Posted: Fri, Mar 12 6:38 AM ET (1138 GMT)
Partner nations in the International Space Station project affirmed Thursday their desire to keep operating the station at least to 2020, while studying the possibility of further extensions. Heads of the agencies involved in the ISS, meeting in Japan, concluded that there are no "technical constraints" to keep flying the ISS to at least 2020. The agencies are studying certification of on-orbit elements of the station through 2028, 30 years after the launch of the station's first modules. Previous NASA budget documents included funding for the ISS only through 2015, but the 2011 budget proposal released last month includes extending ISS operations at least through 2020.

Related Links:

•  Space News article
•  Spaceflight Now article
•  AFP article
•  RIA Novosti article
•  Heads of agencies joint statement on the ISS

Posted: Fri, Mar 12 6:30 AM ET (1130 GMT)
Commercial remote sensing company GeoEye announced Thursday that it has awarded Lockheed Martin a contract to build its next imaging satellite in the hopes of securing additional business from the US government. The GeoEye-2 satellite will be similar in imaging capability to the existing GeoEye-1, which can take images with resolutions as sharp as 41 centimeters, but will feature enhancements to allow it to collect more imagery at faster rates. Advance work on the camera system for the satellite, provided by ITT, started back in 2007. GeoEye plans to launch the new satellite in late 2012. Lockheed Martin built the Ikonos satellite for GeoEye predecessor company Space Imaging, while General Dynamics's satellite unit, sold last week to Orbital Sciences Corporation, built GeoEye-1. Terms of the deal were not disclosed; the contract was announced a day after GeoEye secured a financing deal with Cerebus Capital Management for the satellite, part of GeoEye's effort to secure an EnhancedView contract from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.

Related Links:

•  Denver Business Journal article
•  AP article
•  Reuters article
•  GeoEye press release
•  Lockheed Martin press release

Paradigm orders fourth Skynet satellite for UK military
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The British military and the private company that provides it with communications services have agreed to a deal that will involve the launch of a...

SpaceX test firing aborted
Posted: Wed, Mar 10 5:28 AM ET (1028 GMT)
A planned test firing of the first stage engines on the first Falcon 9 was aborted because of a technical problem, officials said late Tuesday....

White House planning April space conference
Posted: Mon, Mar 8 6:03 AM ET (1103 GMT)
The White House announced Sunday that President Barack Obama will host a conference in April to discuss his administration's new vision for space. The...