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Today’s CSExtra offers the latest reporting and commentary on space related activities from across the globe. Space Launch System heavy lift rocket development carries out “confidence welds.” NASA’s Langley Research Center organizes robotic phase of Asteroid Retrieval Mission. Women more efficient Mars explorers? China completes construction of spaceport for future lunar, Mars missions. Comet Siding Spring zips past Mars on Sunday. Aerojet Rocketdyne embraces next Mars assignment. NASA stops work on solar sail experiment. European Space Agency verifies Rosetta mission landing site. U.S. Air Force X-37B lands, concluding secretive 22 month mission. Russia’s Elena Serova embraces life aboard the International Space Station. Twelve join International Space Hall of Fame. NASA Ames turns 75. International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight produces frustration, optimism over personal spaceflight future. U.S. Court of Federal Appeals opens Sierra Nevada protest proceedings to Boeing, SpaceX. Boeing completes key NASA Commercial Crew Program milestone in CST-100 development strategy. Major space related activities planned for the week ahead.
Human Deep Space Exploration
SLS core stage test welds begin at NASA’s welding wonder in Michoud
AmericaSpace.com (10/19): NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility produces “confidence welds” for assembly of the Space Launch System heavy lift rocket hardware in the site’s giant weld tool. The SLS in under development to start humans of future missions of deep space exploration.
NASA Langley helps build robot to fetch an asteroid
Hampton Roads Daily Press (10/17): NASA’s Langley Research Center hosts members of Virginia’s state government as well as its Congressional delegation to display the facility’s role in the Asteroid Retrieval Mission. NASA plans the robotic capture of a small asteroid, or a piece of a larger asteroid. The captive asteroid would be steered into orbit around the moon, where it could be reached by U.S. astronauts launched aboard the Space Launch System and Orion crew exploration vehicle.
Slate.com (10/20): Women may be more economical than men as Mars explorers, writes Kate Greene, who was a subject in a 2013 NASA funded analog research project, HI-SEAS, conducted in Hawaii. Women participants expended fewer calories and ate less than the male participants. The six person exercise spanned four months.
China’s fourth spaceport completed in boost for space program
South China Morning Post (10/19): Construction is now complete on China’s largest spaceport. Positioned in the south Hainan Province, the launch complex will be used to send a Chinese space station into orbit as well as launch future human missions to the moon and Mars, according to the report.
Unmanned Deep Space Exploration
Comet’s flyby of Mars a boon for scientists
CBS News via Spaceflightnow.com (10/19): Scientists receive rare opportunity to study impact of comet’s passing on the Martian atmosphere on Sunday.
Comet avoids hitting Mars but makes astronomical history
USA Today (10/19): Comet Siding Spring clears Mars after historic encounter on Sunday. U.S., European spacecraft in orbit and on the surface of the red planet record the event.
Comet Siding Spring flies safely past Mars; what’s next?
Los Angeles Times (10/19): All NASA spacecraft at Mars survived a close pass of Comet Siding Spring on Sunday. The comet zipped within 90,000 miles of the planet’s surface Sunday afternoon.
Comet Siding Spring at Mars: How a rare celestial event was discovered
Space.com (10/18): Comet Siding Spring, discovered in 2013, is a gift to scientists who would not be able to study the object if the distant Oort Cloud object had not been nudged with a gravitational push toward the inner solar system.
Aerojet Rocketdyne chosen to help with new mission to Mars
Sacramento Business Journal (10/17): Aerojet Rocketdyne will continue a long tradition of providing propulsion for NASA Mars missions. The latest project, managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, involves Mars 2020, a large rover that will gather and store samples of Martian soil and rock until they can be returned to Earth for study by a future mission.
NASA nixes Sunjammer mission, cites integration, schedule risk
Space News (10/17): NASA suspends development of the Sunjammer Solar Sail mission over cost, schedule concerns. A 2015 flight was envisioned to demonstrate a technology that uses the pressure of sunlight as a propulsion source.
Rosetta’s Philae lander given “green light” for upcoming landing
Spaceflight Insider (10/18): The European Space Agency has confirmed its choice of a landing site on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for the unmanned Rosetta’s mission’s Philae lander. The landing, an exploration first, is set for Nov. 12.
Low Earth Orbit
After nearly two years in orbit, the U.S. Air Force’s secretive space plane lands
Space News (10/17): The U.S. Air Force X-37B unmanned reusable space plane ended a secretive 22 month mission on Friday with a landing at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The long flight marked the third trip to orbit for the military’s two X-37Bs. A fourth mission is planned for 2015, according to the Air Force.
Mysterious X-37B military space plane’s landing in photos
Space.com (10/18): Stills and video of the X-37B landing at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., from Boeing, developers of the reusable space plane.
First female ISS cosmonaut adjusts to life in space
Spaceflight Insider (10/17): In September, Elena Serova became Russia’s first female resident of the International Space Station. Serova’s activities include an experiment to determine how the human heart adjusts to weightlessness.
12 join International Space Hall of Fame
Alamogordo Daily News, of New Mexico (10/19): Twelve men and women from the opening days of human space exploration to New Space are inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame.
NASA Ames turns 75; tens of thousands flock to open house
San Jose Mercury (10/18): NASA’s Ames Research Center marks its 75th year on Saturday. “People often wonder post-Shuttle what NASA’s doing,” said Chuck Duff, Ames’ director of center operations. “We’re doing more than ever. We’re focusing on exploration.”
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
A decade into a new spaceflight era, a mixture of frustration and optimism
Space News (10/17): The two-day International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight, held in Las Cruces, N. M., last week, produced frustration over the pace of commercial human spaceflight development. Many believed personal spaceflight would commence soon after the SpaceShipOne’s Ansari X-Prize winning launched in October 2004. The startup, however, may be near. Symposium participants included representatives from DARPA and NASA involved in efforts to make a break through.
SNC vs NASA: Boeing and SpaceX allowed to intervene, next hearing date set
Spacepolicyonline.com (10/17): The U.S. Court of Federal Claims on Friday grants Boeing and SpaceX permission to intervene in the appeal Sierra Nevada has filed, objecting to the NASA Commercial Crew Program awards to Boeing and SpaceX. Another hearing in the Washington courtroom is scheduled for Tuesday.
Boeing completes Commercial Crew milestone
Florida Today (10/17): Boeing announced completion of its NASA Commercial Crew Integrated Capability contract obligations on Friday. Boeing is prepared to proceed with building and testing of its CST-100 crew capsule, which will launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla.
Exclusive: ULA plans new rocket, restructuring to cut launch costs in half
Dallas Business Journal (10/16): United Launch Alliance will downsize to meet the expectations of smaller U.S. military budgets. ULA plans a new rocket line based on the best of the Atlas 5 and the Delta 4, according to the company’s new CEO, Tory Bruno.
Major Space Related Activities for the Week
Major space related activities for the week of October 20-24, 2014
Spacepolicyonline.com (10/19): Congress remains in recess. New U.S. Court of Federal Claims proceedings scheduled in NASA’s Commercial Crew Program contract awards appeal. Russian spacewalk scheduled outside the International Space Station.
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