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Weekly Links

Down to Earth

SpaceX’s latest Dragon capsule left the ISS on March 19th and was successfully recovered by the company at sea.

A new exhibit about Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space, has opened at the Science Museum in London.

The White House released their budget proposal for 2018, including proposed spending on NASA. The proposal funds NASA at $19.1 billion, which is a slight cut. Taking into account inflation, it comes out to a few percent less than what NASA is working under in 2017. If you really really love reading about budgets, here is a super long post from Casey Dreier at the Planetary Society breaking down the proposal.

The European Space Agency is having trouble with their only orbital launch site down in French Guiana as a general strike is causing most of society in the small French territory to grind to a halt. There had been an Ariane 5 rocket launch planned for last week that continues to be delayed.

In Orbit

There have been three successful orbital rocket launches since my last post on March 12th:

Meanwhile, SpaceX is working towards their next rocket launch. The next Falcon 9 rocket will be a commercial launch of the SES-10 communications satellite. The exciting part of this mission is that it will be the first flight of a reused first stage booster. The static fire test was completed today, with launch scheduled for Thursday evening.

On the International Space Station, the Expedition 50 crew is very busy with a series of spacewalks that will serve as Commander Shane Kimbrough’s send off before he comes home in early April. The first spacewalk was conducted last Friday, March 24th, when Kimbrough and Thomas Pesquet spent six and a half hours outside conducting various repairs and upgrades.

One of the spacewalk’s tasks was to disconnect Pressurized Mating Adapter 3 (PMA-3) before it was robotically moved this past Sunday to its new home on top of Node 2 for future dockings of the Dragon and Starliner spacecraft.

The next spacewalk is this coming Thursday. here is an hour long briefing from last week that describes the spacewalk plans in detail (keep in mind the discussed arrival of the Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo craft has since slipped):

Next up is your weekly dose of awesome Twitter photos from the ISS crew (and go check out Oleg Novitskiy who posts exclusively to his Instagram account).

Posted in ESA, Friday Links, History, ISS, Japan, Mission Control, NASA, Rockets, Russia, SpaceX, ULA | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Down to Earth

NASA has finalized an agreement with Boeing to use the extra seats on two Soyuz flights to the ISS over the next year and a half for additional US astronauts. There is some contractual stuff going on here, but basically NASA is going to use seats that Roscosmos was going to leave empty to save money.

Virgin Galactic has spun off its LauncherOne program into a new company called Virgin Orbit.

Jeff Bezos’ company Blue Origin is now getting in on the new moon missions also. According to the Washington Post (owned by Bezos), Blue Origin has floated a proposal to the new US presidential administration that they want to help support NASA missions to the moon with their Blue Moon concept.

PBS News Hour did a brief segment on all of this new interest in lunar missions:

In Orbit

Two rocket launches since my last post:

It’s hard to keep up with the current ISS crew, the members of Expedition 50, as they tweet like its all they do in what little spare time they have. Here’s a selection of the best pictures from just the last week.

 

Around the Solar System

NASA’s MAVEN probe in orbit of Mars executed an avoidance maneuver of about 0.4 m/s to avoid colliding with the moon Phobos. That velocity change is small, about on the order of the debris avoidance maneuvers we do with the ISS.

Check out these dust devils spotted by Curiosity rover on Mars.

Did you know that Saturn’s moon Enceladus is half cratered and half smooth? Check out this recent image from NASA’s Cassini probe to see for yourself.

Posted in astronauts, Blue Origin, Boeing, Cassini, China, commercial crew, Earth photography, Enceladus, Friday Links, ISS, Mars, Moon, MSL, NASA, New Space, Orion, politics, Rockets, Saturn, Space Tourism, SpaceX, ULA, Virgin Galactic | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Down to Earth

Legendary astronaut Gene Cernan has died at the age of 82. Captain Cernan had an incredible career in the Navy and then at NASA, where he flew on three important missions: Gemini 9, Apollo 10, and Apollo 17. Gemini 9 had Cernan’s harrowing spacewalk (the second for an American); Apollo 10 was the dress rehearsal for the moon landing, in which Cernan and Stafford got to within just miles of the lunar surface before a planned abort; Apollo 17 is of course known as the final mission to the surface of the moon. If you haven’t read Cernan’s autobiography or seen the recent biography about him (both called The Last Man on the Moon) you should put them both on your list.

NASA administrator Charlie Bolden resigned last Thursday – as is tradition for most presidential appointees – the day before inauguration of president Donald J. Trump. NASA is currently being run by acting administrator Robert Lightfoot.

Andy Weir, author of The Martian, announced on social medial that he will be working with CBS on a new show set in Houston’s mission control.

In Orbit

A small Japanese rocket, which would have been the smallest ever to make orbit, failed during a launch attempt last Saturday, January 14th. The rocket was carrying a single small cubesat.

However, two rockets did make successful launches within the last week. First, SpaceX had a spectacular return to flight on Saturday, January 14th, placing 10 satellites into orbit for Iridium after a flawless launch of a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg in California. They even stuck the landing on the first stage recovery.

Lastly, on January 20th, United Launch Alliance launched an Atlas V carrying a USAF satellite, GEO 3.

Meanwhile, a failure investigation has narrowed down the loss of a Russian Soyuz rocket last month to an oxidizer pump, leading the Russian space agency to make some part replacements on both the next manned and unmanned flights. Hopefully we will see Soyuz rockets flying to the ISS again soon!

Around the Solar System

The Japanese probe in orbit of Venus, Akatsuki, has made observations of a massive standing wave in the planet’s atmosphere.

Posted in Apollo, astronauts, Friday Links, History, Japan, NASA, Planetary science, politics, Pop Space, Rockets, SpaceX, ULA, Uncategorized, Venus | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Down to Earth

The crew of three Chinese taikonauts finished their 30-day stay aboard the Tiangong-2 space staion and returned to Earth last month.

A planned cargo resupply flight (with no astronauts aboard) launched from Kazakhstan on December 1 on its way to the ISS, but did not make orbit and crashed somewhere in a remote part of Asia. The next ISS resupply is a Japanese HTV vehicle launching next week.

Virgin Galactic continued their flight test program for the new SpaceShipTwo vehicle (named VSS Unity) with a captive carry flight on November 30 and then a glide drop test on December 3. Powered flights should be happening soon, but no specific dates are public. Here’s a photo gallery of the flight test.

In Orbit

Four other rockets launched since my last post on November 16, all successfully placing their payloads in orbit:

The ISS has had a very busy month, notwithstanding the loss of Progress 65. After the last three members of Expedition 50 arrived, they got quickly to work with last-minute packing of the Cygnus freighter, which they released two days later.

Since the Cygnus departure, the crew has been furiously working on their long list of on-orbit experiments. Thomas has someone found the time to tweet every day. Some of his best are below:

Around the Solar System

Radar measurements on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) have discovered a vast deposit of frozen water under the Northern mid-latitudes of Mars.

Posted in China, Earth photography, ESA, ISS, Japan, Mars, NASA, New Space, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, Rockets, Space Tourism, ULA, Virgin Galactic | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Down to Earth

Check out this super-informative video with astronaut Reid Wiseman explaining “everything about living in space” in 5 minutes:

Wondering what the US Presidential election means for NASA and the space industry? Here are a few opinion pieces:

Spaceflight Insider

Space.com

SpaceNews

The German space agency is deploying a large greenhouse to the South Pole research station in Antarctica. The technology, if it works, should be transferable to spaceflight.

In Orbit

Five orbital launches since my last post on October 30th (see this Wikipedia page for a nice list of all launches this year, with dates, etc.):

Japan launched the Himawari 9 meteorological satellite on an H-II rocket.

China had three launches: the debut of their new Long March 5 heavy-lift rocket on carrying an electric propulsion demonstration payload; a small Long March 11 rocket carrying an X-ray navigation demonstration satellite (read up on pulsar navigation here); a medium-lift Long March 2D rocket carrying a weather satellite.

The fifth launch was a ULA Atlas V rocket carrying a satellite for Earth-observation company WorldView. The launch was from Vandenberg in California.

Around the Solar System

The Mars rover Curiosity spent some time studying an iron meteorite that it found on the surface of the red planet.

Posted in astronauts, China, Friday Links, ISS, JPL, MSL, NASA, politics, Rockets, ULA | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Lots to catch up on since my last post on July 23rd. The great summer for spaceflight continues.

Down to Earth

After Eileen Collins spoke at the RNC, another Space Shuttle commander, Mark Kelly, spoke at the DNC.

Sierra Nevada is getting ready to start test flights of their Dream Chaser spaceplane in California, once their full-scale vehicle is shipped their from Colorado.

Virgin Galactic was awarded an operations license from the FAA as they are preparing to resume flight tests with their new SpaceShipTwo vehicle.

A small sample bag from the Apollo 11 mission is at the center of two lawsuits. I’m sure Dr. Jones would agree that it belongs in a museum.

One of the Orbiter Access Arm’s from the Space Shuttle program is now on display at Houston’s Space Center Houston.

Meanwhile, the next generation of crew access arms, for Boeing’ Starliner capsule, was delivered to the Atlas V pad in Florida.

SpaceX conducted a full duration test fire of one of their recovered first stage boosters. Here’s the video:

Google Lunar X Prize competitor, Moon Express, has received approval from the United States government for their private mission to land a rover on the moon.

Vector Space Systems completed their first successful sub-orbital launch.

In Orbit

Speaking of launches, there were four successful orbital flights since my last post. This brings the year’s total to 50 for 50 on orbital launches. For comparison, 2015 had 87 total with 5 failures.

First was an Atlas V launch from Cape Canaveral carrying a secret payload for the National Reconnaissance Office.

Second and third were two chinese launches carrying a new communications satellite and a radar imaging satellite.

Lastly was the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch early in the morning ofAugust 14. The rocket successfully delivered the Japanese JCSAT communications satellite to orbit and recovered the first stage booster on the ASDS at sea. Very impressive. This brings SpaceX’s year up to 8 successful launches for 8 attempts – a yearly record already in August – and 5 for 8 on booster recovery.

Coming up next week is a spacewalk on ISS by NASA astronauts Jeff Williams and Kate Rubins to install the new International Docking Adapter.

Around the Solar System

The Chinese Yutu rover is still communicating with the ground from the lunar surface, although it has long since stopped roving. Despite some reports that it is “dead” it is still expected to wake up from hibernation after the current lunar night.

Follow this link for an update on the Curiosity rover mission on Mars, including some nice pictures.

Here is a full year of observations of the Earth NOAA’s DSCOVR satellite. The cyclones in the Pacific are quite obvious.

Out There

Apparently claims of a discover of an Earth-like planet around Proxima Centauri (our nearest neighboring star) are exciting, but it is worth waiting for more reputable news sources to pick it up than just a small German newspaper… or a peer-reviewed journal paper?

Posted in Boeing, China, commercial crew, Earth photography, Extrasolar planets, Friday Links, ISS, MSL, NASA, Rockets, Sierra Nevada, Space Shuttle, Space Tourism, SpaceX, ULA, Virgin Galactic | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Here’s your busy June update!

Down to Earth

Blue Origin launched their reusable New Shepard rocket for the fourth time, with a hosted webcast this time. Here is a video of the flight:

A Saturn V first stage, meant to be used on the Apollo 19 flight, was moved to the Stennis Space Center’s visitor center for display, along Interstate 10 in Mississippi.

During a congressional hearing last week, the issue of astronaut post-mission health care was discussed.

This is not strictly space news, but the deep winter rescue mission from the South Pole is just as harrowing and difficult as spaceflight in some ways.

A team of astronauts are going on a multi-night spelunking trip this month as a spaceflight analog training mission.

In Orbit

The new 3D printer aboard ISS by Made In Space has printed its first functional tool.

The Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo vessel was released from the ISS on June 14th and re-entered the atmosphere on June 22nd. In the meantime, NASA conducted the SAFFIRE in-flight fire experiment. Here’s some of the video they recorded:

Also returning to Earth this month, but in a more controlled fashion, was there astronauts aboard Soyuz TMA-19M: Tim Peake, Tim Kopra, and Yuri Malenchenko.

Here are all the orbital launches since my last post on June 6th:

  • A Russian Proton rocket carrying a communications satellite (June 9).
  • A ULA Delta IV rocket launch from Florida carrying a spy satellite (June 11).
  • A Chinese launch of one of their navigation satellite (June 12).
  • A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with two communications satellites (June 15).
  • A European Ariane 5 rocket carrying two communication satellites (June 18).
  • An Indian PSLV rocket carrying a slew of satellites including a flock of PlanetLabs Doves (June 22).
  • A ULA Atlas V rocket carrying a US military communications satellite (June 24).

The SpaceX launch, as usual, was the most exciting, with another ASDS landing attempt. They missed the landing this time. Here are some pictures of the wreckage returning to port.

Around the Solar System

New analysis of Pluto has led to the hypothesis that the dwarf planet may have a subsurface ocean… really!

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) got a new shot of the rover Curiosity on the slopes of Mount Sharp.

You’ve got to love this trailer for Jupiter Orbit Insertion (JOI) of the Juno probe, coming up on July 4th.

Posted in astronomical event, astronomy, Blue Origin, China, ESA, Friday Links, India, ISS, JPL, Mars, MSL, NASA, New Horizons, Orbital Sciences, Planetary science, Pluto, SpaceX, ULA | No Comments »

Weekly Links

Down to Earth

Ohio’s Port Columbus International Airport has been renamed for astronaut John Glenn.

Orbital ATK says it is working on a new rocket, simply called the Next-Generation Launcher, to compete with ULA and SpaceX.

In Orbit

SpaceX continues their very successful year with a commsat launch (Thaicomm-8) to geostationary orbit and another successful landing of a Falcon 9 first stage at sea. Here is a timelapse from an onboard camera showing the landing.

Three other successful rocket launches in the last week included a Soyuz launch by ESA carrying new Galileo navigation satellites, a Soyuz launch by Russia carrying a single GLONASS navigation satellite, and a Chinese rocket carrying Earth-observing satellites.

Up on the ISS, NASA successfully completed deployment of the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM), which is the first expandable structure to be launched as part of a manned spaceflight program. Astronauts are expected to egress BEAM in the near future.

Not much else happened in space news this week (but really, that’s a lot), so here are some pretty pictures from the ISS:

Posted in astronauts, China, Earth photography, ISS, Orbital Sciences, Russia, SpaceX, ULA | No Comments »

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