• Not Again: Boeing Still Isn’t Ready for a Crew-Carrying Starliner

    If you were eager to see the first flight of Boeing’s Starliner with a human crew, you will just need to wait a little longer. The original plan was to send two astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) on July 15, after many earlier delays. But now Boeing said it still needs time to…

  • Starlink: DOD Pays for Ukrainian Service

    Elon Musk got his way. The US Department of Defense (DOD) will be paying an undisclosed amount for the Starlink services being used in Ukraine. This is good news for the Ukrainians had they feared interruption of this vital link with the rest of the world, yet I imagine this will also put SpaceX’s Starlink…

  • Pic of the Week: New Crew Sent to the Tiangong Space Station

    This week’s image shows China’s launch of the Shenzhou 16 spacecraft earlier this week atop a Long March 2-F rocket. The launch included a three-man crew, one being the first civilian astronaut in the Chinese crew rotation, who will relieve the current crew on the Tiangong Space Station.

  • A Day in Astronomy: The Founding of the European Space Agency

    On this day in 1975, the European Space Agency (ESA) was founded after the combination of  the European Space Research Organisation (ESRO) and the European Launcher Development Organisation (ELDO). Ten countries were part of this new organization, which has since grown to 22 members (noted below). The Agency also has associate members and other cooperating partners.…

  • Two Space Stations, Two Stories

    This week astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) said goodbye to the second set of private astronauts who are part of the Axiom Space mission, while China sent its first non-military astronaut to its Tiangong space station. It is not surprising that China started out with military astronauts. NASA also recruited from the US…

  • NASA TV: Stay Tuned In

    If you cannot find anything worthwhile on regular television, don’t forget that NASA continues to broadcast key events on its own television station, including this week’s meeting on UFOs, now called “unidentified anomalous phenomena,” or UAPs. Here is the latest schedule for NASA TV: Tuesday, May 309 a.m. – Coverage of hatch closure for the Axiom…

  • Volunteer Opportunity: Astronomer in Residence

    Looking for something to do next summer? How about being the Astronomer in Residence at the Grand Canyon? You can share your love of astronomy with the public on a regular basis. Doesn’t that sound like fun? Here is more information on the position itself: Grand Canyon Conservancy’s (GCC) Astronomer-in-Residence program supports astronomers and dark-sky…

  • Space Quote: Losing Our View of the Starry Night

    “In 2016, astronomers reported that the Milky Way was no longer visible to a third of humanity and light pollution has worsened considerably since then. At its current rate most of the major constellations will be indecipherable in 20 years, it is estimated. The loss, culturally and scientifically, will be intense.” -Statement in an article in The…

  • Second TROPICS Launch a Success

    The second and final TROPICS satellites, also known as Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure and storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats, were launched late yesterday via a Rocket Lab rocket in New Zealand. The first pair were launched earlier this month. Rocket Lab sent out this message: Payload deployment confirmed! Congratulations to the launch team on our 37th Electron…

  • Pic of the Week: Stellar Birth in NGC 1333

    This week’s image is from the Hubble Space Telescope. It captures the colorful, star-filled NGC 1333, which is about 960 light-years away. Quite a lot is going on in this image – both seen and unseen. This explanations from the European Space Agency (ESA) will hopefully answer many of your questions regarding this image: Hubble’s…