A clip of Burt Rutan at the UP Experience in Texas on Oct. 25. The entire presentation is below. Burt Rutan: Innovation and the Race for Space from The UP Experience on FORA.tv An entertaining talk. Curiously, Rutan identifies only SpaceShipTwo and Dragon as the systems likely to fly humans into space in the next few years. Seems like he’s forgetting someone. Who could it be now? Who indeed?
AUTHOR
Doug Messier
Europe’s space science and Earth observation budgets took hits in the multi-year agreement worked out by ESA’s ministers last week:
ESA’s science budget will be held in place for the next five years at 508 million euros ($664.4 million) per year under a resolution adopted by the governments here.
The decision will mean an annual drop in purchasing power of 2 to 3 percent, depending on the inflation rate, and was a disappointment for ESA officials who had urged their governments to permit an increase of about 2 percent per year to preserve buying power.
On Tuesday, Mojave Air and Space Port’s board of directors said goodbye to its president, Jim Balentine, who was defeated for re-election earlier this month. He was elected to the board in 1994. Balentine will be replaced next month by newcomer Allen L. Peterson, who is president and CEO of the National Test Pilot School at the airport. Peterson will join the board at its next meeting on Dec. 18. […]
By Douglas Messier Parabolic Arc Managing Editor When Karina Drees screened the Mojave Air and Space Port’s new promotional video at the recent SpaceVision 2012 conference in Buffalo, a number of viewers noted something unusual: the almost total lack of animation. The people in Mojave are building real hardware. And flying vehicles. Like..now! Not in like five years’ time. That was a good thing to hear from the college students […]
ESA’s ExoMars rover. (Courtesy of ESA)[/caption]
ESA will go ahead with its ambitious ExoMars program with Russia stepping in after NASA withdrew:
The 20-nation European Space Agency (ESA) on Nov. 19 approved a cooperation arrangement with Russia under which the Russian space agency, Roscosmos, will provide two Proton rockets to launch what has become the Euro-Russian ExoMars mission in 2016 and 2018, according to ESA officials….
Russian officials are making noises that British sopranonaut Sarah Brightman might not take a joy ride to the International Space Station after all. It’s difficult to tell whether there are serious issues with the upcoming flight, or whether this is a Russian negotiating tactic.
Roscosmos Head Vladimir Popovkin told reporters on Friday that Brightman intends to fly to ISS but that the space agency hasn’t made a final decision to let her do so. He expected officials would make a decision during the second half of next year.
“We need to provide young cosmonauts with flight practice,” Popovkin reportedly said, apparently in reference to a group of eight cosmonaut trainees recently selected by the Russian space agency.
Video Caption: NASA Ames Research Center Director Pete Worden was invited as keynote speaker to the Canadian Space Summit to talk about Small Satellites for Science and Other Uses using Earth Observation as an example.
By Douglas Messier
Parabolic Arc Managing Editor
After 41 years, the East Kern Airport District (EKAD) will soon become just a memory.
The district’s Board of Directors voted on Tuesday to adopt the name of the airport it operates. The district will be know as the Mojave Air and Space Port beginning on Jan. 1, 2013.
Astrium PR — Astrium, Europe’s leading space company, is delighted by the decisions taken by the Ministerial Council of the European Space Agency (ESA) on 20 and 21 November 2012. The level of the budget voted for the period 2013-2017 (10 billion Euros) and the programmes funded mark a very real consolidation of the future of European space.
Image above: Astrobotic Technology is developing a rover that operates on solar energy provided with side-facing panels. The solar panels are set vertically because the rover will operate at the lunar poles where the sun appears closer to the horizon. (Credit: Astrobotic Technology)
Steven Siceloff
Kennedy Space Center
The American space program stands at the cusp of a “water rush” to the moon by several companies developing robotic prospectors for launch in the near future, according to a NASA scientist considering how to acquire and use water ice believed to be at the poles of the moon.
“This is like the gold rush that led to the settlement of California,” said Phil Metzger, a physicist who leads the Granular Mechanics and Regolith Operations Lab, part of Kennedy’s Surface Systems Office. “This is the water rush.”