Written by On 4 September, an asteroid was spotted curving towards Earth. Astronomers quickly established that it would impact the planet in 10 hours’ time. The Philippines island of Luzon was in the line of fire, and there was nothing they could do about it but watch. Sure enough, at 16.39 UTC (17.39 in the UK), just […]
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An artist’s rendering of the spacewalk on the Polaris Dawn mission SpaceX SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn mission is a leap forward for private space flight – even though it demonstrates the same capabilities that government space agencies have had for decades. The mission included the first ever spacewalk, also called an extravehicular activity or EVA, performed by […]
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The Perseverance rover is exploring Mars NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS NASA’s Perseverance rover has spotted the first visible light aurora on Mars, suggesting that future astronauts visiting the Red Planet could be in for a light show. Astronomers have observed aurorae, the light produced when particles or radiation hits a planet’s atmosphere, on Mars since 2005, but all […]
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Astronauts Suni Williams (left) and Butch Wilmore (right) give a news conference aboard the International Space Station Associated Press/Alamy After any problem with a rocket launch or mission, experts echo the same refrain: space is hard. As progress in the space industry accelerates, that mantra is becoming more relevant, not less, but that is because […]
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Boeing’s Starliner capsule won’t shuttle astronauts home from space this year NASA It’s official: Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams are staying on the International Space Station (ISS) until at least February. This is a major setback for Boeing’s Starliner, the capsule that brought them there, but it doesn’t spell doom for the US space programme. […]
NASA’s Europa Clipper is setting off for one of Jupiter’s icy moons, Europa, to see if it could harbour life. It will perform dozens of close flybys gathering detailed measurements from its suite of sensors to understand the nature of this distant world’s ice shell and the ocean thought to lurk beneath it. Sam Howell […]