Jeff Bezos enters the arena
Through SpaceX, Elon Musk has dominated spaceflight around the planet in recent years. But amazon founder Jeff Bezos' extraplanetary ambitions could soon pose a challenge to Musk.
The space company founded by Bezos, Blue Origin, has a powerful rocket called New Glenn that could finally take off in 2025. Like SpaceX's Falcon 9, the booster stage is designed to be fully reusable so it can fly again and again and reduce the cost of launches. The rocket could launch national security satellites for the U.S. military and spacecraft for NASA, including Mars orbiters and moon landing modules.
Another thing New Glenn will carry are satellites for amazon, where Bezos is still CEO. The company's Project Kuiper involves plans to build a megaconstellation of satellites that transmit Internet from space, in competition with SpaceX's Starlink constellation. amazon also plans to launch Kuiper satellites using rockets from many of Blue Origin's competitors, including United Launch Alliance, France's Arianespace, and even SpaceX.
Astronomers on a mountaintop in central Chile are wrapping up construction of the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, which could capture its first views of the night sky this year, as early as July 4.
The observatory, formerly the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, was renamed in 2020 in honor of Vera Rubin, who died at age 88 in 2016. Dr. Rubin's work persuaded astronomers of the existence of dark matter, which constitutes the vast majority of the mass of the universe. but nobody knows what it is.
The name is appropriate. Using the world's largest digital camera, scientists will use the Rubin Observatory to create a moving image of the southern sky. These images would help researchers understand the nature of dark matter, as well as dark energy, the unknown force pulling the cosmos apart. The wealth of data will also help reveal the history of our galaxy's birth and catalog our solar system's asteroids and comets, including those that could one day crash into Earth.
The moon and Trump return
Despite all that potential uncertainty, a series of robotic space missions to the moon are planned early in the year. The first two, a pair of landers from the American company Firefly Aerospace and the Japanese Ispace, will be launched <a target="_blank" class="css-yywogo" href="https://x.com/ispace_inc/status/1869226432293183882″ title=”” rel=”noopener noreferrer” target=”_blank”>on the same SpaceX rocket as early as mid-January. Firefly's mission will be the first trip for its Blue Ghost lander and will carry cargo paid for by NASA. Ispace's lunar trip will be its second attempt after the company's first lander crashed onto the lunar surface in 2023.
Later in the first quarter of the year, Intuitive Machines could attempt to put another robotic lander on the moon after the company's Odysseus lander reached the surface intact, but tilted, last February. The company's second lander, called Athena, will also carry NASA-funded instruments, including a drill that will try to find ice samples. Athena will share a SpaceX launcher with Lunar Trailblazer, a NASA orbiter that will study water on the moon.
Vigils for Voyager 1 and 2
Voyager 1 and 2, twin spacecraft that inspired a generation of cosmic wonderers, were launched in 1977. After decades of exploring the outer solar system before charting the unknown frontier of interstellar space, the two spacecraft are showing signs of age.
Early in their journey, the pair passed by Jupiter and Saturn, and Voyager 2 later visited Uranus and Neptune. But perhaps the mission's most iconic gift to the world was a photograph taken of Earth, a tiny pixel against the expanse of space, prompting famed astronomer Carl Sagan to coin the image.pale blue dot.”
In recent years, robotic explorers have come in and out of contact with NASA. Communication with Voyager 2 was intentionally cut off in 2020 for months and then accidentally lost for a couple of weeks in 2023 before being restored.
Voyager 1, on the other hand, scared mission specialists this year when it stopped sending data back to Earth. Instruments on both spacecraft have been turned off to conserve energy.
But NASA isn't giving up yet. When they are finally buried in the space between the stars, it would be a fitting resting place given that the duo have ventured where no other spacecraft had gone before.
India's orbital goal
India is focusing on human spaceflight. A member of the nation's astronaut corps, Shubhanshu Shukla, will spend up to 14 days this spring aboard the International Space Station during a commercial mission with the company Axiom Space.
Shukla and his fellow Indian astronauts hope to be the first to launch into low Earth orbit on their indigenously made rockets. india said in December that an orbital vehicle from that program, known as Gaganyaan, was being prepared for a test launch without astronauts on board. A successful flight could pave the way for the launch of a manned Indian astronaut as early as 2026.
New milestones and new spaceships
SpaceX captivated the world in November during Flight 5 of Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built. Expect the company to try to repeat the impressive “chopsticks” capture of its massive Super Heavy booster. SpaceX may also try to catch the upper stage Starship vehicle after it completes one orbit around Earth and returns to the launch site in south Texas for the first time. SpaceX said it was targeting for 25 launches of Starship in 2025 as it prepares the spacecraft to take astronauts to the moon under the company's contract with NASA.
Other new rockets and spacecraft may take off in 2025.
One is Neutron, a reusable rocket developed by New Zealand-founded Rocket Lab. The company routinely carries satellites into orbit aboard its small Electron rocket and could make a first flight of the new vehicle from a launch site in Virginia.
Another is Dream Chaser, a space plane built by Sierra Space. After delays in 2024, the company hopes to be able to transport cargo to the ISS for the first time this year.
