A public memorial service for Neil Armstrong has been scheduled for September 13 in Washington, D.C.
The Democratic Party platform’s [pdf] position on space and NASA is one sentence long.
President Obama has charted a new mission for NASA to lead us to a future that builds on America’s legacy of innovation and exploration.
This is even worse than the Republican Party platform, and is more inexplicable. Considering how much support the Obama administration has given to private commercial space, this was a great opportunity to sell Obama as supportive of private enterprise. Sadly, they do not, which suggests again that Obama and his party really aren’t that interested in it.
Because of the failure to replace a power unit during last week’s spacewalk, the U.S. portion of ISS is now in a brown-out, with a 25% reduction in power.
They plan a second spacewalk tomorrow to try to fix the problem.
In another attempt to win the $250,000 AHS Sikorsky Prize, the Gamera II human-powered helicopter has successfully flown for more than sixty seconds Video below the fold.
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The competition heats up: Two Russian companies have announced a joint plan to build a suborbital spacecraft for tourism.
Sounds great, but Clark Lindsey has a very informative review of the history of these announcements from Russia, none of which has ever born fruit.
Surgery in weightlessness? Two doctors and an engineer are about to test equipment that might make it possible.
The idea actually has more significance for controlling bleeding during brain and spinal surgeries here on Earth.
Though this is a nice write-up describing Sierra Nevada’s Dream Chaser, the part where they talk about using the vehicle like the shuttle to repair other orbiting satellites is a bit of a stretch.
The competition heats up: On Friday SpaceX successfully completed a launch pad dress rehearsal for the next Falcon 9 launch to ISS.
An evening pause: As Dawn begins its journey away from Vesta, the science team has put together this stunning video tour of the giant asteroid.
Two astronauts on ISS completed an eight hour spacewalk today, extended because of problems with several stuck bolts.
Williams and Hoshide initially progressed well through their tasks, but the astronauts struggled with difficult bolts when removing a faulty power box from the exterior of the space station, and then again when replacing the defunct unit with a new spare.
More information here. In the end they were forced to leave the replacement unit only temporarily attached because the bolts would simply not screw in. It was thought there might be debris in the screw holes.
At 4:05 am last night the two Radiation Belt Storm Probes (RBSP), designed to study the Van Allen radiation belts, were successfully placed in orbit by an Atlas 5 rocket.
I am sure these two spacecraft will do good research and find out things about the Van Allen radiation belts that we will need to know when humans start traveling through them routinely. However, I must say that their name, the Radiation Belt Storm Probes, usually abbreviated as RBSP, is probably the worst name NASA has ever devised for a spacecraft: Impossible to remember, boring to hear, and completely forgettable. Other than that, it’s a public relations winner.
The journey begins: Curiosity heads east 52 feet on the first leg of its exploration of Gale Crater.
The possibility that NASA might finally agree with Russia’s repeated request to fly a year-long mission to ISS grew stronger this morning with two stories:
The first, by James Oberg, digs into the underworld of NASA politics to find that plans might very well be more advanced than NASA is letting on:
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Russian officials today announced that they will hold additional open cosmonaut recruitment drives, similar to the first held earlier this year, but with revisions.
It appears that the first drive was too short, only six weeks long, and did not get them as many applicants as they would have liked.
The competition heats up: Bigelow Aerospace has expanded its workforce as well doubled its factory space in response to the commercial contracts NASA recently awarded.
The company just opened a 185,000-square-foot addition, bringing its North Las Vegas plant up to about 350,000 square feet. It slashed its work force from 150 before the recession to 50 during the downturn; now, it’s looking to jump back up to 90 workers by Christmas. It’s hiring structural, mechanical and electrical engineers, as well as chemists, molecular biologists and workers who craft composite spacecraft parts.
Hat tip to Clark Lindsey at NewSpace Watch.
How not to go cave exploring:
An international crew of six astronauts will start training for a caving adventure designed to prepare them for spaceflight. CAVES, an abbreviation of Cooperative Adventure for Valuing and Exercising human behaviour and performance Skills, prepares astronauts to work safely and effectively and solve problems as a multicultural team while exploring uncharted areas using space procedures.
Or to put it more bluntly, overly complicated, bureaucratically organized, and not very efficient. For example:
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The photo legacy of Neil Armstrong.
More here: “The missing man: There are no good pictures of Neil Armstrong on the Moon.”
An evening pause: This short clip from the Discovery Science series Rocket Science illustrates one reason Neil Armstrong got the job to land the first spacecraft on the Moon, even though it shows Armstrong crashing his test vehicle!
The man was cool-headed. Not only did Armstrong not panic when a thruster failed, he kept trying to regain control of the craft until the last moment, ejecting less than a second before impact. Then, he was calm about it afterward, hardly mentioning the incident to others.
The competition heats up: Orbital Sciences gets ready for its first cargo mission to ISS.
The article gives details about the status of Cygnus and Antares, including mentioning that the first test of Antares is now set for late October.
In space, science, and technology, there really is very little new news to report today. Instead, almost all the stories are about the passing of Neil Armstrong. On spacetoday.net alone I count almost seventy stories on Armstrong, practically everything posted since yesterday, And that is only a sampling.
This response tells us several things.
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I think the gracious statement by Neil Armstrong’s family sums up his life quite well.
We are heartbroken to share the news that Neil Armstrong has passed away following complications resulting from cardiovascular procedures.
Neil was our loving husband, father, grandfather, brother and friend.
Neil Armstrong was also a reluctant American hero who always believed he was just doing his job. He served his Nation proudly, as a navy fighter pilot, test pilot, and astronaut. He also found success back home in his native Ohio in business and academia, and became a community leader in Cincinnati.
He remained an advocate of aviation and exploration throughout his life and never lost his boyhood wonder of these pursuits.
As much as Neil cherished his privacy, he always appreciated the expressions of good will from people around the world and from all walks of life.
While we mourn the loss of a very good man, we also celebrate his remarkable life and hope that it serves as an example to young people around the world to work hard to make their dreams come true, to be willing to explore and push the limits, and to selflessly serve a cause greater than themselves.
For those who may ask what they can do to honor Neil, we have a simple request. Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink.
R.I.P. Neil Armstrong.
The launch of two satellites to study the Van Allen radiation belts has been delayed again, this time due to weather.
The Russians are once again pushing for a year long mission on ISS, while NASA once again appears unenthusiastic.
Though from this article it appears that this time NASA officials are at least considering the idea.
Good news! NASA today announced that recent research on ISS into bone loss due to weightlessness has found that proper exercise and diet can stabilize bone loss.
Past Russian research on Mir had found that exercise and diet could limit the bone loss, but not stop it entirely. The key difference in this recent work seems to be the use of more sophisticated exercise equipment.
If this research holds up, it eliminates one of the most serious obstacles to interplanetary travel.
The Friday launch of two NASA satellites designed to study the Van Allen radiation belts was scrubbed at least 24 hours because of the failure of ground tracking equipment needed during launch.
Progress on the commercial space front.
The most important announcement is NASA’s official acceptance of SpaceX’s COTS contract to transport cargo to and from ISS. The first official cargo mission is set for no earlier than October 8.
The first Earthrise picture taken from the Moon, 46 years ago today.
The European cargo ship docked at ISS today successfully fired its engines and raised the station’s orbit to 260 miles.
This is in contrast to a previous attempt on August 15, which cut off prematurely.
