NASA Probe Crashes in Utah Desert
The planned recovery of a capsule carrying solar-wind particles from NASA’s Genesis deep-space mission went awry this morning. The capsule failed to deploy its parachutes and slammed into the desert near the Air Force’s Utah Test and Training Range at 160 kilometers per hour, shattering it open. (View Quicktime video.) Scientists had been waiting for three years for the solar-wind material, which would have been the first material returned to Earth by a U.S. spacecraft since the final Apollo mission in 1972. It was expected to reveal the composition of the primeval cloud from which the sun and the solar system congealed billions of years ago. The capsule–which was to have been scooped from the sky by a helicopter before it hit the ground–remains embedded in the desert, and NASA recovery teams have not yet determined whether any of the collected particles are salvageable.
Keep Reading
Most Popular
Large language models can do jaw-dropping things. But nobody knows exactly why.
And that's a problem. Figuring it out is one of the biggest scientific puzzles of our time and a crucial step towards controlling more powerful future models.
How scientists traced a mysterious covid case back to six toilets
When wastewater surveillance turns into a hunt for a single infected individual, the ethics get tricky.
The problem with plug-in hybrids? Their drivers.
Plug-in hybrids are often sold as a transition to EVs, but new data from Europe shows we’re still underestimating the emissions they produce.
Google DeepMind’s new generative model makes Super Mario–like games from scratch
Genie learns how to control games by watching hours and hours of video. It could help train next-gen robots too.
Stay connected
Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review
Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.