Archive for the ‘Vector Space’ Category
Weekly Links
Down to Earth
Leonardo DiCaprio is going to produce a new TV series based on The Right Stuff.
NASA’s new TDRS-M satellite had a mishap during pre-flight processing. Launch has been rescheduled while repairs are conducted.
Virgin Galactic conducted another drop test of their SpaceShipTwo vehicle at the Mojave Air and Space Port.
NASA’s fourteenth crew of the Human Exploration Research Analog (HERA) program started their 45-day mission yesterday.
Crew trained & ready! @HERA_XIV mission to simulated asteroid starts TONIGHT @NASA! Hatch doors close in 5, 4, 3, 2… engaging autotweet pic.twitter.com/Qst1G4p3v7
— HERA XIV (@HERA_XIV) August 5, 2017
Rocket startup Vector Space Systems conducted a test launch of their suborbital rocket on Thursday. Here’s a short video of liftoff.
In Orbit
The International Space Station crew is back up to 6 after a new Soyuz launched from Kazakhstan and docked just a few hours later. The three new ISS crew members, Sergey Ryazanskiy, Paolo Nespoli, and Randy Bresnik, are all spaceflight veterans.
There are now 5 active Twitter users on ISS, sharing their thoughts, activities, and views with us! Check out their posts at this feed.
Signing the wall at the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum. You can even spot @StationCDRKelly on it! #SpaceflightTradition pic.twitter.com/NJDC55SKFj
— Randy Bresnik (@AstroKomrade) July 25, 2017
Spied this cool view through the Japanese Airlock, great capability for us to pass science in & out to space! https://t.co/yKBNxgYJYq pic.twitter.com/ZTvCitMWtU
— Jack Fischer (@Astro2fish) July 26, 2017
Technology evolves: our Soyuz Procedure Books are now on a tablet (we still carry the paper versions, just in case…) #Poyekhali #VITAmission pic.twitter.com/1DfQOHxhpq
— Paolo Nespoli (@astro_paolo) July 26, 2017
Doing some arts and crafts tonight to prep for our 6-person crew picture next week. Can’t wait for the crew to bump up to 6! pic.twitter.com/Z4S3ChrW0O
— Jack Fischer (@Astro2fish) July 27, 2017
Got an interesting pic of the launch… @AstroKomrade, @Astro_Paolo & @Ryazanskiy_ISS are now on our six! See you in a few hours guys! pic.twitter.com/7wZn09oNjM
— Jack Fischer (@Astro2fish) July 28, 2017
638 days in space and the view is still amazing! Soaking up some sunset time in the cupola… pic.twitter.com/AiReQzkjJZ
— Peggy Whitson (@AstroPeggy) August 6, 2017
In addition to the Soyuz launch, the only other rocket launch in the past two weeks was a European Space Agency Vega rocket. The rocket launched on August 2 from French Guiana carrying two earth observing satellites.
Around the Solar System
In case you had forgotten that there are two active NASA rovers on the surface of Mars, here are some beautiful panoramas from Opportunity, on the edge of Endeavour crater.
Results are in of the stellar occultation observation of object 2014 MU69, and astronomers think it may actually be a binary, rather that single piece of rock. 2014 MU69 is the Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) that the New Horizons spacecraft will visit in 2019.
New evidence suggests there may be more water hidden beneath the surface of the moon than previously thought.
Out There
Speaking of moons, a new paper analyzing the light curve data from Kepler of a distant star shows the possibility of a large planet with a large moon in orbit. Hubble is scheduled to do follow up observations in October to confirm the finding.