In The Future™, when mankind is Sufficiently Advanced®, nations, companies and entrepreneurs will be shuttling huge cargo spaceships to and from the asteroid belt. Asteroid mining is going to be the first REAL gold rush, “thars gold in them thar rocks!” But not only gold, we’ll...

Although there are doubts about Constellation, and NASA recently announced a “plan B” launch option for a return trip to the Moon, Orion development continues as planned. Next up is the development of the Orion shock absorbers, intended to take the sting out of the return capsule’s...

Wow! I thought the single image of the volcanic eruption (plus shock wave) was cool, but after seeing the complete series of images put together in this animation, I’m literally blown away. Thank you Richard Drumm for sharing the video on Twitter — now this is one YouTube video that needs...

Of course, 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, and half-way through this important year, we’ve seen some amazing feats of science. We’ve been fixing telescopes in orbit, assembling space stations, peering deep into the cosmos with a vast suite of telescopes, we’ve acquired...

When I first saw this image, I didn’t think too much of it. After all, this isn’t the first time I’ve seen a volcanic plume racing through the atmosphere. However, this picture is awesome on so many levels. First, as part of NASA’s Earth Observatory program, an astronaut in the...

A modelled black hole shadow (left) and two simulated observations of Sgr A* using a 7-telescope and 13-telescope array (Fish & Doeleman) All the evidence suggests there is a supermassive black hole lurking in the centre of our galaxy. We’ve known as much for quite some time, but it wasn’t...

"Monolith" by highdarktemplar on DeviantArt. On reading an article in The Daily Galaxy today, I was interested by what the author had to say. In a nutshell, the article pointed out that it is a big mistake to believe we are the only intelligent life in the Milky Way. Why is that? The only...

Venus is a hellish world. Although the planet is nearly the same size of Earth, that’s where the similarities end. Having said that, it does have an atmosphere, but it’s not the kind of atmosphere you would ever want to spend time breathing in. Composed of a dense carbon dioxide/nitrogen...

Firstly, let’s set the record straight: I love disaster movies. I don’t care if the Earth is being invaded by aliens, getting hit by comets, being saved by oil drillers or poisoned by angry trees (yes, my brain even shrank through The Happening). It’s fiction, it’s fun and, let’s...

Apologies for the break in Astroengine Live service. Due to some uber-technical problems, I’m going to have to re-launch the show this time next week. Stay tuned for updates. For now, check out my Astroengine Live archives and enjoy! *** Earlier post: It’s been a while, but Astroengine Live...