Jeff Foust - Space Politics

As I know I've mentioned before, Jeff Foust is one of the most prolific and useful contributors to the wider conversation about Space Exploration happening on the Internet. He's never one to Cry Wolf, so, generally speaking, when Jeff write, we read it.

A short time ago Jeff posted his own perspective of recent speculations concerning the time being taken by the new administration to pick a successor to Michael Griffin as NASA administrator:

Lane on his report and the NASA administrator search

Last week I noted here the mixed reception from former astronauts to a the recent policy paper by George Abbey and Neal Lane, one that proposed foregoing a return to the Moon in favor of more of an emphasis on energy and environment research, as well as long-term planning for missions to near Earth objects. What other response has that report generated?

I had an opportunity last weekend at the AAAS conference in Chicago to ask Lane, after a panel session about the future of the OSTP (Lane was President Clinton’s science advisor), what sort of feedback he’d received. “Mostly favorable,” he said. He alluded to Cernan’s opposition to the proposal that was published by the Houston Chronicle, but wasn’t surprised since Cernan is “still kind of a space nut. He wants to go go go, out to Mars.”

Lane, by comparison, doesn’t think the nation is interested in human missions to the Moon and Mars. “It would be fine to go to the Moon if there was a reason to go to the Moon, and the people wanted to, but they don’t,” he claimed. “People don’t care about going back to the Moon and there’s no rationale for going back to the Moon. I would really like to see NASA go forward in a big way and have a larger and more exciting space program. But right now there’s not the support for it, and NASA’s flailing.”

That’s why, he said, he and Abbey decided that NASA would be better advised to focus on “solving the energy problem” and build public support for the agency that could be leveraged for other missions in the future. “If we keep blowing all our money on Constellation there will be nothing left,” he said.

Read the rest at SPACE POLITICS

I would be a heck of a lot more interested in what Dr. Schmitt has to say about Lane's comments, frankly, and I feel sorry for anyone who would dare call Captain Cernan "a space nut." It marks Lane as either ignorant or covertly hostile to an eventual future beyond the reach of central planning. This Zero-Sum mentality if really getting on my nerves. - JCR

Cement Jet Printed buildings on the Moon and Mega-scale fabrication

AAAS Conference Report HAT-TIP: Next Big Future

Contour Crafting, cement-jet printing of buildings, has been studied for use on the moon. Contour Crafting is the only layered fabrication technology which is suitable for large scale fabrication. CC is also capable of using a variety of materials with large aggregates and additives such as reinforcement fibre. Due to its speed and its ability to use in-situ materials, Contour Crafting has the potential for immediate application in low income housing and emergency shelter construction. One of the ultimate goals of humans is building habitats on other planets for long term occupancy. The CC approach has direct application to extraterrestrial construction. A NASA supported project was aimed at studying the applicability of CC for Lunar construction (Khoshnevis et al., 2005). The development path is to first make single household houses, then multi-unit apartments and offices and then whole communities and towns.

Read the story HERE.

ESA 2nd ATV named after Johannes Kepler

ESA's second Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) has been named Johannes Kepler after the German astronomer and mathematician. Europe's next unmanned logistics spacecraft is scheduled for launch to the International Space Station in mid-2010.

Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) was a German astronomer and mathematician who is best known for discovering the laws of planetary motion. Starting his career as a teacher in Graz, he later moved to Prague where he worked with the Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe. Kepler's work contributed greatly to the scientific and technical progress of Europe and enabled space exploration today.

This year is also the 400th anniversary of the publication of one of Kepler's most influential works, Astronomia Nova. The choice of this key figure in astronomy is particularly fitting in 2009, the International Year of Astronomy.

"We are proud that Europe's second ATV will carry the name of Johannes Kepler," says Simonetta Di Pippo, ESA's Director of Human Spaceflight. "A world-renowned European scientist, his name reflects how Europe's role in human spaceflight and exploration is rooted in a long tradition of science and technological progress. The next ATV mission will be the confirmation of Europe's commitment to and interest in the ISS for the years to come as the first step in a global space exploration effort."

Last year's flawless mission of the first ATV, named after French science fiction writer Jules Verne, demonstrated the spacecraft's key role in International Space Station (ISS) logistics and operations.

On its inaugural flight, Jules Verne delivered six tonnes of cargo to the ISS, including food, clothing, propellants, water and oxygen. It also contributed to ISS operations by performing regular reboosts of the orbital complex and by removing 2.5 tonnes of waste at the end of its six-month mission.

ATV Johannes Kepler is currently under production at EADS Astrium in Bremen, Germany.

Kaguya captures Earth diamond ring effect

On February 9 the lunar orbiter Kaguya successfully imaged the moment when Earth and Sun created the "familiar" (on Earth) diamond ring effect, usually reserved for that moment when, during a full eclipse by the Moon of the Sun, the Sun's photosphere bursts through valleys between mountains on the limb of the Moon. This time, Earth and Moon switch places, and Kaguya captured the sun not fully eclipsed by Earth, using its onboard HDTV camera.

"The moment came when a penumbral lunar eclipse occurred and the view of the Sun from the Kaguya was mostly covered by the Earth," today's JAXA news release reports, "thus the earth looked like a diamond ring.

"This is the first time this phenomenon was shot from the Moon."

JAXA

Scientific Pig Out

Jim Brainerd
The Astrophysics Spectator

Wednesday morning I received an e-mail from the American Physical Society (APS) advising me that I should send a thank-you note to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi for giving the National Science Foundation (NSF) $3 billion and the Nation Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA) $600 million of new funding—euphemistically called “science infrastructure investments”—in the $816 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Instead, I sent a thank-you note to my congressman, one of the 11 House Democrats who voted against the spending bill. Of course, my reasoning had nothing to do with the advancement of science. Reading the bill, I saw that it is simply a massive list of congressional pet projects, an expansion of socialized medicine, and further federalization of the public school system. I think the bill will harm the economy.

Over the short term, researchers in the fundamental sciences will get more money. The bill should give short-term funding to astronomy and astrophysics. The bill earmarks all but $150 million of the NASA funds for climate research, aeronautics, and the mitigation of flood and hurricane damage to NASA facilities; the remaining money is to be spend on science, so much of this will likely be spend on astronomical projects. One billion dollars of the NSF funding is earmarked for such things as the modernization of academic research laboratories, funding of the “Major Research Instrumentation Program,” and funding of the ‘‘Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction’’ program, all of which, presumably, support astronomical observatories, leaving $2 billion for unspecified scientific research. Certainly on the NASA side, and perhaps on the NSF side, some of this money will go to astronomy and astrophysics.

The joy the APS expressed over the additional NSF and NASA funding, I believe, is misplaced.

Read the Commentary HERE.

Kohler refutes Space Florida expose' - (UPDATED with Sentinel's Answer)

NOTE: Early this morning on the Orlando Sentinel's WRITE STUFF blog, Robert Block posted information regarding a letter of support purported to endorse the work of Space Florida mentioned in the general statement by Mr. Kohler below:

Space Florida uses form letter to justify "job creation"

UPDATE: T. Boone Pickens and SPACEHAB have spoken up in a new endorsement of SPACE FLORIDA, reported Thursday morning by PARABOLIC ARC.

The original statement from Steve Kohler answering the Orlando Sentinel:

It is important that Space Florida be given the opportunity to refute inaccuracies outlined in the Sunday, Feb. 15, 2009 Orlando Sentinel story headlined: "Florida's Space Boosters Failed to Launch, Critics Say."

For background, a reporter from the Orlando Sentinel began working on this story several weeks ago. The reporter spent hours in the Space Florida office reviewing and requesting documents, and was provided volumes of background data including every audited financial report since the inception of the organization, all receiving "clean opinion" status. Of the $50 million funding cited in the story, the reporter did not explain that the Space Florida enabling legislation directed that $35 million be spent to support the renovation and upgrade of the ORION project facility at the Kennedy Space Center. In a recent letter to the Lt. Governor, Brevard Workforce Development Board President, Lisa Rice noted how the State of Florida through Space Florida provided $260,000 in funding for the Aerospace Workforce Transition (AWT), stating the funding will have a positive, lasting impact on the State.

Space Florida advocated in favor of the Air Force's assignment to lease SpaceX a launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and has provided SpaceX more than $2 million in cash, facilities and in-kind support with said support continuing to this day. The launch complex is located on Air Force property where responsiveness to national security is their fundamental priority. As the liaison agency for companies that wish to launch from the Cape, Space Florida serves the 45th Space Wing in assuring companies are vetted prior to engaging with the 45th Space Wing and that processes are implemented and executed.

The reporter was provided names and contact information for eleven of Space Florida's customers with strong and positive working relationships, none of which were referenced in his article. The reporter further ignored all data we provided demonstrating Space Florida success.

Customer Satisfaction results from an outside survey completed in November 2008 and presented to the Board of Directors in a public forum were also provided. More than 100 respondents summarized their Space Florida business relationship, noting an overall customer satisfaction rating of 80% and a majority rating "a strong business advantage is seen from association with Space Florida," and their "Intent to recommend (Space Florida) is very strong." Among the many statutory requirements, one of them outlined below designed to drive Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education.

Outlined in 331.3051 Duties of Space Florida, subsection 10, it states Space Florida will:

"(10) Carry out its responsibility for creating innovative education programs by funding programs developed in conjunction with the Department of Education that target grades K-20 in an effort to promote mathematics and science education programs, which may include the Florida-NASA Matching Grant Program, aerospace-focused education programs for teachers, education-oriented microgravity flight programs for teachers and students, and Internet-based aerospace education. Funds appropriated and any in-kind or private-sector contributions may be used to carry out innovative education programs. Funding levels shall be determined by the Space Florida board of directors. " Two contracts with Zero-G Corporation worth $500,000 each, directly served 92 Florida teachers, 2700 students and 19 industry and academic researchers across 47 counties, creating an indirect impact to thousands of teachers and students, through the web-enabled teacher community and shared research projects and lesson plans. The Zero-G microgravity flights are one element of multi-faceted STEM education efforts and continue to be improved.

Space Florida allocated $250,000 in seed money to SPACEHAB for infectious disease research in microgravity which will pave the way for a new biotech industry based in Florida, and includes a payback model to help fund future Space Florida projects.

I hope this document provides you some additional information and perspective. I assure you that the team at Space Florida remains committed to aggressively and successfully attracting commercial space business to the State, and reducing our customers' costs, while assuring their access to space. We remain transparent and open to those that we serve.

Student team to test lunar lander in March

LEAPFROG program provides opportunity for students

The Daily Trojan - Student Newspaper
University of Southern California

Anthony Ngo

The ambitions of eight students are about to take off in early March with the first free flight test of their prototype lunar lander that might one day be the basis of a space-worthy design.

Since September 2006, the Lunar Entry and Approach Platform for Research on Ground program has been quietly making progress through a collective student effort led by David Barnhart at the Information Sciences Institute.

The ISI is an independent research facility affiliated with USC that handles time-sensitive projects that do not fit within a semester system. The LEAPFROG program is one such project.

The project team’s priority is to create a low-cost, lunar-lander apparatus that can be used repeatedly for different missions without being rebuilt. The apparatus is inspired by NASA’s Apollo lander.

After over two years of work on the Generation 0 prototype, the small-scale version is nearing completion.

“By the second week of March we want to fly this machine,” said Varun Khadilkar, a graduate student studying electrical engineering. “It needs to hover at five meters and land safely and softly.”

Read the Story HERE.

LCROSS on its way to meet LRO at Cape

Handle with care (then hurl into darkness). The Lunar Crater Observational Sensing Satellite undergoing inspection prior to its shipment to the Cape. Northrop Grumman

Tom Rogers

Tireless commercial space advocate

From HobbySpace we learn, "Tom Rogers, a pioneer in spaceflight commercialization and space tourism has died. Rogers was a president of the Space Transportation Association and a chairman of the Sophron Foundation.

From this page at Space Quest he provided some of his background., and we are referred also to an article by Robert Hodierne : Space Tourism: They used to laugh at the idea of space tourism. They aren't laughing anymore - Washington Post - December 9 2001.

Space Future has a compendium of papers and articles by Rogers."

A comrade at the Space Transportation Association claims, "without Tom Rogers, there would simply be no NewSpace, Period."

Konrad Dannenberg (1912 - 2009)

Pictured here with Scaled Composite's Burt Rutan (r), Konrad Dannenberg surrendered to American forces at Peenemünde, among Warner Von Braun's 116 comrades who perfected the worlds's first advanced program by raining terror on England, among these Adolf Hitler's "Rache-Waffe," the V-2.

Dannenberg's wife said Monday Dannenberg had died of natural causes in Huntsville.

With Dannenberg's death, a mere few of Von Brauns' "Germans," as they would soon become known, and who came to Alabama after serving as prisoner of war in New Mexico, are still alive.

Dannenberg, 96 Dannenberg had a role in developing Redstone, the Jupiter-C and Saturn rocket boosters, including the Saturn V that began each of America's lunar landing missions between 1968 and 1972.

Why NASA's top job remains unfilled

Politicians, outside interests maneuver to influence choice

By STEWART M. POWELL

Houston Chronicle

WASHINGTON — During the past few weeks, the names of three retired generals have floated around Washington and Houston as candidates for the top job at NASA.

Each time, though, aides to President Barack Obama failed to say whether they had selected the space agency’s administrator, and the guessing game continued.

Now, some supporters of the manned space program with ties to NASA say that one of the key reasons for the prolonged selection process is that powerful politicians and rival space contractors are maneuvering behind the scenes to influence the choice.

At stake is a multi-billion-dollar project to develop the Ares rocket for the space shuttle replacement.

NASA thought it had put the decision behind it to use the Ares to propel the Orion moonship into space when it selected a consortium of ATK Launch Systems Group, the Boeing Co. and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne to develop the moonship. The space agency has spent $13.6 billion on the rocket so far.

But the United Launch Alliance — a joint venture forged by Lockheed Martin Corp. and the Boeing Co. — never accepted Griffin’s decision as final, says John Logsdon, space expert and Obama intimate.

The alliance favors the Atlas V or Delta IV rockets, which the Pentagon uses to launch military satellites. Lockheed’s Atlas V rocket is built in Littleton, Colorado; Boeing’s Delta IV is constructed in Decatur, Alabama.

“They see the choice of a new administrator as an opportunity,” said Logsdon, a former director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University who served on the Columbia accident investigation board.

Read the story HERE.

Virtual Flash tour of the Lunar Electric Rover

Hat Tip to NASA Edge via Mark Tillotson

NASA has posted a respectible Flash animation allowing a tour of the Constellation Lunar Electric Rover/Chariot assembly, in available settings including the Washington Mall, the apparent lunar surface, and a virtual showroom/clean room.

NASA EDGE "posted this prior to the Inaugural," and "some of you may have already seen it," but I'm posting it now because I thought it was a lot easier for most busy Lunatics to zip through than downloading and installing Digital Spaces' DARPA/cold rover simulation, which is way more fun, but more useful for designers working to win the Google Lunar X-Prize.

NASA describes it as "one of a new generation of rovers which NASA is currently testing."

View the NASA Flash animation HERE.

SAS: Space Adaptation Syndrome

Human Adaptation to Space: Space Physiology and Countermeasures

A viewgraph presentation by Jennifer Fogarty, Ph.D., NASA JSC

Space Adaptation Syndrome (SAS): "Approximately 70% of all astronauts traveling into space experience SAS symptoms, which range from nausea and light headedness to vomiting. The exact cause of SAS is unknown, but it is believed that it is caused by conflicting sensory inputs from the vestibular organ (inner ear) and the eyes. SAS symptoms normally last only for a day or two and can be treated by medication.

View the pdf file HERE.

New LRO delay still not official

A leaked internal NASA Email, ahead of any official announcement, has been accepted as Gospel indication that the official launch date of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) / Lunar Crater Observation Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) payload combination will slip once again from April 24 to May 7.

LRO/LCROSS is the long-anticipated and essential component of the Lunar Robotic Precursor Program.

NASA's LRO is equipped with, among other instruments, the LROC camera, promising similar HiRISE camera resolution available on its Mars-counterpart the MRO, capable of one to one half-meter resolution deep photography of the lunar surface. While scouting for future safe landing sites for the next steps in returning to the Moon, including locations for the nodes of the International Lunar Network, unambiguous photography of nearly 70 locations of previous human activitiy on the Moon, including and especially the landing sites of Apollo, will be possible ,after decades of "long duration exposure" to the lunar exosphere.

Last year, Japan's Kaguya orbiter returned 5 meter per pixel resolution photography and terrain camera analysis of the landing sites of Apollo 11, 15 and 17, showing a "blast oval" disturbance of the surface brought about by the descent stage of the Apollo 15 Lunar Module Challenger, ferrying astronauts David Scott and Jim Worden into the vicinity of Hadley Rille in 1971. Kaguya spectral camera imagery showing a similar, less obvious "disturbance" resolved high above the landing site of Apollo 11. (From Apollo Command Modules orbiting approximately 100 kilometers overhead as landing missions were underway, handheld and mapping camera photography clearly resolved the Lunar Modules of Apollo 16 and 17.)

At Mars, and at a much high altitude, the MRO HiRISE camera "easily" resolved the Mars Rovers Opportunity and Spirit, even resolving their tracks through the martian dust, the Phoenix lander last year and the dusty shells of the thirty year old Viking landers. Indications of dust upon the artifacts of Apollo and other older vehicles on the Moon by LRO would advance understanding of the dynamics of the dusty lunar exosphere and inner solar system space weathering in general.

Riding the same Atlas booster to their eventual polar orbit of the Moon, the LCROSS impactor, a weighted and balanced Centaur upper stage, is destined to be shepherded within 10 kilometers of the interior of one of many possible targets within permanently shadowed polar craters in the high hope of kicking up a sufficient, brief and highly visible plume of material long sheltered from the blast of solar winds, while under the watchful eye of it's Shepherding spacecraft, (for an instant) following it closely behind and LRO in orbit overhead. Institutional observatory teams and thousands of amazingly well-equppeded observers, crossing their fingers for clear skies, will also be watching back on Earth.

Analysis of the debris plume, from the impactor, visible for perhaps 45 seconds, it is hoped, will answer a deeper question posed by consistent data returned first by Clementine (1994) and Lunar Prospector (1999).

NASA has much staked on even a minimal presence of even a very modest permanent, persence of "super" water ice at either lunar pole. Both Clementine and Prospector returned neutron spectography indicating a consistent and strong signature of hydrogen around both lunar poles. Bound with oxygen, hydrogen, of course, becomes water, which is of supreme importance to the survival of life.

Lunar Prospector coincidence-shielded neutron detection showed twice the hydrogen nearest to the moon's north as seemed around the lunar south, and from areas both within and outside of permanently shadowed abyssal craters. Water, if discovered, would most likely be the very long-term sheltering of cometary fragments. That, or the most likely source of sheltered "volatile" elements, like hydrogen, and its compounds might be the equally long-term sheltering of bouncing impacting particles coming to rest in the only two areas of the Moon where they could endure. (Why more hydrogen appears sheltered near the northern polar regions than near the south is a mystery, but the distinct geography of both areas is the likely key.)

Water ice would save a future permanently human presence on the Moon the huge expense of having to ship water out from Earth's far deeper gravity well, or the laborious task of distilling bound oxygen from the lunar surface and combining it with perhaps harder to refine hydrogen.

Such refinements are critical to the receding goal of in situ resource utilization, (ISRU) the Grail of "living off the land" essential to permanent extended human presence on the Moon.

LRO/LCROSS are now soon to be stacked, at the Cape, but late last week KSC schedulers were confronted with logistical problems.

Atlas LRO requires a specific, very ideally a twice monthly, launch window timed so both spacecraft are placed in polar orbit following the terminator's rotation with the Moon, to provide the highest possible relief of surface features available at sunrise and sunset, as the Moon rotates ever-so-slightly eastward under each successive orbit of LRO.

Adding to the need of precision at launch is the timing of an arrival of LCROSS for the best possible view from Earth and from orbit of either the northern field of possible targets or the southern regions, made possible only by the Moon's monthly swing above and below our field of view.

The goals of the LCROSS team require its eventually selected target be as close as possible to this line of sight view from Earth and any change in launch dates leads to busy speculation among the large community of knowledgable and well-equipped observers, particularly concerning LCROSS' eventual target. This most recent rumor of a change a May 7 launch date has swing speculation back to the north.

Veteran lunar observer and LPOD contributor Jim Mosher, writing to the LCROSS Observation news group has said, "the choice of what is a favorable libration also sounds like it may be a difficult call for the mission scientists to make."

"At first blush, it might seem obvious one would want the target area tilted strongly towards Earth, but that creates complications," Mosher wrote, after the initial launch delay last August.

"If the plume is large, its upper parts might have to be observed rising in front of a more distant sunlit (crater) wall - as we have seen would be the case with Faustini, and for the most sensitive instruments there may be a background of Earthshine and ambient light on the dark-appearing crater floor that will have to be subtracted from observations of the lower parts of the plume.

"There might be something to be said for a geometry in which the plume rises purely into the sky above the sunlit foreground crater rim; but that would block from view the lowest and densest parts of the sunlit plume, and would preclude any possibility of seeing (of the) the impact flash - which might be hidden from view by the transient crater, anyway - even if it were nominally in the line of sight). I'm not sure what they will decide."

As of this morning, the Kennedy Space Center Visitor's center launch manifest confirms the rescheduling of the Atlas LRO vehicle for May 7.

Observers on the ground, however, anxiously await an official announcement by NASA.

North Korea's "developing reality"

"One will come to know later what will be launched in the DPRK"

By many public accounts Pyongyang is gearing up for a "test" of a new ICBM, excusing itself from explaining why a starving, but 'self-reliant' people so devoted to Juche Socialism, would be so determined to make a Great Leap Forward into 'space development.' A glorious future is fine place to imagine when it becomes necessary to deny the gnawing hunger of the present.

Everyone has seen the night light photographs of the Korean Peninsula from orbit. The lights are big and bright behind tens of thousands of American troops stationed in the DMZ and guarding the cease fire of 1953. In brilliant Seoul and across the Sea of Japan governments are alarmed.

In Alaska, U.S. ADM platforms are working three shifts, very wide awake, as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton prepares to visit Beijing, Kim Jong Il is in need of some attention, and he's not above the grand gesture. Tokyo remembers 2003, when a DPRK Ballistic Missile flew over the Home Islands and fell into the Pacific.

If Kim wants to throw rocks, he may discover a surprise left behind by former President Bush, in the form of a trip wire the new White House might not have bothered to trace down as yet.

Fortunately the result will not mean more additional orbital debris.

Nevertheless, in Seoul, The Korea Times believes the sickly leadership around Kim is "anxious to gain President Barack Obama's attention."

North Korea Monday denied that it was preparing to test-launch a long-range missile, claiming its recent moves are related to "space development."

A statement carried by the North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) was reminiscent of the North's comments in 1998, when it claimed a rocket it launched was really a satellite, according to Yonhap News.

The denial comes following intelligence reports from Seoul that North Korea is assembling a long-range missile at the country's eastern launch site.

"Recently the U.S. and some other countries claimed that the DPRK is making 'preparations for launching long-distance missile,'" the KCNA was quoted as saying.

"This is a vicious trick to put a brake on the wheel of not only the DPRK's building of military capability for self-defense but also scientific researches for peaceful purpose under the pretext of missile," it said.

The report also made clear North Korea will launch whatever it is that it has been preparing.

"One will come to know later what will be launched in the DPRK," it said, "Space development is the independent right of the DPRK and the requirement of the developing reality."

North Korea also denied that it was trying to grab U.S. President Barack Obama's attention with its alleged missile activity, as analysts here have speculated.

Jack Schmitt speaks out on AGW Alarmism

Former U.S. Senator Harrison H. "Jack" Schmitt (R-NM), lunar module pilot for Apollo 17 and the only trained scientist to walk on the Moon, is the latest scientist to be added to the roster of more than 70 skeptics who will confront the subject of global warming at the second annual International Conference on Climate Change in New York City March 8-10, 2009.

The conference expects to draw over 1,000 attendees including private-sector business people, state and federal legislators and officials, policy analysts, media, and students.

Schmitt, who earned a PhD from Harvard in Geology, resigned in November from the Planetary Society, an international non-profit organization devoted to inspiring "the people of Earth to explore other worlds, understand our own, and seek life elsewhere." He is the twelfth person to walk on the Moon; as of 2008, of the nine living moonwalkers, he and his crewmate Eugene Cernan were the last two to walk there.

"As a geologist, I love Earth observations," Schmitt wrote, "But, it is ridiculous to tie this objective to a 'consensus' that humans are causing global warming when human experience, geologic data and history, and current cooling can argue otherwise. 'Consensus,' as many have said, merely represents the absence of definitive science. You know as well as I, the 'global warming scare' is being used as a political tool to increase government control over American lives, incomes and decision making..."

Schmitt will be joined by more than 70 other economists, public officials, legal experts, and climate specialists calling attention to new research that contradicts claims that Earth's moderate warming during the 20th Century primarily was man-made and has reached crisis proportions.

Joseph Bast, president of The Heartland Institute, producer of the event along with more than 30 co-sponsors, explained, "At the first conference last March, we proved that the skeptics in the debate over global warming constitute the center or mainstream of the scientific community while alarmists are on the fringe.

Designing America's Altair at Ames

By Mike Swift
Mercury News

Aiming at a tiny landing pad on the gray surface far below, astronaut Charlie Precourt banked the spacecraft to the right. A mottled blue and white orb hung in the black sky — the Earth.

Precourt, a veteran of four space shuttle missions, deftly flared the thrust to kill the craft's momentum. Far below, a tiny American flag grew in size as the ground swept up to meet the ship. Precourt braked to a gentle touchdown.

Once again, human beings had landed on the moon. But Precourt and his two passengers had never left Silicon Valley.

At NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, a group of former astronauts, including several Apollo astronauts who flew the original Lunar Module in space, are helping design America's next lunar lander. NASA engineers are using the world's most advanced motion-based flight simulator at Ames to help create Altair, the next-generation lunar lander that NASA hopes to land on the moon by 2020, returning humans to the moon for the first time in nearly half a century.

Over and over in recent weeks, in a concrete building deep in the Ames complex, some of NASA's best pilots have been landing — and frequently crashing — on the moon, painstakingly logging data with each descent on the Vertical Motion Simulator, or VMS. The information they are collecting will help determine everything from the amount of thrust the lander's engine will have, to the design and function of the cockpit instruments.

Read more HERE.

Chandrayaan inspires students in India

MUMBAI: When Chandrayaan-I soared into space last October, so did the dreams of many young and aspiring IITians keen on a career with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Says a professor from IIT-Bombay's aerospace engineering department, "Ever since Chandrayaan lifted off, space has become the magic word among students."

Two fourth year BTech aerospace students, Shashank Tamaskar and Kartavya Neema, are already doing a research project on interplanetary flight.

Says Shashank, "Inspired by Chandrayaan-I, I am doing a study on a satellite's flight from Leo to the moon." He started work on the project in August 2008, when Chandrayaan was being primed for its historic launch, and hopes to complete it in a year.

Asked if he would like to join Isro, he says, "Definitely, after I complete my studies." The budding rocket scientist said that the focus among students earlier had been on designing planes, but "with the success of Chandrayaan, most of us are talking about designing rockets and satellites".

Kartavya says he is designing a flight path for a satellite to Mars. "For both of us, the inspiration came from Chandrayaan," he confirms, adding thathe'd love to work at ISRO.

From The Times of India

NORAD to Calgary: Watch out for space debris

Interesting story from Saturday morning on NORAD's early warning to Canada: 10 square meter chunk of Russian Progress detritus "heading your way..."
* Not to be confused with Cosmos-Iridium incident...

CTV.ca News Staff

It was enough of a concern that the North American Aerospace Defense Command -- better known as NORAD -- called the Canadian government to let them know that a piece of space debris was headed towards Calgary.

And the debris was big: a piece of an unmanned Russian rocket, 10 square metres in size.

The rocket had blasted off from Kazakhstan on Tuesday and carried materials for the International Space Station. And when it re-entered the Earth's atmosphere, things got a little scary for the province of Alberta.

Read the story HERE.

NewSpace Angel Investors Remain Engaged Amid Economic Crisis

Edward Ellegood, Cocoa Beach

Ken Murphy at Out of the Cradle has an interesting Q&A interview with attorney James E. Dunstan, who is a partner with Garvey, Schubert and Barer in Washington D.C. Dunstan, whose practice focuses on space law and entrepreneurial companies, had some interesting things to say about angel investors who fund start-ups: "Here’s the funny thing about Angels: The very best ones stay way below the radar, otherwise they’re swamped with more requests for funding than they can possibly wade through. And the space community is really hard on Angels, I’ve found. Once someone finds an Angel, and the Angel’s identity gets out, it’s like chum to the sharks."

Satellite Collision 'More Powerful Than China's ASAT Test (Source: New Scientist)

Space weapons are dangerous - but out-of-control, defunct satellites can do just as much damage, if not more. So says a leading space scientist who has calculated that Tuesday's collision between an Iridium communications satellite and the defunct Soviet-era Cosmos 2251 spacecraft expended a great deal more destructive energy than China's infamous anti-satellite missile test did in January 2007. (2/13)

NASA Considers Altair Descent Stage Cargo Return Role (Source: Flight Global)

NASA is considering launching Moon rock samples into low lunar orbit using refuelled Altair lunar lander descent stages to overcome the cargo return limitations of its Constellation program vehicles. After each of the lunar missions, expected to start in 2020, scientists want hundreds of kilograms of lunar rock brought back for analysis. But the space agency’s transportation system can only deliver 100kg (242lb) while the Apollo program could bring back 110kg. The 100kg limit is due to the Altair lunar lander and Orion crew exploration vehicle’s capabilities. So NASA has set a goal of increasing its sample return capabilty to 250kg. Conceivably, once in orbit the reused descent stage would be met by Orion and its rock samples transferred by astronaut extra-vehicular activity.

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