Space is hard, we know that all too well. But sometimes you need to unwind and one of the best ways for crews & workers to do that was practical jokes (like this Gemini VIII crew gag image). I’ll pin this for a while so let’s see as many gag/joke images we can come up with! 🚀
The artist of our solar system 🎨🖌️
Tumultuous storms and clouds in Jupiter’s northern hemisphere paint a mosaic across the gas giant. This image combines four views captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft in 2019.
Big week for Artemis III 🚀
Just before NASA introduced the Artemis III crew, the SLS solid rocket booster segments arrived in Florida after a six-day rail journey from Utah.
Later this year, teams will begin stacking the boosters that create 75% of the thrust needed at launch.
Liftoff of the debut flight for JAXA’s H3-30 rocket at 9:53:59 a.m. JST / 0053:59 UTC on June 12 (8:53:59 p.m. EDT on June 11) from the Tanegashima Space Center!
T-3 Days until we meet the crew of Artemis III! 🚀 https://t.co/rOBwPCF3jP
NASA will reveal the Artemis III crew on Tuesday, June 9. The mission will launch four astronauts from Kennedy Space Center and test critical rendezvous and docking capabilities between Orion and commercial human landing systems. Be part of the excitement in the Rocket Garden and experience the NASA story!
There is a lot going on right now on the @Space_Station, but fortunately we are all safe and witnessed a spectacular southern aurora show yesterday thanks to a recent solar event.
One week later, incredible progress. It’s a 24/7 operation with a solid path forward to launch this year, helped by a lot of luck. @NASA and @USSpaceForce have both been extremely helpful.
This team. Never tell them the odds.
Some LC-36 updates. Now that we’ve had access to the pad and integration facility we can share a bit of good news. The propellant farm, oxygen, liquid hydrogen and LNG tanks are all in good shape. This is good luck because these are very long lead items. The water tower is also good. The big support tower is damaged, but it can be repaired in place rather than torn down and replaced. The booster “Never Tell Me The Odds” and the three GS-2s that were onsite in the integration facility also look good.
I’ve seen some speculation that we might move directly to the 9x4 configuration, but we won’t do that. Rate manufacturing of 7x2 is going well, and we’re going to continue that at pace as planned and store the stages for use. In addition, we had already been working for some time on eliminating our transporter-erector in favor of an alternative vertical conop, and we’ll now go directly to that; so we don’t need a new transporter-erector.
We will fly again before the end of this year. Gradatim Ferociter.
United Launch Alliance successfully completed today's launch of the Amazon Leo 7 mission by the Atlas V rocket! All 29 advanced broadband satellites have been deployed into low Earth orbit, bringing the total number launched by ULA to 197. Atlas V has delivered the majority of Amazon satellites into space.
Next up, Leo 8 with another 29 satellites in July.
https://t.co/5bAKrECLty
This is my video of the explosion of the Blue Origin New Glenn rocket at Cape Canaveral’s pad LC-36 a short time ago. Includes video & audio from roughly 5 miles away near Jetty Park. That was an absolutely enormous explosion! 🤯
Note: Thankfully, Blue says all staff are OK.
NASA is aware of the anomaly that occurred tonight at Launch Complex 36 involving Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Spaceflight is unforgiving, and developing new heavy-lift launch capability is extraordinarily difficult. We will work with our partners to support a thorough investigation of this anomaly, assess near-term mission impacts, and get back to launching rockets.
We will provide information on any impacts to the Artemis and Moon Base programs as it becomes available.
Here's our video of the explosion at Launch Complex 36. It happened about 9 pm ET (0100 UTC) as Blue Origin was beginning a static fire test of its New Glenn rocket.
Watch live views: https://t.co/tm2wZQmAVD
All personnel are accounted for and safe. It’s too early to know the root cause but we’re already working to find it. Very rough day, but we’ll rebuild whatever needs rebuilding and get back to flying. It’s worth it.
A football field-sized American flag is being displayed on the Hoover Dam, alongside a light show, to celebrate the United States' 250th birthday.
It will stay on the historic dam, weather permitting, through July 4.