drew@drewexmachina.com
According to the FAI (Fédération Aéronautique Internationale) which maintains records for aeronautical activities, the “official” threshold of space is at an altitude of 100 kilometers which […]
Back when I was fresh out of college in the mid-1980s, the buzz in the astronomical community centered on the return of Comet Halley to the […]
Discovered in 1781 by German-born British astronomer, William Herschel, Uranus was the first planet in our Solar System to be discovered since ancient times. In the […]
When thinking about the old Soviet space program, people usually remember its long history of crewed space missions or its somewhat checkered lunar and planetary programs […]
The largest of Saturn’s diverse family of moons, Titan is also arguably one of the more interesting worlds in our Solar System with a thick haze-filled […]
In recent years it seems that NASA regularly extends the missions of its long-lived planetary spacecraft sometimes far beyond their original primary missions. The armada of […]
The impact of the first human to fly into space can hardly be appreciated today in this age of a continuous human presence in Earth orbit. […]
Recently I re-read the 1980 revised edition of Robert Powers’ book Planetary Encounters: The Future of Unmanned Spaceflight which I had bought just a couple of […]
In the days before the internet, the primary means of getting information about space exploration was in books and print periodicals. And back in those days […]
The space-related accidents that have been in the news recently are reminders of the inherent dangers of spaceflight. And such losses are certainly more keenly felt […]
The Voyager mission to the outer planets was arguably one of the greatest voyages of discovery in the history of human exploration. Over the course of […]
The second part of my latest article, “Planetary Orbit Insertion Failures Part II”, has been published on line in The Space Review. With a half a […]
Welcome!
