Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
The first asteroid sample return! Japanese scientists announced today that their probe Hayabusa did capture asteroid dust in its visit to the asteroid Itokawa.
Chinese female astronaut identified.
Except for the failure to install a video camers, two Russian astronauts successfully completed a six hour spacewalk on ISS today, doing a variety of construction tasks on the station’s exterior.
National Opt-Out day at the airports is November 24. One commentator is suggesting that men wear kilts, just to drive the TSA even more crazy.
The space war returns! The lame duck session of Congress is now expected to pass a continuing resolution that extends into next year, leaving the final decisions about the budget to the next Congress. This is very bad news for NASA and what’s left of the government space program.
Update: I should add that I’m not bothered in the slightest that this might happen. The money that the present Congress proposed giving to NASA will not make the exploration of the solar system possible, and in fact might hinder that exploration significantly under the weight of government regulation. It is time to cut the cord, and stop depending on the damn government to conquer the stars.
Fire him! Local councilman calls the cops on two 13-year-old boys, because they are selling cupcake illegally!
Now here’s a good idea: Abolish the TSA.
Scientists have exhumed the body of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe in order to do a new autopsy.
Videos from the Chinese lunar probe, Chang’e 2.
The first tests in Antarctica of a drill designed to drill cores on Mars.
This post by retired NASA engineer Wayne Hale explains why it probably is a good idea if Congress cuts the subsidies for new commercial space: The coming train wreck for commercial human spaceflight. This is the key quote, where Hale describes the regulations NASA is requiring these new companies to meet:
The document runs a mind-numbing 260 pages of densely spaced requirements. Most disappointing, on pages 7 to 11 is a table of 74 additional requirements documents which must be followed, in whole or in part. Taken all together, there are thousands of requirement statements referenced in this document. And for every one NASA will require a potential commercial space flight provider to document, prove, and verify with massive amounts of paperwork and/or electronic forms.
Another example of the TSA’s abuse of airline passengers. And here’s another, this time abusing a three-year-old.
A third crack has been found on Discovery’s external tank shell.
The comet is carbonated!
In a victory for free speech (from a battle that shouldn’t have been fought in the first place), a school has reversed course after ordering a 13-year-old student to remove the American flag from his bicycle because some students said they’d be offended. Key quote:
[School superintendent Edward] Paraz says the school . . . now will be shifting its focus to the students who complained. “In no way did we want to take that right away from Cody,” Paraz told Fox40 on Friday. “…We think we know who the instigators are that were trying to do that and we need to meet with their parents and those students to just kind of explain that this isn’t what we want to have.”
Is Spirit, the Mars rover, finally dead?
The cold war is back! Companies in the U.S. and Russia are in a race to build the first private space stations.
Political correctness gone mad: British bureaucrats, offended by the term “gingerbread man” on school menus, had the menus changed to read “gingerbread person.”
Facts vs ideology in the politics of science.
Why a yard sale to get rid of your junk is not always a good idea: An old vase, ignored by a surburban family for years, fetched them a record $83 million in an auction today.
Oink! The National Organization of Woman is demanding that President Obama reject the Social Security recommendations of his Fiscal Commission.
Will the squealing never stop? NPR says it’s ‘imperative’ that its federal funding not be cut.
Engineers have apparently found the cause of the leak in the hydrogen fuel line to Discovery’s external tank.
More squealing of pigs! The advocates for commercial space are screaming about the spending cuts proposed by the White House’s deficit reduction commission.
Is this good or bad? Less than half of American Muslims support the Ground Zero mosque.
It appears the outrage over the TSA’s new security measures is growing.
Take a look at these spectacular images China released from its Chang’e 2 lunar probe that they say show potential landing sites for later Chinese probes.
As if budget cuts and budget overruns are not enough, the Senate Commerce, Science, and Technology committee announced today it will hold a hearing on NASA’s future on November 18. More here.
