The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) will send the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, to our natural satellite to demonstrate accurate lunar landing techniques.
Space News & Blog Articles
A Giant Black Hole Destroyed a Star and Threw the Pieces Into Space
When a black hole consumes a star, things can get quite messy. Take, for example, the event known as ASASSN-14li, where a massive star strayed too close to a supermassive black hole and paid the ultimate price.
Watch Chandrayaan-3's Pragyan rover take its '1st steps' on the moon (video)
Watch India's Chandrayaan-3's Pragyan rover step onto the moon's surface for the first time and have its picture taken from orbit.
Watch the 1st full trailer for Zack Snyder's sci-fi epic 'Rebel Moon' (video)
Netflix released the first full trailer for Zack Snyder's two-part sci-fi epic, "Rebel Moon" which premieres this December.
Liftoff for Crew-7 with Andreas Mogensen
Video: 00:05:52
On 26 August 2023, at 09:27 CEST (08:27 BST), Crew-7 aboard the Crew Dragon spacecraft Endurance embarked on a journey to the International Space Station. Watch the full coverage of their launch from pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, USA.
Satellite imagery captures wildfires breaking across Greece (photo)
The Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellites are monitoring changes in the fire to aid civil protection and humanitarian response.
Watch the sun over the next 2 weeks to plan the ideal total eclipse 2024 viewing location
Between Aug. 25 and Sept. 8, the sun will be in the same location as during the total eclipse on April 8, 2024 making it the perfect time to scout your viewing spot.
Newly discovered black hole 'speed limit' hints at new laws of physics
When supermassive black holes barrel toward collision, they can reach speeds of up to 1/10th the speed of light, new research suggests.
Everything we know about Star Wars Outlaws
Star Wars video games are set to expand in the coming years, and Star Wars Outlaws will be at the center with a huge open world adventure.
Watch SpaceX launch 5,000th Starlink satellite to orbit tonight
SpaceX plans to launch 22 of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit tonight (Aug. 25), bringing the total number it has lofted to date to more than 5,000. You can watch it live.
Why Chandrayaan-3 landed near the moon's south pole — and why everyone else wants to get there too
On Aug. 23, India's Chandrayaan-3 became the first mission to successfully land near the moon's south pole. But why is this dark, shadowy area so important to space agencies?
This Week's Sky at a Glance, August 25 – September 3
Saturn comes to opposition. Vega crests at the zenith, while Arcturus is exploring the lower west. Go out before the first light of dawn now, and there's your New Year's evening view.
Proba-3: seeing in the dark
Image: Proba-3: seeing in the dark
Hackers are Attacking Observatories
Why would anybody want to hack an observatory? That’s the question facing IT professionals at NOIRLab after somebody tried to crack the computer systems at Gemini North in Hawai’i. The cyber break-in and ongoing investigation by NOIRLab and National Science Foundation experts affected observations and operations in Hawai’i and Chile.
SpaceX, NASA delay launch of Crew-7 astronauts to International Space Station
SpaceX and NASA have scrubbed the planned Aug. 25 launch of the Crew-7 astronaut mission to the ISS. Liftoff is now targeted for Aug. 26 at 3:27 a.m. EDT (0727 GMT).
IceCube-Gen2: 8 Cubic Kilometers of Ice, 5 Times the Sensitivity
The IceCube Neutrino Detector is an observatory unlike any other. Using sensors embedded inside a square kilometer chuck of Antarctic ice, it detects tiny particles called neutrinos, which rarely interact with ordinary matter and are incredibly hard to capture. IceCube has had several major successes in the last few years, including this summer’s announcement of a neutrino map of the Milky Way galaxy. But scientists are pushing up against the limits of IceCube’s capabilities, and plans are in the works for IceCube-Gen2: a detector 5 times as sensitive and 8 times as large, with a radio antenna array across four hundred square kilometers. IceCube Gen2 will increase the number of neutrino detections by an order of magnitude, and will be able to better pinpoint the sources from which the neutrinos are emitted.
One of Neptune's Dark Spots Finally Seen From Earth
There’s no getting around it: our Solar System’s gas giants all have big, conspicuous spots on their faces. These include Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, Saturn’s Great White Spot, Uranus’ Great Dark Spot, and Neptune’s Great Dark Spot. Far from blemishes or features that tarnish the planets’ natural beauty, these “spots” are caused by massive storms or other processes in the planets’ atmospheres. While they are extremely large by Earth standards, they are difficult to study by anything other than robotic probes that can get close to the planet.
Wreckage of Russian warlord's plane spotted from space (satellite photo)
A satellite has spotted the wreckage of the plane that went down in northwestern Russia on Aug. 23, apparently with Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin on board.
SpaceX's Crew-6 astronauts readying to wrap up their record-breaking flight
SpaceX's Crew-6 astronauts spoke with journalists Aug. 23 ahead of their coming return to Earth and also discussed the expected Aug. 25 launch of the Crew-7 mission.