With a thunderous roar, NASA’s Mars Atmoshere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft rocketed into space today on time at 1:28 p.m. EST and the opening of a 20-day launch period. Nestled atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V-401 rocket, MAVEN lifted off from from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral AFS and quickly sliced through […]
NASA
This LADEE Wasn’t Just Eating Bon Bon’s During The Government Shutdown
During the NASA shutdown, the LADEE mission continued to perform its critical maneuvers and capture into the commissioning orbit around the moon. The trajectory correction maneuver (TCM-1) was completed on Oct. 1, and set the spacecraft to rendezvous with the moon on Oct. 6.
MAVEN Granted Reprieve, Preparations Resume For November Launch
The cloud of pessimism over NASA because of funding shortfalls in the federal budget and partial government shutdown lifted somewhat today when the agency’s MAVEN mission to Mars was granted a special exemption from the mass furloughs that have caused activities across NASA and other agencies to grind to a halt. This has allowed workers […]
Moon Express’ Guidance Software Flies NASA’s Mighty Eagle On A Successful Test
The Mighty Eagle, a NASA robotic prototype lander managed out of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. successfully completed a test flight today as part of a series to help validate software from Moon Express, Inc. The flight also evaluated a new hazard avoidance system designed and developed at the Marshall Center. Like […]
To Boldly Go… Voyager 1 Reaches For The Stars
There was a time over a generation ago when people still talked about men walking on the Moon like it was yesterday, where the space shuttle was still something of the future and memories of the Vietnam War still burned painfully in the minds of many. It was five years after Gene Cernan and company […]
NASA Narrows List Of Potential Sites For Next Mars Lander
NASA has narrowed to four the number of potential landing sites for the agency’s next mission to the surface of Mars, a 2016 lander to study the planet’s interior. The stationary Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander is scheduled to launch in March 2016 and land on Mars six months […]
NASA Astronaut Candidate Class Of 2013 Introduced To The Public
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Tuesday formally welcomed the eight newest candidates to the astronaut corps and unveiled a space exploration roadmap that makes clear the global community is working together on a unified deep space exploration strategic plan, with robotic and human missions to destinations that include near-Earth asteroids, the moon and Mars. At […]
NASA Seeks Users For Shuttle Era Launch Structures
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida is seeking concepts for the potential use or divestment of three historic launch platforms that are not needed for the agency’s current or planned future missions. A Request for Information (RFI) released Friday will gauge the interest of commercial or government entities for using the three nearly identical mobile […]
NASA Selects Technology Demonstration Projects for Suborbital Research Flights
NASA has selected for possible flight demonstration 10 proposals from six U.S. states for reusable, suborbital technology payloads and vehicle capability enhancements with the potential to revolutionize future space missions. After the concepts are developed, NASA may choose to fly the technologies to the edge of space and back on U.S. commercial suborbital vehicles and […]
NASA Commercial Crew Partner SpaceX Completes Orbit and Entry Review
NASA Commercial Crew Program (CCP) partner Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) recently reviewed the systems critical to sustaining crews in orbit and returning them safely to Earth aboard the company’s Dragon spacecraft. SpaceX is one of three commercial space companies working under NASA’s Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) initiative to develop spaceflight capabilities that eventually could […]