From the first direct images of a black hole and a nearly-successful private moon landing to self-healing exosuits and self-retrieving rockets, read on for the top stories from what's been a stellar week for space science!
After Math: Eat your heart out, Soundgarden
From the first direct images of a black hole and a nearly-successful private moon landing to self-healing exosuits and self-retrieving rockets, read on for the top stories from what's been a stellar week for space science!
Virgin Orbit just edged closer to its goal of launching rockets in mid-air. The company has completed the first "captive carry" test for its LauncherOne rocket, hauling the 70-foot machine under the wing of Cosmic Girl (its Boeing 747 launch aircraf...
Today, Virgin Orbit announced that Cosmic Girl, its modified Boeing 747-400 launch platform for its Launcher One rocket, will take off from the UK. This will make Cornwall Airport Newquay the first site in the UK to support launches to Earth orbit. T...
Today, space company Virgin Orbit announced that it's secured its first launch contract from the Department of Defense. According to TechCrunch, the payload is scheduled to fly in January 2019, though it's possible that it could launch earlier, in la...
Three space-related companies apparently aren't enough for Richard Branson. Today, TechCrunch reported that Virgin Orbit, which was spun out from Virgin Galactic, has created a subsidiary called Vox Space. It's intended to focus exclusively on govern...
In its research into the best way to provide internet to the entire world, Facebook has mapped where all 7.5 billion people on the planet live. By combining government census data and satellite images along with some help from Facebook's image recogn...
There's a lot happening at Virgin's three space companies, even though they might not be making headlines the same way that other commercial spaceflight companies are. Virgin Galactic is focused on human spaceflight, and will be resuming powered test...
Richard Branson's Virgin Group now has three private space companies. The newest addition is called Virgin Orbit, and it will focus on low-cost small satellite launches based on the company's LauncherOne system. If you'll recall, LauncherOne uses a t...