Meanwhile, Starship remains on the ground for a while
Earlier this afternoon, SpaceX made an attempt to send the world’s largest rocket ever, the more than 130 meter high Starship, into space for a test flight. Unfortunately, that attempt proved unsuccessful. Barely nine minutes before lift-off, it was decided to abort the launch attempt due to pressure problems in the fuel tanks. Apparently there was a frozen pressure valve. At least that is what Elon Muks posted on Twitter shortly after the failed test.
Starship isn’t going anywhere yet, Hubble is happily looking ahead
In short, the rocket that is ultimately supposed to bring cargo and people to the moon and mars is not going anywhere for the time being. And while Mars, with a one-way trip that takes at least 9 months, is quite far, telescopes have allowed us to peer much further into space for years. Everyone has seen the beautiful pictures and discoveries made by the James Webb Deep Space Telescope in the first months after its activation.
Its ‘predecessor’ Hubble has also amazed us many times in recent years. It’s the latest example of that snap of a galaxy with ‘tentacles’. Also called ‘jellyfish galaxy’. The picture shows a galaxy, JO204, about 600 million light-years from Earth. ‘Underneath’ that galaxy are nebulae that ‘hang’ in such a way that it looks as if the galaxy has tentacles, or wisps, that make it look like a jellyfish.
ram pressure
In reality, they are huge gas nebulae created by an intense astronomical process known as ram pressure stripping. They experience ram pressure due to their movement against the intergalactic medium that fills the spaces between galaxies in a cluster of galaxies.
The galaxies experience intense pressure from that movement, and as a result their more loosely bound gas is stripped away. This gas is usually the colder and denser gas in the galaxy – gas which, when stirred and compressed by the ram pressure, collapses and forms new stars in the jellyfish’s beautiful tendrils
