OST Staff

Deep Space

NASA Extends Voyager 2's Science Life by a Year, Eyes Same Fix for Voyager 1

NASA has extended the operational life of Voyager 2 by at least a year using a power-saving maneuver nicknamed the "Big Bang," and the agency now plans to attempt the same procedure on Voyager 1 within a few months. The two probes are the only working spacecraft

Defense

Senate Confirms Schiess as Space Force's Top Officer Amid Push to Match China

The U.S. Senate on Aug. 6 confirmed Lt. Gen. Douglas Schiess as the next chief of space operations, placing a career missile and space officer at the helm of the Space Force. He takes command as the service pursues a sharp expansion in funding, personnel and military missions driven

Satellites

Europe's IRIS² Constellation Grows by 66 Satellites as Cost Climbs to 15.6 Billion Euros

The European Commission has completed negotiations with the SpaceRISE industrial consortium on the IRIS² secure connectivity constellation, adding 66 satellites and significantly raising the program's cost. The agreement, signed August 7 and formally known as Rendezvous 1, allows work on the constellation to proceed. The European Commission selected

Markets

Scaleup Europe Fund Makes ICEYE Its First Bet, Signaling End to Continent's Capital Drought

The European Commission's new €5B Scaleup Europe Fund has completed its first investment, co-leading the €450M Series F of Finnish synthetic aperture radar company ICEYE. The round, announced in June, reached more than €1B in total investment after secondary placements, marking the arrival of large-scale European

Defense

Space Force Seeks to Double Budget to $71 Billion for Orbital Combat Mission

The U.S. Space Force has submitted a fiscal year 2027 budget request of $71 billion, roughly doubling its funding as it shifts its core mission toward active threat mitigation, missile tracking, and tactical warfighting integration. Details of the request emerged July 30, 2026, marking a departure for a service

Astronauts Complete Final Mounting Kit for Space Station Solar Array Upgrade

NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Anil Menon installed the seventh and final set of mounting hardware for new solar arrays during a 6.5-hour spacewalk outside the International Space Station on Thursday, August 6. The work clears the way for the last additions to the station's power

Defense

Australia Becomes First Export Customer for America's Classified AIM-260 Missile

Australia will be the first foreign buyer of the American-made AIM-260 Joint Advanced Tactical Missile, a beyond-visual-range air-to-air weapon whose details remain closely held by the United States. Defense Minister Richard Marles announced the acquisition during a visit to the Pitch Black air combat

SpaceX AI Segment Turns EBITDA Positive Two Years Ahead of Expert Forecasts

SpaceX’s artificial intelligence business crossed a major financial milestone in the company’s first quarter as a public company, reaching positive adjusted EBITDA far earlier than at least one leading space investment firm financial model had projected. SpaceX's AI segment generated $1.15 billion in adjusted EBITDA

Policy

NASA Redirects Gateway Hardware Toward Lunar Surface Demonstration Missions

NASA and Northrop Grumman announced on August 6 that hardware originally built for the Gateway lunar orbital station is being repurposed for Moon Base demonstration missions. The move marks a shift away from crewed operations in lunar orbit toward surface-based missions. Gateway was a cornerstone of the Artemis architecture

Deep Space

IXPE Observations of a Magnetar May Capture a 90-Year-Old Quantum Prediction

Scientists using NASA's Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer may have observed empty space behaving in a way physicists predicted nearly 90 years ago but had never directly seen. The findings, drawn from more than 140 hours of observations of the magnetar 1E 1547-5408 and published in Nature,

Launch

Rocket Lab Launches 92nd Electron, Deploys Eighth Satellite for Japan's iQPS

Rocket Lab launched its 92nd Electron mission on August 6, deploying the eighth satellite for Japanese radar-imaging company iQPS. The flight marked the company's 13th Electron launch of 2026, lifting off from the Mahia launch site in New Zealand. The mission came more than a month after

Satellites

SpaceX Confirms Terafab Satellite Factory in Grimes County, Texas, With Construction Months Away

SpaceX has confirmed that its next Terafab satellite manufacturing facility will be built in Grimes County, Texas, with construction set to begin within months. The confirmation followed a community meeting SpaceX held with residents living near the planned site, marking the first time the company directly engaged the community about

Markets

Telesat Lands Record C$2.3 Billion Contract for Arctic Military Satcom

Telesat has signed a C$2.3 billion contract, roughly US$1.64 billion, with Canada's Defense Investment Agency to provide military satellite communications in the Arctic using its Lightspeed constellation. The deal is described as a record for Canadian military satcom and delivers a major anchor customer

Launch

Blue Origin Traces New Glenn Explosion to BE-4 Oxygen Valve

Blue Origin has identified a liquid oxygen valve in one of its BE-4 engines as the cause of the May 28 static-fire explosion that destroyed a New Glenn rocket and severely damaged its Cape Canaveral launch pad. Because the BE-4 also powers United Launch Alliance's

Deep Space

Perseverance Captures Earth Vanishing Behind Phobos in a First for Human History

NASA's Perseverance rover has recorded Earth disappearing behind the Martian moon Phobos, capturing our planet as a single point of light that winks out behind the little moon's shadowed edge. It is the first time humanity has photographed Earth being occulted by another object from the

Launch

Tesla Cybertrucks Certified as Crew Escape Vehicles for SpaceX Crew-13 Launch

Tesla Cybertrucks will serve as the emergency evacuation vehicles for the upcoming Crew-13 mission, replacing the military-spec escape vehicles historically used at SpaceX launch pads. NASA and SpaceX jointly determined the pickups can safely carry astronauts and ground personnel away from the launch pad in an emergency, embedding

Deep Space

Inouye Solar Telescope Resolves Wave Structures Never Before Seen on the Sun's Surface

The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope has captured the sharpest images ever taken of the Sun's visible surface, revealing swirling wave-like vortices that have never been observed there before. Published August 5th in Nature, the observations resolve features as small as 19 kilometers across and could help

Markets

Rocket Lab Lands $397 Million Space Force Deal to Build and Fly SB-AMTI "Flatellites"

Rocket Lab has won a $397 million contract from the U.S. Space Force to build and launch satellites for the Space-Based Airborne Moving Target Indicator program, known as SB-AMTI. The award, reported August 5, 2026, marks a significant step in the company's move from small

Markets

SpaceX Commits Exclusively to Nvidia for Orbital AI Hardware

SpaceX announced a partnership with Nvidia to design the compute payload for Starmind AI1, the first satellite in a planned constellation built to run AI workloads directly in orbit. Hours later, on the company's first earnings call as a public company, Elon Musk pledged that SpaceX will build

Markets

Neuraspace Raises 15.6 Million Euros to Build European Space Domain Awareness Platform

Portuguese space traffic management startup Neuraspace announced 15.6 million euros ($18 million) in fresh funding on Aug. 5 to expand European space domain awareness and defense capabilities. The financing will directly support NeuraspaceDEF, an AI-powered platform serving both civil and defense users, and advance Europe's push

Launch

SpaceX Delivers Three More BlueBird Satellites to Orbit for AST SpaceMobile

A SpaceX Falcon 9 launched three of AST SpaceMobile's BlueBird Block 2 satellites into low Earth orbit before dawn on Wednesday, adding satellites numbered 11, 12, and 13 to the company's direct-to-device constellation. The mission marks the latest step in building out a network

Launch

SpaceX Sets IFT-14 for Late August With First Operational Starlinks and Ship Catch Attempt

SpaceX will fly the next Starship test, IFT-14, as soon as the end of August, deploying operational Starlink Version 3 satellites into orbit for the first time and attempting to catch the Starship upper stage back at Starbase, Texas. Company officials confirmed the plan during SpaceX's first

Launch

Discarded Falcon 9 Upper Stage Strikes the Moon at 5,400mph

A four-tonne piece of a spent SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that had drifted in space since last year is believed to have crashed into the Moon on Wednesday, gouging out a new lunar crater. The unintentional collision posed no danger to Earth, and NASA and SpaceX said they are

Deep Space

Interstellar Comet 3I/ATLAS Carries Water With Heavy-Hydrogen Ratio 40 Times Earth's

Scientists have measured water on 3I/ATLAS, only the third confirmed interstellar object ever detected, and found a deuterium-to-hydrogen ratio roughly 40 times higher than in Earth's ocean water. The finding, reported in the week of August 3 to 5, 2026, points to the comet having

Markets

Intuitive Machines Wins L3Harris Selection for 18 Missile Tracking Spacecraft

Intuitive Machines has been selected by L3Harris Technologies to design, build, and deliver 18 spacecraft platforms for the Space Development Agency's Accelerated Missile Defense Tranche 3 mission. The selection, announced August 4, 2026, expands the Houston company beyond its lunar lander work into national security space and America&