Explore Worlds
Find Life
Defend Earth
All
All
Sun
Mercury
Venus
Earth
Mars
Jupiter
Saturn
Uranus
Neptune
Small BodiesStories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
Deflecting the flames of a monster rocket
Work continues to prepare Kennedy Space Center's launch pad 39B for the Space Launch System, as a flame trench deflector originally built for the Space Shuttle is removed.
Planetary Radio: Don't Step in That Puddle!
The Planetary Science Institute's Amanda Hendrix is the guest for our July 1 episode. She finds water in the least likely places, including Luna.
PlanetVac Project Underway
The Planetary Society's PlanetVac project with Honeybee Robotics is now fully underway. Here we provide a just released statement by Honeybee, and an introduction to this lab test of a new planetary surface sampling system.
IRIS safely in orbit, ready to eye sun's atmosphere
IRIS, the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph spacecraft, was launched from Orbital Science Corporation's Stargazer carrier aircraft over the Pacific Ocean at 7:27 p.m PDT.
We Need Space-Based Detection of Threats, but NASA Shouldn't Pay for It
Early detection is a crucial step in preventing or mitigating threats from space, but it's not NASA's job.
Stationkeeping in Mars orbit
It had never occurred to me to think about geostationary satellites in Mars orbit before reading a new paper by Juan Silva and Pilar Romero. The paper shows that it takes a lot more work to maintain a stationary orbit at an arbitrary longitude at Mars than it does at Earth.
What would Earth's skies look like with Saturn's rings?
Illustrator and author Ron Miller visualizes what we would see in our skies if Saturn’s majestic rings circled the Earth.
Worlds in Collision
Meet some worlds that were nearly shattered, literally.
Russians start workweek with stroll outside ISS
Cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Alexander Misurkin performed a six-and-a-half hour spacewalk outside the International Space Station on Monday.
How radar really works: The steps involved before getting an image
Arecibo Observatory is known for its 1000-foot diameter telescope and its appearances in Goldeneye and Contact. Aside from battling Bond villains and driving red diesel Jeeps around the telescope (grousing at the site director about the funding status of projects is optional), several hundred hours a year of telescope time at Arecibo go toward radar studies of asteroids.
Astrophotographer captures 'Heavenly Palace' transiting the Sun
Astrophotographer Thierry Legault captured a striking image set of Chinese spacecraft Tiangong 1 and Shenzhou 10 transiting the Sun.
Programming Note: Off for 3 weeks, June 23 to July 14
Hi folks, just a note to let you all know I am off for a 3-week vacation.
Is Opportunity near Lunokhod's distance record? Not as close as we used to think!
A few weeks ago, a press release from the Opportunity mission celebrated Opportunity's surpassing of the previous NASA off-world driving record. That record was set in December 1972 by the Apollo 17 astronauts aboard their Lunar Roving Vehicle. They seem very close to Lunokhod 2's stated 37-kilometer driving record, but hold your horses -- we now know Lunokhod went longer than we thought.
Welcome to new staff
Just a quick post to announce that The Planetary Society's staff is expanding! I am so excited to be able to say that.
If we started today, how long would it take to get to Mars? With this budget, never.
The House of Representatives held a hearing today to discuss their proposed NASA authorization bill, which would fund Planetary Science, cut Earth Science, forbid asteroid retrieval, and command NASA to pursue a path to Mars via the Moon.
Enormously detailed photo of Kasei Valles from Mars Express
ESA celebrated the tenth anniversary of Mars Express' launch with a several-day science meeting during which they issued lots of press releases and numerous spectacular photos. My favorite of them all is this enormous image of Kasei Valles on Mars.
A Little Moonlight
From far away, or from so near you could almost touch it, the moon is beautiful.
Woohoo! The LEGO Curiosity rover is going to be a kit!
The awesome LEGO Curiosity rover designed by Stephen Pakbaz is going to go into production!
Goodnight, Herschel Space Observatory
The European Space Agency’s Herschel Space Observatory received its final commands yesterday, having depleted the liquid helium required to make its infrared observations.