White Space Ship and Brown Planet
Courtesy: SpaceX
© Pascal Fouquet
National Awards 1st Place, United States,
2024 Sony World Photography Awards
SpaceX !
And on June 6, the Dragon 2 fleet's cumulative time in space surpassed the Space Shuttle fleet's time with 1,324 total days in orbit!
Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) !
An on-orbit demonstration of asteroid deflection is a key test that NASA and other agencies wish to perform before any actual need is present.
The DART mission is NASA’s demonstration of kinetic impactor technology, impacting an asteroid to adjust its speed and path. DART will be the first-ever space mission to demonstrate asteroid deflection by kinetic impactor. The spacecraft will launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket out of Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
DART’s target is the binary asteroid system Didymos, which means “twin” in Greek (and explains the word “double” in the mission’s name). Didymos is the ideal candidate for humankind’s first planetary defense experiment, although it is not on a path to collide with Earth and therefore poses no actual threat to the planet.
The system is composed of two asteroids: the larger asteroid Didymos (diameter: 780 meters, 0.48 miles), and the smaller moonlet asteroid, Dimorphos (diameter: 160 meters, 525 feet), which orbits the larger asteroid. The DART spacecraft will impact Dimorphos nearly head-on, shortening the time it takes the small asteroid moonlet to orbit Didymos by several minutes.
Astronomers estimate there are about 1,000 near-Earth asteroids larger than 1 kilometer—big enough to cause a global disaster. About 90 percent of them have been identified. Far less is known about smaller asteroids. All told, about 100 tons of extraterrestrial matter falls onto Earth every day, mostly in the form of harmless dust and an occasional meteorite.
NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) will be the first-ever space mission to demonstrate asteroid deflection by kinetic impactor on a binary asteroid target: the smaller asteroid of Didymos, called Didymos B. Didymos is Greek for “twin.”
DART is directed by NASA and undertaken by a team led by Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory with support from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, NASA Johnson Space Center, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The Planetary Defense Coordination Office within NASA’s Science Mission Directorate is the lead for planetary defense activities and is sponsoring this mission.
DART Animation. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL
Infographic showing the effect of DART’s impact on the orbit of Didymos B. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL
Text courtesy of Scitech Daily
A new era of spaceflight has just begun!
A comparison between SpaceX's Starship Super Heavy and the Saturn V.
Credit - u/hellraiserl33t
Thomas Pesquet Photography of the Nile River & Delta
Endeavour (left) approaches IDA-2 (right) during docking with the ISS Mission type: ISS crew transport,
Operator: SpaceX
SpaceX Crew Dragon Approaches Space Station!
The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft is pictured approaching the International Space Station for a docking.
Image Credit: NASA
The uncrewed SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft is seen silhouetted against Earth's horizon during Demo-1, the first flight of NASA's Commercial Crew Program to the International Space Station, on March 4, 2019.
The vehicle ultimately docked to the station's Harmony module after completing several successful demonstrations during approach
NASA
SpaceX Falcon Heavy !
Falcon Heavy took off from the Apollo 11 launchpad at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 3:45 pm EST on Tuesday. The booster separation went smoothly, with two of the rockets coming back down to Earth and landing in near perfect synchrony.
Shortly after booster separation, the payload fairing split open to reveal the space suit-wearing “Starman” mannequin behind the wheel of the Roadster.
