A taikonaut emerges from China's Shenzhou 7 spacecraft after a successful orbital flight
China tools up for Asian space race
AFP
Forty years after the United States landed a man on the moon, China’s fledgling space programme is racing to get to the lunar surface
before an American return and ahead of its Asian rivals.
The Japanese spacecraft Kaguya captured an eclipse of the Earth from lunar orbit in high definition.
Google Lunar X Prize’s Team Omega Envoy tested a prototype rover on Devon Island in the Canadian Arctic on Sunday.
Space Shuttle
Recession casts doubt over KSC job loss
Florida Today
The retirement of NASA’s shuttles could prompt thousands more job losses than once expected because of a national recession and concerns about ongoing changes to the new moon program.
An unreleased local government study is expected to estimate a net loss of as many as 6,000 to 7,000 jobs after 2010 at Kennedy Space Center, said Lisa Rice, president of the Brevard Workforce Development Board Inc.
The launch window for the fifth Falcon 1 launch opens Monday, July 13th and extends through Tuesday, July 14th, with a daily window to open at 4:00 p.m. (PDT) / 7:00 p.m. (EDT).
The Space Show will include representatives from Google Lunar X Prize Team FREDNET, Utah State’s Space Dynamics Lab and other organizations.
NASA is preparing the space shuttle Endeavour for launch on Monday at 6:51 p.m. EDT – weather permitting.
Artists conception of SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft in orbit
Open space
The Engineer
Tom Shelley, vice-president of marketing with Space Adventures, regards [billionaut Dennis] Tito as a pioneer: ‘He was the first one who put up the money and really proved to a lot of people out there that there is money in private space, that there are people who are prepared to pay for themselves to go up into space and it’s not just the governments who need to pay for space flight.’
Carl Sagan’s widow, Ann Druyan, believes that solar sails could prove to be a “Kitty Hawk” moment in humanity’s exploration of the cosmos.
ISRO chief G Madhavan Nair told graduates of IIIT that Indian space research has progressed rapidly but is still in dire need of more engineers, technicians and researchers.
UK deserves more bang for its buck as minister hints at a British Nasa
The Scotsman
After decades in which successive British governments have considered human spaceflight an expensive distraction, the science minister, Lord Drayson yesterday refused to rule out the creation a British Nasa.
Video of Ad Astra Rocket Company’s VASIMR VX-100 VX-100 prototype plasma rocket undergoing test firing.
