Texas-based Firefly Aerospace is celebrating today (March 11) after successfully launching its Alpha rocket for the first time in nearly a year. Today’s mission, called “Stairway to Seven,” was the…
Category: Astronomy
Jupiter’s moons leave cold ‘footprints’ in the planet’s auroras, James Webb Space Telescope finds
Jupiter’s moons can have surprising effects on the world’s displays of auroral lights by “stomping down” on the planet’s gigantic magnetic environment. These surprising effects, detected in observations from the…
Incoming! 1,300-pound NASA satellite will crash to Earth on March 10
A big NASA satellite will crash back to Earth on Tuesday (March 10) after nearly 14 years in orbit, experts say. The spacecraft in question is the 1,323-pound (600-kilogram) Van…
SpaceX springs forward with another Starlink launch from California
Hours after setting clocks forward for Daylight Savings Time, SpaceX went forward with a launch of Starlink satellites on Sunday (March 8). The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at 7:00…
A jellyfish or a brain? Tell us what you see in this gorgeous deep-space nebula photo
Astrophotographer Ogetay Kayali has captured a nebula resembling a jellyfish — or possibly a brain, depending on your perspective — shining 5,000 light-years from Earth near the bright star Propus,…
Will Proba-3 phone home? European solar-eclipse satellite goes dark
Europe has lost contact with one of its two Proba-3 spacecraft, after an anomaly caused the vehicle to lose orientation. The European Space Agency‘s (ESA) Proba-3 mission launched to Earth…
Is Nus Braka’s weapon in the latest “Starfleet Academy” a “Galaxy Quest” in-joke?
“‘Galaxy Quest’ is, without a doubt, the best ‘Star Trek’ movie.” So said Wil Wheaton in the 2019 “Galaxy Quest” documentary “Never Surrender”, and he should know a thing or…
60 years of ‘Star Trek’: The colorful origins of the rainbow warp effect
You’ve all seen it dozens of times, in banners, posters, trailers, and intro title sequences, that vivid rainbow-like warp field spectrum used in some capacity in nearly every “Star Trek”…
NASA repairs Artemis 2 rocket, continues eyeing April moon launch
NASA has repaired its Artemis 2 rocket, apparently keeping things on track for a possible April launch of the first crewed moon mission in more than 50 years. Engineers made…
How fast is the universe actually expanding? Ripples in spacetime could finally solve ‘Hubble tension’
A team of scientists says it’s possible to use tiny ripples in space and time, or gravitational waves, to measure the rate at which our universe is expanding. This could…
