spacecraft
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Russian Space Junk Came Alarmingly Close to Smashing Into NASA Satellite
That was a really close one. Further analysis of a near-miss collision between two satellites in space revealed that they came even closer to one another than initially believed, raising more alarm over the growing danger of space debris. In late February, NASA’s TIMED spacecraft and the defunct Russian Cosmos 2221 nearly avoided crashing into…
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NASA Set to Launch Solar Sail for Sunlight-Propelled Space Travel
NASA’s experimental solar sail is ready to take flight in Earth orbit, using the pressure of sunlight to test a new way of propulsion through the cosmos. The Advanced Composite Solar Sail System(ACS3) is scheduled for launch on Tuesday, April 23 on board Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket from New Zealand. The mission will use composite…
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Everything We Noticed During Starship’s Remarkable Third Test Flight
Starship flew faster and longer than ever before on Thursday, but with both stages lost during the mission, there’s clearly much more progress to be made. Here’s our detailed breakdown of Integrated Flight Test 3 and what happens next. The megarocket, standing 400 feet tall (121 meters), took off at 9:25 a.m. ET yesterday from…
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NASA Is Still Fighting to Save Its Historic Voyager 1 Spacecraft
For more than 45 years, the Voyager 1 spacecraft has been cruising through the cosmos, crossing the boundary of our solar system to become the first human-made object to venture to interstellar space. Iconic in every regard, Voyager 1 has delivered groundbreaking data on Jupiter and Saturn, and captured the loneliest image of Earth. But…