TYB
Happy Birthday to the Flotus with the mostest
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day
April 26, 2026
Mystic Mountain Monster being Destroyed
Inside the head of this interstellar monster is a star that is slowly destroying it. The huge monster, actually an inanimate series of pillars of gas and dust, measures light years in length. The in-head star is not itself visible through the opaque interstellar dust but is bursting out partly by ejecting opposing beams of energetic particles called Herbig-Haro jets. Located about 7,500 light years away in the Carina Nebula and known informally as Mystic Mountain, the appearance of these pillars is dominated by dark dust even though they are composed mostly of clear hydrogen gas. The featured image was taken with the Hubble Space Telescope. All over these pillars, the energetic light and winds from massive newly formed stars are evaporating and dispersing the dusty stellar nurseries in which they formed. Within a few million years, the head of this giant, as well as most of its body, will have been completely evaporated by internal and surrounding stars.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyLv5I6-jqI
Bad News: Pole Shift Still Getting Worse | S0 News and frens
Apr.26.2026
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66UwP-rpUwo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdZOUQcHtrM (Earthquake activity on the San Andreas Fault 6 EQs within minutes of one another. Saturday Night)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8TnlRX23T0 (Ray's Astro: Fireballs & Comets… Something Isn’t Adding Up | What They Don’t Explain)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d7pL-HySfw (On The Pulse With Silki: BREAKING: MONSTER TORNADO‼️30 MINUTE Touchdown, 9 Miles Long, 1700ft WIDE‼️Enid Oklahoma Devastation)
https://x.com/SunWeatherMan/status/2048377882901405852
https://x.com/StefanBurnsGeo/status/2048280206700646405
https://earthsky.org/space/comet-r3-panstarrs-pics-and-chart/
https://avi-loeb.medium.com/we-have-a-missing-science-problem-not-a-missing-scientists-problem-bde161729b99
https://meteoagent.com/schumann-resonance-forecast
https://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/map/
https://www.volcanodiscovery.com/earthquakes-volcanoes/news/300730/Volcano-earthquake-report-for-Sunday-26-Apr-2026.html
https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/
https://spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=26&month=04&year=2026
Minneapolis plane crash: US legislator Liz Conmy dies as aircraft explodes into fireball
Updated: 13:09, Sun, Apr 26, 2026
A small plane crashed just after taking off from Crystal Airport north of Minneapolis on Saturday, killing a North Dakota state legislator and the pilot, authorities said.
North Dakota state Rep. Liz Conmy, of Fargo, was killed in the crash, her party confirmed.
The North Dakota Democratic–Nonpartisan League Party, an affiliate of the national Democratic Party, paid tribute to Conmy in a social media post, calling her a champion for public education, the environment, and transparency.
“We are completely heartbroken and gutted by the loss of Representative Liz Conmy. Her death is a profound loss for our state,” the party said in a post on X.
Officers responded to a report of a small plane crash at 11:51am local time and found an aircraft that had crashed and caught fire in a park near a residential area in the city of Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, police said.
The incident happened shortly after take-off, Brooklyn Park Police Inspector Matt Rabe said.
He wouldn’t say how many people were on the plane, but the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement that two people were aboard.
The National Transportation Safety Board said it is investigating a crash involving a Beech F33A aeroplane.
Dramatic driveway CCTV from a nearby home captured the moment the plane plummeted and exploded into a fiery ball.
Nobody on the ground was injured following the crash.
Images emerging after the tragedy showed debris scattered around the area of the crash.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/2198533/minneapolis-plane-crash-Liz-Conmy-dies
https://demnpl.com/team/rep-liz-conmy/
Who was Cole Thomas Allen: A NASA fellow, a teacher, and White House Correspondents' Dinner shooting suspect
Last Updated: Apr 26, 2026, 11:53 AM IST
At the annual White House Correspondents' Dinner attended by US President Donald Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and other senior officials, Cole Tomas Allen (31) allegedly charged a security checkpoint near the main ballroom, firing several gunshots.
Authorities say he was armed with a shotgun, a handgun, and several knives. An exchange of gunfire occurred with Secret Service and other law enforcement officers, resulting in one uniformed division officer being struck in his bulletproof vest, while no guests inside the ballroom were injured.
Allen was subdued and taken into custody without being shot. He is believed to have been a guest at the hotel and acted alone as a “lone actor,” according to preliminary statements from officials, including DC Police and the FBI.
President Trump later described him as a “sick person” and shared images of the detained suspect through his Truth Social account.
A NASA fellow, a teacher and a Press dinner event shooting suspect
The prime accused of the White House correspondents’ dinner shooting incident, Cole Thomas Allen (also referred to as Cole Tomas Allen), a 31-year-old resident of Torrance, California, was identified by multiple law enforcement sources as the suspect at the Washington Hilton hotel in Washington, D.C.
Unverified social media profiles, including LinkedIn, describe Allen as an engineer and computer scientist. He was a Caltech alumnus, associated with the university’s “Blitzkrieg Bots” robotics team that won a robotic vehicle design competition in 2016.
He also participated in a Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), which has led to descriptions of him as a “NASA fellow” in some reports.
He earned a Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Caltech and a Master’s degree in Computer Science from California State University-Dominguez Hills.
Professionally, Allen worked as a mechanical engineer at IJK Controls and served as a teaching assistant at Caltech.
He was employed part-time as a teacher with C2 Education in the Los Angeles area and had reportedly been recognized as Teacher of the Month in Los Angeles County in the past.
In addition to his technical background, he was active as a self-employed indie game developer, creating titles such as “Bohrdom” and “First Law.”
Some unverified reports also claim the suspect donated to Kamala Harris's 2024 campaign, but these details remain unconfirmed officially.
Charges and Court Proceedings
US Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro announced initial federal charges against Allen, including two counts of using a firearm during a crime of violence and assault on a federal officer with a dangerous weapon.
Additional charges related to firearms possession were expected. The FBI continued to investigate his background, motivations, devices, and any potential connections, with searches planned at his California residence.
Currently, the investigation remains active, with no confirmed motive publicly released, and Allen’s profile is based on preliminary reports from law enforcement sources and media outlets; further details may emerge as the case proceeds.
https://zeenews.india.com/world/who-was-cole-thomas-allen-a-nasa-fellow-a-teacher-and-white-house-correspondents-dinner-shooting-suspect-3041119.html
https://www.latestly.com/us/cole-tomas-allen-teacher-of-the-month-photo-and-nasa-link-of-the-suspect-surface-after-white-house-dinner-shooting-7407732.html
https://www.wionews.com/world/cole-tomas-allen-whcd-shooting-suspect-has-nasa-fellowship-this-is-what-his-social-media-reveal-1777203528688
https://x.com/allenanalysis/status/2048223430512685243
https://x.com/KanekoaTheGreat/status/2048231309118681180
https://x.com/LauraLoomer/status/2048233629998776436
https://www.collectspace.com/news/news-042526a-crew-13-mission-patch-apollo-13-nasa-spacex.html
extra NASA
https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/spacestation/2026/04/25/progress-95-cargo-craft-launches-to-resupply-station-crew/
https://dailygalaxy.com/2026/04/nasa-plans-to-start-a-fire-on-the-moon/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FJUz-54AX0
NASA's SpaceX Crew-13 pays homage to Apollo 13 on mission patch
April 25, 2026
NASA has assigned its first crew to launch on a mission "13" since Apollo 13 "had a problem" on the way to the moon 56 years ago.
Jessica Watkins and Luke Delaney with NASA, Joshua Kutryk with the Canadian Space Agency and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov will lift off for the International Space Station as Crew-13 on a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft in mid-September.
The four will serve as members of the station's Expedition 75 and 76 crews, before returning to Earth about five months later.
"This flight is the 13th crew rotation with SpaceX," NASA's announcement read. "The crew will conduct scientific investigations and technology demonstrations to help prepare humans for future exploration missions to the moon and Mars, and benefit people on Earth."
Rather than give into triskaidekaphobia (the fear or avoidance of 13), the crew is embracing it, or at least their connection to the last U.S. launch to be similarly numbered.
The Crew-13 mission patch includes visual nods to the insignia worn by Apollo 13 astronauts Jim Lovell, Fred Haise and Jack Swigert in April 1970.
Imitation is an option
"NASA's SpaceX Crew-13 patch looks ardently toward the future of space exploration while honoring the legacy of those who came before," reads the official description of the emblem.
At the center of the Crew-13 patch is a golden dragon, which is both a reference to the name of SpaceX's capsule and the golden horses depicted on the Apollo 13 insignia.
(Lovell and his crewmates worked with NASA contract artist Norman Tiller and muralist and sculptor Lumen Winter, who proposed the equestrian design, to create their flight badge.)
The dragon's tail on the Crew-13 patch wraps around Earth in a manner reminiscent of the blue contrail that connects Earth with the horses on the Apollo 13 insignia.
In the 1970 artwork, it was a nod to the Roman and Greek god Apollo; today, is a "bridge between Earth, the International Space Station, the moon and Mars," per NASA's caption.
The use of roman numerals for "XIII" (13) and the lack of crew names on the Crew-13 patch also mimic elements of the design from almost six decades ago, where as the golden stars are symbolic of the Crew-13 families and the overall capsule shape (as opposed to a circle) references the "possibilities born out of human collaboration toward a common goal," according to the space agency.
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It comes after 12
Prior to Crew-13, NASA managers leaned into the superstition and devised a less intuitive but more data-driven designation that went into effect after the ninth space shuttle mission.
Hence, what would have been STS-13 became STS-41-C, where the '4' was the fiscal year (1984), the '1' was the launch site (Kennedy Space Center in Florida) and 'C' the order of launch (C was the third planned flight of the year).
"I mentioned it was 41-C that originally it was STS-13, and my friend Jim Beggs, who was the Administrator of NASA, had triskaidekaphobia, and he said, 'There's not going to be [another] Apollo 13 or a Shuttle 13, so come up with a new numbering system.'
So we did come up with this complex system for numbering the shuttles during that period of time," said Bob Crippen, STS-41C commander, in a NASA oral history interview.
NASA later reverted back to a straightforward numerical designation after the loss of the space shuttle Challenger and the STS-51L crew in January 1986.
As such, there was an STS-113, which launched aboard space shuttle Endeavour in 2002, but not before having to make late crew changes due to medical issues. The last time that NASA faced the same decision was on Apollo 13.
"We were joking a lot about being number 113," commander Ken Bowersox told the press at the time. He added that to play it safe, the mission patch used Roman numerals (CXIII).
On board the International Space Station, the 13th crewed expedition began on April 1, 2006, ten days before the 36th anniversary of the Apollo 13 launch.
The Russian space program launched six crewed missions designated as number 13. At least one of those times, the head of the country's space agency suggested it be skipped.
"Many people have superstitious beliefs," said Roscosmos director Anatoly Perminov, according to his press secretary, in 2008. "That's why I think that it is a good idea to change the number of the next space ship."
Despite the concern, Soyuz TMA-13 went forward as planned. As did Soyuz 13, Soyuz T-13 and Soyuz TM-13 before it.
Soyuz TMA-13M launched Reid Wiseman and Soyuz MS-13 landed with Christina Koch. Both U.S. astronauts went on to fly aboard NASA's Artemis II mission earlier this month, a crewed fly by of the moon that broke the distance record set by the Apollo 13 astronauts.
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SpaceX
Starlink Mission
April 26, 2026
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 is targeting the launch of 25 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
A live webcast of this mission will begin about five minutes prior to liftoff, which you can watch here and on X @SpaceX. You can also watch the webcast on the X TV app.
This will be the 15th flight for the first stage booster supporting this mission, which previously launched NROL-126, Transporter-12, SPHEREx, NROL-57, and 10 Starlink missions.
Following stage separation, the first stage will land on the Of Course I Still Love You droneship, which will be stationed in the Pacific Ocean.
There is the possibility that residents of Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Ventura counties may hear one or more sonic booms during the launch, but what residents experience will depend on weather and other conditions.
https://www.spacex.com/launches/sl-17-16
https://spaceflightnow.com/2026/04/26/live-coverage-spacex-to-fly-25-starlink-satellites-on-its-50th-falcon-9-launch-of-the-year/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MGjRhVzOiaw
Viasat-3 F3 Mission
SpaceX is targeting Monday, April 27 for a Falcon Heavy launch of the ViaSat-3 F3 mission to geosynchronous transfer orbit from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The 85-minute launch window opens at 10:21 a.m. ET. If needed, a backup opportunity is available Tuesday, April 28 during an 85-minute window that opens at 10:17 a.m. ET.
A live webcast of this mission will begin about 15 minutes prior to liftoff, which you can watch here and on X @SpaceX. You can also watch the webcast on the X TV app.
One of the side boosters on this mission previously supported SDA-0A, SARah-2, Transporter-11, and 18 Starlink missions, and the second previously supported launch of the GOES-U mission.
Following stage separation, Falcon Heavy’s two side boosters will land on SpaceX’s Landing Zones 2 and 40 (LZ-2 and LZ-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
https://www.spacex.com/content/starship/test-like-you-fly
Test Like You Fly
April 24, 2026
Three years since the first flight of Starship, the next generation is here. New ship. New booster. New engines.
New pad and new test site. SpaceX engineers are working to solve one of the most difficult engineering challenges in history: developing a fully, rapidly reusable rocket.
“Test Like You Fly” launches a series that takes you inside the factories and onto the launch pads where humanity's future in space is unfolding.
https://www.spacex.com/content/starship/test-like-you-fly
Historic Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Skid Strip renovated for modern space mission needs
April 24, 2026
Space Launch Delta 45
Leaders reopened the historic runway known as the Skid Strip this week after a two-year, large-scale renovation, marking a new era for one of the most critical pieces of infrastructure supporting U.S. space launch capabilities.
On Tuesday, about 60 leaders from Space Launch Delta 45 gathered for a ribbon-cutting ceremony to celebrate the project’s completion.
The renovation transformed the previously aging runway into a modern, unified strip ready to support some of the nation’s heaviest military aircraft and payloads.
Workers originally built the runway in the 1950s. It earned its Skid Strip name as a landing site for Snark cruise missiles, which used metal skids instead of wheels to grind to a halt.
Over the decades, repairs and updates turned the 10,000-foot-long, 250-foot-wide runway into a patchwork. The Space Launch Delta 45 Civil Engineer Squadron and the Air Force Civil Engineer Center led the comprehensive overhaul and addressed these deficiencies.
The $50.9 million project added new 1,000-foot-long concrete ends to better support massive aircraft like the C-5 Galaxy and C-17 Globemaster III, the primary visitors that deliver satellite payloads and mission equipment.
Workers also installed 366 modern LED light fixtures and brought the entire runway up to current codes.
“The mission here at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station is going to continue to evolve, and it’s only through platforms like this that we’re going to be able to stay ahead of our adversaries,” Col. Christopher Bulson, Space Launch Delta 45’s deputy commander for support, said during the ceremony. “Right now, we do about a third of all global launches.” Construction presented a massive logistical undertaking. At its peak, 80 trucks per day transited Cape Canaveral Space Force Station to deliver materials, and a total of 4,520 trucks took part in the project.
The renewed runway reaches 26 inches into the Florida soil to ensure it has a strong, durable foundation.
The work faced unique Florida challenges, including a brief delay when crews relocated gopher tortoises that had undermined some construction areas.
All told, the renovation of the Skid Strip took about two years and finished four months ahead of schedule. Officials originally granted justification to proceed in 2018.
“The scope and scale of this project was massive and to see the Air Force take that on in support of the Space Force mission has been truly incredible,” Bulson said.
“As Cape Canaveral has adjusted over the decades, it’s been about adapting to the new mission of setting launch records.”
https://www.patrick.spaceforce.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/4467876/historic-cape-canaveral-space-force-station-skid-strip-renovated-for-modern-spa/
test
https://www.rt.com/news/639024-chernobyl-lessons-nuclear-safety/
other RT
https://www.rt.com/news/639055-british-jets-authorized-attack-russian-drones/
https://www.rt.com/news/639060-iran-isfahan-us-jets/
https://www.rt.com/news/639042-netanyahu-prostate-cancer-treatment/
https://www.rt.com/africa/639069-mali-coordinated-terrorist-raids/
Chernobyl 2.0: Here’s where nuclear disaster could happen next
25 Apr, 2026 05:00
Four decades after a failed experiment in Soviet Ukraine led to a world-shaking radiation disaster and made Chernobyl infamous, the psychological safeguards protecting nuclear facilities from military action are weaker than ever.
In March and April of 2026, bombs landed near the Busher Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) in Iran. Russia’s Zaporozye NPP was deliberately firebombed by Ukrainian troops in 2024, as part of Kiev’s attempts to prevent Moscow from operating the contested facility. The Chernobyl wreck itself was targeted by a mystery projectile on the eve of a key international security event in 2025.
Nuclear weapons are so destructive that only an existential crisis should warrant their deployment.
The taboo against nukes has been tested on several occasions since the technology’s iconic status was established by the US bombing of Imperial Japan, – including off the coast of Cuba in 1962, in the Middle East in 1954 and again in 1973. Each time, nerves held.
Nuclear facilities, particularly power plants with their large hot reactors and on-site storage of spent fuel, borrow some of that aura to become almost untouchable, as radiation fallout is strongly associated with both the weapons and technological disasters.
How to bomb a nuclear reactor
Attacking Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant risks “another Chernobyl,” a senior official in Tehran warned, after airstrikes killed 10 people, including a German engineer involved in the project on the Persian Gulf coast.
The year was 1987, and the attacker was Saddam Hussein – no longer a ‘good guy’ in the eyes of the Western public, but still fighting the ‘bad guys’.
Tehran’s invocation of the then-recent Soviet nuclear catastrophe was an exaggeration. The Bushehr facility was still under construction when Iraqis targeted it six times, beginning in 1984.
An attempt to deter Baghdad by reportedly bringing in a small amount of nuclear fuel didn’t work.
In 1980, at the beginning of the Iran-Iraq War, Tehran bombed the under-construction Osiraq nuclear reactor at the Tuwaitha research center near Baghdad. The Israelis struck the French-provided project a year later.
So did the Americans during the 1991 Gulf War – allegedly weeks before it would finally go online.
In 2007, Israel bombed a suspected nuclear reactor in Syria. Years later, the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear watchdog, confirmed that suspicions were correct and the clandestine facility was still being built when it was obliterated.
The pattern of preemptive attacks was upheld by non-state actors. Rodney Wilkinson, a South African fencing champion and anti-apartheid activist, carried out the bombing of the Koeberg Nuclear Power Station just before it went online in 1982, taking care to ensure that there would be zero casualties and no radiation leaks.
In major conflicts between India and Pakistan, both nuclear-armed powers, there were no military strikes on nuclear facilities. In short, the conventional wisdom has long been: you don’t risk another Chernobyl.
Ukraine throws rules out of the window
Like many other norms, respect for the IAEA’s seven pillars of nuclear safety seriously eroded during the Ukraine conflict. Russian forces took over the Zaporozhye NPP on March 3, 2022 during a lighting offensive.
The site has since become the focus of a PR war built around a string of attacks in the plant’s vicinity.
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Ukraine’s story about the military action has morphed over the years. First it claimed Russia kept heavy weapons at the nuclear site, making it a legitimate target.
Then Russia was accused of conducting false flag operations to discredit Ukraine. After the IAEA dispatched an observer mission in September 2022, Kiev claimed Moscow was thwarting inspector rotations – though provocations stopped in 2025, after the international agency decided against travelling through territory controlled by Kiev.
Arguably the most serious incident took place in August 2024, when incendiary drones caused a major fire at one of the Zaporozye plant’s cooling towers.
Kiev claimed it was Russian self-sabotage, which just happened to virtually coincide with the launch of a Ukrainian incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region.
Ascribing logic-defying economic masochism to Moscow is a trope of pro-Kiev messaging. The 2022 blasts that destroyed the Nord Stream gas pipelines were initially framed in the media as Russia putting pressure on Germany by blowing up its own infrastructure.
Now the only mystery remaining about that attack is whether Ukraine carried it out alone, with assistance from some NATO nations – such as Poland or the US – or simply created a distraction so that the West could claim plausible deniability.
Chernobyl propaganda dud
An even more emblematic example of brinkmanship serving Ukrainian interests came in February 2025, when Kiev accused Russia of flying a single kamikaze drone into the shelter covering the Chernobyl plant’s contaminated site.
The incident took place on the eve of the Munich Security Conference. But in Germany, US Vice President J.D. Vance stole the spotlight that Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky was undoubtedly hoping to get.
Vance shocked the audience with his speech roasting perceived Western European degradation and casting doubt on America’s protection of NATO allies.
Consequently, the Chernobyl incident caused barely a ripple in media coverage and left an ugly tear in the New Safe Confinement – the shelter constructed in the 2010s with mostly foreign funding.
US and Israel tear down the window, the wall, the building
In a field where Zelensky merely played fast and loose, US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu swung like a wrecking ball.
In 2024, the two leaders teamed up to strike Iranian uranium enrichment facilities, claiming the 12-day bombing campaign ended Tehran’s nuclear weapons program. This year, Iran was somehow supposedly again weeks away from building the bomb and had to be attacked again.
As the 40th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster approaches, the world has yet to learn how much economic damage the Iran War will cause it. But it has already dealt a blow to nuclear non-proliferation.
The 1970 Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) guarantees signatories the right to, and support for, the peaceful use of nuclear technology in exchange for accepting the IAEA’s controls to prevent weaponization.
Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea all rejected the deal in order to acquire nuclear weapons, secretly or openly.
Washington declares that there is no NPT deal for Iran, period. The religious prohibition of nuclear weapons by Israel-assassinated Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, now seems like a fig leaf.
Trump’s threat to annihilate all Iranian power plants unless it concedes defeat – potentially including Bushehr, now fully operational – may never materialize.
A commando raid deep into Iran to capture “nuclear dust” – Iran’s stockpile of highly enriched uranium that it has no intention to give up – remains in question either.
But what is beyond doubt is that the risk of a major radiological incident is at the moment higher than ever. That’s the inevitable cost of nuclear brinkmanship.
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