SpaceX will launch 53 of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit early Thursday morning (Feb. 2), and you can watch the action live.
Space News & Blog Articles
Tune into the SpaceZE News Network to stay updated on industry news from around the world.
Kapow! Inflatable space station module blows to pieces in video explosion
Sierra Space successfully finished its third module test for the Blue Origin-led Orbital Reef private space complex for NASA, on the long road to replace the International Space Station.
Rolls-Royce unveils early-stage design for space nuclear reactor
The company is working with the U.K. Space Agency to develop nuclear power and propulsion options for spaceflight.
Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max review
The Apple iPhone 13 Pro Max may not be the newest iPhone, but it offers fantastic value for a slightly older smartphone, all the same and it performs reasonably at astro, too.
Smashin' asteroids, Hollywood style: could nuking an asteroid save the Earth?
With the recent success of NASA's DART mission, asteroid deflection technology has made huge strides. Where does that leave Hollywood's more cinematic portrayals of asteroid smashing?
Turning astronauts into Moon explorers
NASA loses more than 200 Jupiter photos after Juno probe camera glitch
For the second flyby in a row, a key camera studying Jupiter has struggled to snap photos as usual.
NASA pledges 'acute awareness' of astronaut safety 20 years after Columbia shuttle tragedy
Seven astronauts lost their lives on space shuttle Columbia on Feb. 1, 2003, due to a series of technical and organizational problems at NASA.
February: Winterʼs Dazzling Stars
February 4th marks the midway point between Decemberʼs solstice and the March equinox. Celebrate that celestial milestone by getting outside to gaze in awe at the amazing array of bright stars youʼll find overhead on February evenings.
The post February: Winterʼs Dazzling Stars appeared first on Sky & Telescope.
Get ready for Starfield with $60 off the Xbox Series S
Xbox Series S is 60% smaller than the Series X and is now $60 off on both Walmart and Microsoft, in time for the release of Starfield.
ESA YGT applications now open!
The 2023 Young Graduate Trainee positions are now open for applications! Opportunities are available in engineering, science, IT and business services. Find out more and apply now.
Setting sail for safer space
Image: Setting sail for safer space
SpaceX crewmates Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken awarded Space Medal of Honor
Former NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken have been presented with the Congressional Space Medal of Honor, the highest U.S. honor reserved for spaceflight veterans.
Starlink satellites, Italian space tug launched by SpaceX rocket
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lifts off from Vandenberg Space Force Base on Tuesday, Jan. 31. Credit: Brian Sandoval / Spaceflight Now
SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket Tuesday from California’s Central Coast with 49 Starlink internet satellites and a rideshare space tug for the Italian company D-Orbit, itself carrying tech demo experiments and cremated human remains for customers in the United States, Germany, New Zealand, and Switzerland.
The mission was SpaceX’s seventh launch of the year, and the second of 2023 from Vandenberg Space Force Base, a military spaceport about 140 miles (225 kilometers) northwest of Los Angeles.
Officials delayed the launch two days to allow more time to complete preflight preparations, but the rocket was ready and weather was favorable for liftoff at 8:15 a.m. PST (11:15 a.m. EST; 1615 GMT) Tuesday from Space Launch Complex 4-East, SpaceX’s West Coast launch site.
The 229-foot-tall (70-meter) Falcon 9 rocket vaulted off the launch pad with 1.7 million pounds of thrust from its nine kerosene-fueled Merlin engines. The rocket steered south-southeast on a path parallel to the Pacific coastline, and fired its first stage engines for about two-and-a-half minutes before the booster separated to begin a descent toward SpaceX’s drone ship “Just Read the Instructions” west of Baja California.
After arcing to the edge of space, the booster re-entered the atmosphere and accomplished a bullseye propulsive landing about eight-and-a-half minutes after liftoff. It was the seventh flight to space for the booster, designated B1071 in SpaceX’s inventory of reusable rockets.
'Star Trek: Picard's' sinister Borg Queen Annie Wersching has died at 45
'Star Trek: Picard" actress Annie Wersching has died at the age of 45 after a two-year illness.
Exoplanets dance around distant star in stunning 12-year timelapse (video)
A new video shows us 12 years in the lives of orbiting exoplanets, crunched down to just a few dramatic seconds.
Don’t Bother Trying to Destroy Rubble Pile Asteroids
The asteroids in our Solar System are survivors. They’ve withstood billions of years of collisions. The surviving asteroids are divided into two groups: monolithic asteroids, which are intact chunks of planetesimals, and rubble piles, which are made of up fragments of shattered primordial asteroids.
It turns out there are far more rubble pile asteroids than we thought, and that raises the difficulty of protecting Earth from asteroid strikes.
The early days of planetary formation were marked by endless collisions that shattered countless planetesimals. The fragments populate the main asteroid belt and other regions in the inner Solar System. But some of those fragments reassembled into rubble pile asteroids, and surprisingly, they’re more resistant to collisions and harder to destroy than their monolithic brethren.
Rubble-pile asteroids are detectable by their density, which is much lower than monolithic asteroids. Peanut-shaped Itokawa was the first confirmed rubble-pile asteroid, and astronomers think the well-known asteroids Bennu and Ryugu are both rubble-pile asteroids, too. When the Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa visited Itokawa in 2005, images showed that its surface was free of impact craters, a dead giveaway that it was a loose collection of rubble since a monolithic asteroid would most certainly show signs of impacts.
Hayabusa brought home some samples from Itokawa, and a new research article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is based on those samples. The article is “Rubble pile asteroids are forever,” and the lead author is Professor Fred Jourdan from the School of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Curtin University.
DARPA's hypersonic HAWC completes final flight test at over Mach 5
DARPA announced the end of the Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC) program with a final successful test flight that reached speeds over Mach 5 and flew for more than 300 nautical miles.
James Webb Space Telescope recovers from 2nd instrument glitch
After one of its instruments was briefly knocked offline, the James Webb Space Telescope returned to full science operations on Monday (Jan. 30).
