Space digest — Oct 29, 2026
Top line: SpaceX's Flight 15 stack is fully checked out — both halves of the November 8 dual-catch attempt have completed their static fires, with the ship designated for the first tower catch named as Ship 42. Separately, startup Cowboy Space says it is building its own rocket because it could not buy one — a launcher whose upper stage stays in orbit as a megawatt-class data center.
1. Flight 15 stack fully static-fire tested; Ship 42 named for the first tower catch
What happened: SpaceX's Starship Flight 15 pre-flight test campaign is now complete on both sides of the stack. Booster 22 fired all 33 Raptor engines at Pad 2 on October 25, and on October 28 SpaceX's own channel confirmed Ship 42's campaign at the Massey's test site — a full-duration six-engine static fire plus a single-engine burn simulating a deorbit burn. Overnight, tracking feeds showed Ship 42 leaving Massey's on Highway 4, headed back to the production site after finishing testing. Meanwhile, a roundup article states Elon Musk has singled out Ship 42 as the vehicle designated to achieve the first-ever tower catch of a Starship upper stage.
What's genuinely new: The full test checkout of the Flight 15 stack — both the booster and the ship — is confirmed as passed, with the deorbit-burn simulation a new named checkout step, directly relevant to bringing the upper stage back for a catch. The naming of Ship 42 as the catch vehicle is a first specific link between that hardware and the first-ever upper-stage catch, which prior reporting had established as a both-stages goal for Flight 15 on November 8 but without a named ship.
Watch: Whether the November 8 target holds, the rollout of the combined stack to Pad 2, and the catch attempt itself — the first time SpaceX would try to recover both stages of a Starship.
Sources Basenor NASASpaceflight (X) NASASpaceflight (X)
2. Cowboy Space is building a rocket because it couldn't find one — and its upper stage stays in orbit as a data center
What happened: SatNews reports on startup Cowboy Space, which is developing its own launch vehicle, "Big Iron," because it says it could not find an existing rocket suited to its needs. The distinctive design choice: Big Iron's upper stage does not come back. Instead of being recovered or expended on return, it stays in orbit and becomes a megawatt-class power platform — described in the report as a megawatt-class data center.
What's genuinely new: First appearance of Cowboy Space and its Big Iron vehicle here, with an orbital-data-center payoff built into the launch architecture itself: the upper stage is designed never to deorbit, instead converting to an in-orbit power/data platform. The company frames the whole vehicle around that end state rather than treating the upper stage as throwaway mass. No launch date, funding figures, or technical specifications appear in the available report, and only one outlet has covered it so far.
Watch: Any funding announcement, technical detail on the megawatt-class power system, a payload or customer commitment, and whether independent outlets follow on.
Sources SatNews
Brief
- Rocket Lab stock eyes its best week in a month: RKLB shares are headed for their strongest week in a month as Neutron hardware reached its test site, Electron missions stack up, and NASA updates land — though retail investors remain hesitant per Stocktwits' market recap. A market-recap restatement of the hardware-to-Wallops shipments already on the Rocket Lab–Iridium storyline's October 27 entries; the Neutron first-flight target remains 2027.
- Artemis II commander moves to Caltech/JPL: Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman is joining Caltech as Associate Vice President and JPL Deputy Director, per Caltech's announcement relayed by Jeff Foust on X.