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A human mission to Mars will take anywhere from two and a half to three years. That is NASA’s best estimate, with each leg of the trip taking six months and including an 18 to 20 month stay on the Red Planet. That does not sound like an extremely long-term prospect until one considers the fact that the world record for the longest single stay in Earth orbit belongs to Soviet cosmonaut and physician Valeri Poliakov at 437 days and 18 hours aboard the Mir space station in 1994-1995. That is less than half the time it would take to complete a mission to Mars.  

Captain Eugene Andrew Cernan died Monday, surrounded by his family in Houston, Texas. He was 82 years old. For more than half his life, he was known as the Last Man on the Moon, but he was also a devoted father and husband, a naval aviator and advocate, and a great friend to many. He remains a hero for the ages.

Ballooning had wide-spread popularity in France during the 18^th century, but English intellectuals were initially skeptical about the balloon’s utility. At the request of King George III, French experimenter François Pierre Ami Argand flew a small hydrogen balloon from Windsor Castle in November 1783, the first such flight in England.

Are you planning on visiting the Museum on Inauguration Day? If so, here are a few tips for your visit on Friday, January 20.

“Gene” Cernan will always be remembered as the “last man on the Moon”—at least until the next person walks there. As commander of Apollo 17, the final expedition of that program, he spent three days on the Moon with Harrison “Jack” Schmitt. Yet that is not all he accomplished in a storied astronaut career.

At the Observatory, we often get the question “What telescope should I buy?” But once you have one, what do you do with it? Maybe it’s still in the box, perhaps you found it frustrating to use, or maybe you’re ready to hunt for more advanced targets. If that sounds like you, it’s time to go to a telescope clinic!

Following the success of the early balloonists Joseph-Michel Montgolfier, Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier, and Jacques Alexandre César Charles, brave aeronauts attempted to push the boundaries of what was possible with one flight after another. Things did not always go well in these early days of flight. Would-be aeronauts Miolan and Janinet announced that they would fly from Paris on July 11, 1784. By 5:00 pm, with the balloon still on the ground, the crowd lost patience and set it on fire. 

It's 5 o'clock somewhere on Mars!

No human has ever set foot on Mars, but scientists have been working there for years. A day on the red planet is about 40 minutes longer than here on Earth, which wreaks havoc on your workweek.

Not to be upstaged by the balloonist Jacques Alexandre César Charles, who launched the first hydrogen balloon in on August 1783, the brothers Joseph-Michel Montgolfier and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier sent a sheep, a duck, and a rooster aloft in a wicker cage dangling beneath a hot air balloon. The flight took place on September 19, 1783, before an enormous crowd, including the Royal family, gathered in front of the royal Palace of Versailles.

The balloon was a product of the scientific revolution of the 17^th and 18^th centuries. Early modern experimenters like the Englishman Robert Boyle, studied the physics of the atmosphere. By the 18^th century the focus shifted to the discovery of the constituent gases that make up the atmosphere. Early plans for flying machines inspired by the new discoveries were impractical, but quickly gave way to the first real balloons.