Editors' Picks
Printed in Space
If your star tracker breaks on the way to the moon, just hit Command P.
Area 51: Origins
America’s once-secret air base had humble beginnings.
Need for Speed
Airplanes with a mission: Fly faster.
The Invention of Flight
Inventors, dreamers, daredevils, charlatans: Aviation's early years had them all.
Vietnam Memoir
Stories from the war that shaped a generation.
Page 20 of 51
The Daily Planet Blog
The Astronauts’ Ride
Strange days for NASA's astronauts. Their numbers are down—from a peak of 150 in 2000 to just over 60 today. And they just lost their main vehicle, the space shuttle. [...]
September 09, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Remembering 9/11 at American History
Each day this week until September 11, the National Museum of American History is displaying artifacts recovered from the horrific crash of United Airlines Flight 93 a decade ago...
September 07, 2011
| By Roger Mola
The Daily Planet Blog
Duck!
Even helping Jeb Corliss looks scary. Here’s the master of the wingsuit doing his thing in close proximity to canyon walls, as seen from multiple camera angles.
September 05, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Going Once….The 1920 Pulitzer Race Trophy
From the Chicago Daily Tribune, November 28, 1920: "At last the pride of the Army air service, the Verville-Packard chasse biplane, has established its worth by romping ahead of thirty-four starters in the first Pulitzer...
September 02, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Destination: Moon or Asteroid? Part III: Resource Utilization Considerations
Part III: Resource Utilization Considerations In Part I and Part II of this series, I examined some of the operational and scientific issues associated with a human mission to a near Earth asteroid (NEO) and contrasted them with the simpler operations and greater scientific return of a mission to the Moon. To continue the discussion [...]
September 02, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Destination: Moon or Asteroid? Part II: Scientific Considerations
Part II: Scientific Considerations In my last post, I examined some of the operational considerations associated with a human mission to a near Earth asteroid and how it contrasted with the simpler, easier operations of lunar return. Here, I want to consider what we might do at this destination by focusing on the scientific activities [...]
September 01, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Daily Planet Blog
Pirates Ready to Board the Space Station
Ahoy there, Matey! Lately it seems that everywhere you turn, there’s a pirate. There are pirate-themed children’s books: Do Pirates Take Baths? and Pirates Don’t Change Diapers (honey, they don’t even change socks). There’s “International Talk Like a Pirate Day” on September 19, founded by Cap’n Slappy and Ol’ Chumbucket. Your car can sport a [...]
September 01, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The View from 30,000 Feet Blog
It Was a Dark and Stormy Night…
With Hurricane Irene safely behind us, I thought I’d share a story from my pre-airline days, about one of my scariest experiences as a pilot. From my logbook, here are my entries for a flight in November 1985. There is only a small space for remarks, so they’re not detailed. But they’re enough to remind [...]
August 31, 2011
| By Steve Satre
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Destination: Moon or Asteroid? Part I: Operational Considerations
Part I: Operational Considerations The current controversy over the direction of our national space program has many dimensions but most of the discourse has focused on the means (government vs. commercial launch vehicles) not the ends (destinations and activities). Near-Earth objects (NEO, i.e., asteroids) became the next destination for human exploration as an alternative to [...]
August 31, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Daily Planet Blog
Time Lapse From Orbit
Here’s some more creative space photography from Ron Garan, who’s currently on board the International Space Station. Garan and several other astronauts have teamed up for the Fragile Oasis project, to share the perspective of Earth that they see from orbit. This time-lapse sequence is apparently a sneak peek at a longer version. The Peter [...]
August 30, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Streaking Along at Mach 20
Initial reports from an August 11 test of DARPA’s Falcon HTV-2 hypersonic research vehicle were mixed. The glider launched successfully and separated from its Minotaur IV rocket over the Pacific, but engineers lost contact with the vehicle nine minutes into the flight, and the test ended prematurely with the vehicle self-destructing according to safety procedures. [...]
August 29, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Washington Shifts to the Left
According to computer modeling by NASA’s QuakeSim project, Tuesday’s 5.8-magnitude earthquake in central Virginia moved the city of Washington D.C. a whopping 0.02 inches “to the northwest and downward.” The small town of Mineral, near the quake’s epicenter, shifted about 2.8 inches.
August 25, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Live 3-D From Space
Got 3-D glasses? Then watch this. According to the European Space Agency, it’s the first live 3-D video ever streamed from space. NASA astronaut Ron Garan is both star and director, and he’s using ESA’s new Erasmus Recording Binocular (ERB-2) camera inside the European Columbus module. ESA plans to start up a 3-D channel on [...]
August 24, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Storm Coming
These days, with so many satellite sensors looking down constantly from orbit, and so many ways to slice their data, it’s hard to remember that hurricanes used to arrive without much warning. Hurricane Irene is currently bearing down on the Turks and Caicos Islands, and may hit the east coast of the United States by [...]
August 23, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
It’s Alive!
Robonaut 2—the humanoid robot soon to be tested as an astronaut’s helper on the International Space Station—is being powered up for the first time this morning (screen shot at left). Since arriving on the space shuttle last February, the robot has been sitting on its pedestal, lifeless. It won’t be commanded to move for a [...]
August 22, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Orville Mugs For His Birthday
You may have noticed the U.S. flag flying on a federal building today, but chances are it was on the pole yesterday, too. Or perhaps you woke feeling the need for “appropriate exercises to further stimulate interest in aviation,” which many of us consider part of our routine. At least today, though, you’ve got President [...]
August 19, 2011
| By Roger Mola
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Splat! Two Moons over Miami?
A recent paper suggests that early in the history of the Solar System, two sub-moons collided to create Earth’s present-day Moon. Several people have asked for my opinion on this new concept, so I will examine how this result was obtained, along with some general remarks on the nature of modern scientific research. Over 25 [...]
August 18, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Daily Planet Blog
Apollo in Afghanistan
Three legendary astronauts—Neil Armstrong, Jim Lovell, and Gene Cernan—were in Kabul, Afghanistan, yesterday, meeting with American service men and women as well as young Afghan Air Force trainees. From the NATO press release: “This is the best day of my life!” said Lt. Fatama Abteen, one of a small handful of female Afghan Air Force [...]
August 17, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Conan Knows Best
Who can forget the immortal question posed by the Mongol General in the 1982 classic Conan the Barbarian? Wait…don’t tell me you’ve forgotten? When the Mongol General bellows “What is best in life?” some (sissy) barbarian offers the following: “The open steppe, fleet horse, falcons at your wrist, and the wind in your hair.” (“The [...]
August 12, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Daily Planet Blog
Wait…What?
The impending retirement of the Lockheed U-2, which began flying for the Central Intelligence Agency in 1956, has been in the news for a while now. Yesterday, AirForceTimes.com reported that the Air Force, which incrementally took over U-2 ops starting in the mid-1960s, will phase out the beloved Dragon Lady by 2015, when the Northrop [...]
August 11, 2011
| By Pat Trenner
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