Topic
Space
Launches, missions, telescopes and the companies racing to orbit. The science explained without the hype.
99 stories, page 1 of 4
Crew-12 splashes down Thursday after 237 days in orbit
Crew-12 undocks from the ISS on Wednesday and splashes down Thursday after 237 days in space. Crew-13 has already started health studies on board.
SpaceA SpaceX countdown abort delays 21 Space Development Agency satellites
SpaceX aborted the SDA Tranche 1 Transport Layer A launch of 21 satellites in the final minute on 5 October, with a retry set for 6 October.
SpaceThe 2026 Orionids peak on 21 October, with a bright Moon in the way
The Orionid meteor shower 2026 peaks on 21 October at about 18 UTC. A waxing gibbous Moon will wash out the evening, so aim for the hours before dawn.
SpaceFalcon Heavy's first spy mission also set a SpaceX record
A Falcon Heavy classified mission, NROL-97, flew on 1 October for the NRO, its first for US intelligence, and SpaceX landed four boosters in a single ...
SpaceCrew-13 reached the ISS in 7 hours 50 minutes, a US record
Crew-13 docked with the ISS about 7 hours 50 minutes after launch on 1 October, the fastest American trip to the station, thanks to favourable ...
SpaceBlack hole jets light up gas hundreds of thousands of light-years from home
Black hole jets heat gas far beyond a galaxy's visible edge, DESI and LOFAR data shows, a new clue in galaxy evolution and why star formation stalls.
SpaceAstronomers report the first detected atmosphere around a rocky, Earth-sized planet sitting in its star's habitable zone.
The first atmosphere detected around a rocky, Earth-sized planet in its star's habitable zone, the combination exoplanet researchers have chased for ...
SpaceA robot just ran a marathon on Mars
NASA's Perseverance rover has now driven 26.2 miles across Jezero Crater, the exact distance of a marathon, one careful metre at a time.
SpaceJWST reads the lava planet 55 Cancri e in fresh detail
JWST's sharper look at 55 Cancri e points to an atmosphere holding on above an ocean of magma, and to how gas behaves over molten rock on very young ...
SpaceRoman Space Telescope first images came from a 300 megapixel camera
Roman Space Telescope first images arrived after NASA powered up the 300 megapixel Wide Field Instrument, a million miles out and partway through 90 ...
SpaceWebb caught Chariklo's rings changing in five years
Chariklo rings changing is the finding from a new Webb study, with the inner ring 50 percent more opaque and the outer ring 60 percent less since ...
SpaceLiquid nitrogen is still flowing on Pluto, three billion miles out
A Southwest Research Institute study finds evidence of liquid nitrogen on Pluto reaching the surface through cracks in Sputnik Planitia, its heart ...
SpaceXRISM reveals black hole winds are 100 times more powerful than expected
Japan's XRISM X-ray satellite found that winds from the quasar H1821+643 carry 100 times more energy than previous estimates, spreading turbulence ...
SpaceThirteen Starship flights, zero orbits. Tuesday is the one that counts.
Starship Flight 14 lifts off no earlier than Tuesday 22 September, aiming for orbital insertion for the first time and carrying 26 Starlink V3 ...
SpaceThe youngest planet ever found was hiding in data nobody re-examined for 8 years
Elias 2-24 b is under a million years old and still eating. The youngest exoplanet ever discovered was confirmed in archival Keck data from 2017.
SpaceUS military confirms it has placed weapons in Earth's orbit
The US military has officially confirmed it has placed weapon systems in Earth's orbit, a milestone that shifts space from a surveillance domain to ...
SpaceSpaceX sets 22 September launch date for Starship's first orbital flight
SpaceX has named 22 September as the date Starship will attempt its first full orbital flight, the biggest single test in the rocket's decade-long ...
SpaceRoman Space Telescope has enough fuel for 22 years, double what NASA planned
NASA's Roman Space Telescope launched with enough fuel to operate for 22 years, double the original mission estimate, and it's also the first NASA ...
SpaceThe comet passing through our solar system is probably older than the Sun
3I/ATLAS formed below minus 240C, and its dinitrogen reading points to an old star system. These are the first measurements of their kind for an ...
SpaceRocket Lab is furious about NASA's Mars mission decision
Rocket Lab has gone public with its frustration over a NASA Mars mission decision, a bold move for a company that still needs the space agency as a ...
SpaceGaia found dormant black holes closer to their stars than physics allows
Gaia has found three dormant black holes with a surviving stellar companion. Two of them sit closer than stellar evolution should allow, and nobody ...
SpaceSaturn's famous hexagon has a bigger, weirder sibling at the opposite pole
Hubble confirmed a 104,000 mile wide decagon forming at Saturn's south pole, a 10-sided atmospheric wave that differs from the famous northern ...
SpaceBoutique launch is thriving: The satellite companies that won't ride-share
Despite SpaceX's rideshare programme making cheap group launches widely available, a significant chunk of the satellite industry keeps paying the ...
SpaceThe Exploration company just raised 450 million dollars to take on SpaceX
The Exploration Company, a Munich-based spacecraft startup, has raised 450 million dollars in what it calls the largest-ever Series C by a European ...
SpaceIsar Aerospace puts Europe's first fully commercial rocket into orbit
Isar Aerospace's Spectrum rocket reached orbit from Andoya on 5 September 2026, the first orbital launch from Western European soil, 18 months after ...