50th Anniversary Of First Step Of Planetary Exploration

From RedOrbit:  50th Anniversary Of First Step Of Planetary Exploration

Image Caption: Mariner 2 was the world's first successful interplanetary spacecraft. Launched August 27, 1962, on an Atlas-Agena rocket, Mariner 2 passed within about 34,000 kilometers (21,000 miles) of Venus, sending back valuable new information about interplanetary space and the Venusian atmosphere. Image Credit: NASA/JPL

Fifty years ago today (14 Dec 2012) , America’s space exploration ushered in a new era when NASA’s Mariner 2 spacecraft became the first ever to study a planet other than our own.
On December 14, 1962, Mariner 2 became the first spacecraft to successfully make a close-up study of another planet. The event took place about 36 million miles away from Earth.
To celebrate the occasion, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which built the spacecraft, released an interactive presentation highlighting 50 years of planetary exploration.
JPL said the first Mariners were built on a demanding schedule, and had three probes in less than a year.
The Soviet Union first tried to get a spacecraft to Venus, but failed in their attempts in 1961. The rocket carrying NASA’s first attempt, Mariner 1, was self-destructed four minutes and 53 seconds into flight.
Mariner 2 launched August 27, 1962 from Cape Canaveral, but the lift off was not at all smooth. During its launch, the rocket began to roll, and it was unable to accept guidance commands. The electrical short causing the issue was mysteriously fixed after about a minute and all was okay.
While Mariner 2 was on its way towards Venus, NASA said it encountered many problems that nearly ended the mission.
“Among these were a solar panel that twice stopped working, a balky sensor designed to locate Earth and gyros that mysteriously misbehaved,” NASA said in a press statement remembering the spacecraft. “Most troubling of all, temperatures on the spacecraft climbed to alarming levels as Mariner 2 drew closer to Venus. Mission controllers worried the spacecraft might cook itself before reaching its destination.”
After traveling for a few months in the abyss, Mariner 2 glided within just 21,564 miles of Venus, during which the spacecraft produced the first close-up measurements of Venus’ scorching surface temperature.
This science mission helped confirm scientists’ hypothesis of a “greenhouse” effect that trapped heat from the sun under an atmospheric blanket. The spacecraft’s tracking also enabled navigators to use radio signals to measure the effect of Venus’ gravity on the spacecraft and calculate the most precise figure ever of the planet’s mass.
During Mariner 2′s cruise phase, it was the first to confirm the existence of the solar wind, which is the steam of charged particles flowing outward from the sun.
Data from the mission also enabled scientists to refine the value for the average distance between Earth and the sun. Mariner 2 also showed that micrometeorites and the radiation environment were not significant threats in that part of the solar system.
“There will be other missions to Venus, but there will never be another first mission to Venus,” Mariner 2′s project manager Jack James of JPL reflected before his death in 2001.
Mariner 2 was the stepping stone for NASA’s exploration beyond our own planet, including rovers on Mars, probes around Saturn, and the Viking twin spacecraft, which are in the process of leaving our Solar System, 37 years later.

 

Secret shuttle in orbit after Atlas V launch

From WFTV.com: Secret shuttle in orbit after Atlas V launch

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. —

For a time on Tuesday it appeared the X-37b Space Plane would remain on the ground at Cape Canaveral air Force Station. But, just before the launch window closed, the clouds parted for the military's mini-shuttle and its top secret mission.

The unmanned shuttle was carried into orbit aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.

The rocket launched from launch complex 41. Launch commentary ended 17 minutes into the undisclosed mission.

This is the second flight for this particular Air Force mini-shuttle, making it a milestone of sorts for the X-37b.

"A space vehicle has launched, returned to Earth and then launched again," said Christa Bell, a representative from United Space Alliance.

Jim Hale is an Air Force veteran and volunteer.

"We're so used to seeing the big shuttle and we thought these reusable vehicles were over and done with, and now we have a whole new generation of reusable vehicles," said Hale.

Unlike two previous mini-shuttle missions that touched down at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, this one may end where it started: on the space coast and with a landing on the shuttle runway at NASA's Kennedy Space Center.

Space exploration is Canadians’ ‘birthright’

From Montreal Gazette: Space exploration is Canadians’ ‘birthright

Canada, the third nation to get to space, can and must claim rightful ownership to extraterrestrial technology – and achievements.

Iain Christie, president of Kanata-based space technology firm Neptec Design Group Ltd., told delegates at the Canadian Aerospace Summit that “being a space-faring nation is a birthright of Canadians” – as befits the third country, after the Soviet Union and the U.S., to launch a satellite into orbit in the 1960s.

The aviation and space industry is still digesting – and praising – the comprehensive aerospace review for the Canadian government released last week by David Emerson, a former cabinet minister.

The report urges Ottawa to place space and aerospace at the top of the government’s national priorities – including personal involvement by the prime minister at the key priorities and planning committee meetings.

Emerson said the space sector had been “drifting” in the federal government’s priorities for several years, and that it regularly fell “into a black hole” in terms of the direction and importance it was accorded.

Industry Minister Christian Paradis said that before commenting and acting on the report’s 25 main recommendations, cabinet colleagues must discuss them at length. He did not say when a decision could be made.

But industry executives, including Steve MacLean, a former astronaut and the president of St-Hubert’s Canadian Space Agency, almost universally hailed Emerson’s report at the summit, organized by the Aerospace Industries Association of Canada.

MacLean and Christie, whose firm makes spaceflight sensors, among other things, emphasized the disproportionate importance Canada and Canadians hold in space exploration.

Christie recalled a space-shuttle mission on which he worked as a junior engineer in Houston in 1995 – STS-74 in NASA parlance.

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who will launch into space again on Dec. 19, “had to take the Canadarm to pull a Russian module out of the space-shuttle bay, attach it to the shuttle, which then flew up and attached it to the Russian Mir space station,” Christie said.

“It was symbolically and physically a Canadian who, a few short years after the Cold War, took the Russians in one hand, the Americans in the other, and brought them together.

“That is emblematic of the role Canada has always played,” he said.

MacLean also recalled how awed he was during a stint at NASA to discover that John Hodge was a Canadian.

When Neil Armstrong’s Gemini capsule – pre-Apollo – suddenly gyrated out of control, Hodge calmly talked him though to recovery “literally seconds away” from spacecraft disintegration.

MacLean said he was “incredibly pleased” by Emerson’s report.

“And when I heard Minister Paradis say that space is important to the country, this stabilizes us,” he said.

“Just that one observation stabilizes things – it tells Canadians what the space program can do for Canada.”

 

Coalition for Space Exploration Announces New Leadership for 2013

From Parabolic Arc:  Coalition for Space Exploration Announces New Leadership for 2013

WASHINGTON, D.C. –The Coalition for Space Exploration (Coalition) today announced veteran aerospace communicators George Torres of ATK and Mary Engola of Ball Aerospace will lead the Coalition in 2013. Torres will serve as the new chair and Engola will continue her role as the deputy chair. Each will serve a one-year term, effective January through December 2013.
Torres works as the vice president of communications for ATK’s Aerospace Group. He has broad experience in communications across the aerospace industry, and previously led communications organizations at Rockwell International, Boeing, Hughes Space and Communications Company, and The Aerospace Corporation. A published author, Torres has written two books on the space program and was the recipient of the Journalism Award of Excellence from the Aviation/Space Writers Association for these efforts.
Lon Rains, chair for 2012, congratulated Torres on his appointment and praised the continued success of the Coalition.
“The space industry has seen a lot of change in the past year and I’m proud that the Coalition has been there to help keep space as an important issue for our country,” Rains said. “I’m confident that with George and Mary leading the charge this momentum will continue to build next year.”
Torres has been an active member of the Coalition throughout its eight year duration and led membership efforts for the latter part of 2012.
“These are dynamic times for the space industry, and much progress has been made,” Torres said. “Yet, economic uncertainties pose a serious threat to our growing momentum and I look forward to working with Mary to lead the Coalition as we continue to advance the dialogue surrounding the importance of space exploration to our country.”
Engola, Coalition 2013 deputy chair, has been an active member since the Coalition’s inception in 2004. She served as the Coalition’s 2012 deputy chair and as chair in 2008. She is currently the manager of customer and industry relations at Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp.
“I am honored to continue serving as a member of the Coalition’s leadership team,” Engola said. “I hope my experience helps to bridge our past success with the future as we do what we can to ensure space exploration remains a national imperative.”
Through effective outreach, the Coalition fosters a national conversation about space exploration among the leadership of member organizations, with other space-related organizations, NASA, legislators and the general public.
About the Coalition for Space Exploration
The Coalition for Space Exploration for Space Exploration is a group of space industry businesses and organizations collaborating to ensure that the United States remains the leader in space, science and technology.  By reinforcing the value and benefits of space exploration with the nation’s leaders, the Coalition intends to build lasting support for a long-term, sustainable, strategic direction for space exploration.

 

Voyager 1 finds unknown region at edge of solar system

From USA Today:  Voyager 1 finds unknown region at edge of solar system

8:18PM EST December 3. 2012 - The Voyager 1 spacecraft is traveling through a previously unknown region of deep space as it heads out of our solar system, which might happen soon, scientists reported Monday.
Voyage and its twin, Voyager 2, were launched in 1977 and will become the first man-made objects to exit our celestial neighborhood -- relatively soon.
"We don't know exactly how long it will take," Edward Stone, a project scientist, told reporters during a teleconference, Space.com reports. "It may take two months, it may take two years."
"We do believe this may be the very last layer between us and interstellar space," he said. "This region was not anticipated, was not predicted."
Both spacecraft, which continue to send data back to Earth, are in the heliosheath, the outermost layer of the heliosphere. That's where the force of interstellar cosmic ray particles slows the solar wind generated by the sun.
Scientists, meeting Monday in San Francisco, dubbed the new region a "magnetic highway," where charged particles from inside and outside the heliosphere flow out and in. NASA posted animations imagining what the Voyagers are experiencing, if the naked-to-the-eye ions could be seen.
The twin probes explored Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and Uranus between 1979 and 1989.

 

Malware Swipes Rocket Data From Japanese Space Agency

From RedOrbit:  Malware Swipes Rocket Data From Japanese Space Agency

Information about one of the Japanese space program’s newest rockets was stolen from a desktop computer that had been infected with malware, officials from the organization revealed on Friday.
A computer housed at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Tsukuba Space Center northeast of Tokyo had been discovered compiling data and transmitting it to computers outside of the agency, according to Ars Technica’s Dan Goodin.
The computer was found to be infected and was cleaned on November 21, and no other computers were found to contain malware, Martin Fackler of the New York Times added.
JAXA officials said that it was not clear if the virus was a cyberattack, Fackler said, but Japanese defense firms had been targeted by similar information-stealing programs, including some that had been linked to China.
“The data stolen from the space agency included information about the Epsilon, a solid-fuel rocket still under development,” Fackler said. “While the Epsilon is intended to launch satellite and space probes, solid-fuel rockets of that size can also have a military use as intercontinental ballistic missiles.”
“The Epsilon, whose first launching is scheduled for next autumn, will also feature new technology that will allow it to be remotely controlled by a personal computer,” he added.
Computer-based espionage attacks have become more and more common in recent years, with a vast array of international targets – including private companies, government organizations, and human rights advocacy groups – becoming frequent targets of such cybercrime efforts, Goodin said. In many cases, evidence linking the attacks to Chinese government officials has been uncovered.
“Highly sophisticated malware dubbed Flame, which reportedly was jointly developed by the US and Israeli governments, has also been used to spy on Iran,” he added. “On Friday, researchers from antivirus provider Kaspersky Lab, published details on a targeted attack on Syria’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.”

Astronauts Criticize US Space Program

From Voice of America:  Astronauts Criticize US Space Program

CHICAGO — NASA Astronauts Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt explored the surface of the moon during the Apollo 17 mission in 1972, the last time anyone has left earth's orbit or set foot on the moon.  During a 40th anniversary celebration of Apollo 17 in Chicago, the astronauts said they had expected their mission would  start a path toward space travel, not become a history lesson.

Retired Astronaut Eugene Cernan is one of just twelve men who walked on the moon.  He currently holds the distinction of being the last man there.

"It is tremendously disappointing that I am here 40 years later and still hold that title or have that yoke on my shoulders," said Cernan.

Cernan, along with fellow Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt, celebrated the 40th anniversary of the December 1972 mission with fellow astronaut Jim Lovell at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago.

As they returned to Earth on that long-ago December 19, Schmitt and Cernan didn't expect that 40 years later they would be commemorating it as the end of an era.

"To say that I thought it would be 40 years, or what is really going to turn out to be 50 or 60 years before Americans are back on the moon, I would not have guessed that at all," Schmitt noted.

"A half century ago, we went 250,000 miles, cracked the door open, and never walked through it into the future. The future is still out there," added Cernan.

A plan to return to the moon, which President George W. Bush proposed, was scrapped by President Barack Obama.

Amid deep budget deficits and an economy slowly recovering, U.S. lawmakers are not keen to spend more money on space exploration, something Cernan says is still only a small part of the overall U.S. budget

"We spend one half of one penny of every one of our tax dollars on space, all of space," Cernan noted.

Schmitt, once a U.S. Senator, says there is also a lack of willpower on the part of NASA.

"And from a fiscal point of view, it falls victim to being very small, and to not having a mission based on geopolitical reality, of the importance of the United States being the dominant space faring nation," Schmitt explained.

With the Space Shuttle now retired, the U.S.- based corporation Space X is developing a vehicle that can transport people to and from earth's orbit. A manned crew capsule could be ready in the next few years.

But for veterans of the Apollo program, that's not enough. They believe NASA should prioritize a return to the moon with Mars the ultimate destination.