OTD…April 24 and the birth of Hubble

#OTD in 2012…Kennedy Space Center bid final farewell to Endeavour

#OTD in 2001…Discovery launched on an International Space Station crew exchange mission

On Aug. 17, gravity waves rippled through the solar system, slightly squeezing and stretching the space Earth occupies, the result of a catastrophic collision of two compact-but-massive neutron stars, producing a so-called “kilonova” explosion that seeded the local environment with a flood of heavy elements ranging from gold and platinum to uranium and beyond, scientists said Monday.