10/22/12 news

    Monday, October 22, 2012   JSC TODAY HEADLINES 1.            Watch the Station Crew Expand to Six on NASA TV 2.            Don't Just Give Candy This Halloween - Give a Little Something More 3.            Read if You Dare (And if Then, Only in Broad Daylight) 4.            ASIA ERG Happy 'Spider' Networking 5.            'Big Bang Theory: The Three Pillars' at LPI on Nov. 15 6.            Domestic Violence in the Workplace 7.            Nutrition Class Tomorrow 8.            JSC Career Path Development Course -- Nov. 14 9.            Fire Warden Refresher (2 Hours) ________________________________________     QUOTE OF THE DAY “ Your life does not get better by chance, it gets better by change.”   -- Jim Rohn ________________________________________ 1.            Watch the Station Crew Expand to Six on NASA TV Expedition 33/34 NASA Flight Engineer Kevin Ford, Soyuz Commander Oleg Novitskiy and Flight Engineer Evgeny Tarelkin are scheduled to launch at 5:51 a.m. CDT on Tuesday, Oct. 23 (4:51 p.m. Baikonur time), from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. They are set to dock to the station's Poisk module at approximately 7:35 a.m. on Thursday, Oct. 25. The trio will by greeted by Expedition 33 Commander Sunita Williams of NASA and Flight Engineers Aki Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Russia's Yuri Malenchenko, who have been aboard the station since mid-July. This can be seen on NASA TV or on the Web. NASA TV coverage of events begins at the following times (all times CDT):   Monday, Oct. 22 11 a.m. -- Video file of Expedition 33/34 final prelaunch crew news conference and Russian State Commission meeting in Baikonur, Kazakhstan Tuesday, Oct. 23 4:30 a.m. -- Expedition 33/34 Soyuz launch coverage (launch at 5:51 a.m.); includes video B-roll of crew pre-launch activities 9 a.m. -- Video file of Expedition 33/34 Soyuz prelaunch and launch B-roll and post-launch interviews Thursday, Oct. 25 7 a.m. -- Expedition 33/34 Soyuz docking coverage (docking at 7:35 a.m., followed by post-docking news conference from Mission Control in Korolev, Russia) 9:45 a.m. -- Expedition 33/34 Soyuz hatch opening and welcoming ceremony (hatch opening at 10:15 a.m.) Noon -- Video file of Expedition 33/34 Soyuz docking, hatch opening and welcoming ceremony JSC employees with wired computer network connections can view NASA TV using onsite IPTV on channels 404 (standard definition) or 4541 (HD). If you are having problems viewing the video using these systems, contact the Information Resources Directorate Customer Support Center at x46367. JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x35111   [top] 2.            Don't Just Give Candy This Halloween - Give a Little Something More The 2012 Combined Federal Campaign has already kicked off at JSC! The CFC is the only federal workplace giving program for federal employees -- and as such, you can choose to give thousands of deserving organizations at the local, national and global levels. They include organizations to educate, shelter, feed, protect, volunteer, or any other number of charities and programs. This year our center's monetary goal is $675,000. We'd like each and everyone to help us reach it. 1. Simply find the charity or charities you want to give to (online or in this book). 2. Federal employees can donate via payroll deductions at EmployeeExpress (EEx). (Instructions on How to Donate via EEx) 3. All JSC team members can make cash/check donations by using the paper pledge form. (Paper pledge forms may be dropped off with the organization coordinator.) Donations of any amount are welcome, starting from $1 per pay period. Or, instead of that extra bag of sugary candy for the kids, donate an equivalent amount with cash/check. Give a little. Help A LOT. Mirella Barron Lanmon x49796   [top] 3.            Read if You Dare (And if Then, Only in Broad Daylight) We asked to be scared, and you answered in fine fashion. Part I of "Bloodcurdling, spine-tingling, bone-chilling--and just plain weird paranormal tales" has been posted to JSC Features. These stories are based on ghosts, paranormal activity or just the plain inexplicable experienced by our own JSC team members. Better yet, there are more stories to come before Halloween, so keep checking back regularly to see the rest. JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x33317   [top] 4.            ASIA ERG Happy 'Spider' Networking Don't miss out on the spooky-fun Halloween luncheon presented by the Asians Succeeding in Innovation and Aerospace (ASIA) Employee Resource Group (ERG) on Wednesday, Oct. 31, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at East Star Restaurant (northeast corner of NASA Parkway and El Camino Real). East Star Chinese Buffet address and phone number: 1025 NASA Parkway, Houston, TX 77058 281-280-8822 There will be at least one officer in costume giving out opportunities to win a door prizes and plenty of time to network with other ASIA ERG members. This event is open to both civil servants and contractors. You do not have to be an ASIA ERG member to participate in the fun and food. Krystine Bui x34186   [top] 5.            'Big Bang Theory: The Three Pillars' at LPI on Nov. 15 Inquisitive adults are invited to attend the presentation "Big Bang Theory: The Three Pillars," by Dr. Dragan Huterer. This free, public presentation on Nov. 15 is part of the Cosmic Explorations Speaker Series at the Lunar and Planetary Institute (LPI). Huterer's presentation is the first in this year's series, "A User's Guide to the Universe: You Live Here. Here's What You Need to Know."  LPI's Cosmic Explorations presentation begins at 7:30 p.m. and will be followed by a light reception. No reservation is necessary. LPI is located in the USRA building (3600 Bay Area Blvd. - the entrance is on Middlebrook Drive). LPI is part of the Universities Space Research Association. For more information, click here or contact Andrew Shaner at 281-486-2163. Andrew Shaner 281-486-2163   [top] 6.            Domestic Violence in the Workplace Be prepared. You may save a life. If you have a friend, co-worker or employee at work who is the victim of domestic violence, it will impact you and your work area in countless ways. Come learn the facts and what you can do if you find yourself in that situation. In recognition of National Domestic Violence Awareness Month, the Employee Assistance Program is honored to host Kim Seaton, Ph.D., as she presents "Domestic Violence in the Workplace: Facts, Intervention and Assistance." When: Oct. 22 Where: Building 30 Auditorium Time: 12 noon to 1 p.m. Lorrie Bennett, Employee Assistance Program, Clinical Services Branch x36130   [top] 7.            Nutrition Class Tomorrow Are you struggling to overcome weight-loss barriers? Good nutrition plays a very big role in weight loss. If you have tried to lose weight but have been unsuccessful -- don't fret! Dropping those extra pounds is not easy and usually requires a lot of hard work. Just because you were not successful in the past doesn't mean you can't do it. This class will address some of the common barriers to weight loss and nutrition strategies for overcoming them. The class will be held tomorrow, Oct. 23, at 5 p.m. in the Gilruth Center. Email Glenda Blaskey to sign up for this class today. If you're working on improving your approach to healthy nutrition but can't attend a class, we offer free one-on-one consultations with Glenda Blaskey, the JSC Registered Dietitian. Glenda Blaskey x41503   [top] 8.            JSC Career Path Development Course -- Nov. 14 The JSC Career Path Development Course is designed to instill a sense of initiative and empowerment. The course connects you to resources, highlights your role in the iterative career development process and exposes you to the various development opportunities at NASA. Objectives: -       To emphasize the value of career path development -       To provide an understanding of the key players and the individual roles they play in an employee's career planning efforts -       To discuss the essentials of the career path development process -       To highlight and provide an overview of the career development tools and resources available -       To boost employee interest in career planning and enable one to make greater contributions to NASA Course details: Date: Wednesday, Nov. 14 Time: 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Location: Building 12, Room 154 For: Civil servant employees SATERN ID#: 65737 Use this direct link to register in SATERN. https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=REGISTRATI... Nicole Kem x37894   [top] 9.            Fire Warden Refresher (2 Hours) This-two hour course is intended for previously trained Fire Wardens from JSC, Sonny Carter Training Facility and Ellington Field required to satisfy the JSC three-year refresher training requirement for building Fire Wardens who have previously completed the initial 4-hour Fire Warden Orientation Training. This course emphasizes a review of the duties and responsibilities of a Fire Warden during an emergency evacuation of their assigned building and conduct of the required monthly walk-around inspection of the Fire Warden's assigned area. Newly assigned Fire Wardens must attend the four-hour Initial Fire Warden Orientation course available in SATERN for registration. Date/Time: Nov. 28 from 1 to 3 p.m. Where: Safety Learning Center, Building 226N, Room 174 Registration via SATERN required: https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=SCHEDULED_... Aundrail Hill x36369   [top]   ________________________________________ 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: 11 am Central (Noon EDT) – File of E33/34 news conf & State Comm Mtg in Baikonur 4:30 am Central TUESDAY (5:30 EDT) – Soyuz TMA-06M launch coverage 5:51 am Central TUESDAY (6:51 EDT) – LAUNCH   Human Spaceflight News Monday – October 22, 2012   Soyuz TMA-06 on new Site 31 launch pad for Tuesday’s 5:51 am Central (6:51 EDT) launch   HEADLINES AND LEADS   Astronaut embraces NASA's new course Soyuz blasts off for station Tuesday   Todd Halvorson - Florida Today   A U.S. astronaut bound for the International Space Station is looking forward to taking part in the opening of this new era of commercial cargo deliveries to the outpost. “Big transition time for NASA,” said NASA astronaut Kevin Ford, who is scheduled to blast off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 6:51 a.m. EDT Tuesday in a Russian Soyuz. “It’s an exciting time to be up there and see this happening.” Flying along with him: Russian cosmonauts Evgeny Tarelkin and Oleg Novitskiy. The three are scheduled to arrive at the station at 8:35 a.m. EDT Thursday, just three days before the departure of a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft that launched Oct. 7 on the first commercial cargo resupply mission to the outpost.   Soyuz craft readied for space station mission   Peter Leonard - Associated Press   A Russian-made Soyuz rocket was erected into place Sunday, ahead of the start of a mission to take a three-man crew to the International Space Station. For the first time since 1984, the manned launch will take place from Baikonur cosmodrome launch pad 31, while the pad that is normally used, from which Yury Gagarin began his landmark space mission, is undergoing modernization. The Soyuz craft remains the only means for international astronauts to reach the space station since the decommissioning of the U.S. Shuttle fleet in 2011.   Soyuz crew transport rolls out for Tuesday launch   Justin Ray - SpaceflightNow.com   Rolling by rail at sunrise Sunday, a Russian Soyuz booster arrived atop a Baikonur launch pad that will host its first manned launch in 28 years when two cosmonauts and an American astronaut blast off Tuesday. Liftoff of the Expedition 33 crew from the Site 31 launch pad at the cosmodrome in Kazakhstan is scheduled for 6:51 a.m. EDT (1051 GMT). It will be the first human liftoff from that pad since July 1984 when Soyuz T-12 was sent to the Salyut 7 space station. It was first used in 1968 with the Soyuz 3 spacecraft.   US astronaut sees science breakthrough in space   Associated Press   A U.S. astronaut departing this week for the International Space Station said Monday that the bulk of the scientific benefits from the orbiting laboratory will be seen over the coming decade, amid questions on whether the estimated $100 billion spent in last 12 years is worth the effort. "The first ten years were really intensive in the construction side of it, bringing all the pieces together and really getting the science enabled," said NASA astronaut Kevin Ford, who will blast off on a Soyuz craft from the Russian-leased Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on Tuesday together with Russian colleagues Oleg Novitsky and Yevgeny Tarelkin. Portland, Indiana-born Ford said the station would now enter its "utilization phase."   ‘Unprecedented’ budget environment drives change across space industry   Brian Berger - Space News   Declining U.S. federal budgets and the looming threat that things could get much worse before they get better are forcing government space agencies and contractors to rethink the way they do business, and according to some officials, that is not such a bad thing. The budgetary uncertainty has caused hiring freezes, and some programs are being structured in ways that might offend the sensibilities of development-efficiency experts. But adversity breeds innovation: As they struggle to cope, agencies and companies are finding themselves cooking up what they hope are fresh recipes for success.   Mack says NASA needs 'bold' long-term plans   Scott Powers - Orlando Sentinel   The United States needs clear, long-term plans for space that do not whipsaw NASA and the Space Coast economy every couple of years, U.S. Senate candidate Connie Mack IV said Friday. Mack, a Republican congressman from Fort Myers, called for "boldness" and firm planning looking ahead 10 to 20 years. He offered no specifics but said he would be open to ideas like a base on the moon. "We need to be bold," he said, to inspire Americans.   Mack: Set long-term budget for NASA   James Dean - Florida Today   U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV said Friday he would help institute a bold, long-term vision for the nation’s “floundering” space exploration program if he is elected to the U.S. Senate. The Republican challenger to U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson suggested few specific changes in NASA policy or funding, but said a consistent 10- or 20-year plan could enable exciting missions even with less money. “They continue to change the mission, and when you change the mission, it’s a floundering program,” he said. “The president and Senator Nelson have done nothing to set a long-term plan and mission for NASA.”   Exploring space: Why’s it so important?   Zaina Adamu - CNN   Carol Beckles isn't buying into all the space exploration hype. She’s a single, middle-class mother of three living in a modest, cozy three-bedroom home in Atlanta’s suburbs. She foots the college bill of her oldest daughter Tiffany, who – like her mom – wishes she got more government help to pay for tuition. “It’s definitely hard. From the time that I was a senior (in high school) I had to start figuring out how I was going to pay for this,” said Tiffany who sits close beside her mom. A mere mention of taxpayers’ dollars going to NASA makes Carol cringe. “I don’t see the use. What are we going out there to do?” she asked. CNN commenters often share these sentiments; one recently identified himself/herself as "waste of tax dollars." It’s been asked since space exploration began in the late 1950s. Some people argue that some –- if not all –- funding for space exploration could be used to revitalize the economy, fix the education system, or solve undersea mysteries, among other Earth-related issues.   Clearing the obstacles to space solar power   Frank Morring, Jr. - Aviation Week   Advocates of space solar power (SSP) continue to refine their ideas for harnessing the Sun’s energy, beaming it to Earth and plugging it into the power grid. Papers presented at the 63rd International Astronautical Congress in Naples, Italy, this month indicate some very good minds are at work on clearing the hurdles to SSP, with some interesting results. “The major problem associated with [SSP] is to apply the technologies to the huge system at [gigawatt] level in power, [kilometer] level in size, and several ten [of] thousands of tons in weight,” writes Susumu Sasaki of Japan’s Institute of Science and Astronautical Science, in a technical paper presented in Naples. “Also it is [necessary] to make its power price be competitive with that of existing power generation systems on the ground.”   Space shuttle Atlantis' final trip short but still a challenge   Richard Simon - Los Angeles Times   Granted, moving Atlantis, the last of the retired space shuttles, won't be as difficult as Endeavour's recent, and tortuous, trip through Los Angeles. That journey required the chopping down of hundreds of trees — and Endeavour arrived 16 hours behind schedule. Still, moving Atlantis 9.8 miles will be no piece of cake. “You’re talking about 165,000 pounds, a national treasure, a priceless artifact.... No pressure,’’ said Tim Macy, director of project development and construction for Delaware North Cos., which operates the Kennedy Space Center visitors complex in Florida.   Wattsburg students speak with astronaut in space   Sean McCracken - Erie Times-News   Astronaut Sunita Williams might have been more than 200 miles away from the surface of the Earth on Friday, but that didn't mean she couldn't answer questions from students at Seneca High School. A dozen Wattsburg Area School District students had the chance to talk directly to Williams for just over 10 minutes Friday through the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station -- or ARISS -- program.   Is space tourism the right stuff? Private space ventures may rekindle public excitement   Todd Dickson - Las Cruces Bulletin   The scaling back of government support for the traditional space program could be reversed if the new private space entrepreneurs are successful, said a keynote speaker on the first day of the two-day International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight (ISPCS). Robert Dickman, executive director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, said the space program has been going through a lot change since NASA made the decision to retire the space shuttle fleet eight years ago.   SpaceX has competition for cargo delivery to ISS   John Kelly - Florida Today (Commentary)   SpaceX is getting the headlines because it’s already delivering cargo to the International Space Station, but there is a second company and transport system in the NASA program to privatize routine resupply runs to the outpost. Orbital Sciences is not as far along as SpaceX, which has now completed two trips to the space station, but the company is stepping toward a launch from Virginia of its Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.   A new future for NASA in technology R&D?   Kirstin Matthews & Kenneth Evans - Houston Chronicle (Commentary)   (Matthews is a fellow in science and technology policy at the Baker Institute. Evans is a graduate intern for the Science and Technology Policy Program.)   Last month, hundreds of Houstonians went outside in the daylight to watch as a plane attached to the space shuttle flew over the city. It was a bittersweet moment for all who watched — a reminder that the shuttle program has been officially canceled, leaving many Americans, including us, wondering what NASA is going to do in the future. __________   COMPLETE STORIES   Astronaut embraces NASA's new course Soyuz blasts off for station Tuesday   Todd Halvorson - Florida Today   A U.S. astronaut bound for the International Space Station is looking forward to taking part in the opening of this new era of commercial cargo deliveries to the outpost.   “Big transition time for NASA,” said NASA astronaut Kevin Ford, who is scheduled to blast off from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 6:51 a.m. EDT Tuesday in a Russian Soyuz. “It’s an exciting time to be up there and see this happening.”   Flying along with him: Russian cosmonauts Evgeny Tarelkin and Oleg Novitskiy.   The three are scheduled to arrive at the station at 8:35 a.m. EDT Thursday, just three days before the departure of a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft that launched Oct. 7 on the first commercial cargo resupply mission to the outpost.   A second SpaceX resupply flight is scheduled to launch in mid-January. Ford and his crewmates might also be on board when Orbital Sciences Corp. launches a mission to show it, too, is capable of safely and reliably delivering outpost supplies.   SpaceX, based in Hawthorne, Calif., holds a $1.6 billion NASA contract to fly 12 cargo resupply missions to the station with its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft.   Orbital Sciences of Vienna, Va., has a $1.9 billion NASA contract to launch eight supply runs to the outpost with its Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.   “Both the vehicles look to be very capable,” Ford said. “We’re really keeping our fingers crossed that they can start (launching) just right on time, at a regular tempo, so we can handle the supply issues that we have.”   The July 2011 retirement of NASA’s shuttle fleet left the U.S. without a means to fly cargo or astronauts to the outpost. The commercial Dragon and Cygnus spacecraft will join robotic resupply vehicles launched by government space agencies in Russia, Europe and Japan. And the U.S. is buying seats on the Russian Soyuz to send American astronauts to the ISS.   SpaceX’s Dragon, which is the only spacecraft capable of returning cargo to Earth, will depart the outpost on Sunday. A few hours later, it is expected to splash down in the Pacific Ocean with a return load of about 750 pounds of experiment samples and equipment.   Orbital Sciences aims to launch an Antares test flight in December. Another Antares and Orbital’s first Cygnus spacecraft are scheduled for launch in the first quarter of 2013.   Ford and his two crewmates will remain on board the station until March 19. They plan to carry out almost 200 research experiments.   “We really want to keep the science experiments running at a high tempo, and get as much time as we can getting the science done,” Ford said.   Awaiting their arrival at the station: U.S. astronaut Sunita “Suni” Williams, Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko and Akihiro Hoshide of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. They’re scheduled to return to Earth on Nov. 12.   The next station trio — Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, U.S. astronaut Thomas Marshburn and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko — will be launched to the station Dec. 5 and remain there until May 2013.   Soyuz craft readied for space station mission   Peter Leonard - Associated Press   A Russian-made Soyuz rocket was erected into place Sunday, ahead of the start of a mission to take a three-man crew to the International Space Station.   For the first time since 1984, the manned launch will take place from Baikonur cosmodrome launch pad 31, while the pad that is normally used, from which Yury Gagarin began his landmark space mission, is undergoing modernization.   The Soyuz craft remains the only means for international astronauts to reach the space station since the decommissioning of the U.S. Shuttle fleet in 2011.   NASA's Kevin Ford and Russian astronauts Oleg Novitsky and Yevgeny Tarelkin will blast off Tuesday from the Russian-leased facility in southern Kazakhstan and will spend around six months on the orbiting laboratory.   They will join U.S. astronaut Sunita Williams, Russia's Yuri Malenchenko and Aki Hoshide of Japan's JAXA agency.   In accordance with custom, the entrance to the hangar storing the Soyuz craft slid open in the pre-dawn darkness as Russian and U.S. space officials looked on and took photographs.   By the end of the Soyuz's slow, half-hour trip from storage to the launch site resting on its side on a flatbed railway car, the sun had risen to reveal a cloudless sky.   Over the following hour, the craft was raised into its upright launch position, setting it off starkly against a backdrop of rolling, tinder-dry steppe.   Russia's Roscosmos space agency spokesman Alexei Kuznetsov said launch pad 31 had recently been renovated and already been used for an unmanned mission over the summer.   "Now we need to do similar things at Site No. 1. As soon as that is finished, it will be in a condition to resume launches," he said.   Site No. 1, better known as Gagarin's Start in recognition of the historic 1961 mission, was last overhauled in 1983.   The need for a back-up launch site became particularly acute with the decommissioning of the U.S. shuttle fleet, when Gagarin's Start became the only operating pad available for manned launches to the space station.   The Soyuz's trip will last around two days and end when it docks with the Poisk module in the Russian segment of the ISS.   Ford, Novitsky and Tarelkin are scheduled to remain in orbit until March, covering a busy time at the space station that will include the first ever arrival of "Cygnus," a commercial cargo vehicle from the Orbital Sciences Corp., of Dulles, Virginia, scheduled for December.   Another two commercial SpaceX Dragon craft are also expected over the same period, as are an additional four Russian Progress resupply vehicles.   Of the three men blasting off Tuesday, only Ford has spent any time in orbit. He spent two weeks in space as pilot of the space shuttle Discovery in 2009 on a mission to transport scientific equipment to the ISS.   "They'll be really prepared. Their training has been excellent," said William Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for space operations, speaking at launch pad 31.   "They have got time to learn on station, so if there are some little rough spots as they get started, they'll be able to accomplish their tasks," he said.   NASA's Tom Marshburn, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko will join the station in December, taking the place of Williams, Malenchenko and Hoshide, who are due to return to earth next month.   In August, a Russian booster rocket failed to place two communications satellites into target orbits, stranding the Russian Express MD-2 and Indonesia's Telkom-3 satellites in a low orbit where they could not be recovered.   A Russian robotic probe designed to study a moon of Mars got stranded in Earth's orbit after its launch in November and eventually came crashing down in January.   Gerstenmaier said the Russian space agency treated crewed programs differently from other launches.   "The hardware that's chosen for this rocket is better quality hardware than they would use for a satellite or for a different launch because of the criticality of what they're doing," he said.   Soyuz crew transport rolls out for Tuesday launch   Justin Ray - SpaceflightNow.com   Rolling by rail at sunrise Sunday, a Russian Soyuz booster arrived atop a Baikonur launch pad that will host its first manned launch in 28 years when two cosmonauts and an American astronaut blast off Tuesday.   Liftoff of the Expedition 33 crew from the Site 31 launch pad at the cosmodrome in Kazakhstan is scheduled for 6:51 a.m. EDT (1051 GMT).   It will be the first human liftoff from that pad since July 1984 when Soyuz T-12 was sent to the Salyut 7 space station. It was first used in 1968 with the Soyuz 3 spacecraft.   Going up Tuesday will be Soyuz TMA-06M bound for the International Space Station to begin a 143-day mission of science and operations at the orbiting outpost.   At the controls of the capsule will be Oleg Novitskiy, 40, a colonel in the Russian Air Force making his first spaceflight.   He will be joined by Evgeni Tarelkin, 37, a captain in the Russian Air Force and also a spaceflight rookie.   Their NASA counterpart and slated to become commander of the space station during the Expedition 34 increment next month is Kevin Ford, 51, a retired colonel in the U.S. Air Force and former pilot of space shuttle Discovery in 2009.   The trio will dock to the space station's Poisk module on Thursday around 8:35 a.m. EDT, joining current residents Suni Williams, Yuri Malenchenko and Aki Hoshide.   The Soyuz rocket and its TMA-06M capsule, mounted horizontally on a railcar, journeyed along a winding route from the integration facility to the pad Sunday.   Hydraulic pistons lifted the rocket upright on the pad and gantry swing arms moved into position to enclose the vehicle. Technicians on four levels hooked up electrical and telemetry cables between the rocket and pad.   "Absolutely beautiful day for a rollout today, the weather is just perfect. Watching the sun rise on the rocket is just phenomenal," said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for human exploration and operations.   "I look at the launch pad, I look at the preparation, I look at the teams here getting ready to go launch this rocket and I just have the utmost respect for them and the work they are doing to get this rocket ready to go to the space station."   Following liftoff of the three-stage, liquid-fueled booster, the capsule will be inserted into a preliminary orbit within nine minutes and begin the two-day pursuit to intercept the station, executing a series of engine firings to rendezvous with the outpost and commence an automated final approach. Docking comes nearly 50 hours after launch.   "The goal of the flight is to fly a safe and productive flight and carry out the plan that the increment managers put out there for us. We have a lot of visiting vehicles that will come and go. It could be up to, including our arrival and departure, maybe 13 traffic movements," Ford said in a pre-flight NASA interview. "The purpose of that is really to get the science going; now we're in the utilization phase and getting the science rolling at full speed, so we've done a lot of preparation in anticipation of the science we’re going to be doing."   US astronaut sees science breakthrough in space   Associated Press   A U.S. astronaut departing this week for the International Space Station said Monday that the bulk of the scientific benefits from the orbiting laboratory will be seen over the coming decade, amid questions on whether the estimated $100 billion spent in last 12 years is worth the effort.   "The first ten years were really intensive in the construction side of it, bringing all the pieces together and really getting the science enabled," said NASA astronaut Kevin Ford, who will blast off on a Soyuz craft from the Russian-leased Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on Tuesday together with Russian colleagues Oleg Novitsky and Yevgeny Tarelkin.   Portland, Indiana-born Ford said the station would now enter its "utilization phase."   "We're going to learn the bulk of everything we know about the science that we're doing up there in the next decade," he said at a press conference on the eve of the launch. He spoke from behind a glass screen designed to ensure the astronauts do not contract illnesses before their mission.   Of the three men departing Tuesday, only Ford has spent any time in orbit. He spent two weeks in space as pilot of the space shuttle Discovery in 2009 on a mission to transport scientific equipment to the ISS.   The U.S. space program has been in a vulnerable position since the decommissioning of the U.S. Shuttle fleet in 2011, which left Russia's Soviet-designed Soyuz craft as the only means for international astronauts to reach the space station.   Earlier this month, California-based SpaceX successfully delivered a half-ton of supplies craft called Dragon to the ISS, the first official shipment under a $1.6 billion contract with NASA. The contract calls for 12 such shipments.   Ford said private companies like SpaceX and Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corp., whose Cygnus cargo vehicle is scheduled for its first trip to the ISS in December, would ensure the sustainability of the lab over the coming decade and enable new exploration.   "These companies out there are themselves learning a lot about getting to and from low-earth orbit and picking up that task so that NASA can indeed begin to concentrate on things out of earth orbit and going out further into our solar system," Ford said.   His remarks echo a statement to Congress in September by William Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for space operations.   Gerstenmaier said commercial transportation would enable the United States to fly its own astronauts to and from the International Space Station, "end our sole reliance on foreign governments" and allow for the expansion of the full-time crew to seven from six.   The incoming Dragon held 1,000 pounds (453 kilograms) of groceries, clothes, science experiments and other gear. It is to depart with almost twice that much cargo at the end of the month. Dragon is the only cargo ship capable of bringing back research and other items, filling a void left by NASA's retired shuttles.   The departure of the Dragon and a spacewalk to carry out repair operations on the station will be among the first operations to be handled by the incoming team.   "We really face a lot of tasks that we'll concentrate on right off the bat when we get aboard," Ford said. "After the spacewalk comes down, hopefully we'll have a little time to catch our breath."   U.S. astronaut Sunita Williams, Russia's Yuri Malenchenko and Aki Hoshide of Japan, who have been at the ISS since mid-July, are scheduled to return to earth next month.   Another multinational three-man crew with astronauts from the United States, Canada and Russia will set off from Baikonur in late December to take their place.   "Christmas Day ... has already been cancelled because we'll be having a Soyuz arriving aboard with our crewmates," Ford said. "Perhaps when they arrive it will be like Santa Claus arriving and bringing us gifts from earth."   ‘Unprecedented’ budget environment drives change across space industry   Brian Berger - Space News   Declining U.S. federal budgets and the looming threat that things could get much worse before they get better are forcing government space agencies and contractors to rethink the way they do business, and according to some officials, that is not such a bad thing.   The budgetary uncertainty has caused hiring freezes, and some programs are being structured in ways that might offend the sensibilities of development-efficiency experts.   But adversity breeds innovation: As they struggle to cope, agencies and companies are finding themselves cooking up what they hope are fresh recipes for success.   The fiscal situation was front and center during the American Astronautical Society’s Wernher von Braun Memorial Symposium at the University of Alabama here Oct. 15-18, where government and industry officials agreed that downward pressure on spending is unlikely to ease any time soon. But what that ultimately means for the U.S. military and civil space sectors was a matter of some debate.   U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Susan Mashiko, deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), said budget increases used to be relatively easy to get whenever a new security threat emerged. “Those days are long gone,” she said. “The budget we face is scrutinized, right down to how many people are you sending to a symposium.”   A One-Two Punch   The Budget Control Act of 2011, enacted amid a debt-ceiling standoff that threatened to shut down the government, mandated $1 trillion in spending cuts over 10 years and tasked a so-called supercommittee to find ways to reduce the deficit by an additional $1.2 trillion over the same period. Because the supercommittee failed to produce a plan, across-the-board spending cuts of 7 to 9 percent are set to take effect in January, a process known as sequestration.   The U.S. aerospace industry has been warning for months that sequestration would be devastating to military and civil space programs alike.   “This is really unprecedented,” said Jim Crocker, vice president and general manager for civil space at Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver. “If we think the confusion that was caused by where we were last year with the lack of clarity had an impact on us, just multiply that by, what, a thousand times and see what that does to the nation … it’s really scary… it is a doomsday scenario.”   Fred Doyle, vice president for defense and intelligence at Boulder, Colo.-based Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., said budget uncertainty, more than anything else, is stymieing private-sector growth and preventing his company from hiring.   “Our leadership says they want to know what the business is going to look like in the 2015 time frame. We don’t know what it’s going to look like on April Fools Day when the CR expires,” Doyle said, referring to the six-month continuing resolution the U.S. Congress adopted in late September to keep federal agencies funded at current levels through March. “If we knew right now that we would have funding in April for the projects we have on contract, we would be hiring 300 people right now.”   While many here assume Congress and the White House will head off sequestration, either by striking a $1.2 trillion deficit-reduction deal or by kicking the can down the road, they also recognize that budgets will remain tight.   The NRO, which buys and operates the nation’s fleet of classified spy satellites, has already throttled back spending significantly, according to Mashiko.   “Between the Department [of Defense] and the intelligence community, we took a $450 billion cut,” she said. “And specific to the National Reconnaissance Office, those cuts that were allocated to the intelligence community, a third … came out of the National Reconnaissance Office.”   NASA, likewise, is feeling the pinch. After a decade of slow but fairly steady growth, the White House proposed in February to roll back the agency’s nearly $17.8 billion budget to its lowest level since 2008 and keep it there indefinitely. The slowdown comes as the agency works feverishly to finish and fly the $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope, foster privately operated commercial crew and cargo transportation services for the international space station and build a heavy-lift rocket capable of launching astronauts to deep space.   “If you look at the budget curve back in the days of Apollo, you had this big hump,” said NASA Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot, the agency’s top-ranking civil servant. “We don’t have the big hump. We’re kind of flat. Not kind of flat. We’re flat.”   Since NASA has been barred by Congress from cutting its 18,000-strong civil service work force, the hunt for savings is prompting the agency to cancel missions, lay off contractors and stretch out the development timetables for priority programs — which, paradoxically, tends to drive up their cost.   Case in point: the Space Launch System, or SLS. Todd May, manager of the SLS Program Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center here, said the agency deliberately chose an SLS design that can be built for a steady $1.8 billion a year and avoid the budget spikes that are typical of big development efforts.   “Flat is the new up in the budget. It is a challenge when you are trying to develop the most powerful rocket ever built,” May said. “If you are a project manager, you know that the development curve wants to be a curve. … So if you stack a development curve on top of a development curve on top of a development curve, you get a very acute rise in cost,” he said, referring to the practice on big programs like SLS of developing several major subsystems simultaneously. “One of the things we came to very quickly is we could probably afford one development at a time,” he said.   By making use of surplus space shuttle main engines and leveraging previous work on the canceled Ares rocket development program, May and his team are able to do just that. As spending on five-segment solid-rocket boosters tapers off and development tests on the Apollo-heritage J-2X upper stage reach a good stopping point — both the solid booster and J-2X were integral components of the Ares program — May will be able to ramp up spending on the SLS rocket’s 8.4-meter diameter core stage.   The budget constraints facing the SLS team have their price. For example, the congressionally mandated rocket will not fly before late 2017 — a year later than lawmakers called for in the 2010 NASA Authorization Act — and the first crewed flight will not happen before 2021. What is more, to achieve the 130-metric-ton lift capability called for in the law, SLS will have to use a different booster and upper stage than the ones that will power the initial flights.   Strength through Adversity   “Gentlemen, we have run out of money; now we have to think.”   That quote, often attributed to Winston Churchill, was invoked by multiple panelists and participants here.   Mashiko said the NRO has spent the last 12 months coming up with “a more capable, resilient and affordable architecture. “Clearly, we couldn’t proceed ahead and do business as usual and still be able to provide the same capability and mission to our customers,” she said.   Charlie Lundquist, manager of the Orion Crew and Service Module project at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, said budget constraints are forcing NASA to rethink the way it manages multibillion-dollar projects. “Necessity is the mother of invention. We’ve been forced to do a lot of this because of the budget situation,” he said.   For one thing, NASA is pulling back on contractor oversight, something aerospace companies have wanted for years. “We’ve got a lot less people overseeing the contractors,” said May, noting that the SLS work force is a third smaller than the Ares program was the year before its cancellation. The leaner operation is leaning less on NASA tradition and, as May put it, “relying more on industry standards that are used today to make rockets that launch national security payloads.”   Charlie Precourt, the retired NASA astronaut who runs ATK’s Utah-based Space Launch Division, praised the agency for being open to new ideas. With the space shuttle no longer in service, ATK was free to scour its solid-motor manufacturing processes for efficiencies that would have been nonstarters in the midst of an operational program.   “Over the course of the year we came up with 450 changes to the manufacturing of the booster that were all approved by our NASA customer, and I would contend that five, 10 years ago, they wouldn’t even have been considered — or a few of them would be considered and approved along the way, gradually each year,” Precourt said.   By doing things like reducing from 47 to seven the number of times a motor segment moves from work station to work station and using ultrasound instead of X-rays for nozzle inspection, ATK was able to reduce the time it takes to produce a motor segment from 48 weeks to 26 weeks, he said.   Mike Hamel, chief of staff at Dulles, Va.-based Orbital Sciences Corp., stood out as perhaps the symposium’s only panelist to say he thinks the United States still spends plenty on space.   “It’s not a question of money to my mind, it’s how we are spending it,” said Hamel, a retired Air Force three-star general who ran the service’s space acquisition shop in Los Angeles. “We’ve got overly complex systems that we buy in too great of numbers … We’ve got to get to simpler individual systems, ones that are done on much shorter time scales.”   What this really means, Hammel said, is “being willing to accept 80-percent solutions for a fraction of the cost.”   Julie Van Kleeck, vice president of space and launch systems at Sacramento, Calif.-based Aerojet, said times are tough for aerospace companies and likely to get tougher. But where many of her colleagues see gloom and doom, she sees opportunity.   “I think actually it’s probably a good thing for everybody. It’s forcing everybody to step back, look at how we’re going to go forward, strengthen ourselves … find business models and ways of going forward that allow us to sustain during what’s probably going to be a more difficult fiscal time,” she said.   Aerojet, whose share of the U.S. rocket propulsion business runs third behind Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and ATK, is currently seeking to strengthen its portfolio by buying Rocketdyne from United Technologies Corp.   “There’s a lot of challenges, a lot of times where we’ll be wringing our hands and saying, ‘they’re going to cut the space budget’ … but I think there’s opportunity here, too,” she said. “I think we could have a bright future if we choose to.”   Mack says NASA needs 'bold' long-term plans   Scott Powers - Orlando Sentinel   The United States needs clear, long-term plans for space that do not whipsaw NASA and the Space Coast economy every couple of years, U.S. Senate candidate Connie Mack IV said Friday.   Mack, a Republican congressman from Fort Myers, called for "boldness" and firm planning looking ahead 10 to 20 years. He offered no specifics but said he would be open to ideas like a base on the moon.   "We need to be bold," he said, to inspire Americans.   But he was non-committal about increasing or even sustaining funding for NASA. He said that what the agency really needs is mission stability.   After meeting privately with the Economic Development Commission of Florida's Space Coast, Mack told reporters he supports the "Space Leadership Act" proposed by U.S. Rep. Bill Posey, R-Rockledge, to create a 10-year term for NASA's administrator and an independent board to develop NASA's budget.   He said the Space Coast has suffered because his Democratic opponent, U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, and President Barack Obama do not have clear, long-term goals.   Nelson, who flew in a space shuttle in 1986 and has made NASA his priority interest, responded in a statement that he helped save thousands of jobs by championing the current heavy-lift rocket and Orion capsule program. Mack voted against it.   Mack demonstrated a lapse in knowledge when he twice complained about NASA relying on Russia and China to ferry astronauts into space.   "The idea that Russia and China are responsible for manned space launches for us is not right," he said.   Currently, NASA contracts with Russia to ferry U.S. astronauts to and from the International Space Station, but there are no deals with China. In three to five years, NASA intends to turn to American private rocket companies.   Mack said his point is that NASA should be launching U.S. astronauts: "We just have to make it a priority."   Mack: Set long-term budget for NASA   James Dean - Florida Today   U.S. Rep. Connie Mack IV said Friday he would help institute a bold, long-term vision for the nation’s “floundering” space exploration program if he is elected to the U.S. Senate.   The Republican challenger to U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson suggested few specific changes in NASA policy or funding, but said a consistent 10- or 20-year plan could enable exciting missions even with less money.   “They continue to change the mission, and when you change the mission, it’s a floundering program,” he said. “The president and Senator Nelson have done nothing to set a long-term plan and mission for NASA.”   Mack spoke to reporters after an hour-long roundtable discussion with local aerospace and defense industry representatives hosted by the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast at the Holiday Inn Titusville. Mack’s campaign did not allow media to sit in on the event.   Afterward, Mack said he supports legislation Republican colleagues have proposed that would turn the NASA administrator into a 10-year position and create a board to oversee agency budgets. The proposal is intended to insulate the space program from changes in administrations.   Nelson chairs the Senate subcommittee that oversees NASA policy, and with Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas was the primary author of the 2010 authorization act that set NASA’s current direction, opposed by Mack.   The legislation canceled the Constellation back-to-the-moon program that a White House panel had concluded was on an “unsustainable trajectory.”   Instead it supported development of commercial vehicles to fly astronauts to the International Space Station by 2017; extension of the station’s life to 2020; development of a heavy-lift rocket and a crew capsule for deep space exploration missions by 2025; and modernization of Kennedy Space Center infrastructure. The shuttle program was retired last year after the addition of two missions.   “Sen. Nelson always has been a firm believer in the U.S. being the leader in space exploration and his and Sen. Hutchison’s plan keeps the U.S. the leader in science and technology for defense and national security reasons,” Nelson spokesman Dan McLaughlin said.   “On the other hand, Mack was the only member of the 27-member Florida delegation to vote against the plan.”   Exploring space: Why’s it so important?   Zaina Adamu - CNN   Carol Beckles isn't buying into all the space exploration hype. She’s a single, middle-class mother of three living in a modest, cozy three-bedroom home in Atlanta’s suburbs. She foots the college bill of her oldest daughter Tiffany, who – like her mom – wishes she got more government help to pay for tuition.   “It’s definitely hard. From the time that I was a senior (in high school) I had to start figuring out how I was going to pay for this,” said Tiffany who sits close beside her mom.   A mere mention of taxpayers’ dollars going to NASA makes Carol cringe. “I don’t see the use. What are we going out there to do?” she asked. CNN commenters often share these sentiments; one recently identified himself/herself as "waste of tax dollars."   It’s been asked since space exploration began in the late 1950s. Some people argue that some –- if not all –- funding for space exploration could be used to revitalize the economy, fix the education system, or solve undersea mysteries, among other Earth-related issues.   “We need to be researching the bottom of the oceans just as much,” said CNN’s space and science meteorologist Chad Myers. “There could be things at the bottom of the Earth that we don’t know about.”   According to a 2010 CNN/ORC poll, 50% of Americans agreed that the money spent for the space shuttle program - which ended last year - should be spent elsewhere. And in a 2009 Gallup poll, the percentage of Americans who believe the U.S. space program should be scrapped jumped four points: From 4% to 8% in an 11-year period (1998-2009).   The numbers reveal that some question the purpose of space exploration. NASA chief scientist Waleed Abdalati said the government’s financial contribution to NASA has been beneficial to humans and will continue to set breakthroughs in technology.   “By sending astronauts to space and trying to understand their biological responses to space environment, we’ve learned a lot about understanding human beings,” said Abdalati. “A lot of the instrumentation in an emergency room, for example, is traceable to investments by NASA to monitor and understand human health and performance in a space-related environment.”   Human benefits from space exploration   The birth of the space age has spurred on a plethora of new ideas and ground-breaking technologies that are used in day-to-day living.    Health: During the early Apollo missions, scientists needed precise images of the moon’s surface in order to land the first man on the moon. In the 1960s, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory created digital image processing, an innovative technology that uses computers to enhance images of the moon. In the medical field, scientists and researchers found that this technology could be used to enhance images of organs in humans. Today, digital image processing is used in Magnetic Resonance Imaging and CT scans.   Medicine: Before Dan Carter joined NASA in 1985, developing large amounts of protein crystal was a challenge. He and colleagues discovered that space-produced crystal could be used to make the atomic components of albumin(PDF), an essential human protein. They founded a called New Century Pharmaceuticals in 1997. Their findings helped lead to the development of a cancer drug combination approach and skin care products.   Information Technology: Captured by satellites, NASA’s Earth Observing System Data and Information System collects and archives information of the Earth’s atmosphere, oceans and vegetation on a daily basis. The massive amount of data accumulated has reached 4.5 petabytes. That’s equivalent to completely filling 90 million four-drawer file cabinets with paper, according to NASA’s 2010 “Spinoff” publication(PDF). To provide convenient access to the large data repositories, NASA partnered with Archivas Inc. to create a high-tech software program that can hold large amounts of information. Hospitals, cell-phone providers, businesses and organizations now use this same technology to store information.   Communications: Satellites play an instrumental role in how we communicate and navigate the world. In the 1960s companies including AT&T and RCA partnered with NASA and other space agencies to build and place satellites in the Earth’s orbit. Global positioning systems, television networks, radio stations and cell-phone carriers are all dependent on satellites to keep the world connected.   GPS in particular arose as a result of Sputnik, the Soviet satellite that launched in 1957. Changes in radio frequency helped U.S. scientists track where Sputnik was because of the Doppler effect - that is, a shift in the frequency of sound or light waves corresponds to a change in position. This principle led to a Navy navigation system called TRANSIT intended for submarines. GPS for continuous navigation was developed as a Defense Department initiative in the 1970s, leading to the launch of the first GPS satellite in 1978. The system was complete in 1995 (More about this from Time.com).   Environment: When the Saturn 1B launch stand (used in several Apollo missions) was disassembled, it was stored away in an open field. No one knew until years later that the launch stand was coated with a paint containing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a toxic chemical that was seeping into the Earth’s soil. Quinn and her colleagues created the Activated Metal Treatment System (AMTS), a paste-like solvent solution that extracts PCBs from paint without removing the paint itself. The innovative system has been redesigned since then to remove many forms of contamination and pesticides on land.   Transportation: The parachute shrouds that landed the Vikings on Mars have a fibrous material used in automobile tires. These state-of-the-art tires were originally developed by Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. Now the tires, famously called radial tires, are manufactured in factories around the world. They are five times more durable than steel and have an expected tread life 10,000 miles greater than conventional tires.   Public safety: Those powerful rocket launchers that propel spacecrafts into deep space are now fighting fires. Rory Groonwald, chief engineer at Orbital Technologies Corporation, partnered with the U.S. Air Force Fire Rescue Research Group to design a similar high-pressured system that suppresses fires in seconds. The technology also reduces water usage because the extreme force creates fines water droplets as opposed to an excessive flow.   Memory foam: For anyone who gets a better night’s sleep from a foam mattress, NASA’s to thank. The administration originally developed the polyurethane-silicon plastic to reduce harsh impact when spacecrafts landed. Now the famed foam is used in everything from automobiles and airplanes to helmets and horseback saddles.   We also have advanced water filtration systems for astronauts as a result of the space program.   Talking numbers   In 2012, NASA was allocated $18.7 billion(PDF) from the federal government (less than 1% of the entire U.S. budget) for further research and exploration. $3.8 billion of that will go specifically to space exploration. By comparison, the Department of Defense got $670 billion and another $69.8 billion went to education.   To put that in perspective, that’s 1.2% of a taxpayer’s total income going to science, space and technology programs while national defense and education receives 26.3% and 4.8% of taxpayers’ dollars, respectively.   Even with a limited budget (the smallest budget of any major agency), President Obama emphasized at a 2010 conference at the Kennedy Space Center that space exploration has been key to America’s position as a world leader.   “For pennies on the dollar, the space program has improved our lives, advanced our society, strengthened our economy, and inspired generations of Americans,” he said.   If re-elected, he plans to pump an additional $6 billion in NASA’s budget over the next three years.   The takeaway   Carol does not know for sure if Tiffany’s post-secondary education in business administration will lead her to a job in the field. She does know though, that the opportunities for her will be greater if she stays in college, so she said she will continue to invest in her daughter's education.   In the same way, said Abdalati, society must continue to invest in space exploration.   “There’s value to making these investments. It’s very easy to look at the challenges we face financially as a nation and consider alternative investments, but if we don’t carve out a small fraction of the national budget to support exploration, we lose something tremendously important and, in fact, we step back as a society.”   Clearing the obstacles to space solar power   Frank Morring, Jr. - Aviation Week   Advocates of space solar power (SSP) continue to refine their ideas for harnessing the Sun’s energy, beaming it to Earth and plugging it into the power grid. Papers presented at the 63rd International Astronautical Congress in Naples, Italy, this month indicate some very good minds are at work on clearing the hurdles to SSP, with some interesting results.   “The major problem associated with [SSP] is to apply the technologies to the huge system at [gigawatt] level in power, [kilometer] level in size, and several ten [of] thousands of tons in weight,” writes Susumu Sasaki of Japan’s Institute of Science and Astronautical Science, in a technical paper presented in Naples. “Also it is [necessary] to make its power price be competitive with that of existing power generation systems on the ground.”   Reviewing the technical readiness level of SSP components, Sasaki reports that to begin deploying commercial SSP spacecraft in the 2030s, “large advances” in power transmission will be needed in the next 10 years, followed by significant advances in large space structures in the 10 years after that, and a final five-year push in space transportation to kick off service. Photovoltaic cells, for example, need to move from 15-30% conversion efficiency to 35-40% in the Japanese model, with specific weight dropping from 10-100 grams/Watt to 1 g/W and service life in space growing from 10 years to 30-40. Today’s cost of $4-6/Watt need to drop to $1-0.50.   To meet the transportation needs, Sasaki sees reusable launch vehicles as the ultimate solution for SSP, and he finds developments in the space tourism field encouraging.   “Another important trend in the space transportation system is the suborbital RLV for space tourism, such as SpaceShipTwo,” he writes. “The technology gap from the suborbital flight to the orbital flight is considered very large, but the suborbital flight technologies could lead to breakthrough in the orbital RLV.”   John Mankins, a longtime U.S. SSP advocate, presented an update on an advanced concept under study with NASA funding known as Solar Power Satellite by means of Arbitrarily Large Phased Array (SPS-Alpha). The idea, he writes, “represents a very different architecture for SPS, using a hyper-modular approach in which all platform elements can be mass produced, and none are larger than a ‘smallsat.’ This could enable significantly lower development time/cost, much greater ease of manufacturing at lower cost, and significantly higher reliability.”   Basically, mass-produced “intelligent” spacecraft weighing 100-300 kg would assemble themselves into a constellation shaped to collect solar energy, convert it and transmit it through the “hive” of other spacecraft to a transmitter array assembled in the same fashion. Mankins says the idea is based on the behavior of bees or ants.   “SPS-Alpha incorporates the concept of the retrodirective phased array, which allows a large number of individual RF elements to be controlled and their transmissions made coherent through the use of a ‘pilot signal’ transmitted from the site of the planned receiver. This technology (co-invented by professor Nobuyuki Kaya of Kobe University) allows the large microwave transmitter required for the concept to be assembled from modular elements via an RF version of adaptive optics.”   The SPS-Alpha study, conducted for the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts, aims at establishing an analytical proof of concept (technology readiness level 3) for its “technical and economic viability,” and is directed toward a near-term road map for development like the one Sasaki provided for the more conventional approach he studied.   Space shuttle Atlantis' final trip short but still a challenge   Richard Simon - Los Angeles Times   Granted, moving Atlantis, the last of the retired space shuttles, won't be as difficult as Endeavour's recent, and tortuous, trip through Los Angeles. That journey required the chopping down of hundreds of trees — and Endeavour arrived 16 hours behind schedule.   Still, moving Atlantis 9.8 miles will be no piece of cake.   “You’re talking about 165,000 pounds, a national treasure, a priceless artifact.... No pressure,’’ said Tim Macy, director of project development and construction for Delaware North Cos., which operates the Kennedy Space Center visitors complex in Florida.   Atlantis will be moved from Kennedy Space Center to the nearby visitors complex Nov. 2. The delivery will be a splashy all-day production, with tickets offering an up-close view of the shuttle selling for $90 for adults.   Shuttles have been delivered to Los Angeles, New York and the Washington area, flying on the back of a 747. In L.A., Endeavour’s 12-mile journey from Los Angeles International Airport to the California Science Center was a three-day spectacle. In New York, the test shuttle Enterprise was carried by barge to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum.   In Florida, it’s just a short trip from Kennedy Space Center’s Vehicle Assembly Building to the visitors complex, most of it on fenced-in NASA property. Even so, planning for the move has been underway for more than a year, and 120 light poles, 23 traffic signals and 56 traffic signs must be taken down to accommodate Atlantis, with its 78-foot wingspan.   The bigger challenge will be putting Atlantis on display, at a 43-degree angle with its payload doors open, Macy said. Its new $100-million home is due to open in July.   Atlantis will be moved at 2 mph on an apparatus used in the 1980s for transporting the orbiter. Its first stop will be at Kennedy Space Center headquarters, where NASA employees and former shuttle workers will gather for a ceremony attended by Atlantis’ last crew. It will move to Space Florida’s Exploration Park and then to its permanent home for a fireworks show.   Macy, who watched the Endeavour’s slow move through L.A., said he learned a lesson.   “Don’t take the shuttle through downtown Orlando.”   Wattsburg students speak with astronaut in space   Sean McCracken - Erie Times-News   Astronaut Sunita Williams might have been more than 200 miles away from the surface of the Earth on Friday, but that didn't mean she couldn't answer questions from students at Seneca High School.   A dozen Wattsburg Area School District students had the chance to talk directly to Williams for just over 10 minutes Friday through the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station -- or ARISS -- program.   The event was organized locally by Paul Semrau, an English and biology teacher at Seneca. The 12 students chosen to ask questions were from Seneca, Wattsburg Area Middle School and Wattsburg Area Elementary Center.   Those students were picked from a pool of almost 60 who applied to ask questions based on their questions and a project they completed.   Those projects could be essays, collages or some other way of representing why their question was important.   Third-grader Maya Morrison, 8, was the first to ask a question Friday. She wondered what an astronaut might pack for a trip into space.   "I wanted to ask that because I couldn't find it on the Internet," Maya said.   Williams answered that she didn't pack much, mostly small things like jewelry and a photo of her family.   Maya's project was a suitcase filled with what she thought an astronaut needs.   Her younger brother Corey Morrison, a 7-year-old in first grade, asked what astronauts are learning from a new fish habitat.   Williams told him, along with a crowd of 500 students in Seneca's Elwin Rose Auditorium, that the fish will help us understand the physical effects of going into space because they are transparent.   Semrau said he found out about the ARISS program through the Northwest Tri-County Intermediate Unit.   He said it was worth pursuing because he saw it as a "real project with real meaning" for students.   "Many of our students didn't believe it could really happen," Semrau said.   Less than 100 schools and organizations across the globe have participated in the radio question-and-answer sessions.   The program is sponsored by NASA, the American Radio Relay League and the Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation.   Williams is the commander of International Space Station Expedition 33.   She is a native of Euclid, Ohio, and a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., and has logged more than 3,000 flight hours in 30 different aircraft.   One of the students asking questions, Seneca senior Samantha Shofestall, 17, is hoping to follow in Williams' footsteps.   Shofestall has applied to the U.S. Naval Academy. She said she hopes to eventually be a pilot and engineer and could see herself pursing a career as an astronaut.   Shofestall asked Williams how space travel has affected her worldview.   "When you look down on the planet, it's so beautiful and peaceful," Williams replied. "It makes you wonder what people are even fighting about because we have such a nice planet down there."   Shofestall said she hopes Friday's program teaches the younger students to love science like she does.   "That's something they can share for the rest of their life," Shofestall said. "Hopefully it sparks an interest in science for them."   Shofestall might be right. After Friday's program, Maya Morrison said she'd like to one day travel to space.   Semrau agreed that it would help spur interest for younger students.   "Today is all about planting seeds," Semrau said.   Is space tourism the right stuff? Private space ventures may rekindle public excitement   Todd Dickson - Las Cruces Bulletin   The scaling back of government support for the traditional space program could be reversed if the new private space entrepreneurs are successful, said a keynote speaker on the first day of the two-day International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight (ISPCS).   Robert Dickman, executive director of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, said the space program has been going through a lot change since NASA made the decision to retire the space shuttle fleet eight years ago.   Since then, the purpose of NASA has also been revised to focus more on space exploration beyond Earth’s orbit, and servicing the orbiting International Space Station has been turned over to the private sector with the success of Elon Musk’s SpaceX rocket and capsule delivery system.   How large companies such Dynetics that supported the traditional space program will adapt or survive remains to be seen, Dickman said, but there is still potential for great space exploration. However, they will require new developments in space propulsion systems and more public interest.   The good part of retiring the shuttle fleet, Dickman said, is that this should spur development of future systems, but there is currently a lack of public interest and support.   Unlike the space race with Russia during the Cold War, there isn’t public concern about current space exploration by other countries, he said.   “The public doesn’t care about a space race with China or going back to the moon,” Dickman said.   But just as traditional orbital and interplanetary space exploration is ramping down, private-sector suborbital space development is ramping up, he said, and that is getting a lot of public interest.   That’s because efforts such as Virgin Galactic are providing people access to space, he said, and new space entrepreneurs, such as Virgin’s Richard Branson, are celebrities.   “That’s where the people in this room play an important role,” Dickman said of the space industry leaders and entrepreneurs gathered at the New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum Wednesday, Oct. 17, for the first day of the two-day ISPCS.   These private sector ventures may provide more efficient answers to making spaceflight systems, he said, that weren’t found in the government bureaucracy and political interest in NASA projects for job creation.   Just as the $10 million XPRIZE jump started the private sector to creating suborbital systems, Dickman suggested that a similar prize – at $1 billion or $2 billion – be offered for a manned flight to Mars to get space entrepreneurs such as Musk and Branson interested in taking on the challenge.   The current change to private sector servicing of the space station and possible future planetary exploration shouldn’t be surprising, Dickman said, because part of NASA’s original mission is to foster the private space industry.   Lessons learned   Former Space Shuttle program manager Wayne Hale, who is currently a consultant for new private space companies, said many he worked with at NASA are finding homes at the new space ventures.   Speaking at the ISPCS Community Partnership Luncheon Tuesday, Oct. 16, Hale said those people bring the tradition of caring obsessively about safety. But it is an industry in its early development, so states such as Texas, Colorado, Virginia, Florida and, now, California are trying to lure companies by providing extra liability protection.   Hale’s talk was meant to help generate more awareness and support for getting competitive legislation passed in the Legislature.   Lawmakers previously had passed liability protection for human spaceflight from Spaceport America, but that was only for the flight operators, not the companies that supply, manufacture and equip the operators. New legislation would expand the protection to those in that supply chain, which is what the competing states are offering.   Hale said the new space entrepreneurs also have the lessons learned by the development of the aviation industry, which became overburdened by regulatory government oversight because of early deaths and recklessness.   Internally, these companies realize that an early mishap could stall the industry’s growth and attract burdensome government oversight, Hale said. They don’t want that oversight because they want to efficiently develop and regularly fly the systems in order to bring costs down.   “It all comes down to cost,” Hale said.“But I have no doubt there is an industry and a marketplace to make a profit from suborbital space flight.”   Unleashing that opportunity, Hale said, requires the elimination of legislative impediments until the new industry can provide a proven record of safety.   SpaceX has competition for cargo delivery to ISS   John Kelly - Florida Today (Commentary)   SpaceX is getting the headlines because it’s already delivering cargo to the International Space Station, but there is a second company and transport system in the NASA program to privatize routine resupply runs to the outpost.   Orbital Sciences is not as far along as SpaceX, which has now completed two trips to the space station, but the company is stepping toward a launch from Virginia of its Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.   The company has tested and activated its new complex at Wallops Island. The Orbital team rolled the Antares to the pad, ahead of planned ground tests, including several wet dress rehearsals involving fueling and then emptying the rocket to test ground systems at the new launch complex.   The first two Cygnus spacecraft are finishing their testing regimen. Early next year, the Cygnus are to be delivered to the NASA site in Virginia for final launch preparations.   Orbital holds a nearly $2 billion contract with NASA for the resupply effort, the second of two companies doing the privatized work.   Up next: a half-minute test firing of the rocket as early as next month and, if all goes as planned, a test flight of the rocket carrying a payload meant to simulate the weight of Cygnus and conditions of a real flight. The flight could happen before the year ends, Orbital said, though that schedule seems optimistic given the newness of the rocket, vehicle and the ground systems.   A first test flight to the station will come in the first or second quarter of 2013, company officials told investors in a quarterly earnings report and related conference call this week. The test flight, similar to SpaceX Dragon's first berthing at the station, will carry some cargo. Operational flights are expected to begin quickly, starting later in 2013.   Regardless of the details of the schedule, Orbital succeeding is as important to the future of privatized space flight as SpaceX succeeding.   Frequency of success, with completely different teams, will solidify that this strategy is the correct one for routine orbital flights to deliver supplies and will build momentum for the funding of similar programs for delivering astronauts to low Earth orbit.   Ultimately, it is becoming more and more clear that injecting competition into the design and development of spacecraft has been a major missing ingredient behind decades of failed attempts to develop space shuttle successors within NASA and its big legacy contractors. The new model is working. Its pace could be quickened with a realization in Washington that expanding the private competition concept into development of the super rockets and spaceships needed for deeper space flight is the way to go.   A new future for NASA in technology R&D?   Kirstin Matthews & Kenneth Evans - Houston Chronicle (Commentary)   (Matthews is a fellow in science and technology policy at the Baker Institute. Evans is a graduate intern for the Science and Technology Policy Program.)   Last month, hundreds of Houstonians went outside in the daylight to watch as a plane attached to the space shuttle flew over the city. It was a bittersweet moment for all who watched — a reminder that the shuttle program has been officially canceled, leaving many Americans, including us, wondering what NASA is going to do in the future.   Over the past four years, the Obama administration has put together a plan to better link NASA and private industry and, with NASA’s support, several very ambitious companies have successfully launched privately financed spaceships, albeit not yet manned. But alongside the shuttle going into retirement and the cancellation of the Constellation program, Obama and Congress have put plans for federally-funded, manned space travel on hold due to overall budgetary restrictions.   A new policy report from the Baker Institute describes how focused research and development (R&D) of new technologies — such as nanotechnology — could be the future of NASA. Nanotechnology has great potential for advancing many traditional NASA technologies beyond their current state. Most notably, nano-engineered materials are known for their strength, lightness and thermal robustness, making them ideal candidates for inclusion in future aircraft and space vehicles. Additionally, nanoscale elements have shown great promise for faster integrated electronics and more sensitive detectors.   According to the report, “the United States currently lacks a national space policy that ensures the continuity of research and programs that build on existing capabilities to explore space.” The absence of a mission-directed goal has hit NASA, and more specifically centers like Johnson Space Center (JSC), hard. Establishing specific objectives for basic research, and aligning these objectives with a nationally recognized plan for space exploration, could help to stabilize congressional appropriations for NASA in the long-term. At home, reinvesting in basic sciences could help find a new role for JSC after the termination of the shuttle program.   Through grants and academic collaborations, NASA could work toward sustained relationships and programming to integrate next-generation technologies with its current infrastructure. Without a consistent plan for our nation’s future in space, and a continued focus on basic research, we risk losing ground to other countries with a more resolved interest and greater financial resources for spaceflight.   END