Nottingham UK (SPX) May 05, 2025
The recent all-women spaceflight carried out on Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin vehicle has raised discussion of who gets to be called an astronaut. Sean Duffy, Donald Trump's transportation secretary, disputed the astronaut title given to those on the flight, including singer Katy Perry and journalist Gayle King. The term astronaut was only rarely disputed until the first "celebrity" suborbital

Tokyo, Japan (SPX) May 02, 2025
Researchers from the University of Tsukuba have confirmed that elevated spring temperatures in 2023 and 2024 caused earlier leaf emergence across Japan. Using satellite data from JAXA's GCOM-C satellite, the team documented how climate change is advancing the start of season (SOS) across multiple regions. Their analysis found that in 2023, leaf flush began 3 to 7 days earlier than the 2018

Washington DC (SPX) May 05, 2025
The first flight of NASA's 2025 New Zealand Super Pressure Balloon Campaign was safely terminated at 7:46 a.m. Sunday, May 4 (in U.S. Eastern Time) after 17 days, 13 hours, and 47 minutes in flight around the Southern Hemisphere's mid-latitude band. Flight controllers at the agency's Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Palestine, Texas, conducted a controlled flight termination of the

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 02, 2025
The second scientific balloon slated for NASA's 2025 New Zealand Super Pressure Balloon Campaign is prepared for launch, pending suitable weather at the Wanaka Airport mid-latitude facility. This mission marks the final flight of the current campaign. Filled with 18.8 million cubic feet (532,000 cubic meters) of helium, the super pressure balloon will traverse the Southern Hemisphere's mid

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 02, 2025
The Strategic Missile Warning Ground and Integration Acquisition Delta, part of Space Systems Command (SSC), in coordination with Space Operations Command's Mission Delta 4, has officially accepted the Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) Survivable Endurable Evolution (S2E2) system for operational use. This critical milestone, achieved on April 25, 2025, enhances the resilience of the U.S. missi

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 05, 2025
Terran Orbital Corporation has been selected by the U.S. Space Force to participate in the Space Test Experiments Platform (STEP) 2.0 program, a 10-year Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract worth up to $237 million. Managed by the Space Systems Command, the initiative supports the Department of Defense's efforts to accelerate the deployment and validation of advanced space tec

Video: 00:03:23

Astrophysicist and Nobel Prize Laureate Didier Queloz answers the who, what, where, when and why of exoplanets in this 3-part series. 

Paris, France (SPX) May 03, 2025
Tucked against the runways of Le Bourget Airport on the city's northeastern fringe, the Musee de l'Air et de l'Espace is more than an aviation attic-it is France's living record of humankind's push skyward. Founded in 1919 and spread across 1.5 square kilometres of Art-Deco hangars, the museum ranks among the world's oldest and richest aerospace collections, safeguarding 150 aircraft and nearly

Washington DC (UPI) May 2, 2025
A spacecraft launched by the Soviet Union in 1972 is due to come crashing back into Earth's atmosphere around May 10 and nobody knows where it will land. The Kosmos 482 mission launched the spacecraft toward Venus but an upper stage rocket booster malfunction left the spacecraft orbiting Earth instead. Netherlands Delft Technical University space situational awareness lecturer Ma

Washington DC (UPI) May 2, 2025
South Korea will fly a shoebox-size cube satellite on an Artemis II test flight in April 2026 in preparation for missions to the moon, NASA and the Korea AeroSpace Administration announced Friday. During the 10-day flight, NASA is planning to send four astronauts around the moon, the first time since Apollo 17 landed men on the lunar surface in 1972. Artimis II was originally scheduled