Monthly Archives: March 2015

Drama as space station crew returns to Earth

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Three space station fliers -- the outgoing NASA commander and two Russian cosmonauts -- undocked and returned to Earth Wednesday, ending a 167-day stay in space with a nail-biting communications blackout that left the crew out of contact with Russian flight controllers during much of the trip home.

The cause of the communications dropout was not immediately known, but during a brief exchange with recovery crews during the final stages of the descent, spacecraft commander Alexander Samokutyaev reported all three crew members were in good shape. The craft then proceeded to an on-target touchdown on the snowy steppe of Kazakhstan.

Landing was expected around 10:08 p.m., but low clouds and icy fog blocked a clear view of the touchdown and it took another nine minutes or so before Russian recovery crews confirmed the descent module was on the ground and in a vertical orientation. An exact landing time was not immediately known.

As always with Soyuz landings, Russian recovery forces and a team of U.S. and Russian flight surgeons were standing by near the landing zone to help the returning station fliers -- Samokutyaev, flight engineer Elena Serova and Barry "Butch" Wilmore -- out of the cramped descent module for initial medical checks and satellite calls home to friends and family.

Carried to recliners near the descent module and quickly bundled in blankets, all three crew members appeared healthy and in good spirits, smiling and chatting with recovery crews before they were hustled away to a nearby medical tent for more extensive checks.

Before leaving the space station, Wilmore said he looked forward to re-entry aboard the Soyuz.

"It's not many jobs that you have the opportunity to return from work in a 17,000-mile-an-hour fireball," Wilmore, a fighter pilot with a shuttle mission to his credit, joked a few days ago. "This is one of those opportunities! To be honest, I'm not a thrill seeker by any means, but a unique experience like that, I do look forward to it, literally coming back in a fireball."

At touchdown, Samokutyaev had logged a combined 331 days in space during two space flights. Wilmore's total, including one shuttle flight, stood at 178 days while Serova, completing her first mission, had logged 167 days aloft.

All three planned to fly by helicopter to Karaganda before splitting up for separate trips home. Wilmore will board a NASA jet and fly back to Houston while Samokutyaev and Serova will head for home in Star City, near Moscow, for debriefing.

Left behind aboard the space station were Expedition 43 commander Terry Virts, cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov and European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti. During a change-of-command ceremony Tuesday, Wilmore thanked his crewmates for a successful stay in space.

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Drama as space station crew returns to Earth

Space station trio to return after 167 days in orbit

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The Soyuz TMA-14M crew (left to right): Barry "Butch" Wilmore, commander Alexander Samokutyaev and flight engineer Elena Serova. The trio plans to undock from the International Space Station Wednesday evening for a fiery return to Earth, landing in Kazakhstan around 10:08 p.m. EDT to close out a 167-day mission. NASA

Three space station fliers -- the outgoing NASA commander and two Russian cosmonauts -- are returning to Earth Wednesday after more than five months in orbit, reducing the lab's crew to three in a brief lull before launch of three fresh crew members at the end of the month, including two who plan to spend nearly a full year aboard the outpost.

Soyuz TMA-14M commander Alexander Samokutyaev, flanked on the left by flight engineer Elena Serova and on the right by shuttle veteran Barry "Butch" Wilmore, plan to detach their ferry craft from the space station's upper Poisk module Wednesday, at 6:44 p.m. EDT (GMT-4), to set the stage for re-entry and landing in Kazakhstan.

After moving a safe distance away from the lab complex, Samokutyaev and Serova plan to monitor a four-minute 41-second deorbit rocket firing, starting at 9:16 p.m., slowing the ship by about 286 mph to drop the far side of its orbit deep into Earth's atmosphere.

If all goes well, the capsule will settle to a jarring parachute and rocket-assisted touchdown near the town of Dzhezkazgan around 10:07:53 p.m. to close out a 167-day five-hour voyage that began with blastoff last Sept. 25 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Forecasters are predicting temperatures in the mid 20s with fresh snow in the wake of a passing frontal system.

"It's not many jobs that you have the opportunity to return from work in a 17,000-mile-an-hour fireball," Wilmore, a fighter pilot with a shuttle mission to his credit, joked from orbit. "This is one of those opportunities! To be honest, I'm not a thrill seeker by any means, but a unique experience like that, I do look forward to it, literally coming back in a fireball."

He said said he was particularly looking forward to landing when "the Soyuz capsule does a lot of rocking and rolling."

"Eventually, the main chutes come out and, of course, you've got the separation of the (heat shield) on the bottom of the capsule and so many different events," he said. "And finally, the soft landing jets fire -- they're not so soft, I'm told -- and then, of course, the touchdown.

"It's going to be wintertime in Kazakhstan, a lot of snow, so maybe we'll hit a nice fluffy snow bank. And as the hatch opens, that fresh air coming in, it'll be chilly, I look forward to that as well."

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Space station trio to return after 167 days in orbit

Space station crew returns safely to Earth

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Two Russian cosmonauts and one American astronaut arrived safely home to Earth Thursday after concluding a six-month stint on the International Space Station (ISS).

Alexander Samokutyaev, Yelena Serova and Barry Wilmore returned to Earth aboard a Russian Soyuz space capsule, landing upright amid heavy fog near the town of Zhezkazgan, in central Kazakhstan. Recovery crews arrived within minutes of the landing to extract the crew from the capsule.

"The Expedition 42 crew is back on Earth, " NASA commentator Rob Navias said as the US space agency broadcast the landing live.

All three crew members are said to be in good condition and will undergo brief medical tests.

After NASA retired its shuttle program, the world relies on Russian Soyuz capsules to transport personnel to and from the ISS

"Soft landing guys. We're going to miss you," ISS commander Terry Virts radioed as his crewmates departed for Earth.

Samokutyaev, Serova and Wilmore left Earth on September 26 and traveled more than 70 million miles (112 million km) during their six months in outer space. Serova is the first Russian woman to serve on the station, which is a $100 billion project of 15 nations.

Three other astronauts currently remain on the space station and the next crew scheduled to join them will launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, on March 28. That crew will consist of US astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonauts Mikail Kornienko and Gennady Padalka.

The mission will focus on "collecting valuable biomedical data that will inform future deep space, long-duration missions," according to NASA.

bw/gsw (Reuters, AFP, AP)

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Space station crew returns safely to Earth

World View Makes 1st Commercial Balloon Flight to Near Space

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A company that plans to send tourists to near-space by balloon has just completed its first commercial flight.

The Arizona-based companyWorld View lofted two payloads during an umanned balloon flight Sunday (March 8) from southeastern Arizona. The mission was part of NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate's Flight Opportunities Program, which flies experiments designed by students, educators and researchers.

"World View is committed to furthering stratospheric exploration and research," Taber MacCallum, World View's chief technology officer, said in a statement. "Our first flight as a NASA flight service provider marks the launch of our commercial efforts to aid research and education by providing a new way for NASA and others to access near-space."

One of the experiments measured the properties of cosmic rays, which are believed to emanate from supernova explosions. The payload was developed by 18 undergraduate students and three faculty members at Gannon University in Pennsylvania.

The second experiment, known as the Planetary Atmospheres Minor Species Sensor, is designed to measure the distribution of gases in the air of Earth and other worlds. It was designed by students from the Florida Space Institute at the University of Central Florida.

"Many types of space applications and research need more access to near-space than has been possible previously," World View chief scientist Alan Stern, who is also principal investigator of NASA's Pluto-bound New Horizons mission, said in the same statement..

"With this flight," Stern added, "World View illustrates its ability to provide expanded access to the near-space environment for NASA, private corporations and universities."

In February, Arizona-based World View announced it had broken the world altitude record for a parafoil flight. The altitude of 102,200 feet (31,151 meters) is the same that officials hope to reach when they loft passengers, officials added.

World View's passenger flights would cost $75,000 per person and would soar high enough for passengers to see black sky and the curvature of the Earth. Last year, the organization said it plans to offer these flights starting in 2016.

Follow Elizabeth Howell@howellspace, or Space.com@Spacedotcom. We're also onFacebookandGoogle+.Originally published onSpace.com.

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World View Makes 1st Commercial Balloon Flight to Near Space

US betting on 3D printing to win the space race

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NASA is now using 3D printing techniques to manufacture rockets in order to regain competitiveness versus the Russian space industry.

The George C. Marshall Space Flight Centre(MSFC) in Huntsville, Alabama is currently using 3D printing in pursuit of an objective which sounds as if it came straight out of the pages of the Cold War annals: building 100%-US-made space rockets with superior performance to those being made by Russian manufacturers. Since the demise of the USSR, the United States has seriously neglected its own equipment production and has instead been buying a huge amount of space gear from the old enemy. In the early 1990s, the abundant, reliable and low-cost Russian rockets provided a highly attractive alternative to the expensive American variety. This cooperative trend continued unabated until the recent cooling of relations between the two countries.

3D printing should enable the US government to build space rockets faster and at a lower cost

In order to reduce dependence on Russian rockets which are today used to take satellites that are vital for national security up into orbit the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has recently made massive investments in the MSFC, which, back in the 1960s, was one of the flagship US space industry bases. The major issue is how to become competitive again given that the US has been importing Russian rockets for over twenty years. The main hopes of NASAs revitalised rocket programme are resting on state-of-the-art digital technology combining computer modelling and additive layer manufacturing (ALM), popularly known as 3D printing. One of the project management team, Steve Cook, who was quizzed recently by the Popular Science website, underlined that this approach is likely to save both a great deal of time and considerable amounts of raw material.

To take just one example, agas generator injector, which would take fifteen months to build using traditional assembly methods, can now be built in just fifteen days, with a 70% reduction in the cost of manufacturing. Moreover, the process of superimposing layer upon layer of material to create a solid object without welds, joins or fasteners, which is characteristic of the 3D printing method, also considerably reduces the weight of the part, thus freeing up precious pounds of thrust that can then be used for payload. In the same vein, printing out a thrust chamber (the main part of the engine, which includes the combustion chamber and fuel nozzle), will cost an estimated 35% less than assembling it in the traditional way, while at the same time the additive manufacturing approach will save months of work. In the longer term, most of the rocket components could be printed, resulting in a powerful, cost-effective, fast-built engine. A first demonstration model is expected to be available sometime in 2018.

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US betting on 3D printing to win the space race

Space rocket passes key test ahead of Nasa deep-space launcher flight

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The motor is 25% more powerful than the four-segment engines used to help lift the space shuttle

A beefed-up space shuttle solid rocket motor passed a two-minute test firing in Utah on Wednesday, a key milestone toward the debut flight of Nasas deep-space launcher in 2018, the US space agency said.

Anchored horizontally to a test stand in the desert in Promontory, Utah, the five-segment motor, built by Orbital ATK, ignited at 9.30am local time.

Bright flames shot out the rear of the rocket for two minutes, marking the first full-duration burn of the enhanced solid-fuel shuttle booster rocket, a live Nasa broadcast showed.

It looked really clean. Were very excited. Great result, said Charlie Precourt, an Orbital ATK vice-president and former Nasa astronaut.

The 177-foot (54-meter) motor is 25% more powerful than the four-segment engines used to help lift the space shuttle. The shuttles were retired in 2011 after 135 flights, two of which ended in disaster.

Several shuttle-era components are being incorporated into the new rocket program, known as the Space Launch System. The motor tested on Wednesday included hardware flown on the first shuttle mission in 1981, Nasa spokeswoman Stephanie Schierholz said.

The test was the first of two planned before two boosters are paired with four liquid-fueled modified shuttle main engines and topped with an Orion capsule for an unmanned debut run around the moon in 2018. Orion, flying on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta 4 rocket, made its initial test flight in December.

United Launch Alliance is a partnership of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.

Nasa is spending about $3bn a year to develop the Space Launch System rocket and Orion capsule, which are designed to fly astronauts to asteroids, the moon, Mars and other destinations beyond the International Space Stations 260-mile-high (418km) orbit.

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Space rocket passes key test ahead of Nasa deep-space launcher flight

Sarah Brightman creates space song with Andrew Lloyd Webber

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Sarah Brightman

Sarah Brightman's ex-husband Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber has written a song for her to sing in space.

The 54-year-old classical singer will travel to the International Space Station later this year and intends on becoming the ever international artist to perform live from space.

Sarah wants the track to be something special so she enlisted the help of the revered composer - who she divorced in 1990 - to create a

poignant piece of music.

Speaking at a press conference in London on Tuesday (10.03.15) to announce her journey into space, she said: "I've been working on something with my ex-husband, Andrew Lloyd Webber and he's thought of the most beautiful line for something so we're just taking it slowly at the moment. Because of the complexities of this, I don't want to promise too much because there is a reality to all this."

Sarah - who is believed to have paid 35 million to fund the trip - is also taking into consideration the difference between singing on Earth and in zero gravity.

She explained: "I've been working on various things, it's finding a song which suits the idea of space and something that's incredibly simple because to sing in micro-gravity is a very different thing to singing down on Earth."

Sarah has been training as an astronaut since January after being accepted by the Russian Federal Space Agency as a space-flight participant for a planned flight arranged by Space Adventures, Ltd. The singer has been learning everything from wilderness survival to the Russian language in preparation for her journey and 10-day stay on the International Space Station.

For Sarah it is the realisation of a life-long dream to go into space.

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Sarah Brightman creates space song with Andrew Lloyd Webber

Mookie Betts impresses ex-Red Sox CF Jacoby Ellsbury

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TAMPA Jacoby Ellsbury doesnt recall the first time he saw Mookie Betts play.

But he remembers precisely when he first noticed him:

Last season Aug. 1, to be exact. Fenway Park. Eighth inning. Derek Jeter had just homered to cut the Red Sox lead to 4-2 over the Yankees when Ellsbury crushed a pitch from reliever Junichi Tazawa toward the center field triangle. Now, the former Sox center fielder knows that tract of land as well as anyone, so he was sure of the result.

Probably wouldve been a triple, Ellsbury said yesterday.

If only the center field future hadnt chosen that moment to coincide with its past.

Betts was playing in only his 11th career big league game and had been recalled earlier in the day from Triple-A Pawtucket. A natural infielder, he moved to the outfield less than three months earlier. But there he was, sprinting back to the lip of the warning track, leaping with his left arm extended as far as it went, hauling in the ball, and holding on as he crashed to the ground.

Ellsbury couldnt have done it any better.

Oh yeah, I remember that catch. It was a really nice catch, Ellsbury said at George M. Steinbrenner Field before going 1-for-3 with an RBI single against a Red Sox lineup headed by Betts, who finished with three hits in his teams 10-6 Grapefruit League win. He had to leap for that catch, make a nice adjustment. ... I dont remember if any runners were on, but it definitely took away some extra bases, thats for sure.

Said Betts: That was the one (catch) of last year that I was like, How the hell did I do that? It just happened so fast. I just remember him hitting it and the next thing Im rolling on the ground.

Funny, isnt it, how things work out? Or not.

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Mookie Betts impresses ex-Red Sox CF Jacoby Ellsbury

Watch NASA test the largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built | Mashable – Video

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Watch NASA test the largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built | Mashable
On March 11 at an isolated location in Utah, NASA successfully tested what the agency is calling the largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built. The booster is intended to help...

By: Mashable

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Watch NASA test the largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built | Mashable - Video

Watch NASA Fire Up the Biggest Rocket Ever Built

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NASA ground tested its Space Launch System for the very first time this week.

NASA on Wednesday fired up its Space Launch System (SLS) for the very first time and thankfully, we can watch the "largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built" produce 3.6 million pounds of thrust in two minutes of awesome.

The SLS will be responsible for lifting NASA's deep-space Orion crew vehicle into space, carrying astronauts to destinations like Mars and near-Earth asteroids.

This week's "major-milestone" ground test was conducted at NASA commercial partner Orbital ATK's Promontory, Utah test facility. It's difficult not to be dumbstruck with the sheer power on display in the video of the test below as the enormous booster scorches the valley around it with enormous jets of flame and billows of smoke.

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Watch NASA Fire Up the Biggest Rocket Ever Built