A brightly burning meteor was seen plunging from the sky in wide areas of Japan, capturing attention on television and social media. The meteor glowed strongly as it rapidly descended through the Earth’s atmosphere on Sunday. Many people in western Japan reported on social media seeing the rare sight. NHK public television said its cameras…
China has launched a rocket on Tuesday to bring back lunar rocks and debris from the moon’s surface for the first time since the 1970s. This ambitious launch in more than 40 years could boost human understanding of the moon and solar system. The mission will test China’s ability to acquire lunar samples from space.…
The SpaceX Falcon 9 took off this Sunday evening, November 15 (local Florida time). Four astronauts took off aboard the crew Dragon at Cape Canaveral for the International Space Station (ISS). After nine years of dependence on Russia, it is the new means of transport used by NASA. The trip should take around 27 hours.…
The air leak on board the ISS had been occurring since September 2019, but the leak levels were starting to worsen. To identify the crack, the astronauts used a very specific method. In August 2020, an air leak was confirmed aboard the International Space Station. It appeared a year before, in September 2019. “ The…
This is the first crew rotation flight of the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket following certification by NASA for regular flights to the space station as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. The Crew-1 flight will carry Crew Dragon Commander Michael Hopkins, Pilot Victor Glover, and Mission Specialist Shannon Walker,…
The agency’s latest rover only has about 146 million miles left to reach its destination. NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mission has logged a lot of flight miles since being lofted skyward on July 30 – 146.3 million miles (235.4 million kilometers) to be exact. Turns out that is exactly the same distance it has…
NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) has confirmed, for the first time, water on the sunlit surface of the Moon. This discovery indicates that water may be distributed across the lunar surface, and not limited to cold, shadowed places. SOFIA has detected water molecules (H2O) in Clavius Crater, one of the largest craters visible…
Captured on Oct. 20, 2020 during the OSIRIS-REx mission’s Touch-And-Go (TAG) sample collection event, this series of images shows the SamCam imager’s field of view as the NASA spacecraft approaches and touches down on asteroid Bennu’s surface, over 200 million miles (321 million km) away from Earth. The sampling event brought the spacecraft all the…
Airbus has been selected by the European Space Agency (ESA) as prime contractor for the Mars Sample Return’s Earth Return Orbiter (ERO) – the first ever spacecraft to bring samples back to Earth from Mars. Mars Sample Return (MSR) is a joint ESA-NASA campaign and the next step in the exploration of Mars. ERO and…
The oxygen generation system (OGS) has failed in the Russian segment of the International Space Station (ISS), according to the crew’s talks with the Earth, broadcast by NASA. Oxygen generation system failures happen on the ISS, but the station has oxygen reserves. A Russian cosmonaut told a specialist from the Mission Control Centre in the…
Having left Earth in 2018, Starman and the Tesla Roadster are now in the vicinity of Mars. In 2018, SpaceX was launching for the very first time its new rocket, the Falcon Heavy, which is actually a Falcon 9 launcher supported by two other Falcon 9 converted into side boosters. The flight was successful and…
Aside for over a year, the Falcon Heavy will soon be back in service. A flight is scheduled for the end of February 2021 for the benefit of the U.S. Space Force. This will be the very first classified mission for a Falcon Heavy. While SpaceX is increasing the number of missions with its Falcon…