Day: April 24, 2024

The world’s most advanced solar sail spacecraft began its odyssey today at 23:32 GMT as it lifted off atop a Rocket Lab Electron launcher from Launch Complex 1 in Mahia, New Zealand. It was one of two payloads on the Beginning Of The Swarm mission. Though it’s only the size of a toaster, NASA’s Advanced …

World’s Most Advanced Solar Sail Rockets Into Space. Read More »

SpaceX notched yet another rocket-reuse milestone this evening (April 23). A Falcon 9 rocket topped with 23 of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites lifted off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station today at 6:17 p.m. EDT (2217 GMT). The Falcon 9’s first stage came back to Earth for a vertical landing about 8.5 minutes after …

SpaceX Launches 23 Starlink Satellites, Aces 300th Rocket Landing. Read More »

The first Starliner crew is in quarantine ahead of their scheduled May 6 launch. The two NASA astronauts to fly aboard Boeing Starliner, Barry “Butch” Wilmore and pilot Suni Williams, entered standard pre-flight quarantine on Tuesday (April 22) at NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, agency officials stated in a press release. Quarantine will …

NASA Astronauts Enter Quarantine For 1st Crewed Boeing Starliner Launch on May 6. Read More »

The Full Pink Moon of 2024 rises tonight. Look to the east shortly after sunset to see the full moon rise above the horizon. The moon will be in the Virgo constellation, and will have most of the night to enjoy the night sky by itself while the planets are situated on the other side …

Watch The Full Pink Moon 2024 Bloom In The Night Sky Tonight. Read More »

Tremendous explosions in a galaxy close to the Milky Way are pouring material equivalent to around 50 million suns into its surroundings. Astronomers mapped this galactic pollution event in high resolution, obtaining important hints about how the space between galaxies becomes filled with chemical elements that eventually become the building blocks of new stars. The …

Cosmic Fountain Is Polluting Intergalactic Space With 50 Million Suns’ Worth of Material. Read More »

In late March, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced that one of its satellite missions “practically left zero debris in orbit” after a spent rocket stage was lowered to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere during re-entry. Similar deorbiting techniques will be used to make future missions “debris-free” by the end of this decade, ISRO …

India Aims To Achieve ‘Debris-Free’ Space Missions By 2030. Read More »

NASA’s interstellar explorer Voyager 1 is finally communicating with ground control in an understandable way again. On Saturday (April 20), Voyager 1 updated ground control about its health status for the first time in 5 months. While the Voyager 1 spacecraft still isn’t sending valid science data back to Earth, it is now returning usable …

NASA’s Voyager 1 Spacecraft Finally Phones Home After 5 Months Of No Contact. Read More »