Blog Archive

Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Spirit Remains Silent, Opportunity Pushes on to Endeavour

Posted by A.J.S. Rayl on 2010/10/31 12:00 CDT

For the Mars Exploration Rovers, October was a lot like September, which was a lot like August: Spirit continued hibernating at Gusev Crater or so it appears since the rover didn't phone home; and Opportunity picked up the pace to Endeavour Crater again, setting new driving records and marking more milestones along the way.

Arecibo images show Hartley 2 is elongated

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/29 11:33 CDT

Comet Hartley 2, the target for Deep Impact's close flyby (now just six days away!) made its closest approach to Earth on October 20, at a distance of 17.7 million kilometers.

Pretty picture: Three moons of Saturn

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/29 12:08 CDT

The Cassini Raw Images Website always offers rewards to the browser. This evening I found the raw images necessary to create this color composite, showing the hazy orange moon Titan, the mid-sized icy moon Dione, and the tiny rock Prometheus all at the same time.

In which I report on w00tstock and wonder how to get nerds more excited about real space exploration

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/28 12:19 CDT

(I promise that this post will get around to the subject of space exploration in a couple of paragraphs.)

Solar system exploration missions in November 2010

What's up in the solar system in November 2010

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/27 02:37 CDT

The major event of the month will be, of course, Deep Impact's flyby of small comet Hartley 2, which happens at 13:50 UTC on November 4. But there's some other things to take note of.

Timeline for the Phobos Sample Return Mission (Phobos Grunt)

Posted by Louis D. Friedman on 2010/10/27 12:13 CDT

In mid-October, I attended the First Moscow Solar System Symposium. Its focus was mostly on Phobos science and plans for next year's launch of the Phobos Sample Return Mission (also known as Phobos-Grunt), on which The Planetary Society will be flying the Living Interplanetary Flight Experiment.

An update to the Cassini Tour Page

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/27 11:24 CDT

Where's the Cassini Saturn orbiter going to be in the next week -- or hundred weeks? It's all already planned out.

Holy cow, is it really the 175th Carnival of Space already?

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/26 10:18 CDT

175th Carnival of Space!? That means the Carnival of Space has been going on for nearly 4 years. Or just about 2 Mars years. Pretty amazing.

A couple of tidbits from today's Deep Impact preview briefing

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/26 03:01 CDT

Today was the press briefing that previewed the upcoming Deep Impact flyby of Hartley 2.

DPS 2010: Pluto and Charon opposition surges, Nix and Hydra masses, Pluto and Eris compositions

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/10/25 11:18 CDT

An awful lot of the talks in the Pluto session on Tuesday morning, October 5, at the Division of Planetary Sciences meeting spent more time focusing on how bad weather conditions were during the astronomers' attempts to view Pluto as it occulted background stars than they did on any measurements or science that came out from the data.

Bill Nye shows how the solar sail deploys

A Marathon Day Two at the USA Science & Engineering Festival

Posted by Susan Lendroth on 2010/10/24 10:41 CDT

Day Two of the USA Science & Engineering Festival, and it started with a game of "dodge the marathoners."

Lightsail 1 Lands on National Mall

Posted by Susan Lendroth on 2010/10/23 10:03 CDT

The Planetary Society showcased our solar sail mission, Lightsail 1, at day one of the USA Science & Engineering Festival on Washington DC's National Mall.