Staying at the Station:
This Week in Space

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The duo of astronauts, Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore, who have been at the International Space Station (ISS) for an extended period due to issues with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, will remain in space for at least another month. This latest delay is due to the prolonged completion of a new SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. Williams and Wilmore were part of the crew on the first crewed test flight of Boeing's Starliner, designed to transport humans to and from the ISS.

The spacecraft was launched in June 2024, with the mission initially planned for an eight-day stay aboard the space station. However, multiple malfunctions detected during the mission led NASA to decide against using the Starliner for the crew’s return.  The spacecraft ultimately landed empty in September, without major issues.

To bring the astronauts back to Earth, they were reassigned to the ISS’s ninth crew, which will remain aboard until February 2025. This change required two of the original four crew members to relinquish their spots and wait for a future opportunity.

NASA has now announced a delay in the completion of the new Dragon spacecraft, which was originally planned to bring the next crew to the station and then return the current crew a few days later. The spacecraft  is not expected to reach the Florida facility for final testing and flight preparation until January 2025.

Although NASA and SpaceX considered using one of the three other active Dragon spacecraft—the fourth is already docked at the ISS—they ultimately decided to wait for the new Dragon's completion. The updated launch date for the new spacecraft is set for late March 2025, resulting in a delay of over a month from the original schedule.

With overlapping crew rotation days, Williams and Wilmore’s stay is expected to extend to approximately ten months. While lengthy, this duration does not break the ISS’s records. Just last year, American astronaut Frank Rubio completed a continuous stay of over a year on the ISS after his return was delayed due to a leaking Soyuz spacecraft—a Russian capsule in that case.

Staying a bit longer. Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore at the docking port of the Starliner spacecraft at the ISS, June 2024 | Photo: NASA

A Perfect Record of Failures

The Japanese company Space One has failed once again in its attempt to launch the Kairos rocket, approximately nine months after its first launch attempt ended in failure. The Kairos 2 rocket was launched from the Kushimoto Space Center in southern Japan, carrying four satellites from Japanese companies, one from a Taiwanese company, and a satellite designed by Japanese high school students.

Space One reported that the rocket’s self-destruct mechanism was activated at an altitude of 100 kilometers after issues were detected with the first-stage engines, causing the rocket to veer off course. The exact cause of the malfunction remains undisclosed.

The Kairos rocket, standing 59 meters tall, is designed to carry payloads of up to 250 kilograms into low Earth orbit. Space One has announced that it will promptly investigate the cause of the failure and attempt another launch in the future.

Two Lunar Landers on One Rocket

iSpace, another Japanese company, confirmed last week that its lunar lander, Resilience, will be launched in January aboard SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, alongside the lunar lander from the American company Firefly. While both landers will be launched into Earth orbit together, each is expected to follow a very different path to the Moon.

Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander will remain in Earth orbit for about 25 days before firing its engines for a fast trip to the Moon, reaching lunar orbit after four days. It will then orbit the Moon in a relatively low trajectory for 16 days before attempting to land in the Mare Crisium plain (Latin for the “Sea of Crises”), located north of the Moon’s equator.

In contrast, iSpace’s Japanese lander will follow a slower, fuel-efficient trajectory, gradually expanding its orbit around Earth before landing on the Moon after roughly four months. iSpace previously used this method with its first lunar lander, Hakuto-R, which crashed during a landing attempt in April 2023.

Firefly’s lander is funded by NASA as part of the CLPS program, which supports private missions to advance the goals of the Artemis program, aiming to resume human lunar exploration. It will carry 94 kilograms of scientific instruments selected by NASA, including equipment for analyzing lunar soil composition, experiments to study lunar dust characteristics, and tests related to lunar navigation.

The Japanese lander is expected to land in a region called the Mare Frigoris plain (Latin for the “Sea of Cold”), much farther north than Blue Ghost’s landing site. It carries scientific instruments from Japanese companies and research institutions, as well as a small rover developed by iSpace. Additionally, it includes several cultural artifacts, including a computer chip storing data in 275 Earth languages.

Following a series of failures by various companies—including Israel’s SpaceIL with the Beresheet spacecraft in 2019—a privately developed spacecraft successfully landed on the Moon for the first time in early 2024.  Although the lander by Intuitive Machines broke a landing leg upon touchdown, it remained operational, marking a milestone for private lunar exploration. These upcoming missions hold the promise of further advancements in space exploration, potentially paving the way for future achievements.

 If all goes as planned, this one will arrive first. Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander at the company’s facility in Texas, prepared for delivery to launch | Photo: Firefly Aerospace

SpaceX’s Security Investigation 

Three U.S. government and defense entities have initiated investigations into SpaceX amid concerns about potential violations of security protocols by the company and its CEO, Elon Musk. According to an investigative report by The New York Times, based on testimony from eight sources within the company and the defense sector, Musk and other top executives may have breached information-sharing rules.  These regulations mandate that individuals with high-level security clearances report overseas travel, meetings with foreign leaders, drug use, and other activities.

The investigations are being carried out by the Department of Defense Office of Inspector General, the U.S. Air Force, and the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security. According to the report, the Air Force recently declined to upgrade or renew Musk’s security clearance, citing concerns that he poses a risk to the security of the information entrusted to him. Officials from several U.S. allies, including Israel, have expressed apprehensions about Musk’s access to sensitive information. Israeli defense sources reportedly warned that Musk is “unpredictable.”

Many SpaceX employees are required to hold high-level security clearances due to the company’s collaboration with military and defense entities on the development and launch of reconnaissance satellites. SpaceX is a major U.S. government contractor, holding contracts worth over $10 billion, some of which are in the defense sector.

Sources within SpaceX informed The New York Times that Musk has, in recent years, disregarded the rules and directives applicable to individuals with high-level security clearances. They also claimed that other top executives at SpaceX feel compelled to adapt to Musk’s behavior and avoid reporting his actions for fear of termination—an outcome that reportedly befell employees who criticized Musk two years ago. Meanwhile, the company ensures that mid-level employees strictly adhere to all protocols.

Cody Miller, a former military officer who worked on security clearances at SpaceX, warned in an email to senior executives about what he described as a “let’s push it till we are caught mentality.” Shortly afterward, Miller was asked to resign and agreed.

Despite these allegations and the three ongoing investigations, the newly elected administration in Washington may choose to overlook the issues entirely.  Musk is closely allied with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has promised to appoint him to head an initiative aimed at improving the efficiency of the American civil service. In the United States, the president has the authority to grant high-level security clearances to individuals, so it wouldn’t be surprising if Musk continues his unrestrained conduct, this time with backing from the White House.

A security threat? Elon Musk with a general from the U.S. Air Force Missile Command at a base in San Francisco, 2019 | Photo: Defense Visual Information Distribution Service, Public Domain

China Sets New Record 

A Chinese astronaut set a new record last week for the longest continuous extravehicular activity (EVA), or "spacewalk," working outside the Tiangong 3 space station for nine hours and six minutes. According to Chinese media reports, Cai Xuzhe, the commander of the Shenzhou 19 mission, and his crewmate Song Lingdong exited the station to install protective shielding against space debris in vulnerable areas, focusing primarily on cables and pipes on the station's exterior.

Cai, who began his EVA about an hour and a half before his colleague, reportedly set the record for the longest spacewalk in history, surpassing the previous record by approximately ten minutes. The former record was held by American astronauts James Voss and Susan Helms during a Space Shuttle mission in 2001.

Although this achievement represents a modest improvement on a record that the Americans are not actively seeking to break, it serves as yet another reminder of China’s substantial investment in space exploration. It also highlights how quickly the country is closing the gap with the United States. China’s expanding capabilities in space exploration are on par with those of other nations, both in its national programs—such as the development of the Chinese space station— and in its private sector's activities beyond Earth.

A record-setting extravehicular activity. Cai (left, on the robotic arm) and Song outside the Tiangong space station | Photo: China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSEO)