The Osiris-Rex spacecraft has been approved for development, and NASA plans to send it to meet up with asteroid Bennu within the next five years. A rendering of Osiris-Rex from a NASA concept video. NASA’s plan to go poking around on an asteroid, with the ultimate goal of snagging one of the space rocks and towing it closer to Earth, is moving forward, and a specific asteroid has been chosen to visit and sample in the next few years Continue reading
Tag Archives: spacecraft
NASA plans asteroid mission. First stop: Bennu
The Osiris-Rex spacecraft has been approved for development, and NASA plans to send it to meet up with asteroid Bennu within the next five years. A rendering of Osiris-Rex from a NASA concept video. Continue reading
NASA Tests Orion Spaceship's Parachutes with Mock Glitch
NASA conducted a successful test of its next-generation spaceship last week, in an exercise designed to simulate two different types of parachute failures during landing. A prototype of the Orion spacecraft landed safely in the Arizona desert May 1 after it was dropped 25,000 feet (7,620 m) from a C-17 airplane as it flew over Yuma, Ariz. Continue reading
NASA's Kepler probe in peril
NASA An artist’s conception shows NASA’s Kepler space telescope observing a planet making a transit across an alien star. (Star and planet not to scale.) By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler space telescope suffered a second failure in its reaction-wheel control system, forcing a suspension of its search for alien planets while the space agency determines whether the four-year mission is truly finished. Continue reading
NASA's planet-hunting telescope is spinning out of control
NASA’s Kepler space telescope is in trouble. The telescope, launched in 2009 in search of Earth-like planets, has lost the use of one of the four wheels that control its orientation in space. Kepler, for the second time this month, has gone into safe mode, NASA reported Wednesday afternoon Continue reading
NASA telescope's planet-hunting days may be over
LOS ANGELES (AP) NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler telescope is broken, potentially jeopardizing the search for other worlds where life could exist outside our solar system. If engineers can’t find a fix, the failure could mean an end to the $600 million mission’s search, although the space agency wasn’t ready to call it quits Wednesday. The telescope has discovered scores of planets but only two so far are the best candidates for habitable planets Continue reading
NASA craft's planet-hunting days may be numbered
LOS ANGELES (AP) NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler telescope is broken, potentially jeopardizing the search for other worlds where life could exist outside our solar system. If engineers can’t find a fix, the failure could mean an end to the $600 million mission’s search, although the space agency wasn’t ready to call it quits Wednesday. Continue reading
Can NASA's Planet-Hunting Kepler Mission Be Saved?
There’s a chance that NASA’s Kepler space telescope can recover from the malfunction that has halted its wildly successful search for alien planets, mission team members say. The second of Kepler’s four reaction wheels devices that allow the observatory to maintain its position in space has failed, depriving Kepler of the ability to lock precisely onto its 150,000-plus target stars, NASA oficials announced Wednesday (May 15). But mission engineers are not conceding that Kepler’s planet-hunting days have come to an end, vowing to try their best to recover the failed reaction wheels over the coming weeks. Continue reading
Ball Aerospace-Built Radarsat-1 Far Outlives Mission Expectations
BOULDER, Colo., May 9, 2013 /PRNewswire/ –A Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. Earth observation satellite built for the Canadian government has concluded its mission after serving the organization for more than 17 years12 years longer than its mission life. Continue reading
NASA lets poets / send haiku to Red Planet / on a MAVEN's wings
NASA / GSFC The MAVEN orbiter, shown in this artist’s conception, is to be launched toward Mars in November. Continue reading
NASA probe gets close-up views of large hurricane on Saturn
Apr. 30, 2013 NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has provided scientists the first close-up, visible-light views of a behemoth hurricane swirling around Saturn’s north pole. Continue reading
Wow! Monster Hurricane on Saturn Spied by NASA Spacecraft
Spectacular new images from a NASA spacecraft orbiting Saturn have captured the most detailed views ever of an enormous hurricane churning around the ringed planet’s north pole. The stunning new images and video of the Saturn hurricane, whichwere taken by NASA’s Cassini probe, show that the storm’s eye is 1,250 miles (2,000 kilometers) wide about 20 times bigger than typical hurricane eyes on Earth. Continue reading
Damaged cargo ship docks with space station
A damaged Russian cargo ship successfully docked with the International Space Station today, delivering 3.1 tons of food, fuel and equipment. Continue reading
Freighter docks with space station despite antenna glitch
Moscow, April 27 (IANS/RIA Novosti) The Progress M-19M space freighter docked with the International Space Station (ISS) despite having failed to deploy one of its navigation antennas, Mission Control said. It docked with the ISS Zvezda module in automatic mode Continue reading
NASA, Partners Solicit Creative Materials Manufacturing Solutions
NASA, the U.S. Continue reading
NASA Spacecraft Take Spring Break at Mars
NASA’s robotic Mars explorers are taking a cosmic break for the next few weeks, thanks to an unfavorable planetary alignment of Mars, the Earth and the sun. Mission controllers won’t send any commands to the agency’s Opportunity rover, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) or Mars Odyssey orbiter from today (April 9) through April 26. The blackout is even longer for NASA’s car-size Curiosity rover, which is slated to go solo from April 4 through May 1. Continue reading
Fastest ride to space station
Watch a Soyuz rocket lift off, sending three spacefliers to the International Space Station. By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News A NASA astronaut and his two Russian crewmates made the fastest-ever trip to the International Space Station on Thursday, arriving less than six hours after launch. In the past, it’s taken two days for Soyuz spaceships to make the trip from Russia’s Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Continue reading
Soyuz launched on four-orbit flight to space station
Updated 11:13 PM ET A veteran Russian commander, a rookie cosmonaut and a Navy SEAL-turned-astronaut rocketed into space Thursday and glided to a smooth docking with the International Space Station less than six hours later, a record-setting rendezvous being tested to reduce the time crew members have to spend cooped up inside the cramped Soyuz ferry craft. Soyuz TMA-08M commander Pavel Vinogradov, flight engineer Alexander Misurkin and shuttle veteran Christopher Cassidy blasted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 4:43:20 p.m. EDT Thursday (GMT-4; 2:43 a.m. Continue reading
NASA : Sequester could delay U.S. plan to launch astronauts by 2017
NASA and its commercial allies are on track to launch astronauts into space from U.S. soil by 2017, unless the government’s sequester delays their efforts. “We’re still marching along on our 2017 initial flight for a crewed vehicle,” said NASA Administrator Charles Bolden in a teleconference Thursday about the recent SpaceX resupply mission to the International Space Station Continue reading
NASA ‘s Voyager 1 Probe Has Left Solar System: Study
NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft the farthest-flung object created by human hands has left the solar system forever, scientists say. Continue reading