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K2 Space comes to Seattle with big plans for big satellites

Engineers at K2 Space satellite factory
Engineers prepare a high-power satellite for testing at K2 Space’s manufacturing facility in Torrance, Calif. (K2 Space via PRNewswire)

California-based K2 Space has established a satellite engineering hub in the Seattle area, joining a thriving regional ecosystem of satellite ventures.

The Pacific Northwest operation will support the company’s drive to build large, high-power satellites for government and commercial customers. The satellites are manufactured at K2’s factory in Torrance, Calif. The company also maintains a policy and strategy office in Washington, D.C.

Since its founding in 2022, K2 Space has raised more than $500 million in capital and registered more than $1 billion in contracts. While many satellite companies focus on miniaturization, K2 Space is going big on satellite mass and power. K2 had its first “mega-class” satellite, dubbed Gravitas, launched into orbit on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in March. The two-ton, 20-kilowatt satellite carried a dozen undisclosed payload modules for multiple customers, including the Department of Defense.

That “go-big” approach is gaining traction: Last month, for example, the U.S. Space Force confirmed that K2 Space would be one of the suppliers for its next-generation military communications network. To serve the anticipated market, K2 Space says it plans to produce hundreds of satellites annually by 2030.

“As we carefully evaluated our expansion plans to align with our next phase of growth, the Seattle area was a natural fit, given its decisive reputation as an aerospace and engineering hub,” K2 Space CEO and co-founder Karan Kunjur said today in a news release. “From flight software and autonomy to the low-level systems that drive our satellites’ most demanding workloads, our Seattle team will contribute to satellites operating at the edge of what’s possible.”

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GeekWire

NASA considers sending spare Mars rover to the moon

Engineering rover at JPL
An engineering development version of the NASA Mars rover takes a spin at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. (NASA via YouTube)

NASA is considering repurposing an engineering development version of the nuclear-powered Mars rovers for a different destination: the moon’s south polar region.

The plan calls for turning the test rover, which is currently sitting at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, into a lunar explorer named PROMISE (“Polar Rover for Observation, Mapping and In-Situ Exploration”).

During an update on the space agency’s long-range plan to build a moon base, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman stressed that the PROMISE mission was still being defined, but added that “there’s very little that would hold us back from making use of that hardware.”

NASA is already planning to send a rover called VIPER (“Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover”) to the moon by the end of next year. But Carlos García-Galán, NASA’s program manager for the Moon Base effort, said PROMISE would bring some capabilities that VIPER lacks.

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GeekWire

Blue Origin switches to new concept for rocket launches

"Road to Space" sign in foreground, with launch pad in background
A tarnished “Road to Space” sign stands near Blue Origin’s damaged launch pad in Florida. (Blue Origin Photo)

One month after a New Glenn rocket explosion damaged its Florida launch pad, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture has decided to shift its focus to a new concept for future launches.

“To return to flight this year, we’re not rebuilding the same pad,” Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp said in an online update. Instead, the company will move ahead with a plan that it already had been working on for Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Launch Complex 36.

The concept of operations, or ConOps in rocket lingo, calls for a hybrid horizontal/vertical configuration for launch preparations. Blue Origin had already planned to employ the hybrid system for a second pad that’s currently in development for its super-sized 9×4 New Glenn rocket. Now the system will be used for the old pad as well as the new one, “creating a common ConOps across two pads,” Limp said.

In a post to X, Limp said the plan “has the added benefit of increasing our flight cadence.”

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Rubin Observatory starts filming 10-year ‘cosmic movie’

Field of stars imaged by the Rubin Observatory
Stars in the constellation Lupus glitter in an image from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory. The full-resolution version of the image amounts to 1.7 gigapixels. (Credit: NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory / NOIRLab / SLAC / AURA)

The science team behind the Vera C. Rubin Observatory has officially launched a decade-long survey of the southern sky — an ambitious project three decades in the making.

The start of the Legacy Survey of Space and Time, or LSST, follows years of planning and construction of the billion-dollar observatory in Chile. Scientists celebrated the completion of the construction phase with a “First Look” batch of pictures a year ago, and then turned to preparing for the LSST in earnest.

In February, the Rubin team turned on the observatory’s Alert Production Pipeline, which can send out millions of notifications about potentially noteworthy astronomical phenomena. That set the stage for what some have compared to filming a time-lapse movie of the cosmos.

“Today, we begin filming the greatest cosmic movie ever made. This moment reflects decades of vision, innovation and the power of federal investment in science through the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy,” acting NSF Director Brian Stone said in a news release. “Every night, NSF-DOE Rubin Observatory will expand the frontiers of knowledge and strengthen America’s global leadership in science and innovation.”

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Universe Today

Large Hadron Collider shuts down for a smashing upgrade

Head-on view of magnet for High-Luminosity LHC
A magnet for the High-Luminosity LHC is readied at CERN's Large Magnet Facility. (Credit: © 2026 CERN / Florence Thompson)

After nearly 18 years of operation, highlighted by the detection of the elusive Higgs boson, Europe’s CERN physics research center says it’s bidding “Farewell” to the Large Hadron Collider. But it’s actually more like “See You Later, Accelerator!”

The new, improved High-Luminosity LHC is due to make its debut in 2030, with up to 10 times the luminosity of the original LHC. CERN officials talk about HiLumi LHC almost as if it will be a brand-new machine.

“The LHC has exceeded every expectation,” Oliver Brüning, CERN’s director for accelerators and technology, said today in a news release. “For nearly two decades, it has transformed our understanding of the universe and inspired generations of scientists, engineers and citizens around the world. Today we say goodbye to the LHC as we have known it, while preparing to welcome its successor: the HiLumi LHC, which will extend this scientific adventure far into the future.”

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GeekWire

NASA backs dozens of projects on the space frontier

Illustration: Blue Origin's Blue Moon Mark 2 lander on lunar surface
An artist’s conception shows the Blue Moon Mark 2 lander on the lunar surface. (Blue Origin Illustration)

NASA has selected proposals from 37 companies, including several with Seattle-area connections, to further its plans to establish a long-term presence on the moon and enable human exploration of Mars.

The companies applied to partner with NASA under the terms of an Announcement of Collaboration Opportunity, or ACO. The selected proposals aim to develop technologies for space transportation, planetary surface operations and lunar surface infrastructure.

“We are empowering American industry to become active partners in NASA’s missions to the moon, Mars and beyond,” Greg Stover, director of the Advanced Research and Technology Division in NASA’s Research and Technology Mission Directorate, said today in a news release. “By tapping into commercial industry, NASA can rapidly develop key capabilities to support its most ambitious missions while fostering the nation’s robust space economy.”

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Cosmic Science

AI quest to decode ancient scrolls yields new revelations

Ashen scroll undergoing laser scanning
Scientists scanned scrolls that were buried in Mount Vesuvius' ancient eruption to decipher their content. (Credit: EduceLab / Univ. of Kentucky)

Scientists have given a status report on their efforts to use CT scans and artificial intelligence to decipher rolled-up papyrus scrolls that were buried in volcanic ash almost 2,000 years ago.

The researchers say they’ve found hints that one of the scrolls was written more than a century before the eruption, which destroyed the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in the year 79. Another partially deciphered scroll hints that the collection may well reveal previously unknown lore about Roman and Greek mythology.

It’s the latest chapter in a scientific quest that began 274 years ago.

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Universe Today

Prize-winning plan aims to protect space infrastructure

Illustration: Earth surrounded by web of satellites
Scientists say the growing web of satellites surrounding our planet is vulnerable to meteor storms. (OneWeb Illustration)

For decades, astronomers and policymakers have been working on plans to protect our planet from killer asteroids. But now there’s a new realm to protect: the thousands of satellites we’re putting in orbit.

And that’s just the start: Future off-world infrastructure, ranging from orbital fuel depots to moon bases, could be hit by asteroids, meteoroid storms or other threats from above.

A new proposal to identify such threats — and do something about them — has earned two researchers from the University of Edinburgh this year’s Schweickart Prize, which is named in honor of Apollo 9 astronaut (and planetary defense advocate) Rusty Schweickart.

“As human activity and vital interests rapidly expand into regions beyond the protective shield of our atmosphere, the number of passing objects capable of causing serious damage to both life and critical infrastructure increases dramatically,” Schweickart said in a news release. “Our Schweickart Prize winners this year have called for a comprehensive and systematic examination of this emerging reality.”

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GeekWire

The biggest worry about sex in space is what comes after

Illustration: Woman floating behind window of spaceship with view of Earth reflected in glass
Researchers aren't as concerned about sex in zero gravity as they are about risks for the resulting children. (Space Adventures Illustration)

Sex in space is the perfect subject for levity and double entendres, and the panelists at a Deep Tech Week session held at Thinkspace Seattle leaned into the humor early on.

“We can all imagine Newton’s Third Law dictates that, unrestrained, you get one thrust in and then you’re at the other end of the spacecraft,” said Shawna Pandya, chief of space medicine at the Florida-based Advanced SpaceLife Research Institute, or ASRI. Early pioneers in the field even designed a spacesuit customized for zero-G intimacy that was equipped with flaps and harnesses in strategic places — giving new meaning to the term “love handles.”

But the researchers at the June 12 session didn’t dwell on the mechanics of in-space intercourse. “I think the sex part will be the easiest part, operationally,” said James Logan, former chief of medical operations at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. “The problems are what comes after that.”

For that reason, the panelists left the levity behind and focused on the serious subject of pregnancy and fetal development in the challenging environment beyond our home planet.

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Fiction Science Club

Science and fiction have their say on UFO ‘Disclosure Day’

Emily Blunt and other actors in a scene from "Disclosure Day"
A TV meteorologist and experiencer (played by Emily Blunt) wields an alien artifact in "Disclosure Day." (Credit: © Universal Studios)

“Disclosure Day” is nigh!

We’re not talking about end times for UFO believers, but about this week’s debut of Steven Spielberg’s latest movie about space aliens.

“Disclosure Day” is something of a second coming for the classic alien sci-fi movie — or perhaps a third coming, given that Spielberg is already famous for “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” (1977) and “E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial” (1982).

The second-coming analogy is apt for another reason: The movie’s title plays off the expectation that the world’s governments will disclose all their secrets about alien contact, but only when they determine that their citizens are ready to hear them. “UFO believers await the day of disclosure with the same burning eagerness as a religious believer expecting the Messiah,” Adam Kirsch, a senior editor at The Atlantic, writes in a forthcoming book titled “We Want to Believe.”

Kirsch says such believers might greet Spielberg’s movie as evidence that Disclosure Day is truly nigh. “For people who are very deeply committed to this idea of disclosure, they will take it as confirmation that disclosure is something that is really going to happen,” he says.

Even Meg Charlton, the author of a newly published alien-abduction novel titled “Voyagers,” felt a sense of anticipation as she was writing the manuscript. “I did spend a lot of the book nervous that I would be scooped by first contact somehow, or full disclosure,” she recalls.

In a double-stuffed episode of the Fiction Science podcast, Kirsch and Charlton explore what science and fiction reveal about our obsession with alien visitors.

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