Wednesday, August 7, 2013

Fwd: Human Spaceflight (and Mars) News - August 7, 2013 and JSC Today



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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: August 7, 2013 5:55:32 AM GMT-06:00
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: FW: Human Spaceflight (and Mars) News - August 7, 2013 and JSC Today

 

 

 

 

 

 

   Headlines

  1. Morpheus Test Today

The Morpheus team plans a tether test of its "Bravo" prototype lander today. The test will be streamed live on JSC's UStream channel. View the live stream, along with progress updates sent via Twitter. Morpheus is a vertical test bed vehicle being used to mature new, non-toxic propulsion systems and autonomous landing and hazard detection technologies. Designed, manufactured and operated in-house by engineers at JSC, Morpheus represents not only a vehicle to advance technologies, but also an opportunity to pursue "lean development" engineering practices. The test firing is planned for approximately 1 to 2 p.m. Streaming will begin approximately 45 minutes prior.  

*Note: Testing operations are very dynamic, and the actual firing time may vary. 

Follow Morpheus on Twitter for the latest information: @MorpheusLander 

For more information, click here.

Event Date: Wednesday, August 7, 2013   Event Start Time:1:00 PM   Event End Time:2:00 PM
Event Location: Via UStream Channel

Add to Calendar

Wendy Watkins

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  1. Super-Flex

Since May 10, JSC has been in Phase 1 of Super-Flex. Data collected so far indicates the overall numbers of cars coming on-site are about a third less on Flex Fridays, and about a third of our civil servants are not logging hours on those days.

As we consider Phase 2, we'd like to get your inputs on how Phase 1 has been for you, and any concerns you might have for going to Phase 2 (where we would put buildings into weekend mode).

You will be receiving an email from the JSC Survey System, and we appreciate your time and input.

Lisa Pesak x30476

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  1. Latest International Space Station Research

NASA astronaut Karen Nyberg has been working with the InSPACE-3 (Investigating the Structure of Paramagnetic Aggregates from Colloidal Emulsions - 3) experiment in the Microgravity Science Glovebox. InSPACE-3 applies magnetic fields to vials of magnetic colloids, liquids with microscopic particles, and observes how those fluids can behave like a solid. Results may improve the strength and design of materials for stronger buildings and bridges. You can read more here.

Liz Warren x35548

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   Organizations/Social

  1. Sustain Motivation During Challenging Times

Due to unforeseen circumstances, this presentation that was scheduled for today at 12 noon in the Building 30 Auditorium has been cancelled. Please remove this from your calendars.

Lorrie Bennett, Employee Assistance Program, Occupational Health Branch x36130

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  1. IEEE AES Chapter: NexGen Flight Control System

The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Aerospace and Electronic Systems (AES) Chapter presents Ron T. Ogan speaking on the NexGen Flight Control System. The Federal Aviation Administration has authorized transformation of the U.S. Air Traffic Control System from a radar-based technology to a system using Global Positioning System Technology over the time period 2013 to 2020. Aircraft transponders will be upgraded from Mode-C to Mode-S, which will provide precise position, altitude, velocity and flight direction. Aircraft equipped with ADS-B receivers and multi-function displays will provide current weather and aircraft traffic for increased safety.

The presentation will run from noon to 12:45 p.m. on Aug. 16 in the Gilruth Center Discovery Room. We offer lunch at 11:30 a.m. for $8 for the first 15 requestors. Please RSVP to Stew O'Dell and specify whether you are ordering lunch. No-shows for lunch will be billed.

Event Date: Friday, August 16, 2013   Event Start Time:11:30 AM   Event End Time:1:00 PM
Event Location: Gilruth Center, Discovery Room

Add to Calendar

Stew O'Dell x31855 http://ewh.ieee.org/r5/galveston_bay/events/events.html

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   Jobs and Training

  1. Particle Count Training ViTS: Aug. 16, 9:30 a.m.

This course will provide the technician/engineer with the basic skills and knowledge for performing a particle count for determination of particle cleanliness level. A written/practical examination will also be offered. Course content includes:

    • Review of approved method for manually counting particles using an optical microscope 
    • Microscope operation and calibration 
    • Non-microscopic visual identification of particles by shape, size, color and other physical characteristics 
    • Sampling techniques for particles in gases and liquids 
    • Filtering techniques for fluid using a Millipore apparatus 
    • Compatibility of filter membranes and their specific uses 
    • Handling filter membranes, a Millipore assembly, performing background determinations and pre-reading of filters prior to sampling 
    • Use of high-pressure filter assemblies 
    • Particle counting and data recording 
    • Statistical analysis 
    • Use of automatic particle-counting techniques and their limitations

A comprehensive test will be offered at the end of the class. Use this direct link for registration: https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=SCHEDULED_...

Event Date: Friday, August 16, 2013   Event Start Time:9:30 AM   Event End Time:11:00 AM
Event Location: Bldg. 17, Room 2026

Add to Calendar

Shirley Robinson x41284

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  1. Excavation & Trenching Safety ViTS: Aug. 16, 1:30

The purpose of this three-hour course is to provide employees with the standards, procedures and practices necessary to meet the standards in CFR 1926.650 Subpart P - Excavations and Trenching Construction. Excavation, trenching and soil testing are the fundamental concepts covered in this course. There will be a final exam associated with this course, which must be passed with a 70 percent minimum score to receive course credit. Use this direct link for registration: https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=SCHEDULED_...

Event Date: Friday, August 16, 2013   Event Start Time:1:30 PM   Event End Time:4:30 PM
Event Location: Building 17, Room 2026

Add to Calendar

Shirley Robinson x41284

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   Community

  1. Save the Date - Aug. 15 - Voyage Back to School

JSC and Space Center Houston (SCH) invite the JSC community and their families to attend NASA's Summer of Innovation (SoI) 2013 Voyage Back to School community event at SCH on Aug. 15 from 4 to 7 p.m. NASA's SoI program partners with school districts and non-profit organizations in the JSC region to provide summer science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) camps for middle school students. Come celebrate all our children's summer successes and enjoy an evening of hands-on activities, speakers and educational shows to inspire and excite your children as they prepare to return to school. The event is free to the JSC community and their families. For more information about SoI, please visit our website. Bring Our Child to Work Day participants are invited to remain at SCH to attend NASA's SoI Voyage Back to School community event from 4 to 7 p.m.

Event Date: Thursday, August 15, 2013   Event Start Time:4:00 PM   Event End Time:7:00 PM
Event Location: Space Center Houston

Add to Calendar

Linda Smith x37836

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  1. Space Center Houston's Back-to-School Book Club

Space Center Houston's (SCH's) Education Department invites all SCH and JSC employees to join us as we "blast off" into the world of great books! The initial meeting will be held on Thursday, Aug. 22, from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. in the SCH club lounge area. A light lunch will be served at no cost to attendees. For more information, please contact us.

Event Date: Thursday, August 22, 2013   Event Start Time:12:30 PM   Event End Time:1:30 PM
Event Location: SCH's Club Lounge Area

Add to Calendar

Alice Walker 281-283-4787

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  1. Blood Drive - Aug. 21 and 22

There is no substitute for blood. It has to come from one person in order to give it to another. Will there be blood available when you or your family needs it? A regular number of voluntary donations are needed every day to meet the needs for blood. Make the "Commitment to Life" by taking one hour of your time to donate blood. Your blood donation can help up to three patients.

You can donate at one of the following locations (note start time change):

    • Teague Auditorium lobby: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
    • Building 11 Starport Café donor coach: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
    • Gilruth Center donor coach: Noon to 4 p.m. (Thursday only)

Criteria for donating can be found at the St. Luke's link on our website. T-shirts, snacks and drinks are available for all donors.

Teresa Gomez x39588 http://jscpeople.jsc.nasa.gov/blooddrv/blooddrv.htm

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JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles.

Disclaimer: Accuracy and content of these notes are the responsibility of the submitters.

 

 

 

 

 

Human Spaceflight News

Wednesday – August 7, 2013

 

HEADLINES AND LEADS

 

Outspoken NASA Official Lori Garver to Leave Post

 

Andy Pasztor - Wall Street Journal

 

NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver, the combative champion of President Barack Obama's commercial space initiatives, is leaving her post to join the country's largest airline-pilots union. As the second-highest official at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for the past four years, Ms. Garver was an outspoken advocate of scrapping some of NASA's legacy programs that have been supported by Congressional leaders and longstanding agency contractors. To replace such programs, she advocated outsourcing cargo and crew transportation into orbit to privately developed and operated rockets and capsules. Ms. Garver also spearheaded plans to target asteroids for human space missions. Those goals, which made her the lightning rod for many NASA critics, embroiled her in nagging disputes with industry leaders and many staffers and legislators on Capitol Hill.

 

NASA deputy administrator to step down

Lori Garver served five years as agency's second in command

 

James Dean - Florida Today

 

NASA's second-in-command Lori Garver on Tuesday announced plans to leave the space agency after an influential and controversial five-year tenure. As deputy administrator, Garver helped shape and implement the Obama administration's major changes in NASA's human spaceflight programs, including the cancellation of rockets for moon missions and decisions to extend the International Space Station's life and fly astronauts there on private vehicles. Starting with her leadership of then President-elect Obama's space transition team in 2008, Garver quickly became a lightning rod for critics who questioned her non-technical credentials or saw her as a threat to the status quo. Others cheered her push to revitalize a NASA struggling to do too much with too little money.

 

Garver Quits NASA For ALPA

 

Frank Morring, Jr. - Aviation Week

 

Deputy NASA Administrator Lori Garver, who has been a policy lightning rod at agency headquarters as the Obama administration worked to shift U.S. human spaceflight from a government-run operation to a commercial venture, has resigned to take a job as general manager of the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA). Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot, the agency's No. 3 manager and top-ranking civil servant, is a likely possibility to fill Garver's post on an acting basis until the White House can nominate another political appointee.

 

Garver's departure leaves NewSpace without its highest ranking advocate

 

Doug Messier - Parabolic Arc

 

Aviation Week takes a closer look at Deputy Administrator Lori Garver's impending Sept. 6 departure from NASA. Frank Morring, Jr. notes that Garver has been the major driver behind the agency's controversial push for commercial space activities as well as the plan to capture an asteroid and have astronauts visit it. The announcement of Garver's departure has already caused consternation among her supporters in the NewSpace community, who are losing their highest ranked advocate at the space agency at a critical time when Congress and the White House are at loggerheads over the space agency's funding and direction. The prospects of Garver being replaced — even temporarily — by Lightfoot will not sit well with that group, either. Lightfoot is former director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., the lead center for the space agency's heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS). NewSpace advocates see SLS as a giant pork barrel project sucking up massive amount of NASA's resources that will be too expensive to fly more than once every three or four years.

 

Who Will Replace Lori Garver as NASA's No. 2?

 

Brian Berger – Space News

 

With Lori Garver's plans to leave NASA come Sept. 6 now official, speculation naturally turns to who -- if anybody -- will replace her as NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden's deputy. First, it's worth noting that the White House could simply chose to leave Bolden without a deputy. After all, NASA's longest-serving administrator, Daniel S. Goldin, never had one (although he did have Lori as a close adviser and associate administrator for policy and plans -- a position that no longer exists on the NASA org chart).

 

Five reactions to NASA Dep Admin Lori Garver's announced departure

 

Space News

 

Elon Musk, Peter Diamandis, Michael Lopez-Alegria, Charles Bolden, and John Holdren…

 

Carrie Underwood Introduced Onstage by Astronaut From Space

 

Sterling Whitaker - TheBoot.com

 

Carrie Underwood got the introduction of a lifetime this past Saturday (Aug. 3). The 'See You Again' singer was introduced at a weekend festival appearance by an astronaut who is currently serving aboard the International Space Station. NASA worked with the organizers of the 31st annual WE Fest, in Detroit Lakes, Minn., to create the out-of-this-world announcement. Astronaut Karen Nyberg, who is a huge fan of Underwood, grew up in nearby Vining, Minn., and later graduated from the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks. She got to introduce the singer to 47,000 fans via a video link — while circling the Earth in a 225-mile-high orbit. Nyberg's husband, fellow astronaut Don Hurley, was on hand at the concert to see his wife bring Underwood onstage. Afterward, the singer posted to Twitter, thanking the fans for their support.

(NO FURTHER TEXT)

 

Former astronaut launches Kickstarter bid for plasma rocket documentary

 

Megan Gannon - Space.com

 

A former astronaut's rocket company is raising money via Kickstarter to make a short documentary that explains the technology behind a propulsion system that could fly people to Mars in just over a month. You can learn more about the project on Kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/821885354/animating-vasimr-the-future-of-spaceflight

 

MEANWHILE, 'CURIOSITY' TURNS ONE…

 

Curiosity wraps up dramatic first year on Mars

 

William Harwood - CBS News

 

One year after a nail-biting descent to the surface of Mars, NASA's $2.5 billion Curiosity rover, fresh from confirming the red planet was habitable in the distant past, is making its way to the base of a towering mound of rocky terrain where it will climb through the geologic history of a once-wet world. "One year ago today, believe it or not, began one of the most daring adventures yet in planetary exploration, certainly the most daring of our exploration steps for Mars," said Dan McCleese, chief scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told scientists, engineers and managers marking the anniversary.

 

Curiosity sings 'Happy Birthday' to celebrate first year on Mars

 

Amina Khan - Los Angeles Times

 

Think those tools aboard NASA's rover Curiosity are only good for sniffing out argon isotopes and drilling into mysterious rocks? Wait till you hear this: A 'Happy Birthday' song played by Curiosity's very own Sample Analysis at Mars instrument, marking the robot geologist's first anniversary on the Red Planet. In Washington on Tuesday, NASA officials, along with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, celebrated the first year since Curiosity's landing in Gale Crater. But engineers at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland also wanted to celebrate the rover's successful landing, and they realized they could do so with some help from Curiosity's tool belt.

 

Curiosity Rover 'Blazing Trail' for Humans on Mars, NASA Chief Says

 

Mike Wall - Space.com

 

In its first year on Mars, NASA's Curiosity rover has made discoveries that should help pave the way for human missions to the Red Planet in the next few decades, space agency officials say. The 1-ton Curiosity rover has beamed home useful information about radiation levels on the Red Planet's surface and in deep space. And its harrowing "seven minutes of terror" landing on the night of Aug. 5, 2012 showcased a way to put heavy loads down with precision on another world, NASA chief Charles Bolden said. "The wheels of Curiosity are literally blazing the trail for human footprints on Mars," Bolden said Tuesday during a one-year anniversary celebration for the rover at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

 

NASA's Curiosity rover celebrates one year on Mars

 

Michael Walsh - New York Daily News

 

One year later, NASA's Curiosity of the Red Planet shows no signs of waning. The mobile laboratory touched down in a Martian crater on Aug. 6, 2012 to study the habitability of the fourth planet from the Sun with hitherto unprecedented access. "Curiosity is finding that Mars would have supported life in the past (such as bacteria) and could possibly support human explorers in the future," Laurie Leshin, the dean of the School of Science at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York, told the Daily News.

 

One year later, NASA looks back at Curiosity rover's scariest moment

 

Alan Boyle - NBCNews.com's Cosmic Log

 

For the Curiosity rover, it's just another day on Mars — but back on Earth, Tuesday was a day to look back at the $2.5 billion mission's first year, including a moment when it looked as if the mission might be lost. The six-wheeled, car-sized rover passed the one-year mark at 1:32 a.m. ET Tuesday, exactly one Earth year after the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft executed a so-crazy-it-actually-worked entry, descent and landing sequence that had the rover dangling from a tether beneath a rocket-powered "sky crane."

__________

 

COMPLETE STORIES

 

Outspoken NASA Official Lori Garver to Leave Post

 

Andy Pasztor - Wall Street Journal

 

NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver, the combative champion of President Barack Obama's commercial space initiatives, is leaving her post to join the country's largest airline-pilots union.

 

As the second-highest official at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for the past four years, Ms. Garver was an outspoken advocate of scrapping some of NASA's legacy programs that have been supported by Congressional leaders and longstanding agency contractors. To replace such programs, she advocated outsourcing cargo and crew transportation into orbit to privately developed and operated rockets and capsules.

 

Ms. Garver also spearheaded plans to target asteroids for human space missions.

 

Those goals, which made her the lightning rod for many NASA critics, embroiled her in nagging disputes with industry leaders and many staffers and legislators on Capitol Hill.

 

In a note Tuesday informing industry associates of her decision to become general manager of the Air Line Pilots Association, Ms. Garver said she also worked to provide NASA with "a more diverse and innovative workforce."

 

In a statement distributed to agency employees, NASA chief Charles Bolden said that as "one of only a few top women leaders in the aerospace industry," Ms. Garver served as "an extraordinary model for young girls" to study science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

 

By hiring Ms. Garver, slated to leave NASA in early September, the pilots union gains a senior employee with deep ties to President Obama, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other powerful Democrats. It also could boost the union's cachet and political stature versus Airlines for America, the trade group representing the largest U.S. passenger and cargo carriers, which previously assembled a stable of well-connected political operatives and former Congressional aides.

 

Ms. Garver's announcement comes at a difficult time for NASA. House and Senate committees are fighting over agency funding, particularly proposals to land astronauts on an asteroid in the coming decades.

 

Attached to Ms. Garver's note was a statement from John Holdren, President Obama's top science adviser, praising her for working "tirelessly in support of the administration's aerospace priorities," including ensuring that "U.S. taxpayers were getting the most for their money from NASA with innovative public-private partnerships."

 

NASA deputy administrator to step down

Lori Garver served five years as agency's second in command

 

James Dean - Florida Today

 

NASA's second-in-command Lori Garver on Tuesday announced plans to leave the space agency after an influential and controversial five-year tenure.

 

As deputy administrator, Garver helped shape and implement the Obama administration's major changes in NASA's human spaceflight programs, including the cancellation of rockets for moon missions and decisions to extend the International Space Station's life and fly astronauts there on private vehicles.

 

Starting with her leadership of then President-elect Obama's space transition team in 2008, Garver quickly became a lightning rod for critics who questioned her non-technical credentials or saw her as a threat to the status quo.

 

Others cheered her push to revitalize a NASA struggling to do too much with too little money.

 

"She came in convinced that it was an organization that badly needed change, and she tried to make some changes," said John Logsdon, a space policy expert and professor emeritus at George Washington University. "It's an organization that is pretty strongly resistant to change."

 

Garver advocated for a new way of doing business, Logsdon said, that involved closer partnerships with an emerging commercial space industry and a stronger focus on technology development to spur innovation amid budget constraints.

 

The administration assembled a blue ribbon committee to review the viability of the Constellation return-to-the-moon program, finding it was on an unsustainable trajectory without an infusion of money.

 

New priorities were outlined in the now infamous rollout of the president's 2010 budget, which canceled Constellation, promoted the development of commercial crew taxis and invested heavily in research and development before committing to a new exploration system.

 

The program surprised and angered many NASA supporters in Congress, who targeted Garver as a key architect.

 

"She became the pointy end of the spear that people associated with this change that was being promoted by the administration," said Alan Ladwig, a longtime Garver associate who recently retired as a senior communications executive at NASA headquarters. "She was seen as the biggest advocate for that."

 

NASA chief and former astronaut Charlie Bolden, by contrast, was seen as taking a more conservative approach.

 

There were reports the two disliked each other and rarely spoke, adding to uncertainty about the agency's direction. Some said those problems were overblown and the pair became an effective team.

 

On Tuesday, Bolden praised Garver as "an indispensable partner in our efforts to keep NASA on a trajectory of progress and innovation."

 

Since one company has begun delivering cargo to the International Space Station and another is close to doing so — under a program begun during the Bush administration — the shift to commercial astronaut flights has gained more acceptance but it still fighting for funding.

 

Ladwig said Garver's support for those initiatives accepted a reality that the government couldn't it all alone.

 

"Since funding wasn't necessarily going to grow by significant amounts for NASA, then you had to look at what are other ways to grow the space economy?" he said. "And that way was through commercial investment."

 

But the agency's exploration plans remain murky and are now subject to partisan debate NASA has historically avoided. A recently announced initiative to robotically capture an asteroid for a crew to visit, as a stepping stone to eventual Mars missions, has met with significant skepticism.

 

Scott Pace, director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University and a NASA associate administrator during the George W. Bush administration, credited Garver with promoting commercial programs but criticized new exploration goals that he said lack a technical foundation and international support.

 

"I think the root problem was not just the cancellation of Constellation but the abandonment of the moon as the next goal for human exploration beyond low Earth orbit," he said. "She was definitely someone who was influential in shaping that decision, which I believe was an unfortunate one."

 

Garver will depart NASA Sept. 6 to become general manager of the Air Line Pilots Association.

 

In a e-mail, she thanked colleagues for support "as we worked to develop a more sustainable future" for NASA.

 

Logsdon said it would take several years to see whether Garver's influence endured or could be undone.

 

"She's planted the seed," he said. "Let's see how deep the roots have grown."

 

Garver Quits NASA For ALPA

 

Frank Morring, Jr. - Aviation Week

 

Deputy NASA Administrator Lori Garver, who has been a policy lightning rod at agency headquarters as the Obama administration worked to shift U.S. human spaceflight from a government-run operation to a commercial venture, has resigned to take a job as general manager of the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA).

 

Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot, the agency's No. 3 manager and top-ranking civil servant, is a likely possibility to fill Garver's post on an acting basis until the White House can nominate another political appointee.

 

Garver, a former aerospace consultant, joined President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign after initially supporting Hillary Clinton. She helped run the space-policy transition team after Obama was elected, forming a close alliance with John Holdren, Obama's science adviser, and other newcomers at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

 

Since then she has been at the forefront of the administration's "New Space" initiatives, including an acceleration of efforts to commercialize human transport to low Earth orbit initiated under the administration of President George W. Bush, and emphasis on open-ended technology development for deep-space exploration.

 

Those plans ran into stiff opposition on Capitol Hill and within the agency, and led to NASA's current, two-pronged approach of seeding development of commercial crew vehicles for access to the International Space Station, while developing the Orion crew vehicle and heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS) in-house for deep-space human exploration.

 

In recent weeks Garver has been an advocate for the administration's plan to capture a small asteroid and nudge it into a high-retrograde lunar orbit for study by astronauts arriving in an Orion launched on an SLS. That scheme has run into strong Republican opposition in Congress, and NASA has said it wants to send an Orion crew to that particular orbit even if the asteroid-relocation mission doesn't materialize.

 

Garver's departure will come on the heels of Elizabeth Robinson, the agency's chief financial officer, who has been named under secretary of energy. Robinson and Garver were staunch allies in the often-heated management policy debates that pitted them against more traditional NASA managers, including Administrator Charles Bolden.

 

"While I am sorry to be losing such a talented and passionate co-pilot, I am happy that Lori is continuing to pursue her dreams and make her mark in the aerospace industry," Bolden stated in a message to NASA staff in which he praised Garver for being "an extraordinary role model for young girls, inspiring them to study science, technology, engineering and mathematics. ... Her last day at NASA will be Sept. 6, and she assumes her new role at ALPA on Sept. 9. I will personally miss her candid and sage advice and good humor."

 

Garver's departure leaves NewSpace without its highest ranking advocate

 

Doug Messier - Parabolic Arc

 

Aviation Week takes a closer look at Deputy Administrator Lori Garver's impending Sept. 6 departure from NASA. Frank Morring, Jr. notes that Garver has been the major driver behind the agency's controversial push for commercial space activities as well as the plan to capture an asteroid and have astronauts visit it. He also notes the following:

 

Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot, the agency's No. 3 manager and top-ranking civil servant, is a likely possibility to fill Garver's post on an acting basis until the White House can nominate another political appointee….

 

Garver's departure will come on the heels of Elizabeth Robinson, the agency's chief financial officer, who has been named under secretary of energy. Robinson and Garver were staunch allies in the often-heated management policy debates that pitted them against more traditional NASA managers, including Administrator Charles Bolden.

 

The announcement of Garver's departure has already caused consternation among her supporters in the NewSpace community, who are losing their highest ranked advocate at the space agency at a critical time when Congress and the White House are at loggerheads over the space agency's funding and direction.

 

The prospects of Garver being replaced — even temporarily — by Lightfoot will not sit well with that group, either. Lightfoot is former director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., the lead center for the space agency's heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS). NewSpace advocates see SLS as a giant pork barrel project sucking up massive amount of NASA's resources that will be too expensive to fly more than once every three or four years.

 

Of more immediate concern, however, is the loss of the movement's most prominent figure as a crucial budget battle looms. The Senate Appropriations Committee has marked up the space agency's budget for FY 2014 at $18 billion, an increase from the $17.7 billion requested by the Obama Administration. The House Appropriations Committee would provide the agency with $16.6 billion, a cut of $1.1 billion.

 

The two houses are far apart on the Commercial Crew Program. The Senate bill provides $775 million, close to the requested $821.4 million, while the House cuts spending to $500 million. The Senate is fine with NASA proceeding with the asteroid mission, while the House prohibits any new funding for the initiative until NASA returns with a more defined plan.

 

It looks unlikely that either bill will get passed by the end of the fiscal year on Sept. 30. Congress has not passed a budget on time in years, instead relying on a series of continuing resolutions that largely leave spending levels and priorities in place.

 

The rancor in Congress this year is especially pronounced, with threats of government shutdowns emanating from Republicans and a generally toxic negotiating environment. Congress has just adjourned for a four-week break, leaving little time to resolve issues when it returns in September.

 

What is likely to happen next month is another continuing resolution coupled with a set of automatic sequestration spending cuts that will cut into NASA's budget and leave the agency without the money it says it needs to carry out the Commercial Crew Program properly.

 

During a media availability two weeks ago at the New Space 2013 Conference, Garver was asked about NASA's options should it not get full funding for the Commercial Crew Program. The exchange:

 

Q. On a little different subject from the asteroid mission, you talked about commercial crew. In the past, you know you've talked for the need for full funding for commercial crew in FY 14. If you end up with something closer to what the House is offering, $500 million, or worse a CR [continuing resolution] and another round of sequestration, what does that do to the program looking forward? Can you protect the 2017 date [for commercial service] any longer, or does it shift out?

 

Garver: So, I think it's really clear that to keep competition as long as possible, and to accelerate the time when we are no longer sending money to Russia, but spending those dollars here with U.S. companies, we need the full funding. We need as close to the full funding as we can get. If Congress decides that is not what they want to do, they can send that money to Russia for a longer period of time. We can go down to one competitor earlier, and thereby possibly increasing the cost and risk. We could look at going and doing this in a different way that is, with Space Act Agreements longer. Right now, Congress, again, locks us into FAR [Federal Acquisition Regulation]-based contracts but not giving us the money and still wants the date. You cannot have all that. So, you have to look at every path to get us, we think, to U.S. capability as soon as possible.

 

Q. Does the $775 [million] the Senate is offering do that for you?

 

Garver: Obviously, it is as close to, so much closer to $821 [million] request that we really believe we could advance the best if we could get…the Senate mark.

 

Whatever happens with budget, one thing is clear: effective Sept. 6, Garver will no longer be around to fight NASA's funding battles.

 

Who Will Replace Lori Garver as NASA's No. 2?

 

Brian Berger – Space News

 

With Lori Garver's plans to leave NASA come Sept. 6 now official, speculation naturally turns to who -- if anybody -- will replace her as NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden's deputy.

 

And since we're speculating, we might as well take a moment to talk about why Garver is stepping down now.

 

It's no secret that Garver, a Michigan native who double majored in political economy and skiing at Colorado College, is a political junkie who originally threw in with Hillary Clinton before joining Team Obama after he won the 2008 Democratic party's presidential primary.

 

With Clinton the clear front runner for the 2016 contest, going to work for the Air Line Pilots Association -- a 51,000-member pilots union with 320 employees and a $106 million budget -- would allow Garver to rebuild her bank account and broaden her base of support should she choose to join Clinton's campaign a few years down the road. So it's quite possible the U.S. space community has not seen the last of Garver.

 

But back to her replacement.

 

First, it's worth noting that the White House could simply chose to leave Bolden without a deputy. After all, NASA's longest-serving administrator, Daniel S. Goldin, never had one (although he did have Lori as a close adviser and associate administrator for policy and plans -- a position that no longer exists on the NASA org chart).

 

If the White House does decide to nominate someone for the post, don't expect it to happen soon. Vetting candidates could easily take 2-3 months. And given the Senate's track record, confirmation could take another 2-3 months. In the meantime, Bolden could always name NASA Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot -- the agency's No. 3 in command and top-ranking career civil servant -- the agency's acting deputy. Or moved fellow astronaut Bob Cabana up from Kennedy Space Center.

 

So who could or should be in the running? Here's my first blush analysis, some of it a bit tongue in cheek. Make your case in comments section below.

 

1. Eileen Collins

 

Given President Obama's second-term tendency to appoint women to top administration posts, retired female astronauts likely will get a close look. Former astronaut Kathryn Sullivan is out since Obama already nominated her last week to become the permanent head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. So why not Eileen Collins, the retired Air Force colonel and NASA astronaut who in 1999 became the first female commander of a space shuttle mission?

 

Collins also commanded the shuttle's post-Columbia return-to-flight mission in July 2005, leaving the agency the following spring "to pursue private interests, including service as a board member of [the United States Air Force Association]," according to Wikipedia. So she's probably available and Bolden likes astronauts.

 

Bottom line: a plausible pick.

 

2. Kay Bailey Hutchison

 

The former U.S. senator from Texas has several things going for her: she likes Bolden, she knows a lot about NASA and she knows how to work with Sens. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) and Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) -- the three senior lawmakers who set the space agenda in the Senate.

 

As Republican, Hutchison would help restore NASA's stature as a nonpartisan agency.

 

Bottom line: Never going to happen, but fun to think about.

 

3. Anousheh Ansari

 

The charismatic Iranian-American engineer and tech executive not only paid her own way to the international space station -- something Garver sought to do through a sponsorship-play capitalizing on her soccer mom cred -- she's also given gobs of money to the X Prize Foundation.

 

The $10 million Ansari X Prize, awarded to the Paul Allen-backed SpaceShipOne team, set the stage for Virgin Galactic and a handful of competitors preparing to fly paying passengers into suborbital space.

 

Bottom line: She's got better things to do with her time.

 

4. Jean Toal Eisen

 

This senior Senate staffer has a solid space policy background, having worked for the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee for 12 years and spent a year at the U.S. Commerce Department as deputy director for the Office of Policy and Strategy before going to work for Mikulski on NASA appropriations.

 

Toal Eisen is also a true-blue Democrat who came to Washington as a research assistant to the late Sen. Fritz Hollings, the then-senior senator from South Carolina, where her mother is chief justice of the state supreme court.

 

Bottom line: With the right friends in the right places -- her old boss, Bill Nelson, would likely preside over her confirmation hearing -- Toal Eisen would glide through the Senate. But does she have the right skill set for the job?

 

5. Richard DalBello

 

Although he has not formally announced that he will be stepping down as vice president of legal and government affairs at Intelsat General Corp., it's a poorly kept secret in Washington space circles that DalBello has been tapped to fill a vacancy at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP).

 

What's left some people scratching their heads is why DalBello would leave a cushy private sector job to take a low profile post he held from 1993 to 1997 under then-President Bill Clinton.

 

One possible explanation is that he's not -- the OSTP space and aeronautics post will be just a temporary gig that allows DalBello to ride herd on NASA while the nomination and confirmation process runs its natural course.

 

Could DalBello do the job, assuming he wants to? Her certainly has the right qualifications, he knows everybody there is to know in space and he has no obvious interest conflicts since he has spent the last eight years working for Intelsat General, a satellite services firm not among NASA's stable of contractors.

 

Bottom line: Makes too much sense not to be a real possibility.

 

Five reactions to NASA Dep Admin Lori Garver's announced departure

 

Space News

 

Elon Musk, Space Exploration Technologies Corp. founder and CEO, in an email to SpaceNews

 

"Lori made a real difference to the future of spaceflight. Most people put their career first, so they play politics and pander to the vested interests. But there are some who truly care about humanity's future in space and will do the right thing in the face of immense opposition. We are fortunate to have several such people in NASA senior leadership and Lori was one of them."

 

Peter Diamandis, X PRIZE Foundation chairman and CEO, in an email to SpaceNews

 

"Lori has been one of the most important forces for supporting commercial space during the past decade. Her leadership has been critical to the entire commercial spaceflight industry. Her impact will be felt for decades to come."

 

Commercial Spaceflight Federation President Michael Lopez-Alegria, in a press release

 

"Throughout her years of service and leadership at NASA, Lori Garver has been a stalwart champion of commercial space and of the public-private partnerships that have begun to change the way the Agency does business. The innovations she promoted will serve the Agency well as it navigates a period of change and challenge. We will miss Lori in the space community and wish her the best as she sets a new course for herself. I know she will continue to be a leader and role model in all of her future endeavors."

 

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, in a press release

 

"I have had the pleasure and honor of working side by side with Lori for the past four years, as we sought to position the agency for 21st century spaceflight, scientific discovery and deep space exploration. She has been an indispensable partner in our efforts to keep NASA on a trajectory of progress and innovation. In a time of great change and challenge, she has been a remarkable leader who has consistently shown great vision and commitment to NASA and the aerospace industry. "Lori has led the way on so many of the Obama Administration's space priorities, including our commercial crew and cargo program, the re-establishment of a space technology mission directorate, our use of challenges and prizes, and our unwavering commitment to diversity and inclusion. As one of only a few top women leaders in the aerospace industry, she has been an extraordinary role model for young girls, inspiring them to study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and pursue their dreams in space and here on Earth. "Lori will always be a great friend to me and to our agency."

 

White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Holdren, in a press release

 

"Lori Garver has worked tirelessly in support of this administration's aerospace priorities, from human space exploration and technology development to Earth science and aeronautics research. She ensured that U.S. taxpayers were getting the most for their money from NASA with innovative public-private partnerships in space and on Earth, and her focus on getting more women and other underrepresented groups engaged in science, technology, engineering, and math was just as important. On behalf of President Obama, as well as myself, I want to thank Lori for her leadership, dedication, and work on behalf of the American people, and wish her all the best in future endeavors."

 

Former astronaut launches Kickstarter bid for plasma rocket documentary

 

Megan Gannon - Space.com

 

A former astronaut's rocket company is raising money via Kickstarter to make a short documentary that explains the technology behind a propulsion system that could fly people to Mars in just over a month.

 

"Our goal is to produce a full-length video, full of stunning animations that describe the way in which we intend to use our technology to transform space transportation," Franklin Chang-Diaz, a retired NASA astronaut and the founder of the company Ad Astra, says in a video describing the Mars rocket documentary. Chang-Diaz earned a doctorate in plasma physics from MIT before he became an astronaut in 1980 and flew on seven space shuttle missions. He founded Ad Astra in 2005 to work on VASIMR, the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket.

 

The engine uses electric power and magnetic fields to create a stream of superheated plasma with steady and efficient thrust, building up speed over time. In theory it could carry a crewed mission to Mars in fewer than 40 days, advocates say. But as Ad Astra's Kickstarter video explains, VASIMR could also bring greater efficiency to missions to capture or deflect asteroids, clean up space junk or reboost orbiting outposts like the International Space Station.

 

Ad Astra's Kickstarter campaign has gone well. With five days left, the company has already surpassed its $46,000 target, garnering more than $53,000 in pledges as of early Tuesday morning.

 

You can learn more about the project on Kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/821885354/animating-vasimr-the-future-of-spaceflight

 

MEANWHILE, 'CURIOSITY' TURNS ONE…

 

Curiosity wraps up dramatic first year on Mars

 

William Harwood - CBS News

 

One year after a nail-biting descent to the surface of Mars, NASA's $2.5 billion Curiosity rover, fresh from confirming the red planet was habitable in the distant past, is making its way to the base of a towering mound of rocky terrain where it will climb through the geologic history of a once-wet world.

 

"One year ago today, believe it or not, began one of the most daring adventures yet in planetary exploration, certainly the most daring of our exploration steps for Mars," said Dan McCleese, chief scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told scientists, engineers and managers marking the anniversary.

 

"The thrill of the Curiosity rover and its science payload hurtling toward the planet to a soft touchdown on six wheels remains with us today, and we're reminded just what an incredible science and engineering feat this is."

 

Curiosity's dramatic entry, descent and landing using a rocket-powered "sky crane" that lowered the car-size rover to the surface on a long bridle captured the public's imagination, both for the sheer drama of the untried technique and its flawless execution.

 

The successful landing set the tone for the high-stakes mission and Curiosity quickly demonstrated its ability to act as a robotic geologist, chalking up a near-flawless performance on the way to becoming one of NASA's most productive planetary explorers.

 

"I'm impressed by the work that's been done since those initial moments on the surface where everything worked perfectly, I'm impressed by the work that's been done in the first year of exploration," McCleese said. "The rover's performance has been in excess of what the most optimistic of us imagined it might be."

 

Since landing on the floor of Gale Crater on Aug. 6, 2012, Curiosity has beamed back more than 190 gigabits of data, more than 70,000 photographs and fired more than 75,000 laser shots at targeted rocks and soil, searching for evidence of past habitability.

 

During its voyage to Mars and its first year on the surface, Curiosity also measured the radiation environment in unprecedented detail -- data needed for any eventual manned missions -- and served as a weather station, charting  shifting winds and temperature swings.

 

Using a high-tech impact drill and a suite of compact but sophisticated laboratory instruments to study collected samples, the rover met its primary mission objective eight months into its mission, confirming a once-habitable past in a region where ancient stream beds show water once flowed freely.

 

Curiosity's discoveries came during what amounts to a side trip on the way from the landing site to Mount Sharp, a mound of sedimentary rocks rising more than 3 miles above the floor of Gale Crater. The rover landed about four-and-a-half miles from an area at the base of the mound where orbital photos indicate a safe path through surrounding sand dunes.

 

Reaching Mount Sharp and sampling its layered terrain will give scientists a long-awaited opportunity for close-range observations across a significant slice of its history.

 

Climbing through layers of older rocks and clays that were deposited when the planet was warmer and wetter and possibly through a transition zone to younger strata deposited in a dramatically drier environment, scientists hope to learn more about how Mars evolved what impact environmental changes had on habitability.

 

"We went there thinking that every layer is a page in a history book and we can go there and see not only are there habitable environments recorded in there, but how did the environments change over time?" said principal investigator Ken Edgett. "As you go up the mountain you will see the time getting closer and closer to now, it will get younger and younger."

 

But instead of heading directly to Mount Sharp, mission managers opted to divert the rover to a nearby area where three different types of terrain came together, looking for interesting science and an opportunity to thoroughly test Curiosity's instruments.

 

The trip paid off with dramatic results, culminating in the discovery of an ancient stream bed and chemical analysis of rock samples that confirmed conditions favorable to life as it's known on Earth in the red planet's distant past.

 

"We drove, literally, through a stream bed on Mars that flowed ankle deep two billion years ago," said Ashwin Vasavada, deputy project scientist. "I'm getting goosebumps just telling you about it!"

 

John Grotzinger, the Mars Science Laboratory project scientist, said the data collected at a site dubbed Yellowknife Bay "all added up to understanding this environment as being chemically one that was favorable for life, not in a harsh way but actually quite a benign environment that's very much like Earth."

 

Reflecting on Curiosity's first year on Mars, Grotzinger said "I think the most extraordinary thing, really, is we found it all so quickly. That decision to drive 500 meters in the opposite direction obviously paid off very well."

 

The rover now is finally making its way to Mount Sharp, covering about 764 yards in the past month. Depending on the terrain, Curiosity can travel up to about a football field per day -- "pedal to the metal," Grotzinger jokes -- on a trek expected to take another several months to complete.

 

"We selected Gale out of the four finalists for one simple reason, because it's so diverse," he said. "So by driving now to Mount Sharp, we will return to our initial objective, which is to explore these foothills. ... We know from orbit that they have clays, we know there's hematite, we know there are sulfates. So we hope to be able to sample a number of what could be different habitable environments."

 

Unlike earlier rovers that relied on solar panels for power, Curiosity is equipped with a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, or RTG, that converts the heat of decaying plutonium dioxide into electricity.

 

The mission design life is two Earth years -- one year on Mars -- but barring major problems, the rover should be able to operate for years beyond the official target.

 

"What we have today is an astonishingly powerful tool for science," McCleese said. "We've been observing, we've been measuring, we've been sampling and in the background, throughout laboratories across the globe, there've been scientists working to help interpret the measurements that have been made.

 

"The questions we ask address some of the most important questions in science and for Mars, one of the great mysteries. And that is, was this planet ever habitable? Our celebration of the success of Curiosity's first year includes the anticipation of even more exciting years of discoveries to come."

 

Curiosity sings 'Happy Birthday' to celebrate first year on Mars

 

Amina Khan - Los Angeles Times

 

Think those tools aboard NASA's rover Curiosity are only good for sniffing out argon isotopes and drilling into mysterious rocks? Wait till you hear this: A 'Happy Birthday' song played by Curiosity's very own Sample Analysis at Mars instrument, marking the robot geologist's first anniversary on the Red Planet.

 

In Washington on Tuesday, NASA officials, along with astronauts aboard the International Space Station, celebrated the first year since Curiosity's landing in Gale Crater. But engineers at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland also wanted to celebrate the rover's successful landing, and they realized they could do so with some help from Curiosity's tool belt.

 

The Sample Analysis at Mars instrument, or SAM, isn't a musical instrument. It doesn't have keys or strings. It's part of the lab in the rover's belly that analyzes rock samples and helped discover a habitable environment on Mars -- a place where microbes could have hypothetically lived in the past.

 

But SAM does make noise. In order to shake powdery rock samples so that they settle down, the instrument vibrates at various frequencies, Florence Tan, SAM's lead electrical engineer, said in a video.

 

These frequencies can be used as musical notes. And by making SAM shake faster and slower, the team was able to tap out a little birthday tune for the rover on Monday. (They went with Aug. 5 because Curiosity landed around 10:30 p.m. Pacific time on that date.)

 

"If there's anyone listening on Mars, on this special occasion, you will hear this," Tan said.

 

This isn't the first foray Curiosity's had into a music career -- singer and producer will.i.am celebrated the landing last year at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory by letting Curiosity broadcast the debut of his song "Reach for the Stars" straight from Mars.

 

Curiosity Rover 'Blazing Trail' for Humans on Mars, NASA Chief Says

 

Mike Wall - Space.com

 

In its first year on Mars, NASA's Curiosity rover has made discoveries that should help pave the way for human missions to the Red Planet in the next few decades, space agency officials say.

 

The 1-ton Curiosity rover has beamed home useful information about radiation levels on the Red Planet's surface and in deep space. And its harrowing "seven minutes of terror" landing on the night of Aug. 5, 2012 showcased a way to put heavy loads down with precision on another world, NASA chief Charles Bolden said.

 

"The wheels of Curiosity are literally blazing the trail for human footprints on Mars," Bolden said Tuesday during a one-year anniversary celebration for the rover at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C.

 

Destination: Mars

 

The long-term goal of NASA's human spaceflight program is to put boots on the Red Planet. Indeed, President Barack Obama has directed the agency to get astronauts to a near-Earth asteroid by 2025, then on to the vicinity of Mars by the mid-2030s.

 

Curiosity's mission marks a key step toward making this dream a reality, Bolden said. He cited the "sky crane" landing system that lowered the car-size robot to the Martian surface on cables one year ago.

 

"Our success in landing a heavier payload on Mars with increased precision brings us closer to developing capabilities necessary for human missions to Mars," Bolden said.

 

That's not to say, however, that Curiosity's sky crane could be used as-is for manned Red Planet efforts. Much more development work will be required to find a way to lower human habitats and other heavy infrastructure to the surface, officials said.

 

"We barely are able to do a metric ton now. When we send humans, we're trying to land 40 metric tons," Prasun Desai, acting director of the Strategic Integration and Analysis Office in NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate, said at the Curiosity anniversary event. "So we're landing a car; what we need to do is a two-story house when we send humans to Mars."

 

The radiation data Curiosity has gathered will also help plan out manned missions to the Red Planet, Bolden said. The rover measured radiation levels in deep space during its eight-month cruise to Mars, and it has been characterizing the radiation environment on the planet's surface since touching down.

 

This latter effort is very much a work in progress. But the data so far are encouraging, suggesting that astronauts could endure a long-term, roundtrip Mars mission without accumulating a worryingly high radiation dose, mission scientists announced late last year.

 

Exploring the solar system

 

Curiosity's main task is to determine if Mars could ever have supported microbial life. The rover has already accomplished this goal; mission scientists announced in March that an area called Yellowknife Bay, near Curiosity's landing site inside the huge Gale Crater, was indeed habitable billions of years ago.

 

Curiosity is now rolling toward the base of the 3.4-mile-high (5.5 kilometers) Mount Sharp, which holds a record of Mars' changing environmental conditions in its many layers.

 

The rover team wants Curiosity to read this history like a book as it climbs up through Mount Sharp's foothills, shedding light on the Red Planet's transition from a relatively warm and wet world long ago to the cold and dry Mars we know today.

 

Not only is Curiosity "discovering the past of Mars, it's actually making discoveries about what Mars is like today," said Jim Green, director of NASA's planetary science division.

 

"That's important, because our future is really in our hands," Green added. "Our destiny is to leave low-Earth orbit, trek out into the solar system. The solar system is ours — let's take it. And we believe humans can actually land on Mars as that ultimate destination for humans within 20, perhaps 30 years from now."

 

NASA's Curiosity rover celebrates one year on Mars

 

Michael Walsh - New York Daily News

 

One year later, NASA's Curiosity of the Red Planet shows no signs of waning.

 

The mobile laboratory touched down in a Martian crater on Aug. 6, 2012 to study the habitability of the fourth planet from the Sun with hitherto unprecedented access.

 

"Curiosity is finding that Mars would have supported life in the past (such as bacteria) and could possibly support human explorers in the future," Laurie Leshin, the dean of the School of Science at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York, told the Daily News.

 

Leshin has been involved in planning and overseeing Curiosity since its inception about a decade ago. She was on the team that helped design the rover's goals and helped design some of its instruments.

 

Over the past year, the car-sized rover culled more than 190 gigabytes of data, transmitted 36,700 full images and 35,000 thumbnail images to Earth and shot 75,000 lasers to study Martian geology.

 

"We've had great fortune to land right near a really interesting spot and to go investigate that with our drill and sample the rocks that formed in this ancient crater bottom on Mars," Leshin said.

 

These rocks formed in a water environment several billion years ago, scientists deduced.

 

"If you were a bacteria on Mars several billion years ago, this would have been a nice place to swim around," Leshin joked.

 

Curiosity found some remnants of this water environment beneath the planet's surface. It also discovered that the radiation levels were not as severe as scientists previously expected.

 

The information culled by the rover could help future astronauts train for surviving in the planet's harsh atmosphere and using its natural resources to their advantage.

 

The rover is currently coasting toward the base of Mount Sharp. It will study the lower layers of the mountain that rises three miles high.

 

"The excitement is really just beginning. We are really only halfway through our primary mission," Leshin said. "There's more great stuff coming."

 

One year later, NASA looks back at Curiosity rover's scariest moment

 

Alan Boyle - NBCNews.com's Cosmic Log

 

For the Curiosity rover, it's just another day on Mars — but back on Earth, Tuesday was a day to look back at the $2.5 billion mission's first year, including a moment when it looked as if the mission might be lost.

 

The six-wheeled, car-sized rover passed the one-year mark at 1:32 a.m. ET Tuesday, exactly one Earth year after the Mars Science Laboratory spacecraft executed a so-crazy-it-actually-worked entry, descent and landing sequence that had the rover dangling from a tether beneath a rocket-powered "sky crane."

 

"We were literally sweating beads and biting fingernails," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden recalled.

 

Allen Chen, the in-house commentator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., confessed during a Monday recap of the mission that there was a point during the descent when he saw a sensor signal indicating that catastrophic failure of the mission was imminent. The signal suggested that the spacecraft was tumbling as it fell toward Mars, or that the protective heat shield was pointed in the wrong direction, he said.

 

"That really spiked my blood pressure," he said. Chen decided to wait a few moments before telling anybody else what he saw.

 

"It turns out that the instrument was fine, we just had a calibration error," he said.

 

"Thanks, Allen," Pete Theisinger, the mission's project manager, deadpanned during the panel discussion at JPL. "I'm glad you didn't tell us."

 

Instead of declaring Curiosity's doom, Chen ended up reporting the best news of the night a year ago: "Touchdown confirmed — we're safe on Mars."

 

Scoopfuls of discoveries

 

A year later, Curiosity is still safe on Mars, with scoopfuls of discoveries to its credit. The sky crane's rocket blast scoured out Martian soil to reveal bedrock — a promising sign for the mission ahead. The rover's first expedition took it through an ancient stream bed, revealing new insights about the Red Planet's watery past.

 

The biggest find was geological evidence that Mars once had an environment that would have been hospitable to life as we know it — not just extremophiles, but the kind of garden-variety bacteria you'd find in a typical earthly stream.

 

"I think the most extraordinary thing, really, is that we found it all so quickly," said Caltech's John Grotzinger, the mission's project scientist.

 

The sobering thing is that Curiosity is really just getting started. Its odometer just turned over the first mile (1.6 kilometers) of travel a few days ago, and over the next year it's scheduled to roll roughly five miles (eight kilometers) to get to its main destination, a 3-mile-high (5-kilometer-high) mountain known as Aeolis Mons or Mount Sharp. That's where Curiosity's scientists hope to pin down exactly how long ago Mars was habitable, and perhaps find molecular traces that could have been left behind by ancient life.

 

Birthday party on Earth

 

In the midst of Curiosity's trek to Mount Sharp, NASA took more than a moment to mark the anniversary: The party hit its prime on Tuesday with a live video event at NASA Headquarters in Washington. Space agency officials and crew members on the International Space Station reflected on the anniversary — and traced the time line for future missions to Mars and an asteroid.

 

Those missions include this autumn's launch of the Maven orbiter to Mars, the 2016 launch of NASA's InSight Mars lander, a 2020 Mars rover follow-up, a mission in the 2020s to get up close and personal with a near-Earth asteroid (or at least a piece of the rock), and journeys to Mars and its moons in the 2030s.

 

Prasun Desai, the acting director of NASA's Strategic Integration and Analysis Office, said completely new technologies will have to be developed over the next two decades. Curiosity proved that NASA could land a 1-ton, car-sized payload on Mars. "What we need to do is land a two-story house when we send humans to Mars," Desai said.

 

Space station astronaut Karen Nyberg agreed that NASA wasn't yet ready for human missions to the Red Planet — not only because of the potential health risks from radiation and prolonged weightlessness, but also because of the sheer logistics of an extended odyssey to another planet.

 

"It's a trip that can't be resupplied. Once you're going, you're going," she said. "I think we'll get there eventually, but I think right now there's a lot of work to do."

 

Nyberg said the International Space Station served as a valuable test bed for future trips to Mars, and Bolden seconded that view. "It is our waypoint to Mars," he said. "And it is, in fact, probably the last outpost of humanity before we find ourselves permanently on Mars, one of these days."

 

To keep the party spirit alive, look for the Twitter hashtag #1YearOnMars, or follow @MarsCuriosity. And for something completely different, check out the tweets from Curiosity's wisecracking alter-ego, @SarcasticRover.

 

END

 

 

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