News briefs: February 26
Posted: Wed, Feb 27 7:55 AM ET (1255 GMT)
TRW has shipped the Aqua spacecraft to Vandenberg Air Force Base for launch in April, the company announced Monday. Aqua, formerly known as Earth Observing...

Astrium-led group wins Skynet 5 contract
Posted: Wed, Feb 27 7:35 AM ET (1235 GMT)
A consortium led by Astrium won a contract Tuesday to build the next generation of military communications satellites for the UK. Paradigm, a joint venture...

Shuttle launch faces weather, technical issues
Posted: Wed, Feb 27 7:11 AM ET (1211 GMT)
Thursday's launch of the shuttle Columbia could be threatened by weather and technical problems, shuttle managers said Tuesday. Cold weather is the primary concern:...

NASA budget too small for "core complete" ISS
Posted: Tue, Feb 26 8:13 AM ET (1313 GMT)
NASA's proposed budget is too small to build even the scaled-down "core complete" version of the International Space Station, Aerospace Daily reported Monday....

News briefs: February 25
Posted: Tue, Feb 26 8:05 AM ET (1305 GMT)
An international arbitrator approved Monday a decision by Loral to dissolve a satellite manufacturing partnership with Alcatel. The Swiss panel found that Loral provided the...

Soyuz launches military satellite
Posted: Tue, Feb 26 2:10 AM ET (0710 GMT)
A Russian Soyuz booster launched a classified military spacecraft Monday in the first Russian launch of 2002. The Soyuz-U rocket lifted off from Plesetsk...

Countdown begins for STS-109 launch
Posted: Tue, Feb 26 2:03 AM ET (0703 GMT)
NASA started the countdown Monday for the Thursday morning launch of the space shuttle Columbia on mission STS-109. The countdown began at 10 am...

News briefs: February 23-24
Posted: Mon, Feb 25 8:01 AM ET (1301 GMT)
Engineers have restored some control to NASA's Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) spacecraft, Astronomy.com reported Friday. FUSE had stopped scientific observations in December...

ISS odor problem solved
Posted: Mon, Feb 25 7:41 AM ET (1241 GMT)
A strong odor that filled the US portions of the International Space Station after a Wednesday spacewalk have been removed, NASA reported. The Expedition Four...

Ariane 4 launches Intelsat 904
Posted: Sat, Feb 23 3:37 AM ET (0837 GMT)
An Ariane 4 booster successfully launched an Intelsat communications satellite early Saturday. The Ariane 44L lifted off at 1:59 am EST (0659 GMT) from...