Earth’s host star can be quite temperamental, compelling astronomers to launch satellites and probes on missions to keep a close watch of the Sun’s massive flares. But instruments pointed towards the Sun have a tendency to acquire cloudy vision as the result of a mysterious layer that’s puzzled scientists for years.
In September 2022, NASA deliberately crashed its DART spacecraft into a small asteroid some 6.8 million miles from Earth, in an attempt to redirect its trajectory as a test-run for any future rock that might threaten Earth.
“I went silent,” Dwayne Fernandes told me. “I shut the hell up.” Fernandes, a double-amputee since the age of 11, was recounting his experience in weightlessness, having recently participated in a parabolic flight alongside a disabled research crew. The zero-g flight threw him into a deeply contemplative state, and as…
Six radar observations made of an asteroid swinging by our planet have revealed an unusually oblong space rock. The object is three times as long as it is wide—an irregular shape, as far as asteroids are concerned.
An asteroid is on its way to Earth, but don’t worry—the end is not here. The asteroid, dubbed 2023 BU, is about the size of a box truck and is not projected to impact our planet during its flyby on Thursday. However, it will be “one of the closest approaches by a known near-Earth object ever recorded,” according to a…
