NASA's Mars Science Laboratory to launch aboard an Atlas V from Cape Canaveral on November 25.

A Russian Soyuz 2 rocket is readied for it's October 20 first flight from South America.  (Arianespace)

First launch of Russia's Soyuz 2 from South America nears

 (Cape Canaveral, FL) -- An unmanned Russian rocket will launch for the first time from South America to deliver two satellites and test the verify the rocket's performanace.

 The mission is expected to draw more customers to the spaceport located on the Atlantic waters for the Arianespace company -- the same company which launches the successful Ariane 5.

 Launch of a Soyuz 2 by Arianespace is planned for the morning of October 20 from French Guiana Space Centre with two European Galileo navigation satellites aboard.

 Following a successful launch, a second Soyuz is expected to lift-off  in December.

 Follow our Live Twitter updates via @spacelaunchnews

Publisher Mary Myers' Launch Prospective 

NASATV

  NASA SCIENCE SATELLITE NEARS REENTRY: A NASA science satellite will plunge back to earth on Saturday raining over twenty pieces of debris over an unknown region of our planet. 

 NASA said on Friday the satellite will unlikly fall toward North America due to it's orbital track, but would not rule out a possible American landing.

 The satellite known as UARS for Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite is expected to re-enter the earth's atmosphere early late on September 23, and...  (UARS ReEntry Story)

  EUROPE'S ARIANE 5 LIFTS-OFF ON 60th FLIGHT: An Ariane 5 rocket lifted-off on September 21 carrying two communications satellites into earth orbit to service North America and the Middle East.

 Launch of the sixieth flight of an Ariane 5 occurred on time at 5:38:07 p.m. EDT. It was also the fifth and final Ariane flight of the year as Arianespace turns their attention to launching Russia's Soyuz 2 rocket in October and December.  (Launch Story)

  NASA SPACECRAFT DEPARTS ON A FIVE YEAR VOYAGE TO JUPITER: A NASA spacecraft began a 1700 million mile voyage on Friday from America's Space Coast as it travels to our solar system's largest and most complex planet.

 Launch occurred follow a brief countdown delay at 12:25:01 pm EDT, on August 5.

 NASA's Juno will study Jupiter's atmosphere for moisture and map it's magnetic fields and more during it's one year mission around the planet. Scientists hope to understand the make up of the large gaseous planet and it's origins, and answer...  (PreLaunch Story)

  iPHONE 4's TO LAUNCH TO SPACE STATION ON FINAL SHUTTLE FLIGHT: A pair of apple iPhone 4's launched into earth orbit aboard the final space shuttle flight and will be used by astronauts during a series of experiments aboard the International Space Station. 

 Each iPhone 4 model will have a special application loaded to test the calibration of the smart phone in space, and uses for it's camera as the crew aims it toward the earth in a series of photography tests.  (Read Story)

  SHUTTLE ATLANTIS LIFTS-OFF ON HER FINALE FLIGHT :  NASA launched the space shuttle Atlantis on Friday to begin a twelve day mission to resupply the International Space Station.

 Nearly 900,000 spectators around the Kennedy Space Center and along the Space Coast witnessed the final launch of a space shuttle.

 Atlantis' solid rocket boosters ignited at 11:29 a.m. EDT, and launching for the last Americans from American soil for several years.   STS-135: Launch Story      VIDEO: Atlantis Launches

  ARIANE 5 LAUNCH DELAYED DUE TO FAULTY FUEL VALVE:  A mighty European rocket will have to wait three weeks to carry aloft two high definition broadcast satellites due to a bad fuel valve.

 A launch attempt on July 1 was scrubbed due to a faulty fuel valve on the core main stage.

 Arianespace on Saturday announced a 20 day delay to roll the Ariane 5 back to it's assembly building to replace the valve.   (PreLaunch Story)

  RUSSIAN CARGO CRAFT DOCKS TO SPACE STATION:  A Russian cargo craft loaded with equipment and supplies successfully docked to the International Space Station on June 23.

 The 24-foot long spacecraft spent two days traveling up to the orbiting outpost with fresh supplies for the crew of six living and working aboard.

 Live video sent down by the supply craft's docking camera showed a nearly 910,000 pound space station alone in earth orbit draped with the blackness of space.  (Read Story)

  AIR FORCE LAUNCHES MINUTEMAN MISSILE FROM CALIFORNIA:  A Minuteman III missile with an unarmed re-entry vehicle was launched on a test flight June 22 from Vandenberg, AFB in California.

 Fog and low visibility combined with a communication link issue delayed the planned night time lift-off into the early dawn giving spectators along the coastline a beautiful view.

 The sixty-foot tall Intercontinental Ballistic Missile departed it's silo at 6:34:59 a.m. PDT (9:34 a.m. EDT), from launch facility 10 on the northern section of Vandenberg.   (Read Story)

  RUSSIA LAUNCHES SOYUZ U WITH CARGO FOR SPACE STATION  An unmanned spacecraft filled with fresh supplies, fuel and hardware lifted off a top a Russian rocket on Tuesday bound for the International Space Station.

 The Progress M-11M supply craft -- loaded with nearly 2.6 tons of food, water and equipment, including supplies for NASA and Japan's astronauts -- lifted-off on time at 10:38 a.m. EDT (1438 GMT) from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.  (Read Story)

  RETRO ISSUE: STS-78 Shuttle Columbia June 1996

 Fifteen years ago, the space shuttle Columbia lifted-off on a life sciences Spacelab flight and SpaceLaunch News covered the flight not only in print but on radio, too.

 Columbia lifted-off on June 20, 1996, and reporter Charles Atkeison broadcast the launch day on WAMT-AM here on the Space Coast that morning.

 Take a moment and enjoy most of our back issue from the flight and the stories and thoughts as we prepared for the upcoming International Space Station.  (STS-78 SLN Magazine)

 NASA SPACECRAFT PREPARES TO DEPART OUR SOLAR SYSTEM: A NASA spacecraft is speeding out and away from our solar system and will make the first leap into interstellar space at any moment according to scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

 Voyager 1's exit will begin giving astrophysicists new data accounts of life outside the solar system.

 The planetary satellite was launched nearly 34 years ago and continues to transmit data back to earth about the space around the craft powered by nuclear batteries.  (Read Story)

 JOINT NASA-ARGENTINA SPACECRAFT LAUNCHES ON SCIENCE MISSION:  A NASA instrument aboard an Argentinan built spacecraft designed to study the salt content of the earth's oceans launched on June 10 on a joint mission to study the ocean's circulation.

 Aquarius will help scientists study the ocean's currents and how the water flows from one region to the next.

 A United Launch Alliance Delta II-7320 rocket with the SAC-D Aquarius satellite riding a top occurred on time at 7:20 a.m. PDT (10:20 am EDT), from Vandenberg, AFB in California.

 Space shuttle portrait in earth orbit Space shuttle Endeavour, moving at 17,500 mph and docked at her port-of-call, was photographed over one hundred times by the crew of the Russian Soyuz TMA20 in the closing days of May.

 Beautiful images show the orbiter at the International Space Station, the first time an orbiter has been photographed at the orbiting complex. A perspective never before seen or recorded by a space crew, the Soyuz crew spent an hour in one place as the shuttle-station complex moved and rotated around as camera's clicked away 600 feet away.

 NEW SPACE STATION CREW READY FOR BUSY TIME IN ORBIT: The next crew members bound for the International Space Station are in their final hours before launch to begin nearly six busy months of living and working in earth orbit.

 Two space station veterans and a first time space flier will link up with the orbiting complex 222 miles above earth to begin a marathon mission.

 Russia's Soyuz commander Sergei Volkov, along with...   (Expedition crew's preview story)

 SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR COMPLETES HER FINAL SPACE FLIGHT: Gliding out of earth orbit and into the blackness of a Florida night sky, shuttle Endeavour returned home to the Kennedy Space Center on June 1 completing her twenty-fifth and final space flight.

 Endeavour's veteran crew of commander Mark Kelly, pilot Greg Johnson and mission specialists Michael Fincke, Greg Chamitoff, Andrew Feustel and Italian Roberto Vittori of the European Space Agency, dropped out orbit after traveling 6,510,000 miles.  (STS-134 Landing Story)

 94 year-old Recalls Personal Space Shuttle Memories: Space flight has long captured the emotions and imagination of many over the past fifty years, and it's not just for the young either.

 One sweet lady, who at 74 left her home in Hollywood, Florida to be closer with her family on the Space Coast, has kept up with space launches for most of her life.

 "I have been a space fan long before I came to help my daughter, Mary Myers, publish SpaceLaunch News in 1990," the soft spoken Josephine Myers explained.    (Read Her Story)

 SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR DEPARTS SPACE STATION FOR A FINAL TIME:  Completing her final mission to the International Space Station, shuttle Endeavour departed her home for the last twelve days to test a new navigation system and prepare for her voyage home.

 Separation occurred on time at 11:55:28 p.m. EDT on May 29, as the orbital complex flew 215 miles high above northern Chile. Endeavour had spent eleven days, hours and minutes docked to the orbiting complex.  (Read Story)

NASA UNVEILES NEW SPACECRAFT FOR CREWED DEEP SPACE TRIPS:  NASA unveiled today the future vehicle of American space travel which will carry humanity beyond the International Space Station and out into deep space and the moon.

 Based on the plans for the Orion spacecraft, a new spacecraft known as the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, or MPCV, will be able to carry four astronauts on a voyage of up to three weeks, according to NASA Headquarters.  (Read Story)

 S L N talks with Discovery pilot Eric Boe:  Space shuttle astronaut Col. Eric Boe, who piloted the final flight of Discovery in March, returned to his hometown of Atlanta just weeks following his second trip to the International Space Station.

 The future astronaut spent a lot of his time as a teenager at Fernbank Science Center in east Atlanta under the leadership of Debbie Huffman, who remains at the science center to this day.

 Boe sat down for a one-on-one interview with SpaceLaunch News.  (Read Story)

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