SpaceX, founded and led by entrepreneur Elon Musk, is a private spaceflight company dedicated to placing satellites and people into orbit. Already winning NASA contracts to transport astronauts to the International Space Station via Starship rocket launch vehicles. SpaceX hopes that one day soon they’ll use Starship rockets to set up permanent colonies on Mars….
Space enthusiasts were recently treated to an eerie sight on Mars: wreckage from a crashed spacecraft. NASA’s small helicopter Ingenuity captured images this month showing parts that protected Perseverance during its landing on Red Planet last year. These photos show the UFO-esque backshell and parachute used to slow the rover’s descent, providing insight into how…
Over the past decade, low-cost satellites have proliferated into space at an ever-increasing rate, significantly lowering costs associated with studying Earth and developing ever more daring ideas for what these spacecraft can achieve. Spacecraft are said to be in orbit when they are between perigee and apogee; their movement being controlled by electronic “eyes” that…
Manmade objects orbiting Earth are vast, from those used to observe our planet itself to others that study Mars, asteroids or even distant stars. Satellites remain in orbit by using fuel to balance their tendency toward flight into space with Earth’s gravitational pull and maintain their velocity in orbit. Satellites From a distance, satellites resemble…
On 1 October, the European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s bepiColombo mission will make its initial flyby of Mercury to gather images for scientists who anticipate starting its main mission sometime between 2025-2027. Mercury can teach us a great deal about how rocky, Earth-like planets form. But before we can glean any insights…
CodyCross has developed Spacecraft Sent To Pluto as a crossword puzzle game, in order for you to solve it successfully you must identify all of the words from given clues and locate their correct answers. While Stern displays a National Geographic article from 1970 that foretold Voyager 2’s grand tour through our solar system’s planets,…
Spacecraft must withstand and operate successfully in the harsh environment of outer space, necessitating structural subsystems that can support any forces generated during launch and ascent of its rocket engine. Spacecraft require propulsion systems in order to change their trajectory and maneuver around space, as well as power sources, communications devices and payload capabilities in…
Spacecraft have explored Venus with radar and other techniques, uncovering evidence of its poisonous atmosphere of carbon dioxide and sulfuric acid. Magellan was among the first ships to map Venus’ surface using its radar altimeter to measure topographic changes on its surface. Parker Solar Probe’s WISPR camera captured nightside photos of Venus that can be…
All spacecraft require propulsion methods to adjust their velocity. Most propulsion systems possess high specific impulse – that is, how quickly their speed changes per unit of propellant consumed – and are relatively energy efficient. Earth lies deep within a gravitational well, taking 11.2 km/s to escape its gravitational pull; humans can endure much greater…
