Today’s Deep Space Extra offers the latest reporting and commentary on space related activities from across the globe. China’s space leadership ponders future deep space ventures. Republican presidential hopeful Jeb Bush likes the idea of a moon colony. Recent imagery from NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft features Pluto’s moons Nix and Hydra. NASA’s Kepler space telescope, a successful extraterrestrial planet finder, detects something strange and distant that has some wondering if an alien intelligence is responsible. Researchers suggest comet impacts may have delivered life’s building blocks to Jupiter’s moon Europa. The asteroid Ceres may absorb the blows when meteorites strike. On Thursday, NASA’s Scott Kelly, the current commander of the International Space Station, will claim the U.S. record for most time accumulated in space. A new U.S., Israeli space pact spurs memories of Ilan Ramon, who perished in NASA’s 2003 shuttle Columbia tragedy. South Korea’s president visits NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. A recently launched NASA CubeSat based space communications demonstration encounters attitude control problems. Virgin Galactic makes SpaceShipTwo fuel adjustment for upcoming test flights.
Human Deep Space Exploration
China exclusive: China aims to go deeper into space
Xinhuanet, of China (10/15): After its lunar explorations, perhaps on the moon’s far side, Chinese space officials are considering missions to deep space destinations. The far away missions would involve astronauts as well as robots.
Jeb Bush: Newt Gingrich’s moon colony idea was ‘cool’
CNN (10/14): While campaigning in New Hampshire, Republican presidential hopeful Jeb Bush offers praise for the human lunar base plan outlined by Newt Gingrich, a former Georgia congressman who ran for president in 2012. “Really, I think it’s pretty cool,” Bush remarked.
Unmanned Deep Space Exploration
Two small Pluto moons get their close-ups
Space.com (10/14): New photos transmitted by NASA’s distant New Horizons mission spacecraft reveal Pluto’s moons Nix and Hydra. New Horizons carried out the first close flyby of distant Pluto on July 14 and is currently headed deeper into space for a future encounter with another Kuiper Belt object.
Has Kepler discovered an alien megastructure?
Discovery.com (10/14): A new research paper is raising the question: Has NASA’s Kepler space telescope detected some kind of artificial structure around a distant star. The star, KIC 8462852, is displaying an unusual signature that may be explained by a structure assembled by an extraterrestrial civilization.
Did comets spark alien life in Europa’s oceans?
Discovery.com (10/14): If biological activity is discovered on Jupiter’s ice and ocean covered moon Europa, it may have originated from the complex chemistry delivered by comet impacts, say researchers. Currently, NASA is planning a future mission to Europa for a closer look.
Study suggests Ceres acts as sponge collecting asteroid impact debris
Orlando Sentinel (10/14): A Brown University study suggests the large asteroid Ceres, which NASA’s Dawn mission spacecraft has been orbiting since March, may act as a “sponge” absorbing most of the material when it is struck by other planetary bodies. The findings using computer simulations may influence the planning for planetary missions designed to collect samples of asteroid materials for return to Earth.
Low Earth Orbit
Record breaker: Scott Kelly becomes most experienced U.S. astronaut tomorrow
Americaspace.com (10/14): NASA’s Scott Kelly, in the midst of a near yearlong stay aboard the International Space Station with Russian colleague Mikhail Kornienko, on Thursday will log the most time in space by an American over a career. Kelly surges past fellow NASA astronaut Mike Fincke, who accumulated 381 days, 15 hours, 11 minutes in space over two Space Station expeditions and a shuttle flight. Kelly currently serves as commander of the Space Station. He is not due back on Earth until March. Kelly and Kornienko are serving as subjects in experiments focused on the psychological and physical effects of long duration spaceflight. The studies are intended to help pave the way for future human deep space exploration.
An Israeli astronaut by 2020? New deal with NASA makes it feasible
Times of Israel (10/14): A new pact between NASA and the Israeli space agency could lead the way to a second Israeli in space. Ilan Ramon, who perished aboard the shuttle Columbia in 2003, paved the way. This week, the two space agencies signed a sweeping new cooperative space agreement at the 66th Annual International Astronautical Congress in Jerusalem.
Park visits NASA space flight center
Yonhap News Agency (10/14): South Korean President Park Geun-hye visited NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland on Wednesday, signaling a desire to strengthen ties with the U.S. in space.
Experimental NASA Cubesat suffers attitude control problem
Space News (10/14): The CubeSat was launched on Oct. 8 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 launch vehicle as a secondary payload. The small satellite was part of a space laser communications demonstration.
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
Orbital ATK readies Cygnus cargo ship for return to flight, reveals mission patch
Collectspace.com (10/14): Orbital ATK stages orbital hardware for the planned Dec. 3 launch of its advanced Cygnus cargo capsule, a resupply vessel developed to deliver supplies to the International Space Station. The end of the year space station delivery mission would be the first for Orbital ATK since an Oct. 28, 2014 launch mishap at NASA’s Wallops Island, Va., Flight Facility. The next launching will unfold from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., using a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 launch vehicle in place of Orbital’s own Antares.
NASA awards contracts for dedicated Cubesat launches
Space News (10/14): NASA on Wednesday announced contracts with three companies for dedicated launches of small satellites. The three companies, Firefly Space Systems, Rocket Labs and Virgin Galactic, must launch between 45 and 90 CubeSat equivalents by April 2018 to earn a combined $17.1 million. Their primary customer will be the Earth Sciences Division of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate. Firefly and Rocket Labs plan launches from the Kennedy Space Center, Virgin’s satellites will be launched with rockets carried aloft by an airplane. NASA is hopeful the contracts will spur a new industry for rockets dedicated to a new class of small satellites that have been finding along on rockets with larger satellites as primary payloads.
Suborbital
SpaceShipTwo bounces back to rubber fuel
Space News (10/14): Virgin Galactic will initiate test flights of SpaceShipTwo using a rubber-like solid fuel. The decision follows the fatal ending to a late 2014 piloted test flight whose causes are still under investigation. George Whitesides, a Virgin Galactic executive, discussed the plan before an audience at the International Symposium for Personal and Commercial Spaceflight in New Mexico last week.