New government reports cast doubt on future of NASA's Mars spacecraft

Credit: theverge.com

For the past six years, NASA has been intensely focused on sending people to Mars — but the rocket and spacecraft that the agency is building for the job face delays and budget problems. That’s according to two new independent reviews done by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), a federal agency that conducts audits on behalf of Congress. Released last week, the reports paint a grim picture for NASA’s Orion crew capsule and the Space Launch System (SLS) — the huge new expendable rocket that would launch the crew capsule to space. The GAO has little confidence that both the Orion and the SLS will meet their scheduled milestones, and the capsule could exceed its intended budget, the GAO hints.

THE REPORTS PAINT A GRIM PICTURE FOR NASA’S ORION CREW CAPSULE AND THE SPACE LAUNCH SYSTEM

The Orion and the SLS are the primary features of NASA’s "Journey to Mars" initiative. The teardrop-shaped Orion crew capsule is designed to ride into space on top of the SLS, carrying a crew of four astronauts into deep space. NASA plans to use the Orion and SLS combo to send astronauts to an asteroid in orbit around the Moon in the 2020s, a program known as the Asteroid Redirect Mission. After that, Orion will eventually be used to send a crew on to the Red Planet sometime in the 2030s, though details about when and how that will happen have yet to be clearly defined.  Read More >>

By Loren Grush

Source: http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/1/12337324/nasa-mars-spacecraft-launch-orion-capsule-sls

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NASA Spaceship Captures Moon Passing In Front OF The Earth

NASA Spaceship Captures Epic Shot Of Moon Passing In Front OF The Earth

‘The moon passed between NASA climate observatory and the Earth,’ Tweeted former astronaut Rick Mastracchio this week.

‘Almost unbelievable that this is a real photo.’’

The image was captured by a NASA camera on board the Deep Space Climate Observatory on July 16, 2015 over the space of five hours. 

A series of test images shows the fully illuminated ‘dark side’ of the Moon that is not visible from Earth.

The images were acquired by NASA’s Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC), a four megapixel camera and telescope on the DSCOVR satellite, which orbits about 1 million miles from Earth.  Read more >>

Source: https://sg.news.yahoo.com/nasa-spaceship-captures-epic-shot-of-moon-passing-072105645.html

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EVA-38: Frustration morphs into success during Russian spacewalk

Credit: nasaspaceflight.com

EVA-38: Frustration morphs into success during Russian spacewalk

June 19, 2014 by David Štula

Two Russian cosmonauts, Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev, ventured out into the vacuum of space for a spacewalk on Thursday, tasked with carrying out important work – including the installation of an antenna – on outside of the International Space Station (ISS) Russian segment. The initial work proved to be frustrating for the cosmonauts, until they pressed on and completed all their required tasks.

Objectives:

The primary objectives of the spacewalk were focused at servicing the exterior of the Zvezda service module and the experiments mounted in that location.

The cosmonaut duo were tasked with installing an automated phased antenna array (AFAR), which will serve as part of the Russian command and telemetry system.

Artemyev and Skvortsov also relocated a part of the Obstanovka experiment – which is used to monitor the presence of charged particles and plasma in the environment of Low Earth Orbit (LEO).

Other tasks included verifying the correct installation of the universal work platform (URM-D), taking samples from one of Zvezda’s windows, and jettisoning an experiment frame.  Read more >>

Source: http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2014/06/eva-38-russian-duo-spacewalk/

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