NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman has selected Stephen Cash to lead the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The appointment takes effect Monday, October 19. Cash is a longtime NASA engineer and aerospace executive. He is returning to the center where he started his career more than 40 years ago. The article's excerpt notes the center's historic contributions to NASA's missions.
Following the Artemis II mission's splashdown on April 10, 2026, U.S. Navy divers photographed the underwater Orion spacecraft heat shield. NASA later examined how well the thermal protection system shielded the crew and spacecraft during reentry into Earth's atmosphere. The agency's detailed analysis was used to assess the shield's performance. The source article is truncated, so the full findings of that assessment are not included here.
As supercooled propellant began flowing into the core stage of NASA's Space Launch System rocket, Allison Mjoen and her family looked on with awe and pride. Mjoen serves as operations manager for NASA's Exploration Ground Systems Program. She helped develop the systems and ground operations meant to carry astronauts back to the Moon. The article is part of NASA's I Am Artemis series profiling the people behind the mission. The piece highlights the personal stake and professional contributions of the engineers preparing for future crewed flights.
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has produced an image of NGC 1827, an edge-on intermediate spiral galaxy. The galaxy lies roughly 37 million light-years from Earth. It is located in the constellation Columba, also known as the Dove. The image shows the galaxy viewed from the side, with its disk seen edge-on.
NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for October 16, 2026, highlights a photograph of the International Space Station being pursued across the sky. The featured image is part of the agency's long-running daily series that pairs a picture of the cosmos with an explanation written by a professional astronomer. The source text available is largely navigation and site boilerplate, so the specific details of the photographer, capture location, and technical notes are not included. The entry is published on NASA's APOD website, which has run since 1995 and is archived for public browsing.
NASA has released high-definition nighttime light images showing the areas along the Florida Panhandle where Hurricane Isaias knocked out electricity. The imagery also illustrates how quickly power was restored in those areas afterward. The photos highlight the storm's impact on the Gulf Coast through changes in nighttime illumination. The source text does not provide further details on the scale of outages or exact timelines.
NASA is taking a significant part in JAXA's Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission, which is aimed at deepening scientists' knowledge of Mars' two moons. The mission will examine the characteristics of Phobos and Deimos and work to establish how they formed. It also plans to bring a sample back from the moons to Earth for analysis. The effort builds on NASA's long record of Mars exploration. The article as provided is truncated, so further specifics about timing and instruments are not included here.
NASA is closely monitoring a climate event that is developing this fall and is described as rarer than a solar eclipse. El Niño is a natural pattern that recurs about every two to seven years and is characterized by unusually warm water in parts of the equatorial Pacific. Scientists at the agency are using satellite observations to follow how the phenomenon is taking shape. The article notes that such events can have wide-ranging effects on global weather and climate. The full report provides further details on the observations and their implications.
The International Space Station, orbiting about 250 miles above Earth, relies heavily on the Sun as its main energy source. Solar power runs the station's life support systems, daily operations, and hundreds of research experiments. These experiments aim to benefit people on Earth and to prepare astronauts for deep space missions. Over the past five years, NASA has expanded the station's power supply through the addition of new solar arrays. The article is truncated, so further details on the specific upgrade are not included here.
NASA will fly a Dynamic Aviation A200 aircraft at low altitude over farmland near Transit, Texas, from October 22 through November 9. The flights are designed to measure gas and particulate emissions coming from animal feeding operations. Agricultural emissions are considered a significant yet poorly studied component of Earth's land and atmospheric systems. The research falls under the FarmFlux mission, which will deploy instruments to collect this data. The effort aims to improve scientific understanding of how farming activity affects the surrounding air.
Registration is now open for the 2026 NASA Space Apps Challenge, a global two-day event. The hackathon takes place on Saturday, November 14 and Sunday, November 15. Participating teams develop solutions drawing on NASA's ambitious exploration goals and its free, open datasets. The annual event is welcoming participants of every age and experience level.
NASA has chosen 12 institutions across the United States to share $12 million in funding. The money is meant to speed up academic research and technology development tied to the agency's goals for exploring the Moon, Mars, and deeper space. The awards come through the M-STAR initiative, part of NASA's Minority University Research and Education Project (MUREP). Each selected institution can receive up to $1 million to support its work.
NASA's Artemis II mission carried four astronauts around the Moon and returned them safely to Earth. The mission is seen as groundwork for future crewed landings on the lunar surface. Further engineering analysis of the Orion spacecraft's heat shield verified early data indicating it worked as designed. Engineers specifically assessed how the thermal protection material held up during re-entry. The findings support the reliability of the shield for future crewed lunar flights.
A radio wave formation resembling a treble clef was captured in a NASA Chandra X-ray Observatory image dated October 14, 2026. Researchers using Chandra data believe the structure was produced by an outburst from a supermassive black hole. The outburst appears to have been followed by a collision between two galaxy clusters. The findings offer a possible explanation for the unusual shape, which the source article describes as remarkably musical in appearance.
NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day for October 15, 2026 features an image of the Milky Way visible over Manhattan. The daily feature pairs a photograph of the universe with a short explanation written by a professional astronomer. The archive page provides access to past submissions, a search function, and a calendar of earlier entries. The source text available here is largely navigational and includes only a partial description of the image's subject.
During El Niño, a series of fires spreads across tropical regions. The outbreak begins in equatorial Asia. It then moves into the central and eastern parts of the Amazon rainforest. The source article does not provide further details on the scale or causes of the fires.
NASA will hold a news conference at 2 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, October 20, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The briefing will preview two upcoming spacewalks, designated US Spacewalks 100 and 101. The planned work focuses on installing solar arrays and augmenting power on the International Space Station. The event will be streamed across several online platforms, with viewing details available on NASA's live page.
NASA astronauts Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney will answer STEM questions from Florida students while aboard the International Space Station. The live Earth-to-space call is scheduled for 12 p.m. EDT on Friday, October 16. It will be streamed on NASA's Learn With NASA YouTube channel. The event is being hosted by Sally Ride Elementary School.
NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has analyzed a radio wave formation nicknamed the 'Treble Clef' for its musical shape. Astronomers determined the structure likely resulted from a two-stage cosmic event. The process began with an outburst from a supermassive black hole. This was followed by a collision within a galaxy cluster, which shaped the ejected material.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched on October 13, 2026, carrying a Dragon spacecraft. The launch occurred near sunrise or sunset, creating a striking visual effect. Sunlight illuminated the rocket's exhaust plume high in the atmosphere. This phenomenon, known as a 'jellyfish', produced a large, glowing shape. The event was captured and shared by NASA.
