Category Archives: SpaceX

‘Mission complete’: billionaire returns to Earth after spacewalk

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Jared Isaacman and crew splash down in SpaceX capsule in the Gulf of Mexico after first ever private spacewalk

The civilian crew on SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn mission returned to Earth on Sunday after a historic five days in orbit that took them higher than anyone since Nasa’s moon trips more than half a century ago.

The Dragon capsule splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico near Florida’s Dry Tortugas shortly after 3.37am local time (8.37am BST), carrying onboard the billionaire tech entrepreneur and mission funder Jared Isaacman, two SpaceX engineers and a former air force Thunderbird pilot.

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Elon Musk’s Starlink backtracks to comply with Brazil’s ban on X

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After judge freezes assets of billionaire’s internet service provider, company flip-flops to block social media platform

Elon Musk’s satellite-based internet service provider Starlink backtracked late on Tuesday and said it would accept and enforce a Brazilian supreme court justice’s order to block the billionaire’s social media platform, X, formerly Twitter.

Previously, Starlink informally told the telecommunications regulator Anatel that it would not comply until Justice Alexandre de Moraes reversed course. Now, Starlink has said in a statement posted on X that it will heed de Moraes’s order despite him having frozen the company’s assets.

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Starlink internet shutdown in Sudan will punish millions, Elon Musk warned

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With a widespread telecoms blackout already in place, emergency help and humanitarian aid at risk if satellite service withdrawn, say NGOs

Nearly 100 humanitarian groups in Sudan have warned Elon Musk he risks “collectively punishing” millions of Sudanese by shutting down his vital Starlink satellite internet service in the war-ravaged country.

Sudan has been grappling with a widespread telecommunications blackout for several months, with many aid groups using Starlink to operate during the humanitarian crisis which the UN has warned is the largest in decades.

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Major US corporations threaten to return labor to ‘law of the jungle’

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Trader Joe’s and SpaceX are among businesses challenging the constitutionality of the National Labor Relations Board

Upset by the surge in union drives, several of the best-known corporations in the US are seeking to cripple the country’s top labor watchdog, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), by having it declared unconstitutional. Some labor experts warn that if those efforts succeed, US labor relations might return to “the law of the jungle”.

In recent weeks, Elon Musk’s SpaceX as well as Amazon, Starbucks and Trader Joe’s have filed legal papers that advance novel arguments aimed at hobbling and perhaps shutting down the NLRB – the federal agency that enforces labor rights and oversees unionization efforts. Those companies are eager to thwart the NLRB after it accused Amazon, Starbucks and Trader Joe’s of breaking the law in battling against unionization and accused SpaceX of illegally firing eight workers for criticizing Musk.

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Japan to launch world’s first wooden satellite to combat space pollution

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The environmentally friendly LignoSat probe – set to orbit this summer – has been created to combat harmful aluminium particles

Japanese scientists have created one of the world’s most unusual spacecraft – a tiny satellite that is made of timber.

The LignoSat probe has been built of magnolia wood, which, in experiments carried out on the International Space Station (ISS), was found to be particularly stable and resistant to cracking. Now plans are being finalised for it to be launched on a US rocket this summer.

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Private moon lander lifts off aiming for first US lunar touchdown in 52 years

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Intuitive Machines’ Nova-C lander sets off on SpaceX rocket from Cape Canaveral on weeklong journey

A moon lander built by the Houston-based aerospace company Intuitive Machines was launched from Florida early on Thursday on a mission to conduct the first US lunar touchdown in more than a half century and the first by a privately owned spacecraft.

The Nova-C lander, nicknamed Odysseus, lifted off shortly after 1am EST atop a Falcon 9 rocket flown by Elon Musk’s SpaceX from Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral.

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South Korea launches first military spy satellite, intensifying space race with Pyongyang

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Seoul’s satellite was launched into orbit on one of Elon Musk’s SpaceX rockets

A SpaceX rocket has launched South Korea’s first military spy satellite, intensifying a space race on the peninsula after Pyongyang launched its own first surveillance satellite last week.

Seoul’s reconnaissance satellite, carried by one of Elon Musk’s SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets, lifted off from the Vandenberg US Space Force Base in California at 10.19am local time on Friday.

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SpaceX’s Starship grounded pending improvements after launch explosion

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Regulators insist on 63 corrective steps after world’s largest and most powerful rocket blew up on debut in April

SpaceX’s Starship, the world’s largest and most powerful rocket, must stay grounded until the company takes dozens of corrective actions after the rocket’s April debut ended in an explosion, federal regulators said on Friday.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it closed its investigation into SpaceX’s failed debut of Starship. The agency is requiring SpaceX to take 63 corrective steps and to apply for a modified FAA license before launching again.

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US sues Elon Musk’s SpaceX for alleged hiring discrimination against refugees

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Justice department alleges rocket company refused to consider asylum seekers and refugees for jobs because of citizenship status

The US justice department on Thursday filed a lawsuit against the billionaire Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX for alleged hiring discrimination against refugees and asylum seekers.

SpaceX “routinely discouraged asylees and refugees from applying and refused to hire or consider them, because of their citizenship status” from at least September 2018 to May 2022, according to the justice department.

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Euclid telescope lifts off in search of the secrets of dark universe

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European Space Agency mission launches on SpaceX rocket from Florida to shed light on dark energy and dark matter

A European-built orbital satellite was launched into space on Saturday from Florida on a mission to shed new light on dark energy and dark matter, the mysterious cosmic forces scientists say account for 95% of the known universe.

The Euclid telescope, named for the ancient Greek mathematician known as the “father of geometry”, was carried in the cargo bay of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket which blasted off about 11am EDT (1500 GMT) from Cape Canaveral Space Force station. A live stream of the liftoff was shown on Nasa TV.

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A 14-year-old Santa Clara University graduate is SpaceX’s newest hire

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Kairan Quazi, the youngest graduate in the school’s history, will start at the company’s satellite internet division Starlink in July

Kairan Quazi is years away from legally being able to watch an R-rated movie at the theater by himself or buy a drink at the bar, but he’s about to get a college degree and start a job at SpaceX.

Other than that, the 14-year-old insists he’s had a fairly normal academic journey.

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Twitter and Tesla’s interests at odds in Elon Musk’s quiet China visit

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The world’s richest person lapsed into an unusual silence on social media during his trip to the electric carmaker’s second largest market

Followers of Elon Musk didn’t know what to expect from his trip to China. Would he speak about Tesla, a company with a large market and manufacturing footprint there? Or SpaceX, with its symbiotic relationship with the American state? Or even Twitter, the social network he bought because “free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy”?

The one thing no one expected: silence.

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Debris blast from SpaceX rocket launch faces environmental scrutiny

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The most powerful rocket ever built destroyed its launchpad and sent a plume of concrete dust and rubble into the air

While the spectacle of SpaceX’s new Starship rocket blowing up over the Gulf of Mexico riveted the public’s attention, it was the explosive nature of the launch at ground level that was drawing heightened scrutiny from the government this week.

The shattering force of last Thursday’s launch in south Texas sent a cloud of pulverized concrete raining over a small town nearby, federal regulators said, raising fresh questions about the environmental impact of ramped-up launch operations at the site.

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SpaceX Starship test flight cancelled minutes before blast-off

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Elon Musk says launch of most powerful rocket ever built called off due to ‘pressurisation’ issue

The largest and most powerful rocket ever built was readied and fuelled for its first test flight on Monday, but SpaceX cancelled the launch minutes before blasting off after discovering a “pressurisation” problem.

“A pressurant valve appears to be frozen, so unless it starts operating soon, no launch today,” the SpaceX founder, Elon Musk, said on Twitter. Minutes later, the launch was officially abandoned, with operators ending the countdown 40 seconds before lift-off.

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Fury in Ukraine as Elon Musk’s SpaceX limits Starlink use for drones

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SpaceX says satellite communications service ‘never, never meant to be weaponised’

A senior Ukrainian presidential aide has reacted with anger after Elon Musk’s SpaceX said it had taken steps to prevent its Starlink satellite communications service from controlling drones, which are critical to Kyiv’s forces in fighting off the Russian invasion.

Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s chief operating officer, said at a conference in the US that the surprise decision had been taken because it had never been the company’s intention to allow Starlink to be used “for offensive purposes”.

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Elon Musk says SpaceX will keep funding Starlink internet in Ukraine

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World’s richest man’s company previously said it could not pay for satellite internet in country indefinitely

Elon Musk on Saturday announced that his company would continue to pay for Starlink satellite internet in Ukraine, a day after suggesting he could not keep funding the project, which he said was losing around $20m a month.

“The hell with it,” the world’s richest man wrote on Twitter. “Even though Starlink is still losing money & other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we’ll just keep funding Ukraine govt for free.”

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Elon Musk’s SpaceX says it can no longer fund Starlink internet in Ukraine

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Firm reportedly asks US government to pick up bill as relationship between Musk and Kyiv breaks down

Elon Musk’s SpaceX has said it cannot afford to continue to donate satellite internet to Ukraine and has asked the US government to pick up the bill, according to a report, as the relationship between the billionaire and Kyiv breaks down.

“We are not in a position to further donate terminals to Ukraine, or fund the existing terminals for an indefinite period of time,” SpaceX’s director of government sales wrote, in a letter seen by CNN.

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‘Like an alien obelisk’: space debris found in Snowy Mountains paddock believed to be from SpaceX mission

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Astrophysicist Brad Tucker says he often gets calls from people who think they’ve found space junk but the scorched metal found by two farmers is ‘very real’

The Australian Space Agency is investigating space debris found in farmland in the Snowy Mountains in southern NSW, after being notified by an astrophysicist who believes it to be from a SpaceX mission.

Brad Tucker, an astrophysicist at the Australian National University, says he often gets calls from people who believe they’ve found space junk – and they are normally easy to rule out.

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Spirals of blue light in New Zealand night sky leave stargazers ‘kind of freaking out’

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Social media abuzz with pictures and theories about formations thought to be from exhaust plume of SpaceX rocket

New Zealand stargazers were left puzzled and awed by strange, spiralling light formations in the night sky on Sunday night.

Around 7.25pm Alasdair Burns, a stargazing guide on Stewart Island/Rakiura, received a text from a friend: go outside and look at the sky. “As soon as we actually went outside, it was very obvious what it was he was referring to,” Burns said.

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Elon Musk denies he sexually harassed attendant on private jet in 2016

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Billionaire says report is ‘utterly untrue’ after allegation he paid $250k in 2018 to settle claim

Elon Musk has denied claims in a news report that he sexually harassed a flight attendant on a private jet in 2016, calling the accusations “utterly untrue”.

SpaceX, the rocket company founded by Musk, paid the female attendant $250,000 (£200,000) in a severance settlement after a sexual misconduct claim against the world’s richest person, according to the news website Business Insider.

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