Rovers rev up for Google’s moonshot jackpot
NewScientist
Like the Ansari X Prize for sending a human into space, the lunar contest is meant to stimulate commercial space exploration.
“What we’re doing is a proof of concept: that this can be done, and for less than the government would pay for the same kind of mission,” says Fred Bourgeois, head of Team Frednet, a Lunar X Prize competitor based in California.
ESA PRESS RELEASE
ESA astronaut Roberto Vittori from Italy has been assigned as a Mission Specialist to Space Shuttle mission STS-134, which is currently scheduled for launch to the International Space Station (ISS) in July or September 2010. This mission will deliver the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) to the Station.
Vittori’s flight opportunity stems from a bilateral agreement between the Italian space agency (ASI) and NASA involving the utilisation of the Italian-built Multi Purpose Logistics Modules.
SWRI PRESS RELEASE
Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), working with The National AeroSpace Training and Research (NASTAR) Center, is leading a program that will provide spaceflight physiology training for prospective scientist-astronauts wishing to fly on upcoming suborbital space missions.
SpaceX has ugraded its Falcon 1 launcher and raised prices sharply.
PlanetSpace has filed a second protest over NASA’s decision to award COTS contracts to SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corporation.
Cut NASA budget, give NOAA the cash for climate change research
By Robert Cassidy
Building Design & Construction
Here’s my recommendation, Norm: Take a few billion from NASA’s $17 billion budget and give it to poor NOAA, the federal agency that studies our oceans and atmosphere (annual budget: $4 billion). Use those scarce dollars to fund lots more R&D on climate change—ocean exploration, atmospheric studies—research that might help us solve the most vexing problem facing humanity—and the built environment—right here on good ol’ Mother Earth.
John Kelly: Reality check on Obama space promises
Florida Today
“Let me be clear,” the president said, “we cannot cede our leadership in space. That’s why I am going to close the gap, ensure that our space program doesn’t suffer when the shuttle goes out of service.”
His goal was “making sure that all of those who work in the space industry in Florida do not lose their jobs when the space shuttle is retired because we cannot afford to lose their expertise.”
Peter J. Brown has a great analytical piece about South Korea’s new Naro-1 (KSLV-1) rocket, which is set for its inaugural launch in the next week.
Brown delves into Seoul’s prickly 6-year partnership with the Russians, who built the first stage of the two-stage vehicle. Despite being on the verge of the first launch, the relationship with Russia has soured a bit over delivery delays and by Khrunichev’s refusal to share information about the first stage due to tech transfer concerns.
HLV Raw: SSP side project making good progress for Augustine Review
NASASpaceflight.com
With the key decision points for the Augustine Commission fast approaching, one of the favorite alternatives to the Ares vehicles – the SD HLLV (Shuttle Derived Heavy Lift Launch Vehicle – or HLV for short) – has made great strides towards becoming a viable option for replacing the Space Shuttle.
X-51 Waverider
PRATT & WHITNEY PRESS RELEASE
Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne’s scramjet engine SJY61-2 has been installed in the second X-51A flight test vehicle at Boeing Phantom Works in Palmdale, Calif. This is the second of four engines that will be used in flight testing of the X-51A scheduled to begin later this year. The X-51A is expected to exceed Mach 6 and set the foundation for several hypersonic applications. Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne is a unit of United Technologies Corp. (NYSE: UTX).
Exterior View of Genesis module
Microspace and human spaceflight
by Grant Bonin
The Space Review
Yet in spite of its successes, microspace has had relatively little overlap with conventional space. And of particular interest to the author, the benefits of microspace have not widely migrated to the arena of human spaceflight. But it may be that the philosophies of small spacecraft development, as well as small spacecraft themselves, can offer important benefits to present and future human activities in space.
XCOR's Lynx vehicle will only reach 60 kilometers - above most of the atmosphere but well short of most accepted definitions of where space begins.
How high is space?
by Jeff Foust
The Space Review
It seems, at first, like a simple question. After all, space is, well, high. Really high. You know, higher than airplanes fly, up where satellites orbit. For most of the Space Age, that Potter Stewartesque definition—we know something is in space when we see it—has been satisfactory. Indeed, not making a precise definition of the “boundary†of space was a deliberate step by some spacefaring powers to avoid debates and disputes about airspace and overflights.
However, the emerging commercial suborbital spaceflight industry might press the issue in the next several years….
