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NASA dominated space and social media in 2016
"We all have a thirst for wonder," American astronomer Carl Sagan wrote in his sci-fi novel Contact. "It's a deeply human quality." And it's partly thanks to this "thirst" that NASA had the space game on lock this year, even though it doesn't have access to as much money as it used to. The agency stepped into 2016 armed with $19.3 billion in government funding. Yes, that's almost a $1 billion more than what the administration originally asked for, but it's also significantly lower than NASA's budget in previous years, when adjusted for inflation.
SpaceX sea landing fails thanks to a broken leg (updated)
So much for SpaceX's successful ground landing representing a sign of things to come. SpaceX has confirmed that the first stage of its latest Falcon 9 rocket suffered a "hard landing" on its attempt to land at sea, breaking one of the landing legs and sending the vehicle crashing down. We're still waiting on full details (we'll update as necessary), but the partial failure isn't shocking. SpaceX had warned of choppy seas before the rocket took off, so there was little doubt that this was going to be tough. Let's just hope that the company can learn more from this third failed experiment -- while it's no doubt happy that the ocean-tracking Jason-3 satellite is still on track, it probably wants to avoid these costly incidents in the future. Update: Elon Musk explains that a leg lockout didn't latch properly, leading the rocket to tip over when it touched down. So close, and yet... [Image credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls]
Watch SpaceX attempt a sea-based landing at 1:42PM ET
Flush with success from its first ground landing, SpaceX is about to make history again... well, maybe. The private space firm is scheduled to launch the ocean-monitoring Jason-3 satellite today (January 17th) at 1:42PM ET, and it hopes to once again attempt landing a Falcon 9 rocket on its drone barge. If everything goes ahead as planned, it'll be the first successful sea landing ever -- and SpaceX can put those unpleasant crashes behind it. You can watch the company's official stream below, while NASA TV has live coverage running before and during liftoff. Update: Unfortunately, the landing wasn't successful. [Image credit: SpaceX Photos, Flickr]
