Latest news with #SpaceExploration
Digital Trends
21-07-2025
- Science
- Digital Trends
New Glenn rocket all set for grand mission on only its second launch
Blue Origin has officially announced that its next-generation New Glenn rocket will launch NASA's ESCAPADE Mars mission in a flight targeted for no earlier than mid-August 2025. Lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida, NASA's ESCAPADE mission to the red planet will achieve several notable milestones, including becoming the first multi-spacecraft orbital science mission sent to Mars. Two spacecraft, called Blue and Gold, will orbit the distant planet while conducting coordinated, simultaneous observations of Mars's magnetic field as it interacts with the solar wind and drives the escape of elements from Mars' very thin atmosphere into space. Recommended Videos It'll also be the first interplanetary mission for the New Glenn rocket, whose inaugural flight earlier this year involved the deployment of a prototype spacecraft to medium-Earth orbit. Additionally, we'll see Blue Origin attempt to land New Glenn's first-stage booster for the first time, similar to how SpaceX brings home its workhorse Falcon 9 rocket minutes after deploying satellites to space or sending astronauts to orbit. A successful landing would put the New Glenn on a path to first-stage reusability, enabling it to cut costs and increase launch frequency with its heavy-lift rocket. New Glenn's inaugural flight took place in January 2025 and while the rocket successfully reached orbit and deployed its payload, the first-stage booster was lost during descent and so had no chance of attempting a propulsive landing. Blue Origin's 98-meter-tall rocket is powered by seven BE-4 engines that together create almost 4 million pounds of thrust as the vehicle leaves the launchpad, making it around 2.5 times more powerful than the Falcon 9. Adding extra buzz to the mission is the fact that it's NASA's first voyage to Mars since the 2020 launch of the Perseverance rover, which arrived at the planet in spectacular fashion early the following year. Dave Limp, Blue Origin CEO, said in a post on X that the upcoming endeavor will be 'an exciting mission for New Glenn and Mars exploration,' and thanked NASA for 'riding with us to space.'
Fox News
21-07-2025
- Science
- Fox News
Buzz Aldrin commemorates Apollo 11 moon landing milestone on 56th anniversary with heartfelt message
Legendary astronaut Edwin Eugene "Buzz" Aldrin Jr. shared a heartfelt message on the 56th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, recalling the historic moment when the lunar module Eagle landed at Tranquility Base. The 95-year-old, who in 1969 walked on the Moon behind mission commander Neil Armstrong, reminisced about the iconic moment they shared while Michael Collins orbited above in the command module. "July 20, 1969. "Contact light, engine stop." The Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle touched down at Tranquility Base on the Moon. A few hours later, Neil Armstrong and I stepped foot on the Moon, with Michael Collins orbiting close-by," Aldrin wrote in a post on X. Aldrin emphasized that this monumental achievement stemmed from years of relentless effort, unwavering dedication, and the teamwork of hundreds of thousands. "An achievement resulting from years of incalculable effort, commitment, and team work." Aldrin invoked President John F. Kennedy's powerful challenge to reach the Moon and see Kennedy's "words become reality." "We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win, and the others too," Aldrin wrote, sharing Kennedy's speech he had given at Rice University in September 1962. The speech, delivered to inspire national unity and ambition, set the stage for achieving the decade's most audacious goal. "Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the Moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked," Kennedy's speech concluded, according to the JFK Library. Aldrin closed with a message of pride and gratitude, honoring all who made the mission possible and extending his blessings to the United States and all of humanity. "I couldn't be prouder to have completed this mission with the hundreds of thousands of people that helped get us to the moon and back home. God bless the USA and all of humankind," Aldrin wrote. Aldrin also shared that Pope Leo XIV spoke with him and his wife, expressing how special the moment was. "Anca and I were grateful and touched to receive the highest blessing today, from His Holiness, Pope Leo XIV on the 56th Anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing," Aldrin wrote. "What an honor! We prayed for good health, long life, and prosperity for all humankind." The Apollo 11 mission was the first in human history to land men on earth's satellite, fulfilling a dream as old as humanity itself. Armstrong was the first astronaut to step on the lunar surface at 9:56 p.m. ET on July 20, 1969. He was followed 19 minutes later by Aldrin. Aldrin is the only one of the three astronauts on the Apollo 11 mission still alive today. Stepheny Price is a writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business. She covers topics including missing persons, homicides, national crime cases, illegal immigration, and more. Story tips and ideas can be sent to
Fox News
20-07-2025
- Science
- Fox News
Buzz Aldrin commemorates Apollo 11 moon landing milestone on 55th anniversary with heartfelt message
Legendary astronaut Edwin Eugene "Buzz" Aldrin Jr. shared a heartfelt message on the 55th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, recalling the historic moment when the lunar module Eagle landed at Tranquility Base. The 95-year-old, who in 1969 walked on the Moon behind mission commander Neil Armstrong, reminisced about the iconic moment they shared while Michael Collins orbited above in the command module. "July 20, 1969. "Contact light, engine stop." The Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle touched down at Tranquility Base on the Moon. A few hours later, Neil Armstrong and I stepped foot on the Moon, with Michael Collins orbiting close-by," Aldrin wrote in a post on X. Aldrin emphasized that this monumental achievement stemmed from years of relentless effort, unwavering dedication, and the teamwork of hundreds of thousands. "An achievement resulting from years of incalculable effort, commitment, and team work." Aldrin invoked President John F. Kennedy's powerful challenge to reach the Moon and see Kennedy's "words become reality." "We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one we intend to win, and the others too," Aldrin wrote, sharing Kennedy's speech he had given at Rice University in September 1962. The speech, delivered to inspire national unity and ambition, set the stage for achieving the decade's most audacious goal. "Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the Moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked," Kennedy's speech concluded, according to the JFK Library. Aldrin closed with a message of pride and gratitude, honoring all who made the mission possible and extending his blessings to the United States and all of humanity. "I couldn't be prouder to have completed this mission with the hundreds of thousands of people that helped get us to the moon and back home. God bless the USA and all of humankind," Aldrin wrote. The Apollo 11 mission was the first in human history to land men on earth's satellite, fulfilling a dream as old as humanity itself. Armstrong was the first astronaut to step on the lunar surface at 9:56 p.m. ET on July 20, 1969. He was followed 19 minutes later by Aldrin. Aldrin is the only one of the three astronauts on the Apollo 11 mission still alive today. Stepheny Price is a writer for Fox News Digital and Fox Business. She covers topics including missing persons, homicides, national crime cases, illegal immigration, and more. Story tips and ideas can be sent to
Yahoo
17-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Dust devils on Mars leave 'fingerprints' that can guide future Red Planet missions
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Martian dust devils are fleeting, but the footprints they leave behind can endure for months. Now, researchers have used those tracks to learn about the whirlwinds and potentially guide future mission planning. As wind swirls across the landscape on both Mars and Earth, it sweeps up ground particles that reveal the dry columns. The whirlwinds dance across the landscape, leaving a path revealed by excavated particles. On the active surface of Earth, such paths are hard to spot. But on the nearly inactive surface of Mars, they can remain for months, long after the devils' minutes-long lifetimes. "Dust devils themselves are difficult to capture in images because they are so short-lived," Ingrid Daubar, a planetary scientist at Brown University and lead author of the study, told by email. "The tracks they leave behind last longer, so we are able to observe them more thoroughly." Dusting off the fingerprints On warm, windy days in Earth's deserts, vortices of sand and debris can form suddenly and move unpredictably. (This author distinctly recalls being "chased" by one such devil in the Mojave Desert as a child in 1990.) Similar conditions on Mars can also produce dust devils. But the whirls on the Red Planet tend to be both wider and taller than their counterparts on Earth, and scientists aren't sure why. Questions like these led Dauber and her colleagues to study images from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter — the highest-resolution photos of the planet snapped from space. HiRISE can capture features as small as 3 feet (1 meter). But its detailed perspective comes at a price: Its images cover only a small percentage of the Martian surface and are taken by request, though most latitudes and longitudes are well sampled. Dauber's team studied 21,475 HiRISE images taken between January 2014 and April 2018 — roughly a quarter of the snapshots captured by the instrument as of autumn 2024. Tracks appear in only 798 of those, or just under 4%. Dust devil tracks (DDTs) suggest dust devils are more common at high northern and southern latitudes and are especially active in each hemisphere's summer, peaking in the southern hemisphere's summer. According to the researchers, Mars' significant orbital eccentricity, or deviation from a perfect circle, causes the atmosphere in the southern summer to circulate more energetically, creating conditions ideal for vortex formation. That, combined with less dust accumulation in the North, makes the southern hemisphere summer an almost perfect storm for dust devils. The observations reflect peak DDT preservation more than dust devil formation, the researchers cautioned, but the culmination coincides with the peak observed by NASA's Spirit rover at Gusev crater, along with global observations of the sand spouts. The researchers also realized that DDTs most commonly form and are preserved in regions of mixed sand, rocks and bedrock, with little bright dust, the most common surface type identified on Mars. Bright dust scooped up from the surface leaves behind trails that are dark from the underlying landscape. "The material on the ground is critical to the formation of the DDTs," Dauber said. Dusty missions The first Martian dust devil tracks appeared in images sent back from NASA's Mariner 9 mission in 1972 (although they weren't discovered until the images were analyzed in 2014). But it wasn't until 1998, when higher-resolution images were captured by Mars Global Surveyor, that the tracks could be seriously analyzed. RELATED STORIES —Dust devils on Mars may spark lightning — possibly threatening NASA's Perseverance rover —NASA's Perseverance rover watches as 2 Mars dust devils merge into 1 (video) —Perseverance Mars rover figures out how devils and winds fill the Red Planet's skies with dust Dust has hindered past ground missions. Mars rovers take their energy from the sun via solar panels. Over time, dust builds up on the panels, limiting their efficacy. The blockage has shuttered missions like NASA's Opportunity rover, which explored the surface for 14.5 years. NASA's InSight lander also succumbed to a dust-related death after four years. The high winds that birth dust devils can also revitalize robots, however. Opportunity's twin, Spirit, got a second lease on life after a Martian whirlwind cleaned its solar arrays back in 2005. Understanding where dust devils are most active can help in the selection of landing sites for future missions. High-latitude bands where DDTs and their progenitors occur more frequently could help to scour solar panels and thus enable a more enduring exploration. "It depends on the mission — every mission is unique," Daubar said. There are many requirements for landing sites and exploration, including regions that will allow for a safe touchdown, alongside complex scientific goals. "It could be that there are only a few places where the specific science goals can be achieved, and then perhaps this could be a deciding factor between those sites," she said. A new study of dust devils on Mars was published in May 2025 in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. Solve the daily Crossword
Sustainability Times
15-07-2025
- Science
- Sustainability Times
'Elon, Mars Is a Hellhole': Astrophysicist Slams Musk's Vision, Says Even Nuclear Apocalypse Makes Earth a Safer Bet
IN A NUTSHELL 🚀 Elon Musk's vision of Mars colonization faces criticism from astrophysicist Adam Becker, who deems it an unrealistic fantasy. of Mars colonization faces criticism from astrophysicist Adam Becker, who deems it an unrealistic fantasy. 🌍 Becker argues that even under apocalyptic scenarios , Earth would remain more hospitable than Mars due to its breathable atmosphere and protective magnetic field. , Earth would remain more hospitable than Mars due to its breathable atmosphere and protective magnetic field. ❄️ Mars presents significant challenges with its harsh environment , including thin CO₂ atmosphere, extreme cold, and toxic soil. , including thin CO₂ atmosphere, extreme cold, and toxic soil. 🔬 Efforts to terraform Mars are seen as impractical, with Becker advocating for prioritizing Earth's preservation instead. In a world where technology and innovation are rapidly advancing, discussions about the colonization of Mars have captured the public imagination. Spearheaded by influential figures like Elon Musk, these discussions often position Mars as a potential sanctuary for humanity in case of catastrophic events on Earth. However, astrophysicist Adam Becker challenges this popular narrative, arguing that such ideas are more fantasy than feasible strategy. In the face of Earth's potential apocalyptic scenarios, Becker believes that our planet, even if ravaged, would remain far more habitable than the cold, barren deserts of Mars. The Martian Dream: Elon Musk's Grand Vision Elon Musk, the visionary CEO of SpaceX, has not shied away from expressing his ambition to make humanity a multiplanetary species. Central to this vision is the colonization of Mars, which is often depicted as a lifeboat in the event of terrestrial cataclysms. However, Adam Becker, an esteemed astrophysicist and author, considers this idea to be a prime example of technological optimism that is disconnected from the physical realities of space colonization. In a candid interview with Rolling Stone, Becker did not mince words, calling the notion 'one of the most foolish things one could say.' Becker's critique is rooted in the sheer impracticality of establishing a sustainable human presence on Mars. The Martian environment poses insurmountable challenges that make it a far less viable option compared to a damaged Earth. While Musk's goals are laudable in their ambition, Becker argues that they overlook the inherent difficulties of adapting the human species to a world that is inherently hostile and unforgiving. 'Candle on the Moon Detected': This Underground Lab's Mind-Blowing Sensitivity Is Rewriting the Limits of Human Technology Surviving Earth's Catastrophes: A Comparative Analysis To support his argument, Adam Becker presents three extreme scenarios: an asteroid impact comparable to the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, a global nuclear war, and runaway climate change. In each of these dire circumstances, Becker asserts that Earth would still be more accommodating than Mars. This is because, despite significant devastation, Earth would retain essential elements such as a breathable atmosphere, suitable gravity, accessible water, and natural protection from harmful radiation. The table below highlights the stark differences between a post-cataclysmic Earth and present-day Mars: 'They Found the Missing Matter': Cosmic Radio Bursts Used to Map Long-Lost Atoms Hiding Across the Universe for Billions of Years Criterion Earth (Post-Cataclysm) Mars (Today) Atmosphere Rich in oxygen and nitrogen, dense 95% CO₂, pressure 0.088 psi, unbreathable Average Temperature Potentially reduced -81°F, extreme constantly Water Presence Oceans contaminated but present Deep ice, inaccessible Magnetic Field Present, protective Absent, direct cosmic radiation Soil Contains organic matter Toxic, rich in cancer-causing perchlorates On Mars, life would be confined to pressurized domes, and any failure in critical systems would lead to immediate disaster. Conversely, Earth, even after a planetary disaster, could still harbor pockets of life capable of recovery and regeneration. Terraforming Mars: Science or Science Fiction? Elon Musk envisions a Mars transformed by human ingenuity: detonating nuclear bombs at the poles, deploying giant mirrors in space, and constructing climate-controlled greenhouses. Yet, transforming Mars into Earth 2.0 is an immense challenge that includes: 'Elon Musk, You're Ignoring the Truth': Astrophysicist's Startling Claim—Earth Would Remain a Paradise Compared to Mars After Nuclear Apocalypse Releasing enough CO₂ to thicken the atmosphere. Creating a sustainable greenhouse effect to warm the planet. Building an artificial magnetic field for protection. Even if all CO₂ reserves were unleashed, the atmospheric pressure would reach only 7% of Earth's, inadequate for survival without pressurized suits. The colossal cost of transporting materials, food, water, and humans across 34 million miles makes the endeavor daunting. Becker concludes that investing in Mars for survival is akin to abandoning a ruined hospital to survive in a radioactive desert with no oxygen. 'Better to preserve our planet, even wounded, than to exile ourselves to a giant open-air pressure chamber,' he argues. Without a credible interplanetary Plan B, the focus must remain on safeguarding this blue jewel suspended in space, the only known sanctuary for life. In the end, the debate over Mars colonization raises profound questions about our priorities as a species. Should we direct our resources towards a distant, uncertain future on another planet, or should we invest in healing and protecting our own? As we stand on the precipice of space exploration, the choices we make today will shape the destiny of humanity. What path will we choose as we look to the stars? This article is based on verified sources and supported by editorial technologies. Did you like it? 4.4/5 (23)
