There’s a good case to make that without the huge planet Jupiter standing guard 483 million miles from the sun, life on Earth — or even Earth itself — might never have gotten started.

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Episode 6: Jupiter: A Grand Planet; A Failed Star

Space does not wish you well. It has no shortage of ways to kill you, and in the fifty years humans have been flying spacecraft around the Earth and out to the moon, the mortal perils have been evident. But ten of the missions were the most harrowing of all. Some of them ended in tragedy, some ended successfully—but all of them involved astronauts playing for the very highest stakes in the very deadliest place.  Countdown tells the tale of those ten missions—some of them American, some Russian. Written and narrated by Jeffrey Kluger—author of Apollo 13 and Apollo 8—Countdown recreates the space crises that every astronaut has feared, and that an unlucky handful were forced to live.

Natural Sciences

Science & Medicine

Science

Gus Grissom tried not to give much thought to the fact that the rocket he was riding to space was built to kill people.  But the terrible V-2 would become the beautiful Redstone, and American Astronauts - manifestly the good guys - would ride them into space.

TIME’s Jeffrey Kluger takes you through the Liberty Bell 7 mission and the events that make it one of the most harrowing space missions of all time.

S1E4: Gus Grissom

The solar system's most overlooked bodies are home to magical things. 


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Today's episode is also sponsored by Audible.com. Audible has over 180,000 audio books and spoken word audio products. Get a free 30 day trial at audible.com/UNIVERSE

Episode 12: The Moons

"Way out beyond Neptune. Tagging bashfully behind its brothers."

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Today's episode is also sponsored by Audible.com. Audible has over 180,000 audio books and spoken word audio products. Get a free 30 day trial at audible.com/UNIVERSE

Episode 11: Pluto and Planet Nine

The Frontier Planet


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Today's episode is also sponsored by Audible.com. Audible has over 180,000 audio books and spoken word audio products. Get a free 30 day trial at audible.com/UNIVERSE

Episode 10: Neptune

The sideways planet--and that's the least of its problems.

Today’s show is brought to you by Squarespace. Start building your website today at Squarespace.com. Enter offer code UNIVERSE at checkout to get 10% off. Squarespace – Build it Beautiful.

Today's episode is also sponsored by Audible.com. Audible has over 180,000 audio books and spoken word audio products. Get a free 30 day trial at audible.com/UNIVERSE

Episode 6: Jupiter: A Grand Planet; A Failed Star

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