NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket with the Orion spacecraft atop launches the agency’s Artemis I flight test, Wednesday, Nov. 16 from Launch Complex 39B at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Moon rocket and spacecraft lifted off at 1:47 a.m. ET. The Artemis I mission is the first integrated test of the agency’s [...]
The Orion spacecraft delivers the Crew and Science Airlock (represented here by a government reference design) to the Gateway Space Station on the Artemis VI mission. The Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre of the United Arab Emirates will provide the airlock for Gateway, humanity's first space station that will orbit the Moon. [...]
The Orion spacecraft for NASA’s crewed Artemis II (right), Artemis III (left), and Artemis IV (center) missions are stationed next to each other inside the high bay of the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on June 22, 2023. Each capsule is in a different stage of production [...]
On April 3, 2023, Jeremy Hansen was announced as a mission specialist for the Artemis II mission. Artemis II will be NASA’s first crewed flight test of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft around the Moon to verify today’s capabilities for humans to explore deep space and pave the way for long-term exploration [...]
With Artemis missions, NASA will land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon, using innovative technologies to explore more of the lunar surface than ever before. We will collaborate with commercial and international partners and establish the first long-term presence on the Moon. Then, we will use what we learn on [...]
Photo of the Day It is one of the largest nebulas on the sky -- why isn't it better known? Roughly the same angular size as the Andromeda Galaxy, the Great Lacerta Nebula can be found toward the constellation of the Lizard (Lacerta). The emission nebula is difficult to see with wide-field binoculars because [...]
Photo of the Day rlier this month, the Sun exhibited one of the longer filaments on record. Visible as the bright curving streak around the image center, the snaking filament's full extent was estimated to be over half of the Sun's radius -- more than 350,000 kilometers long. A filament is composed of hot [...]
Photo of the Day What are those red filaments in the sky? They are a rarely seen form of lightning confirmed only about 35 years ago: red sprites. Research has shown that following a powerful positive cloud-to-ground lightning strike, red sprites may start as 100-meter balls of ionized air that shoot down from about [...]
Photo of the Day How does your favorite planet spin? Does it spin rapidly around a nearly vertical axis, or horizontally, or backwards? The featured video animates NASA images of all eight planets in our Solar System to show them spinning side-by-side for an easy comparison. In the time-lapse video, a day on Earth [...]
Photo of the Day Fans of our fair planet might recognize the outlines of these cosmic clouds. On the left, bright emission outlined by dark, obscuring dust lanes seems to trace a continental shape, lending the popular name North America Nebula to the emission region cataloged as NGC 7000. To the right, just off [...]
