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Move over, Pluto: Telescope spots dwarf planet prospect

Illustration: Paths of planetary objects in solar system, with 2026 ED138 highlighted
A visualization highlights the orbit of dwarf planet candidate 2026 ED138. (Credit: Rubin Observatory / NOIRLab / SLAC /AURA / R. Proctor)

Astronomers sorting through data from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile have found an icy world that has a good chance of joining Pluto in the solar system’s retinue of dwarf planets.

University of Washington astronomer Mario Jurić joined the astronomer who made the discovery, Matthew Holman of the Harvard & Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, to announce the findings today at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society’s Division for Planetary Sciences in Spokane, Wash.

Jurić, the Rubin team’s solar system lead scientist, said the observatory’s capabilities made it possible to detect and characterize the new dwarf planet candidate, known as 2026 ED138.

“Rubin is giving us an unprecedented capacity to explore the sky through a combination of speed, depth, and precision,” Jurić said in a news release. “And the discovery is just the beginning: Once we identify a new object, we can search back months, and sometimes even decades, finding it in images where nobody knew to look. This ability to both discover and ‘precover’ objects is transforming how quickly and accurately we can determine their orbits and understand the distant solar system.”

2026 ED138 traces a tilted orbital path that takes it well beyond Pluto, the solar system’s best-known dwarf planet. It’s currently at a distance of 46 astronomical units, where 1 AU equals the average distance between Earth and the sun. Pluto, by comparison, is currently about 40 AU from the sun. Astronomers suspect ED138 formed billions of years ago closer to the sun before being flung into a wider orbit by gravitational interactions with Neptune.

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Orbital Robotics plans to send robot arms to space station

Combination image: Illustration showing Astrobee robot with Orbital Robotics' arms at left, and picture showing astronaut and Astrobee robots on ISS at right
An illustration shows an Astrobee free-flying robot equipped with Orbital Robotics’ arms, at left. NASA astronaut Megan McArthur shows off three Astrobees aboard the International Space Station, at right. (Credits: Orbital Robotics for illustration at left, NASA for photo at right)

A free-flying NASA robot aboard the International Space Station will soon demonstrate a system for capturing and servicing satellites in orbit, using a pair of autonomous robotic arms built by Seattle startup Orbital Robotics.

“This demo will prove our ability to capture, manipulate and upgrade satellites on orbit, moving humanity one massive step forward towards reusable satellites,” Orbital Robotics CEO Aaron Borger said today in a news release.

Borger told me the company plans to send its arms to the space station in the third quarter of 2027. Three separate demonstrations would be conducted, each about a month apart, he said.

The mission will mark a major milestone for Orbital Robotics, which was founded in 2024 by Borger and other veterans of Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture, including lead hardware engineer Riley Mark, lead software engineer Sohil Pokharna and adviser Doug Kohl.

Orbital Robotics has been developing arms controlled by artificial intelligence for use on free-flying spacecraft, and this will be the company’s first opportunity to prove out its capture technology and autonomous control software together in microgravity under real spaceflight conditions.

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Seattle space ventures face problems and prospects

Varda space capsule on display in foreground of conference hall, with attendees milling about in the background
Dale Goulding, chief operating officer at Forge Digital, chats with Michael Reilly, chief strategy officer at Varda Space Industries, at the Space Northwest Symposium in Federal Way, Wash. One of Varda’s orbital capsules is on display in front of them. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

How high can Washington state’s space industry rise?

Preliminary findings suggest that the economic impact of the state’s space sector more than doubled between 2018 and 2022, and nearly doubled again between 2022 and now. But at the same time, some leaders of the space community are questioning whether the Pacific Northwest can keep pace with other regional clusters in, say, Florida, Texas and Colorado.

That good news, bad news situation made headlines this week when Stoke Space CEO Andy Lapsa questioned whether he’d pick the Seattle area as his home base if he had to do it over — just before taking the stage as a member of Gov. Bob Ferguson’s Washington Space Council.

Ferguson isn’t the only elected official trying to make sure the Seattle area keeps up on the space frontier. Dana Ralph, the mayor of Kent, Wash., where Stoke is headquartered, made that clear in her remarks during the kickoff for Seattle Space Week at the Museum of Flight.

“We don’t take you for granted,” said Ralph, addressing a gathering of CEOs, investors and other VIPs. “I want you to hear that out loud: We don’t take you for granted.”

Seattle Space Week — highlighted by the Space Northwest Symposium in Federal Way — provided plenty of opportunities for discussing the challenges facing Washington state’s space ventures. Here are four problems to face, and four prospects to look forward to…

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Starfish Space’s first Otter spacecraft goes into orbit

SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket rising into blue sky
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket rises from its California launch pad, sending 130 payloads into orbit. (Credit: SpaceX via X)

Starfish Space’s first full-scale Otter satellite servicing vehicle went into orbit today, marking a milestone for the Tukwila, Wash.-based startup.

The Otter spacecraft was among 130 payloads launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Otter is roughly the size of a kitchen oven, with solar arrays that were folded up for launch.

Other payloads on the satellite rideshare mission, known as Transporter-18, included Cowboy Space’s first power-beaming satellite, a prototype for Google’s AI data-center constellation, and a NASA-funded probe that will track the energy released by galaxies and supernovas.

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Starcloud’s AI system will catch a ride to lunar orbit

Illustration: Firefly's Elytra spacecraft with Starcloud's SC-1L payload highlighted in purple and the moon in the background
An artist’s conception shows Firefly’s Elytra spacecraft in lunar orbit. (Firefly Aerospace Illustration)

Redmond, Wash.-based Starcloud has signed up to send its artificial intelligence data-processing hardware into lunar orbit on a Firefly Aerospace spacecraft.

Starcloud’s payload, known as SC-1L, will fly on Firefly’s Elytra orbital vehicle during a NASA-supported mission that’s scheduled for launch no earlier than 2028. The mission will demonstrate technologies that Starcloud plans to use on AI data centers in Earth orbit — and around the moon as well.

“Space is the future of data centers, and the moon is the next frontier for that vision,” Ezra Feilden, Starcloud’s co-founder and chief technology officer, said today in a news release.

Starcloud made its mark in Earth orbit last year with Starcloud-1, a satellite equipped with an Nvidia H100 chip. Starcloud-1 successfully trained a large language model called NanoGPT, marking a first for orbital computing. “We successfully validated our ability to run and train AI models on enterprise-grade GPUs in low Earth orbit, and now we’re taking this proven technology to lunar orbit,” Feilden said.

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That’s one giant leap for Washington’s space industry

Illustration: Washington state map with space company logos scattered across the territory
Analysts have traced the economic impact produced by scores of space ventures in Washington state. (Space Northwest Illustration)

The preliminary results of a study commissioned by Space Northwest, an association focused on regional space ventures, suggest that Washington state’s space economy contributes $8.1 billion in direct economic output annually.

The newly reported figures show that the space industry’s economic impact in the Evergreen State has nearly doubled since a similar study in 2022. That earlier report also documented a doubling effect over the course of four years, from $1.8 billion in 2018 to $4.6 billion in 2022.

Kelly Maloney, Space Northwest’s co-founder and the chair of the association’s board of directors, shared the latest figures today at the Space Northwest Symposium in Federal Way, Wash. She said the preliminary findings, developed by BERK Consulting and Alliance Velocity, reinforce the view that space is not just a niche industry in Washington. “We are effectively the Space Tech State,” Maloney said.

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Governor launches the Washington Space Council

Gov. Bob Ferguson surrounded by Washington Space Council members at Museum of Flight
Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson kicks off the Washington Space Council alongside council members and 10-year-old Sebastian Yu. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson has created a public-private council to elevate the Evergreen State’s profile as regional clusters compete for primacy in America’s space industry.

The 23-member Washington Space Council was introduced tonight at the Museum of Flight during a kickoff event for Seattle Space Week, a celebration organized by Space Northwest.

“The council will help keep us competitive by comparing Washington with other leading states in the industry and identifying ways we can continue to improve and compete,” Ferguson said.

Washington state already ranks as one of the nation’s space industry hotspots. “We’re proud to have a cluster of more than 90 space companies employing more than 13,000 workers, generating over $4 billion in annual economic activity and $1.6 billion in annual payroll,” Ferguson said.

But Andy Lapsa, co-founder and CEO of Kent, Wash.-based Stoke Space, told tonight’s crowd that several other regions are competing with the Pacific Northwest for space-related investments. “States like Florida and Texas and Colorado want this industry, and they want it bad,” he said. “They compete for it every day. Washington has every advantage it needs to lead them all, and the window to use those advantages is open right now.”

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Universe Today

Starship drops off satellites during its first orbital flight

Starship rocket rises from Texas launch pad
SpaceX's Starship rocket rises from its Texas launch pad for its first orbital flight. (Credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX sent its Starship super-rocket on its first orbital flight — a shorter-than-planned test mission that put operational Starlink satellites into orbit for the first time.

The 407-foot-tall rocket rose from its launch pad at SpaceX’s Starbase complex on the Texas coast at 7:50 a.m. CT (5:50 a.m. PT) today and completed nearly two orbits. This was the 14th flight in the Starship test program, but all previous flights had been suborbital.

On its way up, one of the 33 methane-fueled Raptor engines on Starship’s Super Heavy booster shut down prematurely. Despite the single engine failure, the climb to space proceeded as planned, and the booster executed a safe splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico.

One of the six engines on the upper stage, also known as Ship, also experienced an early shutdown. For a few minutes, SpaceX’s team debated whether to go ahead with a follow-up orbital insertion burn or end the test flight without deploying satellites. The team decided to go ahead, and the 19-second burn proceeded smoothly.

“Starship is orbital,” Mission Control declared, drawing cheers from SpaceX employees watching the live video feed.

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Starfish Space gets set for debut of flagship spacecraft

Austin Link and Otter mockup at Seattle Aquarium celebration
Starfish Space co-founder Austin Link shows off a mockup of the Otter spacecraft at the Seattle Aquarium. (GeekWire Photo / Alan Boyle)

Tukwila, Wash.-based Starfish Space is ready for the first launch of its full-size Otter space servicing vehicle, following two orbital tests of scaled-down prototypes.

Otter is due to lift off from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base no earlier than Oct. 1, riding into orbit alongside other payloads on SpaceX’s Transporter-18 satellite rideshare mission. The 660-pound (300-kilogram) spacecraft, roughly the size of a kitchen oven (plus solar arrays), will demonstrate technologies for inspecting inoperable satellites during NASA’s $15 million Small Spacecraft Propulsion and Inspection Capability mission (SSPICY).

“This is the moment Otter becomes real,” Starfish co-founder Austin Link said today in a news release. “It’s no longer something we’re designing for the future. The first Otter is built, it has a customer and a mission, and it’s going to space.”

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Gravitics plans reverse merger and $125M stock offering

Illustration: Diamondback orbital carrier in orbit
An artist’s conception shows Gravitics’ Diamondback orbital carrier, which is targeted for a debut in 2027. (Gravitics Illustration)

Marysville, Wash.-based Gravitics, which is developing orbital carriers for government and commercial customers, is getting ready for a reverse takeover that could lead to a $125 million public offering.

The arrangements are being made with Non-Invasive Monitoring Systems, a Florida-based shell company, with the goal of getting Gravitics listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market.

The two ventures have been discussing the deal for months. The terms for the public offering were announced last month, and this week, a notice filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission revealed a previously unreported $17 million funding round that was completed earlier this year. The filing appears to be part of the preparations for the reverse takeover.

Similar to a SPAC merger, a reverse takeover offers a faster route for a private company to go public by acquiring a less active shell company and taking control of the combined operations. Non-Invasive Monitoring Systems is a prime example: It stopped manufacturing motorized therapeutic platforms in 2019 but retained its OTC listing. The plan envisions “uplisting” the company from OTC to Nasdaq.

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