NASA taps SpaceX Starlink lasers to relay Artemis III imagery from Orion
Two Starlink mini laser terminals on Orion's exterior will downlink 4K video during Artemis III's crewed rendezvous demonstration.
what happened
NASA announced July 16 that it selected SpaceX to install two Starlink mini laser communication terminals on the exterior of the Orion spacecraft for Artemis III, enabling 4K imagery and video downlink to Johnson Space Center's Mission Control, per NASA's own blog post. The terminals use the same laser crosslink technology as the more than 25,000 already operating across the Starlink constellation. Artemis III's four astronauts will use the mission to test rendezvous and docking between Orion and commercial human landing system vehicles.
why it matters
It is another data point in Starlink's expansion from a broadband constellation into a NASA-relied-upon laser-relay supplier; flight heritage on a crewed Artemis mission builds the track record SpaceX needs to sell the same optical relay service to other government and commercial customers.
signal-to-noise
quick facts
- Companies
- SpaceX
- Category
- human-spaceflight
- Impact
- notable
- SNR
- 5 / 5
- Event date
- 2026-07-16
- Published
- 2026-07-17 07:20 UTC