Our Planet

It would take at least 3 million years for Earth to recover from the 6th mass extinction

Even if we stop destroying Earth’s wilderness today, it would take 3 to 5 million years for Earth to recover from the 6th mass extinction, scientists warn.

What high-speed astronomy can tell us about the galactic zoo

An artist's conception of the primary mirror of the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST)

For most of human history, the distant ‘celestial sphere’ was regarded as perfect and unchanging. Stars remained in place, planets moved predictably, and the few rogue comets were viewed as atmospheric phenomena. This began to change with the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe’s observation of the supernova of 1572 – apparently, a new star – and his studies of the Great Comet of 1577, which he proved was actually a distant object. Nonetheless, the impression of permanence is strong. There are very few astronomical objects that noticeably vary to the naked eye: only the brightest comets, novae, and supernovae. For observers in the northern hemisphere, the last naked-eye supernova was in 1604.

Salar de Uyuni salt flat from space

While orbiting over South America” on March 17, 2019, an astronaut aboard the International Space Station (ISS) shot this photograph of the Atacama Desert, the driest non-polar desert in the world, and the numerous salt flats in the Andes Mountains along the border of Chile and Bolivia. The centerpiece is the Salar de Uyuni, the largest salt flat on Earth.

SpaceX launches the second Falcon Heavy

On April 11, 2019, the American space company SpaceX launched its second Falcon Heavy rocket, and this time, landed all three boosters successfully.

First-ever image of a Black Hole

This is the first image ever of a black hole. The EHT (Event Horizon Telescope) captured an image of the nearby elliptical galaxy Messier 87’s (M87’s) supermassive black hole in the center of the Virgo galaxy cluster, 53 million light-years away. It was revealed today (April 10, Wednesday) in multiple press conferences around the world, and was the result of a global collaborative effort from over 200 scientists working with the EHT.

NASA’s Curiosity Rover captures two solar eclipses on Mars

In March 2019, NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover captured two solar eclipses created by each of the planet’s tiny moons, Phobos and Deimos.

Titanic sinking in real-time

On April 15, 1912, RMS Titanic, which was the largest ship afloat at the time she entered service, sank in the North Atlantic Ocean after colliding with an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City.

It was one of the deadliest commercial marine disasters in modern history: of the estimated 2,224 passengers and crew aboard, more than 1,500 died. Here is a real-time animation of the RMS Titanic’s sinking below, published by Titanic: Honor And Glory channel.