All Stories

We have been able to directly measure quakes on the Moon and Mars and refer to them as moonquakes and marsquakes.

Before more Museum galleries open, we're revisiting how we hang really, really big, priceless artifacts from the ceiling in the museum.

A new national Air and Space Museum gallery explores the different ways humans could build a presence in outer space.

Some Smithsonian artifacts that memorialize these achievements might be closer to you than you realize. Through collaborations with affiliate organizations, the Smithsonian sponsors traveling exhibitions and loans artifacts to museums throughout the United States and abroad. 

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe is making its closest approach to the Sun, and many discoveries along the way.

A 2013 expedition funded by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos recovered dozens of parts from the Saturn V rocket that launched Apollo 11 into space in 1969. 

This dark side is also known as the farside (and the side facing Earth is called the nearside). The phrase "dark side of the Moon" is used to refer to something mysterious or unknown. For most of human history we did not know what the farside of the Moon looked like. It wasn’t until 1959 when the Soviet Union launched the Luna 3 spacecraft that we got our first look at the farside.

Ed Stone’s long and distinguished career in space science connects to many of the planetary exploration objects displayed in the galleries at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. That so many of the Museum’s objects have connections to his professional achievements illustrates Stone’s significant legacy in space science and exploration.

Sci-fi is full of giant ships full of humanity living and dying and reaching out to new places far far away. Usually, these are called generations ships. And they rely on well, generations.

AirSpace is looking up! We're exploring how we hang really, really big, priceless artifacts from the ceiling in the museum.