Articles

A.J.S. Rayl

It was to be a Martian summer to remember. Just one month ago, the Mars Exploration Rovers were set to embark on long-awaited adventures. At Meridiani Planum, Opportunity was preparing for its grand entrance into the magnificent Victoria Crater and on the other side of the planet Spirit was finally going to explore the top of Home Plate, an old, intriguing volcanic formation in the Gusev Crater area. Then a series of dust storms hit suddenly, it was a Martian summer to remember alright, but for far different, windswept reasons.

Emily Lakdawalla

The dust storm continues at Mars, but both rovers continue to be power-positive.

Emily Lakdawalla

Both Spirit and Opportunity are still suffering under incredibly dark skies, but, amazingly, they are both

Marc Rayman

There are two ways for a spacecraft to leave its launch pad: climbing on a blazing tower of powerful flames accompanied by a thunderous announcement of its departure or suspended securely and gently on the crane that hoisted it there in the first place.

Emily Lakdawalla

Opportunity has ceased operations for a couple of days because the amount of sunlight available is low due to an unpredicted dust storm.

Marc Rayman

The countdown is underway for Dawn's liftoff on July 8 at 4:04:49 pm EDT.

Marc Rayman

Just after the previous log was posted, further predictions of poor weather at Cape Canaveral and difficulties with a downrange launch vehicle tracking system required a launch postponement.

A.J.S. Rayl

The Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) spent the month of June finishing work and clearing their agendas at their respective locales at Gusev Crater and Meridiani Planum in preparation for highly anticipated new assignments in July.

Emily Lakdawalla

According to the mission website, the New Horizons spacecraft has drifted off to sleep, entering its

Marc Rayman

Now only two weeks away from its planned launch, Dawn is eagerly awaiting the beginning of its cosmic adventure.

Emily Lakdawalla

There was great news last night from Mars Exploration Rover mission operations: Spirit seems to have enjoyed another

Emily Lakdawalla

The Applied Physics Lab issued a press release this evening stating that the MESSENGER mission's second flyby of Venus was successful.

Emily Lakdawalla

The MESSENGER spacecraft is zeroing in on Venus for the most significant gravity assist maneuver of its long journey to Mercury.

A.J.S. Rayl

The Mars Exploration Rovers sent home field reports this past month -- some 1,200 days into their missions -- that drew gasps of amazement from both the science and engineering teams.

Emily Lakdawalla

The MESSENGER team announced today that they accomplished the penultimate trajectory correction maneuver necessary to line the spacecraft up for its second gravity-assist flyby of Venus.

A.J.S. Rayl

The Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) traveled to new targets and made discoveries ranging from the magnificent to the mundane in April, four fast weeks that essentially led both of the twin robot field geologists to the next phase of their explorations.

Emily Lakdawalla

This image is beautiful for many reasons. It was captured by the MVIC imaging spectrometer, part of the Ralph instrument, on New Horizons, as it left the Jupiter system on March 2, 2007.

A.J.S. Rayl

It's been business as usual on the Red Planet this month as the Mars Exploration Rovers investigated new areas on their ever-moving missions to explore Gusev Crater and Meridiani Planum. Both Spirit and Opportunity chalked up yet another productive month of field geology as they roved onward in their fourth year on location, checking out more of the local environs some 149,597,900 kilometers (93 million miles) away on Earthlings' favored other planet.

Emily Lakdawalla

The last one of New Horizons imaging instruments has finally checked in with a lovely image from the Jupiter flyby

Emily Lakdawalla

According to a press release issued minutes ago, New Horizons has successfully completed its close flyby of Jupiter.