Space News for Saturday, December 23, 2023

The Gist: Space News · Dec 23, 2023 · 6m

In this episode, we aggregate and summarize today's top space news stories. Enjoy!(00:10) Podcast Introduction(00:25) Rocket Lab wins $515 million contract to build 18 satellites for U.S. government agency(00:57) Firefly Alpha upper stage malfunction puts payload into wrong orbit(01:26) NASA report studies options for a future national laboratory in orbit after ISS(01:58) To win the new space race, NASA and the DoD need to shift their collaboration into high gear(02:28) Shenzhou-17 astronauts conduct first spacewalk to repair solar array(02:57) Month: (03:22) SpaceX launches Falcon 9…