Month: October 2022

After a seven-month hiatus, NASA spacewalks outside the International Space Station (ISS) are back on. NASA halted routine spacewalks after European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Matthias Maurer noticed a higher-than-normal buildup of water inside his helmet after a nearly seven-hour excursion on March 23. The agency has now completed a review of the incident, finding that it was not a leak caused by hardware issues. Instead, the water was condensation caused by high levels of astronaut exertion and the cooling setting on Maurer’s extravehicular mobility unit (EMU) spacesuit, NASA officials…

For a few days centered on Oct. 21 each year, the Earth sweeps through a swarm of meteoroids known as the Orionids; widely scattered bits and pieces shed by the most famous of all comets, Halley’s Comet.  Actually, this is the second time this year that we will cross this very same stream. We also pass through it at a different part of our orbit for several days during the early part of May, at which time they’re darting out of a different part of the sky and are called…

Now you see it, now you don’t. The Mars Express spacecraft has witnessed a rare spectacle, spotting Mars‘ moon Deimos appearing to pass in front of Jupiter and its moons on Valentine’s Day (Feb. 14). The event, called an occultation, allows scientists to compute Deimos’ orbit around the Red Planet even more accurately, a surprisingly difficult task. In astronomy, an occultation occurs when one celestial object moves in front of another, blocking the more distant object from view. In the newly released video, which comprises 80 frames taken by the…