China opened its 2018 space launch campaign on Tuesday with the launch of the second pair of Gaojing Earth-Imaging Satellites joining the growing SuperView constellation delivering observation products for the commercial market.
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The year 2017 saw a total of 90 known orbital launch attempts from seven nations and space ports in eight different countries. 2017 had the second most orbital launch attempts of any year in the current century, short of 92 launches in 2014 and showing a slight increase from 2016 that had 85 known launch attempts.
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Planet’s Flock 2E-9 Earth-imaging satellite re-entered the atmosphere on December 25, 2017 – decaying 19 months after being released from the International Space Station to join Planet’s orbiting constellation of Doves that image the entire Earth at least once per day.
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The second spacecraft of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) – run jointly by NASA and the German Aerospace Center – re-entered the atmosphere on Christmas Eve 2017
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Japan’s H-IIA rocket thundered off from the Tanegashima Space Center at 1:26:22 UTC on December 23, 2017 with the GCOM-C climate observatory and the SLATS Super-Low Altitude Test Satellite.
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China sent the second satellite of the LKW constellation into orbit on Saturday via a Long March 2D rocket, coming less than three weeks after the first LKW satellite reached orbit in what observers suspected was the first launch in a new series of reconnaissance spacecraft flying under the cover of land surveying missions.
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Japan’s H-IIA rocket leapt off its sea-side launch pad on Tanegashima Island at 10:26 a.m. local time, 1:26 UTC on Saturday, soaring into orbit with a high-profile climate observation satellite and a technology demonstration spacecraft set for a mission orbiting the edge of the atmosphere to develop previously unused orbital real estate.
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Japan’s H-IIA rocket thundered off from the Tanegashima Space Center at 1:26:22 UTC on December 23, 2017 with the GCOM-C climate observatory and the SLATS Super-Low Altitude Test Satellite.
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Japan’s H-IIA rocket is gearing up for its sixth and final launch of the year, set for a Saturday liftoff from the picturesque Tanegashima Space Center to send a pair of very different satellites into orbit
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The failure of a Soyuz 2-1B/Fregat-M rocket launching the Meteor-M 2-1 weather satellite and 18 international secondary payloads was traced back to a software bug on the rocket’s Fregat upper stage brought on by the unique parameters for Soyuz launches out of the Far Eastern Vostochny Cosmodrome.
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Planet’s Flock 2E’-2 Earth-imaging satellite re-entered the atmosphere on November 30, 2017 – decaying 18 months after being released from the International Space Station to join Planet’s orbiting constellation of Doves that image the entire Earth at least once per day.
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Russia suffered its first launch failure of 2017 on Tuesday on the second Soyuz mission carried out from the new Vostochny Cosmodrome in the country’s far east, claiming the loss of the Meteor-M 2-1 weather satellite and an international assortment of small satellites.
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Russia’s Soyuz 2-1B rocket lifted off from the 1S launch pad at the Vostochny Cosmodrome at 5:41 UTC on November 28, 2017 with the Meteor-M 2-1 weather satellite and 18 small satellites riding as secondary payloads.
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Russia’s Soyuz 2-1B rocket lifted off from the 1S launch pad at the Vostochny Cosmodrome at 5:41 UTC on November 28, 2017 with the Meteor-M 2-1 weather satellite and 18 small satellites riding as secondary payloads.
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The second-to-last Delta II rocket lit up the night over California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base in the early hours on Saturday, taking to the skies with the JPSS-1 Weather Satellite for NASA and NOAA, set to become America’s primary meteorological spacecraft in Polar Orbit.
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The penultimate Delta II rocket lifted off from SLC-2W at California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base on Saturday, November 18, 2017 at 9:47:36 UTC with the first satellite in the Joint Polar Satellite System
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The penultimate Delta II rocket lifted off from SLC-2W at California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base on Saturday, November 18, 2017 at 9:47:36 UTC with the first satellite in the Joint Polar Satellite System.
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