Falcon 9 takes to the skies again this morning, carrying 29 more Starlink satellites on the final fully private SpaceX launch, Starlink 10-54. Truly an end of an era, but hopefully the beginning of a great new one. 📸 - @LaunchHeavenX

The next Atlas V 551 rocket launch campaign is underway at Cape Canaveral as United Launch Alliance prepares for the Amazon Leo 8 mission. Targeted for July 3 at 12:03 a.m. EDT, pending range approval, the launch will deliver another 29 advanced broadband satellites into low Earth orbit for Amazon’s constellation.

This is $SPCX.

She has also teased that Flight 15 may fly from their Florida Pad!! 🔥

Lift off🚀 #H3F6

Been waiting for this one for years, she’s a pretty one! The exhaust from those engines looks so good without the bright SRBs blowing out the detail!

Based on the information in this great interview from @SciGuySpace, we will be seeing an SLS stack like this rolling out for initial testing this year. It will certainly look incredibly strange, but I’m excited to see it!

Starting with some energy, and my inability to write brief updates, I am just extremely proud of the NASA crew, our industry, and our international partners. We are getting into a rhythm here at NASA. Earlier this year, setbacks put the Artemis II rocket back in the VAB for repairs, and we determined it was necessary to add another mission, Artemis III in 2027. Since then, we have unveiled the Ignition plans to build a Moon Base and nuclear-powered spaceships, launched a highly successful mission around the Moon, brought the crew home safely, and now watched the torch pass to Artemis III. There will be no shortage of major milestones to celebrate in the months ahead as we build the Moon Base and launch the Nancy Grace Roman telescope. I am beyond proud of the team and all the momentum and excitement around the space program. I do want to take this moment to address two of the questions I have been seeing since the crew announcement. Why are there no women assigned to Artemis III? I have seen reactions ranging from disappointment to outrage. I have personally been to space twice with 50% female crews. My closest advisors and some of the smartest engineers I know are women. In our latest NASA leadership organization, nearly 50% of the Center Directors and Mission Directorate leadership are women. The last astronaut candidate class selected under this Administration was majority female because they were the best of the best, including one astronaut I previously went to space with. In a world with so much controversy, I hope this can be a moment where we celebrate the astronauts selected, respect the integrity of the process, and recognize the extraordinary depth of talent across the entire corps. The crew selection does not involve any political appointees. The Astronaut Office assigns the crew that gives the mission the best chance of meeting its objectives, taking into account many factors, including the background and expertise of the astronauts, such as test pilot experience, development work on specific programs, and availability. For example, those raising this concern may not be aware of the pipeline of crews already preparing to launch to the Space Station, or those who have been undergoing lunar-specific training that would be a better fit for a future surface mission. The Artemis III astronauts are experienced, qualified, and deserve to be celebrated for the mission they have been assigned, just as the crews that follow will be celebrated when their time comes. We have an extraordinary astronaut corps, and every mission and every crew is part of a larger campaign to get America back to the Moon and to build the future we all dreamed about as children. What are the objectives for Artemis III if both landers will not be fully ready? Coming off a highly successful lunar mission like Artemis II, it is not surprising that the bar is set high for Artemis III. I think it is important to understand how difficult and dangerous it is to land astronauts on the Moon. We have not done it in a very long time, and we want to draw from a past playbook for success. That means getting into a cadence of launching, learning, and rolling improvements into the next mission. First and foremost, it is imperative for SLS to be flying with some frequency for operational currency and, honestly, safety. Earlier this year, it was very clear across NASA leadership that an additional mission was necessary in 2027. It is also imperative to gain interoperability data from rendezvous and docking with landers in Earth orbit. We do not need those landers that are still in development to be fully capable and certified for landing on the Moon on Artemis III, but we do need to test certain systems and controllability. Not to mention, we are moving quickly into a future where we do not require a single rocket to bring everything necessary for a mission to space, and as such, gaining experience with multi-launch campaigns and on-orbit assembly is directionally correct. The Blue Origin test lander for Artemis III will incorporate many of the most important systems and subsystems that have not previously been operated by the provider, including ECLSS in a crew cabin, and other avionics. With SpaceX, they have demonstrated many of those capabilities continuously on Crew Dragon, but other controllability tests are important based on the negative-X axis acceleration that will be necessary when Starship undertakes the TLI burn to the Moon with a docked Orion. After Artemis III, we will learn a lot and roll in further improvements, be that hardware, software, or procedural updates, as both providers undertake end-to-end uncrewed demonstrations to the surface in 2028, in advance of Artemis IV, where NASA astronauts will finally complete the grand return to the Moon. As I said in my remarks yesterday, when Gene Cernan left the lunar surface on Apollo 17, he said, “We leave as we came, and, God willing, we shall return, with peace and hope for all mankind.” We are returning, and we are doing so with the fire carried forward from Apollo, the lessons learned from Artemis II, the crew of Artemis III, and all those who will follow. NASA will send the very best crews for the right missions. If the composition of our astronaut corps and our latest class of candidates says anything, it is that we have exactly the talent required to get the job done. Godspeed Artemis III, and all those who will follow.

Already loving this crew 🧡

Artemis III crew will take flight aboard the SLS rocket next year! I can’t wait to see Randy Bresnik, Luca Parmitano, Frank Rubio, and Andre Douglas take to the skies to test critical lunar hardware. Let’s go!

True to its name, Never Tell Me The Odds has safely returned to Rocket Park.

AST SpaceMobile Announces Launch Date for BlueBird Satellites 8, 9, and 10 businesswire.com/news/home/2…

Sometimes reality hits me of what I get to do. I stood feet from a massive vehicle that has flown to space, glided in to a precise point at supersonic speeds, and propulsively landed TWICE. The Space Coast truly is one of the craziest places on Earth.

Never tell Blue Origin the odds. For having experienced an extremely violent explosion that took place just a few hundred feet away, New Glenn booster "Never Tell Me The Odds" looks to be in pretty good shape! Blue Origin rolled the booster back to their Rocket Park facility along with the GS2s to free up space at LC-36 as they clean up and rebuild the pad to hopefully support a launch as soon as this year. 📸 - @LaunchHeavenX