A secret satellite was launched into space today. We don’t know just what it’s doing in space. But! We can see in these pictures exactly how it got there: aboard an incredibly fast rocket.
For over 50 years the Pentagon has had early warning satellites in orbit aimed at spotting launches of ballistic missiles, especially the big intercontinental kind that can fly around the globe in less than 30 minutes and bring about nuclear Armageddon. Recently, these satellites have made news for their “secondary…
Early this morning, the U.S. Air Force tweeted that today marks the 50th anniversary of their first orbiting satellite being launched into space. The satellite referenced in the tweet, known as OV1-2, carried a suite of instruments to better understand the space environment. But was it really the Air Force’s first…
Humans have managed to put a whole bunch of stuff in orbit around the Earth, and keeping track of it all is a serious endeavor. Visualizing the sheer number of objects we’ve managed to send into space also helps us appreciate just how vast space really is. These amazing maps illustrate the cloud of man-made objects…
Yesterday morning at 6:18 a.m. EST an Atlas V rocket with a cutting-edge Navy communications satellite onboard was launched out of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, lighting up the sky in a most otherworldly fashion. People in Miami in particular got an amazingly surreal view of the launch, with the videos below to…
Part of a rocket engine crashes through the roof of a house in northeast China’s Shanxi province early Friday morning.
The sad state of America’s bridges is a perennial topic amongst engineers and a regular talking point for politicians, all of whom have a plan to fix them. An interesting post from the European Space Agency shows how one of the best tools for repair is actually hanging out in Low Earth Orbit.
In an unprecedented disclosure from the DoD, we have finally been told at least something in regards to what the USAF’s secretive X-37B spaceplane’s goals are for its upcoming flight. Among other things, it will test an exotic form of thruster propulsion that could have huge implications for future space development.
After pimping Amazon delivery drones like an infomercial and throwing the F-35 program the ultimate softball, not to mention a series of other embarrassing screw ups, it looked like 60 Minutes was losing its luster. Yet last night’s extra-long segment on USAF Space Command and anti-satellite warfare was well worth…
How many satellites would you say are currently orbiting the Earth? A few hundred? Maybe a thousand? No: There are about 3,700 satellites hurtling through orbit above us—so when one of them "breaks up," it's a big deal.
The Russian Ministry of Defense has announced that its only geostationary early-warning satellite — the Cosmos-2479, launched two years ago — is no longer functioning. With just two other observation satellites left in orbit, the chances of a false-alarm nuclear attack just escalated.
A Brazilian fisherman floating down the Uriandeua river in northern Brazil bumped into perhaps the last thing you'd expect to find in the Amazon: a huge chunk of metal that the UK Space Agency says came from the launch of Europe's largest telecom satellite last year. How in the hell did it get there?
Today, we're hearing yet another report about a satellite that has spotted "potential objects," which might be floating wreckage from the vanished Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Today, those images come from France. Yesterday, the images came from China. Last week it was an Australian bird making discoveries.
A lot of Cold War-era Area 51 documents have been declassified and National Geographic has discovered a rather low-tech method the US Military used to fool the Russians. It involved cardboard, the occasional heater and infrared satellites.
