RGO will close in October
The observatory employs 115 staff to provide technical support for the UK’s overseas telescopes. Some of these staff will transfer to the new Astronomical Technology Centre, which is part of the...
France cuts back SPOT programme
The French space agency CNES is hoping to follow in the footsteps of NASA’s Discovery mission programme by using smaller, cheaper spacecraft instead of larger, more expensive missions. SPOT Imag...
Australia joins Gemini
The observing time of the original six partners – the US, the UK, Canada, Chile, Argentina and Brazil – will be slightly reduced, but this loss will be offset by “enhanced scientific...
Water found on Moon!
Rumours that Lunar Prospector – NASA’s first lunar mission in twenty five years – had confirmed the existence of water ice had captivated the space science community since the beginn...
NASA looks to next Mars mission
The Surveyor 98 mission consists of a satellite called Mars Climate Orbiter, and a ground probe, Mars Polar Lander. Both craft will arrive at Mars during 1999. The orbiter will spend two years measuri...
Newsbytes: Voyager, NASA and Edinburgh
NASA Safety Advisory Panel presents report The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP) has presented its 1997 report. The panel provides a independent assessment of the safety features in NASA’s ...
Missiles by day, planets at night
The $40 million Magdalena Ridge Observatory will use optical interferometry to merge light signals from three new telescopes into a single image. Researchers also hope to test new adaptive optics tech...
Newsbytes: Galileo and aliens
Galileo declassified The Vatican has finally made public its archives, after four and a half centuries of secrecy. Scholars will be able to access files relating to figures such as Galileo, up to the ...
Pathfinder leads the way to red planet
In The Crystal Egg, a short story written in 1897, HG Wells describes how a remarkable object in Mr Cave’s Curiosity Shop allows its owner to gaze at a real-time image from the surface of Mars w...
ESA plans worry staff
A report claims that the European Space Agency is considering joint programmes with the military in space
