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Mars Express Images Shalbatana Vallis, a 1,300 km Equatorial Flood Channel That Burst From Mars 3.5 Billion Years Ago
ESA's Mars Express has released a new HRSC image of Shalbatana Vallis, a 1,300 km equatorial channel that was carved when groundwater erupted onto the Martian surface roughly 3.5 billion years ago.
Tianzhou-10 Launches on Long March 7 and Docks With Tiangong's Tianhe Module in Under Five Hours, Carrying 6.2 Tons of Cargo
China's tenth Tianzhou cargo spacecraft lifted off from Wenchang at 8:14 a.m. Beijing time on May 11 and rendezvoused with Tiangong's Tianhe core module the same afternoon, delivering propellant, a new EVA suit, and six scientific payloads.
ESA and JAXA Sign RAMSES Cooperation Agreement to Send Spacecraft to Asteroid Apophis Ahead of 2029 Earth Flyby
Berlin signing on 7 May commits Japan to launch ESA's Ramses probe on an H3 rocket in 2028, in time to escort Apophis through its 32,000 km flyby of Earth.
NASA's Psyche Spacecraft Prepares for May 15 Mars Flyby, Using the Planet's Gravity to Save Propellant on the Way to a Metal Asteroid
Psyche will pass 4,500 kilometers above Mars on May 15 at 12,333 mph, harnessing the planet's gravity to redirect itself toward the metal-rich asteroid Psyche and calibrate its imager, magnetometer, and gamma-ray spectrometer.
Katalyst Wraps Environmental Testing of LINK Servicer Clearing the Way for a June Pegasus XL Launch to Save NASA's Swift Observatory
Katalyst Space Technologies finished thermal-vacuum and vibration testing of its LINK servicing spacecraft at NASA Goddard on May 4, 2026, on track for a June Pegasus XL launch to raise the Swift Observatory's decaying orbit.
Ireland Becomes 65th Country to Sign Artemis Accords as NASA Extends Civil Space Coalition
Ireland signs the Artemis Accords at NASA Headquarters on May 4, 2026, joining a coalition that reached 64 countries with Morocco's accession days earlier and continuing a rapid spring of new signatories.
Princeton's T16 Pipeline Mines NASA's TESS Archive for 10,091 New Exoplanet Candidates, More Than Doubling the Mission's Tally
A Princeton-led reanalysis of 83.7 million TESS light curves used random forest classifiers to surface 11,554 planet candidates, including one confirmed hot Jupiter, by reaching stars 16 times fainter than prior searches.
NASA Switches Off Voyager 1's Low-Energy Charged Particles Experiment After Nearly 49 Years to Buy Time for the 'Big Bang' Power Fix
NASA powered down Voyager 1's LECP instrument on April 17, 2026 to extend the interstellar probe's life by about a year while engineers prepare a more ambitious power-saving overhaul.
NASA Unveils the Fully Assembled Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, Targeting a Fall 2026 Launch to Hunt Dark Energy and Rogue Planets
NASA publicly revealed its completed Roman Space Telescope on April 21 at Goddard, setting up a Falcon Heavy launch as early as this fall for a five-year survey of dark energy, exoplanets, and the galactic bulge.
Vertical Aerospace Completes First Piloted Thrustborne Transition, Becoming Third Western eVTOL Developer to Demonstrate the Maneuver
Bristol-based Vertical Aerospace flew its VX4 prototype from vertical takeoff into wingborne cruise on April 2, marking the third such piloted demonstration in the West and clearing the way for two-way transition trials later this year.
GE Aerospace Commits Second Consecutive $1 Billion to U.S. Manufacturing as Engine Demand Surges
GE Aerospace announced plans to invest $1 billion across more than 30 communities in 17 states during 2026, bringing cumulative domestic manufacturing investment since 2024 to $2.5 billion as the company races to meet record commercial and defense engine demand.
ESA Postpones SMILE Launch After Vega-C Component Issue Surfaces Days Before Liftoff
A subsystem production defect forced Avio to delay the Vega-C VV29 flight carrying ESA and China's SMILE magnetosphere-imaging mission, originally set for April 9, with no new date confirmed.