spacecraft

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Russia's Failed Mars Probe Will Crash to Earth

Phobos-Grunt, carrying toxic fuel, will come down in mid-January

(Newser) - A failed Russian spacecraft will plummet back to Earth next month, and more than two dozen chunks of it could make impact, along with a load of toxic fuel. The expected crash date of the Phobos-Grunt probe is mid-January, and nearly 400 pounds of fragments could survive re-entry, reports Fox...

Russian Craft's Quest: Grab Martian Moondust

Takes tiny creatures along for the ride

(Newser) - A Russian spacecraft will depart for a Martian moon as soon as tomorrow. Its mission: to land on Phobos and collect soil to bring home to Earth, Scientific American reports. Researchers aim to learn about the moon’s development and composition. And should they discover ice or hydrated rocks, the...

Virgin Spaceship Veers Out of Control

Test flight turns dramatic for SpaceShipTwo as Spaceport opens

(Newser) - SpaceShipTwo's most recent test flight turned into a more extensive test than the private spacecraft's makers had bargained for. A malfunction sent the Virgin Galactic spacecraft briefly hurtling out of control—but then its three-person crew stabilized it for a safe landing, MSNBC reports. The glitch allowed Virgin...

NASA-Backed 'Space Taxi' to Fly Next Year

Dream Chaser's first test flight scheduled for summer 2012

(Newser) - With the space shuttles retired, NASA currently has to rely on the Russians to ferry astronauts and cargo to and from the International Space Station. But it hopes to be able to hail a taxi soon. Dream Chaser, one of four "space taxis" being developed by private industry with...

NASA Snaps First Shots of Mercury From Orbit

Future photos to reveal planet's unseen regions

(Newser) - A NASA spacecraft has captured the first photo of Mercury taken from orbit. The first of yesterday’s 363 images, shown at left, show the planet’s south pole. The gray surface is covered with craters, including a 53-mile-wide one known as Debussy. Other photos from the $464 million Messenger...

NASA Retires 'Stardust' Comet Hunter
 NASA Retires Comet Hunter 
Mar 25, 2011 1:57 AM CDT

NASA Retires Comet Hunter

Stardust spacecraft will burn out, then fade away

(Newser) - NASA's comet-hunting Stardust spacecraft ended its 12-year career with a final experiment. The probe, which has traveled billions of miles since its launch in 1999, was ordered to burn the remaining fuel in its tanks, allowing engineers to calculate how much was left and improve fuel consumption models, Popular Science...

Canadians Aim to Send Hockey Pucks to Moon

Team seeks Google Lunar X Prize

(Newser) - A team of Canadians is aiming to send a few hockey pucks up to join Neil Armstrong's golf balls on the surface on the moon. The Canadians are one of 29 teams from 17 countries competing to win some of the $30 million in prize money Google is offering to...

Paper Plane Launched Into Space

British team achieves world first

(Newser) - A team of British amateurs successfully launched—and recovered—a spacecraft made of nothing but paper and straw. The paper plane, which had a 3-foot wingspan, was sent 17 miles into the atmosphere using a helium balloon, the BBC reports. It captured images from space with a miniature camera as...

Virgin Galactic Spacecraft Makes First Solo Flight

Private spacecraft on course to take paying passengers to space

(Newser) - The world's first manned commercial spacecraft has reached a major milestone. Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo was released from the mothership and completed its first solo glide flight over the Mojave Desert yesterday, Wired reports. The craft, which is undergoing rigorous testing ahead of plans to carry paying customers to space and...

Spacecraft Spins Out Approaching Space Station

Russian cargo ship is stocked with fresh food and clothes for ISS crew

(Newser) - A Russian spacecraft lost control and missed docking with the International Space Station today, floating past the station and into space. Progress 38 is an unstaffed cargo ship filled with stores of fresh food, clothes, and equipment for the ISS crew. Progress' autopilot somehow lost its navigational lock on the...

Up for Grabs: Free* Space Shuttle *$29M Postage & Handling Required

Museums vie for soon-to-be-retired spacecraft

(Newser) - NASA is preparing to give away its space shuttle fleet to institutions willing to cough up $28.8 million per spacecraft for cleaning and transportation. Atlantis will be retired after returning from its final mission today and some two dozen museums and other institutions around the country are vying to...

Zombie Satellite Set to Wreak Havoc

Unresponsive satellite drifting into trouble

(Newser) - Telecommunications customers who suffer service problems later this month may have an unstoppable space zombie to blame. Intelsat's Galaxy 15 satellite has become a "zombiesat"—an industry term for a failed satellite—and is slowly drifting toward the orbit of other satellites while carrying a still-functioning load of...

Renegade Space Balloon Creams SUV

Bystanders narrowly escape as Outback launch goes wrong

(Newser) - Bystanders at a botched space balloon launch in the Australian Outback say they're lucky to be alive. Strong winds caused the giant balloon to break from its mooring as it was filled with air. The attached car-sized gondola full of expensive scientific equipment smashed into an SUV and narrowly missed...

What Is the Air Force Doing With This Spaceship?

Unmanned X-37 will be launched this month for indefinite time in orbit

(Newser) - This month the Air Force will send the X-37—a sort of unmanned mini-space shuttle salvaged from a scrapped NASA project—into orbit, but its intentions, what the X-37 is designed to do, and why it rescued a project NASA planned to ax in 2006 remain mysteriously unclear. The Air...

Branson Unveils SpaceShipTwo
 Branson Unveils SpaceShipTwo 
Dec 8, 2009 1:21 AM CST

Branson Unveils SpaceShipTwo

Billionaire unveils first tourist spacecraft

(Newser) - Virgin Galactic chief Richard Branson yesterday rolled out the vessel he hopes will soon take thousands of people into space. Some 300 clients who already paid a deposit on the entrepreneur's $200,000 space travel tickets were on hand as SpaceShipTwo was unveiled at a hangar in Mojave, Calif., CNN...

We'll Ride Nuke to Mars: Russia
 We'll Ride Nuke to Mars: Russia 
Oct 30, 2009 12:33 PM CDT

We'll Ride Nuke to Mars: Russia

Space program plans elusive nuclear spaceship by 2012

(Newser) - The Russians are planning to ride a $600 million nuclear-powered spaceship to Mars, and they say they may begin construction by 2012. “It’s a very serious project, and we need to find the money,” president Dmitry Medvedev says. Small nuclear reactors and batteries have long powered satellites,...

Craft Find Traces of Water on Moon

Widespread, but still unclear how much

(Newser) - There is indeed some water on the moon, with three different spacecraft seemingly putting to rest the scientific school of thought that the orb is bone-dry. Friday’s issue of the journal Science cites “unambiguous evidence” of either water (two hydrogen molecules and one oxygen) or hydroxyl (one of...

Key Component of Earth Life Found in Comet

(Newser) - An amino acid necessary to the construction of proteins, and therefore life on Earth, has been found in a comet that passes through our solar system, Space.com reports. Glycine was found in samples picked up by a NASA spacecraft in 2004. The discovery suggests that life’s building blocks...

Lava Spotted on Mercury
 Lava Spotted on Mercury 
Oct 30, 2008 2:39 AM CDT

Lava Spotted on Mercury

NASA flybys uncover planet's secrets

(Newser) - A spacecraft studying the planet Mercury has discovered evidence of enormous volcanic eruptions. The scale of the volcanic activity has astonished scientists, according to the National Geographic News. Images from the Messenger spacecraft reveal 3,600 cubic miles of solid lava inside a single crater—enough to drown the entire...

UFO Video Raises a Fuss in Turkey

Objects spotted near Istanbul during 4-month stretch 'serious challenge to science'

(Newser) - Video taken of strange objects in the night sky over Turkey has been deemed authentic—well, at least by UFO researchers. A night watchman shot the video over multiple nights earlier this year, and it shows hovering craft and strange constellations of lights, the Sun reports. A self-described expert who...

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