FAA opens the door to 456 Starship launches a year; Zhuque-2E flies; NASA's Venus pair revived

Dragon — the cargo Dragon now in free flight berths at the Harmony module's space-facing port at 11 a.m. EDT (15:00 UTC) today, with more than 6,300 pounds aboard, including two roll-out solar arrays riding in the unpressurised trunk. Those arrays are the hardware for the two spacewalks NASA just scheduled, so today's docking starts that chain. Anil Menon and Joshua Kutryk monitor the automated approach; NASA+ coverage opens at 9:15 a.m. EDT (13:15 UTC). NASA Space Station Blog

U.S. spacewalks 100 and 101 — Menon and Kutryk will fit the station's seventh roll-out array on Thursday 29 October and the eighth and last one on Thursday 5 November, closing out the power upgrade. Two firm EVA dates to keep, and the 286th station spacewalk marks the end of a years-long array campaign. The eight arrays raise station power from 160 kilowatts to roughly 215, up to 30 percent more; NASA previews both at a 2 p.m. EDT briefing on Tuesday 20 October. NASA

Artemis III short stack — with all four core-stage engines fitted, NASA is about to mate the core to its boosters, making a partial rocket with no Orion on top that rolls to Pad 39B purely to practise loading propellant. The first time Artemis III flight hardware leaves the assembly building, and the crew suit up and rehearse launch day while it sits at the pad. The boosters, finished 30 September, supply over 75 percent of liftoff thrust; the mission is NET June 2027. NASASpaceflight

DAVINCI and VERITAS — the two NASA Venus missions that budget cuts nearly killed now have dates: the descent probe in December 2030, a year sooner than planned, and the radar mapper in November 2032. Venus has had no NASA spacecraft since Magellan ended in 1994, so this is a real arrival to follow rather than a study. Part of the money came from NASA dropping its radar contribution to ESA's Envision orbiter; the probe's fall to the surface takes about an hour. Ars Technica

Reflect Orbital — the company trying to sell sunlight from orbital mirrors has bought two flights from Skyroot Aerospace: one on Vikram-1, which first flew in July, and one on the stretched Vikram-1U. A sign of how tight rideshare capacity is: SpaceX has stopped taking Transporter reservations past 2029, so small operators are shopping with new launch firms. Vikram-1 lifts about 350 kg to low Earth orbit and Vikram-1U about 550 kg from its debut in Q1 2027; price and dates undisclosed. Payload

INTELLACT — In Orbit Aerospace has dropped reentry capsules and now sells software that lets a spacecraft manage its own health, burns and anomalies without waiting for a ground pass, paid for by NASA and Space Force awards. Worth noting where constellation money is going: there are soon more satellites than people who can watch them. It debuts in shadow mode in Q1 2027 on the AFRL/NASA HyperSTEP mission; its SpaceWERX award was one of roughly 29 chosen from over 300 proposals. Payload

Astralink — Aselsan is under contract to build in-orbit prototypes for a Turkish broadband network of 198 low-orbit satellites serving military, civil government and emergency users, with the first spacecraft due up in 2028. Another state-backed constellation joining the queue, and a launch customer to watch; note what is absent, as Aselsan would not say where it stands on frequency coordination. The company told investors about the procurement contract on 3 June; the article is behind a subscription. Space Intel Report

PAZ 2 — the government agreed to bring €65.8 million of a €1 billion loan forward so payments for two new radar satellites match the build schedule, lifting 2026 funding to €245.6 million and cutting 2029 by the same amount. Dull on the surface, but cash-flow fixes like this are what keep a European programme from slipping a year. Airbus is prime contractor, the imagery beats 25-centimetre resolution, and both satellites should be operational by 2031. European Spaceflight

Ofcom — Britain's spectrum authority wants the ITU to soften Ku- and Ka-band power restrictions written a quarter of a century ago to keep low-orbit constellations from interfering with geostationary satellites. These limits decide how much capacity a Starlink-class system can legally pour down, and the operators have been fighting over them since the 2023 radio conference. Ofcom asks for limited changes at WRC-27 in Shanghai and a fuller review at WRC-31; the article is behind a subscription. Space Intel Report

Opinions on Developing New-Quality Productive Forces — a Party and State Council document published on 9 October tells the commercial space sector and the low-altitude economy to grow in an orderly, safe way; space gets part of a single line in the whole text. Documents at this level decide where political cover and patient capital flow, which is what sits behind the commercial launchers now flying from Jiuquan most weeks. Seven sections and nineteen points, with a warning against investment bubbles and piling into an industry for novelty rather than feasibility. China in Space