

Space
NASA’s Mars Rover blasts off on ULA rocket for mission to the red planet
The summer of worldwide Mars missions saved the best for last with the successful launch of NASA’s most advanced rover ever. Following on the heels of the successful launches of China’s Tianwen-1 Mars spacecraft and the United Arab Emirates Hope Mars mission, NASA joined the 309 million miles (497 million kilometers) interplanetary journey to the Red Planet with the successful launch of the Mars 2020 Perseverance mission. Safely secured to the top of a mighty United Lunch Alliance Atlas V 541 rocket and Centaur upper stage, NASA’s car-sized Perseverance rover – and accompanying Ingenuity helicopter – left Earth on Thursday morning (July 30) in spectacular fashion. Getting off this planet, however, is only the beginning.

Why go to Mars again?
The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is perhaps NASA’s most ambitious Mars mission. Formally announced in 2012, the then-unnamed Mars 2020 rover would be tasked with studying the Red Plane in a way that had never been attempted before. It would be collecting samples for eventual return to Earth in search of finding evidence of ancient microbial life.
NASA’s 2012 Curiosity mission uncovered the fact that Mars was rich in material that could have potentially supported microbial life once upon a time. Now, eight years later, the Perseverance mission will hunt for and collect the evidence to back up that claim.

A rover tasked with such an important astrobiological mission required NASA to develop the most technologically advanced range of scientific instruments that had ever been sent to Mars. As described by NASA, Perseverance is outfitted with seven different “state-of-the-art tools for acquiring information about Martian geology, atmosphere, environmental conditions, and potential signs of life (biosignatures).” Perseverance will be the first rover to collect and cache samples of the Martian surface to later be collected and eventually returned to Earth by future joint NASA and European Space Agency missions.
It is also the first rover to travel to Mars with a vast array of high-definition cameras with advanced imaging capability. Perseverance will also carry high-definition microphones with it, allowing, for the first time, the sounds of Mars to be captured. This will include the ability to hear entry, descent, and landing from the point of view of the rover, as well as the sound of what it’s like to drive over the Martian terrain.

Perseverance also carries with it two demonstration missions. Onboard is MOXIE, or the Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment, designed to test technology that can convert carbon dioxide in the Martian atmosphere into oxygen – an important precursor experiment to one day sending humans to Mars. Also aboard is Ingenuity, the first-ever rotorcraft – or helicopter – designed to fly on another planet. Ingenuity will test the effectiveness of rotorcrafts on other planets with different atmospheric and gravitational makeup than Earth to perhaps one day serve as planetary observational crafts or delivery systems.
Leaving Earth was the easy part, sort of
A major challenge that faced the Mars 2020 mission was completing final integrations during the global Coronavirus pandemic, which required most NASA and JPL personnel to work from home. NASA LSP senior launch director, Omar Baez, stated that “I never would have thought that a launch director would be working from home and I’ve done that for the last five months.” He went on further to state that “It’s humbling to see how our whole team from the range, to our partners at JPL, to our partners at ULA, to our folks at headquarters – how we all had to adjust to work in this environment, to work electronically.” Although challenging, the Mars 2020 mission persevered to overcome the obstacles and meet the targeted launch date.
The Mars 2020 mission initially targeted a July 18th liftoff at the very opening of the available one-month interplanetary launch window. The mission did suffer a few minor setbacks during the integration phase when ULA had to take a few days to address an issue with a crane at the Vertical Integration Facility pushing the launch date to July 22nd. Then, as explained in a statement provided by NASA the launch date suffered another delay, this time eight days to July 30, “due to launch vehicle processing delays in preparation for spacecraft mate operations.”

The ULA Atlas V in its 541 configuration consisting of a common core booster and four solid rocket motors fully stacked with the precious payload stood 197 feet (60 meters) tall. The Atlas V 541 provided 2 million lbs of thrust rocketing the spacecraft east away from Florida over the Atlantic Ocean. After approximately ninety seconds of flight, the solid rocket motors burned out, separating away from the booster followed quickly by stage separation. The Centaur upper-stage was the workhorse of the mission left to deliver the Mars 2020 payload to its Earth parking orbit.

After a coast phase lasting about 30 minutes, the upper-stage Centaur performed another eight-minute long nominal burn delivering the payload to a heliocentric – or solar bound, rather than Earthlocked – orbit for the Trans Mars Injection maneuver lining it up to intercept with Mars in February 2021. Upon spacecraft separation and successfully propelling the Perseverance mission onward to Mars, the Centaur upper-stage performed what is called a blowdown maneuver for planetary protection, ensuring that it would miss Mars. Twenty minutes later, the Perseverance spacecraft initiated its transmitter to communicate with Earth, and a good acquisition of signal was received by NASA’s international array of giant radio antennas, the Deep Space Network.
The Perseverance rover and Ingenuity helicopter are expected to continue on the journey to the Red Planet and attempt entry, descent, and landing on February 18, 2020.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk reveals when SpaceX will perform first-ever Starship catch
“Starship catch is probably flight 13 to 15, depending on how well V3 flights go,” Musk said.

Elon Musk revealed when SpaceX would perform the first-ever catch attempt of Starship, its massive rocket that will one day take life to other planets.
On Tuesday, Starship aced its tenth test flight as SpaceX was able to complete each of its mission objectives, including a splashdown of the Super Heavy Booster in the Gulf, the deployment of eight Starlink simulators, and another splashdown of the ship in the Indian Ocean.
It was the first launch that featured a payload deployment:
SpaceX Starship Flight 10 was so successful, it’s breaking the anti-Musk narrative
SpaceX was transparent that it would not attempt to catch the Super Heavy Booster, something it has done on three previous occasions: Flight 5 on October 13, 2024, Flight 7 on January 16, and Flight 8 on March 6.
This time, it was not attempting to do so. However, there are bigger plans for the future, and Musk detailed them in a recent post on X, where he discussed SpaceX’s plans to catch Starship, which would be a monumental accomplishment.
Musk said the most likely opportunities for SpaceX to catch Starship itself would be Flight 13, Flight 14, and Flight 15, but it depends on “how well the V3 flights go.”
The Starship launched with Flight 10 was a V2, which is the same size as the subsequent V3 rocket but has a smaller payload-to-orbit rating and is less powerful in terms of initial thrust and booster thrust. Musk said there is only one more V2 rocket left to launch.
Starship catch is probably flight 13 to 15, depending on how well V3 flights go
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 27, 2025
V3 will be the version flown through 2026, as V4, which will be the most capable Starship build SpaceX manufactures, is likely to be the first company ship to carry humans to space.
Musk said that SpaceX planned to “hopefully” attempt a catch of Starship in 2025. However, it appears that this will likely be pushed back to 2026 due to timing.
SpaceX will take Starship catch one step further very soon, Elon Musk confirms
SpaceX would need to launch the 11th and 12th test flights by the end of the year in order to get to Musk’s expected first catch attempt of Flight 13. It’s not unheard of, but the company will need to accelerate its launch rate as it has only had three test flights this year.
News
SpaceX aces Starship test flight 10 with successful payload deployment
The mission began at 6:30 p.m. local time in Starbase, Texas, when the launch of Starship initiated. After about eight minutes, stage separation was completed, and the Super Heavy Booster headed back down to Earth for a planned splashdown in the Indian Ocean:

SpaceX aced its tenth Starship test flight on Tuesday night after multiple delays pushed the mission back to this evening. Originally scheduled for Sunday night, SpaceX had two delays push the flight back to Tuesday, which ultimately provided ideal conditions for a launch attempt.
The tenth test flight of Starship had several objectives, including a successful splashdown of the booster in the Gulf of America, the deployment of eight Starlink simulation modules from the PEZ dispenser, and a splashdown of the ship in the Indian Ocean.
SpaceX successfully achieved all three of these objectives, making it one of the most successful test flights in the Starship program. There was no attempt to catch the booster this evening, as the company had been transparent about it ahead of the launch.
The mission began at 6:30 p.m. local time in Starbase, Texas, when the launch of Starship initiated. After about eight minutes, stage separation was completed, and the Super Heavy Booster headed back down to Earth for a planned splashdown in the Indian Ocean:
Super Heavy has splashed down in the Gulf pic.twitter.com/LGozUAmLt8
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 26, 2025
Starship was then the main focus of the rest of the broadcast as it completed its ascent burn and coasted through space, providing viewers with spectacular views as the mission headed toward new territory, including the deployment of Starlink simulators. This would be the first time SpaceX would attempt a payload deployment.
The deployment works like a PEZ dispenser, as the simulators were stacked on top of one another and would exit through a small slit one at a time.
This occurred roughly 20 minutes into the mission:
Open the pod bay door, HAL
Starship deploying @Starlink simulator sats pic.twitter.com/3CSOyulzcJ
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 26, 2025
An hour and six minutes into the flight, Starship reached its final destination, which was the Indian Ocean. A successful splashdown would bring closure to Starship’s tenth test flight, marking the fifth time a test flight in the program’s history did not end with vehicle loss.
It was also the first of four test flights this year that will end with Starship being recovered.
Splashdown confirmed! Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on an exciting tenth flight test of Starship! pic.twitter.com/5sbSPBRJBP
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 27, 2025
SpaceX is expected to launch Starship again in approximately eight weeks, pending the collection of data and other key metrics from this flight.
News
WATCH: SpaceX attempts Starship’s tenth test flight after two delays
This evening, SpaceX has already stated that conditions appear to be approximately 45 percent favorable for launch. This is ten percent less than last night, when the mission was eventually scrapped around 7 p.m. local time.

SpaceX is set to launch Starship tonight, provided the weather cooperates and everything with the ship goes smoothly.
This is SpaceX’s third attempt to launch Starship for its tenth test flight, with Sunday’s and Monday’s attempts both being scrapped due to a leak and unfavorable weather conditions on the respective days.
This evening, SpaceX has already stated that conditions appear to be approximately 45 percent favorable for launch. This is ten percent less than last night, when the mission was eventually scrapped around 7 p.m. local time.
Propellant load of the upper stage and Super Heavy booster is already underway, and the launch is expected to occur at 6:30 p.m. in Starbase, Texas.
You can watch the tenth test flight of Starship below via SpaceX:
Watch Starship’s tenth flight test → https://t.co/UIwbeGoo2B https://t.co/BFrpQPQFUw
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 26, 2025
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