commercial space industry News

SpaceX Still Doesn’t Know Why Falcon 9 Rocket Exploded

SpaceX is still homing in on why its Falcon 9 rocket exploded after liftoff last week, unable to resolve conflicting data radioed back to the ground before the explosion, CEO Elon Musk said on Tuesday. “It’s a huge blow to …

2 Explosions Trigger Debate Over Future of Private Space Business

Fiery failures are no stranger to the space game. It’s what happens when you push the boundaries of what technology can do, where people can go. And it happened again to Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo. In the past decade, the space …

Virgin Galactic Spaceship Crashes; Co-Pilot Reported Dead

A spacecraft for Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic Ltd. tourism operator crashed during a test flight in California’s Mojave Desert, killing the co-pilot and injuring the pilot. The pilot ejected and suffered “moderate to major injuries,” Kern County Sheriff’s spokesman Ray …

Commercial Rocket Explosion Draws Attention to Space Industry Risk, Oversight

A NASA advisory panel said earlier this year that inadequate funding jeopardized the safety of commercial space cargo shipments, such as the unmanned Orbital Sciences Corp. mission that exploded this week over Virginia. In its annual report released in January, …