – Boeing completed a critical test of the emergency abort system for the Starliner commercial crew capsule that was mostly successful – except for an unexplained anomaly that resulted in 1 of 3 main landing parachutes failing to deploy during the Pad Abort Test carried out on Monday, November 4 by firing off
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM NASA WALLOPS FLIGHT FACILITY, VA – After mid-week torrential downpours cleared out hordes of space enthusiasts witnessed a gorgeous liftoff of the most powerful version of the Northrop Grumman commercial Antares rocket and Cygnus cargo freighter from NASA’s mid-Atlantic launch base on Virginia’s eastern shore to the International Space Station on Saturday, Nov. 2 carrying a
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM NASA WALLOPS FLIGHT FACILITY, VA – If you have never seen a rocket launch – this could be the one for you. Millions and millions of US East Coast residents could wake up Saturday morning Nov. 2 and enjoy the breakfast time launch of the commercial Antares rocket from the eastern shore of Virginia to the
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM CAPE CANAVERAL, FL- The German Mole is on the move at last on Mars on NASA’s InSight lander after a lot of hard work by engineers on both sides of the Atlantic have has finally paid off trying to save the stuck deep penetrating heat probe on the agency’s spacecraft designed explore the deep interior of
For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM KENNEDY SPACE CENTER/CAPE CANAVERAL AIR FORCE STATION – At last after years of development effort and delays its finally getting real as all the key flight hardware for the maiden uncrewed test flight of the Boeing Starliner commercial crew capsule is coming together for its first blastoff on a shakedown cruise to the International Space Station
For Spaceupclose.com and RocketSTEM Cape Canaveral, FL – A dynamic duo of NASA women astronauts – Christina Koch and Jessica Meir – made history Friday, Oct. 18 when they carried out and successfully completed history’s 1st all-female spacewalk soaring some 250 miles (400 km) above Earth while working and floating outside the International Space Station (ISS) on a critical job