NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Suni Williams are taking a spacewalk outside the International Space Station on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025, to replace station hardware and repair the station’s NICER (Neutron star Interior Composition ExploreR) X-ray telescope. The spacewalk is expected to begin at approximately 8 a.m. EST (1300 UTC) and last for around six and a half hours.
Hague (wearing the suit with red stripes) and Williams (wearing the unmarked suit) arrived at the ISS last year and are both crew members of Expedition 72, which began on Sept. 23, 2024. This is Hague’s fourth spacewalk and the eighth for Williams.
This is a new artist’s animation of our galaxy, the Milky Way, based on data from ESA’s Gaia space telescope.
Gaia has changed our impression of the Milky Way. Even seemingly simple ideas about the nature of our galaxy’s central bar and the spiral arms have been overturned. Gaia has shown us that it has more than two spiral arms and that they are less prominent than we previously thought. In addition, Gaia has shown that its central bar is more inclined with respect to the Sun. No spacecraft can travel beyond our galaxy, so we can’t take a selfie, but Gaia is giving us the best insight yet of what our home galaxy looks like. Once all of Gaia’s observations collected over the past decade are made available in two upcoming data releases, we can expect an even sharper view of the Milky Way.
We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Watch Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lunar lander lift off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. SpaceX and Firefly Aerospace are targeting 1:11 a.m. EST (0611 UTC) Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025, for launch. The lander will carry 10 NASA science investigations to the Moon’s surface.
Following launch, the lander will spend approximately 45 days in transit to the Moon before landing on the lunar surface in early March 2025. The 10 NASA payloads aboard the lander aim to test and demonstrate lunar subsurface drilling technology, regolith sample collection capabilities, global navigation satellite system abilities, radiation tolerant computing, and lunar dust mitigation methods.
The results of these investigations could help further our understanding of the Moon’s environment and help prepare for future human missions to the lunar surface as part of the agency’s Moon to Mars exploration approach.
Fly over Mercury with BepiColombo for the final time during the mission’s epic expedition around the Sun. The ESA/JAXA spacecraft captured these images of the Solar System’s smallest planet on 7 and 8 January 2025, before and during its sixth encounter with Mercury. This was its final planetary flyby until it enters orbit around the planet in late 2026.
The video begins with BepiColombo’s approach to Mercury, showing images taken by onboard monitoring cameras 1 and 2 (M-CAM 1 and M-CAM 2) between 16:59 CET on 7 January and 01:45 CET on 8 January. During this time, the spacecraft moved from 106 019 to 42 513 km from Mercury’s surface. The view from M-CAM 1 is along a 15-metre-long solar array, whereas M-CAM 2 images show an antenna and boom in the foreground.
After emerging into view from behind the solar array, Mercury appears to jump to the right. Both the spacecraft and its solar arrays rotated in preparation for passing through Mercury’s cold, dark shadow.
For several hours after these first images were taken, the part of Mercury’s surface illuminated by the Sun was no longer visible from the M-CAMs. BepiColombo’s closest approach to Mercury took place in darkness at 06:58:52 CET on 8 January, when it got as close as 295 km.
Shortly after re-emerging into the intense sunlight, the spacecraft peered down onto the planet’s north pole, imaging several craters whose floors are in permanent shadow. The long shadows in this region are particularly striking on the floor of Prokofiev crater (the largest crater to the right of centre) – the central peak of that crater casts spiky shadows that exaggerate the shape of this mountain.
Next, we have a beautiful view of Mercury crossing the field of view from left to right, seen first by M-CAM 1 then by M-CAM 2 between 07:06 and 07:49 CET. These images showcase the planet’s northern plains, which were smoothed over billions of years ago when massive amounts of runny lava flowed across Mercury’s cratered surface.
The background music is The Hebrides overture, composed by Felix Mendelssohn in 1830 after being inspired by a visit to Fingal’s Cave, a sea cave created by ancient lava flows on the island of Staffa, Scotland. Similarly shaped by lava is Mercury’s Mendelssohn crater, one of the large craters visible passing from left to right above the solar array in M-CAM 1’s views, and at the very bottom of M-CAM 2’s views. The Mendelssohn crater was flooded with lava after an impact originally created it.
The end of the video lingers on the final three close-up images that the M-CAMs will ever obtain of Mercury. The cameras will continue to operate until September 2026, fulfilling their role of monitoring various parts of the spacecraft. After that point, the spacecraft module carrying the M-CAMs will separate from BepiColombo’s other two parts, ESA’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO) and JAXA’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (Mio). MPO’s much more powerful science cameras will take over from the M-CAMs, mapping Mercury over a range of colours in visible and infrared light.
Credits: ESA/BepiColombo/MTM Acknowledgements: Thank you to external collaborators Emanuele Simioni (INAF), Valentina Galluzzi (INAF), Jack Wright (Open University), and David Rothery (Open University) for their involvement in image sequence planning.
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
From the deep sea to outer space! Submarines are helping scientists’ study how humans adapt to extreme environments — just like astronauts on long space missions.
What we learn underwater today could shape the future of space exploration tomorrow.
📹 ESA – European Space Agency 📸 ESA/Portuguese Space Agency/Portuguese Navy
Did you know the Large Magellanic Cloud, one of our galaxy’s closest neighbors, survived a dramatic collision with the Milky Way’s gaseous halo? Despite losing most of its gas, the Large Magellanic Cloud is still forming new stars—a testament to its resilience! Thanks to Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers measured the Large Magellanic Cloud’s halo for the first time, revealing incredible insights about galaxy interactions.
📹 ESA – European Space Agency 📸 NASA, ESA, R. Crawford
On Wednesday, Jan. 8, at 1:25 p.m. EST (1825 UTC), NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy will speak with NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, Suni Williams, and Don Pettit about their mission aboard the International Space Station.
The four astronauts are in the middle of a long-duration mission living and working aboard the microgravity laboratory. Hague, Wilmore, and Williams are scheduled to return to Earth in the spring of 2025 aboard SpaceX’s Crew-9 Dragon spacecraft, which is currently docked to the station.
BepiColombo flew past Mercury for the fifth time on 1 December 2024.
During this flyby, BepiColombo gathered more data on the mysterious planet and its surroundings. Aside from taking some ‘regular’ photos of the planet and measuring particles and electromagnetic fields in the space around it, this flyby was the first time that any spacecraft imaged Mercury in mid-infrared wavelengths of light.
BepiColombo will pass much closer to Mercury’s north pole during its final flyby of Mercury on 8 January 2025, its last visit before arriving to enter orbit about the planet in November 2026.
📹 ESA – European Space Agency 📸 MERTIS/DLR/University of Münster & NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington
At the start of this new year, close-up pictures and solar flare data that the ESA-led Solar Orbiter mission has been recording for more than three years. See and hear for yourself how the number of flares and their intensity increase, a clear sign of the Sun approaching the peak of the 11-year solar cycle.
This video combines ultraviolet images of the Sun’s outer atmosphere (the corona, yellow) taken by Solar Orbiter’s Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) instrument, with the size and locations of solar flares (blue circles) as recorded by the Spectrometer/Telescope for Imaging X-rays (STIX) instrument. The accompanying audio is a sonification based on the detected flares and the spacecraft’s distance to the Sun.
Solar Orbiter moves on an elliptical path around the Sun, making a close approach to our star every six months. We can see this in the video from the spacecraft’s perspective, with the Sun moving closer and farther over the course of each year. In the sonification, this is represented by the low background humming that loudens as the Sun gets closer and becomes quieter as it moves further away. (There are some abrupt shifts in distance visible in the video, as it skips over dates where one or both instruments were inactive or collecting a different type of data.)
The blue circles represent solar flares: bursts of high-energy radiation of which STIX detects the X-rays. Flares are sent out by the Sun when energy stored in ‘twisted’ magnetic fields (usually above sunspots) is suddenly released. The size of each circle indicates how strong the flare is, with stronger flares sending out more X-rays. We can hear the flares in the metallic clinks in the sonification, where the sharpness of the sound corresponds to how energetic the solar flare is.
Many thanks to Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space / Maple Pools) for making the sonification in this video. If you would like to hear more sonifications and music by this artist, please visit: https://linktr.ee/maplepools Solar Orbiter is a space mission of international collaboration between ESA and NASA, operated by ESA.
————————————————— Credits Credit: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI & STIX, Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space/Maple Pools) Acknowledgements: Data processing for video by Laura Hayes License: CC BY-SA 3.0 or ESA Standard License
Video credit slate Solar Orbiter animation: ESA Sun images: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/EUI Solar flare data: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/STIX Data processing for video: Laura Hayes Data sonification & music: Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space/Maple Pools) —————————————————
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With this Timelapse captured from the ISS by our astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, the entire ESA family wants to wish you a peaceful, safe and exciting year 2025!
May the new year be full of grand adventures and opportunities! We’ll keep bringing the wonders of the universe and Earth to the palm of your hands.
Preparing to orbit and do science on the Moon, investigating how solar wind interacts with Mars, and demonstrating quiet supersonic flight are just a FEW of the milestones we have planned for 2025.
To learn more about the NASA missions mentioned in this highlight video, take a deep dive into these links:
In 1975, 10 European countries came together with a vision to collaborate on key space activities: science and astronomy, launch capabilities and space applications: the European Space Agency, ESA, was born.
In 2025, we mark half a century of joint European achievement – filled with firsts and breakthroughs in science, exploration and technology, and the space infrastructure and economy that power Europe today.
During the past five decades ESA has grown, developing ever bolder and bigger projects and adding more Member States, with Slovenia joining as the latest full Member State in January.
We’ll also celebrate the 50th anniversary of ESA’s Estrack network, 30 years of satellite navigation in Europe and 20 years since ESA launched the first demonstration satellite Giove-A which laid the foundation for the EU’s own satnav constellation Galileo. Other notable celebrations are the 20th anniversary of ESA’s Business Incubation Centres, or BICs, and the 30th year in space for SOHO, the joint ESA and NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.
Sadly though, 2025 will mean end of science operations for Integral and Gaia. Integral, ESA’s gamma-ray observatory has exotic objects in space since 2002 and Gaia concludes a decade of mapping the stars. But as some space telescopes retire, another one provides its first full data release. Launched in 2023, we expect Euclid’s data release early in the new year.
Launch-wise, we’re looking forward to Copernicus Sentinel-4 and -5 (Sentinel-4 will fly on an MTG-sounder satellite and Sentinel-5 on the MetOp-SG-A1 satellite), Copernicus Sentinel-1D, Sentinel-6B and Biomass. We’ll also launch the SMILE mission, or Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer, a joint mission with the Chinese academy of science.
The most powerful version of Europe’s new heavy-lift rocket, Ariane 6, is set to fly operationally for the first time in 2025. With several European commercial launcher companies planning to conduct their first orbital launches in 2025 too, ESA is kicking off the European Launcher Challenge to support the further development of European space transportation industry.
In human spaceflight, Polish ESA project astronaut Sławosz Uznański will fly to the ISS on the commercial Axiom-4 mission. Artemis II will be launched with the second European Service Module, on the first crewed mission around the Moon since 1972.
The year that ESA looks back on a half century of European achievement will also be one of key decisions on our future. At the Ministerial Council towards the end of 2025, our Member States will convene to ensure that Europe’s crucial needs, ambitions and the dreams that unite us in space become reality.
So, in 2025, we’ll celebrate the legacy of those who came before but also help establish a foundation for the next 50 years. Join us as we look forward to a year that honours ESA’s legacy and promises new milestones in space.
Credits: ESA – European Space Agency
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Aboard the International Space Station, NASA astronauts Suni Williams, Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, and Don Pettit wish a merry Christmas and a happy holiday season to Earth in a message recorded on Dec. 23, 2024.
The four astronauts are in the middle of a long-duration mission living and working aboard the microgravity laboratory. The goal of their mission is to advance scientific knowledge and demonstrate new technologies for future human and robotic exploration missions as part of NASA’s Moon and Mars exploration approach, including lunar missions through NASA’s Artemis program.
An ethereal dance of misty clouds of interstellar dust with a myriad of distant stars and galaxies speckled like paint drops over a black canvas. This is a sonification of a breathtaking image taken by ESA’s Euclid space telescope of the young star-forming region Messier 78.
The sonification offers a different representation of the data collected by Euclid, and lets us explore the stellar nurseries in M78 through sound. Close your eyes and listen to let the cosmic image be drawn by your mind’s eye, or watch as the traceback line in this video follows the sounds to colour the image from left to right.
The twinkling sounds of various pitches and volumes represent the galaxies and stars in the frame. The pitch of the sound points towards where we see the dot of light in the image. Higher pitches tell us that a star or galaxy appears further at the top in the image along the traceback line.
The brightness of these objects in and around M78 are represented by the volume of the twinkles. Whenever we hear a particularly loud clink, the star or galaxy that Euclid observed appears particularly bright in the image.
Underlying these jingling sounds, we can hear a steady undertone, made up of two chords which represent different regions in Messier 78. This sound intensifies as the traceback line approaches first the brightest, and later the densest regions in the nebula.
The first two deeper crescendos in this undertone indicate two patches in the image where the most intense colour is blue/purple. These appear as two ‘cavities’ in M78, where newly forming stars carve out and illuminate the dust and gas in which they were born.
The chords intensify a third time at a slightly higher pitch corresponding to the red-orange colours in the image, as the sound draws over the densest star-forming region of the frame. This stellar nursery is hidden by a layer of dust and gas that is so thick that it obscures almost all the light of the young stars within it.
Many thanks to Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space / Maple Pools) for making the sonification in this video. If you would like to hear more sonifications and music by this artist, please visit: https://linktr.ee/maplepools
————————————————— Credits Credit: ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA, image processing by J.-C. Cuillandre (CEA Paris-Saclay) and G. Anselmi, sonification by K. Nielsen (DTU Space/Maple Pools) License: CC BY-SA 3.0 or ESA Standard License
Video credit slate ESA/Euclid/Euclid Consortium/NASA Image processing: J.-C. Cuillandre (CEA Paris-Saclay), G. Anselmi Data sonification & music: Klaus Nielsen (DTU Space/Maple Pools) —————————————————
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Say hello to the fastest-moving human-made object, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe. On a mission to “touch the Sun,” this spacecraft is set to make history on Dec. 24 by making its closest dive through the Sun’s corona, or upper atmosphere.
Join NASA experts on Tuesday, December 17 at 3:00 p.m. EST as they take your questions about the mission, the currently high-activity phase of the Sun and more. Share your questions in the chat!
In 2024, ESA continued to drive Europe’s innovation and excellence in space, equipping the continent with advanced tools and knowledge to address global and local challenges. The year saw pioneering missions, cutting-edge satellites and the pivotal restoration of Europe’s independent access to space.
The first Ariane 6 launch was perhaps ‘the’ highlight of the year but it was only one of many achievements. We saw the last Vega launch and then the return to flight of Vega-C, the more powerful, upgraded version carrying Sentinel-1C.
Far away in our Solar System, the ESA/JAXA BepiColombo spacecraft performed two Mercury flybys in 2024, needed so that it can enter orbit around Mercury in 2026. Juice also performed a crucial gravity assist, this time becoming the first spacecraft to conduct a Moon-Earth double flyby on its way to Jupiter.
Twenty years after ESA’s Rosetta was launched and 10 years since its historic arrival at the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, we launched another spacecraft to a small body, the Hera planetary defence mission to investigate asteroid Dimorphos.
2024 was an important year for Europe’s Galileo constellation which continued to expand with the launch of four new satellites and an updated Galileo ground system. The year also saw the launch of ESA’s Proba-3 mission: two precision formation-flying satellites forming a solar coronagraph to study the Sun’s faint corona.
In human spaceflight, Europe continues to contribute to science from the ISS as Andreas Mogensen’s Huginn mission continued into 2024. Andreas even met up in space with ESA project astronaut Marcus Wandt who was launched on his Muninn mission, making it the first time two Scandinavians were in space together.
Meanwhile the latest class of ESA astronauts completed basic training and graduated in April. Two of them, Sophie and Raphaël, were then assigned to long-duration missions to the ISS in 2026.
We made crucial steps for Europe in gaining access to the Moon: the inauguration of our LUNA facility with DLR, and the delivery of a third European Service Module for NASA’s Orion spacecraft as part of the Artemis programme.
Europe is also contributing to the international Lunar Gateway and developing and ESA lunar lander called Argonaut. These landers will rely on ESA Moonlight, the programme to establish Europe’s first dedicated satellite constellation for lunar communication and navigation.
As 2024 draws to a close, ESA’s achievements this year have reinforced Europe’s role in space. ESA’s journey continues to explore new frontiers, shaping the space landscape for generations to come.
Credits: ESA – European Space Agency
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
The third Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite, Sentinel-1C, has launched aboard a Vega-C rocket, flight VV25, from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. The rocket lifted off on 5 December 2024 at 22:20 CET (18:20 local time).
Sentinel-1C extends the legacy of its predecessors, delivering high-resolution radar imagery to monitor Earth’s changing environment, supporting a diverse range of applications and advance scientific research. Additionally, Sentinel-1C introduces new capabilities for detecting and monitoring maritime traffic.
The launch also marks Vega-C’s ‘return to flight’, a key step in restoring Europe’s independent access to space. Vega-C is the evolution of the Vega family of rockets and delivers increased performance, greater payload volume and improved competitiveness.
📹 ESA – European Space Agency 📸 ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Arianegroup
On Dec. 11, 2024, Panama and Austria became the 49th and 50th signatories of the Artemis Accords.
The United States, led by NASA with the U.S. Department of State, and seven other founding nations established the Artemis Accords in 2020, a common set of principles designed to guide civil exploration and use of outer space for the benefit of all.
By signing the Artemis Accords, these 50 nations come together in the name of safe and responsible space exploration. Any nation that wants to commit to the principles is welcome to sign.
The full list of Artemis Accords nations now includes: Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Austria, Bahrain, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Panama, Peru, Poland, Republic of Korea, Romania, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States of America, and Uruguay.
The third Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite, Sentinel-1C, has launched aboard a Vega-C rocket, flight VV25, from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. The rocket lifted off on 5 December 2024 at 22:20 CET (18:20 local time).
Sentinel-1C extends the legacy of its predecessors, delivering high-resolution radar imagery to monitor Earth’s changing environment, supporting a diverse range of applications and advance scientific research. Additionally, Sentinel-1C introduces new capabilities for detecting and monitoring maritime traffic.
The launch also marks Vega-C’s ‘return to flight’, a key step in restoring Europe’s independent access to space. Vega-C is the evolution of the Vega family of rockets and delivers increased performance, greater payload volume and improved competitiveness.
Credits: ESA/CNES/Arianespace
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
The third Copernicus Sentinel-1 satellite, Sentinel-1C, has launched aboard a Vega-C rocket, flight VV25, from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. The rocket lifted off on 5 December 2024 at 22:20 CET (18:20 local time).
Sentinel-1C extends the legacy of its predecessors, delivering high-resolution radar imagery to monitor Earth’s changing environment, supporting a diverse range of applications and advance scientific research. Additionally, Sentinel-1C introduces new capabilities for detecting and monitoring maritime traffic.
The launch also marks Vega-C’s ‘return to flight’, a key step in restoring Europe’s independent access to space. Vega-C is the evolution of the Vega family of rockets and delivers increased performance, greater payload volume and improved competitiveness.
Credits: Arianespace
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
NASA will hold a media event on Dec. 5 to provide an update on the agency’s Artemis campaign.
Participants:
-NASA Administrator Bill Nelson -NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy -NASA Associate Administrator Jim Free -Catherine Koerner, associate administrator, Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters -Amit Kshatriya, deputy associate administrator, Moon to Mars Program Office, Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate -Reid Wiseman, NASA astronaut and Artemis II commander
Through the Artemis campaign, the agency will establish a long-term presence at the Moon for scientific exploration with our commercial and international partners, learn how to live and work away from home, and prepare for future human exploration of Mars.
NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, exploration ground systems, and Orion spacecraft, along with the human landing system, next-generation spacesuits, the lunar space station, Gateway, and future rovers are NASA’s foundation for deep space exploration.
Proba-3 lifted off on its PSLV-XL rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, on Thursday, 5 December, at 11:34 CET (10:34 GMT, 16:04 local time). The mission was launched using this Indian launcher because it needed to be placed in a highly elliptical orbit extending more than 60 500 km from the ground.
After integration and testing was completed at Redwire Space in Belgium, Proba-3 was transported to India to be prepared for launch. The latest member of ESA’s family of in-orbit demonstration missions, Proba-3 is in fact two spacecraft being launched together, which will separate in orbit to begin performing precise formation flying, precise to a single millimetre, about the thickness of an average fingernail. To prove their performance, Proba-3 has been devoted to an ambitious scientific goal. The pair will line up precisely with the Sun 150 m apart so that one casts a precisely controlled shadow onto the other.
By blocking out the fiery disc of the Sun, Proba-3’s ‘Occulter’ spacecraft will mimic a terrestrial total solar eclipse, to open up views of the Sun’s faint surrounding atmosphere, or ‘corona’, which is a million times fainter than its parent star. Proba-3’s second ‘Coronagraph’ spacecraft hosts the optical instrument that will observe the solar corona. If Proba-3’s initial commissioning phase goes to plan then the spacecraft pair will be separated early in the new year to begin their individual check-outs. The operational phase of the mission, including the first observations of the corona through active formation flying, should begin in about four months.
Proba-3 was led for ESA by Sener in Spain, overseeing a consortium of 14 ESA Member States and Canada including Airbus Defence and Space in Spain manufacturing the spacecraft and Redwire Space in Belgium responsible for the spacecraft avionics, assembly and operations. CSL in Belgium produced Proba-3’s ASPIICS coronagraph Spacebel in Belgium developed the onboard and ground segment software with GMV responsible for the formation flying system and flight dynamics.
Credits: ESA/ISRO – NSIL
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
ESA’s Proba-3 mission lifted off on its PSLV-XL rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, on Thursday, 5 December, at 11:34 CET (10:34 GMT, 16:04 local time).
ESA’s Proba-3 mission lifted off on its PSLV-XL rocket from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, on Thursday, 5 December, at 11:34 CET (10:34 GMT, 16:04 local time).
Credits: ISRO – NSIL
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Meet Esther, our System Engineer currently working on the Proba-3 mission.
Proba-3 is scheduled to liftoff on Wednesday, 4 December, at 11:38 CET from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in India, Proba-3 will use two satellites to create the perfect conditions for observing the Sun’s corona.
One satellite features a telescope, kept in the centre of the shadow cast by the other satellite around 150 m away, thanks to an occulter disc. Maintaining the correct position in the shadow requires a precise formation flying capability, down to a single millimetre of precision.
The double-satellite Proba-3 is the most ambitious member yet of ESA’s Proba family of experimental missions. Two spacecraft will fly together as one, maintaining precise formation down to a single millimetre. One will block out the fiery disc of the Sun for the other, to enable prolonged observations of the Sun’s surrounding atmosphere, or ‘corona’, the source of the solar wind and space weather. Usually, the corona can only be glimpsed for a few minutes during terrestrial total solar eclipses.
Proba-3 aims to reproduce such eclipses for up to six hours at a time, in a highly elliptical orbit taking it more than 60 000 km from Earth. The two spacecraft are being launched together by India’s PSLV-XL launcher from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre.
Radar allows us to see through what would otherwise be invisible. By sending out radio waves that bounce off objects and return as echoes, radar creates a detailed picture of our surrounding world.
This technology is everywhere: from guiding air traffic and enabling self-driving cars to tracking the movements of athletes. But its reach doesn’t stop there—radar is also transforming how we observe our Earth from space.
Satellites like the Copernicus Sentinel-1 mission use radar to see through clouds, darkness and any weather conditions. This capability is invaluable for detecting subtle changes on Earth’s surface—changes that are often hidden from the human eye. Discover how radar technology is helping us unlock these hidden insights about our planet.
Credit: ESA – European Space Agency
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Aboard the International Space Station, NASA Expedition 72 crew members Suni Williams, Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, and Don Pettit wish a happy Thanksgiving to Earth. The crew shared their thoughts on the holiday, as well as their plans for their Thanksgiving meal.
The four astronauts are in the middle of a long-duration mission living and working aboard the microgravity laboratory. The goal of their mission is to advance scientific knowledge and demonstrate new technologies for future human and robotic exploration missions as part of NASA’s Moon and Mars exploration approach, including lunar missions through NASA’s Artemis program.
Just what you need for the holidays… the coziness of a crackling and roaring rocket engine!
Technically, this fireplace packs the heat of the SLS rocket’s four RS-25 engines and a pair of solid rocket boosters – just enough to get you to the Moon! (And get through the holidays with your in-laws.)
This glowing mood-setter is brought to you by the SLS (Space Launch System) rocket that launched Artemis I on its mission around the Moon and back on Nov. 16, 2022. 8.8 million pounds of total thrust – and a couple glasses of eggnog – might just be enough to make your holidays merry.
Video description: A stock fireplace illustration frames looping archival video of the blasting RS-25 engines that launched the Artemis I rocket to the Moon on Nov. 16, 2022 (source: https://go.nasa.gov/4g6LnWc ). The illustration includes stone tiling, a pillow, a basket of firewood, and contains elements generated with AI. NASA added two framed pictures to the illustration. One shows an archival image of the Orion capsule flying through space. The other shows the Artemis logo. The audio features the roar of the rockets at a low level, with the addition of the sounds of a crackling wood fire.
Credit: NASA Producers: Sami Aziz, John Sackman Designer: Chris Chamberland
Thanks to the incredible precision of our Gaia mission, scientists have discovered potential moons orbiting over 350 asteroids! This nearly doubles the known number of ‘binary asteroids,’ revealing a whole new layer of complexity in our Solar System.
Meet Copernicus Sentinel-1 – this ground-breaking mission delivers continuous, all-weather, day-and-night imaging for land, ice and maritime monitoring.
Equipped with state-of-the-art C-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR), Sentinel-1 captures high-resolution data around the clock, in any weather, making it indispensable for detecting the subtle changes on Earth’s surface that remain hidden from the human eye.
Sentinel-1 data serves a multitude of critical applications: from ensuring the safety and efficiency of maritime traffic, tracking sea ice and icebergs, to monitoring structural integrity and natural hazards, such as earthquakes, landslides and volcanic activity.
Its enhanced radar technology provides precises precise information on ground movement, which is critical for urban planning, infrastructure resilience, subsidence risk assessment and geohazard monitoring.
Through consistent, long-term data collection, Sentinel-1 serves as a global asset, essential for environmental and safety monitoring worldwide. The mission is a beacon of innovation, advancing our understanding of our planet’s dynamic landscape.
This video features interviews with Mark Drinkwater, Head of Mission Sciences Division at ESA, Ramon Torres Cuesta, Sentinel-1 Project Manager at ESA and Julia Kubanek, Sentinel-1 Mission Scientist at ESA.
Credit: ESA – European Space Agency
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
Join us on a unique video tour of the Sun’s mesmerising surface. Thanks to its innovative instrumentation and a ‘daring’ trajectory passing close to the Sun, ESA’s Solar Orbiter spacecraft has obtained the highest-resolution full views of the Sun’s surface to date.
Watching the Sun in visible light, Solar Orbiter reveals a grainy surface and dark sunspots. On the same day, the spacecraft mapped the Sun’s magnetic field, tracked how fast and in which direction scorching hot material on the surface is moving, and snapped a hypnotising image in ultraviolet light of the Sun’s upper atmosphere, the corona. All taken on the same day, the four new images shown in this video let us peel away the Sun’s many layers.
The images were taken when Solar Orbiter was less than 74 million kilometres from the Sun; being so close meant each high-resolution image only covers a small portion of the Sun. To obtain the full-disc views showcased in the video, 25 images were stitched together like a mosaic. The Sun has a diameter of around 8000 pixels in the full mosaics, revealing an extraordinary amount of detail.
Credit: ESA – European Space Agency Acknowledgements: Sun images: ESA & NASA/Solar Orbiter/PHI and EUI Teams; Solar Orbiter spacecraft animation: ESA/ATG medialab; Voiceover: Juliet Hannay
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
This video takes the viewer on a journey that zooms through space to reveal the Tarantula Nebula.
Thousands of never-before-seen young stars are spotted in the stellar nursery called 30 Doradus, captured by the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope. It is nicknamed the Tarantula Nebula for the appearance of its dusty filaments in previous telescope images, the nebula has long been a favourite for astronomers studying star formation. In addition to young stars, Webb reveals distant background galaxies, as well as the detailed structure and composition of the nebula’s gas and dust.
Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, ESO, E. Slawik, N. Risinger, D. De Martin, D. Lennon, E. Sabbi, N. Bartmann, M. Zamani Music: tonelabs – Happy Hubble
Live views from the International Space Station are streaming from an external camera mounted on the station’s Harmony module.
The camera is looking forward at an angle so that International Docking Adapter 2 is visible. If the Harmony module camera is not available due to operational considerations for a longer period of time, a continuous loop of recorded Earth views will be displayed with the caption “Previously Recorded.”
The space station orbits Earth about 250 miles (425 kilometers) above the surface. An international partnership of five space agencies from 15 countries operates the station, and it has been continuously occupied since November 2000. It’s a microgravity laboratory where science, research, and human innovation make way for new technologies and research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. More: https://go.nasa.gov/3CkVtC8
Did you know you can spot the station without a telescope? It looks like a fast-moving star, but you have to know when to look up. Sign up for text messages or email alerts to let you know when (and where) to spot the station and wave to the crew: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov
Watch live video from the International Space Station, including inside views when the crew aboard the space station is on duty. Views of Earth are also streamed from an external camera located outside of the space station. During periods of signal loss due to handover between communications satellites, a blue screen is displayed.
The space station orbits Earth about 250 miles (425 kilometers) above the surface. An international partnership of five space agencies from 15 countries operates the station, and it has been continuously occupied since November 2000. It’s a microgravity laboratory where science, research, and human innovation make way for new technologies and research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. More: https://go.nasa.gov/3CkVtC8
Did you know you can spot the station without a telescope? It looks like a fast-moving star, but you have to know when to look up. Sign up for text messages or email alerts to let you know when (and where) to spot the station and wave to the crew: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov
Smile is the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer, a brand-new space mission currently in the making. It will study space weather and the interaction between the solar wind and Earth’s environment.
Unique about Smile is that it will take the first X-ray images and videos of the solar wind slamming into Earth’s protective magnetic bubble, and its complementary ultraviolet images will provide the longest-ever continuous look at the northern lights.
In this first of several short videos, David Agnolon (Smile Project Manager) and Philippe Escoubet (Smile Project Scientist) talk about the why and the how of Smile. You’ll see scenes of the building and testing of the spacecraft’s payload module by Airbus in Madrid, including the installation of one of the European instruments, the Soft X-ray Imager from the University of Leicester.
Smile is a 50–50 collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). ESA provides the payload module of the spacecraft, which carries three of the four science instruments, and the Vega-C rocket which will launch Smile to space. CAS provides the platform module hosting the fourth science instrument, as well as the service and propulsion modules.
Credit: ESA/Lightcurve Films
Acknowledgements: Direction, main camera, sound, editing, post-production by Lightcurve Films. Original music by William Zeitler. Artwork shown in the video is by Eryka Isaak and CAS.
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
On 12 November 2024, Mars kicks off a fresh New Year! While Earth and Mars both orbit the Sun, a Martian year is full of fascinating twists. Curious about how time flows differently on the Red Planet? Let’s dive into what makes a year on Mars unique—and what it shares with our own!
📹 ESA – European Space Agency 📸 ESA/DLR/Freie Universität Berlin
On 12 November 2014, after a ten-year journey through the Solar System and over 500 million kilometres from home, Rosetta’s lander Philae made space exploration history by touching down on a comet for the first time. On the occasion of the tenth anniversary of this extraordinary feat, we celebrate by taking a look back over the mission’s highlights.
Rosetta was an ESA mission with contributions from its Member States and NASA. It studied Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for over two years, including delivering lander Philae to the comet’s surface. Philae was provided by a consortium led by DLR, MPS, CNES and ASI.
Credits: ESA – European Space Agency
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We are Europe’s gateway to space. Our mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world. Check out https://www.esa.int/ to get up to speed on everything space related.
