NASA Archives

Space and Technology

On 5 August 2026 a Discarded SpaceX Upper Stage Hits the Moon at 5,400 MPH. It Weighs 8,800 Pounds and Will Land With the Force of Three Tons of TNT.

The Falcon 9 upper stage that launched Firefly's Blue Ghost and ispace's Resilience in January 2025 had no propellant left for a disposal burn....

Harrison KassAugust 4, 2026

Kosmos 482 Crashing Creative Commons Photo

Space and Technology

Kosmos 482 Was Built to Survive 900°F and 90 Earth Atmospheres on Venus. It Never Left Earth Orbit — and 53 Years Later It Was Still Too Tough to Burn Up

Kosmos 482 lifted off from Baikonur on 31 March 1972, bound for Venus as the sister craft to Venera 8. It reached parking orbit,...

Harrison KassAugust 4, 2026

Space and Technology

In 1984 the Soviet Union sent Vega 2 to Venus, where the surface is 900 degrees Fahrenheit under 90 times Earth’s pressure, hot enough to melt lead — then released a balloon that drifted for two days high in its clouds.

In December 1984 the Soviet Union launched Vega 2 on an unusual double mission: fly past Halley's Comet, then plunge into Venus, a world...

Harrison KassJuly 30, 2026

An artist's conception of the X-43A Hypersonic Experimental Vehicle, or "Hyper-X" in flight. The X-43A was developed to flight test a dual-mode ramjet/scramjet propulsion system at speeds from Mach 7 up to Mach 10 (7 to 10 times the speed of sound, which varies with temperature and altitude).

Aerospace & Defense

NASA’s X-43D: Mach 15, Thirty Seconds of Engine Time, Three Planned Flights, and Not One Vehicle Ever Built

The X-43D was designed to hold a scramjet at Mach 15 for thirty seconds, released from a Peacekeeper rocket at 200,000 feet. A 2004...

Harry J. KazianisJuly 30, 2026

Aerospace & Defense

NASA’s X-43A Hit a Record Mach 9.68 for Ten Seconds. The X-43D Could Have Hit Mach 15 and Shattered the History Books

The fastest air-breathing aircraft ever flown was twelve feet long, carried no pilot, and was designed from the start to end up in the...

Harry J. KazianisJuly 30, 2026

Space and Technology

Inside Mars’s Jezero Crater, once a lake and river delta, NASA’s Perseverance rover found complex carbon molecules built from the same four elements as all life on Earth — yet no one can yet say whether biology or ordinary chemistry made them.

NASA's Perseverance rover has found complex, ring-shaped carbon molecules sealed inside rocks in Mars's Jezero Crater, a basin that billions of years ago held...

Harrison KassJuly 27, 2026

Space and Technology

Saturn’s moon Titan has rain, rivers, seas, dunes, and seasons just like Earth, but at 290 degrees below zero the rain is liquid methane, the rivers carve ice, and the mountains are water frozen harder than granite — and in 2028 NASA sends a drone to see if it hides life.

Saturn's moon Titan looks uncannily like Earth: clouds, rain, rivers, lakes, seas, coastlines, dunes, and seasons. Then you learn the rain is liquid methane,...

Harrison KassJuly 27, 2026

Space and Technology

NASA’s Saturn V produced 7.6 million pounds of thrust, stood 363 feet tall, and sent 24 astronauts to the Moon without losing one — then in 1973 it was retired, its tooling scrapped, and nothing as powerful left Earth for almost 50 years.

From three miles away, the first thing to reach the press site was light. Then the sound arrived as force, shaking tripods and cracking...

Harry J. KazianisJuly 25, 2026

Space and Technology

NASA’s first space station weighed 77 tons and its launch nearly destroyed it, but engineers saved the thing with an improvised parasol, and when it finally fell out of orbit in 1979 a small Australian town fined the agency $400 for littering.

America's first space station was built out of leftover Apollo hardware — a modified Saturn V third stage, 77 tons and 118 feet long,...

Harrison KassJuly 24, 2026

Space and Technology

The first spacecraft ever sent to another planet reached Venus in 1961. It had been dead and silent for three months by the time it arrived

Summary and Key Points: In February 1961, the Soviet Union launched Venera 1, the first spacecraft ever sent from Earth toward another planet. Built...

Harrison KassJuly 20, 2026

19FortyFive

All posts tagged "NASA"

Space and Technology

On 5 August 2026 a Discarded SpaceX Upper Stage Hits the Moon at 5,400 MPH. It Weighs 8,800 Pounds and Will Land With the Force of Three Tons of TNT.

Space and Technology

Kosmos 482 Was Built to Survive 900°F and 90 Earth Atmospheres on Venus. It Never Left Earth Orbit — and 53 Years Later It Was Still Too Tough to Burn Up

Space and Technology

In 1984 the Soviet Union sent Vega 2 to Venus, where the surface is 900 degrees Fahrenheit under 90 times Earth’s pressure, hot enough to melt lead — then released a balloon that drifted for two days high in its clouds.

Aerospace & Defense

NASA’s X-43D: Mach 15, Thirty Seconds of Engine Time, Three Planned Flights, and Not One Vehicle Ever Built

Aerospace & Defense

NASA’s X-43A Hit a Record Mach 9.68 for Ten Seconds. The X-43D Could Have Hit Mach 15 and Shattered the History Books

Space and Technology

Inside Mars’s Jezero Crater, once a lake and river delta, NASA’s Perseverance rover found complex carbon molecules built from the same four elements as all life on Earth — yet no one can yet say whether biology or ordinary chemistry made them.

Space and Technology

Saturn’s moon Titan has rain, rivers, seas, dunes, and seasons just like Earth, but at 290 degrees below zero the rain is liquid methane, the rivers carve ice, and the mountains are water frozen harder than granite — and in 2028 NASA sends a drone to see if it hides life.

Space and Technology

NASA’s Saturn V produced 7.6 million pounds of thrust, stood 363 feet tall, and sent 24 astronauts to the Moon without losing one — then in 1973 it was retired, its tooling scrapped, and nothing as powerful left Earth for almost 50 years.

Space and Technology

NASA’s first space station weighed 77 tons and its launch nearly destroyed it, but engineers saved the thing with an improvised parasol, and when it finally fell out of orbit in 1979 a small Australian town fined the agency $400 for littering.

Space and Technology

The first spacecraft ever sent to another planet reached Venus in 1961. It had been dead and silent for three months by the time it arrived

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