This Week In Space

By Laura Holt, Co-Founder of Her Cosmic Orbit

Anddd we’re back with the second edition of Cosmic Currents – your quick and easy weekly space recap. Let’s get into it…

TLDR;

·       JWST Unveils Protoplanetary Disk

·       More NASA Leadership Changes

·       A Perfect Ten! NS-30 Launch

·       IM-2 The Moon

·       Rare Space Force X-37B Image

·       FIRST ALL FEMALE CREW; NS-31 Announced

·       Starship Flight 8 Slips

·       Another Planetary Parade

·       Blue Ghost Lands on The Moon!

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope released a new selfie this week but also unveiled HH 30, a protoplanetary disk. Now I won’t even begin to try and explain what that is so check out Athena’s explanation here!

After Jim Free’s retirement last week, acting NASA Administrator, Janet Petro, announced Vanessa Wyche will now serve as the acting associate administrator for the agency. Vanessa has been the director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center about four years and assumes the new role immediately. Stephen Koerner now steps into the role of director of Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX. So, you’re saying NASA is currently a women-led agency?! Until the appointment of Jared Isaacman that will be the case!

On Tuesday, Blue Origin completed its 10th successful human spaceflight of the New Shepard program. The crew chose a very fitting mission name, A Perfect Ten. NS-30 crew consisted of Lane Bess, Jesús Calleja, Elaine Chia Hyde, Dr. Richard Scott, Tushar Shah, and an undisclosed sixth crew member.

Intuitive Machines Nova-C IM-2 mission launched at 7:16pm EST Wednesday from Kennedy Space Center’s LC-39A. This was the second Commercial Lunar Payload Services (“CLPS”) initiative which included a payload rideshare with Epic Aerospace, AstroForge, and NASA. According to Intuitive Machines, IM-2 “represents a significant leap forward in lunar exploration, ready to demonstrate water hunting infrastructure services on the Moon’s surface. IM-2 is set to demonstrate lunar mobility, resource prospecting, and analysis of volatile substances from subsurface materials, a critical step toward uncovering water sources beyond Earth—a key component for establishing sustainable infrastructure both on the lunar surface and in space.” We also saw a return of the iconic John Insprucker who joined SpaceX live stream launch commentary. As a proud Texan, I also have to include that Intuitive Machines lunar lander, Athena, has the State of Texas printed on one of its feet!

In a rare move, Space Force DOD released an image of Earth from the X-37B spacecraft. Our second space selfie this week. Check it out here.

Two days after the 10th successful human spaceflight and 30th flight of New Shepard, Blue Origin announces the crew for NS-31. The upcoming mission might be the first, all-female crew! To top that, the lineup consists of Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyen, Gayle King, Katy Perry, Kerianne Flynn, and Lauren Sánchez. While the launch date is not set yet, we are still incredibly excited for this one! This is likely to be the first all-female crew. IIAS previously announced an upcoming scientific spaceflight with Norah Patten, Shawna Pandya, and Kellie Gerardi onboard Virgin Galactic but that is slated for 2026. We’ll see what happens!

SpaceX’s Starship Flight 8 was initially targeting the afternoon window of Friday, February 28 but updates started coming out Wednesday evening that the date slipped a few days. Such is launch life! The teams are now targeting a launch window opening at 5:30 p.m. CT on Monday, March 3.

Another planetary parade! The evening of Friday, February 28th offered a quite a show. Similar to what we saw a few weeks ago, the planetary alignment allowed for naked eye visibility of Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, and Mars. If you had a telescope, you should have also been able to see Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus. According to StarWalk, this extremely rare planetary alignment won’t happen again in this decade! Did you see it?

TOUCHDOWN! Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander made contact with the moon’s surface very early into the morning of Saturday, March 2! The Ghost Riders in the Sky mission launched back on January 15, 2025, and completed a 45-day Earth to Moon transit. This marks the first commercial company in history to achieve a fully successful Moon landing. Click here for live mission updates as they now undergo 14 days of lunar surface operations.