Category: Solar System

Our solar system

FAA clears SpaceX to resume Falcon 9 rocket launches

NeRD

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has given SpaceX’s workhorse Falcon 9 rocket a green light to return to flight. The Falcon 9 had been grounded since Sept. 28, when the rocket suffered an issue with its upper stage during the launch of the Crew-9 astronaut mission for NASA. (A Falcon 9 did launch Europe’s Hera asteroid-inspection probe on Oct. 7, but that was a one-time exception granted by the FAA.) “The FAA notified SpaceX on Oct. 11 that the Falcon 9 vehicle is authorized to return to regular flight…

Read More

SpaceX Starship launches: Live updates

NeRD

2024-10-11T23:05:00.079Z SpaceX aims for Starship Flight 5 launch on Oct. 13 SpaceX’s Starship Flight 5 rocket and its Super Heavy booster are stacked together ahead of a planned launch from Boca Chica Beach, Texas on Oct. 13, 2024, pending FAA approval. (Image credit: SpaceX) SpaceX on Friday, Oct. 11, said its next Starship rocket could launch as early as Sunday, Oct. 13, pending final FAA regulatory approvals. Liftoff is targeted for no earlier than 8 a.m. EDT (1200 GMT) on Oct. 13, if the approvals come through in time. A…

Read More

‘Stunning was the word’: Astronauts snap amazing aurora photo from ISS during severe geomagnetic storm

NeRD

The auroras were pretty special on Thursday night (Oct. 10) — especially if you got to see them from orbit. NASA astronauts Don Pettit and Matthew Dominick are in that very exclusive club, getting a bird’s-eye view of the amazing auroral displays — which were supercharged by a recent solar storm — from the International Space Station (ISS). And the sight took the spaceflyers aback. “Stunning was the word,” Pettit wrote in a lengthy post on X on Friday (Oct. 11)  that shared a photo of the celestial light show. “The…

Read More

Gaia space telescope discovers 55 ‘runaway’ careening away from stellar cluster at 80 times the speed of sound

NeRD

Using Europe’s Gaia space telescope, astronomers have identified 55 runaway stars being ejected at high speeds from a densely packed young cluster in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy of our own Milky Way. This is the first time so many stars have been seen escaping from a single star cluster. The star cluster R136, located around 158,000 light-years away, is home to hundreds of thousands of stars and sits in a massive region of intense star formation in the LMC. It’s home to some of the biggest…

Read More

Jupiter’s Great Red Spot is being squeezed, Hubble Telescope finds — and nobody knows why (video)

NeRD

The venerable Hubble Space Telescope has watched Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS) oscillating, as though it were being squeezed in and out roughly every 90 days.  Why this huge anticyclone, which has been shrinking over the decades and currently measures about 9,165 miles (14,750 kilometers) across (although astrophotographer Damian Peach has reportedly measured it to be just 7,770 miles, or 12,500 km, wide), is behaving in such fashion is a mystery.  “With Hubble’s high resolution, we can say that the GRS is definitely squeezing in and out at the same…

Read More

Hopes dim for another bright October comet after Tsuchinshan-ATLAS

NeRD

While skywatchers around the world have been raving about the performance of Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, there has been talk on social media of yet another spectacular comet due to make its appearance at the end of this month.  The lineage of this second object apparently connects it with a family of comets, some of which have been among the most brilliant ever observed. For this reason, some might have already branded it as “The Great Halloween Comet.”  Unfortunately, it now appears likely that this will not happen.   We’ll get into…

Read More

Severe solar storm could supercharge auroras across US, impact power grids, NOAA warns

NeRD

Get ready, aurora chasers: There’s a good chance you’ll be able to catch a nice light show by the end of the week! Forecasters with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) are highlighting the potential for a severe geomagnetic storm on Thursday (Oct. 10) and Friday (Oct. 11). That storm is likely to be in the G4 class — the second-highest level on the SWPC’s geomagnetic storm scale, which takes into account both severity and potential impacts.   Indeed, the SWPC has issued a…

Read More

Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS photobombs SOHO spacecraft during powerful solar flare (video)

NeRD

Nothing makes a photo more interesting than an unexpected guest appearing in the background. And how cool would it be if the photobomber were a comet? That’s exactly what happened to the sun-studying Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft, a joint effort of the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA, beginning on Oct. 7. Typically, scientists use the view from SOHO’s Large Angle Spectrometric Coronagraph (LASCO) instrument to monitor the sun’s activity and determine if a coronal mass ejection (CME) accompanies a solar flare from active sunspot regions. Coronographs block…

Read More

Official ‘Star Trek’ magazine ends an impressive 30-year run in December

NeRD

As the old proverb goes, “all good things must come to an end,” and so it is with Titan Publications’ “Star Trek Explorer” magazine, which will deliver its final issue (Star Trek Explorer #14) on Dec. 4, 2024 after 30 years of covering Paramount’s popular sci-fi franchise as their official publication. London-based publisher Titan, the firm that also produces a full lineup of comics, graphic novels, and pop culture books, started publishing the deluxe monthly “Star Trek Magazine” in 1995, prior to its rebranding as “Star Trek Explorer” in 2021.…

Read More

Record-breaking ancient spinning galaxy challenges cosmic evolution theories

NeRD

The most distant and thus earliest rotating disk galaxy ever spotted has surprised astronomers and could challenge our theories of galactic evolution. Not only does it seemingly exist too early in the cosmos to be strongly spinning, the galaxy also shows hints of spiral arms similar to highly evolved “modern” galaxies like our own Milky Way. The galaxy, designated REBELS-25, is seen as it was just 700 million years after the Big Bang, at a time when astronomers expect galaxies to have been small and messy. Living up to its…

Read More