A former NASA astronaut has explained how he survived when he was minutes away from death after his space vessel began spinning out of control.

Michael Foale was selected as an astronaut by NASA on his third attempt, shortly after the Challenger accident in 1986.

After completing a number of Space Shuttle missions, he was selected for an extended stay on the Russian Mir space station in 1997.

As we well know by know, space travel doesn’t always go to plan – just ask the astronauts who have been stuck at the International Space Station since June.

Michael Foale (left) had just minutes left to live when the accident occured in 1997 (NASA/Interim Archives/Getty Images)

But Michael was minutes away from losing his life when a supply vessel bringing his team goods to live collided with the Mir station.

Michael was onboard Mir with two Russian cosmonauts, Vasily Tsibliyev and Aleksandr Lazutkin, when that station’s Spektr module was struck by the vessel.

Precious air began leaking out, as Michael told The Mirror: “My first thought was, ‘oh s**t.’ We had about 23 minutes before we passed out.”

Michael’s space training kicked in: If you had less than 30 minutes of oxygen left, abandon ship. So he went and sat in the Mir’s escape pod, a Soyuz space capsule, expecting his crew members to join.

Michael stayed on Mir for a further four months after his near-death experience (NASA/Newsmakers)

But they didn’t. Instead, they were attempting to locate the puncture and seal it up.

Michael explained: “I was thinking, ‘OK, these guys aren’t going, but we should be going.’ Russia wasn’t giving them any chance to leave. They were breaking their own rules. They were accepting the risk they would die.”

Time was ticking. Michael’s new plan was to wait for the Russians to pass out before floating them into the safety pod and getting the hell out of there.

But Lazutkin was busy pulling out power cables in a bid to save the damaged Spektr. Eventually, the team managed to find the leak and covered the hole up. They’d had seven minutes of oxygen left.

That’s when the lights cut out and the station began spinning.

The Mir space station over the Pacific from space (NASA/Space Frontiers/Getty Images)

Michael explained: “At that point, the solar arrays had no power, and the batteries were giving out. There wasn’t a fan running. There was no communication with Moscow or anyone on Earth. The station was totally dead.”

Quick-thinking, Michael suggested blasting the lifeboat’s engine in short bursts. A misfire made the vessel spin even faster.

But fortunately, the technique helped to stabilise the space station, saving it.

Michael was only meant to be staying on the Mir for six weeks. He stayed fourth and a half months instead.

The near-death experience didn’t put him off his work either ,as in 1999, Michael returned to space and earned the record for the longest space walk, at eight-and-a-half hours.

Avid stargazers should ready themselves to view a comet that won’t be visible again for another 160,000 years.

It was recently announced that Comet G3 ATLAS (C/2024), which was only discovered in April 2024, is orbiting the Sun and would be visible to the naked eye.

The comet was 407 million miles away from Earth when astronomers first came across it last year.

The ATLAS comet will reportedly be visible until January 18 (Getty Stock Image)

Now it’s been dubbed as ‘the brightest comet of 2025 so far’ by experts, but – of course – people are being urged not to stare directly at the Sun in the hopes of getting a glimpse of the exclusive meteorite.

Monday (January 13) was predicted to be when the comet was at its closest approach, but it will remain ‘extremely low in the southwestern sky’ from today (January 15) until Saturday (January 18).

Dr Shyam Balaji, researcher in astroparticle physics and cosmology at King’s College London, said that ATLAS is expected to be pretty bright.

Explaining what influences its brightness, Dr Balaji said: “The comet’s brightness will be influenced by its proximity to the Sun, which causes ice and frozen gases to sublimate, creating a coma and potentially a tail.

“While some predictions suggest it could become quite bright, comet brightness predictions are notoriously uncertain. Many comets end up being fainter than initially expected.”

The comet won’t be visible again for another 160,000 years (Getty Stock Image)

Regarding its visibility for observers in the Northern Hemisphere – the UK and North America included – it might be somewhat ‘challenging’.

“Viewing conditions may be challenging due to the comet’s position relative to the Sun,” said Dr Balaji.

“Visibility will depend heavily on local conditions and the comet’s actual brightness. Observers should consult local astronomy resources for up-to-date viewing recommendations as the date approaches.”

Elsewhere, the ongoing LA wildfires may also make things difficult too.

“The smoke from the fires and our current weather patterns won’t help,” Tim Brothers, Technical Instructor and Observatory Manager at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told USA Today.

It’s advised that you move away from the city lights for optimal comet viewing (Getty Stock Image)

How to see the comet

In light of the challenging viewing, Dr Balaji gave some tips on how to make your chances of seeing the phenomena higher.

He advises that you find a viewing point away from city lights; consider using binoculars or a small telescope (as comets often appear dimmer than predicted); use current astronomical software or websites to find the comet’s latest position; and to check reliable astronomy websites for updated viewing information.

Dr Balaji added that people should exercise caution when trying to view the comet during sunrise or sunset.

A former NASA engineer who wanted to smash the all-time height record for dropping an egg without breaking it sent the organic vessel into space – and the footage is mind-boggling

Popular YouTuber and CrunchLabs founder Mark Rober boats just shy of 57 million subscribers.

During his collection of science-based videos, the social media star has used his platform to investigate the origins of bed bugs and battled robots with fellow content creators.

But one of his finest moments on the platform came in November 2022 when he uploaded a 26-minute clip titled ‘Egg Drop From Space’.

The experiment saw Rober levelling up the humble egg drop challenge – a science activity that saw builders creating a structure to protect a raw egg from breaking when it dropped from a height.

The YouTuber’s first idea was to drop one off the Burj Khalifa in Dubai while his second one was to release one from space.

The initial plan was to fit an egg inside a rocket and fly it up to space in a balloon.

Once in the correct area, the rocket would begin to hurtle back down to Earth and land on a soft pad, thus saving the egg from smashing on impact.

One of the key things Rober had to deal with was protecting the egg on the journey to space.

He needed to insulate the egg for the journey, otherwise it’d freeze and quickly crack.

Mark Rober and his team sent an egg into space (YouTube/Mark Rober)

After launching the experiment, disaster struck as the weather balloon designed to lift the egg into space encountered issues.

On the two-hour ascent to space from the ground, twisting cords wrapped around the string designed to bring down the balloon.

The force eventually collapsed the balloon and the whole contraption started falling back to Earth at 150mph without coming apart and separating properly, which risked spelling doom for the egg.

All hope now rested on the chances of the egg-rocket being able to fire itself to freedom and land independently.

Thankfully it was able to jettison from the falling balloon and land back on dry land.

The social media star claimed they would be dropping an egg from Mars next (YouTube/Mark Rober)

Opening up the rocket, Rober reached inside and was able to pluck out one distinctly unbroken egg, rendering the whole thing a huge success.

“We’re safe on Earth,” he exclaimed upon pulling the item free. “Two for two, baby.”

In the video’s caption, he wrote: “Next year we’re doing this on Mars.”

And while a third egg drop video is yet to be uploaded to the star’s channel in 2024, we’re still keeping our eyes peeled for the event.

A new photo of the Earth from space has left people asking a lot of questions about how the planet looks.

When you think about the Earth, one or two colors are probably the first things that come to mind.

One is of course blue, which makes you think that it’s ironic our home is called ‘Earth’ when most of it is covered in water.

But it’s the other which has people asking a lot of questions after they saw the color of the landmasses.

You might be thinking that they would mostly be green, since that’s what most maps or visualisations of the earth that’s what we picture.

But there was one key difference that had people surprised and asking a lot of questions.

So what was it about this that had people scratching their heads?

The earth from space (GOES-East / NOAA/STAR)

Well, it was that the landmasses were less green and more brown.

People took to social media to share their thoughts on the extraordinary picture.

One wrote: “Way more brown than I expected. North and South America both look like vast deserts.”

Meanwhile, another said: “Nowhere near as green as it should be,” while a third wrote: “Simultaneously more green and more brown than I expected.”

Another person explained some fun facts about the image.

They wrote: “This particular photo was taken less than 30,000 km away, on the outbound trajectory towards the Moon, two dozen people have seen a view similar to this, I think Apollo 17 was the only mission that had a view of fully illuminated Earth at any point in their flight.”

Meanwhile, someone else joked: “It’s so wild to think that I am actually in this picture.”

People were left stunned by the picture (Roberto Machado Noa / Getty)

As for the image itself, it was taken from the GOES-East Satellite which provides some live images of Earth.

Some people were also left a little surprised by the amount of clouds that there were over the planet.

Of course, some clouds are to be expected when you’re looking at the Earth from space, but there were rather a lot of them there.

One person asked: “Is that amount of cloud coverage normal?”

Another answered them and explained that at any one time there is cloud coverage of around 67 percent over the Earth.

Such extraordinary pictures really hammer home the big questions about our place in the universe.

Taking to Reddit, one person reflected: “I can’t fathom standing somewhere and looking at the Earth, yet a dozen people have done so. “