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| Image credit: X-Prize |
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| SpaceShipOne Flies to Space and Wins the X-Prize |
| Oct 4, 2004 - SpaceShipOne flew to space Monday morning, for the second time in less than a week. This time, though it came back down $10 million richer, taking the Ansari X-Prize. Pilot Brian Bennie guided the suborbital spacecraft to an altitude of more than 114 km (368,000 feet) after taking off from the Mojave Spaceport in California. Today's flight was completely smooth, without the terrifying series of barrel rolls at the highest point. Monday's flight was so high that it even beat records set by NASA's X-15 aircraft 40 years ago. (Full Story) |
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| Image credit: CfA |
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| Centre of the Milky Way Sterilized by Blasts |
| Oct 4, 2004 - Living at the centre of the Milky Way would be beautiful, but dangerous, according to research from the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Every 20 million years or so, a ring of gas and dust 500 light-years away from the middle of the galaxy collapses, beginning a furious period of star formation, which then sets off a series of supernovae. A planet in the area would be completely sterilized of life as star after star explodes. The next starburst period in the Milky Way is likely to happen in about 10 million years, but don't worry, we're far enough away that nothing would happen to the Earth. (Full Story) |
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