Starship is cleared for its first try at orbit on Monday. It goes into orbit only if controllers are sure it can come back down

The rest of the day

6 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

1. 02

   Pakistan's first astronaut will fly with China

   Two Pakistani pilots, Zeeshan Ali and Khurram Daud, have trained for months at China's astronaut centre in Beijing, Pakistan's space agency told Reuters. [8] One will fly to Tiangong, China's space station, as the first foreigner China has carried. [8] The stay will be about a week, against roughly six months for China's own crews. [8] China has not said who or when, and a final choice is expected in mid-to-late October. [8] Chinese institutes picked four Pakistani experiments, on food and climate, from more than 300 proposals. [8]

   A Chinese crew's stayabout 6 months

   vsvs

   Pakistan's first flyerabout a week

   Why it matters — Pakistan has no rocket or crew capsule of its own, so its astronaut rides a Chinese craft, trained by Chinese instructors, and speaks Mandarin in orbit. [8] Citizens of about 50 countries have flown in space, but only Russia, the US and China have launched their own crews. [8]

2. 03

   FCC votes on skipping environment checks

   The FCC, the US regulator that licenses satellites' radio signals, votes on 30 September on a draft order about environmental reviews, Payload reports. [11] The order says space operations are not 'major federal actions'. [11] That phrase is what triggers a review under NEPA, a US law that makes agencies study a project's effects before approving it. [11] Satellite licences have been exempt from FCC environmental review since 1986, and the order would put them outside the law entirely. [11] The FCC argues that because no country can own space, effects there fall outside the law. [11]

   Why it matters — The FAA proposed in July to waive NEPA and 12 other laws, including the Endangered Species Act, for commercial launch licences, and received more than 3,200 comments. [11] Payload notes the effects of that rule would fall mostly on private sites such as SpaceX's Starbase. [11]

3. 04

   Juice swings past Earth on Monday

   Juice, the European Space Agency's probe to Jupiter's icy moons, passes 8,640 km above Earth on Monday 28 September, closest at 13:45 central European summer time. [10] Earth's pull will change its speed and bend its path, setting up one last Earth flyby in January 2029. [10] It launched in 2023, then swung past the Moon and Earth in 2024 and Venus in 2025. [9] It is due at Jupiter in July 2031. [10] Only one small course correction, four weeks out, was needed to line up this pass. [10]

   123456

   2,0232,0272,031

   1. 1Launch2,023
   2. 2Moon and Earth2,024
   3. 3Venus2,025
   4. 4Earth, Monday2,026
   5. 5Earth again2,029
   6. 6Jupiter2,031

   Why it matters — The team will use the pass to calibrate Juice's instruments on Earth and the Moon before they are needed at Jupiter. [10] For about 21 hours it runs through Earth's shadow on battery power, so some instruments are switched off. [10]

4. 05

   Starlink dodges once every 75 seconds

   Starlink, SpaceX's internet satellite network, moved its satellites nearly 35,000 times a month to dodge possible crashes in the period to May 2026, Ars Technica reports. [12] That is one move every 75 seconds, up from about 500 a month five years ago. [12] A move does not mean a near miss: SpaceX moves when the chance of a crash reaches 3 in 10 million, against NASA's standard of 1 in 10,000. [12] About 17,000 working satellites are now in orbit, some 11,000 of them Starlink's. [12]

   Five years ago500

   Period to May 202635,000

   Why it matters — The European Space Agency's yearly report on space junk, released this month, projects crashes in orbit rising faster and faster if launches keep growing, even if operators follow good practice. [12] Ars expects working in orbit to cost more, in dodging equipment, staff and fuel. [12]

5. 06

   Bennu formed where water froze

   Scientists led by Maria Schonbachler at ETH Zurich in Switzerland measured iron, titanium and chromium in half a gram of the asteroid Bennu. [13] It came from the 120 grams NASA's OSIRIS-REx brought back in 2023. [13] The iron and titanium were evenly mixed, which points to fine dust rather than lumps. [13] Water-bearing minerals suggest Bennu's parent formed near the line where water froze, around where Jupiter is now. [13] The study was published on 23 September in Science Advances. [13]

   Why it matters — Bennu's make-up matches Ryugu, the asteroid Japan's Hayabusa2 mission sampled, and a rare kind of meteorite, so all three may share a birthplace. [13] Schonbachler said Bennu may offer the best glimpse yet of the mix the rocky planets were built from. [13]

6. 07

   A daytime meteor shower peaks

   The Daytime Sextantids meteor shower is active from 22 September to 13 October, as Earth passes through a trail of dust whose source has not been pinned down. [14] Its meteors seem to come from a point about 30 degrees from the Sun, so most are lost in daylight and are easier to catch by radio. [14] Up to five may be seen in the hour before dawn around the peak. [14] Forecasts of the peak differ: 27 September in one listing, and 30 September to 4 October from Robert Lunsford of the American Meteor Society. [14]

   Why it matters — Lunsford says the meteors that are seen skim the top of the air and leave trails lasting several seconds. [14] A bright Moon will hide the faintest of them. [14]