Month: January 2025

Media Day with Artemis II Crews

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NASA/Kim Shiflett From left, CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jenni Gibbons, NASA astronaut Andre Douglas, CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen, and NASA astronauts Christina Koch, Victor Glover, and Reid Wiseman participate in a media day event on Monday, Dec. 16, 2024, inside the Vehicle Assembly Building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Gibbons and Douglas are Artemis II backup crew members. The Artemis II test flight will be NASA’s first mission with crew under the Artemis campaign, sending astronauts on a 10-day journey around the Moon and back. Image…

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Idaho Students to Connect with NASA Astronaut Aboard Space Station

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NASA astronaut and Expedition 72 Flight Engineer Don Pettit points a camera outside a window on the International Space Station’s Poisk module for a sun photography session. (Credit: NASA) Students from Hawthorne Elementary School in Boise, Idaho, will have the chance to hear NASA astronaut Don Pettit answer their prerecorded science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) related questions from aboard the International Space Station. Watch the 20-minute space-to-Earth call at 12:30 p.m. EST Friday, Jan. 10, on NASA+ and learn how to watch NASA content on various platforms, including social…

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NASA’s LEXI Will Provide X-Ray Vision of Earth’s Magnetosphere

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5 min read NASA’s LEXI Will Provide X-Ray Vision of Earth’s Magnetosphere A NASA X-ray imager is heading to the Moon as part of NASA’s Artemis campaign, where it will capture the first global images of the magnetic field that shields Earth from solar radiation. The Lunar Environment Heliospheric X-ray Imager, or LEXI, instrument is one of 10 payloads aboard the next lunar delivery through NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative, set to launch from the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida no earlier than mid-January, with Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost…

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Sun erupts with powerful X1.2 solar flare, causes radio blackouts (photo)

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The sun started 2025 with a bang as it fired off a powerful solar flare this morning. The X-class solar flare peaked at an X.12 at 6:40 a.m. EST (1140 GMT) on Friday (Jan. 3), releasing a blast of energy from a sunspot region known as AR 3947 and triggering a radio blackout event for parts of the Southern Atlantic, Africa and parts of eastern South America. When these blackouts happen, they can result in a full or partial loss of high frequency (HF) radio signals in regions that are…

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NASA, NOAA to Announce 2024 Global Temperatures, Climate Conditions

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This map depicts global temperature anomalies for meteorological summer in 2024 (June, July, and August). It shows how much warmer or cooler different regions of Earth were compared to the baseline average from 1951 to 1980. (Credit: NASA/NOAA) Climate researchers from NASA and NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) will release their annual assessments of global temperatures and discuss the major climate trends of 2024 during a media briefing at 12 p.m. EST Friday, Jan. 10. NASA will share the briefing on the agency’s website at: https://www.nasa.gov/live. Participants will include:…

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How to watch SpaceX launch its 1st Falcon 9 rocket of 2025 tonight

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SpaceX will launch its first Falcon 9 rocket of 2025 today, if all goes according to plan. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is set to take off on Friday (Jan. 3) at 8:27 p.m. EST (0127 GMT) from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The flight will launch the Thuraya 4 spacecraft to geosynchronous orbit on behalf of Space42, a satellite and space services company based in the United Arab Emirates. The satellite will provide mobile communications services throughout Europe, the Middle East and…

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Lagniappe for January 2025

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4 Min Read Lagniappe for January 2025 Explore the January 2025 issue, highlighting the year in review at NASA Stennis, and how to become a NASA test conductor at the official visitor center and more! Explore Lagniappe for January 2025 featuring: NASA Stennis Celebrates Key Testing, Operations Milestones in 2024 NASA Exhibit Puts Visitors in Test Conductor Seat NASA Stennis Hosts Mississippi Kween Gator Speaks Gator Speaks NASA/Stennis This time of year is one Gator enjoys. The ending of one year and beginning of another provides the opportunity to reflect,…

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Mission Possible: Coordinating Travel for NASA Employees

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2 min read Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater) Heather Seagren grew up near NASA’s Stennis Space Center and visited for field trips as a child. Now, as a financial management specialist, Seagren coordinates work trips for NASA employees at the south Mississippi NASA center. NASA/Danny Nowlin A leap of faith for Heather Seagren eight years ago brought the Gulf Coast native to something new, yet also returned her to a familiar place at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Following graduation from Pearl River…

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Rare string of ‘cosmic pearls’ dance together in the universe

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Astronomers have discovered a rare group of five dwarf galaxies located relatively close to Earth; these galaxies exist in a near-perfect alignment, resembling a string of cosmic pearls in the sky. Held together by their mutual gravity, several of the dwarf galaxies (designated D1 to D5) are rhythmically dancing with one another while others are engaged in a “cosmic tug of war,” ripping gas and stars away from each other. The scientists behind this discovery say these factors make this dwarf galaxy grouping particularly intriguing. The arrangement may be as…

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NASA Workshops Culturally Inclusive Planetary Engagement with Educators

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Learn Home Science Activation NASA Workshops Culturally… Overview Learning Resources Science Activation Teams SME Map Opportunities More Science Activation Stories Citizen Science   2 min read NASA Workshops Culturally Inclusive Planetary Engagement with Educators From November 6-8, 2024, the NASA Science Activation Program’s Planetary Resources and Content Heroes (ReaCH) project held a Culturally Inclusive Planetary Engagement workshop at the Bradley Observatory at Agnes Scott College in Atlanta, Georgia for the space sciences community, including planetary science, astrobiology, astronomy, and heliophysics professionals, as well as invited education specialists. To practice the…

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