Spectrum News 1 — The Artemis III mission aims to put astronauts on the moon by mid-2027. NASA astronaut Doug Wheelock said, “We’re going to the lunar south pole, which is a bit more rugged terrain, than at the equatorial landing sites of Apollo.”

Aviation Week — The Sept. 10 launch is the first of 10 planned missions to field initial capabilities under Tranche 1, which is meant to provide regional coverage from the data-centric Transport Layer and the missile-defense-focused Tracking Layer.

SpaceNews — A new collaboration between commercial space and defense firms Varda Space Industries, LeoLabs, and Anduril successfully demonstrated advanced hypersonic vehicle tracking.

On the podcast “From the Crows’ Nest,” Aerospace’s CSPS Systems Director Brian Weeden discusses how U.S. Space Command offers opportunities to rethink how the nation supports terrestrial military operations or conducts activities in space.

SpaceNews — More than 80 U.S. Space Force officers graduated from the service’s new year-long officer training course, which immerses leaders in space operations, cyber warfare, and intelligence — skills now seen as essential as China and Russia develop sophisticated capabilities to challenge American dominance in space.

Air and Space Forces — DARPA announced the start of Phase 1 of its Robust Quantum Sensors (RoQS) program, a trailblazing effort to prototype quantum sensing technology to provide a localized, non-space-based alternative to GPS.

SpaceNews — The Protected Tactical Satcom-Global (PTS-G) program marks the military’s first major attempt to deploy constellations of small satellites in the geostationary belt.

Aviationo Week — The Space Force is working with providers United Launch Alliance (ULA) and SpaceX to launch eight Phase 2 missions by the end of calendar year 2025. The missions were all procured under the NSSL Phase 2 program in 2020.

Aerospace’s Sam Wilson was recently interviewed on the podcast “Thinking the Unthinkable with Ankit Panda.”

SpaceNews — NASA has selected Intuitive Machines, Lunar Outpost, and Venturi Astrolab to advance capabilities for a lunar terrain vehicle (LTV) that Artemis astronauts will use to travel around the lunar surface