NASA Wins 2nd Emmy for Mars Landing ('Star Trek: Discovery' Wins, Too!)

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NASA and SpaceX, the Emmy has landed.

NASA on Sunday (Sept. 15) won a second Emmy for 2019 in honor of the space agency's epic coverage of its InSight landing on Mars last year.

The space agency received a Creative Arts Emmy for Outstanding Original Interactive Program its innovative use of "news, web, education, television and social media efforts" during the November 2018 landing of the InSight Mars lander on the Red Planet. The InSIght Mars lander (the name is short for Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) is studying Mars with seismometers and more to understand how the interior of the planet works. 

The Emmy win for Mars InSight comes one day after NASA nabbed another Emmy for coverage of SpaceX's first Crew Dragon test flight to the International Space Station in March of this year. 

Watch: NASA's SpaceX Crew Dragon Emmy Video
Watch: NASA's Emmy Video for InSight Mars Landing

"More great news! Won an #Emmy for 'Outstanding Original Interactive Program' coverage of the mission to study Mars," NASA chief Jim Bridenstine wrote on Twitter. "Congrats to those who contributed to the news, web, education, television and social media coverage of this landing on the Red Planet."

Officials with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, which oversees the InSight lander mission, were jubilant with the win.

"Putting the Science in the Academy of Arts and Sciences!" JPL officials wrote on Twitter celebrating the win. "Thank you, [Television Academy] for honoring our multimedia efforts to share the NASA InSight mission to Mars."

"We're on a journey of exploration and everyone's invited," they added.

NASA is not the only space-themed winner from the 71st Emmy Awards in Los Angeles this year. CBS' "Star Trek: Discovery" won an Emmy for Outstanding Prosthetic Makeup for a Series, Limited Series, Movie or Special.

"Congrats to Glenn Hetrick, Neville Page, Jimmy MacKinnon and the entire prosthetic make-up team for tonight's Emmy win!" CBS All Access officials wrote on Twitter to celebrate the win.

The Creative Arts Emmys were presented over two days this weekend at the Microsoft Theatre in Los Angeles. An edited version of the ceremony will air Sept. 21 on the cable channel FXX, and will appear in the full 71st Primetime Emmys broadcast on Sept. 22, NASA officials said.

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Tariq Malik
Tariq Malik
Editor-in-Chief

Tariq is the Editor-in-Chief of Space.com and joined the team in 2001, first as an intern and staff writer, and later as an editor. He covers human spaceflight, exploration and space science, as well as skywatching and entertainment. He became Space.com's Managing Editor in 2009 and Editor-in-Chief in 2019. Before joining Space.com, Tariq was a staff reporter for The Los Angeles Times covering education and city beats in La Habra, Fullerton and Huntington Beach. In October 2022, Tariq received the Harry Kolcum Award for excellence in space reporting from the National Space Club Florida Committee. He is also an Eagle Scout (yes, he has the Space Exploration merit badge) and went to Space Camp four times as a kid and a fifth time as an adult. He has journalism degrees from the University of Southern California and New York University. You can find Tariq at Space.com and as the co-host to the This Week In Space podcast with space historian Rod Pyle on the TWiT network. To see his latest project, you can follow Tariq on Twitter @tariqjmalik.