I listened to most of the Congressional hearing today. Rather than getting into the specifics of what everyone said, let me comment on what I think the Obama Administration has been missing during the last three months: an ability to define and lay out on a clear message.
DiBello: Diversification key to space industry Florida Today Laying out opportunities for growth in the space industry, Space Florida President Frank DiBello said Tuesday that his agency’s goal is to triple the value of the state’s space industry through diversification by 2020. “Space is a catalyst for an innovation future and a knowledge base to come,” DiBello told the National Space Club, which met Tuesday at the Radisson at the […]
India Spares Slowing ISRO’s Space Missions
Express News Service
The quality of home-grown electronic components, which are integrated to satellites and launch vehicles, is very poor and hence is hampering the process of indigenisation of the Indian Space programme, said Dr D Narayanamoorthy, senior scientist at Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).
He was delivering the National Technology Day lecture on Indian Space Endeavour on Tuesday. He said that while the percentage of indigenous components in the launch vehicles was very high, the percentage of indigenous components integrated into spacecrafts was about 50 per cent. This, he said, was despite the very poor quality of home-grown electronic components.
Hutchison plans appeal today to save NASA’s shuttle
Houston Chronicle
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison plans to invoke an argument of astronaut safety at a Senate hearing today by showcasing in-flight irregularities suffered by two Russian spacecraft in the last 2½ years as a reason to extend space shuttle operations beyond November.
Soyuz rocket
ESA PROGRAM UPDATE
The Soyuz Consultation Committee, comprising representatives of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, the European Space Agency (ESA), the French space agency CNES and Arianespace, met on Tuesday, 11 May in French Guiana. It confirmed that the inaugural launch of Soyuz from the Guiana Space Centre would take place during the fourth quarter of 2010.
It’s not very clear: NASA, the White House and Congress have been hammering out the details of a three-pronged plan for America’s future in space. The plan that’s emerging would restore hundreds of skilled jobs that might have been lost due to the retirement of NASA’s shuttle fleet, and would revive elements of the Constellation. A consensus is beginning to build in support of the revised plan, which will get […]
Ares I-X rolls out to the launch pad at Cape Canaveral.
Retired general Lester Lyles, a member of the Augustine Committee, has co-signed a letter to a key House member saying that the Obama Administration’s proposed NASA budget is out of balance and underfunded.
A P3 Navy aircraft with Hanger One at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. (Copyright 2008: Douglas Messier)
NAS PRESS RELEASE
NASA’s abilities to meet major mission goals such as advancing aeronautics, exploring the outer planets, and understanding the beginnings of the universe are being seriously jeopardized by a steady and significant decrease in the agency’s basic research capabilities, says a new report from the National Research Council. Congress and NASA should provide the support necessary for needed equipment and services to conduct fundamental high-quality research.
Module for Mars 500 Experience at IMBP. External view of Mars Descent Module.
ESA has chosen its two participants for the upcoming Mars500 experiment, which will lock six people inside of a habitat for more than 500 days to simulate a round-trip mission to Mars.
Italian engineer Diego Urbina and French engineer Romain Charles will join four other crew members in the habitat, which is located in Moscow. Six Russians and a Chinese man are vying for the other four positions. The mission will simulate every phase of a trip to the Red Planet.
Naro ready for June 9 rocket launch
Korea Times
South Korea’s first space rocket launch was a dismal failure, although government officials insist on calling it a “half-success.” The Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), the country’s space agency, doesn’t intend to leave any doubts this time around as it prepares to light up the Korea Space Launch Vehicle 1 (KSLV-1) again for an optimistic retry on June 9.
Apollo commanders Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan will testify before the U.S. Senate U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation on Wednesday.
The hearing marks a rare appearance for the reclusive Armstrong, who was the first man to walk on the moon as commander of Apollo 11. Cernan commanded Apollo 17, which was the last American mission to land on the lunar surface in 1972.
XCOR has been negotiating to fly its Lynx suborbital space plane from a planned spaceport on the Dutch Antilles island of Curaçao.
