A thinner, sharper blade shape called roamx-0201, designed with simulations and wind tunnel tests, could let a future Mars helicopter fly up to 18.7 kilometers in one go.
SpaceAndSky news desk · 5 min read
Look upThe A-Carinid meteors are flaring again
Coming up in the sky
- OCT21-22Orionid meteor showerPeak night, 10-20 an hour under dark skies
- OCT26Full Moon: Hunter's MoonRises at sunset and stays up all night
- NOV13Planet paradeMercury, Venus, Mars and Jupiter before dawn, until Dec 4
- NOV16Mars and Jupiter meetAbout 1 degree apart in the morning sky
- NOV16-17Leonid meteor showerPeak night
- NOV20Mercury’s best morning viewFarthest from the Sun in our sky (20°): look before sunrise
Trending
Satellite night lights show Isaias darkening Pensacola, and the glow back within days
NASA's Black Marble HD imagery shows lights dropping sharply around Pensacola and U.S. Route…
Tiny asteroid 2025 UK9 to pass closer than the Moon on Oct. 31
NASA/JPL lists the small asteroid 2025 UK9 passing 314,648 km from Earth on Oct.…
Planets4 bright planetsSaturn most of the nightMercury after sunsetMars before dawnJupiter before dawnWhere to look ›MoonWaxing Gibbous72% lit, waxingRise and set times ›Northern lightsQuietKp 2.3 now, up to 3.7 in the next 24 hours.Your chance tonight ›Space stationNext passChoose your city to see when the ISS passes over you.Live map ›
- Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier may add up to twice the projected sea level rise
- Kutryk’s first spacewalks: Canada’s astronaut, robot arm and voice all play a part
- NASA’s first nuclear-powered Mars spacecraft gets its power-conversion partner
Next launches
Ceres-1S launchCeres-1S · Galactic Energy
We're Not Hawking AroundElectron · Rocket Lab
Starlink Group 15-15Falcon 9 Block 5 · SpaceX
Latest News
NASA’s next space relay network is in orbit, built by Viasat and SES instead of NASA
Two NASA-funded relay demonstrations reached low Earth orbit on a SpaceX rideshare. They will test commercial links meant to replace the agency's aging relay…
Uzbekistan joins the Artemis Accords, the 77th country to sign
Foreign Minister Bakhtiyor Saidov signed in Samarkand while U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was visiting, lifting the group from 8 founders…
Planet’s sharper Pelican-12 satellite reaches orbit with onboard AI and a data-relay test
Planet Labs says its second-generation Pelican-12 is in orbit after a SpaceX rideshare launch, with a 30 cm class camera goal, an…
Europe’s next weather satellite crosses the Atlantic under sail power
ESA's MetOp-SG-B1 weather satellite reached Europe's Spaceport on the wind-assisted ship Canopée and is due to fly on an Ariane 6 by…
Galileo’s next satellites get a signal ‘brain’ that can be rewritten in orbit
ESA says the first signal module for Galileo's second-generation satellites passed testing at Airbus and can be rewritten after launch to produce…
BepiColombo’s last weeks to Mercury: Capture on 21 November, then a split in two
Eight years after launch, ESA and JAXA's BepiColombo is close to Mercury, and the team marked the launch anniversary by describing the…
Featured
Northern lights forecast: How to read NOAA’s aurora maps, Kp and when to look
NOAA's 30-minute aurora map, the Kp index and a clear, dark sky decide whether you can…
Dragon’s 6,300 pounds of cargo opens a science rush on the space station
Five spacecraft are docked at the space station as the crew unloads SpaceX's CRS-35 Dragon and…
Starbase could host up to 456 Starship launches a year, FAA review says
The FAA has opened scoping for an environmental impact statement covering up to 456 Starship-Super Heavy…
Europe’s Moon drill, built to cut a metre down, passes a deployment test
ESA's Prospect drill, due to search for water ice near the lunar South Pole in 2027,…
Perseverance passes 28.10 miles on Mars, beating Opportunity’s record in a third of the time
NASA's Perseverance rover logged 28.10 miles (45.22 kilometers) on sol 2,006, passing Opportunity's 28.06 miles after…
SpaceX stock: Yes, SPCX trades on Nasdaq, and here is what the filings say
SpaceX has been public since June 12, 2026, under the Nasdaq ticker SPCX; this guide separates…
Leaving Earth soon
Full launch schedule ›- OCT21Galactic EnergyCeres-1S launchCeres-1Saround 03:00 UTC
- OCT21Rocket LabWe're Not Hawking AroundElectron · Earth Science07:00 UTC
- OCT21SpaceXStarlink Group 15-15Falcon 9 · Communications21:59 UTC
- OCT23China Aerospace Science and Technology CorporationLong March 6A launchLong March 6Aaround 10:00 UTC
Times in your time zone. Launch times change often; the schedule refreshes every few minutes.
Rocket Launches
Japan sets Mars moons mission launch for Oct. 19 UTC, with a Phobos sample due home in 2031
- Eight AI computing satellites ride Zhuque-2E in a 10-satellite launch
- Nine launches this week, led by Japan’s H3 sending MMX toward Mars’ moon Phobos
- Gilmour Space finds oxidizer pump faults behind Eris rocket’s 14-second flight
Missions
Curiosity spots the first twilight clouds of a new Martian autumn
- A year in a 3D-printed Mars habitat: NASA’s CHAPEA crew nears the exit
- A decade at Mars: Europe’s gas-sniffing orbiter has found no methane, and plenty more
- Sentinel-3C sees Hurricane Rachel in its first temperature-radiometer image
Universe
ELT mirror passes the halfway mark: 931 segments, nearly 500 already in Chile
- Treble Clef radio shape traced to a black hole outburst and a cluster collision
- ALMA finds rings and gaps in compact planet-forming disks
- Hubble images a dust-lined galaxy, one of 111 done in a 260-galaxy survey
Top categories
Guides
How to see it, when it happens, what it means
Orionid meteor shower 2026: Peak night of October 21-22 and how the Moon affects it
The Orionids peak overnight October 21-22, 2026, but a bright waxing gibbous Moon hides the fainter meteors until…
Mars facts: How far away it is, how cold it gets, its weather and the search for life
Mars is a cold, dry, dusty world half Earth's width, between 54.6 and 401.4 million km away, where…
Saturn’s moons: How many are there, and which are most interesting?
NASA lists 293 confirmed moons for Saturn. Titan and Enceladus stand out, thanks to Cassini and Huygens.
Mars rovers today: Where Perseverance and Curiosity are and their latest pictures
Two NASA rovers still work on Mars: Perseverance, which just broke Opportunity's driving record, and Curiosity, drilling on…
The universe doesn’t stand still
Latest discoveries & stories
NASA’s launch engineers swap rules of thumb for a reusable simulation template
Engineers at NASA's Launch Services Program used a decades-old commercial simulation tool in a new way to predict launch shock…
Euclid, a galaxy-mapping telescope, finds its first new comet by accident
ESA's Euclid telescope, built to map galaxies, caught a streak in its images that turned out to be a new…
ESA’s Moon line-up runs from landing cameras to a drill for water ice
ESA's new overview covers instruments and demonstrations on landers from several partners, aimed at safer landings, lunar water ice, and…
Station’s solar upgrade nears its finish: The last two roll-out arrays are due outside
NASA says the eight roll-out solar arrays will raise the station's power by more than 160 kW, and the final…
When is the next solar eclipse? Dates and viewing regions
The 2026 total eclipse has passed; the next is an annular eclipse on Feb. 6, 2027, and the next total…
Meteor shower tonight: Every major peak from October 2026 to August 2027
The Orionids peak October 21-22, 2026, and the Geminids follow December 13-14. Peak nights through August 2027, with moon conditions…
Marshall legend Stephen Cash returns as center director after a decade away
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman has picked a veteran propulsion and safety engineer who left the agency in 2016 to run…
Artemis II’s heat shield lost far less material than on Artemis I: 9 spots versus 103
NASA's analysis found Orion's heat shield performed as expected on Artemis II: pieces of its charred outer layer broke off…