A Space Adventures promo video on the company’s deal with Armadillo Aerospace. The main thing I gleaned from this video is what a massive leap this is for Space Adventures. To date, it has flown passengers on a well-tested and extremely safe Russian orbital system that was built billions of government rubles. The company arranged the trip and took a cut of the revenue, but there was no tech development […]
NASA's Jeff Hanley (Photo Credit: NASA)
SENATE COMMERCE, SCIENCE AND TRANSPORTATION COMMITTEE
PRESS RELEASE
Leaders of the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee, Chairman John D. (Jay) Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) and Ranking Member Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), today called for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Inspector General to launch an investigation into the sudden removal of the Constellation program manager.
The full text of the May 27 letter to NASA Inspector General Paul Martin from Senators Hutchison and Rockefeller is below.
At ISDC today, Space Adventures CEO Eric Anderson and Armadillo Aerospace’s John Carmack outlined the two companies’ collaboration on developing a suborbital vehicle to take humans and experiments into space. Jeff Foust and Donnie Lowther covered the talk via Twitter: @DKLowther Space Adventures has paid Armadillo to start developing suborbital vehicle–ducks in a row–going to ramp things up. @jefffoust Anderson is showing an animation now: features a cone-shaped vehicle atop […]
Although I was not able to attend this year’s International Space Development Conference (ISDC) in Chicago, I have been able to follow it via Twitter. X Prize Foundation Founder Peter Diamandis gave a presentation earlier today in which he outline the projects that his non-profit group wants to fund. Tweets from Robin Snelson and Donnie Lowther: @DKLowther Diamandis: Beamed Power Launch X Prize; Asteroid Deflection X Prize–concept; Orbital Debris Removal […]
Masten Space Systems succeeded in re-lighting the engine of its Xombie rocket during a test flight this week.
X PRIZE FOUNDATION PRESS RELEASE
The X PRIZE Foundation’s Radical Benefit for Humanity: Making the Impossible Possible, One Prize at a Time gala in San Francisco Saturday evening brought together the tech titans of Silicon Valley with global leaders in business and entertainment under one roof to envision the future. The event raised over $4 million for the Foundation.
Space industry funding to double in next 10 years
The Yomiuri Shimbun
Funding to the nation’s space industry will rise from the current 7 trillion yen to about 15 trillion yen in 10 years, the government said, under a plan aimed at promoting private-sector involvement in developing space technology.
An odd exchange from yesterday’s House hearing illustrates one of the arguments being used to oppose ending space shuttle missions and canceling Ares: national security. This is strange on just about every level:
- Human spaceflight has gone from being an arena of national competition when Armstrong and Cernan flew to one of broad cooperation, as evidenced by ISS.
Texas Rep. Ralph Hall (center) poses with Eugene Cernan, Bart Gordon, Charlie Bolden, A. Thomas Young and Neil Armstrong.
Rep. Ranking Member Ralph Hall (R-TX) put out a press release about today’s House Committee on Science and Technology hearing about NASA’s future plans. Writing on behalf of the committee’s Republican caucus, the ranking minority member of the panel chose to highlight the criticisms of Apollo astronauts Eugene Cernan and Neil Armstrong and former Lockheed Martin CEO A. Thomas Young.
“From the very beginning it was clear that NASA’s proposal lacked the sufficient detail that Congress would need to determine whether it was a credible plan. Yet, in spite of our best efforts to obtain more information from NASA this situation has not improved. Indeed, the President’s trip to the Kennedy Space Center on April 15th only added to the confusion as he laid out more aspirational goals, but provided no clear idea of how they fit together or how he expects to pay for these new ventures.â€
Hall made a brief mentioned of NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, who also testified. The Congressman managed to misspell the general’s first name.
(AFNS) An X-51A Waverider flight-test vehicle successfully made the longest supersonic combustion ramjet-powered hypersonic flight May 26 off the southern California Pacific coast.
The more than 200 second burn by the X-51’s Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne-built air breathing scramjet engine accelerated the vehicle to Mach 6. The previous longest scramjet burn in a flight test was 12 seconds in a NASA X-43.
Space shuttle Atlantis lands at Edwards Air Force Base in California, completing the final servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. Image Credit: NASA/Carla Thomas
At a Congressional hearing today, former Lockheed Martin CEO A. Thomas Young lambasted the Obama Administration’s plan to turn over orbital human spaceflight to private sector companies, calling it dangerous and prone to both cost overruns and program failures.
On May 26, 2010, Masten Space Systems demonstrated an in-air relight on our VTVL reusable rocket, XA-0.1B (Xombie). This test was a major step towards flying payloads on suborbital flights. The view above is from a camera mounted on one of the landing legs. Below is a video from the lander looking down.