On Dec. 20, 2019 at 6:36 a.m. EST, Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner will liftoff atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The unpiloted Orbital Flight Test to the International Space Station will be the first for the company’s spacecraft as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket has lifted off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station carrying a Dragon spacecraft on the company’s 19th Commercial Resupply Services mission to the International Space Station.
When a person is called a “rocket scientist,” it can be referring to someone who supports space exploration, or it can simply mean he or she is very intelligent. A “rock star” usually refers to a member of a successful musical band or someone highly renowned in a particular field. Dr. Brian May could be considered both.
In an address to Congress in 1961, President John F. Kennedy challenged the nation to “land a man on the Moon and return him safely to Earth” before the end of the decade. With the flight of Apollo 12, 50 years ago, NASA achieved that goal a second time.
NASA’s new Ionospheric Connection Explorer, or ICON, satellite will provide scientists and meteorologists with a better understanding of the dynamic zone high in the atmosphere where terrestrial weather meets weather in space. This is the area through which radio communications and GPS signals travel. Changes in weather can effect both.
Building on the success of the first piloted Gemini mission, NASA prepared to launch its most ambitions flight to date – Gemini IV. During June 1965, two astronauts would not only stay in orbit four days, one would attempt America’s first spacewalk. It was another example of advancing technology enabling new avenues of exploration.
When events happen anywhere in the world, from sporting activities to natural disasters, television is there. Images are live, in color and in high definition. But that it is available at all is possible with satellites in Earth orbit. While global TV coverage is common today, it is a technology born the day Telstar was launched more than half a century ago.
Heading into the Labor Day holiday weekend, weather forecasters are keeping a close watch on Hurricane Dorian. A member of the Expedition 60 crew aboard the International Space Station took this photograph on Thursday, Aug. 29, 2019. Dorian was passing the Dominican Republic, seen in the foreground.
The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex captures the excitement of the historic lunar landing in their revamped Apollo/Saturn V Center. This feature will focus on the new exhibits at that facility that includes a 1969 period living room recreating what life was like a half-century ago.
Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the first Moon landing, the U.S. Postal Service issued two stamps marking the event. The first day of issue ceremony took place July 19, 2019 at the Apollo/Saturn V Center at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.