Verge Science is here to bring you the most up-to-date space news and analysis, whether it’s about the latest findings from NASA or comprehensive coverage of the next SpaceX rocket launch to the International Space Station. We’ll take you inside the discoveries of new exoplanets, space weather, space policy, and the booming commercial space industry.
The first Southwest Airlines plane with Starlink will enter this service this summer, and Starlink is set to be available on “more than 300 aircraft” by the end of the year, Southwest says.
Southwest joins airlines like United, WestJet, and British Airways in bringing SpaceX’s Starlink to customers.
[Southwest Newsroom]
Amazon’s Leo now has FCC approval for about 7,700 low Earth orbit satellites. So far it’s only launched about 150, well short of its FCC requirement to deploy 1,600 by July 2026 (it’s seeking an extension). SpaceX has launched over 11,000 Starlink satellites into LEO with about 9,600 still active.
“SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon,” Musk said on Sunday, just a week after merging SpaceX and xAI. It’s a notable change in plans from a little over a year ago when Musk insisted that, “we’re going straight to Mars. The Moon is a distraction.”
[SpaceX prioritizes lunar 'self-growing city' over Mars project, Musk says]
The first Super Bowl ad from SpaceX apparently didn’t have enough time left in production to mention its newly-joined X / xAI elements, but it is promoting the idea of global satellite internet.
Maybe combining Musk’s companies is really about space AI data centers. But reports from Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal indicate that SpaceX’s IPO pursuit includes a push to have major index providers find a way around the usual waiting periods before they’ll add newly listed companies.
The partnership will allow AT&T to use Amazon Leo — the ecommerce giant’s low Earth orbit satellite network — to deliver fixed broadband services to businesses. Amazon launched its gigabit-speed Leo Ultra antenna last November, but it’s only available for commercial use for now.
SpaceX is profitable, while xAI is burning about $1 billion a month. Is this another case of Musk bailing out himself?
I used to compare Elon Musk to an old boss of mine who would spin up a company division every time he found a new hobby, but this might be just as apt:
ElectricOrchestra613:
Elon Musk’s constant new ventures and subsequent mergers just feels like the corporate equivalent of creating a new email every time you want to sign up for a free trial.
Get the day’s best comment and more in my free newsletter, The Verge Daily.
NASA’s overnight wet dress rehearsal of the SLS rocket surfaced a liquid hydrogen leak. A second wet dress rehearsal is now needed, pushing the earliest possible launch of the crewed mission around the moon to March.
Mr. 420 hopes to raise $50 billion by taking SpaceX public with the largest initial public offering in history. The target date is mid-June, near Elon Musk’s 55th birthday on June 28th, and June 8th and 9th “when Jupiter and Venus will appear very close together, known as a conjunction, for the first time in more than three years.”
SpaceX wants the extra funds to help develop its beefier Starship rocket system, expand its Starlink constellation, and to put data centers into space.
Astronomers captured this image of a stunning shock wave around a dead star — a shock wave that, according to all known mechanisms, “shouldn’t be there.”
“We found something never seen before and, more importantly, entirely unexpected,” said co-lead author of the study, Simone Scaringi. “The surprise that a supposedly quiet, discless system could drive such a spectacular nebula was one of those rare ‘wow’ moments.”
The Wall Street Journal has a profile of Gwynne Shotwell, the longtime president of SpaceX, ahead of its potential IPO. It covers her “unusual relationship” with Elon Musk where she often plays the role of “Musk translator” and defender. But make no mistake, she’s in charge:
“The great thing about Gwynne is she’s always stepped in where she feels the company most needs help,” said Kathy Lueders, a former SpaceX executive who spent years as a high-ranking NASA official. “People would say, ‘We need to turn to Gwynne on this one.’ ”
NASA administrator Jared Isaacman said in a press conference that “a single crew member on board the [ISS] experienced a medical situation and is now stable,” but NASA is playing it safe and bringing Crew-11 home early.
A spacewalk was postponed on Wednesday due to the same unspecified medical concerns.
A group of scientists says their “Collision Realization and Significant Harm (CRASH) Clock” estimates satellites in low Earth orbit have only 5.5 days before colliding or nearly missing another object, as of June 2025, compared to 164 days in January 2018.
Space traffic is likely to continue to increase, thanks in part to the latest pet project of tech billionaires: space data centers.
[Scientific American]
Astronomers and environmental scientists are skeptical.
SpaceX is planning to go public at a valuation that would make it the biggest listing of all time, Bloomberg reports. “The Elon Musk-led company is targeting a valuation of about $1.5 trillion for the entire company” and while they’re saying they plan for next year, it’s a Musk company so you know what that means: “the timing could slip until 2027.” SpaceX expects $15 billion in 2025 revenue, and $22 billion to $24 billion in 2026, mostly due to Starlink.
Competition is coming, but it might never catch up.
In an interview with Fox News on Monday, Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that launching solar-powered satellites like Project Suncatcher into space in a bid to alleviate power consumption concerns will be viewed as “a more normal way” to build AI data centers within the next decade or so.
The moss isn’t quite as hardy as the reigning king of extremophiles, the tardigrade, but it put up an impressive showing in an experiment where scientists exposed sporophytes (the reproductive structures that produce spores) to the harsh vacuum of space for 283 days. After crunching the numbers, they believe the moss could survive for around 5,600 days, or a little over 15 years in space and still survive and reproduce. According to the press release:
... Over 80% of the spores survived 9 months outside of the International Space Station (ISS) and made it back to Earth still capable of reproducing, demonstrating for the first time that an early land plant can survive long-term exposure to the elements of space.
Hot on the heels of a second successful launch — and first successful landing — Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin has announced the next version of its rocket. The New Glenn 9x4 — named for its number of engines — should operate alongside the existing 7x2, and could compete more closely with SpaceX’s Starship.
The new trailer for Amazon MGM’s adaptation of Alex Weir’s novel Project Hail Mary teases a bit more of the catastrophe that’s imperiling Earth, but it’s mostly about the friendship that’s going to develop between astronaut Dr. Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) and an alien that looks like a pile of rocks.
“Sentinel-6B will ensure that we continue to collect the high-precision data needed to understand our changing climate,” ESA’s director of earth observation programmes, Simonetta Cheli said in a press release.
The partnership managed to survive the Trump administration’s attempts to stop collecting other environmental data and stymie reports on climate change.
SpaceX has been on a tear with launches, having boosted over 10,000 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit. Now it’s celebrating a new milestone that’s become so automatic we just expect it.
