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Intuitive Machines have successfully soft landed on the Moon, carrying a number of payloads for NASA, this represents a return to the moon for the USA. However far more significantly, it's the first purely commercial lander to land on the surface of the moon, and the first lunar lander to use purely cryogenic propellents for all its deep space maneuvering. Both of these factors are core to NASA's Artemis program, and so seeing success here is important to NASA's plans.However.It's far from a perfect success, because it appears to have fallen over during the landing, and this is limiting the...

[snip] ...In the suit, however, shareholders claim that Amazon "acted in bad faith" and made no effort to properly discharge their fiduciary duties when picking the launch providers. They primarily claim that SpaceX, the leader within the industry was glossed over and not even considered when making the decision. If that were the case, they would have a valid point considering the cost per launch and timeline these satellites are meant to launch by... [/snip]Amazon Shareholders Think SpaceX Should Have Been Picked For Kuiper Launches | 8:06TheSpaceBucket | 23.3K subscribers | 17,895 views | September 1, 2023

As a spacewalk was being planned to move a radiator onto a new module on the space station a cooling system on the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft was seen leaking into space. This resulted in the space walk being cancelled and the crew investigating this problem while trying to limit effects on the station's scientific experiments.Will Leaking Russian Spaceship Leave The Crew Stranded In Space?Scott Manley | 1.53M subscribers | 196,864 views | December 15, 2022

Several satellite and space launches throughout October 2022.

This week Firefly Aerospace signed a deal with Northrop Grumman to replace the first stage of the Antares rocket with the first stage of Firefly Beta, this will eliminate the dependence on Russian engines and bring the manufacturing of the major structural parts into the US.Firefly Will Replace Russian Engines On Antares Rocket With Beta Booster | August 11, 2022 | Scott Manley

Industry experts say US and European economic sanctions against Russia for military action against Ukraine could create economic opportunities for the Indian space sector, rather than burden it with economic costs. He also felt that to seize the opportunity, India should accelerate its satellite launching capabilities, and announce Productivity Concessions (PLI) schemes for the aerospace sector. "All countries that are feeling the pinch due to the absence of Russian rockets for launching satellites may consider alternatives. While the bulk of the satellite launch agreement will be taken up by the United States and Europe, there There will be others who...

It turns out that many rocket fuels are basic chemicals that are used in everyday life, which means you can find them in regular stores. But you shouldn't be under any illusion that these would work or be a good idea for a rocket.A better way to build rockets is to buy pre-made solid rocket motors, and then get certified by experts for bigger and bigger rocket motors https://www.nar.org/.Why Many Household Chemicals Are Also Rocket Fuels | February 24, 2022 | Scott Manley

The final batch of projects which SpaceX announced development of but later abandoned in favour of other goals. As technology was developed some plans were realised to be beyond what was possible in the timescale, or more cost effective solutions were discovered, or the benefits weren't going to deliver an advantage to the overall business.SpaceX's Abandoned Plans - Final Episode (for now!) | June 28, 2020 | Scott Manley

NASA's new Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer spacecraft is a tiny satellite with the unique ability to capture images in X-ray with polarization and timing information for every photon captured. It's designed to operate for 2 years and capture new scientific measurements of some of the most extreme places in the universe with gravitational and magnetic fields that would destroy ordinary matter.And in an interesting turn of events the satellite switched from the intended launch vehicle to a cheaper option that nobody considered - the Falcon 9. This is the first time we've seen a rocket lauched from a domestic US...

Plutonium is generally thought of as an artificial element created by humans, primarily to make the pits of nuclear weapons, but naturally occurring plutonium can be found in ancient rocks. Plutonium 244 is the longest lived isotope of Plutonium, but it's not easy to make, and finding this specific isotope in interstellar dust grains laid down on the ocean floors tells us important things about the formation of the elements that make up the Earth.Based on this paper:60Fe and 244Pu deposited on Earth constrain the r-process yields of recent nearby supernovae A. Wallner et al

After a revised budget proposal from the Whitehouse added another $1.6billion mostly to pay to stop more SLS delays NASA announced that their plan to return to the Moon in 5 years would be named 'Artemis'. Which is of course the best name for any lunar program, so good in fact that NASA aren't the first people to use the name of this goddess for a space program. So let's have a quick tour of other projects with the same name. Realistically, the budget may not happen, for obvious political reasons, but I hope the name stays.