Where we came from and where we're going, together in the sky. What a time to be alive. 🌓🌍

This weird looking object Orion is pointing at is an International Docking System Standard Centerline Docking Target (IDSS CDT), Rev E. It's not just cool looking, there is a lot of information embedded in the geometry that a pilot can use. Print your own here! www.printables.com/model/143055...

The LROC Quickmap website exists, is free, and anyone can use it to make pretty much any map that you would want of any dataset covering any portion of the lunar surface. quickmap.lroc.im-ldi.com

Found out a coworker has made it to his mid-20's without ever seeing or playing with a gyroscope. He doesn't know the meeting I scheduled with him tomorrow is to congratulate him on being one of today's lucky 10,000! *xkcd.com/1053/

Update: Paul Ehrlich no longer contributing to the overpopulation problem*

I solve this problem with kids by pronouncing it "Kuroo-an-us" (slightly rolled r). Then if any kid corrects me, I get to tell them how "Uranus" is our mispronounciation of the god we now call "Kronos", and by the time a 12 year old untangles that 🤯, they've forgotten the butt joke.

Good question! Why people in space? In simple terms, because: 1) People good 2) More people more good 3) Maximum people maximum good 4) Maximum people need people space. In much more elegant terms 😉: youtu.be/XH8Dn_d5mIs?...

It's perfectly normal to encounter the idea of datacenters in space and wonder, "Why?" As an aerospace engineer who has been in this industry for ~15 years, let me try to give some historical context: No one has yet found The Idea™ that makes space-based civilizations a profitable investment. 1/

"Endeavour, use caution when docking with station. Birds on the target"

I keep encountering this misconception about datacenters in space. So let me make this clear: An individual satellite isn't the datacenter. The constellation of ~thousands of satellites is the datacenter. The satellites are single racks. And that's a very solvable power/thermal problem.

Respectfully disagree. Alive is better than inanimate. Vibrant is better than pristine. To me, bringing life (not just human life, all life!) to every part of the solar system that our technology can enable it to exist is a profoundly beautiful act of environmentalism.

Artemis II is taking humans back to the moon soon! Let's talk about their trajectory.

Lawyers, please, I am begging you. Just *try* talking to an engineer. We are just as nerdy as you and delight just as much in a well-constructed "You're wrong". It will save you from writing laws like WA HB 2321. Laws like this actually do make engineers not want to talk to you.

THIS. We need to make "LOL, I suck at math" as shameful and unthinkable a thing for an adult to say as "LOL, I don't read books". Innumeracy needs to be as shameful as illiteracy. Not a self depricatory joke warrenting a "😜"

#duvetknowitschristmas @maxfagin.bsky.social

Max Faget, NASA design engineer on Mercury, Gemini, Apollo *and* Shuttle.

Bolide in the sky on the drive back from Portland!

Good design is redesign. That said, if this design could hurry up and converge already, my scrap part bin would really appreciate it.

My high school friends in 2005: "You know what would be fun? Let's spend a year remaking #MontyPython and the Holy Grail and uploading it to this new website called uh... UTube?" Same friends in 2025: "Hey! Let's relive the time we did that!" Tonight at 6PM PT: youtu.be/0YjQArPxL5I

Most of what I know about mid 20th century pop culture, I learned from either Monty Python, or Tom Lehrer. Truly and unparalleled legend in the world of musical satire (and math, and science, and and and and and) www.nytimes.com/2025/07/27/a...

When I was a kid, my jazz pianist / computer scientist Dad gave me a book on the physics of music. I ate that kind of stuff up. Now ~20 years later, Minute Physics drops this banger of a video that covers the same material, but unlike a book, you can actually *hear* the physics being talked about 🤩

Space folks: You should see #Elio! The world needs more movies that teach good lessons about friendship, family, and the importance of redundant distributed Space Domain Awareness capabilities for orbital debris mitigation.

Whew, what a day! Today we revealed the preview of NSF–DOE Rubin Observatory's epic cosmic movie🎬 #RubinFirstLook From wide-field and deep views of the Universe, to the dynamic and changing sky, Rubin is already bringing the night sky to life! 🔭🧪 rubinobservatory.org/news/first-i...

In Southern California, and the heat has reached Flat Squirrel levels.

Unless these decisions are reversed, this will be remembered as a disastrous week for @NASA. First, I am not optimistic that whomever this administration nominates next for NASA Administrator will be nearly as qualified or enthusiastic about the agency’s mission as Jared. 1/

3D Printable Coordinate Axes. For when you need to illustrate spacecraft dynamics and sever the limbs of your enemies. www.printables.com/model/131135...

Now, behold, I am become Max: Router of my foes, and also 4' x 4' plastic sheets for a project I can't wait to share with everyone.

3D printed dinosaur parts for a friend. Actual dinosaur for scale.

I take back 85% of the jokes I have ever told about Harvard lawyers.

Passover is a joyus celebration of freedom and family coupled with terrible food. I'm glad that my juidaism permits a family brunch of bacon, steak, egg and toast skillets before we "enjoy" the gafilta fish and dry matzah.

Growing up in Colorado Springs, I didn't consider this kind of weather shift to be weird at all. But now that I'm back... yeah. This is weird and fascinating. (Photos taken 24 hours apart)

"I can flyyyyyy... Oh wait"

The Breakthrough Awards + songs about science + Gilbert & Sullivan is striking a lot of my Venn Diagram. This is a *very* good parody of one of the hardest songs to parody well. Transcribed lyrics included next for greater appreciation: www.youtube.com/watch?v=jG02...

Hello NASA JSC! I am at you for the next 3 days. Anyone I know here want to grab lunch?

SciFi authors: If you are looking for a convenient but also semi-realistic reason for why humans play a pivotal role in your galactic federation of dozens of alien species; this can be it: Because Earth's heavy gravity forced humans to develop an overpowered spaceflight capability as a baseline.

I derive some measurable wonder from the fact that we inhabit a world where part of a pre-travel checklist can be "Make sure the robots are set up to keep building things and cleaning the home until you get back"

I won the pi day pi recitation contest at work today, and for reasons that I will leave it to future historians to puzzle out, it's thanks to @tylerboschert.bsky.social

Two Tudyk encounters, two costumes, two decades apart #ECCC

Made it too the moon! The year of CLPS is well unerway. 🌗

Not the relevant subject of today's news cycle, but still a major misunderstanding about terraforming Mars that I am seeing a lot people be confidently wrong about today.

Hey folks. I know the world is pretty rough right now, but Beetlejuice has just fallen asleep in my arms. Could we keep it down a bit? For his sake?

An Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Tiny Little Mt. Rainiery. 1:500000 scale

And there lay the Martians—dead! Slain, after all of man's devices had failed, by the humblest things that God, in his wisdom, has put upon this earth: 6*10^21 tonnes of heavy ass rock and metal.

Truly few things in the universe more hope inducing than kids with QUESTIONS about SPACE!

Fun fact: Earth is the highest gravity object in the solar system that it is possible for life like us it to have arisen. Everything our civilization has done in defiance of gravity (bridges, skyscrapers, aircraft, space programs) we've done on hard mode.

Coming *tonight* at 7PM PT on YouTube. The conclusion to an exciting and heartwarming story about finding friends in the shadows of a total eclipse. Join us here on Andrew's channel for the ride: youtu.be/cD2gPb7O9Sc

4 days back on @vassar.bsky.social campus to speak to sophomores about how science careers can work at a liberal arts institution. 4 photos of my 4 favorite places on campus - Vassar Observatory - Sanders Physics - The Library - Shiva Theater

No words. Because my voice is gone. Which tends to happen when you are sharing a room with a thousand people, all cheering as years of their hard work on New Glenn pays off in a few minutes. Well done you amazing humans. I am proud to be on your team. The moon feels a little closer tonight.

Congrats are overdue to Suni Willaims, who 3 days ago, became the 2nd most experienced US astronaut!

Remember that sci-fi movie/show/book that portrayed The New Tech™ as working fine? And no revolution/apocalypse/utopia came about? And things just got incrementally better? And that happened over & over again? Remember that? Me neither. Because that would be boring sci-fi. But that's reality.