solar system

The View From Above

Absolutely stunning images captured by ISS astronaut Jessica Meir during last week’s spacewalk to install new equipment on the ISS. The urge to write a story about the first image is quite strong. Her description:

“While I wasn’t gazing at Anil Menon during last week’s spacewalk, my eyes were drawn downward to our majestic Mother Earth. Here’s how she looked from my spacesuit.

Photo 1: Coastal view framed by the ISS solar arrays.

Photo 2: The sun sets behind our newly installed IROSA mod kit, a mounting platform for new arrays to be installed on an upcoming spacewalk (like the shorter array in lower left of photo 1).

Photo 3: Mountain views framed by the solar arrays.”

Revisiting the Pale Blue Dot

Ready for your latest dose of feeling tiny and insignificant - while also an incredibly improbable, and thus special and meaningful, part of a vast universe?

Well, I give you one grainy, smudgy image. Not exactly inspiring at first glance, and yet. This timelapse of images (40 seconds in total) was captured by the Perseverance rover's Mastcam instrument on Mars last month, and it shows Earth briefly occulting behind the Martian moon Phobos.

As Carl Sagan so famously and eloquently said:

“Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam."

City Lights, Galactic Lights

Incredible image captured by astronaut Don Pettit on the ISS. The inhabitants of Earth are creating, building, laughing, dancing, and most of all, shining.

From his post: “Milky Way views over the city lights of Earth. Humans shining back at the stars that inspire us! Taken with Nikon Z9, 14mm, f/1.4, ISO 6400 with homemade sidereal tracker on ISS Expedition 72.”

https://x.com/astro_Pettit/status/2075719821623271512

Flashback: Saturn

Incredible view of Saturn few days before “the grand finale” when the probe Cassini finished its trip after 13 years orbiting the planet (2004-2017).

I’m taking a stand: No offense to Juno and Jupiter - they’re delivering wonderful content - but Cassini was the best space probe, and Saturn is the best planet.

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, Space Science Institute, Mindaugas Macijauskas. Via Xavi Bros on X

To The Moon!

Or around it, anyway…. The Artemis II astronauts are officially on the their way to orbit the moon (and briefly journey farther than any human has ever traveled). First, though, they'll orbit Earth and test out a bunch of systems.

I won't lie; the SLS rocket had me nervous. I am a child of the shuttle disasters, and I was biting my nails during the ascent. But SLS got it done.

Now, onward into our future in space.

Enjoy some spectacular shots of the launch, and a bonus shot of Earth from the Orion spacecraft this morning (a view human eyes haven’t enjoyed in too many decades).

Image credit:

Pictures 1 and 2: Eric Kuna https://x.com/erikkuna)

Picture 3: Andrew McCarthy (https://x.com/AJamesMcCarthy)

Picture 4: NASA

New Glenn & ESCAPADE

Fantastic launch (and landing) today by Blue Origin - there's another reusable rocket on the table.

Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket, in its second official launch, sent NASA's ESCAPADE mission on its way to Mars. The Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (NASA makes such great acronyms) mission will use two small satellites (built by another private space company, Rocket Lab) to study space weather conditions at Mars.

In only its second try, Blue Origin executed a perfect landing of New Glenn's booster on their drone ship, "Never Tell Me The Odds."

As awesome as SpaceX's achievements are, we need MORE private space companies doing amazing things, so Blue Origin's success today is great news. Like SpaceX, Blue Origin will be headed to the moon as part of Artemis, and they have grand plans for orbital stations and beyond.

Learn more about the launch today here.

Image Credit: Dave Limp (link) and Blue Origin.

Star Trails

Astronaut Don Petit is back on Earth now, but while he was on the ISS, he took thousands of incredible pictures and videos from orbit, and many of them are only now being catalogued and shared. Visit his X feed regularly to see a constant stream of beautiful images.

In his words: “High resolution star trail from the SpaceX Crew 9 Dragon, marked by a fleet of flashing Starlink satellites, glowing atmosphere, soon to rise sun, and arcing stars. Captured over the Pacific Ocean with Nikon Z9, Sigma 14mm f1.4 lens, effective 24 minute exposure compiled from individual 30 second frames, f1.4, ISO 1600.”

Source

Sunshine

Ace astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy captured a banger of a photo of the ISS against the sun recently (see it here). Now he’s released an incredible bonus shot from the session. This is one hell of an optical illusion!

Source

P.S.: The title of this post is a reference to a quirky but excellent 2007 movie, “Sunshine,” about a team of astronauts sent on a mission to reignite the dying Sun with a nuclear fission bomb.

Two Worlds, One Sun

This stunning visual was created by NASA, the Curiosity rover, and photographer Damia Bouic.

The Sun appears slightly smaller from Mars than from Earth, since Mars is 50% further from the Sun than Earth. More striking, perhaps, is that the Martian sunset is noticeably bluer near the Sun than the typically orange colors near the setting Sun from Earth. The reason for the blue hues from Mars is not fully understood, but thought to be related to forward scattering properties of Martian dust.

The terrestrial sunset was taken in 2012 March from Marseille, France, while the Martian sunset was captured in 2015 by NASA's robotic Curiosity rover from Gale crater on Mars.

Destination Mars

On Thursday, Elon Musk shared SpaceX's plans for Mars over the next 8 years (and a permanent moon base, since it's on the way ) - and beyond, to make humanity a multiplanetary species.

It is ambitious, perhaps even audacious. But the suite of technologies Elon has built are, it turns out, all positioned to make this a reality. Rockets, robots, autonomous and hardy vehicles, tunnel diggers, a space-based communications system, battery packs, cutting-edge astronaut suits...it's almost like he had a plan all along.

There will be challenges and setbacks along the way, but I am so here for this.

- First Starship to Mars planned for 2026

- Enlarging future generations of Starship

- Mars settlement in 2030s

- Robotic + human labor used

- Moon Base in planning

- 100s of Mars landings

Here’s the link to the entire presentation, if you'd like to watch it: https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1928185351933239641

A Mars Mood

I am obsessed with this grainy image snapped by Percy on Mars. It’s quiet and contemplative, haunting and lonely, yet stirring to life the string that tugs at your soul and whispers of your connection to a vast cosmos.

From the Perseverance X account: “That bright "star" is actually Mars' moon Deimos. In the hours before dawn, I snapped this long-exposure image with my left Navcam and caught Deimos as well as two stars from the constellation Leo in the sky. It's definitely a mood, as they say.”

Original post here.

Blue Ghost's Farewell Message

On March 16, Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander completed its mission as lunar night arrived. It was a spectacular success in every sense and marks a new era for commercial space missions.

As the craft shut down, it sent one final message home.

Don't worry, Blue Ghost. You'll have plenty of friends - human and robotic - to keep you company soon.