New Horizons confirms: the solar wind slows as you travel outward

9:25 am

Figure 6 from the paper.
Figure 6 from the paper. Click for full resolution.

The science team for the New Horizons spacecraft, presently zipping outward towards the edge of the solar system, has confirmed earlier data from the Voyager spacecraft that the solar winds speed slows gradually as you move outward from the Sun.

You can read the paper here [pdf]. The distances are measured using astronomical units (AU), each equivalent to the distance from the Sun to the Earth, about 93 million miles.

Previously, New Horizons and Voyager 2 measurements between 30 and 43 AU indicated the solar wind was 5 to 10% slower than at 1 AU near Earth. Now, New Horizons researchers found at 58 AU that the solar wind is 13 to 15% slower than the wind at 1 AU. This gradual slowdown aligns with previous models of how interstellar material enters the heliosphere and affects the solar wind. It also demonstrates how the Sun’s influence decreases over long distances.

The scientists postulate that the slowing is caused by interaction with “interstellar neutral gas particles” that have managed to slip into the solar system. Their interaction with solar wind particles acts to slow the particles down.

New Horizons has not yet reached the termination shock that delineates the edge of the solar system. When it does, entering interstellar space, the wind speed will plummet significantly more, based on data from both Voyagers.

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The rise and fall of two Australian spaceports

8:53 am

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports as of 2024. Click for original map.

Two stories today about the success of one Australian commercial spaceport and the failure of another illustrate perfectly the normal ups and downs one can expect from freedom and capitalism.

The ports in question are Southern Launch and Equatorial Launch Australia. In the first story, Southern Launch announced today that it has raised $25 million in private investment capital.

Adelaide-based spaceport operator Southern Launch has raised $25 million in a funding round led by national security investor Brindabella & Company, with the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC) committing $10 million in direct equity to help scale Australia’s sovereign launch infrastructure.

The capital will fund expansion of Southern Launch’s two facilities – the Koonibba Test Range on the far west coast of South Australia and the Whalers Way Orbital Launch Complex near Port Lincoln – as the company works to meet growing demand from domestic and international launch customers.

Though the spaceport has obtained several tentative launch contacts, this success is mostly the result of its multiple contracts by capsule companies to use Koonibba as a landing site. There is a boom in this recoverable capsule industry at this time — with lots of investment money and multiple companies flying or building capsules. Koonibba at this moment has become the go-to place for such landings.

In the second story, we learn the sad fate of Equatorial Launch Australia (ELA). » Read more

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Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

Rocket Lab buys Iridium

3:39 pm

In a blockbuster deal today, Rocket Lab acquired the satellite company Iridium and all its satellite constellation assets.

Rocket Lab will acquire all the outstanding shares of Iridium common stock for $54 per share in a cash and stock transaction. This represents an enterprise value for Iridium of approximately $8.0 billion.

The acquisition … merges Rocket Lab’s leading launch capabilities and satellite manufacturing with Iridium’s global satellite communications network, spectrum, and 500-plus strong partner ecosystem to create a competitive, vertically-integrated space company that designs, builds, launches, and operates its own constellations, delivering critical communications capability to millions of users worldwide.

The transaction will give Rocket Lab an immediate foothold in space-based applications, including both proprietary and standards-based satellite Internet of Things (IoT) and direct-to-device (D2D), PNT (GPS-capability), and critical safety-of-life services, creating a formidable challenger in the global telecom market.

This deal continues Rocket Lab’s aggressive effort in the last few years to diversify its capabilities beyond simply launching rockets. It has successfully demonstrated its ability to build satellites and even interplanetary probes. This merger immediately gives the company the spectrum and communications constellation that already has 2.5 million subscribers, with the ability to enhance and expand that constellation using its launch and satellite capabilities. With the introduction of its larger Neutron rocket next year, Rocket Lab will be well positioned to compete directly with all the other communications constellations, and to do it at a lower cost.

The deal also strengthens the company’s vertical integration. As the press release notes, it “creates an end-to-end space company spanning launch, spacecraft, spectrum, and on-orbit communications services through a proprietary network. Expected to eliminate third-party launch costs for constellation deployment and replenishment and captures launch margin internally while guaranteeing orbital access as launch capacity tightens, ensuring continuity of service to customers.”

Not surprisingly, the value of Rocket Lab’s stock today has leaped upward, rising from a closing price on Friday of around $85 to over $100 today (late Monday).

The industry trend across the board now is vertical integration, begun by SpaceX. It just pays to have the rocket company own the satellite constellation. Such a partnership lowers cost, and gives the company great flexibility and control. Expect more satellite constellations to team up with other rocket companies, especially the startups like Stoke Space and Relativity that are building reusable rockets.

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Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

June 29, 2026 Quick space links

2:40 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

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We’re all gonna die! Seismologists model the San Andreas fault, and find it about to blow!

9:37 am

Chicken Little rules!
Chicken Little rules!

According to computer simulations based on known but very limited earthquake data during the past 1,000 years, scientists now claim that the San Andreas fault in California is now “critically stressed,” suggesting a big quake is coming soon.

You can read their paper here. The news article at the first link above is typical of most mainstream reports, very much focused on expressing certain doom based on the certainty of this research:

The volatile seismic zone along the roughly 750-mile (1,200-km) San Andreas Fault and the smaller San Jacinto Fault are now “critically stressed” – reaching a 1,000-year high level of pressure – increasing the likelihood of a big earthquake hitting the US West Coast.

Using physics-based modeling and 1,000 years of earthquake data, Earth scientists at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa demonstrated how the build-up of stress throughout these two fault systems and at the juncture of the Cajon Pass is at an all-time high.

The “1,000 years of earthquake data” however is extremely limited, with only the last 100 years reasonably covered. That sparse data is then used to create computer models and simulations, from which these Chicken Little conclusions are drawn.

In other words, garbage in, garbage out.

Without doubt a large quake along the San Andreas fault is eventually going to happen. In fact, scientists have been making this same exact prediction now for almost a half century. That no such quake has happened doesn’t make the prediction false, but the endless predictions of doom by the seismology community for a half century has made them sound increasingly like the little boy who cried wolf. They simply don’t have sufficient knowledge to predict when the quake will happen, but their endless cries of doom has blunted the impact of their words.

Meanwhile, the uncertainty and limitations of their knowledge are too often ignored by the press. To this press: “They are SCIENTISTS, so they KNOW!”

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Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

Hayabusa-2 to fly past asteroid July 5, 2026

9:13 am

Ryugu's northern hemisphere
Ryugu as seen by Hayabusa-2 shortly before it grabbed
samples from the surface in 2019. Arrow indicates planned touchdown
site.

Despite having only one working ion engine, Japan’s Hayabusa-2 asteroid probe will do a fast and extremely close fly-by of the asteroid Torifune on July 5, 2026.

The flyby will see Hayabusa2 get within 1 to 10 kilometers (0.62 to 6.2 miles) of Torifune, using its instrument suite to study the roughly 450-meter-wide (1,476 feet) asteroid as it whizzes past at 5.3 kilometers per second (3.3 miles per second).

Not much is known about Torifune, so a fly-by this close carries risk. In addition, three of Hayabusa’s four ion engines no longer work, and the fourth is starting to degrade.

If successful, however, the fly-by will not only tell us something more about Torifune, it will increase the chances Hayabusa-2 can reach asteroid 1998 KY26 in 2031. That asteroid is small, only about 35 feet across. The plan would be for Hayabusa- to fly in formation for a period, and even attempt a touch down.

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NASA asks industry for proposals for building lunar base infrastructure

8:57 am

NASA today issued a request for feedback from the private sector for building its Moon Base, including the infrastructure for providing “surface power, in-situ resource utilization, [and] advanced manufacturing.”

The solicitation focuses on five technologies that NASA considers necessary but insufficiently developed at this point, some of which it also considers necessary for exploring and colonizing the entire solar system.

  • Solar power generation, including power management and distribution, and energy storage.
  • Radioisotope power, for use by operating spacecraft systems in the solar system’s “darkest, dustiest, and most remote places”.
  • In-situ resource utilization, including using lunar materials to produce fuel, water, and oxygen.
  • In-space advanced manufacturing for producing “essential tools and materials” on the Moon and Mars.
  • Innovative nanomaterials, for use in spacecraft and instruments in order to reduce their weight and size at launch.

The announcement notes that NASA is requesting input from industry, hoping it can “identify any areas of ambiguity, or concerns.” The agency will then revise accordingly.

This solicitation is another example of NASA administrator Jared Isaacman’s push to rationalize the entire Artemis program, to take seriously the real requirements for building a Moon base. Previously NASA made noises along these lines, but management did not do the proper due diligence to figure out what needs to get built in order to actually make a Moon base happen.

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SpaceX launches Sirius radio geosynchronous satellite

11:55 pm

SpaceX tonight successfully launched a SiriusXM radio geosynchronous satellite, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force station in Florida.

The first stage (B1085) completed its 17th flight (31 days after its previous mission), landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairings completed their 6th and 30th flights respectively.

This was SpaceX’s second launch today. The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

78 SpaceX
41 China
10 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
8 Russia

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 78 to 71.

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SpaceX launches 24 more Starlink satellites

9:16 am

SpaceX this morning successfully launched another 24 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

The first stage (B1088) completed its 17th flight (25 days after its previous flight), landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

77 SpaceX
41 China
10 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
8 Russia

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 77 to 71.

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First unmanned test of India’s manned Gaganyaan capsule possibly delayed until late ’27

9:11 am

Artist rendering of India's Gaganyaan capsule
Artist rendering of India’s Gaganyaan capsule

In a presentation yesterday, the head of India’s space agency ISRO V Narayanan indicated that the first unmanned test flight of its manned Gaganyaan capsule might be delayed until the third quarter of 2027.

That test flight was originally targeting a March 2026 launch — part of a series of three unmanned test flights before the manned flight in early 2027 — but March came and went and nothing happened, nor did ISRO explain the lack of any action.

In indicating the possible delay, Narayanan also noted that the agency was looking at a launch before the end of this year. A delay until late ’27 — more than a year — however would suggest a significant issue. It would also mean the manned flight could not occur until 2028, at the earliest.

When Gaganyaan was first proposed in 2018, the goal was to have the first orbital flight in 2022. Since then the program has experienced endless delays and postponements. This new announcement, with no explanation, fits ISRO’s recent pattern of secrecy. No specific reasons for this year’s delays have ever been offered. Meanwhile, the agency has refused to outline for more than two years the specific causes of the two PSLV rocket failures of its third stage, both of which occurred at almost the exact same time in launch.

The secrecy suggests a cultural problem at ISRO, even more serious than a technical one. It implies an unwillingness to deal with error, thus resulting in repeated failures.

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June 26, 2026 Quick space links

2:56 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

4 comments

Rocket Lab launches another radar satellite for Japanese company Synspective

10:55 am

Rocket Lab early today successfully completed its tenth launch (out of a 27-launch contract) for the Japanese radar satellite company Synspective, its Electron rocket lifting off from one of its two launchpads in New Zealand.

The leaders in the 2026 launch race:

76 SpaceX
41 China
10 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
8 Russia

For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 76 to 71.

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Tiny polygon ridges on Mars

9:19 am

Tiny polygon ridges on Mars
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced slightly to post here, was taken on June 21, 2026 by the high resolution camera on the Mars rover Curiosity. It looks down to provide a close-up of the ground the rover is presently parked over, a surface covered with thousands of these tiny polygon ridges, all of which appear less than three inches across.

For a wider view and the overall context, see my post from June 24, 2026. While from a distance the ground at this point looked smoother than anything the rover has seen in more than five years since it entered the foothills of Mount Sharp, once it got close it discovered the ground was completely covered with these small polygons.

The picture to the right is part of a close-up mosaic of these polygons the science team is gathering using the high resolution camera.

The geology here is certainly puzzling. Polygon cracks are not unusual on both Earth and Mars, in places where the ground was once wet and then dried. In drying the material shrinks, producing polygon-configured cracks. On Earth those cracks often fill later with material that is more resistant, such as lava, which remains to form ridges when the surrounding dirt erodes away. Whether this was the process here on Mars however is not known. For one thing, why are these polygons so small? And why so uniform in size?

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SpaceX’s proposed cloud constellation of a million satellites named “Starmind”

8:54 am

Elon Musk has confirmed that SpaceX has named its proposed constellation of a million data computing satellites will be dubbed “Starmind”, following its pattern in recent years of naming every new project in a similar manner.

After Starship, Musk has named every project a variation thereof. We have had Starlink, Starshield, Starbase, Starfactory, Starfall, and now Starmind. It is also building natural gas pipeline to supply methane to Boca Chica that it has dubbed Starpipe.

The company hopes to launch the first Starmind satellites on Starship early in 2027.

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Firefly buys the AI navigation technology used on its Blue Ghost lunar landing

8:45 am

Blue Ghost's shadow on the Moon, with the Earth in the background
Blue Ghost’s shadow on the Moon, with the Earth in the background,
after its 2025 touchdown.

Firefly has now acquired Space-ng, the company that makes the AI navigation technology and software that Firefly used on its successful Blue Ghost lunar landing in 2025.

Space-ng’s vision navigation software was utilized during Firefly’s historic Blue Ghost Mission 1 to determine position and attitude, detect hazardous lunar terrain, and autonomously redirect Blue Ghost in real-time, enabling a safe, precise touchdown within the Moon’s Mare Crisium.

…In addition to vision navigation software, Space-ng brings high-resolution spacecraft cameras and AI compute hardware to enable advanced space domain awareness, onboard optical navigation, rendezvous and proximity operations, and docking without requiring GPS or GNSS. Firefly plans to integrate Space-ng’s technologies across its fleet of lunar landers and orbital vehicles to support its growing mission manifest, including three additional lunar missions under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, another lunar mission supporting NASA MoonFall, and a space domain awareness mission for the Defense Innovation Unit.

Of all the recent attempts by commercial companies to land on the Moon, Firefly is the only one to have a complete success. While Space-ng’s technology worked perfectly to guide Blue Ghost to a safe touch down, the guidance technology used by Intuitive Machines (twice), Ispace (twice), Beresheet, and the first Vikram lander for India all failed close to landing. No wonder Firefly decided to buy it.

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Musk’s employee stock options made them millions; Bezos’s employee options were worthless

8:31 am

According to a very intriguing article at Business Insider today, the stock options offered to employees at SpaceX and Blue Origin were starkly different, with SpaceX’s options making millions for its workers while Blue Origin’s were essentially worthless.

Three ex-employees of Jeff Bezos’ rocket maker Blue Origin told Business Insider that the company’s unusual approach to equity left them with stock options that are essentially worthless.

Meanwhile, they’ve watched SpaceX’s dizzying rise to a $2 trillion-plus valuation provide a massive windfall for early hires — from engineers to welders to cafeteria workers — who received stock options during their time at Elon Musk’s company.

Blue Origin’s options were written so that they only could be cashed in if the company went public within ten years. As Bezos has shown zero interest in going public — which would take away his full ownership and control of the company — those options have been steadily expiring as they reach their ten year due date.

At SpaceX however the employee stock options could always be cashed in, even before the company went public. Employees, both current and former, were allowed to sell their stock back to SpaceX or to its investors in private liquidity events that usually occurred twice each year. After the IPO they could now sell the stock on the open market, at the going rate.

The difference is possibly one additional reason the accomplishments of the two companies have been so starkly dissimilar/ SpaceX made sure its employees got a pay off for the long hours it demanded. Blue Origin did not.

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Leo Arnaud & John Williams – Bugler’s Dream/Olympic Fanfare

6:01 pm

An evening pause: The opening theme of this piece, by Leo Arnaud, was used by ABC for its Wild World of Sports and Olympic coverage in the ’60s and 70s. John Williams later wrote a version for use for NBC’s Olympic television broadcast, incorporating Arnard’s work at the beginning. This live 2009 performance is by the Bands of His Majesty’s Royal Marines in London.

Hat tip Diane Zimmerman.

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