Link Spacecraft Burns Up After Failed Swift Observatory Rescue — SkimNews
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- Katalyst Space Technologies' three-armed Link spacecraft burned up after 85 days in orbit, ending a mission that got within 7-9 miles of the Swift Observatory but could not capture it.
- Link launched July 3 from Kwajalein Atoll on what Katalyst billed as 'America's first commercial space robot,' built in 22 months after the Flagstaff, Arizona company won a $30 million NASA contract in September 2024.
- Electronics failures disabled two of Link's three reaction wheels after launch, sending the spacecraft into a deep spin; mission managers abandoned the rescue effort last month once it became clear there was insufficient fuel left.
- Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, a 22-year-old NASA–Penn State collaboration that has studied gamma-ray bursts, will re-enter Earth's atmosphere in November without the altitude boost that would have extended its life.
- NASA suspended Swift's science observations earlier this year and repositioned it to minimize atmospheric drag ahead of the rescue attempt; ironically, the spacecraft's own lifespan was shortened by the intense solar flare-ups it was built to observe.
- NASA astrophysics director Shawn Domagal-Goldman and administrator Jared Isaacman both praised the mission as worthwhile despite the outcome, with Isaacman saying NASA 'should be willing to move quickly and take smart risks when the potential return is worth it.'
Why it matters: NASA loses the Swift Observatory — a still-productive gamma-ray-burst monitor — in November, cutting short 22 years of science it could not finish. The failed $30 million grab is also a setback for the emerging U.S. commercial satellite-servicing industry, since Katalyst's Link was pitched as the country's first commercial space robot and the mission became a public test of whether a private company could rescue a dying observatory in orbit.
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