Keep the shuttle flying: February 2015

Saturday, February 28, 2015

Fwd: Space station astronauts cleared for third spacewalk

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 28, 2015 at 2:12:48 PM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Space station astronauts cleared for third spacewalk

By William HarwoodCBS News
February 27, 2015, 3:15 PM
Space station astronauts cleared for third spacewalk
Expedition 42 commander Barry "Butch" Wilmore, wearing a green shirt, and Terry Virts chatted with reporters Thursday from the space station's Quest airlock module. NASA managers Friday cleared them for a third spacewalk Sunday to complete initial preparations for dockings by commercial crew capsules. NASA TV

International Space Station managers Friday cleared astronauts Barry "Butch" Wilmore and Terry Virts to proceed with a third spacewalk Sunday, as originally planned, after concluding a small amount of water in Virts' space helmet after an EVA Wednesday was an understood condition and not a threat to crew safety.
The six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk is scheduled to begin around 7:10 a.m. EST Sunday when the astronauts switch their spacesuits to battery power and exit the station's airlock. The spacewalkers plan to install four antennas, laser reflectors and cabling to permit communications with approaching and departing commercial crew capsules being built by Boeing and SpaceX.
"We're going to lay down over 400 feet of cable," Virts told a reporter Thursday. "These cables are going to attach to some antennas that are going to be used for the future American vehicles that are going to be docking, bringing crew to the space station starting in a few years.
"So we need to put these antennas and the cables there for them, and also some reflectors so their on-board navigation systems that use lasers (to) know where the station is and what orientation it's in and will be able to dock properly. There's a lot of moving from one end to the other on the station and a lot of equipment and hardware that we're going to be bringing out there."
During spacewalks last Saturday and Wednesday, Wilmore and Virts laid out some 340 feet of power and data lines needed by two new docking mechanisms what will be installed later this year and made preparations to relocate a storage module and a docking port extension. Virts also lubricated the grapple mechanisms on the end of the station's robot arm.
During airlock repressurization Wednesday, Virts noticed a small blob of water floating in his helmet and reported that a water absorption pad at the back of his helmet was damp, indicating seepage through the helmet's air duct.
During a spacewalk in July 2013, Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano endured a potentially catastrophic water leak that forced him to make a quick retreat to the safety of the airlock. That leak was blamed on a clogged filter inside the suit's water cooling system.
But in Virts' case, the water intrusion occurred after the spacesuit had been reconnected to a station umbilical and after airlock repressurization had begun. As it turns out that same spacesuit experienced similar incidents after seven previous spacewalks, the result of condensation in the suit's cooling system after airlock repressurization.
"When you connect to the umbilical, you have a lot of cold air that's going past the cooling system of the suit and this air will often condense," Alex Kanelakos, a NASA spacewalk officer, said Friday. "And as we repress, we have high-density gas that's flowing past this condensed water that can often move the water over the crew member's helmet."
Up to 57 milliliters, or about four tablespoons, of "sublimator water carryover" is considered acceptable, far less than what was experienced by Parmitano. In Virts' case, only about 15 milliliters -- three teaspoons -- of water made it into the helmet.
"This spacesuit is known to have what we call carryover water," Kanelakos said. "We've had seven other occurrences of this carryover on the spacesuit. ... It's not expected every time, but it's a known feature. That's why we monitor a lot of the parameters on the ground. We're continually getting data and we're watching that to see if we're having any occurrences of this situation or the situation that Luca had. And they're very different occurrences."
Speaking to a reporter Thursday, Virts said "I'm completely confident I'm not going outside unless we're sure it's a good suit."

© 2015 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Fwd: Panel says it can’t confirm Commercial Crew meets safety standards

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 28, 2015 at 2:15:22 PM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Panel says it can't confirm Commercial Crew meets safety standards

Panel says it can't confirm Commercial Crew meets safety standards
Ledyard King, USA TODAY 12:11 a.m. EST February 28, 2015
WASHINGTON – It's impossible to know whether a multibillion-dollar program to replace the space shuttle with private rockets meets safety standards because NASA has been slow to provide adequate information, the head of a NASA advisory panel said Friday.
"Candid, timely, and transparent communication has been insufficient," Vice Adm. Joseph Dyer, chairman of the NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, told members of a House Science, Space and Technology subcommittee. "This lack of transparency has been a concern for a number of years despite numerous discussions... with senior NASA officials."
Dyer's remarks echo a report his panel issued last month saying it has been denied access to "critical safety and certification information" necessary to evaluate the safety of the Commercial Crew Program.
The initiative is an Obama administration priority aimed at hiring private companies to transport astronauts from the U.S. to the International Space Station starting in late 2017. Since the last shuttle mission in 2011, NASA has paid Russia hundreds of millions to ferry U.S crew to the orbiting lab.
Dyer told lawmakers NASA has been more forthcoming with information in recent weeks, but that did not satisfy lawmakers.
"Denying information to (the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel), or Congress, about the Commercial Crew Program is unacceptable when the hardworking American taxpayers are footing the bill for the program and the safety of our astronauts is on the line," said GOP Rep. Steven Palazzo, R-Miss., who chairs the Space Subcommittee that held Friday's hearing.
That sentiment was shared by Maryland Rep. Donna Edwards, the top Democrat on the subcommittee. Edwards told Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's associate administrator for human exploration, she was "incredibly dismayed at the advisory panel's difficulty in obtaining the kind of information they need to advise Congress."
The Commercial Crew Program is a departure from traditional NASA contracting. In part to save money and spur innovation, the agency is giving two companies — Boeing and SpaceX — billions in federal subsidies under Space Act agreements that provide contractors latitude to build their spacecraft. That process is less transparent because some of the work is proprietary to the companies.
Gerstenmaier told lawmakers the companies still must meet NASA's safety standards. He said the release of data was complicated by a bid protest involving the Commercial Crew Program, but the agency turned over pertinent information to the advisory panel in January.
"And we'll continue to give more as needed," he told lawmakers.
It's the latest flashpoint between NASA and Congress over the Commercial Crew Program.
Republican lawmakers are particularly wary of the program because they believe it's draining resources from Congress' top priority: a deep-space mission to Mars. NASA has consistently responded that the two are not connected.
As part of the administration's $18.5 billion request for NASA in fiscal 2016, the White House is seeking $1.24 billion for the shuttle replacement program.
Congress approved a record $805 million for the program in this year's budget but has never fully met the administration's request. That lack of full funding over the years has prompted NASA to rely on Space Act agreements more than it intended, Gerstenmaier said.
When first conceived, Commercial Crew was projected to start flights to the space station in 2016. Gerstenmaier warned anything short of funding the full request next year would likely delay the first flights to at least 2018.
Relying on the Russians for another year of rides to the orbiting lab could cost as much as $500 million, more than the increase NASA is seeking for the program next year.
California Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, whose district is close to SpaceX headquarters, said that would be a mistake.
"That is a very considerable price that we're paying than if we just go ahead and fund the program," he told fellow subcommittee members. "I hope that sinks into people's minds."
Contact Ledyard King at lking@gannett.com
© 2015 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Satellite Information Network, Inc.

Fwd: 20-year-old Military Weather Satellite Apparently Exploded in Orbit

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 28, 2015 at 11:57:46 AM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: 20-year-old Military Weather Satellite Apparently Exploded in Orbit

20-year-old Military Weather Satellite Apparently Exploded in Orbit
by Brian Berger and Mike Gruss — February 27, 2015
http://spacenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/DMSP-USAF-879x485.jpg
Defense Meteorological Satellite System (DMSP) spacecraft. Credit: U.S. Air Force
WASHINGTON — A 20-year-old military weather satellite apparently exploded in orbit Feb. 3 following what the U.S. Air Force described as a sudden temperature spike.
The "catastrophic event" produced 43 pieces of space debris, according to Air Force Space Command, which disclosed the loss of the satellite Feb. 27 in response to questions from SpaceNews.
The satellite, Defense Meteorological Satellite Program Flight 13, was the oldest continuously operational satellite in the DMSP weather constellation.
Launched in 1995, DMSP-F13 provided thousands of hours of weather imagery to Air Force and Navy forecasters before transitioning to a backup role in 2006. The Air Force said its sudden loss would have minimal impact.
"Because this satellite was no longer used by the National Weather Service or the Air Force Weather Agency, the impact of the loss of this satellite is minimal," the Air Force said. "We anticipate real-time weather data for tactical users will be slightly reduced without this satellite, but its data was not being used for weather forecast modeling."
The Air Force still has six DMSP satellites in service following the launch last April of DMSP-F19. A seventh satellite, DMSP-F20, was under consideration for a 2016 launch as recently as November.
Air Force Space Command said DMSP-F13's power subsystem experienced "a sudden spike in temperature" followed by "an unrecoverable loss of attitude control." As DMSP operators were deciding to "render the vehicle safe" the Joint Space Operations Center at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, identified a debris field near the satellite.
The Air Force said it is continuing to track the debris and will issue conjunction warnings if necessary.
"While the initial response is complete, JSpOC personnel will continue to assess this event to learn more about what happened and what it will mean for users within this orbit," said Air Force Col. John Giles, the Joint Space Operations Center's director.
DMSP-F13 flew in a 800-kilometer sun-synchronous polar orbit popular for weather and spy satellites.
The first public indication of a problem with DMSP-F13 came from T.S. Kelso, a senior research astrodynamicist for Analytical Graphics' Center for Space Standards and Innovation in Colorado Springs, Colorado, who noted Feb. 25 that there had been "another debris event with 26 new pieces" in addition to five previously cataloged DMSP-F13 objects.
It appears we've had another debris event with 26 new pieces of debris from DMSP 5D-2 F13 launch. Analyzing circumstances now.
— T.S. Kelso (@TSKelso) February 26, 2015
TLEs suggest event occurred on Feb 3 at ~1715 UTC: pic.twitter.com/dpDnK058ze — T.S. Kelso (@TSKelso) February 26, 2015

Of the 5 previously cataloged DMSP 5D-2 F13 objects, D decayed Jan 31. We have no TLEs for DMSP payload, which was shown as operational. — T.S. Kelso (@TSKelso) February 26, 2015

© 2015 SpaceNews, Inc. All rights reserved.

Fwd: Curiosity rover drills rock sample at Mount Sharp

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 28, 2015 at 2:10:26 PM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Curiosity rover drills rock sample at Mount Sharp

February 25, 2015
NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover Drills at 'Telegraph Peak'
This hole, with a diameter slightly smaller than a U.S. dime, was drilled by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover into a rock target called "Telegraph Peak." Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
› Full image and caption
-- "Telegraph Peak" is third drilling site in outcrop at base of Mount Sharp
-- Choice of drilling site motivated by chemistry measurements
-- Mission heading through "Artist's Drive" and higher on Mount Sharp
NASA's Curiosity Mars rover used its drill on Tuesday, Feb. 24 to collect sample powder from inside a rock target called "Telegraph Peak." The target sits in the upper portion of "Pahrump Hills," an outcrop the mission has been investigating for five months.
The Pahrump Hills campaign previously drilled at two other sites. The outcrop is an exposure of bedrock that forms the basal layer of Mount Sharp. Curiosity's extended mission, which began last year after a two-year prime mission, is examing layers of this mountain that are expected to hold records of how ancient wet environments on Mars evolved into drier environments.
The rover team is planning to drive Curiosity away from Pahrump Hills in coming days, exiting through a narrow valley called "Artist's Drive," which will lead the rover along a strategically planned route higher on the basal layer of Mount Sharp.
The Telegraph Peak site was selected after the team discussed the large set of physical and chemical measurements acquired throughout the campaign. In particular, measurements of the chemistry of the Telegraph Peak site, using the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) on the rover's arm, motivated selection of this target for drilling before the departure from Pahrump Hills.
Compared to the chemistry of rocks and soils that Curiosity assessed before reaching Mount Sharp, the rocks of Pahrump Hills are relatively enriched in the element silicon in proportion to the amounts of the elements aluminum and magnesium. The latest drilling site exhibits that characteristic even more strongly than the earlier two, which were lower in the outcrop.
"When you graph the ratios of silica to magnesium and silica to aluminum, 'Telegraph Peak' is toward the end of the range we've seen," said Curiosity co-investigator Doug Ming, of NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston. "It's what you would expect if there has been some acidic leaching. We want to see what minerals are present where we found this chemistry."
The rock-powder sample from Telegraph Peak goes to the rover's internal Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument for identification of the minerals. After that analysis, the team may also choose to deliver sample material to Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) suite of laboratory instruments.
The sample-collection drilling at Telegraph Peak was the first in Curiosity's 30 months on Mars to be conducted without a preliminary "mini drill" test of the rock's suitability for drilling. The team judged full-depth drilling to be safe for the drill based on similarities of the target to the previous Pahrump Hills targets. The rover used a low-percussion-level drilling technique that it first used on the previous drilling target, "Mojave 2."
Curiosity reached the base of Mount Sharp after two years of examining other sites inside Gale Crater and driving toward the mountain at the crater's center.
NASA's Mars Science Laboratory Project is using Curiosity to assess ancient habitable environments and major changes in Martian environmental conditions. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, built the rover and manages the project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The rover's APXS was provided by the Canadian Space Agency. CheMin was developed by NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Air Force Base, California, and SAM was developed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.
For more information about Curiosity, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/msl
http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/
You can follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter at:
http://www.facebook.com/marscuriosity
http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity

Media Contact
Guy Webster
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-354-6278
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

Dwayne Brown NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726
dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov

2015-069

Curiosity rover drills rock sample at Mount Sharp
28 February 2015 by Astronomy Now
This hole, with a diameter slightly smaller than a U.S. dime coin, was drilled by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover into a rock target called "Telegraph Peak," within the basal layer of Mount Sharp. Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS.
NASA's Curiosity Mars rover used its drill on Tuesday, 24 February to collect sample powder from inside a rock target called "Telegraph Peak." The target sits in the upper portion of "Pahrump Hills," an outcrop the mission has been investigating for five months.
The Pahrump Hills campaign previously drilled at two other sites. The outcrop is an exposure of bedrock that forms the basal layer of Mount Sharp. Curiosity's extended mission, which began last year after a two-year prime mission, is examing layers of this mountain that are expected to hold records of how ancient wet environments on Mars evolved into drier environments.
The rover team is planning to drive Curiosity away from Pahrump Hills in coming days, exiting through a narrow valley called "Artist's Drive," which will lead the rover along a strategically planned route higher on the basal layer of Mount Sharp.
The Telegraph Peak site was selected after the team discussed the large set of physical and chemical measurements acquired throughout the campaign. In particular, measurements of the chemistry of the Telegraph Peak site, using the Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer (APXS) on the rover's arm, motivated selection of this target for drilling before the departure from Pahrump Hills.
Compared to the chemistry of rocks and soils that Curiosity assessed before reaching Mount Sharp, the rocks of Pahrump Hills are relatively enriched in the element silicon in proportion to the amounts of the elements aluminum and magnesium. The latest drilling site exhibits that characteristic even more strongly than the earlier two, which were lower in the outcrop.
"When you graph the ratios of silica to magnesium and silica to aluminum, 'Telegraph Peak' is toward the end of the range we've seen," said Curiosity co-investigator Doug Ming, of NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston. "It's what you would expect if there has been some acidic leaching. We want to see what minerals are present where we found this chemistry."
The rock-powder sample from Telegraph Peak goes to the rover's internal Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument for identification of the minerals. After that analysis, the team may also choose to deliver sample material to Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) suite of laboratory instruments.
The sample-collection drilling at Telegraph Peak was the first in Curiosity's 30 months on Mars to be conducted without a preliminary "mini drill" test of the rock's suitability for drilling. The team judged full-depth drilling to be safe for the drill based on similarities of the target to the previous Pahrump Hills targets. The rover used a low-percussion-level drilling technique that it first used on the previous drilling target, "Mojave 2."
Curiosity reached the base of Mount Sharp after two years of examining other sites inside Gale Crater and driving toward the mountain at the crater's centre.
© 2015 Pole Star Publications Ltd.

AmericaSpace
For a nation that explores
February 27th, 2015
Curiosity Snaps Expansive Selfie, Sets Next Drill Campaign
By Ken Kremer

This self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows the vehicle at the "Mojave" site, where its drill collected the mission's second taste of Mount Sharp. The scene combines dozens of images taken during January 2015 by the MAHLI camera at the end of the rover's robotic arm. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
See drill site photomosaics below
The car-sized Curiosity rover has snapped a sweeping selfie encompassing the spectacular alien terrain of the Red Planet, where she has spent the past five months wandering, exploring, and working to unravel the mysteries of the planet's past and assess ancient habitable environments.
This latest selfie from Curiosity was just released by NASA on Feb. 24 and taken during the last half of January at the majestic "Pahrump Hills" outcrop area on Mars. It shows a super wide-angle view around the "Mojave" site where she just conducted a second local area drilling operation for sample analysis by the rover's duo of on-board chemistry laboratories.
The annotated mosaic scene above shows the locations of both the "Pahrump Hills" drill site campaigns completed so far and a third one upcoming very soon. See below our exclusive photo mosaics showing the rover's deployed arm in action boring into Mars at those two drill sites.
The self-portrait was assembled from dozens and dozens of images taken by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera located on the end of the rover's 7-foot-long (2.1-meter-long) robotic arm during January 2015. Therefore, the arm can't be included in the mosaic, just like when you are taking a hand-held selfie of yourself.
Prior to Mojave, Curiosity also snapped selfies at the "Rocknest," "John Klein," and "Windjana" sample-collection sites.
"Mojave 2" is the name of the rock target at the "Mojave" site where the vehicle took its second "bite" out of the base layer of the Martian mountain she is currently investigating and found that the Martian material has been altered by water that's a different flavor and more acidic than the first "bite."
The wide-field view gives a distinctly enhanced context of the current work location because it also includes the nearby site where Curiosity took that first "bite" out of "Pahrump Hills" at the "Confidence Hills" target during September 2014, as well as where she will take her third "bite" shortly at "Telegraph Peak."
NASA's Curiosity rover conducts fifth Martian sample drilling campaign at "Mojave 2" rock target in this composite photo mosaic from Sols 864 to 889. The mosaic shows the robotic arm deployed on Sol 889, Feb. 5, 2015 to the "Pink Cliffs" portion of the "Pahrump Hills" rock outcrop at the base of Mount Sharp, seen in the distance. Arm stowed at left. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Inset top right shows Curiosity imaged from Mars orbit by NASA's MRO spacecraft. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
The "Pahrump Hills" outcrop belongs to the bedrock exposure of the Murray formation that forms the basal geological layer at the base of Mount Sharp, at the center of Mars' Gale Crater.
The scene is beautifully backdropped by the upper portion of Mount Sharp and the eroded rim of Gale Crater.
Mount Sharp is comprised of sedimentary rock layers that record the history of ancient Martian environments and is the primary destination of the mission.
The mountain towers 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the Martian sky and dominates the center of the Gale Crater, where Curiosity safely touched down some 30 months ago in August 2012.
NASA's Curiosity rover scans around the "Pahrump Hills" outcrop from the "Mojave 2" rock drilling site on Sol 882, Jan. 29, 2015. Mount Sharp is seen in the distance in this composite photo mosaic. MAHLI camera raw images stitched. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com
"Compared with the earlier Curiosity selfies, we added extra frames for this one so we could see the rover in the context of the full Pahrump Hills campaign," said rover team member Kathryn Stack at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
"From the Mojave site, we could include every stop we've made during the campaign."
Most of the frames in the new mosaic were taken Jan. 14, 2015, during Sol 868. Additional frames of the Martian terrain were taken Jan. 29, 2015, during Sol 882, to expand the selfie scene on the left and right into a wider, more expansive panorama. Finally, the frames showing the "Mojave " drill holes were taken Jan. 31, 2015, during Sol 884.
Curiosity has been surveying the "Pahrump Hills" area around the base of Mount Sharp for over five months since arriving there last fall in search of scientifically interesting candidates for drilling to elucidate the history of habitability on Mars.
The first "bite" taken from the mountain base was at a nearby target called "Confidence Hills" during September 2014.
NASA's Curiosity rover conducts 4th drill campaign at 'Pahrump Hills' rock outcrop on Sol 759, Sept. 24, 2014, at the foothills of Mount Sharp seen in the distance. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer-kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo
The rover then conducted a "walkabout" to scout the area for the best places to drill. During the walkabout, the rover climbed from the outcrop's base to higher sections three times to create vertical profiles of the rock structures and chemistry for determining the most scientifically productive spots for sample-collection drilling.
The second bite was carried out at a crystal-rich rock target named "Mojave 2" that lies in the "Pink Cliffs" portion of a outcrop called "Pahrump Hills," an exposure of the Murray formation that is the basal geological unit of Mount Sharp. The location is shown in another annotated scene below.
Curiosity bored the "Mojave 2" sample-collection hole on Sol 882 (Jan. 29) to a full depth of about 2.6 inches (6.5 centimeters). The rotary-percussive drill successfully cut a hole about 0.63 inch (1.6 centimeters) in diameter.
The rover always drills an initial mini-drill test hole to determine if the chosen rock target is indeed safe and suitable for full-depth sample collection drilling.
Therefore, two holes are visible in the new selfie as well as a post-drilling dump pile of leftover material not fed into the pair of on-board miniaturized chemistry labs in the rovers belly: CheMin and SAM.
An up-close view of both drill sites at "Confidence Hills" and "Mojave 2" is also shown in the navcam panoramas created by the imaging team of Ken Kremer and Marco Di Lorenzo.
This self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover shows the vehicle at the "Mojave" site, where its drill collected the mission's second taste of Mount Sharp. The scene combines dozens of images taken during January 2015 by the MAHLI camera at the end of the rover's robotic arm. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
So far Curiosity's odometer totals over 6.4 miles (10.3 kilometers) since landing inside Gale Crater on Mars in August 2012. She has taken some 218,000 images during over 900 Sols of exploration.
Meanwhile, older sister rover Opportunity just climbed to the summit of Cape Tribulation along Endeavour crater on the opposite side of Mars as she celebrated her astonishing 11th anniversary roving the Red Planet!
She captured breathtaking panoramas from the highest peak she will ever climb. See our mosaic created from raw images here.
Now, Opportunity is on the cusp of driving the distance of a marathon runner's race on Earth—detailed here.
Despite all those accomplishments, the White House is trying to "Kill Opportunity"—detailed here.
Stay tuned here for continuing updates from Mars and throughout our Solar System!
Ken Kremer

Want to keep up-to-date with all things space? Be sure to "Like" AmericaSpace on Facebook and follow us on Twitter: @AmericaSpace
This view shows the path and some key places in a survey of the "Pahrump Hills" outcrop by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover in autumn of 2014. The outcrop is at the base of Mount Sharp within Gale Crater. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Copyright © 2015 AmericaSpace - All Rights Reserved

Curiosity Rover Drills into Mars Mountain Again (Photo)
by Mike Wall, Space.com Senior Writer | February 27, 2015 07:45am ET

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity drilled this sample-collecting hole into a rock called Telegraph Peak on Feb. 24, 2015.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS View full size image
NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has bored into rocks at the base of the towering Mount Sharp for the third time.
The car-size Curiosity rover drilled into a rock called Telegraph Peak on Tuesday (Feb. 24), collecting sample powder for analysis by its onboard instruments. The action marked the third drilling operation at an outcrop at the base of Mount Sharp called Pahrump Hills, which Curiosity reached in September 2014 after more than a year of driving.
Mission team members decided to drill Telegraph Peak after Curiosity's Alpha Particle X-ray Spectrometer instrument detected some interesting chemistry in the rock, NASA officials said.
"When you graph the ratios of silica to magnesium and silica to aluminum, Telegraph Peak is toward the end of the range we've seen," Curiosity co-investigator Doug Ming, of NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, said in a statement. "It's what you would expect if there has been some acidic leaching. We want to see what minerals are present where we found this chemistry."
Curiosity — the centerpiece of NASA's $2.5 billion Mars Science Laboratory mission — touched down in August 2012 to investigate whether or not the Red Planet has ever been capable of supporting microbial life. The rover returned exciting results early on; work near its landing site revealed that the area was a habitable lake-and-stream system billions of years ago.
The rover's long stay at Pahrump Hills is coming to an end. Curiosity's handlers plan to send the six-wheeled robot away from the outcrop soon, toward rock deposits higher up in Mount Sharp's foothills, NASA officials said.But Curiosity's main destination has always been Mount Sharp, which rises more than 3 miles (5 kilometers) into the Martian sky. Mission scientists want Curiosity to climb up through the mountain's lower reaches, reading a history of the planet's changing environmental conditions in the rocks as it goes.

Copyright © 2015 TechMediaNetwork.com All rights reserved.

Fwd: Curiosity robot confirms methane in Mars' atmosphere

Sent from my iPad

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 28, 2015 at 2:07:40 PM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Curiosity robot confirms methane in Mars' atmosphere

27-Feb-2015
The Curiosity robot confirms methane in Mars' atmosphere which may hint that existed life
University of Granada

The tunable laser spectrometer in the SAM, Sample Analysis at Mars, instrument of the Curiosity robot has unequivocally detected an episodic increase in the concentration of methane in Mars' atmosphere after an exhaustive analysis of data obtained during 605 soles or Martian days.
Science

27-Feb-2015
The Curiosity robot confirms methane in Mars' atmosphere which may hint that existed life
An article published in Science confirms the existence of methane fluctuations in the atmosphere of Mars, as a result of the detailed analysis of data sent during 605 soles or Martian days
University of Granada

IMAGE: The Curiosity robot has detected the changes of methane on the surface of the red planet (Photo: NASA). view more
Credit: (Photo: NASA)
The tunable laser spectrometer in the SAM (Sample Analysis at Mars) instrument of the Curiosity robot has unequivocally detected an episodic increase in the concentration of methane in Mars' atmosphere after an exhaustive analysis of data obtained during 605 soles or Martian days.
This has been revealed in an article authored by scientists from the MSL (Mars Science Laboratory) mission, recently published in Science. One of the authors of this article is Francisco Javier Martín-Torres, a researcher at the Andalusian Institute of Earth Sciences (CSIC-UGR).
This puts an end to the long controversy on the presence of methane in Mars, which started over a decade ago when this gas was first detected with telescopes from Earth. The controversy increased afterwards with the measurements obtained by orbiting satellites, some of which were occasionally contradictory. These new and incontrovertible data open paths for new research that can identify the sources that produce this gas--which could include some type of biological activity--and the mechanisms by means of which the gas is eliminated with such inexplicable speed.
Ever since the Telescope in the Mauna Kea Canada-France-Hawaii Observatory first announced the detection of methane in the Martian atmosphere, several other measurements of the gas have been conducted by means of a diversity of instruments, both remotely from earth, and also by means of satellites like the Mars Express and the Mars Global Surveyor.
Since methane can be the product of biological activity--practically all the existing methane in Earth's atmosphere originates in this way--this has created great expectations that Martian methane could also be of a similar origin.
Methane in Mars
These observations appeared to be contradictory. Some of them suggested a distribution pattern that was limited in space (with its source in the Northern hemisphere) and time (with a peak of concentration during summer in the Northern hemisphere and its subsequent vanishing in just a matter of months). Both facts are inexplicable by available photochemical and general circulation models, which are currently used to define our understanding of Martian atmosphere.
According to these models, if there really existed methane in Mars, it would remain there for an average 300 years, and during this period it would be homogeneously distributed across the atmosphere. Since we lack a model that can account for its generation, localization and swift disappearance, detections were all called in doubt, and the results were attributed to the instruments employed in their detection, which were working on the very limit of their capacity, and also to the fact that the concentration values of the gas that they yielded were of the ppbv order (parts per billion by volume).
"Within this context, and when we were all almost fully persuaded that the data we had so far collected were at the very least rough it not fully invalid, the expectations to decide on this were bestowed upon the capacity of the SAM instrument to come up with more precise measurements", says this researcher at the Andalusian Institute of Earth Sciences.
By means of its TLS unit, SAM has been detecting basal levels of methane concentration of around 0,7 ppbv, and has confirmed an event of episodic increase of up to ten times this value during a period of sixty soles (Martian days), i.e., of about 7 ppvb.
The new data are based on observations during almost one Martian year (almost two Earth years), included in the initial prediction for the duration of the mission (nominal mission), during which Curiosity has surveyed about 8 kms in the basin of the Gale crater.
Martian seasons
During this period, which comprehends all the full cycle of Martian seasons, the reference to the environmental data collected by the meteorological REMS (Rover Environmental Monitoring Station) station has allowed for the establishment of possible correlations with the environmental parameters that this instrument records: relative humidity, temperature and atmospheric opacity. Data on atmospheric opacity was obtained both by the UV sensor in REMS and also by MastCam (Mast Camera), the camera at Curiosity, which is employed for support in atmospheric surveys.
REMS is an instrument that has been developed and it is being scientifically exploited by Spanish researchers, some of whom have been members of the team that has conducted this important research. The hypothetical existence of seasonal variations in methane concentration in correlation with certain environmental variables, in any case, will be only confirmed through sustained measurements in the future, specifically oriented to establish which factors can determine the sporadic emission and subsequent degradation of this gas in Mars. As far as the spatial disposition of the methane plumes, they have concluded that they are generated in very brief and weak events and in very specific places.
TLS is a two-channel tunable laser spectrometer which analyses in the infrared region--more specifically in a 2,7 μm wavelength through the first channel, and 3,27 μm through the second. The latter channel is specifically prepared for the detection of methane. It has a resolution of 0,0002 cm-1, which allows for the detection of methane through its spectrographic footprint of three very clearly defined lines, and the procedure which is applied (laser light absorption through a sample contained in a closed cell) "is simple, non-invasive and sensitive" as the article itself claims.
Small margin of error
The containing cell can be full of Martian environment or as a vacuum to make contrasting measurements, which include some conducted through artificially increased concentrations, "which has resulted in a very reduced margin for error and guarantees the accuracy of results, which can now be deemed definitively conclusive", says Martín-Torres.
According to him, the new questions posed by these results far outnumber the answers it does provide. "It is a finding that puts paid to the question of the presence of methane in the Martian atmosphere, but it does pose some other more complex and far-reaching questions, such as the nature of its sources--which must lie, we believe, in one or two additional sources that were not originally contemplated in the models used so far. Among these sources, we must not rule out biological methanogenesis. Another new question is related to the bizarre evolution of methane in the Martian atmosphere after its emission. Both questions should be addressed in the future with specifically designed new research."
The newly arrived MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) from NASA will immediately provide continuity for the study of this subject, and in the near future the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), jointly developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Russian Space Agency (Ruscosmos), which is also part of the ExoMars mission, will measure the concentration of methane at larger scale, and it will allow for the establishment of a framework to contextualize the results obtained, and deepen our knowledge of methane dynamics in Mars.
###
Bibliography:
C.R. Webster et al. "Mars Methane Detection and Variability at Gale Crater". Science, 16 de diciembre de 2014.

Bring it back

Fwd: SMAP deploys antenna

Sent from my iPad

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 27, 2015 at 10:11:28 AM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: SMAP deploys antenna

February 26, 2015
New NASA Space Cowboy Successfully Deploys Its 'Lasso'
NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission will produce high-resolution global maps of soil moisture to track water availability around our planet and guide policy decisions.Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
› Larger image | Standard Podcast: Play animation
Like a cowboy at a rodeo, NASA's newest Earth-observing satellite, the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP), has triumphantly raised its "arm" and unfurled a huge golden "lasso" (antenna) that it will soon spin up to rope the best soil moisture maps ever obtained from space.
Launched Jan. 31 from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base on a Delta II rocket, SMAP is now literally riding tall in the saddle as it continues to successfully wrangle the checkout procedures of its three-month-long commissioning phase. Analyses of onboard inertial measurement unit data and other telemetry confirm the antenna deployment, performed Feb. 24, was completely successful.
SMAP's minimum three-year mission will expand our understanding of soil moisture, a key component of the Earth system that links the water, energy and carbon cycles driving our planet. SMAP's combined radar and radiometer instruments will peer into the top 2 inches (5 centimeters) of soil, through clouds and moderate vegetation cover, day and night, to produce the highest-resolution, most accurate soil moisture maps ever obtained from space. SMAP also will detect whether ground is frozen or thawed. Detecting variations in timing of spring thaw and changes in growing season length will help scientists more accurately account for how much carbon plants are removing from the atmosphere each year.
Following its picture-perfect launch and insertion into orbit, mission controllers performed a series of health checks of the observatory's subsystems. They also ran successful initial health checks of SMAP's radiometer and radar science instruments, powering them on for 30 hours in receive-only mode and processing the data. Then on Feb. 18, mission controllers successfully commanded SMAP's 16-foot (5-meter) two-hinged boom to unfold and extend.
On Feb. 24, the team commanded SMAP's reflector antenna at the end of the boom to deploy. Designed and built by Astro Aerospace, a Northrop Grumman Corporation company located in Carpenteria, California, under subcontract to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, SMAP's reflector boom assembly is an advanced, low-mass rotating deployable mesh reflector antenna system that supports the collection of SMAP's radar and radiometric measurements in space. It is the first-ever spinning and precision mass-balanced deployable mesh reflector antenna, and is the largest spinning mesh reflector ever deployed in space. The reflector boom assembly enables SMAP to meet its requirements for high accuracy and high spatial resolution in its soil moisture measurements, and achieve global coverage every two to three days using a single small observatory and medium-lift-class launch vehicle.
Astro Aerospace experts have preliminarily determined that the deployed natural frequency of the reflector boom assembly in orbit is nearly identical to prelaunch model predictions. This provides confidence in the health of the deployed reflector and in its performance once spun up.
For launch, the flexible mesh antenna, which is edged with a ring of lightweight graphite supports called a perimeter truss, had been tightly folded and stowed into a volume of just 1 foot by 4 feet (30 by 120 centimeters). Upon deployment, the truss slowly opened, like a camp chair, to its full diameter of almost 20 feet (6-meters). Despite its size, the reflector weighs in at a mere 56 pounds (25 kilograms). With its supporting boom and launch restraints, the entire reflector and boom assembly weighs just 127 pounds (58 kilograms).
"Deploying large, low-mass structures in space is never easy and is one of the larger engineering challenges NASA missions can confront in development," said Kent Kellogg, SMAP project manager at JPL. "This week's result culminates more than six years of challenging reflector and boom assembly development, system engineering and an extensive test campaign. With this key milestone in our rear-view mirror, the team now looks forward to completing the remainder of our commissioning activities and beginning routine science operations for this important mission with broad applications for science and society."
Later this week, SMAP's science instruments will be checked out with the deployed reflector antenna in a non-spinning configuration. This will mark the observatory's first operation with the reflector and boom assembly functioning as an antenna to view Earth. It will also mark the first time SMAP's radar high-power amplifier will transmit a signal.
In about a month, after additional tests and maneuvers to adjust the observatory to its final 426-mile (685-kilometer), near-polar operational science orbit, SMAP's "lasso" antenna will do a sort of Texas two-step, spinning up in a two-stage process to nearly 15 revolutions per minute. By rotating, the antenna will be able to measure a 620-mile (1,000-kilometer) swath of Earth below, allowing SMAP to map the globe every two to three days.
SMAP science operations will then begin, and SMAP data will be calibrated and validated. The first release of SMAP soil moisture data products is expected within nine months. Fully validated science data are expected to be released within 15 months.
SMAP will have broad benefits for society. It will help improve climate and weather forecasts and allow scientists to monitor droughts and better predict flooding caused by rainfall or snowmelt -- information that can save lives and property. In addition, since plant growth depends on the amount of water in the soil, SMAP data will allow nations to better forecast crop yields and assist in global famine early-warning systems.
SMAP is managed for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington by JPL, with instrument hardware and science contributions made by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. JPL built the spacecraft and is responsible for project management, system engineering, radar instrumentation, mission operations and the ground data system. Goddard is responsible for the radiometer instrument. Both centers collaborate on science data processing and delivery to the Alaska Satellite Facility, in Fairbanks, and to the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado in Boulder. NASA's Launch Services Program at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida was responsible for launch management. JPL is managed for NASA by the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
For more information about SMAP, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/smap
NASA monitors Earth's vital signs from land, air and space with a fleet of satellites and ambitious airborne and ground-based observation campaigns. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records and computer analysis tools to better see how our planet is changing. The agency shares this unique knowledge with the global community and works with institutions in the United States and around the world that contribute to understanding and protecting our home planet.
For more information about NASA's Earth science activities, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov/earthrightnow
Follow SMAP on Twitter at:
https://twitter.com/NASASMAP

Media Contact
Alan Buis
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California.
818-354-0474
alan.buis@jpl.nasa.gov

2015-071

Spinning 'Origami' Antenna Successfully Deployed In Space | Video
2015, February, 26 14:16
NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive mission team deployed its spacecraft's large antenna on Feb. 24th, 2015. The mission will track and map soil moisture on Earth.
http://www.space.com/28675-spinning-origami-antenna-successfully-deployed-in-space-video.html

Friday, February 27, 2015

Fwd: Russia’s New ISS Module to Be Ready in Early 2016

Sent from my iPad

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 27, 2015 at 10:16:28 AM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: Russia's New ISS Module to Be Ready in Early 2016

Russia's New ISS Module to Be Ready in Early 2016
16:34 25.02.2015(updated 17:05 25.02.2015)
34710
New Russian module for the International Space Station will be finished in February 2016.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Russia's Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center will finish assembling the new module for the International Space Station (ISS) in February 2016, the center's acting chief said Wednesday.
"We will finish equipping the module in February 2016. Then the module will be transferred to [Russian rocket and space corporation] RSC Energia for final adjustments. After that, it will be ready to be launched and subsequently integrated into the international space station," Andrey Kalinovsky said.
The launch of module Nauka ("Science" in Russian) initially planned for 2007, has been repeatedly delayed.
Nauka will perform a range of functions including life-support, steering the ISS with an attached motor and docking with cargo vessels.
The modules of the ISS are canister- or sphere-shaped areas of the station where the astronauts live and work.
Currently, the ISS comprises more than a dozen modules, including five Russian modules, according to NASA.

© 2015 Sputnik All rights reserved.

Fwd: NASA’s Earth Sciences Division to celebrate busiest year in more than a decade

Sent from my iPad

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Date: February 27, 2015 at 10:07:36 AM CST
To: "Gary Johnson" <gjohnson144@comcast.net>
Subject: FW: NASA's Earth Sciences Division to celebrate busiest year in more than a decade

NASA's Earth Sciences Division to celebrate busiest year in more than a decade
Over the past 12 months NASA has added five missions to its orbiting Earth-observing fleet – the biggest one-year increase in more than a decade. The Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory was launched from Japan on Feb. 27, 2014. The most recent mission, the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP), was launched from California on Jan. 31. (Image Credit: NASA)
By Zen Vuong, Pasadena Star-News
02/26/15, 12:01 AM PST |

NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission will produce high-resolution global maps of soil moisture to track water availability around our planet and guide policy decisions. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)
LA CAÑADA FLINTRIDGE >> Friday marks the most active year NASA's Earth Sciences Division has had in more than a decade thanks to the launching of five orbiters in the past 12 months.
NASA's Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) orbiter blasted off from Japan exactly a year ago today. The pioneering international satellite constellation produces revolutionary new data that will answer questions about the life-sustaining water cycle and improve weather forecasting and water resource management.
"What the view from space has given us is an ability to see the entire globe in multiple dimensions and multiple ways," said Peg Luce, deputy director of the Earth Science Division in NASA's Science Mission Directorate Headquarters in D.C. "It's completely transformed our understanding of the Earth, yet we have a high regard for the accuracy of our data, so there's always an extensive calibration program and that can often include ground-based, ship-based or airborne campaigns or sensors.
"So they work together, but certainly the ground-based can't possibly give the type of global understanding that you could get from a suite of measurements."
A group of five NASA panelists participated in a teleconference Thursday to brief about early results derived from the GPM Core Observatory, Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2, International Space Station RapidScat, Cloud-Aerosol Transport System, and recently launched Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) satellite.
Three of the five missions are managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge.
Although some of the data is available online for the public, all of the information is free and available to the international scientific community and world-wide decision makers.
"This isthe beginning of a really strong replenishment of the current fleet we have in orbit," Luce said. "We are anticipating launches of over a dozen new missions in the next eight years or so."
Including two instruments mounted on the International Space Station, NASA now has 20 operational Earth-observing space missions.
"This has been a phenomenally productive year for NASA in our mission to explore our complex planet from the unique vantage point of space," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in a statement. "Combined with data from our other Earth-observing spacecraft, these new missions give us new insights into how Earth works as a system."
Last month, NASA released data from a dozen-strong international satellite network and the Core Observatory, providing the agency's most comprehensive global rain and snowfall analysis since the GPM mission began. Its first visualization of rain and snow was released Thursday.
"Precipitation is one of the phases (of Earth's cycles) where climate change is going to be noticed by most humans," said Gail Skofronick-Jackson, GPM project scientist.
As California enters what could be a fourth year of record-breaking drought, satellites such as SMAP, which looks at soil moisture, could help determine how much rainfall is needed before rainwater begins to replenish depleted reservoirs and aquifers.
Launched on Jan. 31, SMAP completed a key milestone Tuesday when it deployed its 20-foot-wide reflector antenna, which, in a month, will begin rotating at 15 revolutions per minute. The satellite will map the entire globe's soil moisture every two to three days.
Initial data from the SMAP mission will be available in April, Luce said.

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