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Events in space don’t often unfold like they do in the movies.
But spaceship travel can provide awe-inspiring sights and surprising moments more spectacular than fiction.
SpaceX lined up its mega moon rocket and Starship capsule on the launch pad for its fourth test flight this week, and the exciting show did not disappoint.
The uncrewed Starship capsule went on an orbital excursion before making a controlled re-entry and putting its heat shield through its paces in the high temperatures of Earth’s atmosphere. Ultimately, the sturdy ship burned up during the expected landing and splashed into the Indian Ocean.
Milestones achieved during the flight demonstrate the eventual end of the Starship reusable, which will be useful as the SpaceX team intends to send their vehicle on trips to the moon, Mars and beyond.
Meanwhile, SpaceX’s rival, Boeing, made history on the first crewed flight of its Starliner spacecraft.
Chris O’Meara/AP
Boeing’s Starliner capsule lifts off atop an Atlas V rocket Wednesday from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
After liftoff on Wednesday, the Starliner and its first human crew headed for the International Space Station.
But the flight was not without problems, including helium leaks and thruster failures.
After dealing with potential mission control setbacks, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunny Williams received jubilant welcomes aboard the station Thursday afternoon. The astronaut duo will now spend the next eight days on the station.
“We’re happy as can be to be in space,” Williams said. “It just doesn’t get much better.”
Giant snake motifs dominate a collection of ancient rock engravings found in Venezuela and Colombia, believed to be among the largest ever found.
The researchers suggest that the monumental works, which also include human figures, geometric figures and birds, served as boundary markers of the territories the engravers inhabited.
One of the snake engravings is about 138 feet (42 meters) long, which may be the largest single rock engraving recorded in the world, according to the researchers.
“One could be a warning sign — you’re in our backyard, you better behave yourself. The other can be an identity marker – you’re in our backyard, you’re among friends,” said lead study author Dr Philip Riris, a senior lecturer at Bournemouth University in England.
“But I don’t think they had one goal, so it could easily be both.”
Courtesy Denver Museum of Nature and Science
The family that discovered the dinosaurs returns to the site in July 2023 for the dig, including (clockwise from top left) Sam Fisher, Emmaline Fisher, Daniel Fisher, Liam Fisher, Kaiden Madsen and Jessin Fisher.
A family hike through the North Dakota badlands in 2022 led to a major scientific discovery — and soon a rare dinosaur find will be on display at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.
Sam Fisher, his sons Jessin and Liam, then 10 and 7, and their cousin Kaiden Madsen, who was 9, noticed what looked like a dinosaur leg sticking out of a rock, so they consulted a researcher at the museum .
Initial excavations suggest it is a juvenile Tyrannosaurus Rex and the fossil will be on display at the museum from June 21.
Experts at the museum will determine the true nature of the fossil as they clean it, and the public can watch the entire process in real time.
Geologists have found the first evidence of fresh water on Earth locked in ancient crystal grains dating back about 4 billion years, much older than expected.
Previously, researchers thought that at that time the Earth was completely covered by a global ocean, rather than having dry land.
A new study suggests that Earth’s water cycle was already at work then.
The finding means that, geologically speaking, the recipe for the beginning of life existed shortly after the formation of our world.
Jacob C. Blockland
An artist’s reconstruction of life shows Genyornis newtoni, the last of the mihirungs, at the water’s edge.
About 50,000 years ago, giant “thunderbirds” that were taller than humans and weighed hundreds of kilograms lived in the forests and grasslands of Australia.
But these flightless birds, known as mihirungs, have been hard to find in the fossil record—until now.
When researchers discovered a skull belonging to the species known as Genyornis newtoni, they set out to create a digital reconstruction of the creature.
The final product revealed the massive thunderbird to have a face not unlike a strange goose with a powerful muscular jaw.
Go on a curious journey with these stories:
— Engineers have determined a new plan that will allow NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope to continue making mind-blowing observations of space after the observatory repeatedly went into “safe mode” this year.
— The world’s largest collection of fossilized feces is now on display at the Poozeum in Williams, Arizona, where visitors can get “first-hand insight into the diets, behaviors and environments of ancient creatures,” said owner George Frandsen.
— An intricately decorated blue room is the latest find at the archaeological site in Pompeii, and researchers believe it served as an ancient Roman sanctuary.
— Botanists have found that the cells of a small fern contain more than 50 times more DNA than those of humans, making it the largest known genome, according to new research.
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