Defying expectations, solar activity is back in a big way, with the number of sunspots counted on the Sun’s surface last month reaching levels not seen in nearly 23 years, more than twice the number predicted by previous forecasts. This newfound activity signals not only that the Sun is wellread more
In 2015 the Pentagon’s Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP) devised a bold plan to lure unidentified anomalous phenomena out into the open to gather more data on—and perhaps even capture—the otherwise mercurial craft that had been dogging US Naval aviators while training in restricted airspace. Although the operation wasread more
The first spacewalk by a civilian was conducted on September 12 by tech billionaire Jared Isaacman, an activity that has, until now, been the exclusive domain of professional astronauts, cosmonauts and taikonauts. On September 10 the Crew Dragon capsule Resilience that carried Isaacman and his three crewmates into orbit was launched atop one ofread more
Decommissioning teams at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant have begun a two-week operation aimed at retrieving a sample of the radioactive debris that remains inside the facility’s stricken nuclear reactors, using a telescoping robot custom-built for the task, thirteen years after the power plant suffered multiple meltdowns in the wake of the tsunami thatread more