Jonathan M.

The first model of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) reusable rocket demonstrator Themis standing on its launch pad in Kiruna, Sweden, with a cloudy sky in the background.

Standing on its own four legs🦿🦿🦿🦿

@esa.int's reusable rocket demonstrator Themis is standing tall.

Themis will demonstrate rocket stage recovery and reuse technologies and the first model arrived at the Esrange Space Center launch pad in Sweden 🇸🇪 over the summer.

NOAA-15 1800UTC pass

One of the last days of NOAA APT transmissions, as NOAA-15 will be decommissioned this week 😢
That good ol' satellite has been transmitting for all my life, though, so I suppose it has earned its rest.

March 6th: the French CSO-3 reconnaissance satellite.
The third launch is currently planned for August, with the first MetOp-SG weather satellite.

Your criticisms are absolutely valid, but a cadence close to the advertised 12 launches per year can not be expected in the first year of operations.

Except that it has launched since

Ariane 6 has now been active for 1 year!

Since the shadows at the south pole exhibit a "swirl" shape, it is indeed likely that the full map of the moon is a mosaic of pictures obtained by a single orbiting spacecraft over the course of a month or so, to obtain consistent lighting everywhere on the texture.

Seems like a rendering to me. The shadows near the pole and the fuzziness of the terminator are very odd.

Internet Roadtrip Let's take a streetview roadtrip

Internet Roadtrip is my favorite thing on the internet right now—it’s basically Twitch Plays Google Street View. They started in Boston, spent several weeks on a quest to cross the Canadian border, and are now exploring New Brunswick. neal.fun/internet-roa...

firefly alpha flt-006 second stage nozzle having fell off

jaxa's SLIM lunar lander, after an engine nozzle fell off

ula's vulcan vc2 in the middle of, you guessed, losing a nozzle

starship flight 8, missing two different nozzles

im assembling a team

For your visual enjoyment. The last set was in the Finished Goods Warehouse in Decatur. These are at the Cape.

I could not have said this any better. Rockets are cool but what's the point of having them if we're not going to explore other worlds by using them? It's what we DO with these machines that matter. The funds ARE there,gang. Let's continue to be the driving force in space science.

Inaugural Isar Aerospace Spectrum Launch Set for Late March An Andøya Space notice has revealed that the launch of the inaugural flight of the Isar Aerospace Spectrum rocket is set for 20 to 30 March.

An Andøya Space notice has revealed that the launch of the inaugural flight of the Isar Aerospace Spectrum rocket is set for 20 to 30 March.
europeanspaceflight.com/inaugural-is...

That round Starship will just be rolling 10km downhill 😭

Seems like this is Soyuz MS-07, right?
The Moon and Jupiter seem to match up for that one.

I'm seeking a large sensor directional sensor that can track an object in solar orbit near Earth on the 137MHz VHF band. Anyone in the #radioastronomy community or satellite tracking community got a lead?

THANKS!

My best satellite image yet!
All the way from the Sahara to Iceland 😁

Meteor M2-4 LRPT ~14:00UTC

Meanwhile, Rafale vs Ariane 6

source: Chef d'état-major armée de l'Air et de l'Espace

#VS263 #CSG #CSO3

They say the lunar lander is communicating, but they believe they're not in the correct attitude. They are still working on getting the 1st images down so they can determine the exact orientation, but an internal measurement unit seems to suggest it's on its side again like IM-1.

C'est ce soir à 17h24, le deuxième décollage d'#Ariane6 vers l'orbite terrestre ! Un gros et double enjeu de souveraineté, à la fois pour le lanceur (malgré son problème de compétitivité) qui assure l'accès à l'orbite de l'Europe, et pour le satellite espion CSO-3 français et ses images du monde.

This is Marco Rubio explaining how the USA promised to defend Ukraine forever if they got rid of their nuclear arsenal left after the Soviet Union fell.

This is why lil marco was sinking into the couch. He was hoping we wouldn’t find it…so don’t RT right now this very second.

Be sure to have a look at Venus in the near future when the clouds allow it!

Nowadays, it is an obvious crescent, even with my simple telescope full of chromatic aberration.

The truth is disgustingly obvious and …. Ignored…

Enfin !

European car makers are also following this trend. It feels so uncomfortable!

Donate to Fund Jonathan's Space Report Library Transition, organized by Jonathan McDowell For 35 years I've been sharing information about space exploration w… Jonathan McDowell needs your support for Fund Jonathan's Space Report Library Transition

Well, big news. I am planning to move the Space Library to a new home. And I need some help - in 35 years I've never asked for funding, donations or subscriptions for my Space Report, to keep it independent, but now I need to raise some additional funds.
www.gofundme.com/f/fund-jonat...

Iapetus, from Cassini NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Kevin M. Gill

Iapetus, from Cassini NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Kevin M. Gill

Iapetus, from Cassini NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Kevin M. Gill

Iapetus, from Cassini NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/CICLOPS/Kevin M. Gill

Another fun thing at Saturn: its walnut shaped moon Iapetus!

Not only is it a super fun word to say, but the moon sports an equatorial mountain range running most the way around and up to 10km high.

phylogenetic analysis has revealed that elephant shrews are not properly classified with true shrews, but are in fact more closely related to elephants than to shrews

Our Moon refracted by Earth's atmosphere, bending its contour. Taken by Himawari-9 on March 8th 2023.

Saturn's rings refracted by Saturn's atmosphere. The moon Atlas can be seen at the bottom. Taken by Cassini on June 7th 2005, processed by Gordan Ugarkovic.

I love planetary atmospheric refraction 🥹

It has been quite the day, has it not?

Le premier tir d'un lanceur européen depuis l'Europe de l'Ouest approche petit-à-petit, Rocket Factory Augsburg, une compagnie privée bavaroise, vient d'obtenir sa licence de vol.

RFA One devrait décoller en fin d'année depuis l'Écosse.

📸 - RFA