Hello All,

The Earth was beautiful from space, as seen from the SpaceX Falcon 9/SES-22 vehicle about two hours ago (see: https://www.spacex.com/launches/ses-22/ - from the 17:50 to 28:40 points in the video. It was apparently windy out in the Atlantic, as the first stage--while descending to land on the drone ship--twisted and turned quite a bit during re-entry! But it landed successfully, although it skidded across the deck a little, just as it touched down. Also:

The second stage, with the SES-22 communications satellite still attached, re-ignited at about the 45:11 point in the video (27 minutes and 12 seconds after liftoff) over the night side of the Earth, and burned for about 1 minute, boosting SES-22 into a geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO); the Vacuum Merlin-1D engine's flame was spectacular against the utter blackness of space and the Earth's night side! SES-22 separated from the Falcon 9 second stage at the 51:31 point in the video. As well:

ESA's BepiColombo dual Mercury orbiter spacecraft (it also carries an orbiter supplied by JAXA) has made a close flyby of its objective, and returned pictures of the planet (see: https://spaceflightnow.com/2022/06/...n-second-flyby/ ). Several flybys are necessary, so that the ion drive-powered spacecraft can lose enough velocity to enter orbit abound the planet closest to the Sun. Plus:

NASA's CAPSTONE CubeSat lunar probe (see: https://spaceflightnow.com/2022/06/...ck-to-the-moon/ ) has been launched to the Moon (see: https://www.youtube.com/results?sea...CAPSTONE+launch *and* https://spaceflightnow.com/2022/06/...s-moon-program/ ) from New Zealand, aboard a Rocket Lab Electron launch vehicle. The spacecraft will fly the same unusual orbit--a Near-Rectilinear Halo Orbit (NRHO, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near-...ar%20m issions. ) that is planned for the Artemis program's Gateway space station, a way station for crews heading to--and returning from--the Moon's surface.

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