{"id":742153,"date":"2026-06-17T06:11:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T06:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/742153\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T06:11:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T06:11:11","slug":"nasa-discussing-bold-mission-to-boost-swift-space-telescope-today-listen-live","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/742153\/","title":{"rendered":"NASA discussing bold mission to boost Swift space telescope today: Listen live"},"content":{"rendered":"

A bold telescope-rescue mission is set to launch later this month, and you can learn all about it today (June 17).<\/p>\n

That mission will be conducted by Link, a robotic servicing spacecraft built and operated by the Arizona-based company Katalyst Space Technologies. Link will meet up with NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory<\/a> in the final frontier, raising the telescope’s orbit to give it more time to study the heavens.<\/p>\n

NASA and Katalyst representatives will discuss the plan today, during a press conference that starts at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT). You can listen live via NASA<\/a>. Space.com will stream the feed as well, if the space agency makes it available.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n

\"a\n<\/p>\n

Katalyst Space’s Link spacecraft is seen mated with its Pegasus XL rocket. (Image credit: NASA\/Ron Beard)<\/p>\n

Participants will be:<\/p>\n

Shawn Domagal-Goldman, division director, Astrophysics, NASA Headquarters in WashingtonBrad Cenko, principal investigator, Swift, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center<\/a> in Greenbelt, MarylandKieran Wilson, principal investigator, LINK, Katalyst SpaceRobert Lamontagne, vice president, strategic partnerships, Katalyst SpaceWes Collier, vice president, launch systems, Northrop Grumman<\/p>\n

Swift launched to low Earth orbit<\/a> in 2004 to hunt for gamma-ray bursts<\/a>, the most powerful explosions in the universe. The telescope is still perfectly capable of doing this important job, but Earth’s atmosphere<\/a> is dragging it down toward a fiery death.<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

Swift doesn’t have a propulsion system to fight this downward pull, so it needs some help \u2014 which is where Katalyst comes in. Last fall, NASA announced it had tapped the company<\/a> to raise Swift’s orbit.<\/p>\n

It’s an unprecedented ask: No private spacecraft has ever linked up with a robotic U.S. government satellite. And time is of the essence; some models predicted the observatory could come back to Earth as soon as this summer.<\/p>\n

\"Space\"<\/p>\n

Katalyst has acted fast, getting Link ready for a launch later this month from the Marshall Islands in the Pacific. (NASA has not yet announced a target date). Link will fly aboard a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket, an air-launched vehicle that will be carried aloft by a plane.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A bold telescope-rescue mission is set to launch later this month, and you can learn all about it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":293609,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[49,48,66,306],"class_list":["post-742153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/293609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}