Shaking up a space plane
The competition heats up: Europe’s experimental space plane begins shake tests in preparation for a November test flight.
They are testing to see if it can withstand the vibrations during launch.
Category: Points of Information
Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
Telescope teamwork produces spectacular galaxy image
Combining images from a host of space and ground-based telescopes, astronomers have created a spectacular image of the galaxy M106.
This galactic fireworks display is taking place in NGC 4258 (also known as M106), a spiral galaxy like the Milky Way. This galaxy is famous, however, for something that our Galaxy doesn’t have – two extra spiral arms that glow in X-ray, optical, and radio light. These features, or anomalous arms, are not aligned with the plane of the galaxy, but instead intersect with it.
The anomalous arms are seen in this new composite image of NGC 4258, where X-rays from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory are blue, radio data from the NSF’s Karl Jansky Very Large Array are purple, optical data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope are yellow and blue, and infrared data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope are red.
A new study of these anomalous arms made with Spitzer shows that shock waves, similar to sonic booms from supersonic planes, are heating large amounts of gas – equivalent to about 10 million Suns. What is generating these shock waves? Radio data shows that the supermassive black hole at the center of NGC 4258 is producing powerful jets of high-energy particles. Researchers thinkthat these jets strike the disk of the galaxy and generate shock waves. These shock waves, in turn, heat some of the gas – composed mainly of hydrogen molecules – to thousands of degrees.
The astronomers also used the Herschel Space Observatory to confirm the data from Spitzer.
More cost increases due to Obamacare
Finding out what’s in it: Obamacare is forcing health insurers in New York to request premium increases from 12 to 20%.
Newly discovered dinosaur tracks
A cluster of dinosaur tracks discovered recently in Alaska has revealed to paleontologists a wealth of new information about their behavior.
The thousands of impressions, created on a 180-meter-long portion of near-coastal flood plain, today pepper a steep mountainside. Most of the tracks, made somewhere between 69 million and 72 million years ago, were left by hadrosaurs, commonly known as duck-billed dinosaurs (the crested creatures in this artist’s representation).
The consistent and excellent preservation of tracks suggests all the footprints were created within a short time period. Varying in width from 8 to 64 centimeters, the footprints cluster within four distinct size ranges, which researchers suggest represent specific age groups within a multigenerational herd. About 84% of the tracks were made by adult and near-adult hadrosaurs and 13% by young presumed to be less than 1 year old. A mere 3% of the tracks represent juvenile hadrosaurs, a rarity that strongly suggests the young of this species experienced a rapid growth spurt and therefore spent only a short time at this vulnerable size, the researchers report online this week in Geology.
Gigantic underground trampoline about to open
Want to have some fun? An amusement park in Northern Wales is about to open a gigantic underground trampoline ride to the public..
Battle Below is located deep within a 100 ft (30.5 m) deep and 60 ft (18.3 m) wide disused mine. The new site features three large trampolines stretching across the cave-like mine walls and are positioned at varying heights. The trampolines are linked together by 60 ft (18.3 m) slides and a spiraling staircase. Adding to the atmosphere, multi-colored LED lights have been installed throughout the mine, which project onto the walls of the cavern.
It took over a kilometer of nett and 4,500 man hours to complete the underground trampolines, which can accommodate 100 bouncing visitors at a time. Patrons are required to wear protective gear, including overalls and a helmet before gaining access to the site via an old mining train. They’re also encouraged to bounce as high as they dare, potentially reaching a maximum height of 80 ft (24 m).
Bounce Below opens on July 4, with tickets starting from £15 (about US$25) per person.
A profile of the designer of China’s Yutu lunar rover.
A profile of the designer of China’s Yutu lunar rover.
The details about Jia Yang’s life as well as some of the challenges he faced building the rover and other spacecraft for China is most interesting. I also suspect that if we pay close attention we will see his name pop up again in connection with future missions.
Cygnus/Antares launch date scheduled
Orbital Sciences has set July 11 as the launch date for its next Cygnus cargo mission to ISS.
They have concluded their inspection of the refurbished Russian engines on the Antares rocket and are satisfied it does not have the problems that caused another engine to blow up during tests.
NASA and Boeing finalize contract to build the SLS rocket
NASA and Boeing today signed a $2.8 billion contract for Boeing to build the core stage of the SLS rocket
Scheduled for its initial test flight in 2017, the SLS is designed to be flexible and evolvable to meet a variety of crew and cargo mission needs. The initial flight-test configuration will provide a 77-ton capacity, and the final evolved two-stage configuration will provide a lift capability of more than 143 tons.
It would be nice for the U.S. to have this heavy-lift rocket, but I fully expect the funds to run out immediately after it makes its inaugural flight, despite the wonderful pork it provides to so many Congressional districts. It just costs too much per launch.
Russia abandons Sea Launch
Running from competition: The Russian space agency Roskosmos has decided not to spend the money necessary to buy Sea Launch and make it part of its consolidated United Rocket and Space Corporation (URSC).
Part of the reason the Russians are abandoning Sea Launch is that the rocket the ocean-going platform uses is the Ukrainian-built Zenit rocket, and Russia wants URSC to a wholly Russian operation. Rather than partner with Ukraine for profit, they will let the business die.
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket gets a customer
The competition heats up: The commercial satellite company Inmarsat has booked SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket for one firm launch and two additional options.
The firm contract is for the launch, scheduled perhaps aggressively for late 2016, of a satellite being built for both Inmarsat and Arabsat of Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Arabsat will use the satellite for conventional telecommunications services for its wholly owned Hellas-Sat fleet operator of Greece. The Inmarsat payload uses S-band to provide mobile communications in Europe as part of a satellite-terrestrial broadband network, which is a new business line for Inmarsat.
Inmarsat’s launch contract is for a rocket that has not even yet been tested once, which tells us something about the faith they have in SpaceX. While I would be shocked if they didn’t have an option to pull out should there be significant delays or problems in launching Falcon Heavy, that they are willing to commit to it now is a convincing endorsement of SpaceX.
FIRE sues to end university speech codes
Pushback: The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) today filed lawsuits against the speech codes at four universities.
Read the article. The specific examples are quite oppressive. For example:
At Citrus College in California, student Vincenzo Sinapi-Riddle is challenging three unconstitutional policies, including a free speech zone that the school already agreed to abolish after a 2003 lawsuit. Not only did Citrus College reinstitute its “Free Speech Area,” comprising a miniscule 1.37% of campus, but it also requires student organizations to undergo a two-week approval process for any expressive activity.
Millions of Obamacare applications can’t be processed
Federal officials have admitted that, of the 2.9 million Obamacare applications that have problems and thus cannot be processed, 85% cannot be resolved.
You ask a government bureaucracy to run things, you get these kinds of problems. Everyone knows this, even liberals, which is why I am endlessly puzzled that they still demand the government to do things for us.
OCO-2 in orbit
Second time’s the charm: A Delta 2 rocket successfully launched the Orbiting Carbon Observatory 2 (OCO-2) into orbit on Wednesday, five years after the first OCO was lost at launch when its Taurus XL rocket fell into the ocean.
The Earth-observing satellite is designed to globally track the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
I have to note that if the science of climate change was so “settled,” as President Barack Obama keeps insisting, why did we then spend half a billion dollars on this satellite? Wouldn’t it make more sense to drop the research and focus entirely on saving the planet?
Another lawsuit presses the IRS
A third lawsuit against the IRS, this one by True the Vote, will demand answers at a hearing on July 11 about those lost emails.
This lawsuit is in addition to the Z-Street and the Judicial Watch suits. Thus, we now have three different judges in three different courts pushing back at the IRS coverup, with hearings scheduled for July 10 and July 11.
As I said, things should get very hot for the IRS and the Obama administration come mid-July.
True the Vote sues Mississippi over voter fraud in Republican primary
True the Vote, the organization harassed by the IRS and the Obama administration for investigating fraud at the polls, has sued the Mississippi Secretary of State over alleged voter fraud in last week’s Republican primary.
Though I found some of Cochran’s campaign efforts quite disgusting, I was not offended that blacks came out to vote for him. As long as their vote is legal, that is their right. However, the allegations of fraud that have been swirling around this election suggest that maybe a closer look is warranted.
Hubble to search for Kuiper Belt targets for New Horizons
After completing a preliminary search for potential Kuiper Belt objects which the Pluto probe New Horizons might visit, scientists have decided to use the space telescope for a deeper more complete search.
As a first step, Hubble found two KBOs drifting against the starry background. They may or may not be the ideal target for New Horizons. Nevertheless, the observation is proof of concept that Hubble can go forward with an approved deeper KBO search, covering an area of sky roughly the angular size of the full Moon. The exceedingly challenging observation amounted to finding something no bigger than Manhattan Island, and charcoal black, located 4 billion miles away.
More here.
A WhiteKnightTwo test flight today
The competition heats up: WhiteKnightTwo took off on its first test flight since January today.
No word on what they are testing, though I suspect it is related to the cracks rumored to have been found on the ship’s wings.
Free paid vacations for House lawmakers
Who says they’re conservatives? The House Ethics committee, run by Republicans, has quietly eliminated the requirement that elected officials list any privately sponsored travel they receive in their annual financial-disclosure forms.
The move, made behind closed doors and without a public announcement by the House Ethics Committee, reverses more than three decades of precedent. Gifts of free travel to lawmakers have appeared on the yearly financial form dating back its creation in the late 1970s, after the Watergate scandal. National Journal uncovered the deleted disclosure requirement when analyzing the most recent batch of yearly filings. “This is such an obvious effort to avoid accountability,” said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “There’s no legitimate reason. There’s no good reason for it.”
Once again more evidence that we the voters must replace as many of these crooks, from both parties, as we can.
Construction of Vostochny spaceport on schedule
The competition heats up: According to Russian Deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin, the new Vostochny spaceport is on schedule to begin operations in 2015.
A streamlined Arianespace to build Ariane 6?
The competition heats up: The merged Airbus/Safran rocket division has surprised the European Space Agency with a proposed new design for Ariane 6.
The Airbus-Safran proposal, if carried to its logical end, would mean a single company building Ariane vehicles, with fewer subcontractors and much less government oversight. It would likely mean the end of the CNES launcher division as industry takes more control of Ariane design and operations.
In other words, the contractors who build the rockets for ESA want more power over that construction. They want less government oversight, and more ownership of the rocket they build.
Sounds like what’s happening in the U.S., doesn’t it? Giving ownership to the rocket builders means they not only have more flexibility and thus can be more efficient, it makes it easier for them to innovate in both construction and sales.