space videos

Animations for media and public use. This reel depicts key events during entry, descent, and landing that will occur when NASA’s Perseverance rover lands on Mars February 18, 2021. In the span of about seven minutes, the spacecraft slows down from about 12,100 mph (19,500 kph) at the top of the Martian atmosphere to about 2 mph (3 kph) at touchdown in an area called Jezero Crater. Perseverance will seek signs of ancient microbial life on Mars, collect and cache Martian rock and regolith (broken rock and dust), characterize the planet's geology and climate, and pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet.

NASA revealed the first five full-color images and spectrographic data from the world's most powerful space telescope, the James Webb Space Telescope, a partnership with ESA (European Space Agency), and CSA (Canadian Space Agency). The world got its first look at the full capabilities of the mission at a live event streamed from the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, on July 12, 2022. The event showcased these targets: - Carina Nebula: A landscape speckled with glittering stars and cosmic cliffs - Stephan’s Quintet: An enormous mosaic with a visual grouping of five galaxies - Southern Ring Nebula: A nebula with rings of gas and dust for thousands of years in all directions - WASP 96-b: A distinct signature of water in the atmosphere of an exoplanet orbiting a distant Sun-like star - SMACS 0723: The deepest and sharpest infrared image of the distant universe to date

This artist’s rendering illustrates new findings about a star shredded by a black hole. When a star wanders too close to a black hole, intense tidal forces rip the star apart. In these events, called “tidal disruptions,” some of the stellar debris is flung outward at high speed while the rest falls toward the black hole. This causes a distinct X-ray flare that can last for a few years. NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, Swift Gamma-ray Burst Explorer, and ESA/NASA’s XMM-Newton collected different pieces of this astronomical puzzle in a tidal disruption event called ASASSN-14li, which was found in an optical search by the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae (ASAS-SN) in November 2014. The event occurred near a supermassive black hole estimated to weigh a few million times the mass of the sun in the center of PGC 043234, a galaxy that lies about 290 million light-years away. Astronomers hope to find more events like ASASSN-14li to test theoretical models about how black holes affect their environments. During the tidal disruption event, filaments containing much of the star's mass fall toward the black hole. Eventually these gaseous filaments merge into a smooth, hot disk glowing brightly in X-rays. As the disk forms, its central region heats up tremendously, which drives a flow of material, called a wind, away from the disk. Music credit: Encompass by Mark Petrie from Killer Tracks.

This animation depicts the collision between our Milky Way galaxy and the Andromeda galaxy. Hubble Space Telescope observations indicate that the two galaxies, pulled together by their mutual gravity, will crash together about 4 billion years from now. Around 6 billion years from now, the two galaxies will merge to form a single galaxy. The video also shows the Triangulum galaxy, which will join in the collision and perhaps later merge with the Andromeda/Milky Way pair.

We are all connected to and by Earth --- whether it's the trees and plants that give us the oxygen we breathe, the snow-capped mountains that provide the water we drink, or the breathtaking geophysical forces that shape the land beneath our feet. NASA has over 20 satellites measuring the height of oceans and inland water, clouds and precipitation, carbon dioxide and much more. By understanding our changing world, we improve lives and safeguard our future.

On June 7, 2021, NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew closer to Jupiter’s ice-encrusted moon Ganymede than any spacecraft in more than two decades. Less than a day later, Juno made its 34th flyby of Jupiter. This animation provides a “starship captain” point of view of each flyby. For both worlds, JunoCam images were orthographically projected onto a digital sphere and used to create the flyby animation. Synthetic frames were added to provide views of approach and departure for both Ganymede and Jupiter.

This video uses data gathered from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft to recreate some of the stunning views of the Moon that the Apollo 13 astronauts saw on their perilous journey around the farside in 1970. These visualizations, in 4K resolution, depict many different views of the lunar surface, starting with earthset and sunrise and concluding with the time Apollo 13 reestablished radio contact with Mission Control. Also depicted is the path of the free return trajectory around the Moon, and a continuous view of the Moon throughout that path. All views have been sped up for timing purposes — they are not shown in "real-time." Credits: Data Visualization by: Ernie Wright (USRA) Video Produced & Edited by: David Ladd (USRA) Music provided by Universal Production Music: "Visions of Grandeur" - Frederick Wiedmann

This animation takes the viewer on a simulated flight into, and then out of, Jupiter’s upper atmosphere at the location of the Great Red Spot. It was created by combining an image from the JunoCam imager on NASA's Juno spacecraft with a computer-generated animation. The perspective begins about 2,000 miles (3,000 kilometers) above the cloud tops of the planet's southern hemisphere. The bar at far left indicates altitude during the quick descent; a second gauge next to that depicts the dramatic increase in temperature that occurs as the perspective dives deeper down. The clouds turn crimson as the perspective passes through the Great Red Spot. Finally, the view ascends out of the spot.

The moment has finally arrived, it's time for Felix Baumgartner to perform the space dive. Taken from Red Bull Space Dive.