NASA-funded SSPICY satellite declared unrecoverable after its radio stays switched off

3 November 2026

NASA and the company Starfish Space have concluded that the spacecraft Otter, flying the Small Spacecraft Propulsion and Inspection Capability demonstration, cannot be recovered. Operators made first contact after the 1 October launch but lost it during commissioning and were unable to restore two-way communication. Troubleshooting traced the trouble to the fault protection software, which is wrongly keeping the spacecraft's radio switched off. The demonstration was to approach and inspect inoperable objects of United States origin in low Earth orbit while testing propulsion, guidance, navigation and control, together with an articulating robotic boom. Its wider purpose was to mature industry technology for servicing, assembly and manufacturing in space, and to gather data on orbital debris. NASA funded the mission through the Advanced Research and Technology Division of its Research and Technology Mission Directorate, while support was managed by the Small Spacecraft and Distributed Systems programme at Ames Research Center in California.