Artemis Moon

Teams at an underwater facility in Houston, Texas, are making preparations to train astronauts who are preparing for future missions to the Moon. This facility is being modified to recreate the harsh lunar environment by submerging future moonwalkers in a pool that’s 40 feet deep.Three Astronauts May Be Stranded on the ISS After Disturbing Soyuz Coolant LeakAstronauts have been training at the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory (NBL) at NASA’s Sonny Carter Training Facility for more than 30 years, with the buoyancy of 6.2…

NASA’s Artemis 2 is feeling realer by the minute. The next upper stage of the Space Launch System (SLS) megarocket is now ready for tests at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in advance of the upcoming mission. Astronomers Could Soon Get Warnings When SpaceX Satellites Threaten Their ViewUnited Launch Alliance (ULA) has started testing the second Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage (ICPS), which recently came out of its storage and moved into a test cell at the Delta Operation Center for pre-flight testing and preparations,…

Depiction of NASA’s Artemis 3 mission.Image: NASA Visualization StudioThe coming week is poised to be an exciting one for rocket lovers, with no less than seven launches planned in the next seven days. It’s also the week when when finally get to see what NASA’s Artemis Moon suits will look like. Terran 1, Electron, Falcon 9, these are a few of our favorite things. These rockets are all poised to take to the skies this week, but whether they’ll all get a chance to fly remains an open question. Third time is hopefully the…

Orion’s view of the Moon on December 5, the 20th day of the mission.Photo: NASANASA’s Artemis 1 mission concluded with Orion’s immaculate splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday. Seemingly a billion years—and most assuredly a few billion dollars—in the making, the mission ended far too quickly for space junkies like me. But in those short few weeks, it managed to nail all its primary objectives. Artemis 1 was strictly meant as a demonstration mission, a way for NASA to test its new SLS megarocket and Orion…

Orion approaching the Moon prior to its outbound powered flyby on November 21, 2022.Photo: NASANASA experienced a data connection glitch between the Orion spacecraft and ground control for nearly an hour early this morning, in a surprising disruption to the craft’s otherwise fair-weather journey around the Moon.Data was lost between Orion and NASA’s Mission Control at Johnson Space Center for 47 minutes, from 1:09 a.m. ET to 1:56 a.m. ET, according to a NASA blog post. The data loss occurred while the team was working on…

Launch of SLS during the early hours of Wednesday, November 16, 2022. Gif: NASA/GizmodoNASA’s Artemis 1 mission is officially underway, with SLS lifting off from Kennedy Space Center early Wednesday morning and sending the Orion spacecraft on a 25-day journey to the Moon and back.An idea conceived more than 12 years ago has finally taken flight. NASA’s 5.75-million-pound Space Launch System thundered away from Launch Pad 39B at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center at 1:47a.m. ET, marking the start of the Artemis 1 mission and…

Artist’s depiction of CAPSTONE.Image: NASANASA’s CAPSTONE probe has nearly completed its four-month-long journey to the Moon, where it will test a unique halo orbit in preparation for a future space station. Late last week, however,as the probe was performing a course correction maneuver, CAPSTONE entered into safe mode from which it has yet to emerge. CAPSTONE entered into safe mode during the evening of Thursday, September 8, just as the probe was completing a trajectory correction maneuver. CAPSTONE’s mission team…

SLS on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Photo: ESA - S. CorvajaNASA’s first attempt to launch its Space Launch System megarocket did not go as planned, with officials declaring a scrub due an “engine bleed” issue. Sounds ominous, but NASA officials said Monday afternoon thata re-attempt on Friday is not out of the question. At 8:34 a.m. ET, and with the countdown clock stuck at T-40 minutes, launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson declared an official end to the first SLS launch attempt. The…

SLS on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Photo: NASAThe fourth and most recent attempt at a full launch rehearsal of NASA’s Space Launch System went reasonably well, and despite some lingering issues and uncertainties, the agency is sending the rocket back to the hangar for final preparations in advance of its first flight. That inaugural launch will represent Artemis 1, the first mission in NASA’s Artemis lunar program. In a press release today, NASA—to my surprise—said it is done testing SLS after…