05 April 2011
Russia And US To Discuss Nuke-Powered Spaceship Project
Russia's Federal Space Agency Roscosmos and NASA will discuss the development of a nuclear-powered spaceship on April 15, agency director Anatoly Perminov said on Monday. Not only the United States, but also "countries with a high level of reactor manufacturing technology" are to take part in the project, he said.
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05 April 2011
Former Cosmonaut Offers First-Hand Account Of The Death Of Yury Gagarin
Russian pilot and cosmonaut Vladimir Aksyonov has offered the most plausible account to date of the crash of the fighter jet that killed Yury Gagarin, the first man in space, and Vladimir Seryogin, a regimental commander at the cosmonaut training center where Gagarin was enrolled.
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04 April 2011
SpaceX scheduled to reveal heavy-duty Falcon rocket
SpaceX plans to unveil a new super-rocket Tuesday, putting the blossoming space transportation firm in contention for larger satellite launches and more ambitious exploration missions.
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04 April 2011
Rising launch costs could curtail NASA science missions
Already faced with a potentially flat budget over the next half-decade, scientists and managers overseeing NASA's robotic science probes worry rising and volatile rocket launch prices could further limit the agency's ability to explore the solar system and maintain crucial climate research.
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04 April 2011
Update on Russia's New Spaceport
The Vostochny space launch facility will be built in addition to the currently operational Plesetsk and Baikonur space launch facilities which are insufficient to satisfy Russia's growing needs in space exploration. Construction will begin in summer 2011. Vostochny will embrace about 1,500 facilities, including 2 space launch pads, a training and a medical center and an hydrogen and oxygen plant. The first launches are planned for 2015.
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04 April 2011
Successful First Mission For Aerospace Breakup Recorder
A Reentry Breakup Recorder (REBR) carried aboard the Japanese HTV2 vehicle during its fiery plunge into the South Pacific Ocean successfully collected data during the breakup of the HTV2 vehicle and "phoned home" that data as it fell into the ocean Tuesday evening. The REBR, an instrument designed and constructed by engineers at The Aerospace Corporation, survived impact and continued to transmit data from the ocean. Analysis of the data will take six to eight weeks.
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01 April 2011
Witnesses Say Future Of NASA Human Space Flight Is Uncertain
Today, in a hearing of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics, witnesses expressed serious concern about the lack of clear focus by the Administration on NASA's transition from the Space Shuttle program toward development of the Space Launch System (SLS) and Multi Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV). These vital components of NASA's human space flight program were outlined as top priorities in the NASA Authorization Act of 2010, which was signed into law.
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31 March 2011
Obama Administration Pushing Back on Congressionally Directed Rocket
Obama administration officials continue to push back against a congressionally directed heavy-lift launch vehicle development that would salvage elements of the Constellation program the president seeks to dismantle.
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31 March 2011
NASA to set exploration architecture this summer
NASA's top human space exploration official told U.S. lawmakers Wednesday the agency expects to settle on a design and schedule for a new heavy-lift rocket and crew capsule by this summer, but experts say it's unlikely the vehicles will meet a mandate to be ready for flight by 2016.
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29 March 2011
A Reusable Manned Deep - Space Craft
Almost a year after Launchspace contributing editors suggested an exploration vehicle that would take crews from low Earth orbit to many solar system destinations such as asteroids and lunar circumnavigation, NASA has come up with NAUTILUS-X, which stands for Non-Atmospheric Universal Transport Intended for Lengthy US space eXploration.
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28 March 2011
Space Program Can Help Realise Sustainable Development: PM
'The space program has a vital role to play in making the concept of sustainable development a reality,' Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said, stressing the importance of space-based observation systems, development of newer class of environment and monitoring sensors and study of weather-related phenomena.
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28 March 2011
Bolden Balks at Congressionally Designed Rocket
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said March 25 that the agency does not want to build the heavy-lift rocket mandated by Congress in the 2010 NASA Authorization Act, Spacepolicyonline.com reports.
Speaking at a Space Transportation Association luncheon on Capitol Hill, Bolden said NASA prefers to build a launch vehicle that can be evolved to carry astronauts to deep space destinations.
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25 March 2011
UK Space Industry Given A Boost In The Budget
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25 March 2011
Russia's New Angara Rockets To Be Test Launched Before 2014
Test launches of Russia's new generation Angara booster rockets will begin no later than 2013, a spokesman for the Russian Space Forces said.
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23 March 2011
NASA ushered in a new era of space exploration at its Wallops Flight Facility
On Tuesday a ribbon cutting ceremony was held for the opening of the new Horizontal Integration Facility (HIF).
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23 March 2011
XCOR And ULA Demonstrate Revolutionary Rocket Engine Nozzle Technology
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22 March 2011
LockMart Makes Strides In Human Space Exploration
Lockheed Martin has unveiled the first Orion spacecraft and a spacious state-of-the-art Space Operations Simulation Center (SOSC). These two major projects, located at Lockheed Martin's Waterton Facility near Denver, Colo., showcase the NASA-industry teams' progress for human space flight, the Orion Project and NASA's Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle.
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21 March 2011
Astronaut Cady Coleman Shares Her Love of the Flute from Space
Catherine Coleman brought with her to the station four flute-like instruments in her small allotment of personal items.
The collection includes two items from the traditional Irish music group The Chieftains - a penny whistle, which is similar to a recorder, from group-leader Paddy Moloney and a very old Irish flute from Matt Molloy. There is also a flute from Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull and her own personal flute aboard.
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21 March 2011
Planetary Exploration Suit Will Be Tested In Antarctica
University of North Dakota aerospace engineer and researcher Pablo de Leon is part of a unique mission to test a planetary exploration suit - the NDX-1 - at a remote military base in Antarctica. The team departed for the Antarctic base from an Argentine Air Force site earlier this week.
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18 March 2011
European Space Missions to Go It Alone After NASA Yanks Support
ESA was supposed to decide in June whether to spend about $1 billion on IXO, the Europa-Jupiter mission known as EJSM-Laplace, or a space-based gravitational-wave detector called LISA. But each L-class mission, which wouldn't launch until the next decade, has been developed with NASA as a would-be partner. The beleaguered U.S. space agency has now told ESA it has higher priorities for its limited space science budget.
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18 March 2011
NASA Money Woes Batter Planetary Flagship Budget
NASA could be forced to impose a roughly $1 billion cap — including launch costs — on any new planetary flagship mission it undertakes this decade, far less than the U.S. National Research Council (NRC) recommended for this class of probe in its most recent survey of planetary priorities and more in line with what the agency spends on medium-sized missions.
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17 March 2011
ILS Threatens Protest of Arianespace Subsidy
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FOR FURTHER READING
04 April 2011
A Fallen Giant: The Soviet Space Industry
You can turn a blind eye to technology, but you can't abolish it completely. In 1993, the national aerospace industry asserted itself on the commercial space-launch market. It took the industry a lot of time and effort to adapt to the realities of the market economy, losing human resources, production facilities, experience, knowledge and hope in the process.
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04 April 2011
Tough decisions ahead for planetary exploration
Last month the planetary science community rolled out a study identifying its priorities for missions in the next decade. Jeff Foust reports on how the difficult choices included in that report are further complicated by NASA’s latest budget proposal.
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04 April 2011
In praise of Mercury
Last month NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft slipped into orbit around Mercury, becoming the first spacecraft to orbit the innermost planet. Lou Friedman describes his “personal, not scientific” connection to that rocky world.
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04 April 2011
The Big Bird and the turkey
While all the KH-9 reconnaissance satellites were launched on Titan rockets, would it have been possible to launch one on a space shuttle? Dwayne Day examines that question as the KH-9 program approaches declassification and the shuttle its own retirement.
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04 April 2011
Space law and the new era of commercial spaceflight
As commercial spaceflight, including both suborbital and orbital human flights, become more common, these applications will raise new legal issues. Christopher J. Newman and Ben Middleton discuss some of the issues that space law experts will have to grapple with in the near future.
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04 April 2011
Review: First Contact
The field of astrobiology has increasingly entered the mainstream of scientific research as scientists make new discoveries on Earth and beyond. Jeff Foust reviews a book that provides an overview of the field and assesses the prospects for life elsewhere in the universe.
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28 March 2011
“We’ve got to move on”
As the 2011 fiscal year reaches the halfway mark this week, NASA still lacks a final budget for the fiscal year as well as a firm plan for its future human spaceflight plans. Jeff Foust reports on how the continued debate and lack of action has some in industry increasingly concerned.
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28 March 2011
The flight of the Big Bird (part 4)
Dwayne Day concludes his history of the KH-9 HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite program with a look at its ill-fated final flight and its overall contribution to the nation’s security.
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28 March 2011
Picking sides in cislunar space
Many space exploration architectures have identified the two Lagrange points near the moon, L1 and L2, as promising stepping stones for future human missions, but which one is better? Dan Lester examines the tradeoffs of going to one point versus the other, and the benefits of either.
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28 March 2011
India’s ABM test: a validated ASAT capability or a paper tiger?
Earlier this month India tested an ABM that officials claimed could also provide the country with an anti-satellite capability. Michael Listner explores how serious India may be in developing its own ASAT.
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28 March 2011
Review: Spacesuit
While essential to human spaceflight, the spacesuit hasn’t gotten the attention that people, rockets, and spacecraft have received over the decades. Jeff Foust reviews a new book that puts the development of the spacesuit, in particular the one used for the Apollo missions, into a technical and cultural perspective.
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28 March 2011
The Sun rises on Chinese space science
The new report from the Royal Society is called Knowledge, Networks and Nations: Global Scientific Collaboration in the 21st Century. It examines how the emerging economies, led by China and followed by others such as Brazil and India, are challenging the "old order". The pre-eminent scientific positions of the US, Western Europe and Japan are now being eroded on every front - in the number of scientific papers published, in citations made, and in patent applications. In terms of pure investment, the emerging economies are also pumping increasing funds into their labs and their science-based industries.
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21 March 2011
Taking the initiative: SLI and the next generation (part 2)
If achieving affordability in future launch vehicles requires at least partial reusability, what is the best way to achieve it? Stewart Money examines the various approaches studied over the years, from recovering rocket engines to flying back complete stages.
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21 March 2011
The path to the future, from a voice from the past
When the day comes when humans settle space, what legal structures will they use? Jeffrey G. Liss uncovers some insights from an unlikely but authoritative source: a former member of the Supreme Court.
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21 March 2011
New competition and old concerns in the commercial launch market
SpaceX achieved a major milestone last week when it won a launch contract from a major commercial satellite operator. Jeff Foust reports that SpaceX’s entry into this market, and other developments, come at a time when other launch companies are worried about a potential shakeout in the market.
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21 March 2011
Earthquakes and climate change: get the data
Most would agree that satellites play a key role in studying and perhaps even predicting natural disasters, like the recent earthquake in Japan. Lou Friedman wonders why their isn’t similar support for using satellites for understanding climate change.
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21 March 2011
America’s unknown astronauts
Throughout the history of NASA, a handful of astronauts have won widespread recognition for their achievements. Anthony Young notes that, during the shuttle program, many more carried out their missions in something more closely resembling obscurity.
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