Space.com
• Hanneke Weitering, Tariq Malik
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard a Titan 4B rocket on Oct. 15, 1997. The mission was designed to explore Saturn and its moons, beginning a journey that would take seven years to reach the planet.
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NASA is nearing completion of its conversion of a Boeing 777 from a commercial passenger aircraft into a flying laboratory. The aircraft is scheduled to begin its first scientific research mission in January 2027.
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NASA’s Cassini spacecraft lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard a Titan 4B rocket on Oct. 15, 1997. The mission was designed to explore Saturn and its moons, beginning a journey that would take seven years to reach the planet.
NASA’s SkyFall helicopters are expected to extend exploration beyond areas accessible to ground vehicles, covering distance quickly and reaching terrain that may otherwise be difficult or impossible to examine. Scientists say the aircraft could give researchers views of parts of Mars not previously seen.
NASA principal systems engineer Shatel Bhakta discusses the work needed between now and 2028 to advance the agency’s Moon Base plans. The conversation focuses on the incremental steps required to move toward a future lunar base.
NASA’s SPHEREx observatory has taken the “fingerprints” of brown dwarfs across the nearby cosmic neighborhood. Too massive to be traditional gas planets but too small to sustain the nuclear fusion that defines stars, these objects cool and shrink over time while spinning faster as they age.
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Voyager Technologies says its Griffin-1 lunar lander has completed acceptance testing at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The spacecraft is planned to launch in late 2026 on a mission to the Moon’s south pole, marking a readiness milestone ahead of its scheduled flight.
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SpaceX’s CRS-35 mission, its 35th flight under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services program, sent a cargo Dragon toward the International Space Station. The spacecraft was due to rendezvous with the station on Oct. 15 after a two-day journey, carrying more than 6,000 pounds of cargo.
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A NASA official says the agency is staffing up and accelerating work on its first Venus missions in a generation. The available report does not identify the missions, schedule or scale of the hiring, leaving the program’s specific milestones unclear.
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