THE GURU'S LAB

  IMAGE SOURCE SPACEX image caption Starship prototype SN9 during its flight test at Boca Chica, Texas, in January 2021 Elon Musk is developing a vehicle that could be a game-changer for space travel. Starship, as it's known, will be a fully reusable transport system capable of carrying up to 100 people to the Red Planet. The founding ethos of Elon Musk's private spaceflight company SpaceX was to make life multi-planetary. This is partly motivated by existential threats such as an asteroid strike big enough to wipe out humanity. Settling other planets would place some of the eggs in other baskets, sparing human civilisation if one of them were to experience a cataclysm. In 2016, the  entrepreneur outlined his rationale  at an international conference in Mexico: "History is going to bifurcate along two directions. One path is we stay on Earth forever, and then there will be some eventual extinction event," he said. "The alternative is to become a spacefaring civil

  This week, many of our NASA assets provided forecasters with information to incorporate into their analysis of Hurricane Ida. We used satellite imagery, data visualizations, and photographs from the International Space Station to analyze the storm and get vital information to disaster responders to inform recovery efforts. Hurricane Ida made landfall in Louisiana on Aug. 29, affecting our Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans and Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. No injuries have been reported, but both locations sustained damage. Stennis was able to open for some operations while Michoud remains closed this week as teams conducted detailed damage assessments and initial cleanup work. Get the latest with our  Michoud Hurricane Ida Status Reports . A Nighttime View of Power Outages  – Days after Hurricane Ida brought fierce wind, rain, and storm surges to Louisiana, large swaths of the state are enduring electric power blackouts. A team of scientists from our Goddard Space Fligh