It's been a busy month in space. In early October, SpaceX reached a milestone when the fifth Starship test flight successfully landed its booster on the launch pad for the first time. SpaceX also launched NASA's Europa Clipper on Oct. 14 using a Falcon Heavy rocket, sending a probe to explore Europa, Jupiter's fourth largest moon. On October 7, a Falcon 9 rocket launched the European Space Agency's (ESA) Hera mission to assess the impact of NASA's 2022 mission that deliberately destroyed an asteroid and provide guidance for future projects that protect Earth from asteroids.
October also saw the return of NASA's Crew-8 mission, with three NASA astronauts and one Russian cosmonaut returning to Earth in the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule on Oct. 25 after about eight months doing scientific research on the International Space Station. Their journey home was delayed in part by mechanical problems with Boeing's Starliner, which launched NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams into space in June but was forced to return inactive due to spacecraft leaks, halting other ISS operations.
November, on the other hand, is expected to bring exciting government and commercial activities from SpaceX, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, ESA and Roscosmos.
Here are five space missions to watch in November 2024:
- Nov. 4: SpaceX's 31st commercial resupply mission to the ISS. From the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the Falcon 9 rocket will launch a cargo mission to the ISS, carrying essential supplies, food and scientific research to the orbital station for the 31st time. Specifically, the mission will deliver scientific experiments and equipment from NASA and ESA that range from testing the solar wind to how materials age when exposed to space.
- Nov. 4: Roscosmos captures the ionosphere. On the same day, Russia's federal space agency Roscosmos will launch its Ionosfera mission, sending four satellites using a Soyuz-2.1b/Fregat rocket from Amur Oblast, Russia. The constellation of satellites is set to probe Earth's ionosphere, the region of its upper atmosphere.
- Nov. 29: ESA man-made solar eclipse. Later this month, ESA will launch its Proba-3 mission on a PSLV-XL rocket operated by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and launched from ISRO's Satish Dhawan Space Center in Andhra Pradesh, India. The mission consists of two satellites, which will maintain a precise configuration in space to create a solar eclipse that allows the agency to see the solar corona.
- TBD: First launch of Blue Origin's New Glenn. Blue Origin is expected to soon launch the first flight of its New Glenn rocket from the facility leased by the company in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The next-generation rocket will carry the company's Blue Ring spacecraft prototype into space.
- TBD: Rocket Lab's 54th mission. Rocket Lab, SpaceX's emerging challenger, is preparing its “Changes in Scope, Changes in Attitudes” campaign that will use an Electron rocket to launch a secret commercial customer satellite into Earth orbit. Rocket Lab describes this mission as “the fastest evolution to date.” The launch was originally scheduled for October 19 but has since been delayed to allow for more testing, meaning it could happen in November.
