In Today’s Deep Space Extra… NASA prepares divers for the ocean recovery of an Orion capsule after Exploration Mission-1, a late 2018 uncrewed test flight that will liftoff atop the new Space Launch System exploration rocket.
Human Deep Space Exploration
Orion Mission Update for September 2016
Spaceflight Insider (10/1): At NASA’s Johnson Space Center, divers train to retrieve astronauts returning to Earth after deep space missions aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft. Meanwhile assembly and testing of an Orion spacecraft move forward ahead of the capsule’s first uncrewed test flight atop a Space Launch System exploration rocket in late 2018.
Getting Real About Getting To Mars
Forbes.com (9/30): Reaching Mars with humans will require a public-private partnership, according to a strategist with the Space Frontier Foundation.
Space Science
Bye, bye, Rosetta: 5 greatest moments from the spacecraft’s historic comet mission
Mashable (10/1): The European Space Agency’s long-running Rosetta mission drew to a close on Friday, as the mission spacecraft descended to the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the object it had been orbiting for more than two years of close-up scrutiny. Objects like 67P may have delivered the building blocks of life and water to the planets during their formation.
Rosetta mission ends with comet touchdown
Spaceflightnow.com (9/30): After a dozen years of spaceflight, the European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft settled stomach-first onto its permanent home on the Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on Friday at 7:19 a.m., EDT.
Voyager Golden Record being reissued on vinyl 40 years after launch
Collectspace.com (10/1): Ozma records is releasing the golden NASA LP that launched from Earth in 1977 for the distant reaches of the solar system and beyond aboard the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft. The recording, re-named the Voyager Golden Record: 40th Anniversary Edition, carried the sounds of Earth from that era in the event the spacecraft encountered a distant intelligent civilization.
Neil deGrasse Tyson and others explain the big bang and everything else
Washington Post (9/30): Tyson and two science colleagues bring complex physics down to Earth with a note of humor in their new collaboration, Welcome to the Universe.
Low Earth Orbit
Sprites Above Hurricane Matthew
Spaceweather.com (10/2): As Matthew grows into an even-more powerful Caribbean hurricane, a photographer in Puerto Rico captures a rare form of lightning call sprites leaping from the storm into space.
Big Wings, Bigger Dreams: A Sleepover In The Space Shuttle’s Shadow
NPR (10/1): A sleepover at the Smithsonian Institution’s Udvar-Hazy Center, outside of Washington D.C. and home to such aerospace history as NASA’s space shuttle orbiter Discovery, is a 10-year-old’s dream come true.
What It’s Like to Work in Space, Using Bulky EVA Gloves
Space.com (10/1): Working with your hands while garbed in a protective spacesuit presents a time-consuming challenge.
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
Airbus signs up first customer for external space station platform
Space News (9/30): Airbus Defense and Space finds its first commercial customer for an external science platform that the European Space Agency intends to attach to the Columbus module aboard the International Space Station in 2018. Neuman Aerospace, of Australia, is developing a solar electric thruster using a metallic fuel.
Major Space Related Activities for the Week
Major space related activities for the week of October 3-7, 2016
Spacepolicyonline.com (10/2): Oct. 4-10 marks World Space Week, commemorating the start of the space age, which began with the former Soviet Union’s Oct. 4, 1957 launching of the Sputnik satellite. A number of events are planned as part of the U.N.-initiated commemoration. On Tuesday, Blue Origin plans an abort test of its reusable New Shepard suborbital passenger launch vehicle. The rocket has previously flown four times from its West Texas test site.