Astronomy, Space Tourism | featured news

Virgin Galactic is one flight closer to becoming a commercial "spaceline." The company's passenger spacecraft, SpaceShipTwo, completed its first rocket-powered flight Monday morning above the Mojave Desert in California.

Millionaire spaceflier Dennis Tito has worked out a plan to send two astronauts to Mars and back without stopping — but the 501-day flight plan won’t work unless it launches in 2018.

Attention wealthy nations and billionaires: A team of former NASA executives will fly you to the moon in an out-of-this-world commercial venture combining the wizardry of Apollo and the marketing of Apple. For a mere $1.5 billion, the business is offering countries the chance to send two people to the moon and back, either for research or national prestige. And if you are an individual with that kind of money to spare, you too can go the moon for a couple days.

A space capsule has returned to Earth, ending the first commercially contracted re-supply mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The capsule was sent by the California-based company SpaceX, the first of 12 missions it will perform for US space agency Nasa... SpaceX says it is just a few years away from being able to provide an astronaut "taxi" service.

Sarah Brightman, the world's biggest selling soprano, says she has booked a trip to the International Space Station... Brightman, a UNESCO ambassador, said the trip would also serve as a way to promote the U.N. agency's message, in particular by encouraging women's education in the sciences and environmental awareness. She hinted at the possibility of doing a promotional "space concert."

A privately built robotic space capsule arrived at the International Space Station early Wednesday, making the first routine commercial cargo delivery to the orbiting lab under a billion-dollar deal with NASA.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, topped by a Dragon cargo capsule, rises from its launch pad at Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida during preparations for Sunday's scheduled launch to the International Space Station.

No, it’s not science fiction: for those who have run out of places to go, companies are competing to take amateur astronauts into the heights, and beyond.

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station released Space Exploration Technologies' unmanned Dragon cargo ship on Thursday, one of the final milestones in a pioneering mission for commercial firms seeking a major role in space travel.

Space station astronauts floated into the Dragon on Saturday, a day after its heralded arrival as the world's first commercial supply ship.