8/23/12 news

 
Thursday, August 23, 2012
 
JSC TODAY HEADLINES
1.            TONIGHT: ISS Expedition Special Event at Space Center Houston
2.            NASA Cost Estimating Team Award
3.            ISS Update Spotlights Commercial Crew
4.            Looking for Open House Volunteers for Mission Control Center in Building 30
5.            NASA Night With the Houston Astros
6.            Register for JSC's Still Imagery Resources Training
7.            Starport's Fall Basketball League -- Last Chance to Register
8.            Personal Financial Education -- Filling the Gap
9.            Fire Warden Orientation Course (Four Hours)
________________________________________     QUOTE OF THE DAY
“ To feel that one has a place in life solves half the problem of contentment. ”
 
-- George E. Woodberry
________________________________________
1.            TONIGHT: ISS Expedition Special Event at Space Center Houston
The International Space Station Expedition Special Event, featuring crew members Dan Burbank, Expedition 29 flight engineer and Expedition 30 commander; Anatoly Ivanishin, Expedition 29/30 flight engineer; Anton Shkaplerov, Expedition 29/30 flight engineer; Oleg Kononenko, Expedition 30 flight engineer and Expedition 31 commander; Andre Kuipers, Expedition 30/31 flight engineer; and Don Pettit, Expedition 30/31 flight engineer, will be held tonight at 7:30 p.m. in the Space Center Houston Theater. The event will consist of awards, slides, a video presentation and a question-and-answer session. This event is free and open to JSC employees, contractors, friends, family members and public guests.
 
Jessica Ocampo 281-792-7804
 
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2.            NASA Cost Estimating Team Award
Members of the AM2/Performance Management and Integration Office won the NASA Cost Estimating Team of the Year award. Zach Hunt, Carolyn Wall and Steve Wilson were recognized for their outstanding cost estimating of the Commercial Crew Program activities. They received the award at the Agency Cost Symposium. Congratulations to them!
 
Cathy Claunch x38979
 
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3.            ISS Update Spotlights Commercial Crew
In this ISS Update, NASA Public Affairs Officer Michael Curie talks with Cheryl McPhillips, Commercial Crew Program (CCP) partner manager for the Sierra Nevada Corporation, the company developing the Dream Chaser spacecraft for NASA.
 
See the video here: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=150905441
 
In the next ISS Update, CCP partner manager for SpaceX, Derek Hassmann, discusses the Dragon spacecraft and the CCP following the Commercial Crew Integrated Capability, or CCiCap, announcement earlier this month.
 
See the video here: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=150916111
 
JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x35111
 
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4.            Looking for Open House Volunteers for Mission Control Center in Building 30
The Building 30 Mission Control Center (MCC) will be participating this year in the JSC Open House on Sept. 29, opening our doors to the public, and we need your help. There is an estimated 30,000 people that will show up to see the MCC and what goes on behind the scenes. The public is so interested in learning about space and what it takes to get there.
 
If you are interested in volunteering and spreading the word about the MCC's history up through the current station programs, email Rebecca Marsh at rebecca.e.marsh@nasa.gov to sign up.
 
Positions that are available:
- Apollo Mission Control floor
- Apollo Viewing Room (movie will be showing)
- Shuttle Viewing Room
- Hallway support
- Elevator support
- Greeters/welcome desk
 
Two- or three-hour shifts requested between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. Very flexible.
 
Thank you very much for your help and support!
 
Rebecca Marsh x36873
 
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5.            NASA Night With the Houston Astros
Celebrate NASA Night at the Ballpark with discounted tickets! The game is Friday, Sept. 14, against the Philadelphia Phillies at 7:05 p.m. The first 10,000 fans will receive an Astros fleece blanket. Plus, enjoy a post-game, NASA-themed fireworks show. Visit http://starport.jsc.nasa.gov/Events/ for ticket pricing and purchase information.
 
Shelly Haralson x39168 http://starport.jsc.nasa.gov/
 
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6.            Register for JSC's Still Imagery Resources Training
Learn how to find that "perfect" picture in a sea of photos during a webinar on Thursday, Aug. 30, from 9 to 10 a.m. CDT. Mary Wilkerson, imagery librarian, will teach users how to find and obtain NASA still images in Imagery Online (IO) and the Digital Imagery Management System (DIMS). http://io.jsc.nasa.gov
 
To register, go to the link below.
 
Click on the "Classroom/WebEx" schedule: http://library.jsc.nasa.gov/training/default.aspx
 
Provided by the Information Resources Directorate: http://ird.jsc.nasa.gov/default.aspx
 
Ebony Fondren x32490 http://library.jsc.nasa.gov
 
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7.            Starport's Fall Basketball League -- Last Chance to Register
Tomorrow is your last day to register for Starport's Thursday Basketball League! Don't miss your chance to have a blast this fall.
 
Registration closing on Friday, Aug. 24
- Basketball (Thursday games)
 
Additional open league registrations:
- Closes Aug. 30 -- softball (co-ed and men's)
- Closes Sept. 5 -- dodgeball (co-ed)
- Closes Sept. 6 -- flag football, kickball and ultimate frisbee
 
Upcoming Registrations:
- Sept. 6 to 27 -- soccer
 
Free-agent registration now open for all leagues. All league participants must register at: http://www.IMLeagues.com/NASA-Starport
 
For more detailed information about each league, please visit http://starport.jsc.nasa.gov/Fitness/Sports/ or call the Gilruth information desk at 281-483-0304.
 
All leagues will fill up fast, so sign your team up today so you and your friends don't miss out on an awesome basketball season!
 
Steve Schade x30304 http://starport.jsc.nasa.gov/Fitness/Sports/
 
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8.            Personal Financial Education -- Filling the Gap
Financial issues are complicated enough, never mind the additional difficulty of determining where to go for accurate and reliable information. Do you recall who taught you about investments, retirement planning, taxes and long-term health care? And who taught them? English and math are required in school, but some of the most important elements in our lives are not part of our school programs.
 
The final six financial wellness classes are being offered today and next week on site:
 
Today:
Retire with Confidence I & II: Prepare for and protect your retirement years
 
Next Tuesday:
Personal Financial Protection: How to use insurance to your best advantage, including long-term care and cash-value policies
Maximize Your Investments: Risk tolerance and portfolio asset allocation
 
Next Thursday:
Estate Planning Intro: Basic terms and concepts
Estate Planning Advanced: Being the executor of an estate
 
Enroll at the link below.
 
Shelly Haralson x39168 http://www.explorationwellness.com/rd/AE108.aspx?Aug_Signup.pdf
 
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9.            Fire Warden Orientation Course (Four Hours)
This four-hour course will satisfy the JSC training requirement for newly assigned Fire Wardens from JSC, Sonny Carter Training Facility and Ellington Field. This course must be completed before assuming these duties.
 
Topics covered include: duties and responsibilities of a Fire Warden; building evacuation techniques; recognizing and correcting fire hazards; and types and uses of portable fire extinguishers.
 
Fire Wardens who have previously attended this four-hour orientation course and need to satisfy the three-year training requirement may attend the two-hour Fire Warden Refresher Course now available in SATERN for registration.
 
Date/Time: Sept. 13 from 8 a.m. to noon
 
Where: Gilruth Alamo Ballroom
 
Registration via SATERN required:
https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=SCHEDULED_...
 
Aundrail Hill x36369
 
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________________________________________
JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles. To see an archive of previous JSC Today announcements, go to http://www6.jsc.nasa.gov/pao/news/jsctoday/archives.
 
 
 
 
NASA TV:
·      9 am Central (10 EDT) – Interpreted Replay of Expedition 32 Event for JAXA with TV Asahi
·      11:30 am Central (12:30 pm EDT) –  NASA Social for Radiation Belt Storm Probes mission
·      12:30 am Central FRIDAY (1:30 EDT) – RBSP Launch Coverage
·      3:07 am Central FRIDAY (4:07 EDT) – RBSP Launch
·      5:30 am Central FRIDAY (6:30 EDT) – RBSP Post-Launch News Conference
 
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT…
 
CCiCap and Sierra Nevada Corp.’s Dream Chaser
 
Cheryl McPhillips, Commercial Crew Program Partner Manager for Sierra Nevada Corporation, the company developing the Dream Chaser spacecraft talks about her new role on the heels of the Commercial Crew Integrated Capability announcement earlier this month.
 
CCiCap and SpaceX’s Dragon/Falcon 9
 
Derek Hassmann, CCP Partner Manager for Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), which is developing a crew-rated version of its Dragon capsule integrated with its Falcon 9 rocket, stopped by Mission Control to discuss the Space Act Agreement announced earlier this month as part of the CCiCap endeavor.
 
Human Spaceflight News
Thursday – August 23, 2012
 

 
HEADLINES AND LEADS
 
Rumor: NASA chief Bolden considering replacing JSC director
 
Eric Berger - Houston Chronicle's SciGuy
 
The news and rumor site NASA Watch has posted a provocative update that states the following: Multiple sources report that NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden is planning to fire/reassign Ames Center Director Pete Worden and two other center directors as well. The site’s editor, Keith Cowing, followed up that tidbit with the following update: Sources report that Bolden has also discussed replacing both GRC (Ray Lugo) and JSC (Mike Coats) center directors even though neither have done anything to warrant replacement. The following statement comes from spokesman Mike Cabbage at NASA’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.: “We have a great management team at NASA, doing amazing things every day to keep the United States the world leader in space exploration.   We’ve just landed the most sophisticated rover ever on Mars and we’re launching a space weather mission on Friday. Right now, we’re just focused on building on this record of success.”
 
NASA chief: We explore because that's what humans do
 
Todd Halvorson – Florida Today
 
We sat down with NASA Administrator Charles Bolden earlier this month at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., to talk about NASA and the future of U.S. space exploration. While the space agency remains as busy as ever, the 2011 retirement of the space shuttle fleet created a perception that the U.S. space program had lost its focus. In reality, the agency has embarked on a course that features three top priorities…
 
Europe’s ATV-3 space freighter raises space station orbit to 420 km (261 m)
 
RIA Novosti
 
Europe’s ATV-3 unmanned resupply spacecraft raised the International Space Station (ISS) orbit to about 420 kilometers, a mission control spokesman said on Wednesday. ATV-3 engines were fired up at 1:15 p.m. Moscow time [09:15 GMT] in the first of the two maneuvers to adjust the ISS orbit and remained switched on for 384 seconds, raising the ISS orbit to 414.8 km
 
Coming in October: SpaceX Dragon Gets Down to Work
 
Joe Pappalardo - Popular Mechanics
 
NASA’s launch schedule at Cape Canaveral now includes a rough date for the next Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) cargo-delivery trip to the International Space Station, giving an October date for the launch. "Hopefully this is a really straightforward mission," Elon Musk told PM during our recent trip to the headquarters of SpaceX in Hawthorne, Calif. The last mission, he said, was a two-step. "[First we] did a loop around the space station to verify that the systems were functioning well, that we could communicate with the space station, that the docking sensors could lock on and that kind of thing, and then we went in and actually did the docking. So it was a longer mission than ... this one will be. This one, we’re going to go straight up, attempt lock, and go straight in."
 
Super Guppy lands in Dayton
 
Derek Myers - Fayette Advocate
 

 
The Super Guppy landed at WPAFB on Wednesday carrying historic cargo. The massive aircraft was carrying the first crew compartment trainer, or CCT-1, used to train astronauts. For more than 30 years, CCT-1 was housed in Johnson Space Center’s Space Vehicle Mockup Facility (SVMF) and was used to train crews from STS-1 (Space Shuttle Columbia) through STS-132 (Space Shuttle Atlantis) as a high-fidelity representation of the Space Shuttle Orbiter crew station for on-orbit crew training and engineering evaluations. Here, astronauts learned how to operate many of the orbiter sub-systems in more than 20 different classes.
 
Space Shuttle Trainer lands at WPAFB
 
Dayton Daily News
 
More than a year after the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force lost a bid to land one of three space shuttle orbiters, perhaps the next best thing arrived Wednesday aboard NASA’s Super Guppy cargo plane to mark a new era at the world’s largest military aviation museum. A space shuttle crew compartment trainer, a mock-up of the shuttle nose and cockpit that trained hundreds of astronauts for space, was carried aloft on a whale-shaped turboprop aircraft from Ellington Field near Johnson Space Center in Houston to its new home in Dayton.
 
Space Shuttle Rocket Boosters on Move to Edwards Air Force Base
A yellow Peterbilt big rig with a 150-long rocket booster strapped to the back is on the final leg of its journey from Kennedy Space Center
 

 
Jonathan Lloyd - KNBC TV (Los Angeles)
 
Two rocket boosters designed to propel space shuttles 28 miles in about two minutes have traveled nearly 2,500 miles in about two weeks on the way from Florida to Southern California's Edwards Air Force Base. The rocket boosters -- they will eventually be part of the space shuttle Endeavour display scheduled to open in October at the California Science Center -- were picked up Aug. 13 at  Kennedy Space Center. They are scheduled to arrive Friday at Edwards Air Force Base, about 100 miles north of Los Angeles, where they will be stored until they are ready for transport to the Science Center.
 
Singer Sarah Brightman may be Russia's next space tourist: report
 
Gabriela Baczynska - Reuters
 
British singer Sarah Brightman may be the next paying passenger to ride a Russian rocket to the International Space Station, the Interfax news agency reported on Wednesday, citing an unidentified official in the space industry in Russia. If it happens, Brightman, 52, would make the journey in 2015 and would be the first paying customer since Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte who donned a red clown's nose during his 2009 trip, the official was cited as saying.
 
Singer Sarah Brightman may be Russia's next space tourist
'Phantom of the Opera' star received medical approval for flight a month ago
 
NBC News
 
British singer Sarah Brightman may be the next paying passenger to ride a Russian rocket to the International Space Station, sources familiar with the negotiations said Wednesday. If the trip happens, Brightman, 52, would make the journey in 2015, the Interfax news agency reported, citing an unidentified official in the Russian space industry. A source familiar with Brightman's side of the negotiations confirmed to NBC News that talks were under way, but stressed that they were at an early stage. Assuming the negotiations are successful, Brightman would be the first paying orbital space passenger since Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte, who donned a red clown's nose for his 2009 trip to the space station.
 
MEANWHILE, ON MARS…
 
Curiosity goes for a spin
 
William Harwood – CBS News
 
In a major milestone, the six-wheel Curiosity Mars rover took its first baby steps Wednesday, rolling about 15 feet forward, performing a slow 120-degree pirouette and then backing up eight feet to prove the $2.5 billion science lab is, in fact, mobile and ready to rove. The short test drive began at 10:17 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) and took about 16 minutes to complete. The actual drive time was about a third of that, but the rover was programmed to stop and take multiple pictures of its tracks in the dusty pebble-strewn soil of Gale Crater. The move came one sol, or martian day, after the rover's four corner wheels passed an initial steering check, wiggling back and forth as commanded.
 
Rover's short test ride proves it moves
 
James Dean - Florida Today
 
NASA’s Curiosity rover on Wednesday left its first tracks on Mars, successfully completing a short test drive that showed it was ready to roll on longer treks for science investigations over the next two years. A series of images from rover cameras showed the shallow path its six cleated wheels imprinted in firm soil as they rolled forward 15 feet, turned 120 degrees and then backed up about eight feet.
 
Mars rover passes driving test, looks to hit road
 
Alicia Chang - Associated Press
 
Now that Curiosity passed its driving test on Mars, the six-wheel NASA rover set its sights on longer treks. The first test drive around the pebbly Martian crater where it landed was just that - a test drive. The rover edged forward about 15 feet, rotated to a right angle and reversed a short distance, leaving tracks in the rust-tinged soil. Mission managers were elated that Wednesday's maiden trek of the $2.5 billion mission was glitch-free. In several days, Curiosity was poised to drive farther to study whether the red planet's environment could have supported life.
 
Mars rover Curiosity aces first test drive
 
Irene Klotz - Reuters
 
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity took a 16-minute drive on Wednesday, its first since reaching the Red Planet to search for habitats that could have supported microbial life. The $2.5-billion, two-year mission, NASA's first astrobiology initiative since the 1970s-era Viking probes, kicked off on August 6, with a risky, but successful landing on at a site NASA has named "Bradbury Landing," a nod to the late science fiction author and space aficionado Ray Bradbury.
 
Mars Rover Curiosity Takes 1st Martian Test Drive, Sees Tracks
 
Mike Wall - Space.com
 
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity took its first halting steps on the Red Planet Wednesday, snapping photos of its tracks to commemorate the test drive milestone. The 1-ton Curiosity rover was slated to move about 10 feet (3 meters) forward, turn to the right 90 degrees and then back up several meters, mission managers said yesterday. And based on pictures that came down from the six-wheeled robot today, that brief maneuver — or something like it — appears to have happened.
 
Mars Rover Landing Site Named for Sci-Fi Icon Ray Bradbury
 
Tariq Malik - Space.com
 
NASA began a new chapter of its Martian chronicle Wednesday when the agency named its Mars rover Curiosity's landing site after the late science fiction author Ray Bradbury. Curiosity's landing site inside Mars' vast Gale Crater was rechristened "Bradbury Landing" today to honor the iconic writer's legacy and dedication to Mars exploration, NASA officials said. Ray Bradbury died in June at age 91. His first book, "The Martian Chronicles," paints a vivid picture of the human exploration of Mars through a series of short stories. The book was published in 1950 and later adapted into a TV series and video game.
 
A Deeper Search for Secrets on Mars
 
New York Times (Editorial)
 
Astronauts won’t be landing on Mars anytime soon, but, in recent weeks, NASA has made great strides toward exploring the planet more thoroughly than ever before with automated laboratories dropped on the surface. It is a welcome development given increasingly tight budgets for robotic explorations of the solar system. Two automated rovers have been on the surface of Mars for many years and have made important discoveries about ancient wet environments on the planet that may have been favorable for microbial life. But one rover stopped transmitting data in early 2010, and the other may be nearing the end of its productive life.
__________
 
COMPLETE STORIES
 
Rumor: NASA chief Bolden considering replacing JSC director
 
Eric Berger - Houston Chronicle's SciGuy
 
The news and rumor site NASA Watch has posted a provocative update that states the following:
 
Multiple sources report that NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden is planning to fire/reassign Ames Center Director Pete Worden and two other center directors as well.
 
The site’s editor, Keith Cowing, followed up that tidbit with the following update:
 
Sources report that Bolden has also discussed replacing both GRC (Ray Lugo) and JSC (Mike Coats) center directors even though neither have done anything to warrant replacement. Reassigning Woodrow Whitlow from NASA HQ has also been discussed. However, Bolden’s real focus is on going after Pete Worden – and these other replacements and/or chess moves are being discussed as window dressing to obscure that focus. More to follow.
 
In my experience Coats, a decorated former astronaut, has done a pretty good job in trying to move Johnson Space Center forward after the double body blow of the space shuttle program’s end and the cancellation of the Constellation Program.
 
As a consequence of these cuts, center’s budget has shrunk from about $6 billion a year to $4.5 billion, and its workforce of civil servants and contractors has fallen from 17,000 to about 13,000.
 
Coats also has not been overly shy about speaking his mind, offering from time to time an opinion that might contradict the views of his superiors in Washington.
 
For example, he recently told me that he fully endorsed the idea of removing much of the President’s Office of Management and Budget’s control over the space agency.
 
I am presently looking into these rumors. When I glean more information, including a response from NASA’s administration in Washington, I will update this post.
 
3:20 PM UPDATE: The following statement comes from spokesman Mike Cabbage at NASA’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.:
 
“We have a great management team at NASA, doing amazing things every day to keep the United States the world leader in space exploration.   We’ve just landed the most sophisticated rover ever on Mars and we’re launching a space weather mission on Friday. Right now, we’re just focused on building on this record of success.”
 
Thanks to Mike for the quick response.
 
NASA chief: We explore because that's what humans do
 
Todd Halvorson – Florida Today
 
We sat down with NASA Administrator Charles Bolden earlier this month at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., to talk about NASA and the future of U.S. space exploration.
 
While the space agency remains as busy as ever, the 2011 retirement of the space shuttle fleet created a perception that the U.S. space program had lost its focus.
 
In reality, the agency has embarked on a course that features three top priorities:
 
·         Development and 2018 launch of a telescope — James Webb Space Telescope — that promises to peer deeper into the universe than ever before.
 
·         Operation of the International Space Station, which is being extended through at least 2020. NASA also is investing in the development of commercial space taxis and freighters to ferry crew and cargo to and from the outpost. Before retirement, that was the space shuttle’s job.
 
·         Development of a new heavy-lift rocket and the new Orion spacecraft to send astronauts deeper into space than any human has ever traveled. The target is a mission to an asteroid by 2025 and the vicinity of Mars by the mid-2030s.
 
Bolden, a former shuttle pilot and mission commander and retired Marine Corps Major General, talked to Florida Today about those priorities and the value of being a space-faring nation.
 
Question: If you could tell the American people what it is that NASA brings to the table, what it is that NASA does for taxpayers, what would you say?
 
Answer: I think I would let the American people know that we are the technological innovators of the country, as far as they’re concerned. The work that we’ve been doing — whether it’s in human exploration or aeronautics or science — has benefited humanity greatly.
 
You know, our vision actually is to take everything that we learn and do and make life better here on Earth. So, whether you are talking about the ability to get humans and cargo to space for commerce, the way we are trying to do with the commercial crew and cargo program, or whether it’s Curiosity on Mars helping us learn more about another planet in our solar system, it’s going to help us understand our own Earth better.
 
Or the many Earth sciences missions we fly that help us with disaster planning and management, help us with water-resources management — even the farmer, you know, crop-planning and laying out a field every spring; you know, when he gets on the tractor today and turns on his GPS and gets perfectly straight furrows and all that kind of stuff — that’s all part of the work that NASA and the technical communities in the American government have brought to them.
 
Q: Let me ask you this: let’s just say the economy is not the best right now, and a lot of people would question why should we be funding the space program, and so the question I would have for you is, “Why explore? Why do we as a nation explore?”
 
A: It’s different if you ask the question, “Why explore, and is it worth spending the money?” It’s definitely worth spending the money.
 
Humans explore because that’s in humans’ nature. They always want to know what’s across the next mountain or what’s around the corner.
 
But financially, why do you do it? You explore because it requires the development of new capabilities that you didn’t have before, and historically, every single time we develop new capabilities, most of them become applicable in the common everyday marketplace, and humanity benefits from them, and businesses grow, whether it’s a heart monitor, or you know, a laptop computer or any of the other things that have been developed over the course of the space program’s history — from Mercury, Gemini and Apollo right on up until now — pharmaceutical research on the International Space Station, developing drugs for things like salmonella.
 
We look at the effects of microgravity on astronauts. It causes bone-mass loss and muscle-mass loss. It gives doctors down here on Earth a better opportunity to understand the process of osteoporosis, which generally strikes women, but not just women. You know, whereas it happens over a course of years down here on Earth, we see bone-mass deterioration over the course of days (in microgravity).
 
Not to mention in the area of aeronautics where, because of the research and development that NASA has done in aeronautics — the one positive balance of trade item for America is airplanes, you know, is aircraft. And so if you look at most modern-day airplanes, I would venture to say there is probably some development, some invention, something on that airplane that makes it great, that came out of NASA aeronautics research and development.
 
Q: With the retirement of the shuttle fleet last July, in states that might not be space-centric, there seems to be a perception that NASA is going out of business. If the average American asked you, “Is NASA going out of business?” what would you tell them?
 
A: I would tell them, “certainly not.”
 
That’s the most absurd thing that people can be saying, and they do say it . . . NASA can’t do everything, so we need to prioritize on some big items that both the administration and the Congress can support.
 
And those three priorities ended up being the James Webb Space Telescope, for incredible scientific discovery; a heavy-lift launch vehicle and Orion for human exploration, to continue to maintain America’s preeminence as the Number One space-faring and exploring nation; and then the third thing was extension and enhancement of utilization of the International Space Station.
 
Q: Let me ask you this: you are, of course, a former astronaut, a former shuttle pilot and mission commander, and your first flight, STS-61C, landed 10 days before the (1986) Challenger accident. And on that accident, among the great astronauts who lost their lives, was Ron McNair, who was your mentor. I was wondering if that whole situation gave you, and (your wife) Jackie, and the kids, pause — whether that made you contemplate perhaps getting into a less-dangerous business — and, obviously, you didn’t, but what made you want to go ahead.
 
A: I tell people all the time, I thought for about a nanosecond — I mean, I really thought about, ‘Is this really what I want to do, and should I be doing this,’ and in just like a heartbeat, I said, ‘This is why I came here.’
 
I understood the risk. Ron and his crew understood the risk, and the decision I made, and I talked to my family, and the decision they made was, we need someone who is willing to accept the risk to advance humanity. And so, we’re in the right business.
 
Europe’s ATV-3 space freighter raises space station orbit to 420 km (261 m)
 
RIA Novosti
 
Europe’s ATV-3 unmanned resupply spacecraft raised the International Space Station (ISS) orbit to about 420 kilometers, a mission control spokesman said on Wednesday.
 
ATV-3 engines were fired up at 1:15 p.m. Moscow time [09:15 GMT] in the first of the two maneuvers to adjust the ISS orbit and remained switched on for 384 seconds, raising the ISS orbit to 414.8 km
 
The second reboost began at 5:17 p.m. Moscow time [13:17 GMT] and continued for almost 35 minutes, raising the station’s orbit to an average altitude of 420.6 km.
 
The maneuver was carried out to ensure the best conditions for the landing of Russia’s Soyuz TMA-04M manned spacecraft on September 17 and the docking of the Soyuz TMA-06M manned spacecraft with the ISS on October 15.
 
During the ISS orbital adjustment on August 15 the ATV-3's engines shut down prematurely because of an increase in temperature on one of the freighter's engines that was not involved in the maneuver. As a result, the ATV lifted the ISS orbit only by five kilometers instead of the planned 7.7 km.
 
Coming in October: SpaceX Dragon Gets Down to Work
Elon Musk tells PM about the improvements to his spacecraft in anticipation of the October launch that marks the start of private-space resupply missions to orbit.
 
Joe Pappalardo - Popular Mechanics
 
NASA’s launch schedule at Cape Canaveral now includes a rough date for the next Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) cargo-delivery trip to the International Space Station, giving an October date for the launch.
 
"Hopefully this is a really straightforward mission," Elon Musk told PM during our recent trip to the headquarters of SpaceX in Hawthorne, Calif. The last mission, he said, was a two-step. "[First we] did a loop around the space station to verify that the systems were functioning well, that we could communicate with the space station, that the docking sensors could lock on and that kind of thing, and then we went in and actually did the docking. So it was a longer mission than ... this one will be. This one, we’re going to go straight up, attempt lock, and go straight in."
 
As with the first run, the SpaceX Dragon capsule will close to within range of the ISS’s grappling arm, and it will do so on autopilot. "Dragon has quite a bit of onboard intelligence. We’re not steering it with a joystick," Musk says. "As it approaches the space station, it’ll stop at various points and ask for permission to proceed. And then if it encounters something where it can’t proceed with high confidence, it will report that back and pause."
 
During the first docking, the laser ranging system was thrown off by sunlight glinting from the space station. Musk says the problem has been fixed. "LIDAR is sort of a 3D laser scanner that scans something and then it comes up with a point cloud and tries to figure out what it’s looking at," he says. "The system tries to fit that with what it’s expecting to see, and then, using that, it figures out what the relative position and motion is between Dragon and the space station. And it uses that to plot an approach vector."
 
During that first approach in May, the Dragon was working from a model of the ISS that wasn’t totally accurate, as pieces have been added to and subtracted from the real-life station. "There was a reflector on the Japanese model that was extremely bright and it was showing up to a far greater degree than we expected," Musk says. SpaceX solved the problem on the fly by uploading some new code to narrow the field of view, similar to putting blinders on a horse so it doesn’t get distracted. That temporary fix has morphed into a permanent reprogramming. "We’ve improved the software on the LIDAR, on the image-recognition software, so if it encounters this again it would not have a problem," Musk says.
 
When asked what part of the first flight scared him the most, Musk said the deployment of the solar arrays, which continuously move to face the sun. "If they didn’t work then . . . the batteries would run out of energy well before we reached the space station," he says. On the first flight, "Once the Dragon was placed in orbit, separated from the rocket, deployed the solar panels and the panels were producing power better than expected—that’s when I felt really good because I knew that now if something went wrong we had time to fix it," he says.
 
Super Guppy lands in Dayton
 
Derek Myers - Fayette Advocate
 

 
The Super Guppy landed at WPAFB on Wednesday carrying historic cargo. The massive aircraft was carrying the first crew compartment trainer, or CCT-1, used to train astronauts.
 
For more than 30 years, CCT-1 was housed in Johnson Space Center’s Space Vehicle Mockup Facility (SVMF) and was used to train crews from STS-1 (Space Shuttle Columbia) through STS-132 (Space Shuttle Atlantis) as a high-fidelity representation of the Space Shuttle Orbiter crew station for on-orbit crew training and engineering evaluations. Here, astronauts learned how to operate many of the orbiter sub-systems in more than 20 different classes.
 
The crew module of the trainer consists of a flight deck and a mid-deck, and contains components, such as panels, seats and lights, visible to or used by the flight crew. Non-functional switches, connections, guards and protective devices all have the same physical characteristics, operating force, torque, and movement as a real space shuttle.
 
Col. Johnson is Fairborn native and Air Force Astronaut Pilot who has been on two space missions and spent a lot of time using the trainer. He reunited with some of his former crew members Wednesday as they welcomed the machine.
 
Col. Johnson is a Fairborn native and Air Force Astronaut Pilot who has been on two space missions and spent a lot of time using the trainer. He reunited with some of his former crew members Wednesday as they welcomed the machine.
 
“I haven’t’ seen them in awhile, we’ll be laughing about this event,” says Johnson.
 
He says while some people are upset the museum isn’t getting a space shuttle, the trainer is a one of a kind asset.
 
“There are only a few of these bigger simulators around and still there are people that didn’t get anything so I think it’s a positive moment for this community. I don’t view it as a consolation prize,” comments Johnson.
 
NASA’s Super Guppy aircraft has a cargo compartment that is 25 feet tall, 25 feet wide and 111 feet long. It can carry a maximum payload of more than 26 tons. The aircraft has a unique hinged nose that can open more than 200 degrees, allowing large pieces of cargo such as the CCT-1 to be loaded and unloaded from the front.
 
On Thursday, museum and NASA technicians will off-load the trainer, move it inside the Cold War Gallery and reassemble the interior. Later, CCT-1 will be moved to a new Space Gallery in the museum’s planned fourth building.
 
Plans also call for the museum to build a mock-up of the payload bay, and when the CCT-1 exhibit is completed, it will allow the public to have a look into the cockpit and mid-deck areas of a shuttle and learn how astronauts trained for their missions.
 
The trainer will be moved Wednesday morning to it’s temporary home in the museum’s Cold War Gallery.  That process will take about 3 hours.
 
The public is invited to view it there Friday.
 
Space Shuttle Trainer lands at WPAFB
 
Dayton Daily News
 
More than a year after the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force lost a bid to land one of three space shuttle orbiters, perhaps the next best thing arrived Wednesday aboard NASA’s Super Guppy cargo plane to mark a new era at the world’s largest military aviation museum.
 
A space shuttle crew compartment trainer, a mock-up of the shuttle nose and cockpit that trained hundreds of astronauts for space, was carried aloft on a whale-shaped turboprop aircraft from Ellington Field near Johnson Space Center in Houston to its new home in Dayton.
 
“There are probably 10 places that deserve the space shuttle and we only had three,” said Gregory H. Johnson, a NASA shuttle astronaut and retired Air Force colonel who was on hand for the arrival. The trainer, however, prepared more than 300 astronauts, 75 of them from the Air Force, to fly in space.
 
“It’s the training camp,” said Johnson, a graduate of Park Hills High School in Fairborn. “It’s the real thing. There are only a few of these big simulators around and a lot of people didn’t get anything.”
 
Over the next year, the museum will build a mock-up of a payload bay and a tail section and temporarily house the exhibit in the Cold War Gallery until a new, $48 million hangar is built in 2014.
 
Jack Hudson, museum director and a retired three-star Air Force general, said he expects the arrival will bring more visitors to the iconic museum, which attracted about 1.2 million visitors last year, but the exact number is hard to predict.
 
“Attendance will grow,” he said. “We know it will.”
 
Crews will slide open the nose of the Super Guppy this morning and take several hours to unload the 23,000- pound trainer. The historic artifact will be displayed Friday near the hangar doors of the Cold War Gallery.
 
The four-engine Super Guppy, with a bulbous-shaped, silver upper fuselage, a middle blue stripe and a white underbelly, landed about an hour later than scheduled on the museum’s 7,200-foot-long runway. The crew was delayed by a longer-than-expected refueling stop at Little Rock Air Force Base in Arkansas and headwinds, mission officials said. Hundreds of people lined a fence and watched on a nearby hill as the odd-shaped, one-of-a-kind plane soared overhead.
 
For Gregory C. Johnson, a NASA astronaut and one of the plane’s co-pilots, the trainer has both a national and a personal career history.
 
“It’s a little nostalgic because we did a lot of things in that,” the retired naval aviator said.
 
The emotion of bringing a retired space shuttle orbiter to the museum remains strong for some.
 
“I think it’s great but I wish we would have gotten the shuttle instead,” said Ken Huck, 56, of Beavercreek, who toured the museum on Wednesday with fellow visitor Mike Michaud, 49, of Denver, Colo.
 
Retired shuttles now call home the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the California Science Center in Los Angeles, and the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.
 
The Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City landed the Enterprise, flown in atmospheric test flights but which never rocketed into space. Huck, a Wright-Patterson flight engineer and former NASA co-op student, said two shuttles on the East Coast within an hours-long drive of each other wasn’t fair when the Air Force museum was passed over.
 
“New York City ripped us off,” he said, with a laugh.
 
Lin Erickson, the Air Force Museum Foundation’s chief development officer, touted the arrival as a gain because once a payload bay and tail assembly are constructed patrons can climb inside and see how things work rather than view a space artifact from a distance.
 
The payload will contain an Air Force missile detection satellite that never launched, according to museum curator Doug Lantry.
 
When the new hangar opens, an amphitheater will be built near the shuttle trainer to explain science, technology, engineering and math concepts to visitors.
 
“I think what we’ll create will be a much cooler experience and far superior,” Erickson said.
 
The trainer did have fans.
 
Jeff Falkenstein, 49, of Logan, Ohio, and an Air Force veteran, made his first jaunt to the museum Wednesday, and planned to stay to see the artifact’s arrival.
 
“It will be very historical to see it come in,” he said. “I’m hoping it will bring a lot more people to see it.”
 
Space Shuttle Rocket Boosters on Move to Edwards Air Force Base
A yellow Peterbilt big rig with a 150-long rocket booster strapped to the back is on the final leg of its journey from Kennedy Space Center
 

 
Jonathan Lloyd - KNBC TV (Los Angeles)
 
Two rocket boosters designed to propel space shuttles 28 miles in about two minutes have traveled nearly 2,500 miles in about two weeks on the way from Florida to Southern California's Edwards Air Force Base.
 
The rocket boosters -- they will eventually be part of the space shuttle Endeavour display scheduled to open in October at the California Science Center -- were picked up Aug. 13 at  Kennedy Space Center. They are scheduled to arrive Friday at Edwards Air Force Base, about 100 miles north of Los Angeles, where they will be stored until they are ready for transport to the Science Center.
 
The exact route from the Arizona border to Edwards AFB will be determined in coordination with Caltrans and the California Highway Patrol, said Kelli McGookin, of Performance Transport. The Bloomington-based company she owns with her husband Mike -- he's driving the yellow Peterbilt big rig a rocket booster strapped to the back -- was contracted to move one of the boosters.
 
The company usually hauls heavy construction equipment. Yes, this is its first job involving a rocket booster.
 
"It's not just wide, but it's long and high," said McGookin, who added that people immediately recognize the rocket booster. "They stand in awe, and stop and pull off on side of road."
 
Another company is hauling the second booster along the same route, which has primarily been on or parallel to Interstate 10.
 
The boosters provided the liftoff thrust necessary to counquer the pull of Earth's gravity and reach space, but they have trouble with corners and freeway overpasses. The dolly turns independently of the trailer, making corners less challenging.
 
The transport route, subject to change because of construction and traffic conditions, is usually determined by highway patrol agencies and state transportation departments.
 
The boosters are expected to be in the Banning area by Thursday evening before the final 130-mile tow to the air base for storage.
 
The boosters, which separated from an orbiter's external fuel tank at an altitude of about 24 nautical miles, dropped to the ocean on parachutes. During the years of the space shuttle program, they were recovered, refurbished and reused.
 
As for Endeavour, it is scheduled to arrive at LAX Sept. 20 on the back of a Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. The shuttle will travel 12 miles on city streets before arriving Oct. 13 at the Science Center.
 
The exhibit is scheduled to open Oct. 30 at a temporary location at the Science Center. The museum plans to construct the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, scheduled for completion in 2017. It will house the shuttle and related exhibits.
 
The Science Center was selected last year by NASA to house one of three retired shuttles. Atlantis will remain in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Discovery will go on display at the Smithsonian Institution's Dulles Airport hangar.
 
Endeavour's journey marks a homecoming for the shuttle, wihch completed its final mission in April 2011. The shuttles was built at Rockwell International Space Systems in Palmdale.
 
Singer Sarah Brightman may be Russia's next space tourist: report
 
Gabriela Baczynska - Reuters
 
British singer Sarah Brightman may be the next paying passenger to ride a Russian rocket to the International Space Station, the Interfax news agency reported on Wednesday, citing an unidentified official in the space industry in Russia.
 
If it happens, Brightman, 52, would make the journey in 2015 and would be the first paying customer since Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte who donned a red clown's nose during his 2009 trip, the official was cited as saying.
 
Russia has sent seven private passengers to the International Space Station, each of them reportedly paying at least $20 million. American investment manager Dennis Tito was the first to make the journey in 2001.
 
But seats on the three-person Soyuz capsules have become scarce since U.S. space agency NASA retired its space shuttles last year, leaving Russian rockets as the only craft capable of carrying crews to the station for now.
 
Brightman - who rose to fame starring in the original London and New York casts of "The Phantom of the Opera" - visited Russia about a month ago and received the approval of a medical commission to begin training at the Cosmonaut Training Centre outside Moscow, the source added.
 
Brightman's agent was not immediately available for comment, and officials at Space Adventures, a U.S.-based firm that has organized paid trips in the past, were not immediately available for comment either.
 
The singer was married to composer Andrew Lloyd Webber in the 1980s and pursued a chart-topping solo career after their divorce, bringing classical music to a broader audience and selling millions of records along the way.
 
Interfax cited an unnamed source in the Russian space industry saying plans to send a two-person crew to the station for about a year in 2015, instead of the usual six months, would free up a seat for a paying passenger on that trip or others around that time.
 
Russian space agency Roskosmos said on Wednesday it supported the idea of gradually extending expeditions to the station to a year, but said that no decision had yet been taken.
 
Singer Sarah Brightman may be Russia's next space tourist
'Phantom of the Opera' star received medical approval for flight a month ago
 
NBC News
 
British singer Sarah Brightman may be the next paying passenger to ride a Russian rocket to the International Space Station, sources familiar with the negotiations said Wednesday.
 
If the trip happens, Brightman, 52, would make the journey in 2015, the Interfax news agency reported, citing an unidentified official in the Russian space industry. A source familiar with Brightman's side of the negotiations confirmed to NBC News that talks were under way, but stressed that they were at an early stage.
 
Assuming the negotiations are successful, Brightman would be the first paying orbital space passenger since Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte, who donned a red clown's nose for his 2009 trip to the space station.
 
Russia has sent seven private passengers to the space station, with the reported price tags escalating from $20 million to more than $40 million. California investment manager Dennis Tito was the first to make the journey in 2001.
 
Seats on the three-person Soyuz capsules have become scarce since NASA retired its space shuttles last year, leaving Russian rockets as the only craft capable of carrying crews to the station for now.
 
Brightman — who rose to fame starring in the original London and New York casts of "The Phantom of the Opera" — visited Russia about a month ago and received the approval of a medical commission to begin training at the Cosmonaut Training Center outside Moscow, the source added.
 
She was married to composer Andrew Lloyd Webber in the 1980s and pursued a chart-topping solo career after their divorce, bringing classical music to a broader audience and selling millions of records along the way. Estimates of her net worth have ranged from $45 million to $52 million and beyond.
 
Virginia-based Space Adventures has organized trips to the space station for deep-pocketed passengers in the past, but representatives of the company have not commented publicly on the prospects for future trips.
 
Sources have said the space station's partners are considering a plan to send two spacefliers into orbit in 2015 for almost a year, instead of the usual six months. The logistics involved in that experiment would open up an opportunity for two short-term visitors to the station — visitors who could include paying passengers such as Brightman.
 
The Russian space agency said on Wednesday that it supported the idea of gradually extending expeditions to the station to a year, but that no decision had yet been made.
 
MEANWHILE, ON MARS…
 
Curiosity goes for a spin
 
William Harwood – CBS News
 
In a major milestone, the six-wheel Curiosity Mars rover took its first baby steps Wednesday, rolling about 15 feet forward, performing a slow 120-degree pirouette and then backing up eight feet to prove the $2.5 billion science lab is, in fact, mobile and ready to rove.
 
The short test drive began at 10:17 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) and took about 16 minutes to complete. The actual drive time was about a third of that, but the rover was programmed to stop and take multiple pictures of its tracks in the dusty pebble-strewn soil of Gale Crater.
 
The move came one sol, or martian day, after the rover's four corner wheels passed an initial steering check, wiggling back and forth as commanded.
 
"I'm pleased to report that Curiosity today had her first successful drive on Mars," lead rover planner Matt Heverly told reporters Wednesday. "This drive checkout, coupled with yestersol's checkout of the steering actuators on sol 15, means we have a fully functioning mobility system on our rover."
 
In a black-and-white panoramic image taken by the rover's navigation cameras, Curiosity's tire tracks could be seen in the martian soil, along with scour marks where the vehicle's sky crane descent rockets blasted away topsoil.
 
"In this image you can see our touchdown point, you can see the tracks driving away from that location as well as the scour marks to the right and the left of the rover's initial position," Heverly said. "It confirms our expectations the soil is firm, great for mobility, we're not seeing too much sinkage and we should have smooth sailing ahead of us."
 
Project Manager Pete Theisinger said the short drive was of crucial importance to the mission.
 
"It couldn't be more important," he said. "We built a rover, so unless the rover roves we really haven't accomplished anything. So yes, (it's) tremendous and the fact that we completely exercised it and everything's on track is a big moment, period."
 
The science team voted to name Curiosity's landing site "Bradbury Landing" after the late science fiction writer Ray Bradbury, whose lyrical stories about Mars provided inspiration to countless scientists and engineers.
 
"Today would have been Ray Bradbury's 92nd birthday," said Michael Meyer, director of Mars science at NASA Headquarters. "His books have truly inspired us. 'The Martial Chronicles' have inspired our curiosity and opened our minds to the possibility of life on Mars.
 
"In his honor, we declare the place that Curiosity touched down to be forever known as 'Bradbury Landing.' ... It harkens back to a time when ships landed on the shores of other new worlds to explore. And this place might, in fact, with its water reference, be even more apropos."
 
Curiosity was lowered by its innovative sky crane landing system to a pinpoint touchdown in Gale Crater on Aug. 6. Since then, engineers have been activating, checking out and testing its major subsystems and science instruments. Eight of its 10 high-tech instruments have passed initial checks. The only anomaly so far is a broken wind sensor, one of two mounted on the rover's main camera mast.
 
Engineers must still test Curiosity's sample acquisition system -- a soil scoop and power drill -- and the complex equipment needed to move rock and soil samples to laboratory analyzers in the body of the rover.
 
But so far, so good, and after additional equipment checks are carried out, along with close-up inspections of the rocks revealed by the sky crane landing thrusters, scientists plan to begin a 1,300-foot drive to a nearby target area known as Glenelg, where three different rock types are visible in orbital photographs.
 
"On the way to Glenelg, we'd like to stop as soon as we encounter scoopable fine material to get going testing out the sample handling system and getting sample into SAM and CheMin," said Joy Crisp, the deputy project scientist.
 
The Sample Analysis at Mars experiment -- SAM -- will study atmospheric gases and soil samples to look for signs of carbon compounds using two ovens, a pair of spectrometers and a gas chromatograph. The Chemistry and Mineralogy experiment -- CheMin -- uses X-ray diffraction to identify minerals in soil samples. Both are crucial to Curiosity's mission to search for evidence of past or present habitability.
 
"The first material would be scoopable fines, and we'd be trying to clean out the scoop and sample handling system by doing that several times, just tossing it out on the ground and then taking a sample to put in SAM and CheMin," Crisp said.
 
"When we finally get to Glenelg, we want to study the outcrop there and take a look at the context between the three different terrain types and maybe there is where we would decide to do our first drilling into rock. And after Glenelg, we head for Mount Sharp. That will be a much longer drive with probably a few brief stops along the way. That's going to take several months before we get to that point."
 
Climbing the lower slopes of Mount Sharp, a three-mile-tall mound of layered rocks about 5 miles from Bradbury Landing, is the primary goal of Curiosity's mission. Scientists believe hundreds of thousands to tens of millions of years of martian history are preserved in the ancient rock beds the rover will cross during its anticipated ascent.
 
"It is fantastic how well everything's working," Meyer said. "We have high hopes this is really going to prove out this region and tell us whether or not it was ever potentially habitable."
 
But Theisinger quickly pointed out that testing was not yet complete.
 
"I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't exercise a little bit of caution here," he said. "We are 16 days into a two-year mission, OK? We haven't put the (robot) arm on the ground yet. We haven't exercised the sample gathering capability, which is a key, key, key element of this rover science mission. So as good as it's gone, as wonderful as it is, we've only checked off about two of the level one requirement boxes -- launch on time, land on Mars, OK?
 
"We've got a long way to go before this mission reaches its full potential. But the fact that we haven't had any early problems is, in fact, fantastic."
 
Rover's short test ride proves it moves
 
James Dean - Florida Today
 
NASA’s Curiosity rover on Wednesday left its first tracks on Mars, successfully completing a short test drive that showed it was ready to roll on longer treks for science investigations over the next two years.
 
A series of images from rover cameras showed the shallow path its six cleated wheels imprinted in firm soil as they rolled forward 15 feet, turned 120 degrees and then backed up about eight feet.
 
“It couldn’t be more important,” Pete Theisinger, the $2.5 billion mission’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., said of the test run. “We built a rover, so unless the rover roves, we really haven’t accomplished anything.”
 
The new parking spot offered a clear view of the place Curiosity touched down inside Gale Crater early Aug. 6 (Eastern time), including “scour marks” landing rockets left on either side of the car-sized rover. Pictures confirmed one wheel had landed on a small rock.
 
NASA announced it had named the site Bradbury Landing in honor of the late science fiction writer Ray Bradbury, author of “The Martian Chronicles.” Bradbury, who died in June, would have turned 92 Wednesday.
 
Curiosity roved for roughly 16 minutes, but most of that time was spent taking pictures. Actual drive time was only four or five minutes, starting around 10:15 a.m. EDT.
 
Scientists hope Curiosity and its 10 instruments can determine if Mars has ever been able to support life.
 
Mars rover passes driving test, looks to hit road
 
Alicia Chang - Associated Press
 
Now that Curiosity passed its driving test on Mars, the six-wheel NASA rover set its sights on longer treks.
 
The first test drive around the pebbly Martian crater where it landed was just that - a test drive. The rover edged forward about 15 feet, rotated to a right angle and reversed a short distance, leaving tracks in the rust-tinged soil.
 
Mission managers were elated that Wednesday's maiden trek of the $2.5 billion mission was glitch-free. In several days, Curiosity was poised to drive farther to study whether the red planet's environment could have supported life.
 
"It couldn't be more important," said project manager Peter Theisinger at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We built a rover. So unless the rover roves, we really haven't accomplished anything ... It's a big moment."
 
The short spin came a day after Curiosity successfully wiggled its wheels to test its steering capabilities.
 
Curiosity landed in Gale Crater near the Martian equator Aug. 5 to explore whether the environment once supported microbial life. The touchdown site has been named Bradbury Landing in honor of the late "The Martian Chronicles" author Ray Bradbury, who would have turned 92 on Wednesday.
 
The rover's ultimate destination is Mount Sharp, a towering mountain that looms from the ancient crater floor. Signs of past water have been spotted at the base, providing a starting point to hunt for the chemical building blocks of life.
 
Before Curiosity journeys toward the mountain, it will take a detour to an intriguing spot 1,300 feet away where it will drill into bedrock. With the test drive out of the way, Curiosity was expected to stay at its new position for several days before making its first big drive - a trip that will take as long as a month and a half.
 
Curiosity won't head to Mount Sharp until the end of the year.
 
Rover driver Matt Heverly said the first drive took about 16 minutes with most of the time used to take pictures. Heverly said the wheels did not sink much into the ground, which appeared firm.
 
"We should have smooth sailing ahead of us," he said.
 
After an action-packed landing that delicately lowered it to the surface with nylon cables, Curiosity has entered a slow streak. Since the car-size rover is the most sophisticated spacecraft sent to Mars, engineers have taken their time to make sure it's in tiptop shape and that its high-tech tools work before it delves into its mission.
 
Curiosity joins the rover Opportunity, which has been exploring craters in Mars' southern hemisphere since 2004. Opportunity's twin, Spirit, fell silent in 2010 after getting stuck in a sand trap.
 
Earlier this week, Curiosity exercised its robotic arm for the first time, flexing its joints and motors before engineers stowed it again. Weeks of additional tests were planned before it can drill and scoop up Martian soil.
 
The nuclear-powered rover has been tracking levels of dangerous radiation on the Martian surface in an effort to guide future astronaut landings. It also powered up its weather station, taking hourly readings of air and ground temperatures, pressure and wind conditions.
 
Over the weekend, it fired its laser at a humble rock to study what it's made of. Unsurprisingly, the zapped rock was typical of other Martian rocks, made of basalt.
 
During the checkups, scientists discovered a damaged wind sensor, possibly after it was hit by rocks that landed on the rover's instrument deck during landing. Deputy project scientist Ashwin Vasavada said the broken sensor will not jeopardize the mission since there's a spare.
 
Since nailing the daredevil landing, the rover team has been acknowledged by President Barack Obama. Gov. Jerry Brown, who declared Wednesday as "Space Day" visited the lab and donned 3-D glasses to view an animation of Curiosity's first drive on a big screen in the control room.
 
Mars rover Curiosity aces first test drive
 
Irene Klotz - Reuters
 
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity took a 16-minute drive on Wednesday, its first since reaching the Red Planet to search for habitats that could have supported microbial life.
 
The $2.5-billion, two-year mission, NASA's first astrobiology initiative since the 1970s-era Viking probes, kicked off on August 6, with a risky, but successful landing on at a site NASA has named "Bradbury Landing," a nod to the late science fiction author and space aficionado Ray Bradbury.
 
Aside from a quick steering test earlier in the week, the one-ton rover had stood firmly on its six wheels since touching down inside an ancient impact basin called Gale Crater, located in the planet's southern hemisphere near the equator.
 
At 10:17 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, Curiosity became a rover, trudging out a total of 15 feet, turning 120 degrees and then backing up 8 feet to position itself beside its first science target -- a scour mark left behind by the rover's descent engine.
 
Most of Curiosity's drive time was spent taking pictures, including the first images of the rover's tread marks in the Martian soil.
 
"It couldn't be more important. We built a rover, so unless the rover roves, we really haven't accomplished anything," project manager Pete Theisinger, with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., told reporters during a press conference.
 
Engineers saw no problems during Curiosity's test drive, clearing the way for a first round of analysis of rock blasted clean by the rover's landing system engine.
 
Curiosity is due to make a longer drive in about a week to a place where three different types of terrain come together.
 
"The soil is firm, great for mobility," said lead rover planner Matt Heverly. "We should have smooth sailing ahead of us."
 
Mars Rover Curiosity Takes 1st Martian Test Drive, Sees Tracks
 
Mike Wall - Space.com
 
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity took its first halting steps on the Red Planet Wednesday, snapping photos of its tracks to commemorate the test drive milestone.
 
The 1-ton Curiosity rover was slated to move about 10 feet (3 meters) forward, turn to the right 90 degrees and then back up several meters, mission managers said yesterday. And based on pictures that came down from the six-wheeled robot today, that brief maneuver — or something like it — appears to have happened.
 
The black-and-white photos, taken by Curiosity's navigation cameras, clearly show its tracks on the Martian surface.
 
A spokesman at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., which manages Curiosity's mission, declined to discuss the drive, explaining that the rover team would elaborate during a press conference today at 2:30 p.m. EDT (1830 GMT).
 
Curiosity touched down inside Mars' huge Gale Crater on the night of Aug. 5. Its two-year mission, officially known as the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL), aims to determine if the Red Planet could ever have supported microbial life.
 
Since Curiosity hit the red dirt, the MSL team has been systematically vetting the $2.5 billion rover and its 10 science instruments, making sure everything is in good working condition for surface operations. Today's short drive — and a Monday (Aug. 20) test of Curiosity's steering abilities — are part of this checkout process.
 
Everything has gone well so far, team members have said, though Curiosity's weather station is not working perfectly. Wind sensors on one of the instrument's two booms have been damaged, perhaps by rocks deposited on Curiosity's deck during or shortly after landing.
 
But the other boom's sensors are working fine, so the impact should be limited to some slight ambiguity regarding wind direction, researchers have said.
 
If everything continues to check out, Curiosity could head toward its first major science target — a spot 1,300 feet (400 m) away called Glenelg — as early as this weekend, mission managers have said. Three different types of terrain come together at Glenelg, making it a one-stop shop for lots of science investigations.
 
But Curiosity's ultimate destination is the base of Mount Sharp, the 3.4-mile-high (5.5-kilometer) mountain rising from the center of Gale Crater. Mars-orbiting spacecraft have spotted evidence of clays and sulfates in Mount Sharp's foothills, suggesting the area was exposed to liquid water long ago.
 
While Curiosity is getting ready to roll, it won't exactly speed through its Martian environs. The rover will likely spend a month or more journeying to Glenelg, researchers have said, and then remain there for a while, studying the site's rocks and soil.
 
Curiosity may be ready to turn its wheels toward the interesting deposits in Mount Sharp's foothills, which are about 5 miles (8 km) away as the crow flies, toward the end of the year, scientists have said.
 
Mars Rover Landing Site Named for Sci-Fi Icon Ray Bradbury
 
Tariq Malik - Space.com
 
NASA began a new chapter of its Martian chronicle Wednesday when the agency named its Mars rover Curiosity's landing site after the late science fiction author Ray Bradbury.
 
Curiosity's landing site inside Mars' vast Gale Crater was rechristened "Bradbury Landing" today to honor the iconic writer's legacy and dedication to Mars exploration, NASA officials said.
 
Ray Bradbury died in June at age 91. His first book, "The Martian Chronicles," paints a vivid picture of the human exploration of Mars through a series of short stories. The book was published in 1950 and later adapted into a TV series and video game.
 
"Today would have been Ray Bradbury's 92nd birthday, but he's already reached immortality in his short stories and books," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program. "His books have truly inspired us. His 'Martian Chronicles' has inspired our curiosity."
 
The Mars rover Curiosity landed on Aug. 5 inside Gale Crater to determine if the area could have ever supported microbial life. The site of Bradbury Landing is the space contained within the first boxy wheel marks made by Curiosity as it was lowered to the Martian surface by its sky crane descent stage, Meyer said.
 
Curiosity took its first test drive on Mars today, rolling forward, then turning in place and photographing its tracks on the Red Planet.
 
"I kind of like the name. For one, it was the majority vote by the science team, having been inspired by Ray Bradbury," Meyer added. The name also is a nod to the era of ocean exploration on Earth that took adventurers to many new lands, he added.
 
NASA has a long tradition of naming landing sits on Mars after scientists and other icons related to space exploration or the Red Planet.
 
"Since sending the first rover to Mars in 1997, NASA has made it a tradition to name its landing sites after visionaries and explorers who devoted their lives to expanding our boundaries," said Robert Pearlman, editor of the space history website collectSPACE.com and SPACE.com contributor.
 
"Previous sites are now named in tribute to astronomer Carl Sagan and the fallen astronauts of space shuttles Challenger and Columbia," Pearlman added. "'Bradbury Landing,' named after the late author Ray Bradbury, is a fitting tribute to a man who, through his writings, inspired us to imagine life on Mars — both alien and human. Those themes parallel Curiosity's goals of seeking out signs of habitable environments for past and present Martian life and advancing the day when humans can follow the rover to the Red Planet."
 
NASA named the Mars Pathfinder lander that touched down on Mars in 1997 with the Sojourner rover the "Carl Sagan Memorial Station." The 2004 landing sites of the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity are dubbed the "Columbia Memorial Station" and "Challenger Memorial Station," respectively.
 
NASA's oldest Mars lander, Viking 1 — which launched 35 years ago this week — also received a new name during its mission. Viking 1 was renamed the "Thomas A. Mutch Memorial Station" in honor of Thomas Mutch, the leader of the Viking imaging team, after his death in 1980 — two years before the lander's mission ended.
 
The Viking 2 lander, which launched shortly after Viking 1, was later rechristined the "Gerald Soffen Memorial Station" after Gerald Soffen, the chief scientist of the Viking missions.
 
The $2.5 billion Curiosity rover mission is expected to last at least two years on Mars.
 
A Deeper Search for Secrets on Mars
 
New York Times (Editorial)
 
Astronauts won’t be landing on Mars anytime soon, but, in recent weeks, NASA has made great strides toward exploring the planet more thoroughly than ever before with automated laboratories dropped on the surface. It is a welcome development given increasingly tight budgets for robotic explorations of the solar system.
 
Two automated rovers have been on the surface of Mars for many years and have made important discoveries about ancient wet environments on the planet that may have been favorable for microbial life. But one rover stopped transmitting data in early 2010, and the other may be nearing the end of its productive life.
 
Just as their era is ending, a new rover, the Curiosity, which landed this month, will crawl across the surface for at least two years and use 10 instruments to study surface soils and rock strata in a Martian crater to investigate whether the planet has ever had environmental conditions favorable to microbial life.
 
Although many space scientists worried that the Curiosity would be a last hurrah for planetary exploration for years to come because of constraints on NASA’s exploration budget, the agency unveiled a new mission on Monday to examine the internal structure of Mars.
 
The mission, named InSight, will land a package of instruments in 2016 that can take seismic readings from the interior, dig 16 feet below the surface to measure heat flows and detect how the planet wobbles in orbit. From this geophysical, subsurface data, scientists expect to understand whether the planet’s core is solid or liquid, why the crust of Mars is not divided into tectonic plates like those that drift and cause quakes on Earth, and what forces shaped the rocky inner planets of the solar system, including Earth, more than four billion years ago.
 
Whatever is learned from Curiosity and InSight will advance scientific knowledge and might well be useful in planning potential manned missions.
 
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