AstroAmateur
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astroamateur.bsky.social
AstroAmateur
@astroamateur.bsky.social
25 followers 100 following 86 posts
Just a dude who likes to take pictures of rockets and space.
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astroamateur.bsky.social
Congrats @rocketlabcorp.com on achieving 20 Electron launches in a year! Electron becomes the second commercial rocket to reach such a milestone. Hopefully in a few years we'll be congratulating Neutron for the same achievement.
December 18, 2025 at 2:56 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Large explosion at Firefly's test facility. Potentially either an Alpha or Eclipse first stage. A secondary explosion followed the first which could suggest damage to the ground tanks. Hopefully everyone's safe and we get more info soon
September 29, 2025 at 7:57 PM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
rocketlabcorp.com
⏱️150,000 hours 🛣️2,574 miles 🚚38 hours
That’s what it took to design, build, test & deliver our two ESCAPADE spacecraft from Long Beach to Kennedy Space Center. Next stop: 🛰️🔴🛰️ Mars to study its magnetosphere & unlock clues for future explorers. bit.ly/4mshUbK
ESCAPADE: Journey to Mars
The journey is just beginning! Rocket Lab's twin spacecraft for NASA and UC Berkeley's ESCAPADE mission have arrived at Kennedy Space Flight Center in preparation for their launch to Mars.
bit.ly
September 22, 2025 at 8:45 PM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
rocketlabcorp.com
Can’t get enough of Electron missions?

How about another one tomorrow?

With our 67th mission complete, we’ve scheduled our next launch from LC-1 in less than 48 hours – Electron’s fastest turnaround from the same launch site yet!

ℹ️ Mission details: bit.ly/3I1UJ9L
June 26, 2025 at 7:09 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Venus, Saturn, and the Moon looked pretty happy this morning
April 25, 2025 at 3:37 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
2 Falcon 9 launches. 2 RTLS landings. 1 cloudy night that nearly ruined this composition.
April 22, 2025 at 1:30 AM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Listen in on the Senate Nomination Hearing for future NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. LIVE now
www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqej...
#NASA
Jared Isaacman Senate Nomination Hearing for NASA Administrator
YouTube video by NASA
www.youtube.com
April 9, 2025 at 2:17 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Refreshing article by @sciguyspace.bsky.social about Starliner's flight from Butch Wilmore's perspective. No politics or clickbait. Just the facts of what happened straight from Butch.

arstechnica.com/space/2025/0...
Starliner’s flight to the space station was far wilder than most of us thought
“Hey, this is a very precarious situation we’re in.”…
arstechnica.com
April 1, 2025 at 6:42 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
The first one is always a doozy. The launch infrastructure seems to be okay which is great. Time to work the issue and get the second rocket on the pad.
transport.esa.int ESA Space Transport @transport.esa.int · Mar 30
European commercial rocket Spectrum, developed and operated by Isar Aerospace, took flight from Andøya Spaceport 🇳🇴 and flew for 30 seconds, clearing the launch pad and proving the rocket can achieve one of the hardest parts of space transportation: liftoff 🚀

More: www.esa.int/Enabling_Sup...
March 30, 2025 at 3:35 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
🫡
science.esa.int ESA Space Science @science.esa.int · Mar 27
Gaia has been powered down after more than a decade spent gathering data.

Though the spacecraft’s operations are now over and Gaia goes into a well deserved retirement, the scientific exploitation of Gaia’s data has just begun 👉 www.esa.int/Enabling_Sup...

🔭 🧪
Farewell, Gaia! Spacecraft operations come to an end
The European Space Agency (ESA) has powered down its Gaia spacecraft after more than a decade spent gathering data that are now being used to unravel the secrets of our home galaxy.On 27 March 2025, G...
www.esa.int
March 27, 2025 at 7:21 PM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
nasaspaceflight.com
The arrival and docking of Crew Dragon Endurance and the Crew-10 Astronauts as captured by NASA Astronaut Don Pettit aboard the International Space Station.
March 16, 2025 at 8:53 AM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
rocketlabcorp.com
New launch background images just dropped 🔥 That's 2/2 in three days from Launch Complex 1. Thanks Kineis for flying on Electron.
March 18, 2025 at 7:49 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
And the sun sets on Firefly's Blue Ghost. It's not expected to survive the 2 week long lunar night, but stranger things have happened!
One of its final pictures sees the Earth, Venus, and the Sun before it dips below the Moon's horizon.

Credit: Firefly shorturl.at/jaI7N
The Lunar sunset. The sun is halfway below the lunar horizon. There's a small dot above the sun which is Venus and another object that appears as bright as the sun. That object is the Earth.
March 18, 2025 at 6:58 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Recently upgraded from a Canon 550d (2010) to a Canon 200d (2017). The low light performance improvement has been fantastic!

#orion #astrophotography #astronomy #nebula
The orion nebula consists of a bright core surrounded by small, light blue/green clouds. Those are surrounded by much larger red/violet clouds.
March 18, 2025 at 4:00 PM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
rocketlabcorp.com
High fives all round – that’s mission success for our 62nd Electron launch! Congratulations to the team at Kineis, it has been a privilege to deploy your entire constellation in less than a year across five dedicated Electron launches.
March 18, 2025 at 3:24 AM
astroamateur.bsky.social
I took some photos from a 2022 shoot of the Moon with Mars, stacked it and reprocessed it. I was so much happier when I saw how much more detail I could get out of the same data.

#moon #astrophotography #mars
A full moon with a small speck of red below it. The small speck is Mars. This image is the stacked version of the Moon with more detail of its surface A full moon with a small speck of red below it. The small speck is Mars. This version is the original. It is brighter and the details are less sharp and washed out.
March 17, 2025 at 11:42 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
My final stacked image of last week's Blood Moon

#bloodmoon #astrophotography #space #moon
The Blood Moon is a full moon with a red gradient that occurs during totality of a lunar eclipse.
March 16, 2025 at 10:33 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
Getting a little artsy with it. Yesterday's lunar eclipse combined with last year's solar eclipse. Instantly one of my favorite pieces
Several stages of the total lunar eclipse combined to show the progression. The bottom left moon starts full and slowly becomes darker until it reaches the middle which is bright red. Then they progress back to a full moon. Multiple frames of a solar eclipse combined into one photo to show the progression. It starts as a full sun in the top left, become covered more and more by the moon's shadow until the middle sun which is entirely covered and only shows the outer ring of light. The progression reverses after the middle. The lunar eclipse progression photo and solar eclipse progression photo overlayed on top of each other making an X shape. The total lunar eclipse sits within the total solar eclipse stage.
March 15, 2025 at 3:04 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
In case you were wondering what the eclipse looked like from the lunar surface, Blue Ghost has you covered!

fireflyspace.com/news/blue-gh...
A solar eclipse. The shadow of the earth is covering the sun, but the sun's light is outlining the Earth in a way that looks like a diamond ring
March 14, 2025 at 2:21 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
A quick and dirty edit of the beautiful blood moon. If you're awake in North America, go outside NOW!
March 14, 2025 at 7:23 AM
astroamateur.bsky.social
And thus begins a long night of lunar photography and not much sleep
March 14, 2025 at 5:18 AM
astroamateur.bsky.social
It appears to be AI generated but it got quite the chuckle out of me nonetheless. Poor Crew 10 astronauts stranded on Earth
Comic book set up. Top frame - Narrator: "Brave Astronauts Butch and Suni are living an astronaut's worst nightmare: being in space on a space station, working as astronauts." Butch: "Will nobody save us?" Suni: "Of course, the crew-9 dragon has been docked since september, so we could go back any time if it was necessary." Butch: "We're all alone! Apart from the other five crewmembers obviously" Bottom Frame - Narrator: "Meanwhile on the ground..." Mission Control Man 1: "Launch scrubbed!" Mission Control Man 2: "Now Crew-10 are standed on Earth!" Mission Control Man 3: "The horror! The horror!"
March 13, 2025 at 3:59 PM
Reposted by AstroAmateur
ridingrobots.bsky.social
A full lunar eclipse is coming! It will be visible in the Western Hemisphere late at night on March 13 or very early in the morning of March 14, depending on your time zone. Details: go.nasa.gov/3DxJuEf
The partially eclipsed Moon, glowing red in a deep blue sky, sets behind an alpine mountain range with tall cliffs and fields of snow. Mt. Timpanogos, Utah in 2021, photo by Bill Dunford.
March 12, 2025 at 6:58 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
C'mon on NASA, Rocketlab is itching to do MSR cheaper and faster than the current plan (or lack thereof). Put 'em in, coach!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdCA...
www.rocketlabusa.com/missions/mar...
Rocket Lab’s Commercial Solution to Mars Sample Return
YouTube video by Rocket Lab
www.youtube.com
March 12, 2025 at 2:58 PM
astroamateur.bsky.social
The bill would continue support for SLS with the goal of 2 launches per year. It also supports keeping the ISS operational at least until a commercial alternative is available.
March 12, 2025 at 2:58 AM