technical updates

"Sometimes dead is better." Who can forget the immortal words of Jud Crandall, delivered by the incomparable Fred Gwynne in the 1989 film adaptation of Stephen King's Pet Sematary? Turns out Crandall could have been talking about somewhere just as otherworldly as the cursed Chumash burial ground at the heart of one of King's most terrifying works of fiction. That's because astronomers have discovered two husks of two zombie planets shuffling through the gory remains of what was once their planetary neighbors around a long-deceased star, or white dwarf. The shattered planets were revealed by a clear gap in the debris around the white dwarf J1328−1450, located around 1,600 light-years away from Earth. One of the remnants is estimated to be no larger than the size of the average solar system asteroid, while the other is estimated to be between the size of the moon and the dwar...

On Oct. 28, 1971, the United Kingdom launched its first satellite. The satellite was named Prospero, but it was also known as the X-3. This wasn't Britain's first satellite , but it was the first and only one the British space program launched with one of its own rockets. The first six British satellites all launched from the United States on NASA rockets. Prospero launched on a carrier rocket called the Black Arrow. The Prospero mission was the fourth and final flight of a Black Arrow rocket . Prospero was designed to study how the environment in space affects communications satellites. It tested things solar cells and telemetry systems, and even had a micrometeoroid detector that would determine small particles in space posed a threat to the spacecraft. The mission lifted off from the Woomera Range Complex in Australia. While the launch was a success, the rocket's final stage bump...

Living underwater was surprisingly peaceful. It was in many ways exactly what I imagine living on Mars would be like one day. There were no humans around us, except for my three SEA STAR crewmembers and me. Apart from the human noises we made, we couldn't hear anything other than the life support systems keeping us alive submerged 22 feet (7 meters) below the surface. We were living in these extreme conditions to study the challenges astronauts may face on long-duration space missions. Since performing research in space is still rare and expensive, there are numerous facilities around the world that focus on recreating space-like conditions on Earth . One of those stations is the Jules' Undersea Lab, where the SEA STAR simulated space mission took place. This underwater habitat was called "La Chalupa" when it was built in the 1970s. Its purpose was to allow divers to live and pe...

The next International Space Station (ISS) spacewalk will have more maple-leaf flavor than usual, as a Canadian astronaut will become the first to go outside the orbiting complex in seven years. Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Joshua Kutryk, who's also a colonel in the Royal Canadian Air Force, will help the ISS boost its power supply during his first-ever spacewalk on Thursday (Oct. 29). Kutryk will be joined by NASA astronaut Anil Menon, who has done three spacewalks already and also serves as a colonel with the U.S. Space Force . The duo are scheduled to venture outside the orbiting lab at 8 a.m. EDT (1200 GMT), kicking off a spacewalk that will last roughly 6 hours and 45 minutes. You can watch it live here at Space.com , courtesy of NASA, beginning at 6:30 a.m. EDT (1030 GMT). Official photo of Canadian Space Agency astronaut Joshua Kutryk. (Image credit: Canadian Space Agency) I...

Virgin Galactic has officially unveiled the first space plane in its next-gen "Delta" line, and announced the results of the worldwide vote to choose its name. Spaceship Apeiron will be the first Delta-class vehicle, Virgin Galactic revealed on Wednesday (Oct. 28). Apeiron (pronounced "A'-per-on," according to the announcement) takes its name from the ancient Greek word meaning "boundless," and was selected through a public poll that drew votes from thousands of people across 83 countries and six continents. The reveal comes on the same day that the space plane is scheduled to be flown from its manufacturing facility in Mesa, Arizona, to Spaceport America in New Mexico, where the vehicle will undergo final preparations before beginning flight tests. Apeiron was one of four finalist names that Virgin Galactic narrowed down from a list of 276 employee-submitted ...

I was breathing just fine through my life support systems, but I kept feeling an urge to double check that everything was ok with my "spacesuit" before heading out on this "spacewalk." I have worn many different types of spacesuits on Earth during my career, but for the first time in my life, I knew that I couldn’t just stop to breathe the air outside if there were an emergency. That's because I was underwater. On this excursion, I was leading a simulated space mission underwater called SEA STAR. My " spacesuit " was actually scuba diving gear, and the simulated spacewalks , or EVAs (Extra-Vehicular Activities), included outings where we explored underwater environments. Being underwater, if we encountered a major problem with our gear, we would have had to treat it as seriously as if we were astronauts on the International Space Station . There was no immediate ...