From afar, the whole thing looks like an eagle. A closer look at the Eagle Nebula, however, shows the bright region is actually a window into the center of a larger dark shell of dust. Through this window, a brightly-lit workshop appears where a whole open cluster of stars is being formed. In this cavity, […]
What would it be like to fly free in space? At about 100 meters from the cargo bay of the space shuttle Challenger, Bruce McCandless II was living the dream — floating farther out than anyone had ever been before. Guided by a Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), astronaut McCandless, pictured, was floating free in space. […]
Our fair planet sports a curved, sunlit crescent against the black backdrop of space in this stunning photograph. From the unfamiliar perspective, the Earth is small and, like a telescopic image of a distant planet, the entire horizon is completely within the field of view. Enjoyed by crews on board the International Space Station, only […]
Clouds of smoke billow out over the surrounding area as the uncrewed Skylab 1/Saturn V space vehicle launches from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on May 14, 1973. via NASA https://ift.tt/ICwurVO
Grains of cosmic dust streaked through night skies in early May. Swept up as planet Earth plowed through the debris streams left behind by periodic Comet Halley, the annual meteor shower is known as the Eta Aquarids. This year, the Eta Aquarids peak was visually hampered by May’s bright Full Moon, though. But early morning […]
A team member from the Environmental Management Branch at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center works to remove a mangrove seedling deposited by tropical winds on the shoreline of KARS Park at Kennedy in this image from April 12, 2023. via NASA https://ift.tt/qmvsIPO
Fomalhaut is a bright star, a 25 light-year voyage from planet Earth in the direction of the constellation Piscis Austrinus. Astronomers first noticed Fomalhaut’s excess infrared emission in the 1980s. Space and ground-based telescopes have since identified the infrared emission’s source as a disk of dusty debris surrounding the hot, young star related to the […]
Vance I. Oyama holds a readout from the gas chromatograph in the life detection laboratory at NASA’s Ames Research Center in this picture from April 22, 1965. via NASA https://ift.tt/nrFxbfj
For ten years the stargazer dreamed of taking a picture like this. The dreamer knew that the White Desert National Park in Egypt’s Western Desert is a picturesque place hosting numerous chalk formations sculpted into surreal structures by a sandy wind. The dreamer knew that the sky above could be impressively dark on a clear […]
Spacewalkers Stephen Bowen and Sultan Alneyadi are pictured in their Extravehicular Mobility Units, or spacesuits, exiting the International Space Station’s Quest airlock and beginning a spacewalk. via NASA https://ift.tt/RSLDoUT