WASHINGTON (NASA PR) — Sen. Bill Nelson took office as the 14th administrator of NASA Monday, after he was given the oath of office by Vice President Kamala Harris during a ceremony at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building in Washington.

HOUSTON (NASA PR) — Mark Geyer, director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, is stepping down from his position leading the center to focus more time on his health and family in light of a cancer diagnosis.

“Mark has had an exceptional impact on this agency, leading the nation’s key human spaceflight programs for decades. Under Mark’s leadership, Johnson has moved the United States into a new era of human space exploration,” said NASA Administrator Sen. Bill Nelson. “We’re fortunate to continue to have Mark and his decades of expertise serving the agency in his new role as senior advisor to the associate administrator.”

“It has been my honor to lead the Johnson Space Center team,” Geyer said. “JSC is a group of extremely talented professionals all dedicated to the mission of expanding human exploration of the solar system. The diverse scope of work they accomplished and the challenges they overcame inspired me every day.  I have been so blessed to work here.” 

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Until the advent of the reusable Falcon 9, most first stages of rockets fell into the ocean, on the lightly populated steppes of Kazakhstan (Russian launches from Baikonur), or crashed beside and even into rural villages, throwing up huge clouds of toxic propellants in the process (Chinese launches).

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

One of the fascinating things to watch since Virgin Galactic went public 18 months ago has been stock analysts’ and other supposed experts’ takes on the company. I’ve read articles, watched YouTube videos and CNBC reports, and closely followed quarterly earnings calls.

My conclusion: most of them didn’t have a clue.

BROOMFIELD, Colo. (SWF PR) — The recent resurgence in anti-satellite (ASAT) testing in space and growth in robotic rendezvous and proximity operations (RPOs) conducted for military and intelligence purposes have generated concerns from many countries about the increasingly contested nature of space. While many RPO activities are not directly aggressive or destructive themselves, they can lead to misconceptions or heightened tensions that could negatively impact space security and stability.  Additionally, destructive ASAT tests have created thousands of pieces of orbital debris over the last several decades, which can pose long-term risks to all space activities.

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Suborbital flight provider Virgin Galactic announced on Friday that it is delaying release of its first quarter earnings report from Tuesday, May 4, to Monday, May 10. The release will now occur after and not before rival Blue Origin starts selling tickets on May 5 for trips to space aboard its suborbital New Shepard spacecraft.

Virgin Galactic said it needs more time to restate 2019 and 2020 earnings in response to an April 12 statement by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on the accounting treatment of company-issued warrants, which provide holders the right to purchase stock at a set price by a certain date.

WASHINGTON (NASA PR) — In the first 100 days of the Biden-Harris Administration, NASA has taken bold steps to expand America’s exploration and scientific frontiers, advancing the nation’s commitment to build back better through innovation, combat climate change, re-establish America’s standing abroad, and inspire the next generation.

PARIS (CNES PR) — CNES, the National Space Studies Center, and the University of the Bundeswehr in Munich, are joining forces to launch SpaceFounders, the Franco-German accelerator dedicated to European space tech start-ups whose ambition is to help the best become the world champions of the next decade.

The SpaceFounders program, ultra-intensive and ultra-high quality, takes place over ten weeks, face-to-face, with meetings and workshops in Toulouse and Munich, European capitals of aeronautics and space, and online, with conferences and mentoring sessions. The program concludes with two “Demo Days” in Paris and Berlin, allowing start-ups to meet a wide range of venture capital funds, European Family Offices and public funders, and thus obtain the funding necessary for their development.

Marco Fuchs announces agreement with Pedro Siza Vieira, Minister for the Economy and Prof. Heitor, Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education in Lisbon

Lisbon, Portugal – April 23, 2021 – Rocket Factory Portugal LDA Unipessoal, a subsidiary of German launch service provider Rocket Factory Augsburg AG (RFA), successfully concluded the contractual negotiations to develop composite structures of its launch vehicle RFA ONE together with CEiiA, a Portuguese Engineering and Development Center based in Matosinhos, North of Portugal. The announcement took place during the event “Space in the Recovery of Portugal and Europe” in Lisbon, to be followed by a visit to the island of Santa Maria, Azores. 

Harris will swear in former Sen. Bill Nelson as the next NASA Administrator on Monday morning (details TBA). The Senate unanimously approved his nomination on Thursday. Nelson issued the following statement on Saturday: “The Vice President is the perfect person to lead the federal government’s space policy, which is increasingly complex, with many nations in space. “Vice President Lyndon Johnson was the first chair of the National Space Council when […]

Four astronauts returned to Earth early Sunday morning on a SpaceX Crew Dragon after a six-month stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS), completing the first

The Resilience spacecraft carried NASA astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, and Shannon Walker, and Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to a splashdown off the coast of Panama City, Florida at 2:56 a.m. EDT.

Richard Branson’s space tourism company used similar numbers to go public on the New York Stock Exchange. Were investors duped?

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Nicholas Schmidle’s book about Virgin Galactic and SpaceShipTwo is coming out on Tuesday. In an essay he wrote for The New York Times, he recounted how Virgin Galactic President Michael Moses didn’t believe the company’s own flight projections when they were presented to him by its then-chief financial officer.

At one point, I was leaked a cache of internal documents. Some revealed the depth of Virgin Galactic’s oftentimes shaky grip on reality.

In 2013, Mike Moses, at the time Virgin Galactic’s senior vice president for operations, was sent an email containing a chart from Virgin Galactic’s chief financial officer at the time, Ken Sunshine. The chart showed a radical uptick in flight operations, projecting 75 flights in 2015, 194 in 2016, 229 in 2017 and 264 in 2018. “No chance in hell,” replied Mr. Moses, who is Beth’s husband. “These numbers are a pipe dream.” (Mr. Moses, through a representative, declined to comment on those emails.)