Browse Resources by Year

2017 – Russia Human Launch – Snapshot

Russia remained the only nation to launch humans to orbit during 2017, using its Soyuz launch vehicle and capsule. The continued depression of Russian launch activity during…

2017 – U.S. Suborbital – Snapshot

Many countries and organizations have floated plans for human suborbital spaceflight. However, there are very few building suborbital launch vehicles for this purpose, and even fewer…

2017 – U.S. Human Launch – Snapshot

The last U.S. human space launch was conducted in 2011. NASA now relies on Russia’s Soyuz space launch system, paying hundreds of millions of dollars to transport U.S. astronauts to…

2017 – European Space Agency Budget – Snapshot

ESA operated with a 2017 budget of €5.75 billion (US$6.56 billion), a 12.8% increase from . . .

2017 – European Commission Space Budget – Snapshot

A growing share of European public investment in civil space programs is funded by the European Union under the auspices of its executive body, the European Commission (EC). The EC promotes two European flagship space initiatives…

2017 – EUMETSAT Space Budget – Snapshot

The European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) had a total expenditure of €531.7 million (US$606.8 million) for 2016, the most recent year . . .

2017 – PNT Ground Networks – Snapshot

During 2017, the United States Air Force still conducted operations with decades-old ground equipment. The ground network consisted of 11 command and control antennas and a total of…

2017 – GPS – Snapshot

The U.S. Air Force (USAF) managed 31 operational GPS satellites during 2017, seven more than the minimum 24 GPS satellites required for effective operations. Even though the U.S. number of . . .

2017 – European Spaceports – Snapshot

The European Space Agency (ESA) uses a single spaceport, the Guiana Space Centre (CSG) in Kourou, French Guiana. Orbital launch provider Arianespace carried out all…

2017 – GLONASS – Snapshot

Russia’s share of operational PNT satellites increased from 21% in 2016 to 26% in 2017. Operating the Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS), the nation was tied with . . .