Boeing's Starliner heads back to hangar after valve issue thwarts test launch for NASA | Astronaut captures sparkling 'shooting star' video as Russian space station module falls to Earth | Chinese startup iSpace fails to reach orbit again with third launch of its Hyperbola-1 rocket
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Boeing's Starliner capsule will trudge back inside for more checks after skipping a Tuesday launch attempt when indications suggested a problem with a valve in the vehicle's propulsion system. Ground teams will roll the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket back into the Vertical Integration Facility at Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on Thursday (Aug. 5), NASA confirmed in a statement. The move allows engineers to directly access the Starliner capsule, which officials hope will help them track down the elusive valve issue.
From his perch on the International Space Station, a French astronaut watched a long-running Russian space module break into pieces in a shower of fireworks. What's more, he caught the event on video.
The latest failure of a Chinese commercial rocket may point to growing pains as the country opens its space sector to more private participation, according to a news report. The flight test of China's Hyperbola-1 rocket, built by the Chinese company iSpace, was unsuccessful, China's state media outlet Xinhua reported. This is the second failure of this rocket type in less than six months.
A weather satellite has recovered from a brief anomaly and is back to studying Earth and its ongoing wildfires. GOES-17 (Geostationary Orbital Environmental Satellite 17), an Earth-monitoring satellite operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), suffered an anomaly on July 22.
Super Heavy is on the launch stand. On Tuesday (Aug. 3), SpaceX rolled its first true Super Heavy booster from its assembly facility in South Texas a few kilometers down the road to its launch site. And on Wednesday (Aug. 4), the company hoisted the 230-foot-tall (70 meters) rocket onto the launch stand using a giant crane.
Starship is powering up. SpaceX plans to launch the first orbital test flight of Starship, its reusable deep-space transportation system, in the next few months from the company's South Texas site, near the Gulf Coast village of Boca Chica.
Perseid meteors are already beginning to fall in a display that promises to dazzle skywatchers this month. The Perseid meteor shower will peak on the evening of Aug. 12, just four days after the new moon on Aug. 8, so dark skies should be quite favorable for the annual display, which is one of the most dependable displays of "shooting stars." That's in stark contrast to next August, when the meteors will coincide with a full moon.
The first all-civilian mission on a SpaceX Crew Dragon is getting the star treatment. Netflix plans to produce a documentary, "Countdown: Inspiration4 Mission to Space," following the adventures of the Inspiration4 crew scheduled to launch to space for a three-day mission later in 2021.
