Man has walked . . . and driven on the Moon

 Despite skeptics, there is much good evidence that these events happened decades ago. Photographs were transmitted at the time.  Moon rocks came back to earth on the trip. The men who were there came back to tell the tale, not a made-up story, but their actual experiences.  The truth of these events hangs together for us.

Despite hearing the truth, skeptics either know and deny, or do not know that President Obama is one of us.  He is of American birth in Hawaii; the documentation is there.  He speaks English without an accent.  His childhood friends have talked about knowing him way back when.  H's good at shooting "hoops," an American sport.  He gets sad, and yes, mad when bad things happen to the rest of us Americans, his fellow citizens.

Barack Hussein Obama is the President of the United States.  Skeptics need to just get over it.

My Other Blogs: My creative website is Making Good Mondays. Follow me at Twitter. And Carol Gee - Online Universe is the home page for all my websites.

Things may be OK again at the ISS.

When there was a failure to successfully launch a Russian Progress vehicle recently, there was a very real possibility that the International Space Station could go to unmanned status.  The reason for the failure had to be nailed down and fixed before we could send any more astronauts or cosmonauts into orbit in a Soyus capsule.  There would have to be another Progress sent to the ISS, a successful rocket launch.  And the current three member crew would have to eventually come home after reaching the limits of how long they could stay in space.
The reason for the 3rd state failure was rather quickly determined, however,  and November 14, 2011 set as the next target date for a Soyuz launch.  It is only a couple more weeks when we think things on the ISS will begin to get back to normal.
We will all breathe a sigh of relief when that happens.  And we will feel even more relieved when we again have a U.S. capability to send crew members into low earth orbit.  It cannot happen soon enough for me.

Posted via email from Behind These Links

Soon there will be another rover headed to Mars

Though we still have one active Mars rover sending us information, NASA is excited by the next phase of Mars exploration via robotics. The new rover, named Curiosity, will be far ahead of its predecessors in size, capacity and complexity. It has 17 cameras, for example.



I cannot wait to see the outcomes!

Amplify’d from www.nasa.gov

NASA'S Next Mars Rover To Land At Gale Crater

WASHINGTON -- NASA's next Mars rover will land at the foot of a layered mountain inside the planet's Gale crater.

The car-sized Mars Science Laboratory, or Curiosity, is scheduled to launch late this year and land in August 2012. The target crater spans 96 miles (154 kilometers) in diameter and holds a mountain rising higher from the crater floor than Mount Rainier rises above Seattle. Gale is about the combined area of Connecticut and Rhode Island. Layering in the mound suggests it is the surviving remnant of an extensive sequence of deposits. The crater is named for Australian astronomer Walter F. Gale.

During a prime mission lasting one Martian year -- nearly two Earth years -- researchers will use the rover's tools to study whether the landing region had favorable environmental conditions for supporting microbial life and for preserving clues about whether life ever existed.

In 2006, more than 100 scientists began to consider about 30 potential landing sites during worldwide workshops. Four candidates were selected in 2008.

Curiosity is about twice as long and more than five times as heavy as any previous Mars rover. Its 10 science instruments include two for ingesting and analyzing samples of powdered rock that the rover's robotic arm collects. A radioisotope power source will provide heat and electric power to the rover. A rocket-powered sky crane suspending Curiosity on tethers will lower the rover directly to the Martian surface. The portion of the crater where Curiosity will land has an alluvial fan likely formed by water-carried sediments. The layers at the base of the mountain contain clays and sulfates, both known to form in water.

Curiosity will go beyond the "follow-the-water" strategy of recent Mars exploration. The rover's science payload can identify other ingredients of life, such as the carbon-based building blocks of biology called organic compounds. Long-term preservation of organic compounds requires special conditions. Certain minerals, including some Curiosity may find in the clay and sulfate-rich layers near the bottom of Gale's mountain, are good at latching onto organic compounds and protecting them from oxidation.

"Gale gives us attractive possibilities for finding organics, but that is still a long shot," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program at agency headquarters. "What adds to Gale's appeal is that, organics or not, the site holds a diversity of features and layers for investigating changing environmental conditions, some of which could inform a broader understanding of habitability on ancient Mars." The rover and other spacecraft components are being assembled and undergoing final testing. The mission is targeted to launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida between Nov. 25 and Dec. 18. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena manages the mission for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. To view the landing site and for more information about the mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/msl   Read more at www.nasa.gov

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a19ms8

Governing from the gut . . .

Emotional Reasoning -- Mid term 2010 election voters in the United States behaved in predictable ways on November 2.  They voted based on feelings more than cool logic. They, in effect, rejected the past two years of progressive legislation resulting from the leadership of a cool, detached and analytical Obama administration.  Influenced by billions of corporate dollars that purchased emotionally charged and distorted political ads, they voted out of fear and anger.  The result is that we have returned to being a corporatocracy after a two year hiatus.  Big business is back in charge with a bang in the U.S. House of Representatives, "the People's House," if it ever left at all.
Magical Thinking -- Governing from the gut required magical thinking on the part of voters choosing their Republican Representatives.  "Magical thinking" requires staying in denial about the reality of corporate greed, corruption, and millions of housing foreclosures.  They were able to ignore the deepest recession in decades.  Preferring to go back to Republican rule, the unemployed were influenced to feel they will be able to go back to work.  If government will only get out of the way so business can get back to work, there will be more jobs.
Denial -- Never mind that those jobs have been, and will continue to be, outsourced for cheaper labor.  The business of the nation has now become high finance.  Moreover, except for the Chicago Mercantile, that state of affairs has left the broad Rust Belt in the center of the country bereft of viable industry.  Since the turn of the century, the Middle Class has increasingly been in an anguished search for help.  And in 2010 their gut told them that those in power could not be of any assistance, and that the country was "going to hell in a hand basket" because of the government.
Throw-them-out mentality -- The map of yesterday's voting patterns shows how upset the Midwest and the South (along with a few other pockets of unrest) have been feeling about the economy.  The election's outcome today is a divided government that will result in a stalemate for the next two years.  Republicans have been absolutely clear about that.  Their promise is "Government is now going to get out of our way. . It is Obama's Waterloo. We can just feel it in our gut."  Speaker-to-be John Boehner's triumphant tears are proof positive of the value of governing from the gut.  Now, off to the golf course.

Posted via email from Southwest Postings

Klingon space opera makes cosmic debut http://ping.fm/oZ2la

Jupiter's distance to Earth shortest since 1963

The planet Jupiter will be at its closest to the Earth since 1963 today and Tuesday, scientists say. This will cause the planet's appearance to peak at a brightness and size not seen since then. The planet Uranus will also make a close approach, but will be more difficult to spot, as it is much farther away.

From: http://ping.fm/OHtkv

Study suggests better exercise needed for astronauts for long duration flightss http://ping.fm/5agM8

Above and Below - Worlds Far Apart?

See the full gallery on posterous

A month in, the outrage grows against British Petroleum after their contracted drilling rig explosion and massive uncontrolled discharge into the Gulf of Mexico.  I am reluctant to call it an "oil spill." That is ar too much of an understatement for what has actually happened.  Mere journalistic convention cannot begin to convey what really must be said about this environmental disaster happening just a few hundreds miles to my southeast.  For that I will turn to a more skillful voice:

Slyvia Earle, Explorer in Residence at the National Geographic Society, gave crucially important testimony before the House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure on Wednesday, discussing how much cheap oil is costing the earth.  Earle is the scientist and activist whom committee chairman, Congressman James Oberstar called "the only voice for the ocean," as he introduced her before the committee. 

Earle made several important points during her statement on behalf of the ocean.  First, burning fossil fuels releases Carbon Dioxide into the atmosphere, "warming the planet and acidifying the ocean. . . the future of humankind depends on swiftly shifting to energy alternatives that do not generate carbon dioxide. . . the greatest problem facing us now with respect to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill is ignorance, and with it, complacency."  To quote further from her testimony (see her full statement in the 'cheap oil' link above):

. . . Ironically, fossil fuels have powered civilization to new heights of understanding . . . Fossil fuels took us to the moon and to the universe beyond, and made it possible for us to see ourselves in ways that no generation before this time could fathom. They have provided the backbone of the extraordinary progress we enjoyed in the 20th century and now into the 21st. We now know that those of us now alive have participated in the greatest era of discovery and technological achievement in the history of humankind, largely owing to the capacity to draw on what seemed to be a cheap but by no means endless  source of  energy.
At the same time we have learned more, we have lost more. . . Despite the years of research by hundreds of scientists and institutions, knowledge about the nature of Gulf of Mexico is still primitive, partly because the methods used for exploring the ocean are still primitive.  Larry McKinney observes that we know more about the face of the moon than the bottom of the Gulf, and are better equipped to live and work in space than we are to explore the ocean on this planet.
We  should be looking for the possibility of life in what is believed to be an ocean on one of Jupiter's moons, but why are we not at least as concerned about life in the ocean in this part of the solar system--the ocean that keeps us alive? Life in the sea, after all, supports the basic processes that we all take for granted--the water cycle, the oxygen cycle, the carbon cycle, and much more. With every breath we take, every drop of water we drink, we are dependent on the existence of Earth's living ocean.

The Deepwater Horizon was just one of nearly 4,000 oil and gas rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, according to the National Resources Defense Council map and photo tweeted by the National Wildlife Fund.  FYI, much of my currently disheartening Gulf of Mexico crisis information comes from my Twitter list, Earth and Space Folks, where news of human activity in the the regions above the earth and beneath the sea meet.

NASA's current mission to the International Space Station is STS-132.  This week's news coverage centers, ironically, around the Shuttle Atlantis' last planned flight before its retirement.  There are only two missions left in 2010, and then the entire shuttle program ends, sending NASA into its next phase.  What that is remains mostly unknown at this point.  But we do know that NASA assets are vital to the government's efforts in the Gulf.  NASA reported a week ago that, "Research Flights Take NASA Scientists Over Gulf Oil Spill." (05.13.10).  To quote:
  

The Gulf oil slick is visible [in the blue photo above] as a bright diagonal swath in this image taken at 28,000 feet from a camera mounted on Langley’s B-200 research airplane. Credit: NASA
**********
A team from NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, VA, made research flights over the Gulf of Mexico this week to help investigate potential uses of satellites for monitoring the thickness and dispersal of oil spills and the oil¹s impact on marine life.

The flights were part of a NASA-wide mobilization of its remote-sensing assets to help assess and research the spread and impact of the Deepwater Horizon BP oil spill. Langley's King Air B-200, outfitted with two sensing instruments, flew Monday and Tuesday over the oil slick created by the explosion of a drilling rig nearly three weeks ago.
Data gathered during the flights will underpin a new effort to use satellite data to enhance monitoring and detection of oil spills. Other measurements taken during the flights could be used to observe the ecological impact of the oil spill by observing the density of phytoplankton – critical in the marine food chain – in Gulf waters.

 

When I was a child the world seemed like a vast and wondrously mysterious place.  But now into my seventh decade here, it seems diminished somehow and undervalued by far too many members of the species of whom I am a part.  We must see space and earth -- above and below -- as integral parts of the same system for which we must care.

Posted via email from Make Good Mondays

The KSC/NASA story from different perspectives

NASA's Kennedy Space Center hosted a conference on April 15, 2010 about the future of the space program, keynoted by the President of the United States, Barack Obama. All of us who have an abiding interest in the U.S. space program have been waiting for the President to let us know how he feels about it and what he wants to do about NASA in the future. I first learned about the conference from one of my favorite White House reporters, Mark Knoller, on Twitter.  Earlier Knoller tweets had signaled what was about to be announced:

1. Feb. 1, 2010 - Kiss lunar visits goodbye: Obama budget proposes scrapping the Constellation program to return Americans to the moon.
2. Feb. 1, 2010 - Aides say Obama wants NASA to focus on "longer range R&D advanced robotics" & longer range research for possible human trip to Mars.
3. March 7, 2010 - White House just announced that Pres. Obama will attend a Summit on the US Space Program April 15 in Florida.
4. March 7, 2010 - Obama will use space summit to discuss "new course Administration is charting for NASA and future of US leadership in human space flight."
5. March 7, 2010 - Obama's new budget canceled funding for the Constellation program to return Americans to the moon.by 2020.

KSC Space Conference - Mark Knoller, naturally, became my source for what happened at the April 15 conference.  He added photographs to his coverage, to which I have linked.

KSC images by Mark Knoller of CBS

An eagle has built a nest  above the area where the press gathered for the big space conference at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.  Knoller explained his pic in a tweet reply to: "@team_venture Our NASA escort said it was an eagle. Born in Brooklyn, I only know pigeons. My ornithology is for the birds."

President Barack Obama addresses the crowd gathered to hear his plans for the future of the United States' space program under NASA.

CBS White House reporter, Mark Knoller posted a series of tweets April 15, 2010 from the Space Conference held at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.  They are worth repeating here because they so effectively and succinctly present part of the story that I watched unfold yesterday on NASA television.  Knoller's play-by-play on Twitter follows:

1. Obama now addressing NASA personnel in Operations and Checout building at Kennedy Space Center.
2. Obama says he is 100% committed to the mission of NASA and its future.
3. Obama delivers speech- flanked by mockup of Orion space capsule and by space shuttle main engine.
4. Obama reaffirms commitment to increase NASA budget by $6-billion over 5 years. Gets polite but unenthusiastic applause.
5. Obama defends his strategy to jumpstart new commercial space transportation industry by private sector.
6. Obama pledges to finalize a design for a new heavy-lift launch rocket no later than 2015 and then begin to build it.
7. Obama asserts that "nobody is more committed to manned space flight" than he is. But he says it must be done "in a smart way."
8. Obama says his plan calls for manned landing on an asteroid - and then to Mars by the 2030s. "And I expect to be around to see it."
9. Obama acknowledges some want the US to go to the moon again. "We've been there before,"said Obama advocating new destinations.
10. Obama says he wants $40-million in job retraining funds for personnel losing jobs as space shuttle program winds down.
11. Even at a time of record deficits, Obama defending spending money on NASA and the space program. (more)
12. Obama says space pgm improves our lives, advances our society, strengthens our economy & inspires generations of Americans.
13. NASA press office staff was heavy-handed in trying to prevent reporters from interviewing NASA employees at Obama event.
14. Obama said he knows the space pgm is "more than just Tang..I had to point out I actually really like Tang. I thought that was very cool."

Mainstream media coverage

leading up to the conference had focused almost exclusively on the controversy among various factions regarding what the Obama administration was about to do to NASA.  Astronauts either opposed or accepted the Obama plan, as did lawmakers, Floridians, NASA workers and others with an interest in the future of space flight.  MSM coverage after the conference held to that flawed model, for the most part. 

For further more valid program information

here are some links for follow up.  The primary story, by Steven Siceloff, is from NASA.gov

: "President Outlines Exploration Goals, Promise."  The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy posted "THE FACT SHEET: Obama's Space Plan Revealed" at Space.com.  On April 12, Bill Harwood, one of our very best space reporters, posted this at The Space Shot on CNET News, "Russian president calls station, suggests 'space summit.  Here is Harwood's story about the space conference: "Obama insists new plan will spur deep space exploration."  Irene Klotz is another great space reporter, and her stories on the issues can be found on Reuters.

Posted via email from Southwest Postings

2010 will mark the end of the NASA shuttle program.

Photo credits: STS-130 night landing (NASA TV), Shuttle silhouette near ISS (NASA astronauts), Shuttle S-turn during landing approach - taken from ISS (by Astronaut Soichi Noguchi via Twitter).
The International Station will be able to operate until at least 2020, according to the current budget.  NASA's decades-old shuttle program will end in September.  After that supplies and personnel will be ferried to the ISS by unmanned vehicles operated by other countries.  U.S. astronauts will be transported back and forth via Russian Soyuz capsules.  The Bush administration's Constellation program has been canceled.  However, the U.S. is investing in the emerging commercial space industry.  NASA's larger vision for the U.S. space program has yet to be announced.  Until then we will be watching the end of an era in U.S. space flight.
NASA's space shuttle, Endeavour's 6-person crew landed safely Sunday night at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.  Well reported by Marcia Dunn for the Associated Press, "All that's left now are four shuttle flights to stock the space station with more experiments, spare parts and supplies."  The story went on:

. . . making a rare nighttime landing to end a mission that resulted in the virtual completion of the International Space Station. . . During their mission — which spanned two weeks and 5.7 million miles — the astronauts delivered and installed a new space station room, Tranquility, and a big bay window with sweeping views of the Earth.
. . . Tranquility already is serving as a base for life-support equipment, as well as a gym and restroom. It also holds the seven-windowed dome, quite possibly the most anticipated addition ever made to a spacecraft.
. . . The two new compartments were supplied by the European Space Agency at a cost of more than $400 million. Their addition brought the 11-year-old space station to 98 percent completion. 
. . . NASA plans on wrapping up the shuttle program this fall, after which the space station will be supplied by craft from Russia, Europe and Japan. Astronauts will be hitching rides exclusively on Russian Soyuz capsules. The Obama Administration is proposing that commercial rocket companies take a crack at the U.S. ferry side of it, once the three remaining shuttles are retired.

The STS-130 mission's main purpose was to finish constructing the International Stace Station.  After completing the installation of the ISS's new Tranquility module with its wow-factor cupola, the combined crew received a call from President Obama, the AP reported at MSNBC- Space.com,  2/18/10.  To quote:

"I just wanted to let you guys know how proud we are of all of you," Obama said. "Everybody here back home is excited about this bay on the world that you guys are opening up. And Stephen Colbert at least is excited about his treadmill."
. . . Surrounded by schoolchildren with an engineering bent, Obama noted "the amazing work" being done on the space station by multiple nations. It is "a testimony to why continued space exploration is so important and is part of the reason why my commitment to NASA is unwavering," he said.

End of space station era?
Obama did not mention his recent decision to cancel NASA's back-to-the-moon program, Constellation — a controversial verdict within the aerospace community. He also offered no hints as to where astronauts might venture next, following the space station era.

The United States' lunar pull-out leaves China shooting for the moon, according to Francois Bougon's AFP story of 2/20/10.  To quote:

China aims to land its first astronauts on the moon within a decade at the dawn of a new era of manned space exploration -- a race it now leads thanks to the US decision to drop its lunar programme.
US President Barack Obama earlier this month said he planned to drop the costly Constellation space programme, a budget move that would kill off future moon exploration if it is approved by Congress.
In contrast, China has a fast-growing human spaceflight project that has notched one success after another, including a spacewalk by astronauts in 2008, with plans for a manned lunar mission by around 2020.

Bougon concludes:

But Beijing has other significant Asian competitors to reckon with as it vies to become the second nation to put a man on the moon.
India landed a lunar probe in 2008, and a top official said last month it was targeting a manned space mission in 2016. Japan, meanwhile, launched its first lunar satellite in June last year.

So it appears that United States preeminence in space exploration will soon be at an end.  That is a bittersweet reality for so many of us, that we have yet to take it in.  The beginning of the end started with the Bush administration's poorly conceived and underfunded Constellation program.  It became a plan for an expensive set of space vehicles with nowhere to go.  The good news for Earth is that long ago the space program became a truly international project, or set of projects.  It is too expensive and dangerous for just one country to dominate.  Perhaps one day China and India will come to that same conclusion.  Meanwhile we have a very solid partnership with Canada, Russia, ESA (European Space Agency) and JAXA (Japan).  The astronauts have always been just fine with that.  We must now join them in that profound interdependence.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from Southwest Postings

STS-130 shuttle launch scrubbed due to clouds

Image via Wikipedia

The six astronauts were all prone and in their seats, the tanks were full, and the white room crew had pulled away. The shuttle's cargo bay was loaded with new digs for the International Space Station. It was to have been the last night launch. But it was "no go" for Endeavour. NASA will try again tomorrow.
http://amplify.com/u/1s08
 

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

 

Related articles by Zemanta

• NASA to close shuttle program (robbiz1978.blogspot.com)
• Shuttle fueled up for final night launch (msnbc.msn.com)
• Shuttle Endeavour 'go' for Sunday blastoff (go.theregister.com)

Posted via email from Make Good Mondays

Cloudy weather halts STS-130 shuttle launch -- from the New York Times.com

The six astronauts were all prone and in their seats, the tanks were full, and the white room crew had pulled away. The shuttle's cargo bay was loaded with new digs for the International Space Station. It was to have been the last night launch. But it was "no go" for Endeavour. NASA will try again tomorrow. http://amplify.com/u/1s08

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

FACTBOX: Endeavour to carry final space station hub, cupola: story

The latest on NASA's upcoming launch

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Shuttle set for Sunday launch amid space plan shift, carrying node & cupola: http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6151JD20100206

Posted via web from Make Good Mondays

NASA Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer snaps its first picture | Space News from The Huntsville Times - al.com

By Shelby G. Spires

January 06, 2010, 2:28PM

View full size

NASAThis is a photograph of the Carina constellation taken by NASA's Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer. 

This infrared snapshot of a region in the constellation Carina near the Milky Way was taken shortly after NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, ejected its cover, according to NASA. 

The "first-light" picture shows thousands of stars and covers an area three times the size of the moon. WISE will take more than a million similar pictures covering the whole sky. . .

via blog.al.com

That NASA calls this a "snapshot" is an understatement. Reread the size described: "three times the size of the moon."
The ability to do this sort of thing still amazes me and contributes to my remaining an incurable "space junkie."

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Incredible New Hubble Image Full of Stars | International Space Fellowship

Just in time for the holidays: a Hubble Space Telescope picture postcard of hundreds of brilliant blue stars wreathed by warm, glowing clouds. The festive portrait is the most detailed view of the largest stellar nursery in our local galactic neighborhood.

Hubble's Festive View of a Grand Star-Forming Region. Credit: NASA/ESA

The massive, young stellar grouping, called R136, is only a few million years old and resides in the 30 Doradus Nebula, a turbulent star-birth region in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way. There is no known star-forming region in our galaxy as large or as prolific as 30 Doradus.

Many of the diamond-like icy blue stars are among the most massive stars known. Several of them are over 100 times more massive than our Sun. These hefty stars are destined to pop off, like a string of firecrackers, as supernovas in a few million years.

The image, taken in ultraviolet, visible, and red light by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3, spans about 100 light-years. The nebula is close enough to Earth that Hubble can resolve individual stars, giving astronomers important information about the stars’ birth and evolution.

via spacefellowship.com

Click on this link for a wonderful new Hubble image. It depicts a region labeled charmingly as a "stellar nursery." It comes to us as a result of the recent refurbishing of the Hubble Space Telescope by brave astronauts armed with hammers, wrenches and fabulous new instruments..

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Shuttle delivers the goods to space station - Return to Flight- msnbc.com

The space shuttle Atlantis and its crew of six arrived at the International Space Station Wednesday to drop off some massive spare parts for the orbiting laboratory.

The two vehicles linked up at 11:51 a.m. ET as the two spacecraft flew 220 miles (354 kilometers) above Earth. After sealing the link between them, astronauts opened the hatches at 1:29 p.m. ET.

"We're crashing the party," Atlantis commander Charlie Hobaugh radioed to the waiting station crew when the shuttle was about a mile away.

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"We're looking forward to seeing you guys," station astronaut Jeff Williams replied.

Atlantis launched Monday carrying more than 27,000 pounds (12,246 kilograms) of cargo for the space station, including a pair of massive carrier platforms laden with large spare parts for the orbiting laboratory. The spares, which include huge gyroscopes, pumps and other gear, will be installed at the station during three spacewalks planned for the 11-day space mission.

via msnbc.msn.com

Not wasting any time, the combined Atlantis-ISS crew is today in the midst of the STS-129 first space walk of this busy logistics mission. As usual, a rookie and an old hand are outside together in their suits/mini-spacecrafts, working hard and stealing glances at the earth flying underneath them.
It never ceases to excite and amaze. Watch everything on a NASA cable or satellite TV channel.

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Stuck Mars rover to begin moving - Mars- msnbc.com

LOS ANGELES - The Mars rover Spirit will soon try to drive itself out of a sand trap where it has been stuck for the past six months.

NASA is set to outline plans to try to free Spirit, a risky process that could take months.

Details of the extraction attempt will be announced later Thursday.

For the past several months, engineers have been busy testing different escape routes on Earth using prototype rovers.

via msnbc.msn.com

I continue to be amazed at the capacity of these plucky little machines . . . and their dedicated engineer "drivers."

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Mission: Ares 1-X

NASA Targeting 11 A.M. for Rocket Launch
28 October 2009, 9:50 a.m. EDT

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - NASA is now hoping to lift off its Ares I-X test rocket at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 GMT). Weather officers are still looking toward a break in the clouds that looks to reach the launch pad around that time.

The flight has been held on the ground by cloudy weather since its launch window opened at 8 a.m. EDT.

Click here to read the launch preview story.

Click here for SPACE.com’s NASA TV feed.

via space.com

Space.com has a very good page on the Aries 1-X project. It has been interesting to contrast this rocket test mission with the Shuttle missions. There is a huge difference between manned and unmanned rocketry. There is also a lot of difference between going into low earth orbit and going up for just a couple of minutes and parachuting the vehicle back into the ocean.
I wish this great bunch good luck and Godspeed today. I am a space junkie and still love to watch the big booms.

Posted via web from Southwest Postings

Amelia Earhart's scarf flying to space - Space.com- msnbc.com

As a new major motion picture about famed female pilot Amelia Earhart prepares to launch onto movie theater screens this weekend, a scarf she wore is being readied for its own liftoff, flying on the space shuttle with the astronaut grandson of her personal photographer.

Randy Bresnik, whose grandfather Albert was recruited by Earhart in 1932 to be her only authorized photographer, is set to take the scarf on shuttle Atlantis when it departs with supplies and spare parts for the International Space Station (ISS) in November.

"We are flying Amelia Earhart's favorite scarf that she unfortunately did not take with her on her final mission," revealed the STS-129 astronaut during an interview with collectSPACE.com. "Fortunately, she also decided not to take her photographer with her otherwise I might not be here today."

Story continues below ↓

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As the film "Amelia" starring Hilary Swank in the title role recounts, Earhart, who made the first transatlantic solo flight by a woman in 1933, and her navigator Fred Noonan disappeared while flying over the Pacific Ocean during an attempt in 1937 to become the first female to fly around the world.

via msnbc.msn.com

I have always had a special place in my heart for Amelia Earhart. She disappeared the year I was born.
It is amazing how much Hillary Swank looks like her. And Richard Gere is also in the new film. How can we lose?!

Posted via web from Southwest Postings