Payload – Amazon, Globalstar, Iridium, and Canada’s Telesat joined together to establish the SpaceConnect Association, for non-geostationary satellite (NGSO) operators.

SpaceNews – The U.S. Space Force is launching a new competition for mobile satellite-control antennas, formally restarting a program it canceled after abandoning a $1.7 billion contract with AeroVironment and shifting toward a more commercial procurement strategy.

Ars Technica – Rocket Lab announced that it is acquiring the satellite communications company Iridium. The deal, made for cash and shares of Rocket Lab stock, values Iridium at about $8 billion. The deal pairs the launch company, founded and led by Peter Beck, with a decades-old profitable satellite company whose network of 80 satellites in low-Earth orbit provides telecommunications services.

The U.S. Space Force completed the second launch of its VICTUS HAZE Tactically Responsive Space (TacRS) mission, sending a Rocket Lab Electron rocket into orbit on from the company’s Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand.

Air and Space Forces – The U.S. Space Force’s roadmap for modernizing the system includes near-term upgrades to the constellation, including fielding 12 more GPS IIIF satellites. They are also looking ahead and crafting concepts for what it calls a Generation 4, or Gen4, GPS capability.

The Mars Society – During this summer’s expedition, Crew 19, commanded by Trevor Jahn of the Aerospace Corporation, will conduct a wide range of research and field studies focused on exploration science, operational readiness, environmental monitoring, technology demonstration, and analog astronaut activities.

Intelligence Community News – Through Aerospace’s SPARTA framework, the Department of Homeland Security Science and Technology Directorate has published key resources to enable onboard threat detection and provide actionable information for implementing space cybersecurity.

SpaceNews – The supplier selections shed new light on the industrial teams behind the first operational phase of PTS-G, a U.S. Space Force effort to build a more resilient military communications network using commercially derived satellites in geostationary orbit.

Clemson News – The mission will focus on the premidnight aurora sector, where previous studies have shown especially strong energy dissipation and some of the fastest upper-atmospheric winds. It is a collaboration between Clemson, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the Aerospace Corporation and the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.

Wired – NASA presented the details of its phased plan to create the first lunar base at the moon’s south pole. The Moon Base project replaces the Gateway program, an orbital station that would have served as a node between the Earth and the moon