USA in Space

16/07/2026

Starship 13 (the largest rocket in the world) is scheduled for launch at about 6:45 pm ET today.
Now broadcasting:

Leading up to NSF's Starship Flight 13 launch broadcast, NSF will g...

09/07/2026

HEADS UP! 🚀 There's a SpaceX launch scheduled for tomorrow morning at 5:25 AM! The trajectory is northeast, which means Florida and most of the Southeast have a chance to see a bright jellyfish cloud *IF* the launch is on time. Make sure to take pictures if you see it!

09/07/2026

Liftoff is scheduled for 5:25 a.m. ET on Thursday (July 9).

23/06/2026

Will you see the launch?

This Wednesday, June 24, a two-stage Terrier-Improved Malemute sounding rocket will launch from Wallops carrying more than 50 student experiments to suborbital space! This rocket travels no more than 100 miles above Earth’s surface and may be visible in the Chesapeake Bay area. The window for launch will open at 5:30 a.m. EDT.

The experiments will embark on a short, 15 minute flight before splashing down safely in the Atlantic Ocean. A boating crew will recover the payload section and return the experiments to the students.

The Wallops Visitor Center will open its gates at 4:30 a.m. for launch viewing.

23/06/2026

29/05/2026

The moment everything went wrong… Blue Origin New Glenn rocket explodes during last night’s static fire test at Cape Canaveral.

Update: Blue Origin New Glenn Rocket Incident – What We Know So Far
Last night (Thursday, May 28, 2026, around 9:00 PM EDT), Blue Origin’s massive New Glenn rocket — a 320+ foot tall heavy-lift vehicle — exploded during a routine static fire / hotfire test at Launch Complex 36 (LC-36) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

The test was a standard pre-launch engine firing (the rocket stays anchored on the pad) ahead of its next mission (NG-4) to deploy satellites for Amazon’s Project Kuiper broadband constellation. Seconds after ignition, an “anomaly” occurred, triggering a powerful explosion and massive fireball that lit up the night sky orange across parts of Florida’s Space Coast. Shockwaves were felt in nearby Cape Canaveral and Cocoa Beach, and the glow was visible from as far as Fort Pierce (over 100 miles away), with some reports even from South Carolina.

What happened to the rocket?
The entire rocket (including the first-stage booster) was destroyed in the blast. It was a full-stack test, and the vehicle was lost.
Damage to the pad and surrounding area
Launch Complex 36 suffered extensive damage — the pad infrastructure took a severe hit, with one of the tall lightning protection towers toppling and other key structures (including the transporter-erector) heavily impacted or destroyed. The facility is now unusable and will require major rebuilding and recertification. Flames continued burning on the pad for over two hours.
Surrounding area: Homes in nearby communities shook from the blast, but there are no reports of structural damage or injuries to civilians or personnel. Blue Origin and officials confirmed no one was hurt — all employees were accounted for and safe. Emergency crews reported no ongoing threats from fumes or hazards. Some rocket debris may wash ashore in coming days/weeks (Blue Origin has issued safety guidance: do not touch it and report locations).

Blue Origin’s plans going forward
Blue Origin called it an “anomaly” and immediately began investigating the root cause (still unknown; too early to determine). Founder Jeff Bezos posted:
“All personnel are accounted for and safe. It’s too early to know the root cause but we’re already working to find it. Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying. It’s worth it.”
The company plans to rebuild and return to flight. However, with LC-36 (the only pad built for New Glenn) heavily damaged, rebuilding and recertification will take months — not weeks. The next New Glenn launch is now delayed (previously eyed for early June), likely pushing into late 2026 or 2027.

Who else does this affect?

Amazon / Project Kuiper: The mission was set to launch 48 satellites. This adds to existing delays for their broadband constellation (already behind FCC milestones). Amazon will likely lean more on other providers (SpaceX, ULA, Arianespace) and may need timeline extensions.

NASA / Artemis lunar program: Significant setback. New Glenn was slated to launch key elements for NASA’s Moon base plans, including Blue Origin Moon landers, lunar terrain vehicles (recent ~$468M contract), and support for Artemis missions targeting crewed landings ~2028. NASA is assessing impacts and will work with partners on the investigation. Timelines for lunar infrastructure could slip.

Broader space industry: Highlights the inherent risks and difficulty of developing heavy-lift rockets. It affects U.S. competitiveness in commercial satellites and lunar exploration (vs. China’s 2030 crewed Moon goals). Elon Musk commented simply: “Most unfortunate. Rockets are hard.”

This is a major but not uncommon setback in spaceflight development — Blue Origin has faced prior challenges (including a mission anomaly last month) but remains committed to progress.
Videos of the dramatic explosion are widely circulating online (search “Blue Origin New Glenn explosion” for footage). We’ll share official updates as Blue Origin and NASA release more details.
Stay curious about space — it’s unforgiving but worth the effort! What are your thoughts?



(Sources: Official Blue Origin & Jeff Bezos statements, NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration responses, reports from The Guardian, BBC, local Florida news, and Spaceflight Now. Information current as of May 29, 2026.)

23/05/2026

🚀 Starship Flight 12 is in the books — and it was a huge success! Yesterday, May 22, 2026, SpaceX launched the all-new Version 3 Starship and Super Heavy (with the powerful Raptor 3 engines) for the very first time from their brand-new Orbital Launch Pad 2 at Starbase, Texas.

The flight hit many key objectives: the upper stage deployed its Starlink mass simulators, performed a strong atmospheric reentry with the heat shield holding up beautifully, and executed a controlled landing burn before splashing down in the Indian Ocean. The booster had some engine challenges and a hard ocean landing, but that’s exactly why we test — every bit of data brings us closer to full, rapid reusability!

Massive congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on this epic milestone! You continue to push the boundaries of spaceflight and make the dream of making life multi-planetary feel closer than ever. What an incredible achievement — can’t wait to see what Flight 13 brings! 🚀🌍

22/05/2026

After yesterday's Scrub of SpaceX's Starship launch, count down has started again. Launch 🚀 window opens at 6:30 pm ET

NASASpaceflight.com stream has started https://www.youtube.com/live/UfQHy4mVcBo?si=25VuR1HGwvg4Voma

SpaceX went into hold five times during yesterday’s (May 21, 2026) Starship Flight 12 launch attempt.
The countdown reached the built-in hold point at T-40 seconds (a planned pause for final checks). From there, the team cycled through multiple attempts to resume:

The clock briefly restarted a couple of times.
It kept resetting back to T-40 seconds each time an issue was detected.
Flight Director Dan Huot and the team called “go” for launch at one point, but it halted again.

After roughly 10 minutes of troubleshooting, they ran out of time in the 90-minute launch window and scrubbed the attempt around 6:40–7:40 p.m. CDT (depending on exact source timing).
Why the holds and scrub?
The root cause was a ground support equipment issue on the new Pad 2 launch tower (Mechazilla):

Primary issue: The hydraulic pin that holds/retracts the tower’s quick-disconnect umbilical arm (the “tower arm” that connects to Starship for propellant loading and last-second systems) did not retract as commanded. This is a safety-critical mechanism—if it doesn’t pull away cleanly, it could damage the rocket or tower during liftoff.

Elon Musk confirmed this directly on X shortly after the scrub: “The hydraulic pin holding the tower arm in place did not retract. If that can be fixed tonight, there will be another launch attempt tomorrow at 5:30 CT.”

An initial trigger also involved the water diverter (flame diverter/deluge system) under the pad, which auto-aborted and gave the team data to review. This was mentioned early in the holds by the commentator.

No issues were reported with the Starship V3 vehicle itself (Booster 19 or Ship 39), the Raptor 3 engines, or propellant loading—it was purely a pad/tower system problem on this first flight from the brand-new Orbital Launch Pad 2.
This is common on debut flights of new hardware (especially a new pad and V3 stack). SpaceX is already targeting a retry today (May 22) in the same 5:30–7:00 p.m. CT window, and the team is working to resolve the pin overnight.

Leading up to NSF's Starship Flight 12 attempt 2 launch broadcast, ...

22/05/2026

Rocket Lab has been awarded a $90 million contract by the U.S. Space Force's Space Systems Command to design, manufacture, integrate, and operate two geostationary satellites hosting the Heimdall space domain awareness payload produced by Rocket Lab Optical Systems.

Rocket Lab components have long played an essential role in many GEO programs, but this is our first satellite production program for geostationary orbit. The two satellites will be built on our Lightning bus, adapted for the thermal, radiation, propulsion, and station-keeping demands of GEO.

21/05/2026

SpaceX Starship Flight 12 (the largest rocket made to date).

Mission Profile and Objectives
This is a suborbital test flight (not attempting full orbit). The primary goal is simply to get the new V3 hardware into the real flight environment and gather data for rapid reusability. No booster catch attempt on this first V3 flight.

Key events (approximate timeline from liftoff):

T+0:00 — Liftoff
T+0:45 — Max Q (maximum dynamic pressure)
T+2:24 — Stage separation (hot staging)
T+6:34–6:59 — Super Heavy boostback + landing burn → splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico
T+17:37–27:15 — Ship deploys ~20–22 Starlink V3 mass simulators (plus 2 special ones with cameras)
T+38:37 — In-space Raptor engine relight demonstration
T+47:47 — Starship atmospheric reentry
T+65:06–65:26 — Ship landing burn → splashdown in the Indian Ocean

Starship-specific tests include:

Deploying Starlink simulators (some with cameras to photograph the heat shield in flight and test future inspection methods).
Intentionally removing one heat shield tile and painting others white (to simulate damage and measure effects).
Stress-testing rear flaps and performing a banking maneuver that simulates future return-to-launch-site trajectories.

Why It Matters
Starship has already flown 11 times (through late 2025), with progressive improvements in landing, reusability, and payload deployment. Flight 12 builds directly on those lessons to accelerate toward operational flights—orbital refueling, Starlink V3 mega-deployments, NASA Artemis lunar missions, and eventually crewed Mars flights. Success here would clear the path for higher-cadence testing and the first true orbital attempts with V3 hardware later in 2026.
SpaceX provides constant updates on X and their website, and the mission is fully expendable for this test (both stages splash down). Weather and technical readiness will determine the exact liftoff time within the window.
If you're watching live or want more details, check SpaceX's page directly: Starship Flight 12. This is one of the most exciting steps yet in the Starship program—stay tuned for what could be a spectacular test!