NASA is hatching a 'fast-paced plan' to boost this space telescope. But first, they'll have to find it

Artist's illustration of NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory orbiting Earth.

(Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab)

It's getting to be crunch time for a groundbreaking satellite-rescue mission.A private spacecraft called "Link" is set to lift off late next month to meet up with NASA's Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, which launched to low Earth orbit (LEO) in 2004 to hunt for powerful space explosions known as gamma-ray bursts.Swift is still working just fine. But atmospheric drag is pulling it down at an ever-increasing rate, and the telescope is powerless to resist; it doesn't have a propulsion system. Link will be the scope's savior, if all goes to plan, meeting up with Swift in LEO and boosting it to a higher altitude.

Engineers from Katalyst stabilize their LINK robotic servicing spacecraft as it moves into a vibration chamber at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center on April 15, 2026. (Image credit: NASA/Scott Wiessinger)This plan is bold and unprecedented. Link, built by Arizona-based Katalyst Space Technologies, aims to become the first private spacecraft ever to capture a robotic satellite operated by the U.S. government.Doing so will not be easy, especially since it's unclear where exactly Swift will be in the coming months. That's because Earth's atmosphere — and therefore the drag it imposes on orbiting spacecraft — is not static. Our blanket of air expands when the sun is active and contracts during times of solar quiescence.Solar activity waxes and wanes on an 11-year cycle, the most recent of which peaked in 2024. That intense round of space weather put the Swift team on notice: Modeling work performed in early 2025 predicted that the telescope would reenter the atmosphere by the summer of 2026.That dire prognosis laid the groundwork for Link's rescue mission, which NASA funded via a $30 million contract with Katalyst. The modeling work has continued, too, as NASA and the company flesh out their "fast-paced plan" to raise Swift's orbit."These predictions evolve over time, based on space weather forecasts and other factors like Swift's current height and orientation," Michael Shoemaker, deputy flight dynamics lead in SSMO (Space Science Missions Operations) at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, said in a May 26 statement.