Anniversaries abound

Space Snapshot

The Hubble Space Telescope has been observing the outer planets for a decade now. The mission’s OPAL (Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy) program celebrated its 10-year anniversary this week by sharing Hubble images of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune, as well as some of the insights we’ve gained through these observations. This array of Saturn images, for example, shows data collected through various filters that have taught us about cloud dynamics in the gas giant’s atmosphere. Image credit: NASA et al.

Fact Worth Sharing

Saturn's 26.7-degree tilt means that as it goes around the Sun, from Earth we sometimes see the giant planet's rings from an oblique view, and other times edge-on. We'll see the thin ring system nearly disappear from this edge-on view again in 2025.

Mission Briefings

NASA’s solar eclipse experiments are yielding results. During the April 8 total solar eclipse, NASA funded several research projects to help understand how Earth is affected by the Sun. One project involved organizing over 800 students across the U.S. to launch balloons equipped with scientific instruments to study the eclipse from above. This research confirmed that eclipses can generate ripples in Earth’s atmosphere called atmospheric gravity waves. Image credit: Nationwide Eclipse Ballooning Project/Virginia Tech.

The Artemis Moon missions are being delayed. Artemis II — a crewed flight around the Moon and back to Earth — has been pushed from September 2025 to April 2026 at the earliest. Artemis III — a crewed lunar landing — will not take place until 2027 at the earliest. These delays are due to hardware issues, including problems with the Orion capsule’s heat shield.

BepiColombo completed its fifth Mercury flyby. ESA’s BepiColombo mission will enter into orbit around Mercury in 2026, but first must adjust its trajectory and speed with several flybys of the innermost planet. It conducted the fifth of these passes last week, and became the first mission to image Mercury in mid-infrared light as it flew by.

ESA is celebrating 25 years of operations for its X-ray observatory. The XXM-Newton space telescope has been in space since 1999 studying celestial objects ranging from planets to black holes. ESA celebrated the milestone by highlighting several key discoveries, including how X-ray auroras arise at Jupiter’s magnetic poles.

From The Planetary Society

Take a look back on the last year in pictures. The latest issue of The Planetary Report, our quarterly member magazine, reviews the last year of space exploration through the lens of images. Here you can see one of the featured pictures, a montage of 25 images created with data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory to commemorate the telescope’s 25th anniversary in space. Members get a hard copy of the magazine, but anyone can read it for free on our site. Image credit: NASA et al.

Planetary Radio meets StarTalk! StarTalk host Neil deGrasse Tyson recently joined Planetary Society CEO Bill Nye for two podcast episodes all about space science, exploration, and the advocacy that makes it all possible. Check out their conversations on StarTalk and on Planetary Radio.

SpaceX’s reusable rockets changed the space industry forever. Here’s how. Space journalist Eric Berger follows the story of the people behind SpaceX’s modern technological revolution in his book, “Reentry: SpaceX, Elon Musk, and the Reusable Rockets that Launched a Second Space Age”. He joined Planetary Society members in the latest virtual book club meeting for a deep dive into his insider chronicle. Watch the event recording here, and — if you’re a Planetary Society member — sign up for the book club today in the online member community.

Expand our future in space! Any gift to our year-end campaign powers The Planetary Society's mission to explore worlds, find life, and defend Earth. Plus, thanks to a generous Society member, any gift made now through the end of the year will be matched up to $100,000. Make your year-end gift today!

What's Up

The Geminid meteor shower peaked last night (between Dec. 12 and 13) but you should still be able to see some meteors tonight from a dark site. While you’re out, look for super bright Venus in the early evening west with Saturn high in the east. Jupiter rises in the east near sunset and crosses the sky over the course of the night, joined by the nearly full Moon on Dec. 14. Reddish Mars rises in the east later in the evening, joined by the Moon on Dec. 18. Learn more about what else to see in this month’s night skies.

Help save space missions. Join today!

If you are not already a member, we need your help. NASA is at a crossroads, and your support is needed today! Funding for space science and exploration is not guaranteed. It requires the voice of passionate advocates like you.

NASA is facing major budget cuts for the first time in a decade, and thousands of skilled scientists, engineers, and technicians have already been laid off at NASA centers across the US. NASA funding must grow, not shrink, if the agency is to succeed in returning to the Moon, exploring the Solar System, and seeking out life beyond Earth.

We must prevent future budget cuts. When you become a member of The Planetary Society, you join the world’s largest and most influential space advocacy nonprofit. Will you join us and enable the future of space exploration?

Wow of the Week

The Hubble Space Telescope is nearing a major anniversary too, with 2025 marking its 35th year of operations. You can join in on the celebrations by participating in NASA’s Hubble Night Sky Challenge. The agency has highlighted celestial objects that will be visible in the night sky each month, and challenges backyard astronomers to find them and compare their view to Hubble’s. Pictured here is a Hubble image of the Orion Nebula, one of the items to look for in January. Image credit: NASA et al.

Want some tips to help you complete the challenge? Learn more about how to explore the night sky with Stargazing 101, our in-depth course on backyard astronomy. It’s available to all Planetary Society members in our digital community. Not a member yet? Join today.

Send us your artwork!

We love to feature space artwork in the Downlink. If you create any kind of space-related art, we invite you to send it to us by replying to any Downlink email or writing to [email protected]. Please let us know in your email if you’re a Planetary Society member!