A research plane has crashed in a remote area of Antarctica, stranding three.

A research plane has crashed in a remote area of Antarctica, stranding three.

Once the beacon had sounded, a U.S. LC-130 aircraft was sent to the crash site, but it was unable to establish radio contact with the Twin Otter, while a thick layer of low-lying clouds prevented those onboard from seeing the plane. Later, a DC-3 aircraft spent hours circling above the crash site, but it also came away empty-handed.

An experimental vertical take-off and landing rocket crashed during its most recent test on Tuesday.

An experimental vertical take-off and landing rocket crashed during its most recent test flight on Tuesday.

The Xaero had already flown more than 100 test flights, so this crash does not make it a failure. Like all engineering tests, the flight will only be a failure if they cannot figure out what went wrong.

This update says they have located the problem, the failure of a valve.

One reason why Neil Armstrong got the job

An evening pause: This short clip from the Discovery Science series Rocket Science illustrates one reason Neil Armstrong got the job to land the first spacecraft on the Moon, even though it shows Armstrong crashing his test vehicle!

The man was cool-headed. Not only did Armstrong not panic when a thruster failed, he kept trying to regain control of the craft until the last moment, ejecting less than a second before impact. Then, he was calm about it afterward, hardly mentioning the incident to others.