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Today’s CSExtra offers the latest reporting and commentary on space related activities from across the globe. China looks to late October mission to advance plans for a robotic lander that would return with samples of lunar soil and rock. Hubble Space Telescope spots Kuiper Belt destinations for New Horizons spacecraft. NASA’s Messenger spacecraft photographs evidence of ice at Mercury. Comet Siding Spring to whip past Mars on Sunday. Two NASA astronauts restore power channel during spacewalk outside the International Space Station. Research scheduled for the International Space Station overwhelming time available to the astronauts. India launches navigation satellite. Orbital Sciences announces International Space Station cargo mission delay for hurricane watch. Sierra Nevada seeks injunction from U.S. federal courts in NASA Commercial Crew Program contract case.
Unmanned Deep Space Exploration
China readies moon mission for launch next week
Space.com (10/14): China readies a precursor for a future mission that will land on the moon and return to Earth with samples of soil and rock. The precursor, launching Oct. 23, will circle the moon and return to Earth to test the re-entry strategy.
Beyond Pluto: Hubble ID’s Kuiper Belt options for New Horizons
NBC News (10/15): Images from the Hubble Space Telescope enable NASA’s New Horizon’s spacecraft team to identify three possible destinations for their probe after it passes close to Pluto in July 2015. Each is a Kuiper Belt object.
First photos of water ice on Mercury captured by NASA spacecraft
Space.com (10/15): NASA’s Messenger mission spacecraft transmits first ever images of ice trapped in the recesses of planet Mercury’s North Pole.
Comet will buzz Mars Sunday: How to see it in telescopes
Space.com (10/15): U.S., European and Indian spacecraft at Mars will be watching Sunday as the Comet Siding Spring races within 87,000 miles of the red planet, while traveling at 126,000 miles per hour. The comet will be visible from Earth with the aid of a moderately sized telescope.
Low Earth Orbit
Spacewalk achieves all major objectives
CBS News via Spaceflightnow.com (10/15): NASA space walkers Reid Wiseman and Barry Wilmore replaced a failed voltage regulator outside the International Space Station on Wednesday and began to prepare the American segment for the arrival of commercial crew transport vehicles.
NASA has more science bound for Space Station than crew can handle, official says
Space News (10/15): Agency official spells out the challenge before a National Research Council panel in Washington earlier this month. The International Space Station is staffed by three astronauts on the U.S. operating segment, three on the Russian segment. “We are literally going into an increment coming up where we have allocated to us 875 hours [of research time], and I have about 1,400 hours of research.” said Rod Jones, manager of NASA’s ISS Research Integration Office. The increment, or expedition, begins in March.
Indian navigation satellite launched by PSLV
Spaceflightnow.com (10/15): India launches the third in a series of Asian regional global positioning constellation satellites on Wednesday, placing the spacecraft into geostationary transfer orbit.
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
Hurricane threat pushes Antares launch back to Oct. 27
Spaceflightinsider.com (10/15): Orbital Sciences bumps launch plans for its next cargo mission to the International Space Station from Oct. 24 to Oct. 27 at the earliest. The move provides time to monitor a Caribbean hurricane and its impact on Bermuda, where the U.S. maintains a tracking station needed for the mission.
Sierra Nevada seeks federal injunction to stop work on NASA space taxi
Denver Post (10/15): Sierra Nevada asks the U.S. federal court in Washington to direct NASA to stop work on Boeing’s CST-100 and SpaceX’s piloted Dragon capsule. The two companies prevailed in September contract awards from NASA’s Commercial Crew Program to complete the development of spacecraft that can carry astronauts to and from the International Space Station. Sierra Nevada, a losing bidder, filed an appeal to the U.S. General Accountability Office that stopped all work. NASA, however, instructed Boeing and SpaceX to resume their activities.
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