Tag: space.com

A loud boom from a meteor caused the ground to shake in southeastern Michigan. The meteor was recorded here as a bright light.

A Japanese Epsilon rocket launched a new Earth-observation satellite into space this week, notching a third successful flight for the solid-fueled booster. 

The Epsilon rocket lifted off the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Uchinoura Space Center at 6:06 a.m. Japan Standard Time on Jan. 18, JAXA officials said. Just under an hour later, the rocket delivered its payload, the ASNARO-2 radar Earth-observation satellite, into orbit. 

“The launch and flight of Epsilon-3 took place normally,”‘ JAXA officials said in a statement.

A Japanese Epsilon rocket launches the ASNARO-2 radar Earth-observation satellite from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Uchinoura Space Center on Jan. 18, 2018 (Japan Standard Time).

Credit: JAXA

The Epsilon booster is a three-stage solidfueled rocket topped with a compact liquid-fueled propulsion system for this Epsilon-3 mission. It is nearly 79 feet tall (24 meters) and can carry payloads of up 1,543 lbs. (700 kilograms) into low-Earth orbit.

For this mission, the Epsilon rocket delivered ASNARO-2 (short for Advanced Small-size Radar Satellite 2) into orbit for Japan’s NEC Corporation. The launch had been delayed from November 2017 so engineers could address an incompatibility issue in the booster’s electrical system, JAXA officials have said. 

JAXA’s Epsilon rocket made its debut flight in 2013. A second mission, Epsilon-2, launched in December 2016.

Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalik and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

Asteroid 2002 AJ129 will make its closest approach to Earth on Feb. 4, 2018, at 4:30 p.m. EST (2130 GMT). At closest approach, the asteroid will be no closer than 10 times the distance between Earth and the moon.

The U.S. Air Force has a new missile-tracking sentinel in orbit.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket launched the new missile-warning satellite Friday night (Jan. 19) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Liftoff occurred at 7:48 p.m. EDT (0048 GMT on Jan. 20) after a one-day delay so engineers could address a ground-based issue associated with the rocket’s liquid-oxygen system.

The Atlas V booster and its Centaur upper stage lit up the Florida night sky to launch the new military satellite mission, called the Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) GEO Flight 4, from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral. SBIRS GEO Flight 4 is the fourth in a series of Air Force missile-detection satellites designed to use advanced scanners and infrared detectors to track launches of ballistic missiles.

A United Launch Alliance lofted the SBIRS GEO Flight 4 satellite into orbit for the U.S. Air Force Jan. 19 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Credit: ULA

About 42 minutes after liftoff, the satellite is expected to reach an initial orbit that ranges from 100 miles (161 kilometers) at its closest point to Earth to 19,358 miles (31,154 km) at its farthest point, according to a ULA mission description. The satellite will eventually move into a geosynchronous orbit 22,236 miles (35,786 km) above Earth, allowing it to keep watch over the same region of the planet.

The $1.2 billion SBIRS GEO Flight 4 satellite follows the January 2017 launch of its predecessor, SBIRS GEO Flight 3. Two earlier satellites, SBIRS GEO Flights 1 and 2, have been operational in orbit since 2013.”SBIRS provides our military with timely, reliable and accurate missile warning and infrared surveillance information,” Tom McCormick, vice president of Lockheed Martin’s Overhead Persistent Infrared systems mission area, said in a Jan. 11 statement.

“We look forward to adding GEO Flight-4’s capabilities to the first line of defense in our nation’s missile defense strategy,” McCormick said in the statement.

Friday night’s launch marked the first flight of an Atlas V rocket of 2018 and the second mission of the year for United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between the aerospace companies Boeing and Lockheed Martin. A ULA Delta IV rocket launched the classified NROL-47 spy satellite on Jan. 12.

A look at the SBIRS GEO Flight 4 missile-warning satellite before it’s packed for launch atop its United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.

Credit: Lockheed Martin

Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalik and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket carrying the new SBIRS GEO Fight 4 missile- warning satellite stands atop Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida ahead of a scheduled Jan. 18, 2018, launch.

NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps, seen here in November 2017 at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, has been removed from her scheduled expedition to the International Space Station in June 2018.

A photo of Alpha Centauri.

Floating freely on the flight deck, Sally Ride communicates with ground controllers in Houston during her STS-7 mission in June 1983.

Credit: NASA

Sally Ride became the first American woman to go into space when she flew on the space shuttle Challenger on June 18, 1983. She made two shuttle flights, and later became a champion for science education and a role model for generations. Ride died of cancer in 2012. 

Encouraged to explore

Born in Encino, Calif., on May 26, 1951, Sally Kristen Ride was the older of two daughters of Dale B. Ride and Carol Joyce (Anderson) Ride. Her father was a professor of political science and her mother was a counselor. While neither had a background in the physical sciences, she credited them with fostering her deep interest in science by encouraging her to explore.

An athletic youngster, Ride attended Westlake High School for Girls, a prep school in Los Angeles, on a partial tennis scholarship. She graduated in 1968. After a brief foray into professional tennis, she returned to California to attend Stanford University. There she received a bachelor of science degree in physics and a bachelor of arts degree in English in 1973. Furthering her studies at Stanford, she obtained a master of science degree in 1975 and a doctorate in physics in 1978, according to a NASA biography of Ride.

After completing her studies at Stanford, Ride applied to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Besting thousands of applicants, Ride was selected as one of NASA’s first six female astronauts and began spaceflight training in 1978.

Ride started her aeronautics career on the ground, serving as a capsule communicator (CAPCOM) as part of the ground-support crew for the second (November 1981) and third (March 1982) shuttle flights.

At 32, Ride experienced her first spaceflight as a mission specialist on STS-7, NASA’s seventh shuttle mission, aboard the space shuttle Challenger. The mission launched on June 18, 1983, and returned to Earth on June 24. Tasks on the mission included launching communications satellites for Canada and Indonesia. The astronauts also conducted the first successful satellite deployment and retrieval in space using the shuttle’s robotic arm. During the flight, Ride became the first woman to operate the shuttle’s robotic arm.

Ride’s history-making Challenger mission was not her only spaceflight. She also became the first American woman to travel to space a second time when she launched on another Challenger mission, STS-41-G, on Oct. 5, 1984. That mission lasted nine days. On that flight, she used the shuttle’s robotic arm to remove ice from the shuttle’s exterior and to readjust a radar antenna. Ride was assigned to a third shuttle mission, but her crew’s training was cut short by the Challenger disaster in January 1986. [Images: Sally Ride: First American Woman in Space]

Space shuttle investigations

While Ride shaped the future of space aeronautics on her first historic Challenger flight, she continued to influence the space program after her days of space travel were over. Ride served on the accident investigation boards set up in response to the two space shuttle tragedies — Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003. In 2009, she participated in the Augustine committee that helped define NASA’s spaceflight goals.

From 1982 to 1987, Ride was married to fellow astronaut Steven Hawley. They had no children.

Former astronaut Sally Ride talks to young women at the Sally Ride Science Festival, held at the University of Central Florida, Orlando, Fla., in 2003.

Credit: NASA

Post-NASA work

After she left NASA in 1987, her passion for space and science continued. Ride joined Stanford University Center for International Security and Arms Control. She later became a professor of physics at the University of California, San Diego. She served as president of Space.com from 1999 to 2000.

Believing that it was important encourage students — especially girls — to embrace the study of science, she co-founded Sally Ride Science, a science outreach company, in 2001, with her partner, Tam O’Shaughnessy. One of the company’s efforts included adding the MoonKam experiment onto unmanned NASA’s Grail moon gravity probes, which allowed students to choose and take their own photos of the moon from lunar orbit.

Ride also wrote five science-related children’s books: “To Space and Back”; “Voyager”; “The Third Planet”; “The Mystery of Mars”; and “Exploring Our Solar System.”

Ride died on July 23, 2012, at the age of 61 following a 17-month battle with pancreatic cancer.

Legacy

Ride received numerous accolades shortly after her death. The spot on the moon where NASA intentionally crashed Ebb and Flow, the two gravity-mapping probes in the Grail mission, was named after her. Ride had played a key role in the project’s education and outreach efforts. The U.S. Navy named a research ship after the astronaut. President Barack Obama posthumously awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, in November 2013.

“As the first American woman in space, Sally did not just break the stratospheric glass ceiling, she blasted through it,” Obama said. “And when she came back to Earth, she devoted her life to helping girls excel in fields like math, science and engineering.” 

In 2014, journalist Lynn Sherr released a book about Sally Ride called “Sally Ride: America’s First Woman In Space.” Sherr had covered Ride’s career extensively while working for ABC News, and over the years the two women became friends. Shortly after the book was published, Sherr did an interview with Space.com partner collectSPACE about Ride’s career and the importance of the women’s movement in her life.

O’Shaughnessy also wrote a children’s biography of Ride, called “Sally Ride: A Photobiography of America’s Pioneering Woman in Space.” In an interview with Space.com, O’Shaughnessy said Sherr did an excellent job in her family-approved biography, but she wanted another to write another one to convey Ride’s message to children.

“I started thinking about doing one myself for kids, and trying to do it as appropriately as I could with all the issues of death and being gay and being a gay couple, and Sally being such a hero to so many people,” she said in a Space.com interview in 2015.

In late 2017, the U.S. Postal Service announced that Ride’s image would appear on a stamp in 2018. The design portrays a painted portrait of Ride as she appeared around the time of her first spaceflight in 1983. Behind her is a space shuttle heading into space. “Sally Ride inspired the nation as a pioneering astronaut, brilliant physicist and dedicated educator,” the USPS said in a press release at the time.

Additional reporting by Elizabeth Howell, Space.com contributor

Additional resources

NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston has been the agency’s human spaceflight hub for half a century, though not always under its current name.

JSC was established in 1961 as the Manned Spacecraft Center. It was envisioned as a key support facility in NASA’s quest to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade, the ambitious goal laid out by President John F. Kennedy in May 1961.

The Mission Operations Control Room in the Mission Control Center at the conclusion of the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission.

Credit: NASA

The center became operational in 1963 and was renamed 10 years later to honor Texas’ own Lyndon Baines Johnson, the 36th president of the United States, who died in January 1973. JSC donned its new name on Feb. 17, 1973.

JSC employs about 15,000 civil servants and contractors (approximately 110 of which are astronauts) and occupies more than 200 buildings spread across 1,700 acres (690 hectares) of land. [NASA’s 17 Apollo Moon Missions in Pictures]

Astronaut training center

JSC is the home of NASA’s astronaut corps. Every one of the agency’s spacefliers trains there before blasting off, as do foreign astronauts bound for the International Space Station.

Such training takes many forms. The Space Vehicle Mockup Facility, for example, allows astronauts, engineers and mission support staff to practice operating the 430-ton space station with full-scale mock modules.

Astronauts prepare to live and work in microgravity with the help of partial-gravity and virtual-reality simulators at JSC, and they practice spacewalks at a Johnson satellite facility called the Neutral Buoyancy Lab — an enormous pool that holds 6.2 million gallons (23.5 million liters) of water. The pool is the largest in the United States, “perhaps in the world,” then-JSC-employee Herb Baker told Space.com in 2016. 

There’s no diving board for this pool. Instead, astronauts are lifted in by crane. A mock space station lies beneath the blue surface. According to Baker, each mock spacewalk lasts 6 to 7 hours, with divers switching out in shifts.

Further, before NASA’s space shuttle program ended in July 2011, pilots and commanders kept their flying skills sharp in T-38 jets based at an airfield close to JSC. 

‘Houston, we’ve had a problem’

JSC’s Mission Control — now formally known as the Christopher C. Kraft Jr. Mission Control Center — has helped plan, support and operate every NASA human spaceflight mission since 1965. Indeed, off-Earth NASA astronauts have long used “Houston” when addressing their handlers in Mission Control, exemplified by Jack Swigert’s famous utterance during 1970’s harrowing Apollo 13 moon mission: “Houston, we’ve had a problem.”

That problem, incidentally, was an exploded oxygen tank that crippled the mission’s service module and threatened the lives of all three astronauts onboard. Some quick and creative thinking got the men home safely, after a dramatic slingshot trip around the moon.

The 1995 movie “Apollo 13” took some creative license with the phrase, changing it to “Houston, we have a problem” and having the words come out of Apollo 13 commander James Lovell’s mouth.

Today, there are three mission control offices in building 31. The original historical room took commands from the Apollo crew. The International Space Station Flight Control Room has been in use since 1998, but has been slowly phased out as missions shift to the newest flight control, Mission Control 21 (MCC-21).

No longer in use, the historic control room directed shuttle missions until 1992. It has been restored to look much as it did in the early Apollo days. In 1985, it was designated a National Historical Landmark. The room now contains boxy green computers from the 1960s, while mission patches line the walls of the room. Five giant screens in the front display a map of the world and images of the rocket launches. A red phone stands in as a direct line from the flight director to the president of the United States.

“The work done in this room and in this building will never again be duplicated,” flight director Tony Ceccacci told his ground control team before signing off for the last time. “I believe the accomplishments of the shuttle program will become the next set of ‘shoulders of giants’ for the future programs to stand on.”

In MCC-21, the layout is similar to the historical room, with screens on the front and lines of desks. Teams of engineers and technicians at Mission Control are on duty around the clock every day, keeping watch over the astronauts who have established a continuous human presence aboard the $100 billion space station for a dozen years.

These flight controllers monitor the crewmembers’ health and safety and ensure that all spacecraft systems are operating properly.

Mission Control also houses a training room in which simulated spaceflights are practiced, a Life Sciences Control Room that helps oversee spaceborne experiments and the Exploration Planning Operations Center, which tests out concepts for journeys beyond low-Earth orbit.

“The story of this building has changed from the original days, through the mid-90s to now — and this won’t be the last one,” William Foster, ground control office in Mission Control, said in a 2013 NASA interview. “The evolution [of Mission Control] will continue as technology improves.”

A center of research

JSC is also engaged in several research projects, exploring ways to keep astronauts healthy in orbit, get the most scientific return out of their off-Earth stays and help them reach more far-flung destinations, such as Mars or asteroids. [Infographic: NASA Centers’ New Mission]

For example, JSC scientists study ways to mitigate the worst effects of microgravity and radiation exposure on the human body. They’re also working to develop new and better life support systems, in-space living quarters and spacewalk gear.

JSC houses the Space Food Systems Laboratory, where biochemists come up with meals for astronauts and figure out space-friendly packaging and preparation methods.

Space technology advancements like NASA’s Robonaut 2 (left) can help humanity launch more ambitious space exploration missions.

Credit: NASA

Further, JSC worked with car manufacturer General Motors to build the first humanoid robot to reach space. The $2.5 million Robonaut 2, which arrived at the space station in February 2011, is designed to help astronauts with complex chores and keep the orbiting lab running properly.

JSC is also leading development of the Space Exploration Vehicle, which can be configured to fly freely through space or sit atop a 12-wheeled chassis to become a rover about the size of a pickup truck. Either way, the SEV’s pressurized cabin can carry two astronauts on 14-day trips.

Another Johnson project is the Morpheus planetary lander, an experimental vehicle that demonstrates new “green” propellants and autonomous landing-hazard detection technology. Morpheus, which could carry about 1,100 lbs. (500 kilograms) to the moon someday, crashed during its first free-flight test in August 2012.

Visitors center

Space Center Houston is the Johnson Space Center’s visitors center. Exhibits and tours offer a look at spacecraft, astronaut gear, laboratories and training facilities. The center is open every day except Dec. 25. Also, Oct. 8 is reserved for home-schooled visitors. Space Center Houston is located at 1601 NASA Parkway, about 25 miles south of downtown Houston and right next door to Johnson Space Center.

Additional reporting by Nola Taylor Redd, Space.com contributor

Additional resources

Today at 12:20 p.m. EST (1720 GMT), Space.com will get a long-distance connection with NASA astronaut Scott Tingle on the International Space Station, and we want you to join us! You can watch it live here, courtesy of NASA TV. Do you have a question for Tingle in space? Let us know!

Space.com associate editor Sarah Lewin will speak with Tingle, who is on his first career spaceflight, to find out how the adaptation to space has been, what’s surprised him most, if he would want to visit the moon – NASA’s new goal – and what he looks forward to in an upcoming spacewalk. If you have a burning question for Tingle, or about life in space, let us know in the comments below or on our Facebook page here!

Tingle is a month into his half-year mission with the Expedition 54 (and later Expedition 55) crew on the ISS. He launched to the space station on Dec. 17aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft and arrived two days later on Dec. 19. 

A captain in the U.S. Navy, Tingle was selected to join NASA’s astronaut corps in 2009 and is a veteran test pilot. He hails from Randolph, Massachusetts and holds bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering from Southeastern Massachusetts University and a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Purdue University. He and his wife Raynette Mahelona have three children.

You can follow Tingle’s mission on Twitter, where he posts photos and updates as @Astro_Maker.

You can read Tingle’s official NASA biography here.

Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalik and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

Satellite photos show parts of Africa’s Sahara Desert blanketed in snow following a rare winter storm earlier this month.

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite captured stunning views of the snow-covered dunes in northwest Algeria, on the edge of the Sahara Desert — an area known to be one of the hottest places on Earth, according to a video from ESA.

The images, taken on Jan. 8, revealed that some areas of the desert were covered in up to 15 inches (40 centimeters) of snow, which fell across the arid region on Jan. 7, according to the video. [The Sahara Desert: Facts, Climate & Life]

“Most of the snow had melted by the end of the next day, but luckily, the Sentinel-2A satellite happened to be in the right place at the right time to record this rare event from space,” ESA representative Kelsea Brennan-Wessels said in the video. 

The Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite photographed a rare snowfall in northwest Algeria at the Sahara Desert’s edge on Jan. 7, 2018.

Credit: Copernicus Sentinel/ESA CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Specifically, the satellite images show that snow fell on the lower Saharan Atlas mountain range. While temperatures in this area can drop significantly at night, snowfall is very unusual in the Sahara Desert because the air is so dry. 

In fact, the recent snowfall marks only the third time in 37 years that scientists have recorded powdered snow in this part of the desert, according to the ESA video. The previous storms that were recorded occurred in February 1979 and December 2016.

The Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellites are largely used to track changes in Earth’s land and vegetation. The recent satellite images show that there is very little flora in the region, according to the video. 

On Jan. 8, 2018, data from the Operational Land Imager on the Landsat 8 satellite caught this view of 4 to 12 inches (10 to 30 centimeters) of snow that accumulated on higher elevations of the Sahara Desert near the northern Algerian town Aïn Séfra.

Credit: NASA/OLI/SRTM

This rare Sahara snowfall was also photographed by the Landsat 8 satellite (a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey) on Jan. 8. The Landsat 8 images revealed a snow accumulation of between 4 and 12 inches (10 to 30 cm) in the desert near the northern Algerian town of Aïn Séfra, according to a statement from NASA. 

Such snowfall is much more common in higher altitudes of the Sahara, including the High Atlas mountains in Morocco, which also saw a substantial amount of snow in February 2012 and January 2005, NASA officials said in the statement.  

Follow Samantha Mathewson @Sam_Ashley13. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

New images from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) suggest there is an underground network of lava tubes beneath the lunar surface that could offer astronauts easy access to water. 

The stunning new photos show multiple small pits in a large impact crater known as the Philolaus Crater, which is located near the north pole of the moon. Researchers said these pits are likely lava tube “skylights” — entrances to underground tunnels that were once filled with lava. 

The underground tunnels could also provide access to subsurface ice, and in turn, water. Astronauts would therefore be able to use this water resource during future missions to the moon, said a new study from the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute and the Mars Institute. [Photos: The Search for Water on the Moon]

“The highest-resolution images available for Philolaus Crater do not allow the pits to be identified as lava tube skylights with 100 percent certainty, but we are looking at good candidates considering simultaneously their size, shape, lighting conditions and geologic setting,” Pascal Lee, planetary scientist at the SETI Institute and the Mars Institute, said in a statement. 

This series of images shows the location of some of the newly-discovered potential lava tube skylights at Philolaus Crater, near the moon’s North Pole.

Credit: NASA/LunarReconnaissanceOrbiter/SETI Institute/Mars Institute/PascalLee

The Philolaus Crater is approximately 43 miles (70 kilometers) wide and located about 340 miles (550 km) from the moon’s north pole. The pits appear to be small, rimless depressions, measuring between 50 and 100 feet across (15 to 30 meters), with completely shadowed interiors, according to the statement. 

The pits identified on the floor of the Philolaus Crater are located along sections of winding channels thought to be collapsed lava tubes, also known as sinuous rilles. 

Earlier research identified over 200 pits across the moon’s surface, but the new images are the first to identify possible skylights located in the moon’s polar region, where water ice accumulates, the study said. Therefore, the newfound skylights would offer easier access to subsurface ice, alleviating the need to excavate the lunar surface, the researchers said.

“This discovery is exciting and timely as we prepare to return to the moon with humans,” Bill Diamond, president and CEO of the SETI Institute, said in the statement. “It also reminds us that our exploration of planetary worlds is not limited to their surface and must extend into their mysterious interiors.”

Formed about 1.1 billion years ago, Philolaus Crater is relatively young, which makes it a great target for studying the moon’s recent evolution, the researchers said in the statement. 

Lava tube skylight candidates at Philolaus Crater near the moon’s North Pole.

Credit: NASA/Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter/SETI Institute/Mars Institute/Pascal Lee

Also, the crater is located on the nearside of the moon, which means that it would offer future lunar missions the benefit of direct communications with Earth, according to the statement.

Going forward, the researchers plan to further investigate Philolaus Crater to confirm whether or not the pits are lava tube skylights, and if the underground network of tubes actually contains water ice. 

“This is an exciting possibility that a new generation of caving astronauts or robotic spelunkers could help address,” Lee said. “Exploring lava tubes on the moon will also prepare us for the exploration of lava tubes on Mars. There, we will face the prospect of expanding our search for life into the deeper underground of Mars where we might find environments that are warmer, wetter and more sheltered than at the surface.”

Their findings were presented Jan. 11 at NASA’s Lunar Science for Landed Missions Workshop, which is held at the Ames Research Center. 

Follow Samantha Mathewson @Sam_Ashley13. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

House lawmakers on Wednesday (Jan. 17) pressed SpaceX and NASA officials on what exactly happened to the secret Zuma spacecraft launched into space this month on one of the company’s Falcon 9 rockets.

SpaceX representatives, including Gwynne Shotwell, the president and chief operating officer, have firmly stated that the rocket functioned correctly during the classified mission, which launched Jan. 7 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. After the launch, media rumors suggested that the mission had failed to put its classified payload in orbit, citing unnamed U.S. officials who had been briefed on the mission.

But House lawmakers still had questions: Rep. Brian Babin, R-Texas, the chairman of the House Space Subcommittee, raised the issue of Zuma as the first question during Wednesday’s hearing about the progress of the commercial crew program, asking NASA and SpaceX representatives what they could share about the seeming failure. [Strange Sky Spiral from SpaceX Zuma Launch]

“Recent press reports indicated that a U.S. government mission named Zuma may have either failed in orbit or the launch could have been unsuccessful,” Babin said. “I do not want to discuss anything classified in an open session, [but] the circumstances surrounding this mission do have a direct impact on NASA and this committee’s jurisdiction and oversight responsibilities.”

SpaceX launched the Zuma mission into orbit for an unspecified U.S. government agency on Jan. 7, 2018, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, but the next day media reports suggested the classified satellite might have failed.

Credit: SpaceX/Flickr

For instance, he said,the Falcon 9 is scheduled to launch a large exoplanet survey telescope for the agency in March, and eventually launch astronauts to the International Space Station. Plus, the defense contractor Northrop Grumman, which built Zuma and the payload adaptor that connected it to the rocket, is currently working on the $9 billion James Webb Space Telescope. (Outlets such as Ars Technica have speculated that the payload adaptor could have failed, leading to the satellite’s demise.)

So would SpaceX consider briefing the committee on the mission in a classified setting, Babin asked?

“I want to point out, on the Zuma mission, that we relayed the information that Falcon 9 … performed very well as specified, and that we are picking up the launches by the end of the month as we planned all the time,” Hans Koenigsmann, the vice president of build and flight reliability at SpaceX, told the committee. “Regarding a briefing, we will go through the proper channels, and follow the protocol — as you pointed out, we can’t talk any details in this particular setting.”

Next, Babin turned to NASA, asking William Gertenmaier, associate administrator of the Human Exploration and Operations Directorate at NASA, whether anyone at the agency knew details of the mission. After all, he said, any problem with the Falcon 9 rocket would be important to know before using the rocket in NASA’s missions to the space station.

“We do not know the details of the mission, per se, but we’ve been informed by others that if there’s any mishap investigation or any other activities that are involved, we will be appropriately involved in that activity,” Gerstenmaier said.

“If this is declared a mishap and we understand that it’s a mishap, NASA will be informed, and we will have appropriate personnel participate in those mishap activities,” Gerstenmaier added after further questioning.

Later in the briefing, Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala., vice chair of the subcommittee,  read aloud from a commentary published on the Forbes magazine website Jan. 15 written by Loren Thompson, a consultant who is chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute. Brooks then asked SpaceX about Zuma, grouping the mission with Falcon 9 failures such as a launchpad explosion in 2016, during a routine static-fire engine test, and a rocket breaking apart 2 minutes after launching cargo toward the International Space Station in 2015. 

Koenigsmann talked through the other failures, saying that SpaceX had learned their lessons from those, but again reiterated that for Zuma: “I can’t, unfortunately, present any details; I can only reiterate that Falcon 9 did everything Falcon 9 was supposed to do.”

When asked previously for comment about the failed mission, a Northrop Grumman spokesperson told Space.com that the company cannot comment on classified missions. This puts SpaceX in a challenging position as questions about the mission have been redirected to the rocket company (including by the Pentagon).

The questions came up during a hearing primarily aimed at evaluating how well SpaceX and the company Boeing are progressing toward delivering crew to the space station starting in 2019, including the companies’ reliability. The committee members’ questioning makes clear that the confusion about Zuma won’t die soon, as the Pentagon and Northrop Grumman continue to remain mum — and that the potential failure still lingers as regulators evaluate the reliability of private spaceflight companies.

Editor’s note: This story has been updated to correct the booster SpaceX will use to launch astronauts to the ISS on its Crew Dragon capsules. An earlier version stated that Crew Dragon launches would use a Falcon Heavy rocket. SpaceX will use a Falcon 9 booster. 

Email Sarah Lewin at slewin@space.com or follow her @SarahExplains. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.