SCIENCE

SYDNEY — Skies across Australia will glow under the luminous Pink Moon this week, with the April full moon reaching its peak on Thursday, April 2, 2026, at around 1:11 p.m. AEDT, offering skywatchers a spectacular celestial display as autumn settles in the southern hemisphere.

SYDNEY — Australia has emerged as one of the world's cleanest countries for air quality in 2026, ranking 10th globally in the latest World Air Quality Report and joining an elite group of just 13 nations and territories that met the World Health Organization's strict PM2.5 guidelines for safe breathing air.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — NASA on Monday began the final countdown for Artemis II, the first crewed mission to the moon in more than half a century, with the massive Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft poised for liftoff as early as Wednesday evening from Kennedy Space Center.

Tromso sits deep inside the auroral oval, making it one of the world's most accessible and reliable spots for viewing the northern lights in 2026. Located 217 miles north of the Arctic Circle, the Norwegian city offers frequent displays from September through April, with peak activity expected during the lingering effects of the solar maximum.

SYDNEY, Australia — An eerie blood-red sky blanketed parts of Western Australia on March 27, turning the horizon over Shark Bay into an apocalyptic scene as powerful winds from Tropical Cyclone Narelle whipped up iron-rich desert dust ahead of the storm's landfall.

With NASA's Artemis II mission on the verge of launching as early as April 1, 2026, the four astronauts selected for humanity's first crewed journey beyond low-Earth orbit in more than 50 years are drawing global attention.

A car-sized asteroid designated 2026 FM3 will make a relatively close flyby of Earth late Wednesday, passing at a distance of about 148,000 miles — roughly 60% of the average Earth-moon separation — but posing no risk of impact, NASA officials said.

Elon Musk's SpaceX is preparing to file its initial public offering prospectus with U.S. regulators as soon as this week or next, according to a report Tuesday, setting the stage for what could become the largest IPO in history with a potential raise exceeding $75 billion and a valuation topping $1.75 trillion.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — A brilliant fireball streaked across the night sky over Northern California on Sunday, March 22, 2026, drawing more than 200 eyewitness reports from California, Nevada and Arizona and marking the third notable meteor event in the United States in just six days.

Australia has reached a pivotal moment in its energy history, with renewable sources exceeding 50% of electricity generation in the National Electricity Market (NEM) for the first time during the December 2025 quarter, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO).

FAIRBANKS, Alaska — Skywatchers across much of the northern United States and Canada have a prime opportunity to witness the northern lights, or aurora borealis, tonight into early Friday morning as a powerful geomagnetic storm impacts Earth, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Space Weather Prediction Center.

CLEVELAND — A powerful sonic boom that shook homes, rattled windows and startled residents across Northeast Ohio on Tuesday morning was almost certainly caused by a meteor entering Earth's atmosphere, the National Weather Service in Cleveland confirmed.

As spring severe weather season ramps up across the United States, the National Weather Service continues to emphasize the critical distinction between a **tornado watch** and a **tornado warning** — two alerts that often cause confusion but carry vastly different implications for public safety.

NASA is aiming for an April 1 liftoff of the Artemis II mission, setting the stage for the first crewed voyage around the Moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. Agency officials announced the target date following a successful Flight Readiness Review on March 12, 2026, declaring the program "on track" for the historic 10-day test flight.

A massive adult female Kemp's ridley sea turtle, one of the world's rarest and most endangered species, washed ashore in critical condition near Galveston on March 7, 2026

Our sun, born 4.6 billion years ago near the crowded, chaotic heart of the Milky Way, did not make its journey to the galaxy's calmer outer suburbs alone.

A defunct NASA satellite launched nearly 14 years ago is set to make an uncontrolled re-entry into Earth's atmosphere, with most of the spacecraft expected to burn up during the fiery descent but some debris potentially reaching the surface.

A burst of seismic activity shook northwest Louisiana early Monday when four earthquakes struck within a 10-minute window near the small village of Edgefield, intensifying concerns in a region that has seen unusual tremors in recent weeks.

Believe it or not, Australians are the bright minds behind the likes of Google Maps, polymer bank notes, and the electric drill.

A predawn SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launch illuminated Florida's skies with a mesmerizing "jellyfish" contrail Wednesday, captivating residents from the Space Coast to north Florida and beyond as the exhaust plume caught early sunlight high in the atmosphere.

Skywatchers worldwide witnessed a dramatic total lunar eclipse early on March 3, 2026, as Earth's shadow fully enveloped the full Worm Moon, transforming it into a striking copper-red "blood moon" for nearly an hour during totality.

Skywatchers across much of the world prepared for a striking celestial event early Tuesday, March 3, 2026: a total lunar eclipse that turned the full Worm Moon a dramatic copper-red hue, often called a "blood moon." This was the only total lunar eclipse visible anywhere in 2026, marking the third in a near-tetrad sequence and the last until late 2028.

Stargazers across much of the world, including South Korea, have a prime opportunity tonight, March 1, 2026, to witness a striking "planetary parade" as six planets — Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune — appear to align in a gentle arc across the evening sky shortly after sunset.

Skywatchers across the United States will have a prime opportunity to witness a striking total lunar eclipse — commonly known as a "blood moon" — in the early morning hours of Tuesday, March 3, 2026, as Earth's shadow fully engulfs the full moon, bathing it in a coppery red hue.

A spectacular high-pressure water eruption at SpaceX's Starbase facility in South Texas has captured widespread attention online, with videos of the massive "water blast" racking up millions of views as the company prepares for its 12th Starship test flight.

A senior NASA planetary defense official warned that humanity remains vulnerable to thousands of undetected near-Earth asteroids capable of devastating entire cities, emphasizing that current detection efforts have cataloged only about 40% of potentially hazardous objects in the 140-meter (460-foot) size range and that no ready-to-deploy deflection system exists for an imminent threat.

Bonobos, humanity's playful and peace-loving closest living relatives, are capable of genuine pretend play — the first time this sophisticated cognitive behavior has been reliably documented in a non-human great ape species outside of humans and, to a lesser degree, orangutans.

Australian scientists have unveiled a theoretical breakthrough that could dramatically accelerate the development of practical quantum computers, proposing the use of tiny "quantum batteries" to power the systems and potentially quadruple the number of qubits packed into the same physical space.

Sydney-based Space Machines Company has been awarded a A$2.9 million contract by Australia's Department of Defence to develop an advanced artificial intelligence-driven system aimed at detecting and responding to threats against satellites in Earth's orbit, bolstering national and allied space security in an increasingly crowded and contested domain.