The Apollo 8 Spacecraft and The Trip to The Moon
December marks the anniversary of Apollo 8’s arrival at the Moon
December marks the anniversary of Apollo 8’s arrival at the Moon
Every Christmas since 1968 we celebrate the date when the first humans got an up close and personal look at the Moon. Apollo 8 was launched on 21 December 1968 and entered lunar orbit on 24 December, just in time for the crew to celebrate Christmas further from the Earth than anyone had ever celebrated Christmas, or anything else, ever.
Recent research suggests there may be a link between a supernova about 2.6 million years ago and the extinction of a large number of marine megafauna on the Earth at the time.
This is a short video on how to find the Sculptor Galaxy in the Southern Sky. This is a beautiful and bright galaxy that is well worth a look at.
A light hearted look at how you might make a blackhole if you happen to have a large star handy.
It’s not easy to make a star, you need a lot of cold space and a huge amount of hydrogen. But if you manage to do that then you can have your very own Sun sized star to keep you warm in winter.
BepiColombo is due to launch on Saturday on an Ariane 5 rocket. The mission will get to Mercury in 2025 helping us learn a lot more about the planet that is the closest to the Sun.
This Saturday night is International Observe the Moon Night so hopefully the weather will be great and we can all catch a glimpse of the Moon.
Aside from the Big Bang, Gamma Ray Bursts are the most powerful releases of energy in the universe, sometimes releasing over 100 times the entire energy of the Sun over it’s 10 billion year lifespan.
The Chandra X-Ray Observatory has developed a glitch and gone into safe mode. The 19 year old spacecraft is well past it’s design life but continues to produce incredible science so hopefully it’ll be back to full serviceability very soon.
The aborted launch of the Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft with Expedition 57 to the International Space Station reminded the world that space flight can still be dangerous. Fortunately both Nick Hague and Alexey Ovchinin return safely to the surface of the Earth.
The amount of interstellar particles being detected by Voyager 2 may indicate that the spacecraft is about to pass through the heliopause into interstellar space.
The Hubble Space Telescope is currently in safe mode while technicians at NASA figure out what has gone wrong with a gyroscope that was found to be not performing properly. Hopefully it’s an easy fix and Hubble will be back to full operations soon.
Quasars are the brightest objects in the universe and are amazingly powerful. They are caused by Super Massive Black Holes.
(And we can do something about it.)
Life needs CHNOPS, the six essential elements Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Oxygen, Phosphorus, and Sulphur. Curiosity found them on ancient Mars, but a new study shows Earth was born without them. Only a lucky impact with Theia made our world habitable. In contrast, Venus never stood a chance. Meet the three planetary siblings and discover why only Earth became a cradle for life.
Mars’s mantle contains ancient fragments up to 4km wide from its formation—preserved like geological fossils from the planet’s violent early history.
Cosmic rays are hitting the atmosphere constantly. One of the products of the collisions is muons, and we can detect muons on the surface of the Earth to learn about the cosmic rays.
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