In Today’s Deep Space Extra… NASA prepares to test fire the RS-25, a powerful first stage rocket engine for the Space Launch System exploration rocket under development to start astronauts on future missions of deep space exploration.
Human Deep Space Exploration
It’s going to be a Blast! First RS-25 flight engine test set for March
Universe Today (3/9): NASA has set Thursday for the first ground fire test of the RS-25 rocket engine that will help to propel the first stage of NASA’s Space Launch System exploration rocket. The engine, based on the space shuttle main engine, is to help start U.S. astronauts on future missions of deep space exploration. The ground test is scheduled for NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.
Space Science
After equipment woes, NASA mission to Mars is rescheduled for 2018
NPR (3/9): Difficulties with a vacuum leak in a French-led instrument contribution to NASA’s Mars InSight Lander, a seismometer, led to a decision in December to skip a March launch opportunity. On Wednesday, NASA said it will work with the French space agency, CNES, on a repair in time for a May 2018 lift off. With success, the lander would touchdown on Mars in late November 2018 to study subsurface geophysical processes.
Red planet triumphs and defeats: A history of Mars missions
Space.com (3/9): Mars is not the easiest place to explore, according to a look back at missions launched by the former Soviet Union, Europe, China and Japan as well as the U.S.
Amazing total solar eclipse photos show ‘black hole in the sky’
Space.com (3/9): Indonesia and Southeast Asia offered the best views of a rare total solar eclipse late Tuesday and Wednesday.
Low Earth Orbit
Three spacefarers from three nations discuss four-month mission to Space Station
America Space (3/9): NASA’s Kate Rubins, Russia’s Anatoli Ivanishin and Japan’s Takuya Onishi previewed their mission aboard the International Space Station, currently scheduled to lift off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on June 21. Their launch will introduce an updated version of the vulnerable Soyuz launch vehicle and new science experiments.
NASA to play with fire in space after delivering Space Station supplies
USA Today (3/9): NASA’s next contracted Orbital ATK cargo mission to the International Space Station is set for a Mar. 22 lift off. Once the mission ends, the Orbital Cygnus cargo capsule will depart the Space Station. In a departure from past, missions the departing Cygnus spacecraft will be used to stage a flame in space experiment.
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
Jeff Bezos pulls back the curtain on his plans for space
Washington Post (3/9): Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos follows boyhood spaceflight dreams with plans to launch passengers on suborbital missions with the reusable New Shepard rocket. At the same time, Blue Origin is developing a powerful new rocket engine and orbital launch vehicles, Bezos explained to news reporters invited to tour facilities at the company’s Kent, Wash., headquarters this week.
Communications satellite launched to cover Rio Olympics
Spaceflightnow.com (3/9): Arianespace successfully launched a Eutelsat communications satellite from French Guiana early Wednesday atop an Ariane 5. The spacecraft is expected to be operational in August in time to broadcast Olympics opening ceremonies from Rio de Janeiro.
Investigation completed against suspects in Russian spaceport embezzlement case
TASS, or Russia (3/10): Investigators charge four in connection with the embezzlement of funds designated for the construction of the Vostochny cosmodrome. The organized effort was responsible for the loss of more than $15 million in the acquisition of metal structures at artificially high prices for the complex in 2012-13, according to the report. Another individual is still being sought in the matter. Construction difficulties have forced a delay in the planned December 2015 first launch from the new launch complex.