What do comets look like up close? If you want to know you can either take a spacecraft and fly there or you can prepare one in your kitchen... (More)

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NOTE: The launch of Endeavour has now been put off until at least 8-MAY-2011. At that date there will be no opportunities to observe the Shuttle from Europe. The information in this blog is no longer valid.

The Shuttle Endeavour is now scheduled to lift off from Florida on Monday, 2-MAY-2011 at 18:34:00 UTC (20:34:00 CEST). Weather permitting some observers in Europe will be able to see the Shuttle and its External Tank 20 minutes later... (More)

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Some news reports during the last few days mentioned that the Earth axis had shifted and the rotation slowed down due to the large earthquake in Japan on March 11, 2011. What's behind this story? (More)

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Half a century ago a flight by a chimpanzee left its mark in space history. But all did not go as planned... (More)

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At the end of the year people look back at the events of the past twelve months but also try to look ahead at what to expect for the upcoming year. Some predictions are obviously better than others... (More)

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Have you ever heard about how engineering in ancient Rome effected the design of the Space Shuttle? A nice story - but ultimately incorrect... (More)

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Did dinosaurs become extinct because they didn't have a space program? A select group of people around the world think so and feel that mankind can do better... (More)

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Space is anything but empty and the satellites which we depend on more and more are facing a number of threats... (More)

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What do South American dances have to do with space science? For the past ten years a quartet of satellites named Rumba, Salsa, Samba and Tango have been orbiting the Earth in kind of a formation dance yielding valuable insights into the plasma processes in the Earth's magnetosphere... (More)

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The first Japanese solar sail space mission can now be called a full success as the major milestones of the project have been achieved... (More)

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How do asteroids smell? From now on I will always associate asteroids with the smell of a barbecue... (More)

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For the first time a spacecraft moves across interplanetary space with the help of a sail being propelled by the light of the Sun... (More)

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How much do we spend on space projects? Here is my biased attempt to look at space budgets in different countries... (More)

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Although modern rockets use advanced fuels to send satellites into space an upcoming launch will resort to something that goes back to the dawn of rocketry in ancient China: Black Powder... (More)

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Special statistical techniques in the so called field of data mining which are designed to find patterns in large volumes of data can be applied to detect anomalies in space missions... (More)

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