Don't forget to join us this Thursday at Hibachi Grill on Bay Area Blvd. for our monthly Retirees Luncheon. And after lunch with your fellow NASA colleagues,,,,, then you can go hear interesting talk at the Gilruth Rec. Center.
Thursday, May 1, 2014 "Boeing Crew Space Transportation"
Time: 2:30 - 4:00 PM John Mulholland
Gilruth Alamo Ballroom Boeing CST-101 Program Manager
Future:
It is not to early to make your reservations now.
NAL Social/Dinner
Tuesday, June 17,2014 "SPACEWALKER" - Jerry Ross, Astronaut
5:30 - 9:00 PM NASA Alumni League Summer Social & Dinner
Gilruth Alamo Ballroom
| | JSC TODAY CATEGORIES - Headlines
- Change From JSC Listserver to Agency Mailing List
- Office of Chief Counsel Reduced Staffing - May 5-9
- Managed Elevated Privileges Continues
- Electronic Document System (EDS) 2.0 Release - Organizations/Social
- Starport Jewelry Fair - Building 3 Café - Jobs and Training
- Job Opportunities
- Career Power - Optimize your Career Development - Community
- Starport Scholarship Deadline Extended
- Employees Needed for Simulated Mission to Mars |  |
| Headlines - Change From JSC Listserver to Agency Mailing List
The JSC Listserver (@JSC-LISTSERV-01.JSC.NASA.GOV) is scheduled to be decommissioned May 30. JSC Listserver list owners should begin using the NASA Agency Mailing List Service (AMLS). There is no charge to use the agency service. Any NASA employee may request a mailing list. List owners manage their lists directly through a Web interface. JSC list owners and others who need to request a mailing list for NASA activities, staff or interests can request an agency mailing list. To create an agency mailing list, see "How to request a mailing list" under NASA AMLS. Create agency mailing lists before May 30, as the JSC Listserver will no longer be available. For more information on the JSC Listserver, please contact Damon Saber. - Office of Chief Counsel Reduced Staffing - May 5-9
The Office of Chief Counsel will operate with greatly reduced staff during the week of May 5. This means that matters arriving in the office during that week may not be acknowledged right away or completed that week. It would be helpful if clients could please try either to accelerate or defer delivery of work that might otherwise come to us that week. We will, of course, always get to any true emergencies right away. - Managed Elevated Privileges Continues
On Tuesday, April 29, Managed Elevated Privileges (MEP) continues with the Engineering Directorate offices (EA). MEP controls admin rights (Elevated Privileges, or EP) on NASA computers and allows users to request EP when needed. Users must complete SATERN training before submitting any requests for EP. All users, especially those scheduled for MEP deployment, are strongly urged to complete the SATERN training for "Basic Users" (Elevated Privileges on NASA Information System - ITS-002-09). Users can coordinate with their supervisor, OCSO or organization IT point of contact to determine the level of EP they may need beyond "Basic User" and any additional training required. The next scheduled deployment date is May 20, which will continue with the EA and EC org codes. For more information, go to the MEP website or contact Heather Thomas at x30901. - Electronic Document System (EDS) 2.0 Release
On March 10, the EDS 2.0 document type Task Performance Sheet (TPS) replacement of the paper JSC Form 1225 was started. The plan is to implement according to record centers (RCs). On March 10, this went in to effect from RC15 and 44. The other RC schedules are as follows: RC Implementation Date RC Building 7 - April 2 RC Building 32 - May 1 RC Building 36 - June 1 RC Building 10 - June 1 RC Building 350 - June 1 Any new paper TPS (JF 1225) in the signature cycle will only be accepted for two weeks after the designated implementation date. Any exception will need to be coordinated with respective division management and provided to Quality and Flight Equipment Division management. Class schedules are available in SATERN. Organizations/Social - Starport Jewelry Fair – Building 3 Café
Jewelry is Fun will be out tomorrow, April 29, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. in the Building 3 Starport Café selling $5.99 jewelry. Enjoy great savings on jewelry and accessories! Click here for more information. Jobs and Training - Job Opportunities
Where do I find job opportunities? To help you navigate to JSC vacancies, use the filter drop-down menu and select "JSC HR." The "Jobs" link will direct you to the USAJOBS website for the complete announcement and the ability to apply online. Lateral reassignment and rotation opportunities are posted in the Workforce Transition Tool. To access: HR Portal > Employees > Workforce Transition > Workforce Transition Tool. These opportunities do not possess known promotion potential; therefore, employees can only see positions at or below their current grade level. If you have questions about any JSC job vacancies or reassignment opportunities, please call your HR representative. - Career Power – Optimize your Career Development
Career Power is an engaging learning experience that guides individuals in managing their own development and careers by using activities, discussions and skill-building exercises. Employees can manage their future with Career Power, a lifelong process for today's workforce. Outcomes: - Apply the Career Power model to design their own development strategy
- Identify future trends and see the implications for their own career
- Discover values, skills and interests; manage their personal brand
- Set career direction with multiple options
- Draft a development plan; complete their IDP; and prepare and practice for career conversations
Course Details: Date: Thursday, May 1 Time: 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 a.m. Location: Building 12, Room 134 For: Civil servant and contractor employees SATERN ID#: 73300 Use this direct link to register in SATERN. Community - Starport Scholarship Deadline Extended
The deadline to turn in applications for the Starport (JSC Exchange) Scholarship Program has been extended to May 30. Starport is proud to offer two scholarships this year to provide financial assistance for dependents (children) of JSC civil servants or reimbursable detailees and dependents (children) of JSC Starport Partners to attend college. Applicants are evaluated on the basis of academic achievement, financial need and involvement in school or community activities. The scholarship winners may pursue any course of study leading to a recognized degree at any accredited college in the country. Additional information regarding Starport Partners, the Starport Scholarship Program and applications can be found online. - Employees Needed for Simulated Mission to Mars
Mentor a student team as they design a simulated mission to Mars during High School Aerospace Scholars. Share your NASA experience and advice while connecting our workforce with the brightest Texas high school students. Choose any week(s) to volunteer and enjoy our fun activities. Summer Schedule: - Week 1: June 15 to 20
- Week 2: June 22 to 27
- Week 3: July 6 to 11
- Week 4: July 13 to 18
- Week 5: July 20 to 25
- Week 6: July 27 to Aug. 1
If interested, please: 1. Complete the mentor application here. 3. Review mentor responsibilities. 4. Apply before May 2. | |
| |
| JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles. Disclaimer: Accuracy and content of these notes are the responsibility of the submitters. |
NASA and Human Spaceflight News
Monday – April 28, 2014
HEADLINES AND LEADS
Elon Musk's SpaceX to sue government over space launch contract
Christian Davenport and Brian Fung – The Washington Post
Elon Musk, the business mogul who dreams of colonizing Mars, wants a bigger piece of the space market, and he's willing to sue his biggest potential customer to get it.
SpaceX gets closer to making a reusable rocket, sues Air Force
SpaceX data show that it may be able to launch and return a booster by the end of the year. CEO Elon Musk also says the company is suing the Air Force to open up competition in rocket launches.
W.J. Hennigan – Los Angeles Times
Elon Musk, founder and chief executive of Hawthorne rocket maker SpaceX, hastily called a news conference Friday in Washington, D.C., where he outlined an array of matters confronting his upstart company. SpaceX's Latest Cargo Flight Delivers a Step Toward Rocket Reusability
Dan Leone – Space News
A Space Exploration Technologies Corp. Dragon spacecraft arrived at the international space station April 20, delivering nearly 2,100 kilograms of cargo to the orbital outpost. Dragon's arrival followed an April 18 launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 launcher that pulled double-duty as an experiment in rocket reusability. The goal was to do a simulated "landing" at sea of Falcon 9's first stage, which was equipped with four landing legs for the experiment.
Editorial: SpaceX's Plan Shows Aggressive Investment In R&D
"The audacity of the concept and speed of the program's progress make it an exemplar."
Aviation Week & Space Technology
SpaceX founder Elon Musk has always acknowledged the debt his company owes to NASA. Much of SpaceX's technology is rooted in the space agency's research. As the entrepreneur says, "I would not have been able to start SpaceX without the amazing work NASA has done in the past. Nor would SpaceX be where it is today without the help of NASA."
Marshall Space Flight Center ranks among most innovative federal government centers
Lee Roop – Huntsville (AL) Times
Not only is NASA the most innovative and employees' favorite agency to work for in the federal government, new reports say the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville is one of the top five most innovative sub-agencies in the entire government.
Congress must fund deep-space travel for U.S.'s sake
Charles Walker, Guest Columnist – Orlando Sentinel
With our economy stuck in a slow recovery, voters want leaders in Washington to create high-tech jobs, support new technologies for American industry and help inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers and innovators that will grow our economy for the future. It's a tall order, but I'm glad to see so many congressional representatives from Florida are meeting this challenge, in part by supporting NASA missions to explore deep space.
Astronaut Twins To Separate For The Sake Of Space Travel
NPR Staff
This month, NASA revealed new details of the plan to send humans to Mars by 2030. It's an elaborate and expensive mission, involving a giant deep-space rocket, and roping an asteroid into the moon's orbit to use as a stepping stone to Mars.
How Nasa plans to put a man on Mars in 20 years: Space bosses reveal the route to the red planet
Mark Prigg – Daily Mail (UK)
Nasa has reveal new details of its plan to send humans to an asteroid by 2025 and Mars in the 2030s.
ISS Partners Considering Additional One-Year Missions
Jeff Foust – Space News
To better understand the human health risks of future missions to Mars, NASA and its international space station partners are considering flying as many as half a dozen additional one-year missions to the station, a NASA official said April 23.
Proton-M Rocket Launches Kazakh, Russian Satellites
RIA-Novosti
A Russian Proton-M carrier rocket has successfully placed Kazakhstan's KazSat-3 telecommunications satellite and Russia's Luch-5V relay satellite into Earth orbit, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said Monday.
COMPLETE STORIES
Elon Musk's SpaceX to sue government over space launch contract
Christian Davenport and Brian Fung – The Washington Post
Elon Musk, the business mogul who dreams of colonizing Mars, wants a bigger piece of the space market, and he's willing to sue his biggest potential customer to get it.
SpaceX, his California-based rocket company, announced Friday that it plans to file a lawsuit protesting the award of a lucrative space contract by the Air Force, saying it should have been competitively bid.
Speaking before reporters at the National Press Club, Musk, the entrepreneur who co-
founded PayPal and Tesla Motors, said SpaceX could provide rockets to launch into space for considerably less money than United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing, which won the sole source award in December.
The multibillion-dollar contract is for 36 rockets to launch defense payloads, such as satellites, into space. By 2030, the Pentagon expects to spend almost $70 billion on the program.
"This is not SpaceX protesting and saying these launches should be awarded to us," Musk said. "We're just saying these launches should be competed. If we compete and lose, that's fine. But why would they not even compete it? That doesn't make sense."
SpaceX's rockets are not qualified for the mission, but he said the company is navigating the Air Force's certification process, which he called a "paperwork exercise." And Musk called for the Air Force to cancel and rebid the contract.
"Since this is a large, multiyear contract, why not wait a few months for the certification process to be completed, and then do the competition?" he said.
Air Force officials did not respond to requests for comment.
In a statement, ULA said that it was "proud and focused on supporting" the program, and that the Pentagon's "robust acquisition and oversight process and ULA improved performance enabled over $4 billion in savings as compared to prior acquisitions approaches."
At a Senate hearing last month, Michael Gass, ULA's chief executive, said that his company's Atlas V and Delta IV rockets "are the most powerful and most reliable in the world. They are the only rockets that fully meet the unique and specialized needs of the national security community."
The company was supported by Sen. Richard C. Shelby, a Republican from Alabama, where ULA assembles its engines, who praised ULA for launching 68 successful missions.
"I believe we must ensure that the program's record of success is maintained," Shelby said at the hearing. "And while the goal of competition is to lower the cost of access to space, which I think is good, combined with the need to maintain performance and reliability, such as we have today, competition may not actually result in a price reduction for the federal government."
Scott Pace, director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University, said that given the complexity of launching national security satellites into space, the government isn't just interested in the low bidder.
"The government has stressed the importance of reliability. Launching a satellite payload, particularly a national security payload, is something that really, really has to work. It cannot fail," he said. "That focus on mission assurance is something the government has prioritized over cost alone."
But Musk said his rockets are reliable and proven, as well as cost efficient. He said his company could have delivered the contract to the Defense Department for $1 billion less per year.
SpaceX has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to fly resupply missions to the international space station.
"It just seems odd that if your vehicle is good enough for NASA . . . there is no reasonable basis for it not being capable of launching something quite simple like a GPS satellite," Musk said. "This doesn't seem right to us."
Musk also criticized ULA for using Russian engines in some of its rockets, which he said was possibly a violation of U.S. sanctions and unseemly at a time when Russia "is the process of invading Ukraine."
SpaceX plans to file the protest by Monday at the Court of Federal Claims. Musk said that even though the contract was signed in December, he was not aware of it until March.
"The contract was negotiated and executed outside of public view and has never been made public," the company said in a statement.
Musk said that company officials tried to discuss its concerns with the Air Force but ultimately decided it had no choice but to file the suit.
SpaceX gets closer to making a reusable rocket, sues Air Force
SpaceX data show that it may be able to launch and return a booster by the end of the year. CEO Elon Musk also says the company is suing the Air Force to open up competition in rocket launches.
W.J. Hennigan – Los Angeles Times
Elon Musk, founder and chief executive of Hawthorne rocket maker SpaceX, hastily called a news conference Friday in Washington, D.C., where he outlined an array of matters confronting his upstart company. A cryptic email was sent to media around 9 p.m. Pacific time Thursday that said he would "make an important SpaceX announcement" the next day at the National Press Club. The big announcement, however, wasn't quite clear. Musk made several revelations during the half-hour event.
First, he provided an update on SpaceX's goal of creating the world's first fully reusable rocket — the holy grail in rocketry. Then, he said the company was filing suit against the U.S. Air Force to open up competition in rocket launches. Finally, he mentioned that SpaceX was building a launch facility in southern Texas.
Musk opened the event by talking about a reusable rocket because last week SpaceX launched its Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida to deliver supplies to the International Space Station for NASA. After the Falcon 9 blasted off and the second stage was jettisoned, the first stage fell back to Earth before reigniting its rocket engines to cushion its attempted landing in the Atlantic Ocean.
Although SpaceX was unable to recover the first stage because of a storm and unsafe sea conditions, the company received data that said the rocket carried out a soft landing. The data was so promising that engineers believe SpaceX will be able to launch and return a booster by the end of the year.
The stage would then be refurbished and reused early next year.
"The data is very clear that it shows a soft landing," Musk said. "I think this bodes very well for achieving reusability."
For SpaceX, a reusable system could mean big savings in developing and operating rockets. The closest example of a reusable launch system is the retired space shuttle fleet, spacecraft that were only partially reused after a tedious months-long overhaul.
These savings would help further bring down costs. SpaceX already keeps costs low — rockets start at $56 million — because it manufactures nearly all of its own parts. Founded in 2002, SpaceX makes rockets at a sprawling facility in Hawthorne that was once used to assemble fuselage sections for Boeing 747s.
SpaceX's sales pitch has worked on NASA. The company's launch last week marked the third flight in its $1.6-billion, 12-mission contract with the space agency to transport cargo to the space station.
But the company hasn't been able to break into the lucrative business of launching the U.S. government's most sophisticated national security satellites.
For eight years, the Pentagon has paid Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp. — operating jointly as United Launch Alliance — to launch the government's pricey spy satellites without seeking competitive bids.
The Air Force buys United Launch Alliance rockets to launch school-bus-size satellites for spying, weather forecasting, communications, GPS and other experimental purposes. The government pays the company nearly $1 billion each year whether it launches six times or none.
Musk has taken issue with the cozy partnership and wants a piece of the military's contracts, which could be worth as much as $70 billion through 2030.
"These launches should be competed," he said. "If we compete and lose, that is fine. But why would they not even compete it?"
The company plans on filing the lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims next week.
In recent months, United Launch Alliance has been criticized for the way it builds its rockets. It uses a Russian-built RD-180 rocket engine on its Atlas V.
In the wake of Russia's seizure of Crimea, SpaceX has hammered United Launch Alliance over use of the engine. The Pentagon has directed the Air Force to perform a review to understand the implications of using the engine.
"This seems like the wrong time to send hundreds of millions of dollars to the Kremlin," Musk said.
In a question-and-answer part of the briefing, Musk revealed more details of his previously announced plans to add a small Texas town on the Gulf of Mexico to its list of rocket launch sites.
He said a launch pad in Brownsville, Texas, would be "active in a couple of years."
SpaceX already has two launch pads in Cape Canaveral and another launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base, northwest of Santa Barbara.
SpaceX's Latest Cargo Flight Delivers a Step Toward Rocket Reusability
Dan Leone – Space News
A Space Exploration Technologies Corp. Dragon spacecraft arrived at the international space station April 20, delivering nearly 2,100 kilograms of cargo to the orbital outpost. Dragon's arrival followed an April 18 launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 launcher that pulled double-duty as an experiment in rocket reusability. The goal was to do a simulated "landing" at sea of Falcon 9's first stage, which was equipped with four landing legs for the experiment.
After separating from the upper stage that sent Dragon to orbit, Falcon 9's first stage fired back up, steered itself back down to sea level, extended its landing legs, and turned itself vertical more or less as it would for touchdown on solid ground. SpaceX says the stage hit the water at near-zero velocity.
"I'm happy to confirm that we were able to do a soft-landing of the Falcon 9 boost stage in the Atlantic, and all the data that we received back shows that it did a soft landing and was in a healthy condition after that," SpaceX founder and Chief Executive Elon Musk said during an April 25 press conference here.
The stage was not recovered intact because of rough seas, Musk said. SpaceX did get bits and pieces of the stage back, including one of the stage's four landing legs.
Dragon, meanwhile, is slated to bring back some 1,600 kilograms of cargo, including scientific experiments and medical samples, when it splashes down May 18. Dragon's launch was delayed several times, most recently April 14, when a faulty helium valve on Falcon 9's first stage prompted the company to abort liftoff and swap out the balky hardware.
On April 23, with Dragon still berthed with station, astronauts completed a spacewalk to replace an external computer that failed April 11.
Now that Dragon has arrived, NASA's other contract cargo hauler, Orbital Sciences Corp. of Dulles, Va., is set to launch its next cargo delivery mission in early June.
SpaceX, Hawthorne, Calif., and Orbital are delivering cargo to the ISS under Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contracts signed in 2008. SpaceX's $1.6 billion deal calls for delivering at least 20 tons of cargo spread over 12 flights. Orbital, which has flown one delivery mission so far, has an eight-flight, $1.9 billion contract.
Reduce, Reuse, Refly
SpaceX's latest ISS cargo run, its third CRS flight to date, marked the second time the company has conducted launch-day experiments with rocket reusability.
Looking ahead, a landing attempt on terra firma might yet happen this year, and SpaceX might fly a recovered booster as early as 2015, Musk said during the press conference. Besides experiments conducted after launches for customers — the first took place after Falcon 9 launched Canada's Cassiope space-weather satellite in September — SpaceX has been testing components of its reusable booster system on test bed vehicles known as Grasshopper and F9R.
The single-engine Grasshopper, now retired, started flying in 2011 from SpaceX's test facility in McGregor, Texas. F9R, a three-engine variant that logged its first flight April 14 in McGregor, will eventually transition to New Mexico's Spaceport America for suborbital flights.
The company's goal is to land a used booster stage on the ground, retrieve it, reintegrate it with another payload, refuel it and relaunch it, engines and all. Musk used the phrase "fully, and rapidly reusable." After a dry landing, it might take as little as one day to refuel and reuse a recovered booster, Musk speculated at the April 25 press conference.
NASA, meanwhile, was interested in the April 18 experiment because of its applicability to landing large payloads on Mars. However, the agency was not able to get the data it wanted because the Lockheed Martin P-3 aircraft that was supposed to be dispatched from the Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., to track the descending stage was not able to get off the ground "because of icy conditions," according William Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for human exploration and operations.
"What we were doing is looking at how [rocket] thrusters work supersonically for braking into the thinner martian atmosphere instead of using parachutes," Gerstenmaier told SpaceNews at the Humans to Mars summit here April 22. "We needed external photographic evidence, external thermal imaging.
An aircraft that tracked the first stage's entry, descent and splashdown for SpaceX did not produce the sort of data NASA wanted, Gerstenmaier said.
Editorial: SpaceX's Plan Shows Aggressive Investment In R&D
"The audacity of the concept and speed of the program's progress make it an exemplar."
Aviation Week & Space Technology
SpaceX founder Elon Musk has always acknowledged the debt his company owes to NASA. Much of SpaceX's technology is rooted in the space agency's research. As the entrepreneur says, "I would not have been able to start SpaceX without the amazing work NASA has done in the past. Nor would SpaceX be where it is today without the help of NASA."
But standing on the shoulders of giants is also the first step to becoming one yourself, and SpaceX's ambitious test of a reusable booster this month may have done as much to prove it is on a trajectory to greatness as all its other spectacular successes put together. The risk involved is testing a radical concept for a reusable booster concept during a vitally important cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station (ISS). As if the ISS resupply flight was not important enough, SpaceX also wants to compete against United Space Alliance for U.S. Air Force missions to launch military and intelligence satellites. Failure was not an option, just a distinct possibility.
SpaceX has not revealed much of its flight data, but it seems to have been overwhelmingly successful (see page 25). And the flight certainly evokes NASA's can-do spirit of the 1960s. SpaceX's breakneck pace of development has been almost Apollo-like in its execution.
The ground-launched Grasshopper vertical-launch, vertical- landing development testbed, which formed the first part of Musk's plan to slash the cost of each launch, only flew for the first time in September 2012. Pending further successful tests of the follow-on Falcon 9 reusable demonstrators as well as more booster recovery attempts on other launches this year, SpaceX says the first reflight of a used booster could come as early as next year.
Success is far from guaranteed, and the pieces of Musk's low-cost launch puzzle still need to be fitted together. But the ambitious effort shows a more aggressive investment in R&D than by the established players, either those supported in the U.S. by the Defense Department or those in Europe backed by the EU and European Space Agency. If Musk can get so far so quickly, who is to say his vision of human settlements on Mars is beyond reach.
Marshall Space Flight Center ranks among most innovative federal government centers
Lee Roop – Huntsville (AL) Times
Not only is NASA the most innovative and employees' favorite agency to work for in the federal government, new reports say the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville is one of the top five most innovative sub-agencies in the entire government.
Votes by federal government employees determined the top agency to work for, but the most-innovative choice is based on analysis by the Partnership for Public Service, Deloitte and the Hay Group of the Office of Personnel Management's 2013 Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey.
NASA claimed all of the top five sub-agency spots for innovation, in fact, starting with No. 1, the John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. The other NASA centers in the top 5 are Goddard Space Flight Center (2), Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (3), Marshall Space Flight Center (4) and Langley Research Center (5).
Marshall Director Patrick Scheuermann has now led two of NASA's most innovative centers. Scheuermann came to Marshall on Sept. 25, 2012 from Stennis.
The least-innovative agency in the federal government? That would be the Department of Homeland Security, according to the study.
Congress must fund deep-space travel for U.S.'s sake
Charles Walker, Guest Columnist – Orlando Sentinel
With our economy stuck in a slow recovery, voters want leaders in Washington to create high-tech jobs, support new technologies for American industry and help inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers and innovators that will grow our economy for the future. It's a tall order, but I'm glad to see so many congressional representatives from Florida are meeting this challenge, in part by supporting NASA missions to explore deep space.
In a recent letter cosigned with 28 other members of the House, Reps. Frederica S. Wilson, Corrine Brown, Bill Posey and Alan Grayson urged the White House to put a greater emphasis on efforts to send American astronauts to explore space beyond earth's orbit.
Deep-space missions would restore America's forward-leaning space leadership in a way not seen since the Apollo program that landed us on the moon and generated thousands of technology spinoffs — like the integrated circuit. This is a great challenge our country and our economy need. While developing countries like China are trying to catch us in space with missions to earth orbit and the moon, we should continue our leadership by reaching past them to Mars and beyond.
NASA is already building the systems we need. Contractors have started construction of the most powerful rocket in history, the Space Launch System, which will be capable of sending nine school buses worth of cargo beyond Earth's orbit. Later this year, NASA will test a prototype of the manned Orion space capsule that would ride atop the SLS. And NASA scientists are working on the tough challenges posed by deep-space missions that could last years, like how to shield astronauts from deep-space radiation and maintain efficient life support.
NASA's deep-space efforts complement the flurry of activity by private companies to reach the International Space Station. As the first astronaut to fly with NASA on behalf of a commercial space company, I've seen how a smart division between NASA and the private sector can drive costs down for profitable missions, leaving NASA with more money to pursue greater space exploration.
As commercial space companies make it cheaper and more efficient to send astronauts to the ISS, NASA should be allocating more funding to new technologies that will send astronauts into deep space.
Exploring deep space will unlock incredible rewards for science and our economy. Designing and building deep-space technologies will create thousands of jobs and generate lucrative commercial spinoffs that drive our economy — like GPS and cellphone cameras, and medical technologies like in-ear thermometers — just like every prior phase of our space program from Apollo to the shuttle. In 2011 alone, NASA invested roughly $900 million in Florida, driving critical economic growth.
These missions will also uncover new clues about the beginnings of the universe and how our solar system evolved. The discoveries we make will, in turn, inspire the next generation of American scientists and engineers so we continue to lead in space for decades to come.
Some argue that space exploration is a luxury we can't afford. But if we want to continue America's global economic leadership, I'd say it's a necessity, not a luxury. Investing in NASA generates enormous returns — upwards of $10 in lucrative spinoffs for each dollar spent in research and development — at very little cost. The entire NASA budget is less than half a penny out of each taxpayer dollar. And deep-space missions would not break our budget. To put them in perspective, we spend as much to maintain empty government buildings every two years as it would cost to build the SLS and Orion capsule needed to reach Mars.
Sending American astronauts into deep space could become the defining technology challenge of this generation. NASA is ready to meet that challenge — all it needs is unified support from Washington and clear direction on specific goals. I stand with the representatives from Florida in calling on President Obama and others in Congress to support NASA's human exploration into deep space by fully funding the SLS, Orion space capsule and other critical deep-space technologies.Charles Walker is a former engineer and astronaut who flew on three space shuttle missions on behalf of the McDonnell Douglas Corp. in the 1980s.
Astronaut Twins To Separate For The Sake Of Space Travel
NPR Staff
This month, NASA revealed new details of the plan to send humans to Mars by 2030. It's an elaborate and expensive mission, involving a giant deep-space rocket, and roping an asteroid into the moon's orbit to use as a stepping stone to Mars.
But there are still some serious questions about a manned expedition to Mars. Namely, is it safe? That's where astronauts Scott and Mark Kelly come in. The Kelly brothers are identical twins, and the only siblings ever to both fly in space.
Starting next March, Scott Kelly will spend a year at the International Space Station. While he's up there, he will be a part of some novel scientific experiments comparing his health to his brother's down on Earth.
The idea is to learn about the effects of long-term space travel on the human body, which will influence how NASA proceeds with the Mars mission and other space travel initiatives.
The twins are ideal candidates for studying how these extended trips can affect genetics.
"It was kind of ironic or interesting — maybe serendipitous — that after this flight I will have flown about 540 days compared to [Mark's] 54, so an order of magnitude more," Scott tells NPR's Eric Westervelt.
It's known that being in space can affect bone and muscle mass, and the exposure to radiation can increase the risk of cancer. The astronauts hope this experiment will also shed light on how space travel affects the immune system. In one test, NASA says, both brothers will be given a flu vaccine to see how their systems react.
While there are a number of possible health issues associated with being in space, Scott will also be exercising a lot while he's up there (and that might encourage Mark, who is now retired, to run an extra mile or two in the meantime).
The details of the experiments haven't been finalized yet, but they will likely include drawing blood, ultrasounds, CT scans and urine samples.
"The kids usually get a little laugh out of Dad's pee being in the refrigerator," Mark says.
After 15 years of being a NASA astronaut, he says, "I've had a lot of science done on me already, so I kind of know what I'm getting myself into."
How Nasa plans to put a man on Mars in 20 years: Space bosses reveal the route to the red planet
- Giant deep space SLS rocket already being built
- Small missions would lead to first manned mission to Mars in 2030s
- Asteroid will be used as a base to send astronauts to Mars
Mark Prigg – Daily Mail (UK)
Nasa has reveal new details of its plan to send humans to an asteroid by 2025 and Mars in the 2030s.
The space agency was recently given the go-ahead for a mission to redirect an asteroid into the moon's orbit, land astronauts there and use the asteroid as a testing outpost and way station on the way to Mars.
Development of key components of the deep-space rocket, capsule and infrastructure needed to reach Mars are already underway.
Nasa's top human exploration chief has revealed to a Senate panel plans for a manned mission Mars in the 2030s are on track.
Development of key components of the deep-space rocket, capsule and infrastructure needed to reach Mars are already underway - and today Nasa was given the go-ahead for a mission to land on an asteroid as part of a 'stepping stone' to Mars.
'Our next step is deep space, where NASA will send a robotic mission to capture and redirect an asteroid to orbit the moon,' Nasa said today.
'Astronauts aboard the Orion spacecraft will explore the asteroid in the 2020s, returning to Earth with samples.
'This experience in human spaceflight beyond low-Earth orbit will help NASA test new systems and capabilities, such as Solar Electric Propulsion, which we'll need to send cargo as part of human missions to Mars.'
A House subcommittee recently approved an authorization bill that would allow Nasa to redirect an asteroid into the moon's orbit, land astronauts there and use the asteroid as a testing outpost and way station on the way to Mars.
'Beginning in FY 2018, NASA's powerful Space Launch System rocket will enable these "proving ground" missions to test new capabilities,' Nasa said.
'Human missions to Mars will rely on Orion and an evolved version of SLS that will be the most powerful launch vehicle ever flown.'
The agency will now have to spell out the cost and details of the mission as part of an exploration 'roadmap' to Mars that Nasa will have to submit to Congress.
The approval came as associate Nasa Administrator Bill Gerstenmaier told members of a Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation subcommittee that the agency remains on target to launch an uncrewed mission in 2017 to test the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion multi-purpose crew vehicle that will carry astronauts to Mars.
Avionics testing of solid rocket boosters was completed this week at Kennedy Space Center in preparation for a test of the SLS rocket later this year, and acoustic testing is also underway.
'There is real hardware in manufacture for the path to Mars,' Gerstenmaier told senators.
'Our architecture is designed for long-term human exploration of our solar system, including the goal of human missions to Mars.'
The hearing, called 'From Here to Mars,' outlined intermediate space missions being planned as steps toward long-duration space travel.
'With the technologies and techniques we develop, we will enable expeditions to multiple destinations, ultimately allowing us to pioneer Mars and other destinations as we lay the groundwork for permanent human settlements in the solar system,' Gerstenmaier said.
One planned mission is to a near-Earth asteroid, Gerstenmaier said.
'NASA will employ SLS and Orion for an early human exploration mission to perform pioneering human operations further from the Earth than ever before, rendezvousing with and returning samples from an asteroid redirected to at stable orbit around the Moon by the robotic segment of the Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM),' he explained.
'We're going to grab a piece of the solar system, we're going to deflect it around the moon and insert it into a distant retrograde orbit around the moon where our crews can go visit," he said.
'To think we're moving a piece of the solar system for our use that will allow us to learn skills and techniques that we need to push the human presence into the solar system, that's a pretty awe-inspiring statement.'
However, the ambitious Mars mission could be delayed or derailed if funding from a budget-conscious Congress continues to erode, or if other countries' plans for a lunar mission force the U.S. to change course for security reasons.
ISS Partners Considering Additional One-Year Missions
Jeff Foust – Space News
To better understand the human health risks of future missions to Mars, NASA and its international space station partners are considering flying as many as half a dozen additional one-year missions to the station, a NASA official said April 23.
Speaking at the Humans to Mars Summit here, Bill Paloski, manager of NASA's Human Research Program, said discussions are ongoing to fly up to five or six one-year crew increments after the first one-year increment, featuring NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Roscosmos cosmonaut Mikhail Korniyenko and scheduled to start next March. If approved, the first of the additional one-year missions would likely start a year after the end of the first.
The purpose of the additional one-year missions would be to build up a larger database of the medical effects of long-term spaceflight to support planning for Mars missions, which could last up to two and a half years. "The way to extrapolate to 30-month missions is to get some more data at 12 months and to be able to determine that, between 6 months and 12 months, we're able to protect people," he said.
Those later one-year missions would, like the upcoming one, involve two crew members, Paloski said in an interview at the conference. One would be a Russian cosmonaut, and the other would either be a NASA astronaut or one from Europe, Japan or Canada. He added that they are not currently considering flying crew increments of longer than one year.
Proton-M Rocket Launches Kazakh, Russian Satellites
RIA-Novosti
A Russian Proton-M carrier rocket has successfully placed Kazakhstan's KazSat-3 telecommunications satellite and Russia's Luch-5V relay satellite into Earth orbit, the Russian space agency Roscosmos said Monday.
"The Briz-M booster with two satellites has separated from the Proton-M carrier rocket. The Kazakh satellite, KazSat-3, is due to reach its final orbit at 5:17 p.m. Moscow time (01:17 GMT) and the Russian Luch relay satellite will separate from the booster at 5:57 p.m. Moscow time (01:57 GMT)," the agency said.
The Luch-5V will be the third satellite in Russia's Luch Satellite Data Relay Network, used to transmit live TV images and communications from the International Space Station and orbital spacecraft to Earth, in a manner similar to that of the US Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System.
The KazSat-3 satellite will provide telecommunications, TV, broadband Internet and other services in Kazakhstan and neighboring countries. It was manufactured as part a project to create a national space telecoms network.
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