A NASA panel has just released a detailed report revealing the last moments of the space shuttle Columbia and its seven-member crew, lost February 1, 2003, on reentry. You can download the 400-page report, “Columbia Crew Survival Investigation Report...

Here is the transcript for my podcast about how to see Mercury, Rigel, and globular cluster M79 . Check out the Astronomy.com's interactive star chart to see an accurate map of your sky. It'll help you locate some of this week's key targets...

On January 4, I’ll leave the cold, snowy Midwest for the sunny (and mid-60s) Southern California (Long Beach, to be exact). Just that alone sounds great, but I’m not heading out there for a vacation. Instead I’ll be in California for the 213th American...

Over the past few months, I have been in charge of selecting the weekly poll we put up on the main page of Astronomy.com , and it has given me some insight into our readers and those who visit our site. Here are five things I’ve learned so far: 1)...

In January 2009 world-renowned amateur astronomer and comet discoverer David H. Levy joins Astronomy magazine as a Contributing Editor. Levy will write a monthly column for the world’s most popular magazine on astronomy, which has a circulation of more...

On Christmas Day, 1758, a German amateur astronomer and farmer named Johann Georg Palitzsch did something that would have made a great Christmas gift for English astronomer Edmond Halley. Johann “recovered” Halley’s Comet, meaning he was the first to...

Here is the transcript for my podcast about how to see the The Kids, Pazmino’s Cluster, and the Flaming Star Nebula . Check out the Astronomy.com's interactive star chart to see an accurate map of your sky. It'll help you locate some of this...

Many phases of the Moon ago — more than 200 — I came under the spell of earth science and wrote a lot about it for a number of years. This week, some of that ancient knowledge came back to visit as I gazed at a fantastic 28-image mosaic of Saturn’s moon...

Noted astrophotographer and Astronomy contributor John Chumack sent us a still image of the Geminid meteor shower, which peaked December 13/14. He shot the photo from his observatory in Dayton, Ohio. Read John’s comments below. My backyard observatory...

I just finished writing an article about the telescope’s history (you know, with the International Year of Astronomy coming up in 2009). I know that in the astronomy world aperture fever runs wild, but wow, some of these telescopes are just ginormous...

California’s Mount Wilson Observatory (MWO) is celebrating the centennial of its famous 60-inch reflecting telescope . Upon its completion in 1908, the “60-inch,” as astronomers call it, was the largest telescope in the world. Pioneer astronomer George...

Here is the transcript for my podcast about how to see the Hyades star cluster, open cluster M37, and NGC 1275 . Check out the Astronomy.com's interactive star chart to see an accurate map of your sky. It'll help you locate some of this week's...

If you feel like time is dragging, you’re right, at least partly. Actually, it’s Earth that’s dragging, and its lackadaisical attitude will be responsible for 2008 being a longer year . Oh, joy. Like it hasn’t been long enough already. On December...

Did a parent, boyfriend/girlfriend, spouse, supervisor, etc., ever say to you in an argument, “You’re not the center of the universe, you know!” Well, sorry to disappoint, but you’re not the center of the galaxy either. That honor belongs to a...

Michael Carroll, renowned illustrator and a frequent art contributor to Astronomy magazine, sent us his musings on the Phoenix Lander’s fate. Because his father worked at the Martin Marietta (now Lockheed/Martin) facility in Littleton, Colorado, Michael...

Whoever said NASA is only about serious space and aeronautics work obviously hasn’t checked out the government agency’s annual Great Moonbuggy Race . Here’s NASA’s press release about this exciting and entertaining competition: Registration is open...

It’s great how some people communicate science ideas. A few months ago we heard about the science writer at the Large Hadron Collider who filmed a rap video about the LHC and posted it on YouTube. So what does this have to do with Astronomy ? Well, Rob...

Here’s an “extra” for those of you who saw the nice conjunction December 1 featuring Venus, Jupiter, and the crescent Moon. Amateur astronomer Ian Sharp, who lives in Ham, England, just sent me two videos . The first shows the Moon (you can’t really see...

This week, Astronomy.com reported some intriguing comet research at Lowell Observatory in Arizona. A Lowell scientist, Dave Schleicher, studies the chemistry of comets. He and his colleagues recently found that Comet 96P/Machholz 1 has a weird chemistry...

Here is the transcript for my podcast about how to see Kemble's Cascade, open cluster M36, and barred spiral galaxy NGC 925 . Check out the Astronomy.com's interactive star chart to see an accurate map of your sky. It'll help you locate...

Astronomy magazine’s offices are located in an office park off I-94 in Waukesha, Wisconsin. I’m one of the lucky people here blessed with a corner window that provides a pretty wide view of the sky. In summer, I watch wicked thunderstorm systems scudding...

One of our friends from Canada, Richard Huziak, sent us these pictures of meteorites from the November 20 fireball . Here's the message he sent along with the images: First picture: Approx 1.5Kg, ~8cm in diameter Second picture: Approx...