Space News

The first astronauts to travel to the Moon in more than half a century are back on Earth after a record-setting mission aboard NASA’s Artemis II test flight. NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman (commander), Christina Koch (mission specialist), Victor Glover (pilot), and CSA astronaut Jeremy Hansen (mission

New nighttime maps based on NASA satellite imagery are upending assumptions, revealing a world where artificial brightening and dimming have intensified over the past decade. The findings show intense flaring over major oil and gas fields in the United States, while factors such as rural electrifica

A luminous swirl set against the deep black of space, the barred spiral galaxy IC 486 glows with a soft, ethereal light in this new NASA Hubble Space Telescope image. IC 486 lies right on the edge of the constellation Gemini (the Twins), around 380 million light-years from Earth. Classified as a bar

Los primeros astronautas en viajar a la Luna en más de medio siglo han regresado a la Tierra tras una misión que ha establecido nuevos récords a bordo del vuelo de prueba Artemis II de la NASA. Los astronautas de la NASA Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover y Christina Koch, y el astronauta Jeremy Hanse

NASA is sending more science, technology demonstrations, and crew supplies to the International Space Station following the successful launch of the agency’s Northrop Grumman Commercial Resupply Services 24 mission, or Northrop Grumman CRS-24. Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus XL spacecraft, carrying approx

This image from April 10, 2026, captures NASA’s Orion spacecraft, with its parachutes deployed, seconds before splashdown in the Pacific Ocean. The Artemis II crew accomplished many milestones on their nearly 10-day mission, surpassing the Apollo 13 record for farthest crewed spaceflight and c

The first astronauts to travel to the Moon in more than half a century are back on Earth after a record-setting mission aboard NASA’s Artemis II test flight. NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, and CSA (Canadian Space Agency) astronaut Jeremy Hansen splashed down at 5:07

Seen during Artemis II’s lunar flyby on April 6, 2026, the Moon and Earth align in the same frame, each partially illuminated by the Sun. The Moon’s surface appears in sharp detail in the foreground, while Earth sits much farther away, smaller and softly lit in the background. A faint reflecti

The crew of NASA’s Artemis II mission captured extraordinary images of our home planet during their journey around the far side of the Moon.

Windshaper A large WindShaper fan array is available for dynamic low-speed and hovering flight research.  The WindShaper is ideal for generating arbitrary wind gradients and wind gusts via a simple Python API.  A companion WindProbe is also available for quick surveys of flows.  The W

A historic mission to the moon. A record-setting budget for the Space Force. Billions of dollars in new valuations. As the 41st Space Symposium opens in Colorado Springs, optimism is bountiful for the space industry. At the same time, leaders are emphasizing speed, near-perfect execution and new way

The future of space is commercial, with American companies critical to establishing a moon base and developing a vibrant economy in low Earth orbit (LEO) and beyond. The Trump administration has set a goal to attract at least $50 billion of new investment in American space markets by 2028. Sure, $50

Amazon has unveiled the antenna its upcoming constellation would use to provide gigabit speeds to commercial aircraft, after gaining ground with major airlines despite Starlink’s LEO broadband dominance. The post Amazon reveals aviation antenna as LEO inflight connectivity race intensifies appeared

China has conducted what appears to be a wet dress rehearsal for its Long March 10B, paving the way for a potential launch within weeks. The post Fueling test suggests imminent debut of China’s reusable Long March 10B rocket appeared first on SpaceNews.

Seattle startup aims to pre-position spacecraft in orbit for rapid deployment The post Gravitics targets 2027 flight test for ‘orbital carrier’ architecture appeared first on SpaceNews.

Easy access to space depends as much on ground communications as on launch availability or satellite design. In a quickly growing commercial space market, an increasing number of operational services […] The post Near Real-Time Payload Data Delivery with SSC Space Go appeared first on SpaceNew

Washington Harbour Partners leads round, with participation from other investment firms The post Citra Space raises $15 million Series A to expand platform for identifying objects in orbit appeared first on SpaceNews.

ODC.space aims to streamline procurement of satellites for on-orbit computing The post Atomic-6 unveils online marketplace for orbital data centers appeared first on SpaceNews.

Earth’s orbit is “on track for a catastrophe.” That was the rather alarming prediction of the authors of a recent piece published in The Conversation. As the argument goes, orbit is filling up fast, and both nation-states and private companies plan to add tens of thousands of spacecraft to the thous

The chairman of the Senate appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA says he opposes proposed cuts to part of NASA’s budget and will seek to fund the agency at 2026 levels. The post Key Senate appropriator rejects proposed NASA budget cuts appeared first on SpaceNews.

As a wave of plans for low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband constellations enters the market, a 63-year-old former NASA Branch Chief and Google executive is betting on narrow beams, higher […] The post Q&A: Building a broadband constellation for a contested space era appeared first on SpaceNews

COLORADO SPRINGS – Sophia Space will begin deploying edge compute nodes on Kepler Communications satellites in late 2026, under a strategic pact announced April 13. Through the partnership, Sophia Space will demonstrate its Orbital Data Center (ODC) software, while relying on Kepler’s optical data r

Rocket Lab has won a contract from Japanese radar satellite company iQPS for three additional Electron launches. The post Rocket Lab wins contract for three more iQPS launches appeared first on SpaceNews.

A Falcon 9 launched a Cygnus cargo spacecraft April 11 as Northrop Grumman continues its dependence on a competitor to fly resupply missions to the International Space Station. The post Falcon 9 launches Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the ISS appeared first on SpaceNews.

East Aurora, NY – Moog Inc. (NYSE: MOG.A and MOG.B), a worldwide designer, manufacturer, and systems integrator of high-performance precision motion and fluid controls and control systems, highlights the critical […] The post Moog Technology Keeps Artemis II Astronauts Safe During Histor

The uncrewed Northrop Grumman Cygnus XL spacecraft, the S.S. Steven R. Nagel, arrived at the International Space Station on Monday (April 13), bringing with it about 11,000 pounds of supplies.

Rise joined the Artemis 2 crew as a mascot of the moon, bearing 5.6 million names. But the mascot quickly took on a new meaning.

Artemis 2's Victor Glover and Christina Koch are all smiles after splashdown.

The Artemis 2 mission to the moon beamed back some incredible photos, and we've rounded up the best ones.

A rare stargazing spectacle will unfold on Friday, April 13, 2029, as the asteroid Apophis passes closer than satellites over Europe and Africa in a true once-in-a-lifetime event.

Scientists outline how a once-in-a-century solar storm could disrupt the technology modern society depends on.

Experience the Aug. 12, 2026 total solar eclipse from Spain and Iceland with festivals, spa sessions and skywatching events along the path of totality.

The Artemis 2 astronauts are back on Earth, and they've begun processing their historic moon mission. But it's still tough for them to put the experience into words.

On Episode 205 of This Week In Space, Rod Pyle and Tariq Malik discuss the flight of Artemis 2.

Northrop Grumman's second "Cygnus XL" cargo ship launched toward the International Space Station on Saturday morning (April 11).

NASA doesn't plan to rest on its laurels after the historic success of its Artemis 2 moon mission. Here are the agency's ambitious plans for Earth's nearest neighbor.

NASA's Artemis 2 astronauts came home today (April 10), wrapping up an epic mission that broke spaceflight records and set the stage for even more ambitious moonshots to come.

Thousands of enthusiasts, professionals and curious skywatchers will gather this weekend for the world’s largest and most spectacular astronomy and space expo.

A newly released NASA timelapse reveals the moon crossing the sun as seen from deep space, giving the Artemis 2 crew a rare extended view of totality and the solar corona.

A rare long-period comet returns after 170,000 years — here's how to find comet C/2025 R3 (Pan-STARRS) before sunrise this April, with key dates, viewing tips and the best mornings to look.

Since July 2025, the European Space Agency's pair of Proba-3 satellites has already created 57 artificial solar eclipses. So far, the mission has collected more than 250 hours of high-resolution videos of the sun's atmosphere, called the corona. That's the same amount of observing tim

Scientists in Japan have developed a high-resolution X-ray telescope sharp enough to distinguish an object just 3.5 mm wide from one kilometer away, by combining precision mirror-making technology with space astronomy. To test its performance, they built a first-of-its-kind evaluation system, capabl

On August 19, 2022, solar astronomers using the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST) on the Hawaiian island of Maui caught the fading remnants of a C-class solar flare. Their observations showed something unusual: very strong spectral fingerprints of calcium II H and hydrogen-epsilon lines.

For decades, astronomers were only able to study the universe's very first stars using theoretical models. Now, observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) have revealed what may be the most compelling evidence to date for these ancient "Population III" stars, finding them clustered

By analyzing the data from various space observatories, Chinese astronomers have inspected a nearby quasar designated SDSS J000532.84+200717.4. Results of the new study, published April 1 on the arXiv preprint server, shed more light on the X-ray variability of this object.

Astronomers analyzing gravitational-wave data from the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA Collaboration have reported that merging binary black holes fall into three distinct categories. The study shows that the three subpopulations have their own characteristic masses, spin behavior, and merger rate that may be link

Observations conducted with the Subaru Telescope and its first-generation wide-field camera, Suprime-Cam, have revealed new insights into the relationship between the color and size of Jupiter Trojan asteroids.

Thirty-four years after Cornell University scientists first conceived it, the Fred Young Submillimeter Telescope (FYST) now rises above the Atacama Desert, near the summit of Cerro Chajnantor in Chile. FYST will help answer some of the most important questions in astronomy, including how the univers

Astronomers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) have employed the Lijiang 2.4-m telescope to perform optical photometric and spectroscopic observations of a core-collapse Type IIP supernova designated SN 2024abfl. Results of the observational campaign, published April 2 on the arXiv, preprint

The European Space Agency has achieved a European first with Celeste, successfully transmitting a navigation signal from low Earth orbit, following the launch of the mission's first satellites on March 28.

On Earth, extreme solar activity often appears as beautiful, benign auroras. But venturing beyond the safety of the Earth's magnetic field, one faces the full brunt of a temperamental star that can suddenly erupt with flares and coronal mass ejections.

The Paranal solar ESPRESSO Telescope (PoET), installed at the European Southern Observatory's (ESO's) Paranal site in Chile, has made its first observations. The telescope will work with ESO's ESPRESSO instrument to study the sun in detail. Described as a solar telescope for planet hu

The absence of a signal could itself be a signal. This is the idea behind a new study published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics, which aims to redefine how we search for dark matter, showing that it may not be necessary to find the same "clues" everywhere in order to interpret

Fast solar winds originating from the sun can have direct impacts on Earth—disrupting systems like GPS, aviation, electrical grids, and satellite and radio communications. A new paper by New Mexico State University astronomy graduate student Khagendra Katuwal examines the connection between coronal

Leo is a prominent sight for stargazers in April. Its famous sickle, punctuated by the bright star Regulus, draws many a beginning stargazer's eyes, inviting deeper looks into some of Leo's celestial delights, including a great double star and a famous galactic trio.