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The next Boeing Starliner mission to the International Space Station will carry cargo, not astronauts, under a modified NASA contract. NASA announced Monday that the agency and Boeing had mutually agreed to modify a 2014 contract for crew transportation services, reducing the number of operational missions from six to four. The first of those, Starliner-1, is scheduled to launch no earlier than April but will not have astronauts on board. NASA said the cargo flight will allow it and Boeing to confirm that modifications to the spacecraft to corect thruster problems on a 2024 crewed test flight have been fixed. The reduced number of flights also align with plans to retire the ISS at the end of the decade. [SpaceNews]

China sent a replacement Shenzhou spacecraft to the Tiangong space station. A Long March 2F rocket lifted off at 11:11 p.m. Eastern Monday, putting the uncrewed Shenzhou-22 spacecraft into orbit. The spacecraft docked with Tiangong at 2:50 a.m. Eastern Tuesday. China launched the uncrewed spacecraft to replace Shenzhou-20, which suffered damage to a window from a micrometeoroid or orbital debris impact. The astronauts who flew to Tiangong on Shenzhou-20 returned earlier this month on Shenzhou-21, while the astronauts who arrived on Shenzhou-21 will now use Shenzhou-22 for their return trip next spring. [SpaceNews]

Amazon unveiled the production model of the high-end terminal for its Amazon Leo satellite broadband service. The Leo Ultra terminal is capable of of download speeds up to 1 gigabit per second (Gbps) and upload speeds up to 400 megabits per second (Mbps), Amazon said Monday, calling it the fastest commercial phased-array antenna in production. SpaceX's in-service Starlink Performance Kit advertises peak download and upload speeds of 475 Mbps and 75 Mbps, though it aims to begin introducing gigabit-class service next year without requiring new terminal hardware after deploying upgraded, larger satellites. Leo Ultra is designed to connect directly to Amazon Web Services or other cloud and on-premise networks, enabling customers to move data from remote areas to private systems without passing through the public internet. [SpaceNews]

Oman ordered its first GEO communications satellite from Airbus. Space Communication Technologies (SCT), Oman's state-backed operator, announced a contract Nov. 24 with Airbus for OmanSat-1, based on the OneSat platform. The Ka-band satellite will provide reconfigurable connectivity over the Middle East, East Africa and Asia. OmanSat-1 is the sixth commercial GEO communications satellite ordered so far this year. That is the same number as ordered last year but well below the heyday of the GEO market when operators purchased 20 to 25 satellites a year. [SpaceNews]

BlackSky confirmed it was the confidential customer of an Electron launch last week. The company released Tuesday initial images from its third Gen-3 satellite, which took its first images within 24 hours of its launch. The company said it was the confidential commercial customer of Rocket Lab "Follow My Speed" mission last Thursday, which took place less than five hours after Rocket Lab announced plans for the launch. BlackSky did not disclose why it elected to be confidential at the time, given that the company has a launch contract with Rocket Lab and said in an earnings call earlier in the month that its next satellite was at the launch site being prepared for launch within weeks. [SpaceNews]

Other News

Blue Origin will fly a space domain awareness payload on its first Blue Ring spacecraft. The company said Monday that the first Blue Ring spacecraft, launching next year, will carry an optical sensor from Caracal to track and identify objects in GEO. Blue Origin said the payload will operate flexibly in "dynamic orbits" during a year-long mission. Scout Space will have its own space domain awareness sensor on the spacecraft along with internal Blue Origin payloads. [Blue Origin]

The Space Force plans to issue a solicitation early next month to demonstrate space-based interceptors for Golden Dome. Space Systems Command issued a recent pre-solicitation notice, stating that a formal call for proposals will be issued by Dec. 7. The command says it expects to issue multiple awards using its other transactions authority for companies to develop prototypes of kinetic interceptors for midcourse missile defense. [Defensescoop]

South Korea's space agency plans to embark on a project to develop a reusable launch vehicle. The Korea AeroSpace Administration adopted the plan at a national space committee meeting Tuesday. The vehicle would use methane fuel and be reusable, although the agency did not provide additional details about the proposed vehicle or its schedule. [ChosunBiz]

Amazon is facing a legal challenge to its license to operate its satellite broadband service in France. A telecommunications industry union says it has asked an administrative court to overturn a license issued for Amazon Leo in July, arguing that regulators failed to perform a market analysis or consult with the country's competition authority before awarding the license. The union added it regretted it did not make a similar effort to block a 2021 license for SpaceX's Starlink. [Reuters]

Ukrainian mobile operator Kyivstar has started testing direct-to-service services using Starlink. The company, which previously announced a deal with SpaceX to provide D2D services, says it is now rolling it out across the country, although for now the service is compatible only with Android smartphones capable of at least 4G services. Support for iPhones will be added in a later software update. [Ukrainian News Agency]

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FROM SPACENEWS

U.S. Space Force Maj. Gen. Stephen Purdy will headline this year's Icon Awards on Dec. 2

Join us on Dec. 2 in Washington DC: U.S. Space Force Maj. Gen. Stephen Purdy will headline this year's Icon Awards program with a keynote speech that is expected to touch on the future of space acquisition, innovation and collaboration. Purdy has been serving as the Acting Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space Acquisition and Integration. Other speakers and attendees include leaders from NASA and the Department of State's Office of Space Affairs as well as executives and innovators from across the industry. Register now.

Send the Politicians to Mars

"If a politician comes and asks you, 'Why should I invest in space exploration?' you need to have a very good and concrete answer, which I think we don't always have. A lot of people then start arguing about, if we take a lunar mission, for example, if we establish a lunar presence we can use this to then test technologies and use resources to go to Mars. Yes, but then the politician is asking you, 'Why should I go to Mars?'"

– Lars Petzold, research fellow at the European Space Policy Institute, discussing the challenges of getting support in Europe for space exploration during a panel at Space Tech Expo Europe last week.

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