There is no better way to give people time to ponder the universe's greatest mysteries.
Tourists, including a Star Trek legend, ventured into space over the course of the year. Government and privately owned space travel companies made new discoveries.
The good, the bad, and the funny are the top space moments of the year.
NASA succeeded in its first flight of a robotic aircraft on another planet after its Mars-bound craft reached its destination 300 million miles from Earth earlier this year.
Ingenuity, a small helicopter that hitched a ride with the spacecraft, lifted 10 feet above Mars for just over 39 seconds in the thin atmosphere of the Red Planet. The April 19 achievement was called a Wright brothers moment by Mi Mi.
Ingenuity has had more than a dozen flights. In the future, flying robotic scouts may become sidekicks for rovers and astronauts.
"We don't know where Ingenuity will lead us," acting NASA Administrator Steve Jurczyk said in a press statement. Today's results show the sky on Mars may not be the limit.
The Perseverance rover was carried by the drone and safely touched down two months before it flew over Mars. The journey took seven months. Perseverance is one of three Mars missions going on right now.
Perseverance, NASA's ninth Mars rover, could be the key to answering some of the universe's greatest questions. The mission is to search for evidence of life on the desertlike planet, a reason why it landed on a narrow strip in an ancient river delta.
Over the next couple of years, the car-size rover will use a seven-foot arm to uncover rock and soil samples that could contain signs of old life.
How old? Maybe 3-or-so billion years.
The Chinese Long March 5B rocket is going to be launched on April 29, 2021. Credit: Photo by STR
2. The sky was falling.
We didn't know where the rocket would crash when it plummeted to Earth.
A piece of China's biggest rocket, Long March 5B, reentered the atmosphere above the Maldives in the Indian Ocean on May 8, burning up in the process. People in the Middle East reported seeing debris, but no one was hurt.
It gave some people a case of Chicken Little because no one knew where it was going to hit. There was a chance the rocket could rain debris on the cities.
The Chinese program launched a part for the new space station, but the rocket lost control in the sky. The flight was part of a plan to send rockets to build the "heavenly palace" of Tiangong.
The barreling fragment is not likely to hit land, according to Astrophysicists. Most of the junk that goes back to Earth splashes down. It's good that most of the planet is covered in water, so the chances of space stuff hitting the ocean are good.
The space agency has taken an unexplained risk before.
Sian Proctor was the first black woman to pilot a spaceship. The credit is given to the company: SpaceX.
3. First black woman in space.
In September, the first amateur crew to circle the world without a professional astronaut was pioneered by the company, which signaled the arrival of the commercial space tourism industry.
The first Black woman to serve as a spacecraft pilot was also a part of the Inspiration4 mission.
Sian Proctor is a 51-year-oldgeoscientist from Arizona. The International Space Station was passed by about 100 miles.
In 2009, he was a finalist to become anastrologer for NASA. She lived in a small building in Hawaii for several months as part of an isolation study for journeys to Mars.
On the Inspiration4 flight, the crew ate cold pizza, took a call from Tom Cruise, and dealt with a malfunctioning toilet fan.
During the three-day mission, he also painted with watercolors.
She said that she wedged herself down under seat 4 in the Dragon capsule so that she could keep her paints out of the water.
During a spacewalk, Thomas Marshburn points his camera downward toward the International Space Station. Credit: NASA.
4. Russia blew up a satellite.
Russia gave the International Space Station a rude awakening last month when it ran a missile test.
A ground controller warned seven astronauts to get ready to leave their ships as debris was threatening to hit the station. The US space agency said the Nov. 15 incident caused at least 1,500 pieces of debris to scatter.
The swirl of refuse posed no danger to anyone this time, but will pose a danger to astronauts in the future, U.S. officials said.
Russia's space agency denied that the anti-satellite test put the space station in danger.
Small fragments from the explosion could puncture space suits. Two astronauts needed to switch out an antenna outside the station, so NASA delayed the spacewalk. They carried out the task three days later.
The growing space junk problem and overarching defense issues have been renewed by the event. During the first meeting of the National Space Council, Vice President Harris condemned Russia for their use of space debris.
She said that as activity in space grows, we must demand responsibility from all spacefaring nations. Rules and norms on safety and security must be expanded to include military, commercial and civil space activity.
The Lucy mission will study the Jovian asteroids that are in the same area as Jupiter. Credit: Caltech.
5. Lucy is in the sky.
Lucy was launched by NASA this fall on a 12-year asteroid tour with plans to fly by several space rocks.
Lucy is a mission named after an early human who was named after The Beatles. The asteroids are thought to have been leftover from planet formations.
One asteroid in the solar system's main belt will be explored. The remnants of the early solar system are thought to be the latter. They are clustered in two warm areas before and after Jupiter.
Lucy, the fossil from Ethiopia, advanced our knowledge of human history, according to U.S. space officials.
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said that Lucy embodies NASA's quest to push out into the universe for the sake of exploration and science.
The Atlas V rocket launched the spaceship and it will circle back to Earth three times. It will be the first vehicle to return to Earth from the outer solar system.
The Pentagon couldn't explain the number of UAP seen by Navy pilots. The Department of Defense has a video.
6. The report was anticipated to be dropped.
Many believers were hoping that a forthcoming federal government report on unidentified flying objects would uncover the truth about extraterrestrials.
The big reveal was lackluster when the unclassified report was released in June. The document only had nine pages and no aliens.
The Navy pilots have seen a number of unexplained aerial phenomena since 2004. The document, released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, said that 21 of the cases demonstrated technology the country couldn't recognize.
Conspiracy theories about visitors from outer space have been spurred by the lack of explanation.
The Pentagon formed the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group just before Thanksgiving to find out what happened to UAP in sensitive airspace.
A rendering shows the location of an exoplanet. The X-ray and optical data was provided by NASA/CXC/SAO.
7. Extragalactic planetary.
Scientists think they have found the first planet.
A paper published in Nature Astronomy in October states that researchers discovered the exoplanet candidate in the spiral WhirlpoolGalaxy using a technique involving the study of X-ray wavelengths. Outside of the solar system are planets.
The exoplanet is thousands of times farther away than the stars in the Milky Way. Astronomers think the planet is roughly the size of Saturn and has a double the distance from the sun.
The discovery was made by looking for dips in the brightness of X-rays from X-ray bright binaries, usually containing a neutron star or black hole. The dips might show that a planet has passed in front of a star. The researchers say that the new X-ray strategy could allow for the detection of exoplanets at much greater distances.
Prior to the new candidate, all known exoplanets were found in the Milky Way.
It will be challenging to get more data to support the finding of the planet, if it exists.
We would have to wait decades to see another transit if we were to confirm that we are seeing a planet. We wouldn't know when to look because of the uncertainties about how long it takes.
William Shatner, one of the most familiar space figures in pop culture, became a real space traveler in October of 2021. The photo was taken by Patrick T. Fallon.
8. Capt. Kirk got a starship.
William Shatner was overwhelmed by the experience of being thrown into the air.
Jeff Bezos lost the space race to Richard Branson, but his space tourism company Blue Origin won the hearts of Americans when it took the former Star Trek actor up to kiss the Karman line, where Earth's atmosphere and outer space meet.
No nonagenarian has gone where Shatner has gone before. He was the oldest person to go to space. 66 miles up, anyway.
The first suborbital crewed flight of four regular folks was on July 20. The second flight carrying Shatner received more buzz than the first.
Shatner was overwhelmed by the view effect and grasped for something profound to say about his hayride. His character Capt. James T. Kirk was a signature of his, as he had a string of thoughts that sounded a lot like his poetry.
He gestured overhead to describe the blackness of space after he said there was Mother Earth and comfort. Is there death? I don't know. Is that how death is? Whip! And it is gone.
What does it mean? We are here for Shatner's journey.
He said he hoped he never recovered from this.
