Rosetta Approaches Asteroid Lutitea
24.04.2012

What would it look like to approach an asteroid in a spaceship? In 2010, ESA's robotic Rosetta spacecraft zipped past the asteroid 21 Lutetia taking data and snapping images in an effort to better determine the history of the asteroid and the origin of its unusual colors.

Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
14.04.2008

This moon is doomed. Mars, the red planet named for the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic. These...

Apollo 14 Heads for Home
5.02.2021

Fifty years ago this Sunday (February 7, 1971), the crew of Apollo 14 left lunar orbit and headed for home. They watched this Earthrise from their command module Kittyhawk. With Earth's sunlit crescent just peeking over the lunar horizon, the cratered terrain in the foreground is along the lunar farside.

APOD: 2025 March 3 Б Blue Ghost on the Moon
3.03.2025

There's a new lander on the Moon. Yesterday Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost executed the first-ever successful commercial lunar landing. During its planned 60-day mission, Blue Ghost will deploy several NASA-commissioned scientific instruments, including PlanetVac which captures lunar dust after creating a small whirlwind of gas.

Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
22.11.2015

This moon is doomed. Mars, the red planet named for the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic. These...

Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
31.05.1998

Phobos is doomed. Mars, the red planet named for the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic. These Martian...

Phobos: Doomed Moon of Mars
2.10.1995

Mars, the red planet named for the Roman god of war, has two tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos, whose names are derived from the Greek for Fear and Panic. These Martian moons may well...

NEAR Shoemaker Views Eros
11.02.2001

Orbiting asteroid 433 Eros, 145 million miles from Earth, NASA's NEAR spacecraft has been returning stunning views as its year long mission of exploration nears completion. A mosaic of NEAR images recorded at a range of about 127 miles, this picture illustrates some of the amazing

Jupiter Triple Moon Conjunction
5.02.2015

Our solar system's ruling giant planet Jupiter and 3 of its 4 large Galilean moons are captured in this single Hubble snapshot from January 24. Crossing in front of Jupiter's banded cloud tops Europa, Callisto, and Io are framed from lower left to upper right in a rare triple-moon conjunction.

Moons Beyond Rings at Saturn
4.01.2022

What's happened to that moon of Saturn? Nothing -- Saturn's moon Rhea is just partly hidden behind Saturn's rings. In 2010, the robotic Cassini spacecraft then orbiting Saturn took this narrow-angle view looking across the Solar System's most famous rings.