NASA’s DART mission successfully demonstrated that a kinetic impact can alter not just a moonlet’s orbit but the trajectory of an entire binary asteroid system. By crashing into Dimorphos, the smaller companion of Didymos, the spacecraft reduced its orbit around the larger asteroid by 33 minutes and nudged the system’s heliocentric velocity by about 11.7 micrometers per second. The effect was amplified by debris ejected … Continue reading Asteroid defense mission shifted the orbit of more than its target

NASA announced plans to accelerate its Artemis program, standardize the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, and add a new mission to support returning astronauts to the Moon. The update, shared at Kennedy Space Center, highlighted preparations for Artemis II, focusing on transportation systems for crewed lunar missions. NASA plans to introduce a 2027 mission to test capabilities closer to Earth before sending astronauts to the … Continue reading NASA Strengthens Artemis: Adds Mission, Refines Overall Architecture 

The March 3 total lunar eclipse wowed skywatchers worldwide as the full moon passed through Earth’s umbral shadow, turning a deep crimson blood-red. Totality, caused by sunlight filtered through Earth’s atmosphere, was visible across much of the Americas, Asia, and Oceania, with photographers capturing stunning images from places like Auckland, Manila, Beijing, and Utah. Some images showed rare effects, such as the “turquoise band,” a … Continue reading The total lunar eclipse 2026 dazzles in incredible photos from around the world

The European Space Agency’s JUICE captured stunning images of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS using its JANUS camera, showing a glowing coma and a long tail of gas and dust. 3I/ATLAS is only the third known interstellar object to pass through our solar system, having originated around another star before drifting into our cosmic neighborhood. The comet’s coma is a cloud of gas and dust released as … Continue reading Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS shines in new image

SpaceX successfully launched 29 Starlink V2 Mini satellites Friday morning from Cape Canaveral, despite thick fog obscuring the view. Liftoff occurred at 7:16 a.m. EST, and the satellites were deployed about an hour later. The Falcon 9’s first-stage booster, B1069, landed on the drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas in the Atlantic, marking its 30th flight. B1069 first launched in December 2021 and, after a … Continue reading SpaceX Falcon 9 launches from Cape Canaveral with 29 Starlink satellites

A total lunar eclipse, also known as a blood moon, will be visible Tuesday across North America, Central America, western South America, Australia, and eastern Asia, with partial views in Central Asia and much of South America. The red hue occurs as Earth’s shadow covers the full moon, with sunlight filtering through the atmosphere. Totality will last about an hour, and no special equipment is … Continue reading A total lunar eclipse will turn the moon blood red on Tuesday

A SpaceX Dragon cargo capsule undocked from the International Space Station today after a six-month mission delivering about 5,000 pounds of supplies and scientific gear. The capsule demonstrated a new capability by performing six reboost maneuvers to help maintain the ISS’s altitude, a task usually done by Russia’s Progress freighter. Dragon is set to splash down in the Pacific Ocean off California on Feb. 27, … Continue reading SpaceX Dragon cargo capsule heads for home after historic ISS-boosting mission

Scientists have captured the most detailed image yet of the Milky Way using Chile’s Alma radio telescope, revealing its vast structure in unprecedented detail. The image shows long, thin filaments of matter flowing to form stars and planets, providing new insights into how our galaxy—and others in the early universe—developed. Previously, astronomers could only see isolated patches of the galaxy’s center, but the new survey … Continue reading New image reveals secrets of Milky Way galaxy in stunning detail

NASA rolled its Artemis II moon rocket off its seaside launch pad Wednesday to return it to the Vehicle Assembly Building for repairs after a helium pressurization issue delayed the mission. The 23.6-million-pound rocket and launch platform traveled four miles over 10–12 hours using an Apollo-era crawler-transporter. Engineers will access the rocket’s upper stage, the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS), to fix the helium system, … Continue reading NASA hauls moon rocket off launch pad to fix another launch-delaying malfunction

Last year, a tiny 2-meter-wide asteroid, 2025 TF, passed over Antarctica at just 428 kilometers—lower than the International Space Station—without being detected until afterward. While harmless due to its small size, the close pass highlights that asteroid detection, though vastly improved, still has blind spots. Data show near-Earth asteroid detections have surged: from 103 small asteroids (under 7 meters) spotted between 2000–2007 to 1,124 between 2017–2026, and 7–20 meter … Continue reading An asteroid passed 428 km from Earth and no one saw it coming

SpaceX launched its Falcon 9 on the Starlink 6-110 from Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 40 at 6:04 p.m. ET. The launch, with a 95% favorable weather forecast, was the 10th flight for the booster B1092, which successfully landed on the droneship Just Read the Instructions in the Atlantic. The mission carried 29 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit to expand SpaceX’s global internet coverage. The launch window ran from 3:56 p.m. to 7:56 p.m. ET, giving … Continue reading SpaceX launches Starlink satellites

Researchers have uncovered new insights into Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, including its origin and unusual behavior. Titan, larger than Mercury and massive enough to affect Saturn’s tilt, is drifting away from the planet at 11 centimeters per year, faster than previously thought. New research combining Cassini data, simulations, and formation theories suggests Titan merged with a lost moon about half a billion years ago. This collision may have created Hyperion, … Continue reading Astronomers say they have solved one of Saturn’s greatest mysteries

The European Space Agency announced that a study using the James Webb Space Telescope has examined Uranus’s upper atmosphere, marking a key step in understanding ice giants. Researchers mapped the planet’s ionosphere, which extends up to 5,000 kilometers above the cloud tops and interacts with Uranus’s tilted and offset magnetic field, influencing its auroras. Using the Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec), the team built a 3D map of temperature and ion density … Continue reading James Webb Telescope Takes a First Peek Inside Uranus

Astronomers using the Hubble, Euclid, and Subaru telescopes have discovered one of the most dark-matter-dominated galaxies ever seen, named CDG-2, about 245 million light-years away. Unlike typical galaxies, which are five times more dark matter than ordinary matter, CDG-2 is composed of roughly 99% dark matter, making it extremely faint and nearly invisible. The galaxy was detected through a cluster of four globular star clusters … Continue reading Hubble telescope discovers rare galaxy that is 99% dark matter

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket on Feb. 19 from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, carrying 29 Starlink internet satellites. The booster completed its 26th mission and successfully landed on the drone ship Just Read the Instructions off the coast of the Bahamas, marking only the second landing that far south. The launch lit up the night sky, but no sonic … Continue reading SpaceX rocket launches from Florida, booster lands near Bahamas Thursday

NASA planetary defense officer Kelly Fast warns that humanity is largely defenseless against up to 15,000 undetected “city-killer” asteroids, roughly 500 feet across, which could cause regional devastation. While large asteroids are tracked and smaller ones frequently hit Earth harmlessly, these mid-sized asteroids are difficult to detect because they orbit close to Earth and reflect little sunlight. To address this, scientists plan to launch the … Continue reading NASA scientist warns there’s no way to stop thousands of city-killing asteroids from striking Earth

NASA has begun the second wet dress rehearsal for the Artemis II mission at Kennedy Space Center, with a simulated launch window set for Thursday at 8:30 p.m. The multi-day test runs through full launch operations, including loading cryogenic propellant into the Space Launch System rocket and practicing countdown procedures. Teams at Johnson Space Center and other NASA centers are supporting the exercise to ensure … Continue reading NASA begins countdown for Artemis II wet dress rehearsal

Enceladus, one of Saturn’s smallest moons at just 500 kilometers across, has been found to generate surprisingly vast and complex electromagnetic waves, far beyond its physical size. Data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft revealed that the moon’s water geysers release charged particles, forming a plasma that interacts with Saturn’s magnetic field to produce Alfvén waves. These waves travel hundreds of thousands of kilometers, reflecting off Saturn’s … Continue reading Saturn’s Moon Enceladus Reveals Hidden Giant Electromagnetic Web

NASA’s Curiosity rover may have brought scientists closer to finding signs of past life on Mars after detecting organic compounds in a rock sample nearly a year ago. While such compounds can form through non-biological processes, researchers concluded that these alone could not account for the findings, leaving open the possibility that life once existed on the planet. The study, published Feb. 4 in Astrobiology, … Continue reading NASA Mars rover finds new clues pointing to past life on Mars

NASA launched two suborbital rockets from Alaska this week to study the electrical “circuitry” of auroras, the northern lights caused by interactions between solar wind and Earth’s atmosphere. The first mission, Black and Diffuse Auroral Science Surveyor (BADASS), launched on Feb. 9 to investigate black auroras, where electrons shoot into space rather than toward Earth, reaching 224 miles (360 km) in altitude and returning high-quality … Continue reading NASA launches twin rocket missions from Alaska to study mysterious black auroras

SpaceX’s Crew-12 mission docked with the International Space Station (ISS) on Valentine’s Day after a 34-hour journey, bringing four new astronauts aboard the short-staffed station. The crew includes NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA’s Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, with Hathaway and Adenot on their first spaceflight. They join three existing ISS crew members—NASA’s Chris Williams and cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and … Continue reading SpaceX Dragon astronauts make Valentine’s Day docking at space station

Astronomers have discovered a planetary system around the red dwarf LHS 1903 with an unusual “inside-out” architecture, challenging conventional planet formation models. The system has four planets: three innermost planets follow the expected pattern of rocky then gas giants, but the outermost planet, far from the star, is small and rocky—similar to Venus. Researchers ruled out planetary migration or collisions and propose the planets formed … Continue reading Scientists have found a weird ‘inside out’ planetary system

Astronomers may have observed the birth of a black hole in the Andromeda Galaxy, as a 13-solar-mass star, M31-2014-DS1, mysteriously brightened, dimmed, and then vanished without a supernova explosion. The discovery, led by Columbia University’s Kishalay De using NASA’s NEOWISE data, suggests that relatively lightweight stars can quietly collapse into black holes, challenging previous assumptions about black hole formation. Follow-up observations from Hubble and the … Continue reading Astronomers witness vanishing star collapse into a black hole in Andromeda galaxy

A United Launch Alliance Vulcan Centaur rocket launched on February 12 from Cape Canaveral on a U.S. Space Force mission, sending payloads directly to geosynchronous orbit over 22,000 miles above Earth. The rocket flew with four solid rocket boosters, which separated about 90 seconds after liftoff, and the Centaur upper stage took roughly 10 hours to deliver all payloads. Observers noted an irregular plume from … Continue reading ULA’s Vulcan launches Space Force mission

SpaceX has expanded its Starlink satellite network again, launching 24 new satellites on Wednesday, Feb. 11, marking the third launch this month and the 12th this year. The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 12:11 p.m. EST, successfully deploying the new satellites into low Earth orbit about an hour later. The rocket’s first-stage booster, B1100, completed its third … Continue reading SpaceX Falcon 9 deploys 24 Starlink satellites after California launch