In space, we help each other 📡🌈 ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ European and Russian specialists recently worked together to catch signals from an astrophysical observatory mission, now mapping X-ray sources in our galaxy and beyond, discovering previously unknown supermassive black holes ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ In a joint technology demonstration conducted in April and May, @roscosmosofficial, and the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences and us, in cooperation with NPO Lavochkin used three of our deep space ground stations to download vital scientific data from the Spektr-RG spacecraft. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ The Spektr-RG astrophysical observatory was developed by Roscosmos with participation from Germany led by the @germanaerospacecenter and is currently operating to map the entire sky in X-rays and identify new X-ray sources, such as supermassive black holes, across the Universe. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ This spring, the Russian ground stations normally used to communicate with Spektr-RG were in unfavourable geographic positions, and experts from our Estrack…

The forthcoming Kerbal Space Program update, 1.10 features a major collaboration with the European Space Agency to bring the Rosetta and BepiColombo missions to the game in the form of playable missions and special parts.
I sat down to play through the mission while talking to the real Manager of Spacecraft Operations for Bepicolombo - Elsa Montagnon. Obviously because of quarantine rules this had to be an entirely digital collaboration, but she explains a lot of details of how the real spacecraft is managed while I tried to navigate my way through multiple gravity assists to reach the innermost planet.
Thanks to Elsa for joining me

Discover Kerbal Space Program, and learn about rocket design, dynamics and orbital mechanics while having fun
https://www.kerbalspaceprogram.com/

Find out more about BepiColombo at the ESA website
http://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/BepiColombo_overview2