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SpaceX Plans to Send 2 Tourists Around Moon in 2018

“While the trip appears to be within the technical capabilities of SpaceX, industry observers wondered whether the company could pull it off as quickly as Mr. Musk indicated. “Dates are not SpaceX’s strong suit,” said Mary Lynne Dittmar, executive director of the Coalition for Deep Space Exploration. The Dragon 2 and Falcon Heavy are years behind schedule and have yet to fly.“It strikes me as risky,” Dr. Dittmar said, adding that autonomous systems are not infallible. “I find it extraordinary that these sorts of announcements are being made when SpaceX has yet to get crew from the ground to low-Earth orbit.””

Morehouse’s Comet, photographed in stereograph in 1908 or shortly thereafter. It is not known whether this comet has a closed-loop orbit, but if it does it will not return to earth for millions of years.

Night lights change in the Middle East between 2012 and 2016

via @nasa

Milky Way & shooting stars.

The Great Red Spot

The first Space Launch System hardware from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans just arrived at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. We take a minute to introduce you to the crew of NASA’s barge Pegasus. The crew made an 18-day journey on the barge leaving New Orleans on April 28 and arriving at Marshall on May 15. The barge delivered a structural test version of the core stage engine section of SLS, NASA’s new heavy-lift rocket. Pegasus will deliver four test articles of the rocket’s core stage to Marshall for tests that will simulate the forces experienced during launch. Pegasus will later ferry the flight-ready core stage to NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, for testing and then to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida for integration of the SLS flight vehicle in the Vehicle Assembly Building.

Comet McNaught.

Orion nebula & The running man nebula, by TimMorrill

Orion nebula & The running man nebula.