| | | A SpaceNews daily newsletter | | 01/29/2025 | | | | | President Donald Trump instructed SpaceX to return two NASA astronauts "stranded" on the ISS since last summer, even though SpaceX is already planning to bring them back soon. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk posted on social media late Tuesday that Trump asked SpaceX to bring the astronauts back "as soon as possible," which Trump confirmed in his own post a few hours later. Neither provided additional details and NASA did not answer questions about the announcement. The astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, flew to the station on Boeing's CST-100 Starliner in June, but remained there when NASA decided to bring back Starliner uncrewed, citing concerns about its thrusters. The two are currently scheduled to return on the Crew-9 Dragon spacecraft, likely in early April. NASA has previously rejected the notion that the astronauts are stranded as they had the ability to return home at any time in an emergency. [SpaceNews]
The Defense Department has not paused contracts despite a White House directive freezing other federal spending. The Pentagon said Tuesday it had not stopped contract awards after an OMB memo Monday ordering a "temporary pause" of grants, loans and other financial assistance. The memo, the Pentagon said, did not apply to military programs, although some Army offices did temporarily suspend contracting actions in response to the memo. The Pentagon will "temporarily pause activities related to the obligation or disbursement of financial assistance," though. [SpaceNews]
United Launch Alliance is slated to conduct more military launches this year than SpaceX. Brig. Gen. Kristin Panzenhagen, head of the Space Force's assured access to space office, said at the Space Mobility conference Tuesday that the service has 11 Vulcan launches scheduled for 2025 and seven on Falcon rockets. That schedule depends on the timing of certification of Vulcan, although the Space Force currently expects the first national security Vulcan launch to take place as soon as this spring. [SpaceNews]
The Space Force is still developing its strategy for the use of in-space logistics. Following a $30 million congressional allocation in 2023 aimed at accelerating these efforts, the Space Force has yet to solidify its long-term strategy for in-space services to allow the maneuvering and servicing of satellites. The service has awarded contracts to commercial players including Astroscale, Starfish Space, Northrop Grumman and Orbit Fab for various prototype projects. Space Force Maj. Gen. Dennis Bythewood, a special assistant to the chief of space operations, said at the Space Mobility conference that the service has not decided on a funding level for those efforts in its 2026 budget request amid reports that at least one version of that proposal zeroed out funding for it. [SpaceNews]
Thales Alenia Space has signed a contract to develop a Venus mission for ESA. Thales and ESA officials signed contract valued at 367 million euros ($383 million) Tuesday for the EnVision mission. The spacecraft is scheduled to launch in late 2031 to orbit Venus, carrying instruments from ESA as well as NASA to study the planet. Thales Alenia Space expects to finalize the industrial team and get full authorization to proceed with the mission's next steps in June 2026. [SpaceNews]
FAA officials believe they can meet a March 2026 deadline to shift existing launch licenses to new regulations. Those regulations, called Part 450, were intended to streamline the launch licensing process, but companies have complained they are difficult to work with. An FAA official said at the Space Mobility conference Tuesday that they are working with the companies that hold 20 older launch licenses that need to move to the new regulations, and have schedules in place that would allow that transition to be complete by the end of this year. The FAA is also working on ways to improve Part 450, including an aerospace rule-making committee that started work last month. [SpaceNews]
| | | | | India's first launch of the year placed a navigation satellite into orbit Tuesday night. A GSLV Mark 2 rocket lifted off at 7:53 p.m. Eastern from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota. It placed into orbit NVS-02, the second of five new-generation spacecraft for the Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC). NVS-02 will operate from GEO, replacing the IRNSS-1E satellite. The mission was the first of 10 orbital launches planned by India in 2025 and also the 100th launch from Sriharikota. [SpaceNews]
Blue Origin scrubbed a New Shepard suborbital flight Tuesday because of weather and technical issues. The company called off launch of the NS-29 mission from its West Texas test site after an extended hold initially caused by weather conditions. The company later said it was working on a technical issue with the vehicle as well. New Shepard is carrying 30 payloads, most of which will take advantage of lunar gravity levels during a portion of the flight when the capsule is spun. Blue Origin did not announce a new launch date for NS-29. [Space.com]
The Aerospace Corp. is collaborating with Google Public Sector to improve space weather forecasts. The organizations announced Tuesday they will work together to apply artificial intelligence and high-performance computing to solar-activity forecasts. Forecasters have struggled to predict solar flares and coronal mass ejections due in part to the complexity of solar activity and the volume of observations. Google will apply technologies like Vertex AI, a Google Cloud machine-learning platform, to the problem. [SpaceNews]
The CEOs of Airbus and Leonardo met Tuesday to discuss a possible satellite alliance. The CEO of Leonardo, Roberto Cingolani, said he met with his counterpart at Airbus, Guillaume Faury, to discuss how the two companies, along with Thales Alenia Space, could work together to combine their satellite businesses in some way. Such a combination, which has been rumored since last year, could allow those European companies to be more competitive against American firms. Cingolani didn't offer a timeline for reaching an agreement on an alliance, noting that such discussions take time. [Reuters]
Starlink direct-to-smartphone connectivity may soon be coming to iPhones. Apple has been working with SpaceX and T-Mobile to incorporate Starlink into the next update of the iPhone's operating system. T-Mobile, which is partnered with SpaceX on Starlink direct-to-device services in the United States, currently only offers the service on some Samsung phones. Adding Starlink to iPhones would compete with Apple's existing partnership with Globalstar to provide satellite connectivity through that company's satellites. [Bloomberg]
A near Earth asteroid has a small chance of hitting Earth in 2032, but don't panic yet. Observations of 2024 YR4, an asteroid discovered a month ago, led to an estimated orbit that gives the asteroid a 1-in-83 chance of hitting the Earth in December 2032. Additional observations may refine the orbit and eliminate any chance of an impact, a situation that often occurs with newly discovered asteroids. The asteroid currently has a rating of 3 on the 0-to-10 Torino Scale used by planetary scientists to gauge impact risk, only the second time an asteroid has rated higher than 2 on that scale. [Sky & Telescope]
| | | | | | Be Nice to the Space Lawyers
| | | | "I think the moon is here to stay unless we do something incredibly wrong with the space lawyers."
– Seth Lacy, senior scientist for space mobility and precision maneuver at AFRL, on the prospects for commercial lunar activities during a panel at the Space Mobility conference Tuesday.
| | | | What's New With SpaceNews? |  | | Check out the latest episode of Commercial Space Transformers, our new video series featuring conversations between SpaceNews Senior Staff Writer Jason Rainbow and the people driving the space industry's commercial transformation. This week, Theresa Condor, CEO of Spire Global, discusses the evolution of Spire since its founding in 2012, the changes in the commercial space industry, and the company's strategies under Condor's leadership.
Watch out for new episodes every Tuesday on SpaceNews.com and on the SpaceNews YouTube channel.
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