The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), an intelligence service of the U.S.A. whose specific purpose is to design, build and manage American spy satellites, has donated two spy telescopes to NASA. It seems that the NRO contacted NASA last year to see if there was a chance for the two satellites to be turned into scientific instruments instead of being dismantled.
Ebb and Flow, the GRAIL (Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory) space probes, completed early their prime mission to study the Moon with great accuracy by measuring its force of gravity. In the course of 89 days, the two spacecraft recorded data on the entire lunar surface for three times using the Lunar Gravity Ranging System on board of both of them.
Yesterday, the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft was released from the International Space Station and came back to Earth. Meanwhile, SpaceX announced that it signed a contract with Intelsat, the world’s largest supplier of satellite services to use the Falcon Heavy rocket for the launch of a satellite in a geostationary transfer orbit (GTO).
