Space, in brief

Armed forces moving into orbit

SpaceX launched 21 relay satellites for a US military network that warns of missiles. [4] Kapta Space, a Seattle start-up, raised $24 million for radar to follow missiles from orbit. [7] All 27 European Union countries approved a shared plan for answering threats to their satellites. [5]

SpaceX's reach growing

Phone company shares fell on Friday after SpaceX agreed to buy airwaves for a phone service. [8] SpaceX is the only US company flying astronauts today, and it plans to retire that capsule. [1] Insuring SpaceX's debt against default now costs more. [12]

Governments as the main buyer

NASA promises each winning station company at least $100 million. [1] Kapta's new money pays for radar units for classified missions it won this year. [7] NASA says the first part of its Moon Base launches in December. [15]

Test dates slipping

The European Commission gave Themis, Europe's reusable rocket test, until the end of 2026 to make its first hop. [12] SpaceX's next Starship flight moved to 8 November at the earliest. [14] NASA held back its station request for months to work through comments on its July draft. [2]

1. 1NASA asks companies to build the space stations that replace the ISS, and offers to arrange their first crew flights
2. 2Phone company shares fall after SpaceX airwaves deal
3. 3US military network gets 21 more satellites
4. 4Europe pays for guard satellites, not weapons
5. 5Start-up raises $24m for radar that follows missiles

NASA on Friday asked US companies to propose private space stations to replace the International Space Station, the lab that circles Earth with astronauts on board. [1]

Watch 8 December, when bids are due, and whether any company besides SpaceX and Boeing offers to fly crews to a private station. [1][2]

Shares in big phone companies fell on Friday after SpaceX agreed to buy more airwaves for Starlink Mobile, its plan to sell phone service. [8][11]

These 800 MHz airwaves reach inside buildings, which SpaceX calls one of its last gaps. [11] Verizon closed 8.75% down, its worst day since 2002.

T-Mobile fell 13.27% and AT&T 9.81%. [8] In London, Vodafone lost 4.9% and Airtel Africa 6.3%, and Deutsche Telekom fell 8% in Germany. [9][10]

SpaceX says it can now be the first operator to use both satellite and ground airwaves, and Musk called the deal the last piece it needed for full US coverage. [11][9]

JPMorgan analysts still see little near-term risk, because a ground network takes years and a lot of money to build. [8]

A SpaceX Falcon 9 launched 21 data-relay satellites for the US Space Development Agency from California at 07:39 GMT on Saturday. [3][4]

The agency is building a military network in low orbit that carries messages for US forces and warns of missiles. [4]

A first try on 5 October stopped 58 seconds before launch over odd readings from the rocket's second stage. [3]

This was the fourth of nine launches for the first batch, and the plan is a new batch every two years. [4]

Every relay satellite so far has flown on a SpaceX rocket. [4]

A rival cannot see what a guard satellite is for, only what it can do, so it builds its own, and both sides end up with more.

Its rival sees a machine that could attack, builds its own, and both end up with more weapons in orbit and no more safety.

An EU fund and France already pay for craft that can act against a rival's satellite, and they call it defence.

A country that might face those forces counts these satellites as part of an attack aimed at it.

Each government sees its own satellites clearly, and the other side's plans hardly at all.

All 27 European Union countries approved a shared plan this week for answering threats to their satellites. [5]

Josef Aschbacher, head of the European Space Agency, told reporters in Turkey that Europe does not put weapons in space. [5]

But an EU defence fund and France are paying for satellites that can fly up to a rival's craft and act against it without smashing it. [5]

Germany's strategy calls for such 'bodyguard' satellites too. [5] The treaty banning nuclear weapons in orbit dates from 1967, when 128 satellites flew.

About 16,810 working ones fly now. [6]

It follows Troy Meink, the US Air Force secretary, saying in recent weeks that the US has weapons in orbit. [5][6]

Aschbacher warned that wrecking satellites would spread debris that could make space unusable for everyone. [5]

Kapta Space, a Seattle start-up, raised $24 million on Friday to build radar for satellites that can follow moving targets. [7]

Radar sees by bouncing radio waves off a target, and Kapta's is meant to track missiles mid-flight, where ground radars can lose them. [7]

The money pays for radar units for classified missions it won this year. [7] Its chief, Milton Perque, says the radar will first fly within 24 to 36 months. [7]

Perque says radar in space has been too expensive to fly in the hundreds a missile watch needs, and claims Kapta's design is cheaper. [7]

Payload notes it looks made for Golden Dome, the Trump administration's planned missile shield, though Kapta says its work began earlier. [7]

NASA's head, Jared Isaacman, said on Thursday that the first part of NASA's Moon Base will launch in December. [15]

Robot missions with no crew would then fly almost every month from early 2027. [15]

US space policy had set 2030 for the first Moon Base parts, so this would beat that goal. [15]

NASA is also building a website so the public can watch the base go up. [15]

Isaacman said rovers and equipment will be waiting when astronauts arrive. [15]

He spoke at a White House science summit, where a NASA deal on space nuclear power was signed with no new money or cost estimate attached. [15]

The price of insuring SpaceX's debt against default rose on Wednesday, Ars Technica reports, citing the Financial Times. [12] Protecting $1 million of its debt now costs $19,400 a year. [12]

It follows SpaceX's plan to borrow $40 billion to buy Nvidia chips for AI. [12]

On Thursday Elon Musk posted that SpaceX could one day be worth far more than the whole world economy. [13]

SpaceX was worth $2.2 trillion at Thursday's close and lost $541 million in the second quarter. [13]

One analyst called Musk's post "classic Musk hype and theatre". [13] Musk wrote on Friday that seeing a path did not mean he was confident of reaching it. [13]

SpaceX's next Starship test, Flight 15, is now set for no earlier than 8 November, NASASpaceflight reports. [14] Starship is SpaceX's giant rocket, which SpaceX plans to catch and fly again. [14]

Ship 42, the upper stage for that flight, went back for a third round of tank testing with its six engines removed. [14]

Ship 40, which flew on Flight 13, came home to Texas on 7 October after 75 days at sea. [14]

Flight 16, no earlier than 10 December, would be the first from Florida. [14]

NASASpaceflight guesses the extra tests fix engine failures seen on Flights 12 and 14, but SpaceX has not said. [14]

Starship's licence is written for Flight 14's plan, so a new plan, such as catching the ship, would need the regulator's approval. [14]

Jeff Bezos told Fox News this week that Blue Origin, his rocket company, is building three more launch pads. [12]

That would give it four, counting the Florida pad it is rebuilding for its big New Glenn rocket. [12]

The company has asked the FAA, the US aviation regulator, to let it fly 50 times a year from Florida. [12]

Bezos said the goal is to fly every day, then every hour. [12]

Bezos tied the new pads to that request to fly 50 times a year. [12] Ars Technica notes Blue Origin has yet to launch even once a month. [12]

Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida is getting lasers that can knock down drones flying into its airspace, Ars Technica reports, citing The War Zone. [12]

SpaceX, United Launch Alliance, Blue Origin and Relativity Space all launch from the base. [12] Hundreds of drones flew into the area last year. [12]

The usual defence, jamming a drone's radio link, could also damage the rockets and spacecraft there. [12]

The lasers are meant to keep launches safe and to keep prying cameras away from a base full of military and company secrets. [12]

The European Commission has given SALTO, a 42.8 million euro project to test Europe's reusable rocket demonstrator, until the end of 2026. [12]

The rocket, Themis, must make short hops: lift off, land and fly again. [12] The first deadline was November 2025, and it has been pushed back several times. [12]

Separately, German start-up Rocket Factory Augsburg named Alexander Dahm, who worked on the Ariane 5 rocket, as its new chief. [12]

Its first stage was destroyed in a 2024 ground test, and it has not yet reached orbit. [12]

Themis is Europe's test of a rocket that lands so it can fly again. [12] On Saturday a SpaceX booster made the 668th landing of a Falcon rocket. [3]

Julian Shapiro found three small galaxies near the big spiral galaxy M101 while he was still in high school, Universe Today reports. [16]

They are now named Shapiro I, II and III, and his paper is in The Astrophysical Journal. [16] He used public telescope archives, open to anyone. [16]

Small galaxies far from big ones should still be making stars, but these three are not. [16]

Shapiro argues they once passed close to a big galaxy, lost their gas, and were flung back out. [16]

Such backsplash galaxies are predicted by the leading model of the universe but have been hard to find nearby. [16]

A test copy of the probe NASA's DAVINCI mission will drop into Venus's atmosphere passed a series of furnace tests in August and September, The Planetary Society reports. [17]

The tests, at a heat-treating firm in Bedford, Pennsylvania, copied the fast, extreme heating of the fall through Venus's air. [17] DAVINCI is NASA's planned mission to Venus. [17]

The test copy is an engineering model, built to check the design before the flight probe is made. [17]

Elon Musk turned his complaint about Starlink's stalled launch in India on one man by name this week: Mukesh Ambani. [18][19]

Ambani's Reliance group owns Jio, India's largest phone and internet company. [18]

On Thursday Musk asked on X whether Ambani was the real boss of India, and he later called him Prime Minister Ambani. [18][19]

On Saturday he shared old news reports about political donations to India's ruling party by a Reliance-linked firm. [20]

India's communications minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia, said on Friday that India allows no monopolies and that three satellite operators hold licences. [20]

Reliance has not responded, and CNBC cites local reports that Jio plans its own network of about 1,600 low-orbit satellites. [20][18]