Panel OKs $1.5 billion for Ares
The Huntsville Times
A spending bill approved by a House and Senate conference committee late Tuesday gave a congressional seal of approval to the Ares rocket projects called into question by a White House-appointed review panel.
ESA's ATV team wins the Royal Aeronautical Society Gold Medal in the 'team' category, London, 10 December 2009. Credits: Royal Aeronautical Society/T. Taylor
ESA PRESS RELEASE
The UK’s Royal Aeronautical Society has awarded its top Gold Medal Team prize to ESA’s Automated Transfer Vehicle operations team, in recognition of their achievement in operating ATV Jules Verne during its 2008 mission to the International Space Station.
The Gold Medal is conferred for work of outstanding achievement in aerospace.
SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY FACILITIES COUNCIL
PRESS RELEASE
Collaborations between UK and Russian space scientists and engineers could be on the horizon following a visit to the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s (STFC’s) Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, by the Russian Federal State Unitary Enterprise “Centre for Ground-Based Space Infrastructure†(TsENKI) and representatives of the Russian Space Agency, Roscosmos.
Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne celebrated the opening of the new PoWeR Innovations Research facility on the campus of University of Alabama in Huntsville, Ala, on Dec. 9. The facility is part of a collaborative effort designed to develop new technologies and business strategies for both the company and the university. Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne is a United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX) company.
Photo Credit: Sam Coniglio
SpaceShipTwo Readied For Testing
Aviation Week
The vehicle, which was named VSS Enterprise at the ceremony, has had all systems installed and is “ready to go” for the start of initial flight tests, according to designer and manufacturer Scaled Composites.
Space the future of destination weddings?
Metronews.ca
The Edmonton World Trade Centre hosted an information session yesterday with the world’s first public space-travel provider Virgin Galactic. The event was hosted by Michael Broadhurst, Western Canada’s only certified space agent.
Is Virgin Galactic heralding the space tourism age?
Seattle PI
Jeff Greason, vice chairman of the Commercial Space Flight Federation and president and chief executive of XCOR Aerospace, said space tourism would remain only for the rich for a while yet.
UK to get its own space agency ITN A new executive agency is being set-up to take the UK’s space and satellite sector into a new age, Science and Innovation Minister Lord Drayson has said. It will replace the British National Space Centre, and bring together six Government departments, two research councils, the Technology Strategy Board and the Met Office in order to boost growth and jobs in the technology […]
OSC's Taurus II rocket at Wallops Island.
ORBITAL SCIENCES PRESS RELEASE
Orbital Sciences Corporation, one of the world’s leading space technology companies, today announced that Alliant Techsystems and the U.S. Air Force’s Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC) successfully ground tested the second stage rocket motor of the company’s Taurus® II launch vehicle at AEDC in Tennessee. The solid-fuel CASTOR® 30 motor, which is supplied to Orbital by ATK Space Systems of Magna, Utah, was test fired for approximately 150 seconds, producing 72,000 lbs. of maximum thrust. In order to accurately test the motor performance, the static fire test was conducted using a vacuum chamber specially designed to simulate upper atmospheric conditions, since motor is designed to ignite at altitudes in excess of 100,000 feet.
AIAA PRESS RELEASE
AIAA President Dave Thompson today testified before the House Committee on Science and Technology on “Decisions on the Future Direction and Funding for NASA: What Will They Mean for the U.S. Aerospace Workforce and Industrial Base?†Thompson and his fellow panelists were asked to address the effects of NASA’s future direction and funding on the country’s aerospace industry and the nation as a whole.
Thompson said that the number of retiring professionals exceeds the supply of younger aerospace engineers entering the profession, and warned the committee that over half of all current aerospace engineers will reach retirement age within five years. “If talented young engineers and scientists are not recruited, retained, and developed to replace the generation that is near retirement, then the U.S. stands to lose the critical economic and national security benefits of the domestic aerospace industry.â€
It looks like Virgin Galactic was lucky to avoid serious injuries at its unveiling of SpaceShipOne on Monday night. Gale force storm winds tour apart the tent the company set up for VIP party goers not long after vehicle roll out. Fortunately, they got everyone evacuated before the destruction. Attendee Rand Simberg has dubbed it “Virgin’s PR Fiasco“: They invite a lot of high-falutin’ people, including a lot of wealthy […]
Virgin Galactic's VMS Enterprise. Photo Credit: Sam Coniglio
The Independent‘s Guy Adams casts a more skeptical eye toward Sir Richard Branson’s space tourism venture, noting problems with Virgin Trains and questioning the environmental claims that are being made:
It’s difficult not to admire the dynamism that brought him to this point. And it was actually rather affecting, at Monday’s unveiling in the Mojave Desert, to meet the “future astronauts” who boldly intend to entrust their lives to a spacecraft developed by a man whose state-of-the-art locomotives are unable to negotiate fallen leaves.
