14 December 2011 Last updated at 17:54 GMT Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. Nasa animation of how the space harpoon works Nasa is developing a harpoon capable of taking samples from comets. The space agency has already built a prototype capable of launching test harpoon tips across a distance of a [...]
Tag: nasa
December 15, 2011
December 14, 2011
Microsoft founder’s space venture
14 December 2011 Last updated at 00:51 GMT Paul Allen is one of several Silicon Valley billionaires innovating in the private space industry The co-founder of Microsoft has announced plans to build a new spaceship that could launch unmanned rockets and carry cargo into space. Paul Allen, 58, plans to develop a giant aircraft that [...]
December 8, 2011
Nasa’s Voyager 1 enters interstellar space
Nasa‘s Voyager 1 has entered uncharted territory on the border of our solar system and the remainder of the Milky Way. Scientists at the US space agency said the craft had gone into a region at the edge of the solar system, describing it as “a kind of cosmic purgatory”. Ed Stone, Voyager project scientist [...]
December 2, 2011
Jim Rathmann
The American racing driver Jim Rathmann, who has died aged 83, won the most exciting Indianapolis 500, his country’s most important motor race. His victory in 1960 came at the end of an afternoon that saw 29 changes of the lead, still a record for the race. After retiring from the sport, Rathmann became the [...]
November 27, 2011
Mars Curiosity rover launch marks boldest ever interplanetary mission
Nasa has launched its Mars Curiosity rover on a journey of eight and a half months to the red planet. It is the biggest and best equipped robot ever sent to explore another planet. Curiosity will reach Mars next summer – if all goes to plan, abseiling down from a hovering “sky crane” to set [...]
November 27, 2011
Giant Nasa rover launches to Mars
26 November 2011 Last updated at 17:57 GMT By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. The Atlas 5 launch rocket carrying the Mars rover blasted off from Florida Nasa has launched the most capable machine ever built to land on Mars. The near one-tonne rover, tucked [...]
November 26, 2011
Nasa ready to launch Mars rover
25 November 2011 Last updated at 16:07 GMT By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News Continue reading the main story Curiosity – Mars Science Laboratory Project costed at $2.5bn; will see initial surface operations lasting two Earth years Onboard plutonium generator will deliver heat and electricity for at least 14 years 75kg science payload more [...]
November 16, 2011
Soyuz capsule docks with International Space Station
The Soyuz TMA-22 spacecraft carrying Nasa astronaut Dan Burbank and Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin docks to the International Space Station’s Poisk mini-research module. Their arrival has averted a possible de-crewing of the station following the failure of a Soyuz booster in August
November 14, 2011
Russia resumes Soyuz ISS flight
14 November 2011 Last updated at 07:49 GMT Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. The BBC’s Daniel Sandford: “The dangers are not over yet” A Russian spacecraft carrying three astronauts – two Russians and one American – has launched successfully from Kazakhstan. They are the first to travel on a Russian Soyuz [...]
November 14, 2011
Soyuz crew bound for International Space Station after successful launch
A Russian Soyuz capsule carrying an American and two Russians has blasted off successfully from Kazakhstan on a mission to the International Space Station. It is the first flight of a Nasa astronaut in the post-space shuttle areas and is a welcome success for the Russian space programme. Last week a Russian Mars probe failed [...]
November 10, 2011
US charges ‘computer hijackers’
9 November 2011 Last updated at 22:33 GMT The hackers are alleged to have been paid for each click on online adverts US authorities have charged seven people with spreading software to hijack millions of computers worldwide. Six of them are Estonians, who have been arrested, while the seventh, a Russian, is still at large. [...]
November 10, 2011
Computer hijackers charged in US
9 November 2011 Last updated at 22:33 GMT The hackers are alleged to have been paid for each click on online adverts US authorities have charged seven people with spreading software to hijack millions of computers worldwide. Six of them are Estonians, who have been arrested, while the seventh, a Russian, is still at large. [...]
October 29, 2011
US launches advanced weather sat
28 October 2011 Last updated at 09:58 GMT By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. The launch is something of a preview of the next-generation JPSS fleet of satellites The US has launched NPP, its $1.5bn (£0.9bn) next-generation weather and climate satellite. NNP rode into its [...]
October 26, 2011
Hurricane Rina weakens off Mexico
26 October 2011 Last updated at 18:39 GMT Resorts in the Yucatan Peninsula are bracing for Rina’s arrival Hurricane Rina has weakened to a category one storm as it approaches Mexico’s Caribbean coast, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) says. It is expected to lose more force before it makes landfall on the Yucatan Peninsula [...]