Tag Archives | space.com

SpaceX test-fired a Falcon 9 rocket on Oct. 2, 2017, ahead of the scheduled Oct. 11, 2017, launch of the SES 11/EchoStar 105 communications satellite. The liftoff will be the second for this Falcon 9’s first stage, which also launched in February 2017. This evening (Oct. 11), SpaceX plans to launch a satellite using a […]

SpaceX is really putting its reusable-rockets vision into action. A two-stage Falcon 9 booster with a pre-flown first stage successfully launched the EchoStar 105/SES-11 communications satellite to orbit today (Oct. 11), marking the third time SpaceX has pulled off such a used-rocket feat. The Falcon 9 lifted off at 6:53 p.m. EDT (2253 GMT) from historic […]

This wide-field view of the sky around the bright star Alpha Centauri was created from photographic images forming part of the Digitized Sky Survey 2. The star appears so big just because of the scattering of light by the telescope’s optics as well as in the photographic emulsion. Alpha Centauri is the closest star system […]

A Russian Soyuz rocket carrying the Progress 68 cargo ship stands atop its launch pad at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan ahead of a scheduled Oct. 12, 2017 launch. The spacecraft will make a 3.5-hour flight to the International Space Station. The Russian space agency Roscosmos is about to make history with its fastest cargo flight […]

Skywatcher Shawn Malone took this photo of the aurora March 15-16, 2012. She writes: “[A]urora activity picking up casts a bright reflection off of Lake Superior, Marquette, MI.” The northern lights, or aurora borealis, offer an entrancing, dramatic, magical display that fascinates all who see it — but just what causes this dazzling natural phenomenon? […]

The University of Central Florida (UCF) Knights football team will wear NASA-themed uniforms for a homecoming “Space Game” on Saturday, Oct. 14, 2017 in Orlando. A Florida football team is about to add a few stars to its Knights. The University of Central Florida (UCF) has revealed that its Knights football team will wear NASA-inspired […]

The Apollo 11 command module Columbia arrives at NASA’s Lunar Receiving Laboratory at the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston in July 1969. HOUSTON — The last time that it was in Houston, the spacecraft that flew the first humans to walk on the moon was purposely kept away from the public. On its first return […]

When NASA’s InSight lander travels to Mars next year, it will carry two microchips bearing the names of members of the public. Want to send your name to Mars? NASA is offering another chance to do so. When the InSight lander launches to the Red Planet next year, it will contain the names of members […]

Stargate Command is a virtual platform that will debut a new series, “Stargate Origins.” NEW YORK — Stargate fans, dust off those chevrons! new series “Stargate Origins ” is launching this fall, but will be available only on MGM’s new “Stargate Command” streaming platform, now accessible online as well as to download for iOS and […]

Instruments aboard the Landsat 8 satellite captured these visible and thermal images on Sept. 16, 2017, of the A68 iceberg that snapped off Antarctica’s Larsen C Ice Shelf. As the sun rises above the Antarctic horizon after the long, dark austral winter, scientists are getting a better look at the Delaware-size iceberg that sheared off […]

StarTalk Radio program host Neil deGrasse Tyson (far right) moderated a live recording of his program with co-host Chuck Nice (far left), ethicist S. Matthew Liao (second from left) and former MythBusters host Adam Savage (third from left). NEW YORK — Astronomer and science communicator Neil deGrasse Tyson spent his 59th birthday — and the […]

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope snapped this shot of Mars on Aug. 26, 2003, when the Red Planet was 34.7 million miles from Earth. The picture was taken just 11 hours before Mars made its closest approach to us in 60,000 years. Mars is the fourth planet from the sun. Befitting the red planet’s bloody color, […]

NEW YORK – “The Orville,” Seth MacFarlane’s new sci-fi comedy/drama, is a lot like Star Trek – except when it isn’t. Debating the relative ethics of gender reassignment in an all-male society? Classic Trek. Breaking up the tension with jokes about old Rankin-Bass Christmas specials? That’s closer to Family Guy. Although the show is still […]