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UPDATE ON NASA ARTEMIS II ROLLOUT

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HEY, SPACE PLACERS! Artemis II Crew NASA Kennedy Space Center, Florida A press conference was held today to update the status of the upcoming Artemis II moon mission https://wtop.com/the-space-place/2026/01/moon-here-we-come-nasa-inches-closer-to-lunar-return-with-artemis-ii-mission/ . All systems are GO  https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/missions/2026/01/16/artemis-ii-moon-rocket-ready-for-big-move/ .     From the Artemis II launch team there was an air of excitement about tomorrow’s rollout of the Artemis II stack. This excitement was aptly stated by John Honeycutt, Artemis II mission management team chair: “These are days we live for. SLS and Orion are ready to go to the pad. This mission feels a lot different from Artemis I as Artemis II is the next step to landing on the moon.” Honeycutt, who is the final word in determining whether Artemis II is a “GO/NO GO” for launch based on the myriad of inputs provided to him, added, “We have one job - safe return and we will fly whe...

MOON, HERE WE COME

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 Hey Space Placers! MOON, HERE WE COME A lifelong dream fulfilled... Follow Artemis here and on @wtop.com  January 15, 2026 Greg Redfern skyuguyinva@gmail.com   Kennedy Space Center, Florida Hundreds of NASA employees and contractors are working on this three day holiday weekend to attempt something that hasn’t happened since December 1972 - sending NASA astronauts to the moon. Final preparations to transport the Artemis II mission https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/artemis/   “stack” comprised of the Space Launch System rocket https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/space-launch-system/   and the Orion spacecraft https://www.nasa.gov/humans-in-space/orion-spacecraft/ to Launch Pad 39B are underway. Once the go ahead is given, the eleven million pound stack, secured to a huge transporter-crawler - Number 2 https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/nasas-crawler-transporter-2-sets-record/  to be precise - will rollout from the cavernous Vehicle Assembly Building htt...

For 21 years, enthusiasts used their home computers to search for ET. UC Berkeley scientists are homing in on 100 signals they found.

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Hey, Space Placers! A screenshot of the SETI@home user interface on a desktop computer in 2009. The software ran on millions of home computers worldwide, analyzing radio data from space in search of signals from extraterrestrial civilizations. Robert Sanders/UC Berkeley I did this WAYYYYYYY back when - decades ago actually Did you? Get all the details here. Sky Guy in VA 

ROMAN SPACE TELESCOPE

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Hey, Space Placers! Roman Space Telescope at Goddard Space Center  More to come. Sky Guy in VA 

Young Galaxies Grow Up Fast

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 Hey, Space Placers! The 18 galaxies from the ALPINE-CRISTAL-JWST survey. Each picture shows the location of ionized gas (as traced by the hydrogen alpha line, the spectral signature of hot hydrogen gas) in the galaxies. Several of the pictured galaxies are interacting, meaning two or even three galaxies are in the process of merging. Credit: Andreas Faisst (Caltech) and the ALPINE-CRISTAL-JWST Survey team "Astronomers have captured the most detailed look yet at faraway galaxies at the peak of their youth, an active time when the adolescent galaxies were fervently producing new stars. The observations focused on 18 galaxies located 12.5 billion light-years away." Read more here  . Sky Guy in VA

THE LATEST FROM NASA ON THE ARTEMIS II SCHEDULE

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 Hey, Space Placers! NASA’s SLS (Space Launch System) rocket is seen inside High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building as teams await the arrival of Artemis II crewmembers to board their Orion spacecraft on top of the rocket as part of the Artemis II countdown demonstration test, Saturday, Dec. 20, 2025, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. NASA/Joel Kowsky NASA has just announced the current schedule for Artemis II's roll out of the stack to the Launch Pad 39B plus three separate launch windows. We are getting closer and closer to "lighting that candle" to head to the Moon!!!!! Sky Guy in VA

NASA, in a rare move, cuts space station mission short after an astronaut’s medical issue

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Hey, Space Placers! NASA’s SpaceX Crew-11 members stand inside the Space Vehicle Mockup Facility at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. From left are Mission Specialist Kimiya Yui from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency), Commander NASA astronaut Zena Cardman, Mission Specialist Oleg Platonov of Roscosmos, and Pilot NASA astronaut Mike Fincke. Credit: NASA Here's the followup to my blog yesterday - 1/826. NASA will return Crew 11 in the next few days.  Sky Guy in VA