Image: Young ESA team prepare Ariane 6 passenger
Space News & Blog Articles
Tune into the SpaceZE News Network to stay updated on industry news from around the world.
Winter solstice 2022 brings the longest night of the year to Northern Hemisphere
The winter solstice is today (Dec. 21), marking the official start of astronomical winter in the Northern Hemisphere and the shortest day of the year.
8 ways the James Webb Space Telescope is revolutionizing astronomy
One year after its launch, the flagship space telescope is already making discoveries that are transforming our knowledge of the universe, both near and far.
Snowy Alps
Image: This Copernicus Sentinel-3 image shows the wide-coverage of snowfall in the Alps, which hopefully bodes well for the coming year.
A wreath of star formation
Image:
Webb's picture of the month December is dominated by NGC 7469, a luminous, face-on spiral galaxy approximately 90 000 light-years in diameter that lies roughly 220 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Pegasus.
ESA to invite companies to connect with the Moon
Space companies in Europe that could create telecommunications and navigation services for missions to the Moon will be invited to bid for the work, following the completion of two feasibility studies.
Juice launch kit
Download this launch kit (in English, other languages below) to learn more about the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice) mission and its science goals.
Two Pléiades Neo Earth-imaging satellites lost in failure of Europe’s Vega C rocket
Illustration of the Vega C rocket with its Zefiro 40 second stage firing. Credit: Arianespace
The final two spacecraft in Airbus’s four-satellite, 600 million-euro commercial Pléiades Neo Earth observation fleet crashed into the Atlantic Ocean shortly after launch from French Guiana Tuesday night, falling victim to a failure of a European Vega C rocket.
Europe's Vega C rocket fails on 2nd-ever mission, 2 satellites lost
Europe's Vega C rocket failed during its second-ever mission on Tuesday night (Dec. 20), which was supposed to loft two satellites for Airbus' Pléiades Neo Earth-imaging constellation.
Live coverage: Vega C rocket set for operational debut
Live coverage of the countdown and launch of a Vega C rocket with the Pléiades Neo 5 and 6 commercial Earth observation satellites for Airbus. Text updates will appear automatically below. Follow us on Twitter.
Two potentially habitable Earth-like worlds orbit a star in our cosmic backyard
Astronomers have discovered two Earth-like exoplanets orbiting a red dwarf near our solar system that orbit their star with respective 'years' lasting just 10 and 21 days.
Watch 2 NASA astronauts conduct spacewalk early Wednesday
Two NASA astronauts will conduct a spacewalk early Wednesday (Dec. 21) to install new solar arrays on the International Space Station, and you can watch it live.
Astronomers Spot Stars in the Most Distant Galaxies for the First Time
Since it launched on December 25th, 2021 (quite the Christmas present!), the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has taken the sharpest and most detailed images of the Universe, surpassing even its predecessor, the venerable Hubble Space Telescope! But what is especially exciting are the kinds of observations we can look forward to, where the JWST will use its advanced capabilities to address some of the most pressing cosmological mysteries. For instance, there’s the problem presented by high-redshift supermassive black holes (SMBHs) or brightly-shining quasars that existed during the first billion years of the Universe.
Zero-G flight for disability ambassadors shows space is accessible for all
AstroAccess flew 14 individuals from 5 countries on a parabolic research flight Dec. 15, to open up space research to more people.
SpaceX aims to start launching next-gen Starlink satellites this month: report
SpaceX will soon start launching a new generation of Starlink broadband satellites, which could help the company deal with surging demand, according to a report.
Strange arrangement of Milky Way's groupie galaxies may undermine dark matter
Scientists may have explained the mysterious distribution of small satellite galaxies around our Milky Way that has long puzzled astronomers, but not everyone is in agreement.
We Could Spread Life to the Milky Way With Comets. But Should We?
Here’s a thorny problem: What if life doesn’t always appear on planets that can support it? What if we find more and more exoplanets and determine that some of them are habitable? What if we also determine that life hasn’t appeared on them yet?
NASA's InSight lander on Mars goes silent as power runs low
NASA lost contact with its Mars InSight lander on Monday (Dec. 18) after the spacecraft failed to respond to communications from its control team.
Shock wave from sun has opened up a crack in Earth's magnetic field, and it could trigger a geomagnetic storm
A mysterious shock wave in a gust of solar wind has sent a barrage of high-speed material smashing into Earth's magnetic field, opening up a crack in the magnetosphere.
Salute Apollo 17's 50th anniversary with freshly restored moon mission shots
NASA restoration wizard Andy Saunders on Apollo 17's restored photos in his new book, "Apollo Remastered"
