European Spaceflight & ESA

A solar eclipse is usually something we wait years to see from Earth. ESA’s Proba-3 mission changes that idea completely. Instead of waiting for the Moon to block the Sun, Europe is using two spacecraft flying in perfect formation to create artificial solar eclipses in space. This allows scientists to observe the Sun’s faint outer atmosphere, the corona, in far greater detail — and it could help us better understand solar wind, space weather, and the storms that affect satellites, GPS, radio signals, and power grids on Earth.

ESA’s ambitious Enceladus mission could launch in 2042 and search for signs of life beneath the icy surface of Saturn’s mysterious moon.