NASA has completed its investigation into Boeing's problematic first test flight of a Starliner crew capsule as the company and agency look toward a second test flight sometime this year.

The commercial crew vehicle, which Boeing developed for NASA to ferry astronauts to and from the space station, made its orbital uncrewed debut in December, lifting off from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. But the craft failed to reach the orbiting laboratory due to a series of glitches and software issues, an independent review team found.

Earlier this year, a NASA review of the flawed test flight identified 61 "corrective actions" for Boeing to address on Starliner. On Tuesday (July 7), NASA announced that that number has swelled by another 19 corrections, for a total of 80, after a second review.

The announcement came in a teleconference update with reporters on the test flight, called Orbital Flight Test 1 (OFT-1), as Boeing prepares for a do-over mission, OFT-2, later this year.

Related: Boeing's 1st Starliner flight test in photos

Boeing announced in April that it will conduct a second uncrewed flight test with Starliner to demonstrate that the spacecraft is safe and reliable before any astronauts ride it to space. However, a launch date for that OFT-2 mission has not yet been set. But the flight is likely to happen "toward the latter part of this year," Steve Stich, manager of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, said in Tuesday's teleconference.

"Today, we're sort of turning the page a bit from the investigation phase of OFT and moving into our hardware development," Stich said. "The spacecraft is coming along very well."

In February and March, NASA and Boeing revealed the results of separate investigations into two major anomalies that led to the partial failure of the OFT mission. First, Starliner's onboard timer drew an incorrect time from the Atlas V rocket shortly after it launched, and consequently, the spacecraft didn't execute the orbit insertion burn needed to reach the space station. The second major problem was a valve-mapping error with the software that controls Starliner's thrusters, which could have led to an in-space collision.

Related: Boeing defends Starliner space capsule ground tests after debut flight

NASA and Boeing announced this week that they have now also wrapped up a separate investigation into a third major anomaly, which led to a temporary drop in communications between Starliner and ground control crews during the mission's launch. That brief glitch left mission control unable to manually command Starliner to do the orbit insertion burn after the onboard timer issue prevented it from happening automatically.

"As we started to look at the data from the flight and why we didn't get a good forward communication link with a spacecraft, what we found was that the system perhaps allowed a little bit too big of a band of frequencies to come in to the transceiver itself," Stitch said.

"What Boeing has done to fix that and mitigate that problem is actually installing a filter, which essentially only allows the receiver to listen to a very narrow band of frequencies with the Tracking and Data Relay Satellite," he added. (NASA's Tracking and Data Relay Satellites, or TDRS, allow ground controllers to communicate with spacecraft.)

Video: Boeing gives Starliner capsule parachutes a workout in drop test

While investigating the first two anomalies earlier this year, the joint NASA-Boeing review team came up with the initial list of 61 corrective actions to implement before Starliner can fly again. But with the recent completion of the investigation into the communications problem, as well as what NASA calls a "high-visibility close call" investigation, that list has now grown to 80 recommendations, Kathy Lueders, NASA's chief of human spaceflight, said in the teleconference.

NASA and Boeing have not made the complete list of recommendations public due to concerns over releasing "proprietary data," Leuders said. But NASA did provide a list of categories and numbers of recommendations in a statement.

Thirty-five of the recommendations pertained to process and operational improvements, 21 of them deal with testing and simulations, 17 are related to software updates and requirements and seven are in a category that includes hardware modifications and other organizational changes.

The high-visibility close call investigation was meant "to specifically review the organizational factors within NASA and Boeing that could have contributed to the flight test anomalies," NASA officials said in the statement. "The close call investigation team, established in March, was tasked with developing recommendations that could be used to prevent similar close calls from occurring in the future."

"NASA and Boeing have completed a tremendous amount of work reviewing the issues experienced during the uncrewed flight test of Starliner," Steve Jurczyk, NASA's associate administrator, said in the statement. "Ultimately, everything we've found will help us improve as we move forward in the development and testing of Starliner, and in our future work with commercial industry as a whole."

Email Hanneke Weitering at hweitering@space.com or follow her @hannekescience. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and onFacebook.

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Sheyna Gifford spent a year living on a volcano in Hawaii with just five other people as part of HI-SEAS IV, a NASA project to simulate life on Mars.

Living in a biodome the size of a two-bedroom apartment and going outside only in their space suits, the crew studied the psychological effects and group dynamics that could be at play when astronauts eventually make it to Mars.

But this interview about relationships, food and free time while in isolation also has a few interesting parallels to our collective situation during the 2020 coronavirus pandemic.

It just teaches you to appreciate everything you have on this planet, Gifford told Nerdette a few months after the mission ended in 2017.

Lights that turn on when you want them to. Water that can run when you want it to. The ability to call your friends and family and hear their voices in real time, Gifford said. All of those things that you just think of as something that you can do at the drop of the hat become impossible on Mars, and therefore become very precious. So its good for you as a person. It gives you a sense of perspective and gratitude.

In this episode of Nerdette, Gifford tells co-host emeritus Tricia Bobeda what living in a box on top of a volcano for a year was like. Plus, she explains why you should think carefully about who and what you want on your spaceship.

This episode originally aired in February 2017. That full interview can be found here.

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Isolation Insights From Sheyna Gifford, Who Spent A Year In A Mars Simulation For NASA - WBEZ

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The InSight lander has been trying to deploy its heat probe instrument for months, but its going to take a break. This probe was supposed to dig down to take the planets temperature, but NASA has only made progress when nudging the probe along with the landers robotic arm. The latest data suggests the probe isnt moving anymore, so NASA has decided to pause this part of the mission and use the arm for other important work.

InSight landed on Mars in late 2018, and NASA set to work mapping out the area around it. After building a model of the landers surroundings, NASA chose the best spot to deploy the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument. The lander had SEIS up and running a few months later, allowing NASA to turn its attention to the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3). This instrument, sometimes called the mole, is essentially a self-hammering nail that was supposed to reach a depth of about five meters (16 feet) all on its own. Alas, it proved much more challenging than SEIS.

The InSight team found the HP3 could only dig down several inches before it stalled and eventually popped back out. NASA has speculated that the Martian soil is so fine that it continuously falls back into the hole each time the probe tries to hammer itself down deeper. In March, NASA decided to push the probe with the robotic arm to keep it from backtracking, and that appeared to work at first. However, the probe is now completely underground, and it seems to have stalled without the arm to keep pushing.

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Video of the lander from June 20th (above) shows soil vibrating and jumping on the arms scoop. NASA believes this is due to the HP3 tapping the bottom of the arm as it bounces back with each failed attempt to move deeper. The team has decided the arm will back away, allowing the lander to get images of the moles current state. This could help NASA properly diagnose the problem and find a solution. More likely, it will just have to change the design of similar instruments in the future to account for Mars unusual soil properties.

InSights robotic arm has other jobs to do. NASA wants to use the arm to get a selfie of the lander, but not just for fun. The team needs to see how much dust has accumulated on the stationary robots solar panels. The arm cameras will also do a little astronomy on Mars, scanning the sky for meteors entering the Martian atmosphere. The team knows the moles situation isnt likely to improve during the pause, but there are still a few things to try. In particular, the team is working on a plan to dump loose material into the hole in hopes of providing the needed friction.

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The Perseverance rover on Mars as imagined by an artist.

NASA's Perseverance rover hopes to answer our biggest burning question about Mars history: Did the red planet once host life?

The dry, dusty Mars we know today was very different in the deep past. Humanity's latest rover is making a beeline for an area of Mars that was once home to a lake, a perfect place to look for signs of ancient microbes.

Since Sojourner in 1997, NASA has sent a succession of increasingly sophisticated wheeled explorers to Mars. Perseverance is the latest and greatest and in July 2020, it launches on an epic journey across space.

From the cosmos to your inbox. Get the latest space stories from CNET every week.

Perseverance will do much more than snap amazing images of Mars. These are some of the key mission objectives:

The mission is planned to last for at least one Mars year, which works out to about 687 days on Earth (it takes longer for Mars to go around the sun). However, NASA has a good track record with extending its robotic Mars missions. We can look to the long-lived Opportunity and Curiosity rovers as role models for this.

Now playing: Watch this: Meet the Mars 2020 rover launching this year

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After a series of delays, Perseverance is now targeted to launch no earlier than July 30. NASA has nudged the event back several times from the original July 17 date. The delays are not yet an issue since the open period for launch stretches until Aug. 15. NASA will livestream the rover's sendoff.

When: July 30Where: Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FloridaRocket: United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V

The window is important. "Owing to the relative positions of Earth and Mars to each other, launch opportunities come up only every 26 months," said NASA in a June 2020 release. Missing this window would mean NASA would have to wait until September 2022 for its next shot. The space agency will do everything possible to make sure Perseverance takes off on time.

NASA performed extensive tests of the parachute system that will lower Perseverance to Mars.

As long as the rover launches sometime within the designated time period, it will have the same arrival date: Feb. 18, 2021. The landing process will include some of the most harrowing minutes of the entire mission.

Perseverance will get to try out a new method that NASA hopes will deliver it as close to its targeted landing site as possible. NASA calls this the "Range Trigger" technique and it's all about deploying the parachutes at exactly the right time.

"If the spacecraft were going to overshoot the landing target, the parachute would be deployed earlier," said NASA. "If it were going to fall short of the target, the parachute would be deployed later, after the spacecraft flew a little closer to its target."

Earth observers can look forward to an unprecedented view of the entry, descent and landing process. The mission is equipped with cameras and a microphone to capture all of the excitement and stress as NASA attempts to land Perseverance gently onto the surface of Mars.

This Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter image shows the Jezero Crater delta region.

Jezero Crater is located just north of Mars' equator and was once home to a river delta. That history of water makes it a prime spot to look for signs of past microbial life. Sounds like the perfect landing site for a science laboratory on wheels.

"The landing site in Jezero Crater offers geologically rich terrain, with landforms reaching as far back as 3.6 billion-years-old, that could potentially answer important questions in planetary evolution and astrobiology,"said NASA's Thomas Zurbuchenwhen the site was announced in 2018.

The car-sized Perseverance rover looks fairly similar to its predecessor, Curiosity, but also represents quite a few technology advances since Curiosity was designed. Here are the numbers:

Length: 10 feet (3 meters)Weight: 2,260 pounds (1,025 kilograms)Wheels: Six aluminum wheels with titanium spokesTop speed: Just under 0.1-miles per hour (152 meters per hour)

The Perseverance rover is stocked with instruments that it will use to investigate the Jezero Crater on Mars.

Perseverance is loaded with seven instruments chosen to help it achieve its mission objectives. You can get the full rundown from NASA, but here are some highlights:

Mastcam-Z: The camera system mounted on the rover's mast is equivalent to eyes on a head. According to NASA, its main job is "to take high-definition video, panoramic color and 3D images of the Martian surface and features in the atmosphere with a zoom lens to magnify distant targets." The mastcam will be our main viewing window onto the Jezero Crater.

MOXIE: The Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment is one of the ways Perseverance is helping to prepare humans to go to Mars. This instrument is designed to make oxygen from the carbon-dioxide atmosphere. This capability will be necessary to help future human explorers breathe, but it would also help us make propellant for rockets right on site. That's a necessary step for bringing our Mars astronauts back to Earth after their missions.

SuperCam: When you put a camera, laser and spectrometers together, you get SuperCam, an instrument that will help look for organic compounds, a key part of the quest for signs of past microbial life. "It can identify the chemical and mineral makeup of targets as small as a pencil point from a distance of more than 20 feet (7 meters)," said NASA.

Sherloc: The "Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals" or Sherloc, as the instrument is affectionately known, will search for signs of life on the red planet. The instrument and its companion camera (nicknamed Watson) are capable of taking microscopic images of Mars and analyzing them. Equipped with a laser it can fire at the surface, Sherloc is able to measure chemicals present in the soil and rock using a technique known as spectroscopy.

The NASA Mars helicopter team attaches a piece to the flight model in early 2019.

"Let's send a helicopter to Mars" might sound a little far-fetched, but NASA is doing it anyway. Ingenuity, a small helicopter designed to work in the challenging conditions on the red planet, is all tucked into the rover's belly where it will ride out the journey.

Ingenuity is a high-risk, high-reward technology demonstration. It will hang out under the rover for a few months until NASA finds a suitable spot to deploy it. Perseverance will drop it onto the Martian surface and then move away.

The helicopter will make the first attempt at powered flight on another planet. NASA hopes Ingenuity soars and becomes a model for a new way to investigate other worlds.

Check out this video for more on how this little chopper could change the way we approach space exploration.

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NASA currently has two machines operating on the surface of Mars, the stationary InSight lander and the Mars rover Curiosity. InSight is located in a region called Elysium Planitia, a large plains area. Curiosity is cruising around Gale Crater, a giant ditch with a massive mountain inside it. Perseverance will be scoping out a very different part of the planet as it continues NASA's legacy of Mars exploration.

The last time we had two functioning rovers on Mars was in 2018 when the Opportunity rover lost contact with home due to the impact of a global dust storm. Perseverance won't have the same issues as Opportunity. Like Curiosity, it uses a nuclear power source that doesn't require sunlight to keep it going.

This plate holds the names of nearly 11 million people and carries a coded message.

Perseverance will be a long way from Earth, but it will carry poignant remembrances of its home planet. Over 10.9 million people signed up to have their names travel with the rover through NASA's Send Your Name to Mars public outreach program. The names are etched on small silicon chips that NASA installed on the rover on an aluminum plate underneath a protective shield.

The plate also bears an illustration of the Earth, our sun and Mars. Hidden in the sun's rays is the message "explore as one," written in Morse code.

A separate aluminum plate pays tribute to health care workers and their efforts to aid humanity during the coronavirus pandemic. This plate carries an illustration of a serpent wrapped around a rod with the Earth at the top.

These names and messages are a reminder that NASA's robotic explorers never truly travel alone. Perseverance is the culmination of years of effort from NASA, but it's also an emissary for humanity, an extension of our curiosity and sense of wonder and a little bit of Earth on Mars.

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Last year, NASA set itself an ambitious goal: Send astronauts to walk on the moon in 2024. Now, the agency is busy planning what astronauts will do during those excursions.

NASA hasn't landed humans on another world in nearly 50 years, not since 1972's Apollo 17 mission to the moon. But that's the agency's goal for its Artemis program. So, the agency is combining that Apollo experience with what it has learned during decades of living and working on the International Space Station, and sprinkling in some challenges it wants to tackle in preparation for the next major exploration milestone, a human mission to Mars.

Science isn't the limiting factor, of course: Scientists have been itching to get back to the moon's surface for ages. But discussions surrounding the Artemis program have tended to focus on the challenges that need to be tackled before the first crewed landing in 2024 or on the agency's long-term vision for the moon, rather than on the practical details of taking advantage of early moonwalk opportunities.

Related: NASA sees inspiration parallels between Apollo and Artemis moonshots

In a series of presentations made last month, NASA personnel described some of the details of the agency's vision for a new era of moonwalks. In particular, representatives offered a sense of how extravehicular activities, or EVAs, during the first landed mission, Artemis 3 in 2024, could unfold.

First, the basics: During the mission, two astronauts will spend up to about 6.5 days on the lunar surface, Lindsay Aitchison, a spacesuit engineer at NASA, said during the Lunar Surface Science Virtual Workshop held on May 28.

That's nearly twice the duration of the longest astronaut stays during the Apollo missions. During that stay, the astronauts will conduct about four extravehicular activities, each of which could last about six hours, Aitchison said, matching the duration of typical excursions outside the International Space Station.

On the first crewed landing mission, astronauts will have to use their own two feet to get around the lunar surface. NASA isn't expecting to have a large rover on the surface and ready to assist exploration until the second crewed landing at the earliest. "We will be limited to just the crew and how far they can walk on their own two feet," Aitchison said. "That's still a fairly wide distance, but it is somewhat limited until we get to the further phases of exploration."

Given that constraint, Aitchison said, NASA has calculated that during each EVA, the crew should be able to cover about 10 miles (16 kilometers) round-trip. (For comparison, during their single milestone lunar excursion on Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin covered about 3,300 feet, or 1 km, in 2.5 hours.)

The astronauts' explorations will also be limited in terms of where their suits can keep them safe. The Apollo missions all landed in the equatorial region of the moon, but the Artemis missions will go someplace entirely new, the south pole region, where extremely cold temperatures may pose problems for spacesuits.

That's a calculated decision on NASA's part. The south pole is tantalizing because scientists have confirmed that water ice lurks frozen below the moon's surface in deep southern craters that never see direct sunlight. Would-be explorers hope that such ice could be mined and processed into drinking water or rocket fuel, facilitating more ambitious missions.

But the same conditions that would foster such ice would make direct exploration by astronauts difficult. The spacesuits on the first landed mission won't be able to withstand such cold temperatures, Jake Bleacher, a geologist and chief exploration scientist at NASA, confirmed during the same meeting. Even on subsequent missions, astronauts may still need to stay in warmer, sunlit areas and leave direct work in the permanently shadowed regions to robotic assistants.

The first Artemis spacesuit will be a model called the Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit, or xEMU, which is based on the EMU suits astronauts currently use during spacewalks on the International Space Station while incorporating some moon-specific lessons from the Apollo program.

"This is where we're going to test out technologies, utilize lessons learned from EMU and obviously Apollo, in order to get to 2024," Natalie Mary, an EVA systems engineer at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, said during a Committee on Space Research meeting held virtually on May 20 focusing on human missions to Mars. "We do have some things that we are holding off [on] for sustained lunar [exploration]."

In particular, throughout the xEMU design process, spacesuit engineers have focused on fit and mobility in order to facilitate exploration. Unlike Apollo and space station suits, the xEMU suits emphasize lower-body movement, meant to ensure that astronauts can walk around the surface with relative ease.

However, the xEMU will be an evolving technology, and NASA already plans to make certain changes to support longer lunar stays for later Artemis missions, including beefing up the suit's protection against vicious moon dust. Later suits could also be programmed to verify their condition, rather than requiring precious astronaut time for a detailed inspection to ensure safety.

One of the components of the xEMU suits that NASA is most carefully analyzing is the gloves, Tamra George, a tools specialist at Johnson Space Center, said during the Lunar Surface Science Virtual Workshop.

"One of the biggest things that limits our designs of EVA instruments and tools is the gloved hand," George said.

Suit gloves must navigate a tricky balance, George said, since they need to be flexible to facilitate astronaut activities but also tough enough to keep astronauts isolated from the harsh lunar environment. And between the bulk of the gloves themselves and the pressure of the suit, space handiwork can be both difficult and draining.

And, of course, the lack of transportation on the lunar surface affects the kinds of instruments astronauts can bring on the moonwalks just as it limits the ground they can cover. Because astronauts on the Artemis 3 mission will need to carry their toolkits themselves, heavy or bulky equipment won't be an option until later missions.

Those constraints, plus moonwalk experience during the Apollo era, have led to NASA settling on an initial set of eight basic science instruments for astronauts to bring on these excursions, Adam Naids, a hardware development engineer at Johnson Space Center, said at the same meeting. Those tools include geology staples like a hammer, rake, scoop and tongs.

Of course, the Artemis 3 mission is still more than four years away, so NASA is still early in the planning process of every aspect of its spacewalks.

"The idea here was just to get us started on developing some of the tools that had a high probability of flying based on what was done in Apollo," Naids said. "This isn't meant to be an all-inclusive list. There's going to be dozens and dozens of other tools and equipment that's going to be made, but it got us started."

Email Meghan Bartels at mbartels@space.com or follow her @meghanbartels. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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If you watched the sun set on Uranus, the sky would start off as a brilliant blue and fade into deeper blues with striking turquoise notes. So how do we know that?

Geronimo Villanueva, a planetary scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, visualized what sunsets look like on Uranus (at the 1-minute, 43-second mark in the video above), as well as on Earth, Mars, Venus and Saturn's largest moon Titan while building a computer modeling tool for a potential future mission to Uranus. This tool is being developed with the ultimate goal to perhaps one day carry it through Uranus' atmosphere to study the atmosphere in person, according to a NASA statement.

But for now, because sunsets happen with planets rotate away from the light of their star (in our case, the sun) and during this process photons (light particles) are scattered in different directions depending on the types of molecules in the atmosphere, these simulations are a valuable tool for exploring far-off atmospheres.

Using known information about these worlds' atmospheres, Villanueva created a set of sky simulations that show what sunset would look like on these worlds. In the animations created from these simulations, the view is what you would see if you were looking up at the sky from these worlds through a wide camera lens, with a white dot representing the sun's location.

While, in this simulation, sunset on Uranus is a stunning ombre of blue tones, the sky on Venus shifts from a dull yellow to a muddy brown, the sky on Mars appears as a greyish-brown spectacle and Titan's shifting sky moves from a vibrant orange-yellow to a deep, burnt orange.

These sky simulations are now part of an online tool known as the Planetary Spectrum Generator, which was developed by scientists at NASA Goddard (including Villanueva). With this generator, scientists can simulate how light moves through the atmospheres of objects ranging from planets to comets. With this tool, scientists can explore the atmospheres of far-off worlds and rocky objects and better understand their surfaces and atmospheres, according to the same statement.

Email Chelsea Gohd at cgohd@space.com or follow her on Twitter @chelsea_gohd. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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See a sunset on Uranus, other worlds (and a moon, too) in this NASA simulator - Space.com

WASHINGTON NASA hopes to keep the costs of additional delays in the James Webb Space Telescope within the programs existing reserves and thus avoid asking Congress for additional funding.

At a June 24 meeting of NASAs Astrophysics Advisory Committee, Eric Smith, program scientist for JWST at NASA Headquarters, said that while a new target launch date for the giant space telescope hasnt been determined yet, the agency expected that the costs associated with that slip will be covered by existing budgetary reserves.

The program has fiscal reserves, in addition to the schedule reserves, and right now we do not anticipate needing additional funding because we have money to pay for extra time in the schedule, he said.

JWST exhausted its schedule reserve because of the slowdown in work caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The program still had nearly two months of schedule reserve when the pandemic caused work to briefly halt in March, then continue at a slower pace. Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA associate administrator for science, said June 10 that because of that slowdown, the mission will not make its March 2021 launch date.

Smith said NASA expects to set a new launch date in July after completing reviews, including examining how changes in work procedures required by social distancing protocols affect the remaining activities. What has changed is the efficiency in which those tasks can be completed, he said. That may include, he said, adding more schedule reserve beyond the two months that the program had in March.

He did not estimate how much the launch date will slip, but it is likely to be at least a few months. Before the pandemic slowed work on JWST, NASA was planning to put the telescope through a final series of acoustics and vibration tests in May and June. Smith said those tests are now scheduled for August.

Smith declined to say how much budget reserve the mission has remaining. We can go a few months, several months past the March [2021] date and still have reserves to cover that, he said.

JWST has a cost cap of $8.8 billion set by Congress after the missions previous schedule slip in 2018. Schedule overruns alone dont require congressional approval, Smith said, but cost increases that exceed the cap would require reauthorization.

SOFIA cancels Southern Hemisphere campaign

Another NASA astrophysics mission affected by the pandemic, the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), has canceled a planned deployment of the airborne observatory to New Zealand because of the pandemic.

In a June 23 presentation at the committee meeting, Naseem Rangwala, SOFIA project scientist, said the project worked for weeks on a way to carry out that observing campaign within the restrictions imposed by the pandemic, but ultimately concluded it was not feasible.

The logistical, personnel and travel-related challenges remained, and we made a very difficult decision to cancel the 2020 New Zealand deployment, she said. The project has for several years carried out such deployments, typically in the Northern Hemisphere summer, to conduct observations of celestial objects visible only from Southern Hemisphere skies.

She said the project worked with the New Zealand government and the U.S. Embassy in New Zealand on ways to carry out the campaign given the countrys restrictions on international travel, including a 14-day quarantine on any arrivals. Those restrictions have eradicated COVID-19 in the country, but ultimately were too much to overcome for SOFIA.

SOFIA, a Boeing 747 equipped with a 2.5-meter infrared telescope, has been grounded since March because of safety restrictions imposed in response to the pandemic. Earlier this month, project officials expressed optimism about resuming flights as soon as late June.

Those plans, which will require the approval of NASA, are still being developed, Rangwala said, using some of the planning that went into the canceled New Zealand campaign. The project developed detailed plans and protocols for how to safely operate SOFIA within COVID-19 constraints, she said.

She said the project now hopes to resume flights in mid-July from California. We are making very good progress on getting the observatory returned to science flights, she said.

SOFIAs shutdown during the pandemic comes as the mission faces the threat of cancellation in the agencys fiscal year 2021 budget proposal, as well as efforts to improve the efficiency and scientific output of the observatory. That has included canceling an instrument that was under development for SOFIA called the High Resolution Mid-infrared Spectrometer, or HIRMES.

The HIRMES project was over-budget and over-schedule, said Paul Hertz, director of NASAs astrophysics division, at the meeting. They had unsolved technology problems and could not produce a believable plan to complete within a predictable amount of money, so we terminated the project for its overruns.

Work on HIRMES-related technology will continue, he said, but will be funded by a technology development program and not the SOFIA project.

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SpaceXs Crew Dragon spacecraft approaches the International Space Station on May 31 with astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken on-board. Credit: NASA

NASA has agreed to allow its astronauts to fly on reused Crew Dragon spaceships and Falcon 9 boosters beginning as soon as SpaceXs third launch of a crew to the International Space Station, a mission expected to launch next year.

The space agency has modified its $2.7 billion commercial crew contract with SpaceX to permit reuse of spacecraft and rocket hardware. NASA had not previously approved the use of previously-flown spacecraft and rockets on missions carrying the agencys astronauts into orbit.

In a disclosure dated May 15 andposted on a federal government procurement website, NASA said the contract modification allows for the extension of the Crew Dragons Demo-2 test flight which launched May 30 with astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken from two weeks to up to 119 days.

The launch of Hurley and Behnken on top of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida marked the first time astronauts have launched into orbit from U.S. soil since the final space shuttle flight took off July 8, 2011.

The two-man crew docked May 31 at the International Space Station, where they will support operations on the orbiting research complex for several months. NASA officials say the Demo-2 test flight is likely to conclude with a parachute-assisted splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean in August.

Once Hurley and Behnken are back on Earth, NASA engineers will review data from the Crew Dragon test flight before formally certifying the SpaceX crew capsule design for operational crew rotation missions to and from the space station.

SpaceX is under contract to fly six of these post-certification missions through the mid-2020s.

The contract modification announced by NASA also requires SpaceX to participate in additional joint test training with search and rescue teams from the U.S. military, which would deploy from Patrick Air Force Base in Florida and other locations to retrieve astronauts in the event of an emergency abort during launch.

SpaceX, NASA and the military search and rescue teams conducted joint training exercises leading up to the Crew Dragon Demo-2 launch. Those training sessions will continue before all the next six Crew Dragon missions under contract to NASA.

In exchange for the new NASA requirements, the space agency will allow SpaceX to reuse Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 boosters for NASA astronaut missions. NASA says SpaceX could begin reusing Crew Dragon vehicles and Falcon 9 first stages on crewed launches beginning with the second post-certification mission, or Crew-2.

The Crew-2 launch is scheduled in 2021. The Crew-1 mission SpaceXs first operational astronaut flight is slated to fly with a brand new Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket.

Consistent with the public-private partnership strategy for the Commercial Crew Program, NASA specifies what safety requirements must be met, and industry is free to propose how to meet those requirements, wrote Josh Finch, a NASA spokesperson, in an emailed response to questions from Spaceflight Now.

In this case, SpaceX has proposed to reuse future Falcon 9 and/or Crew Dragon systems or components for NASA missions to the International Space Station because they believe it will be beneficial from a safety and/or cost standpoint, Finch wrote. NASA performed an in-depth review and determined that the terms of the overall contract modification were in the best interests of the government.

According to Finch, SpaceX will propose a reuse plan for future crew missions, beginning as early as the Crew-2 flight. He wrote that a specific plan has not been developed yet to proposed which Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 boosters might be reused for the Crew-2 mission and subsequent flights.

Also, NASA will need to approve that plan after it is proposed by SpaceX, Finch wrote.

The modification to SpaceXs commercial crew contract, which was originally signed with NASA in 2014, includes no exchange of funds, according to Finch.

Each of SpaceXs operational crew rotation flights to the space station will carry up to four astronauts, including space fliers from NASA and the space stations international partners.

NASA has assigned astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker to the Crew-1 mission. Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi will join the U.S. astronauts on the Crew Dragon spacecraft.

The launch date most recently announced for the Crew-1 flight was Aug. 30, but that could be pushed back to September if the Crew Dragons Demo-2 test flight comes back to Earth in August. NASA is expected to take one-to-two months to review data from the Crew Dragon test flight before giving the green light for SpaceXs first operational launch with astronauts.

SpaceX has reused Falcon 9 first stages on 37 missions with a perfect success record since launching the first previously-flown Falcon booster in 2017. SpaceX also reused Dragon cargo capsules up to three times on resupply missions to the space station.

The first version of SpaceXs Dragon supply freighter has been retired, and SpaceX plans to fly a cargo variant of the Crew Dragon spacecraft for future logistics missions to the space station. SpaceX also refers to the new generation of space station servicing vehicles as Dragon 2, with crew and cargo configurations.

The human-rated Dragon includes seats, crew displays, life support systems and SuperDraco abort engines, which would be activated to push the capsule away from its rocket if it fails during launch. The SuperDracos will not fly on Dragon capsules configured for cargo missions.

NASA previously approved plans to reuse the Dragon 2 vehicles for cargo delivery flights to the space station. SpaceX says the Dragon 2 cargo capsules can fly to the space station and back up to five times, an improvement

Boeings Starliner capsule, which is also designed to carry astronauts, will also be reused on crew missions to the space station. The Starlinerlands under parachutes on land.

Boeing has manufactured two Starliner spacecraft for its missions to and from the International Space Station.

But an unpiloted Starliner test flight in December failed to reach the International Space Station due to a misconfigured mission elapsed timer, which caused the spacecraft to burn too much fuel after it separated from its United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket. Engineers traced the problem to a software programming error, and the Starliner spacecraft aborted its mission to the space station and safely returned to Earth.

Boeing plans a second Starliner test flight without astronauts later this year. If that goes well, the Starliner could be ready to carry a crew to the space station on a demonstration mission in the spring of 2021, before kicking off six operational crew rotation flights under contract to NASA.

Email the author.

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.

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NASA agrees to fly astronauts on reused Crew Dragon spacecraft - Spaceflight Now

The first woman to be in charge of NASA's human spaceflight program will oversee the first mission to land a woman on the moon, and she's expecting "really big things" to come from the next generation of young, female space enthusiasts.

Kathy Lueders, who until now led NASA's Commercial Crew Program, will take the helm of all crewed spaceflight activities at NASA as the associate administrator for the agency's Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate. The promotion, which NASA announced June 12, came about two weeks after Doug Loverro resigned from the position.

"When Jim asked me if I would take this role, you know, I didn't really think about being first," Lueders said during a teleconference with reporters on Thursday (June 18), referring to NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. "I was more overwhelmed with the potential tasks in front of me," she said.

Related: 'Get used to it' The women who broke Apollo's glass ceiling

Lueders said her husband was the one who pointed out to her that no other woman has ever held the job before. "That made me stop and really think about all of the other 'firsts' that have been out there that really have paved my way," she said. "In fact, today is the day that Sally Ride was the first U.S. woman in space. And so that's one of many firsts," she added.

During Thursday's teleconference, Bridenstine formally introduced the agency's new human spaceflight chief and laid out the work that lies ahead for Lueders and her team. "We have a big agenda to go back to the moon by 2024 with the next man and the first woman," Bridenstine said. "I really believe that Kathy Lueders is the type of person that we need leading here in order to achieve those outcomes."

As the manager of NASA's commercial crew program, Lueders oversaw the SpaceX Crew Dragon Demo-2 mission that launched NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station (ISS) last month. Before that, she served as the ISS program's transportation integration manager, overseeing cargo resupply missions. Her NASA career started in 1992, when she became the second woman to ever work in the propulsion lab at NASA's White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico.

"What's been amazing to me over the last few days is seeing all the tweets, Snapchats, Instagrams, all the notes from all the girls out there. That really helped me realize the power of my being first, what that means to them. They will see themselves in me," she said. "I'm very honored by that, and I'm expecting really big things from them. You better get going!"

While Lueders seems happy to serve as an inspiration to young women who are interested in pursuing space-related careers, she pointed out that women aren't the only people who have been underrepresented in the space industry.

"I think when we can see ourselves in the people that are out there, it makes us realize we can do it. And that's very, very important for not only girls out there but for all groups of people that are out there."

Email Hanneke Weitering at hweitering@space.com or follow her @hannekescience. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and onFacebook.

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Kathy Lueders, NASA's 1st female spaceflight chief, will guide a US return to the moon - Space.com

Every year, winds loft about 800 million metric tons of desert dust from North Africaby far the planets largest source of airborne dust particles. The dust is often visible from space during the spring, summer, and early fall, when huge plumes of dry, dusty air from the Sahara Desert (the Saharan Air Layer) blow westward over the tropical Atlantic Ocean.

In June 2020, satellites captured these images of a Saharan Air Layer outbreak in progress. The top image, acquired June 18 with NASAs Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) on NOAAs DSCOVR satellite, shows the scale of the plume in relation to continents bordering the Atlantic Ocean.

That same day, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASAs Terra satellite acquired a detailed view of the dust over the Cape Verde (Cabo Verde) islands. The archipelago, located about 570 kilometers (350 miles) off the west coast of Africa, is frequently in the path of dust plumes.

Summer typically carries a larger volume of dust over the islands, but that dust also tends to float higher in the atmosphere than in other seasons. Still, the volcanic peaks are high enough to alter the air flow and produce patterns in the dust. Notice the v-shaped pattern on the leeward side of the islands. The phenomenon is similar to the v-shaped wake you see behind a boat in a lake or a rock in a stream.

The map above shows the dust on June 18 as represented by the Goddard Earth Observing System Model, Version 5. GEOS-5 is a global atmospheric model that uses mathematical equations to represent physical processes. The map depicts aerosol optical thickness, a measure of the amount of light that the aerosols scatter and absorb, and a proxy for the number of particles in the air. Orange and red colors indicate extremely hazy conditions.

The thickest parts of the plume appear to stretching about 2,500 kilometers (1,500 miles) across the Atlantic. Forecasts indicate that the dust could reach the Caribbean by June 20, and then later drift over the contiguous United States.

Dust from Africa can affect air quality as far away as North and South America if it is mixed into the air near the ground. But the dust plays an important ecological role, such as fertilizing soils in the Amazon and building beaches in the Caribbean. The dry, warm, and windy conditions associated with Saharan Air Layer outbreaks can also suppress the formation and intensification of tropical cyclones.

NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using MODIS data from NASA EOSDIS/LANCE and GIBS/Worldview, imagery from the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR), and data from the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office at NASA GSFC. Story by Kathryn Hansen.

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Dust Traverses the Atlantic Ocean - nasa.gov

The sunset on Uranus fades from a bright blue to royal blue with hints of turquoise, according to NASA scientists who have simulated sunsets on other planets and moons.

Geronimo Villanueva, a planetary scientist from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre, created animated simulations of sunsets on Earth, Venus, Mars, Uranus, and Titan while building a computer modelling tool for a possible mission to Uranus.

Videos of the simulations were released by NASA this week using the known colours of the sky on Uranus and other worlds.

The simulations are shown from the perspective of someone on these worlds during sunset.

According to NASA, during sunset, photons get scattered in different directions as these worlds rotate away from the Sun's light.

This results in the changing colours shown in the simulations.

"When sunlight which is made up of all the colours of the rainbow reaches Uranus's atmosphere, hydrogen, helium and methane absorb the longer-wavelength red portion of the light," a statement from NASA says of the simulation.

"The shorter-wavelength blue and green portions of light get scattered as photons bounce off the gas molecules and other particles in the atmosphere.

"A similar phenomenon makes Earth's sky appear blue on a clear day."

A halo of light is produced on both the hazy Earth simulation and Mars because of the way light is scattered by particles such as dust or fog that are suspended in the clouds.

The Mars sunset turns from a brownish colour to blue because Martian dust particles scatter the blue colour more effectively, according to the statement.

The simulations were created to validate the accuracy of Dr Villanueva's computer modelling tool, which NASA says would be a valuable instrument in any mission to Uranus.

"One day, a probe could descend through the Uranian atmosphere, with Villanueva's tool helping scientists interpret the measurements of light that will reveal its chemical makeup," the statement read.

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NASA simulates what sunsets look like on other planets and moons - ABC News

Jupiter has a long history surprising scientistsall the way back to 1610 when Galileo Galilei found the first moons beyond Earth. That discovery changed the way we see the universe.

Fifth in line from the Sun, Jupiter is, by far, the largest planet in the solar system more than twice as massive as all the other planets combined.

Jupiter's familiar stripes and swirls are actually cold, windy clouds of ammonia and water, floating in an atmosphere of hydrogen and helium. Jupiters iconic Great Red Spot is a giant storm bigger than Earth that has raged for hundreds of years.

One spacecraft NASA's Juno orbiter is currently exploring this giant world.

Go farther. Explore Jupiter In Depth

Ten Things to Know About Jupiter

10 Need-to-Know Things About Jupiter

1

Eleven Earths could fit across Jupiters equator. If Earth were the size of a grape, Jupiter would be the size of a basketball.

2

Jupiter orbits about 484 million miles (778 million kilometers) or 5.2 Astronomical Units (AU) from our Sun (Earth is one AU from the Sun).

3

Jupiter rotates once about every 10 hours (a Jovian day), but takes about 12 Earth years to complete one orbit of the Sun (a Jovian year).

Jupiter and Io

4

Jupiter is a gas giant and so lacks an Earth-like surface. If it has a solid inner core at all, its likely only about the size of Earth.

5

Jupiter's atmosphere is made up mostly of hydrogen (H2) and helium (He).

6

Jupiter has more than 75 moons.

7

In 1979 the Voyager mission discovered Jupiters faint ring system. All four giant planets in our solar system have ring systems.

8

Nine spacecraft have visited Jupiter. Seven flew by and two have orbited the gas giant. Juno, the most recent, arrived at Jupiter in 2016.

9

Jupiter cannot support life as we know it. But some of Jupiter's moons have oceans beneath their crusts that might support life.

10

Jupiter's Great Red Spot is a gigantic storm thats about twice the size of Earth and has raged for over a century.

Great Red Spot

Did You Know

There are no rockets powerful enough to hurl a spacecraft into the outer solar system and beyond. In 1962, scientists calculated how to use Jupiter's intense gravity to hurl spacecraft into the farthest regions of the solar system. We've been traveling farther and faster ever since.

Pop Culture

The biggest planet in our solar system, Jupiter also has a large presence in pop culture, including many movies, TV shows, video games and comics. Jupiter was a notable destination in the Wachowski siblings science fiction spectacle Jupiter Ascending, while various Jovian moons provide settings for Cloud Atlas, Futurama, Power Rangers, and Halo, among many others. In Men in Black when Agent Jplayed by Will Smithmentions he thought one of his childhood teachers was from Venus, Agent Kplayed by Tommy Lee Jonesreplies that she is actually from one of Jupiters moons.

Kid-Friendly Jupiter

Jupiter is the biggest planet in our solar system. It's similar to a star, but it never got big enough to start burning.

Jupiter is covered in swirling cloud stripes. It has big storms like the Great Red Spot, which has been going for hundreds of years.

Jupiter is a gas giant and doesn't have a solid surface, but it may have a solid inner core about the size of Earth. Jupiter also has rings, but they're too faint to see very well.

Visit NASA Space Place for more kid-friendly facts.

Resources

Galileo Spacecraft Model

Galileo was the first spacecraft to orbit Jupiter.

Pioneer 10 was first through the asteroid belt and first to Jupiter.

With a few materials and a few steps, you can build your own glasses to view 3D images.

You can create your own red/blue 3D images to print, or look at on a computer screen, using a normal digital camera and some image processing software.

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Overview | Jupiter NASA Solar System Exploration

NASA continues to gear up for the launch of its next Mars rover, which is now just over two months away.

Engineers at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida have begun stacking the Perseverance Mars rover and its associated hardware in the right configuration for liftoff, which will occur during a three-week window that opens on July 17.

The stacking process began on April 23, NASA officials said. On that day, the car-size rover was integrated with its "sky crane" descent stage, which will lower Perseverance to the Martian surface on cables. (This sci-fi-seeming strategy already has one successful touchdown under its belt the landing of Perseverance's predecessor, the Mars rover Curiosity, in August 2012.)

Related: NASA's Mars 2020 rover Perseverance in pictures

"Attaching the rover to the descent stage is a major milestone for the team because these are the first spacecraft components to come together for launch, and they will be the last to separate when we reach Mars," David Gruel, the Perseverance rover assembly, test, and launch operations manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, said in a statement.

"These two assemblies will remain firmly nestled together until they are about 65 feet [20 meters] over the surface of Mars," Gruel added.

Another big stacking milestone came on April 29, when the rover-sky crane duo was attached to the back shell. This conical structure contains the mission's parachute system and helps protect spacecraft hardware during the mission's brief, fiery trip through the Martian atmosphere. (The mission's heat shield will also play a key protective role, of course.)

Perseverance will land inside Mars' 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero Crater in February 2021. The rover will do a variety of science work in this locale, which harbored a lake and a river delta in the ancient past.

For example, Percy will hunt for signs of ancient Mars life, characterize the region's geology and collect and cache samples for future return to Earth, among other tasks.

The mission's science team has already started practicing for these various operations. In February, for instance, seven team members trekked out to a dry lakebed in Nevada with instruments similar to those that Percy carries.

The researchers practiced gathering data after receiving instructions from other mission team members spread around the world, simulating the processes by which Percy will be directed to explore the Red Planet.

Such dry runs are "especially important for scientists who are new to Mars rovers," field team leader Raymond Francis, also of JPL, said in a different statement. "It's a team effort, and everyone has to learn how their roles fit into the whole mission."

Mike Wall is the author of "Out There" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Karl Tate), a book about the search for alien life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom or Facebook.

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NASA starts packing Mars rover Perseverance ahead of July launch - Space.com

Stuck at home? You can now explore the cosmos from the comfort of your living room.

NASA has taken to social media to engage and educate people across the world with a new initiative called NASA at Home. This is a free online resource for people of all ages looking to learn and get excited about science and space while staying at home.

NASA at Home has activities and resources for people of all ages and is designed to be a helpful tool for families and students. It's an online platform made up of a wealth of videos, podcasts, e-books, instructions for at-home projects and features virtual tours of incredible technology like NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the International Space Station. The initiative also includes access to formal lesson plans and amazing images and stories about space and science. The platform even includes an app that allows you to virtually pilot a NASA aircraft!

Visit the NASA at Home website for daily space activities!

More details:

"We know people everywhere, especially students, are looking for ways to get out of the house without leaving their house," Bettina Incln, the associate administrator for NASA's Office of Communications, said in a NASA statement. "NASA has a way for them to look to the skies and see themselves in space with their feet planted safely on the ground, but their imaginations are free to explore everywhere we go. We've put that information at their fingertips. We hope everyone takes a few moments to explore NASA at Home."

For older students or adults looking to get involved, the initiative includes citizen scientist opportunities that allow you to contribute to real, ongoing research. You can search for everything from alien planets to signs of life out in the solar system.

NASA at Home also includes videos that will air on NASA Television every weekday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. EDT (1400 to 2000 GMT). The initiative will also run videos on Instagram live. Every weekday starting at 4 p.m. EDT (2000 GMT), record-breaking NASA astronaut Christina Koch reads children's books on Instagram live.

To keep up with all that NASA at Home has to offer, you can check-in at their website here or always search the hashtag #NASAatHome.

Follow Chelsea Gohd on Twitter @chelsea_gohd. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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'NASA at Home' is bringing space to you daily with incredible resources for all ages - Space.com

The Universe is a wondrous place, full of vast numbers of planets to explore, unsolved mysteries, and even 'superbubbles' blown by black holes.

But there's one thing that space really isn't: loud. Without Earth's air molecules to help you hear, out there in space you'd be listening to a whole lot of silence.

Luckily, that didn't stop NASA from figuring out a way to produce sound in the soundlessness of space back in 2019 - by 'sonifying' the above image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope.

Yep, move over music, podcasts, or audio-books - the new thing to listen to is Hubble images.

The image NASA used for this project was taken by the Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide-Field Camera 3 back in August 2018.

The guys working with Hubble call the image a 'galactic treasure chest' because of the number of galaxies splattered across it.

"Each visible speck of a galaxy is home to countless stars," NASA explained about the image.

"A few stars closer to home shine brightly in the foreground, while a massive galaxy cluster nestles at the very centre of the image; an immense collection of maybe thousands of galaxies, all held together by the relentless force of gravity."

But as beautiful as this image already is, it just reached a new level, once transformed into a stunningly eerie musical composition.

The team that created the sonified image explains that the different locations and elements of the image produce different sounds.

Stars and compact galaxies are represented by short and clear sounds, while the spiralling galaxies emit more complex, longer notes.

"Time flows left to right, and the frequency of sound changes from bottom to top, ranging from 30 to 1,000 hertz," NASA explained in comments accompanying the video.

"Objects near the bottom of the image produce lower notes, while those near the top produce higher ones."

And although it might sound a little eerie at first, the 'sounds' of this picture create a rather beautiful melody, especially near the middle, when the sound reaches a galaxy cluster called RXC J0142.9+4438.

"The higher density of galaxies near the centre of the image," the team explained, "results in a swell of mid-range tones halfway through the video."

So there you have it: an entirely new way to enjoy the Universe.

A version of this article was first published in March 2019.

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NASA Has Translated a Hubble Photo Into Music, And It's Absolutely Chilling - ScienceAlert

Apollo 9 saw three NASA astronauts blasted into the Earths orbit for 10 days as a test flight before the Apollo 11 mission, which saw the first people land on the Moon. Commander James McDivitt, Command Module Pilot David Scott, and Lunar Module Pilot Rusty Schweickart lifted off from Earth on March 3, 1969, before spending 10 days in orbit, completing 151 trips around Earth.

The three men landed back on Earth on March 13, just four months before the Apollo 11 mission set off for the Moon.

While the trio was in the Earths orbit they snapped images of the Moon, and conspiracy theorists believe they have spotted something odd in some of the photographs.

Prominent conspiracy theorist Scott C Waring has been analysing the images from the NASA astronauts and spotted what he believed to be a fleet of UFOs travelling in front of the Moon.

The supposed UFOs, according to Mr Waring, were up to three kilometres long and appear to be extremely thin.

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The alien hunter posted on his blog ET Database: "UFOs that were over 2-3 km long have been seen and reported by pilots and other eyewitnesses, I myself have reported UFOs in NASA photos on the moons surface that were about 10km across in comparison with the nearby crater who's diameter is known.

"Here again are three UFOs, long and giant in size flying past the moon and recorded by none other than NASA!

"It's a glitch, a scratch, a cheap lens on your scope, sorry boys, NASA buys only the best quality and highest performance parts for its observations, but thank you for playing."

Some conspiracy theorists claim the Moon could be occupied by aliens and this is the reason NASA has not returned since the Apollo missions ended in the 1970s.

READ MORE:Alien city discovered on dark side of the Moon - shock claim

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UFOs: Were aliens spotted on the Moon in NASA's Apollo 9 mission images? - Express.co.uk

Jane Datta leads the human resources operation of the federal agency whose mission is to explore space, but does so with her feet planted firmly on the ground.

NASA accomplishes its mission because of its talented people, she says. But a key part of her job is to balance the aspirational with grounded reality.

Datta draws on nearly 30 years of experience in industry and government to maintain that balance. Her private sector experience includes a stint as an associate at Booz Allen Hamilton and various personnel positions at United Technologies Corp. She has an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University and a B.A. from Yale University.

Datta has served at NASA since 2007. She was director of the agencys Workforce Policy, Planning and Analysis Division before becoming deputy assistant administrator in the Office of Human Capital Management. Datta was appointed chief human capital officer in February, just before the novel coronavirus outbreak became a pandemic.

Datta recently spoke to Government Executives CourtneyBubl about her time at the agency and what she has learned, especially about leading in an age of stay at home orders. Excerpts from that interview follow.

How would you characterize your management style?

NASA is an innovative organization with an evolving and complex set of missions, and my staff in the Office of the Chief Human Capital Officer is dedicated to helping the NASA workforce and supporting the agencys missions. For us to perform at our best, I believe I need to establish an environment that allows my people to be creative, explore ideas and try out new things.

Thus, my management style is to set a general direction for our work and give my team freedom to figure out how to move in that direction and integrate efforts across our many activities. I want to be connected to the work enough to appreciate some of the details involved so I can advocate for things we need, communicate what we are doing at the agency level, or make connections with stakeholders outside our organization.

I place a premium on authentic engagement and take time to recognize teams and individuals as they make progress, move our work forward, or achieve great things. I also make a point of getting to know my staff through small group and individual interactions. I believe I have an amazing team that feels valued, energized and safe to explore ideas, so we can do anything.

What approach do you take to the job?

The approach I take to the job is to never stand still. I need to be constantly reaching for more and better that can be turned into value for my team and for NASA. To do this, I have prioritized coalition building as a key approach for bringing knowledge and insight to OCHCO programs and for benefiting the workforce. For instance, I participate in forums with other CHCOs and chief human resources officers where we share best practices and learn from each other.

I was new in my role when COVID-19 emerged as a critical issue requiring massive intra- and interagency coordination. The accelerated requirement to assimilate information, create action plans and execute in alignment with the highest levels of government has enduring impact for me and for my team.

Another characteristic of my approach to the job is to balance the aspirational with grounded reality. I am fortunate to have an ambitious team that is rich in ideas about what we can achieve as a function. But we also need to understand where we are, and what we can practicably achieve, so that we continue to move forward.

Whats the best part of the job?

The people. I know this sounds simple, but it is true. I wake up every day wanting to work with the people in my function, in NASA leadership and in organizations we collaborate with across the agency.

A former colleague once mentioned he came to NASA thinking it was primarily a data-driven agency and departed realizing it was really a people-driven agency. I couldnt agree more. I am also honored to be part of an agency leadership team that really puts people first.

What are some challenges in the federal hiring process?

NASA accomplishes its mission because of its talented people. This has never been truer as NASA works with U.S. companies and international partners to push the boundaries of human exploration to return to the moon, lay the foundation for private companies to build a lunar economy and ultimately send humans to Mars. NASA has a 21st century program and yet, in many respects NASA still has the same 20th century personnel system that was operational during the Apollo era.

NASA OCHCO has conducted extensive research into the foundational challenges of the federal hiring process and its impact on the NASA mission. Some of the underlying issues include a slow and not applicant-friendly process, a position-based system based on static and repeatable work that does not resonate in todays fluid marketplace for skills, and a non-competitive compensation structure.

Based on our findings, we are making changes and working toward a new, modern workforce system that emphasizes agility, acquires and deploys top talent rapidly, and aligns compensation and performance.

How do you work with labor unions?

NASAs bargaining unit workforce is represented by either the American Federation of Government Employees or the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers. The rights provided to these unions come in two different forms. At the agency level, they have been granted national consultation rights. Consequently, NASA informs AFGE and IFPTE of any substantive change in conditions of employment proposed by the agency, and permits a reasonable time for them to present their views and recommendations regarding the changes. NASA considers these views and recommendations before taking final action. For the purposes of NCR, the unions have identified two representatives from both the AFGE and IFPTE to participate on a national council to administer their rights.

I place a premium on authentic engagementand take time to recognize teams and individuals as they make progress.

At the center level, NASA local unions, which reside at eight of our 10 centers, have been certified by the Federal Labor Relations Authority as the exclusive representative of bargaining unit employees. This allows the local unions to negotiate employment matters, including the terms of collective bargaining agreements, at each represented center. As a result, NASA is a party to ten CBAs, five with AFGE locals and five with IFPTE locals.

What is NASA's policy on telework?

We consider telework a strategic priority. We believe that with telework or remote work options, our workforce can more easily balance their work and personal responsibilities and access a greater variety of work assignment opportunities.

Telework has long been encouraged at NASA, and because we were early adopters of virtual collaboration, we were able to make the agency transition and maintain operational continuity through the COVID-19 pandemic.

How has your job changed to follow public health guidance during the coronavirus outbreak?

I was in my role for just six weeks when COVID-19 became a pandemic. I joined an agency team planning how we would respond to the emergency, and in a short time, we were dedicating most or all of our days to addressing the rapidly changing situation. Along with the team, we focused on how to keep employees safe, prioritize agency work and communicate, communicate, communicate.

Over the last several months, I have established clear priorities for OCHCO work, much of which continues despite the new normal of mandatory telework for my staff. For instance, we have continued to hire and onboard new employees. While in-person training activities have been delayed, we have created and implemented virtual supervisor training sessions on adapting to virtual work, ensuring employees are engaged and supported, and looking after ourselves in this challenging time.

Dealing with an emergency as unprecedented as this one has revealed what is possible that might have seemed improbable and required us to reset some of our expectations and patterns. My job is to ensure we leverage what we have learned to help us be more efficient and effective even after we return to normal operations.

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NASA's Jane Datta On the People Part of the Space Mission - GovExec.com

KEY POINTS

NASAs automated asteroid tracking system has detected three near-Earth objects that will safely fly past the planet on Monday (May 4). Based on the data collected by the agency, the largest asteroid in the group is about as big as the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt.

NASAs Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) identified the first asteroid that will approach Earth on May 4as 2020 HQ3. As indicated in the agencys database, this space rock has an estimated diameter of about 161 feet.

It is currently moving across space towards Earths vicinity at an average speed of over 21,000 miles per hour. According to CNEOS, 2020 HQ3 will approach Earth on May 4 at 2:13 a.m. EDT. During this time, the asteroid will be about 0.02768 astronomical units or around 2.6 million miles from the planets center.

The next asteroid that will zip past Earth on Monday is called 2020 HU9. CNEOS estimated that this asteroid measures about 220 feet wide. It is currently moving across the Solar System at an average velocity of over 38,000 miles per hour.

2020 HU9 is expected to enter Earths neighborhood on May 4 at 7:51 a.m. EDT. It will be about 0.04304 astronomical units or about 4 million miles from the planet during its approach.

The last asteroid that will fly past Earth tomorrow has been identified as 2020 HV4. According to the data collected by CNEOS, 2020 HV4 is the biggest asteroid in the group. It has an estimated diameter of about 427 feet and is currently flying towards Earth at a speed of about 22,000 miles per hour.

2020 HQ3 is classified as an Aten asteroid while both 2020 HU9 and 2020 HV4 belong to the Apollo family of space rocks. Although they belong in different asteroid groups, the three approaching space rocks follow natural orbits that intersect Earths path as it goes around the Sun.

As Apollo asteroids, the orbital axis of 2020 HU9 and 2020 HV4 is bigger than that of Earth. 2020 HQ3, on the other hand, follows a smaller orbital axis than Earth.

This artist's animation illustrates a massive asteroid belt in orbit around a star the same age and size as our Sun. Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech

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NASA Tracker: 3 Asteroids To Fly Past Earth On Monday - International Business Times

NASA asked. 56,000 votes decided.

In honor of Earth Day's 50th anniversary and the 20th anniversary of NASA's Earth Observatory, the space agency invited the public to vote on the best pictures that capture our beautiful planet in the Earth Observatorys collection. (The Earth Observatory is a publishing outlet where NASA shares images and other discoveries that come from its research.)

After five rounds of voting, the winner of Tournament Earth was announced on April 28.

The winning photo, taken in 2001 by Serge Andrefouet, a remote sensing specialist at the University of South Florida, captures sand and seaweed in the Bahamas using the Landsat 7 satellite. Tides and ocean currents created the patterns you can see in the image.

Check out the winner (and some of the other finalists) below.

WINNER! This year's winning image was also a runner-up in the 10th anniversary contest.

RUNNER-UP: Astronauts captured a volcanic plume in the Raikoke Volcano, a volcano on the Kuril Islands that doesn't often erupt.

FINAL ROUND: Captured on Landsat 8, this image shows the transition from sand dunes to land in southern Africas Namib Desert.

FINAL ROUND: This image, a combination of art and scientific imaging, was made using data from satellite missions, with graphic artists creating layers of global data for things like land surface and sea ice layers.

THIRD ROUND: At the International Space Station, astronauts captured "aurora australis" (the southern lights) with a digital camera while above the Indian Ocean.

THIRD ROUND: This, of course, isn't a picture of Earth at all. It's an image of Saturn taken from the Cassini spacecraft, but Earth Observatory liked it enough to include it. (Technically, you can see Earth in the upper left quadrant of Saturn's rings.)

THIRD ROUND: One of a series of images documenting Alaska's Columbia glacier, this image tracks the glacier's fast-moving retreat.

THIRD ROUND: Astronauts took a picture with a digital camera ofAtafu Atoll, the smallest of three atolls and one island making up theTokelau Islands in the southern Pacific Ocean. (Atafu Atoll is about eight kilometers wide!)

Landsat 8 caught an ongoing eruption flowing in Iceland betweenthe Bardarbunga and Askja volcanoes.

The image here captures the melting ice cap on Eagle Island in Antarctica as it hit its hottest temperature on record this February.

A NASA camera on the Deep Space Climate Observatory caught the moon as it passed between the spacecraft and Earth.

With a new instrument available on the International Space Station since 2014, scientists now hope to observe some of the 4.3 millionlightning flashes that occur daily. Here are just some of them.

Taken from Voyager 1, this image from 1977 shows the Earth and Moon together back when Voyager 1 was a mere 7.25 million miles from Earth. (As of 2012, it was 11.31 billion miles from Earth.)

This image is a visualization of the solid particles and liquid droplets (called aerosols) found in ecosystems around the world on just one day: August 23, 2018.

This picture of the Andaman Sea was captured by Landsat 8, which, thanks to the reflection of the Sun, makes internal waves readily visible.

A tried and true favorite, this iconic 1968 photo was taken by the Apollo 8 crew while orbiting the Moon.

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NASA releases the winning photos of Tournament Earth - Mashable

The idea of life on Jupiter's ice-covered moon Europa has fascinated scientists for decades but it was in the 1990s, with sharp images from NASA's Galileo spacecraft, that researchers came a step closer to believein its possibility. NASA has now remastered some of Galileo's stunning images of Europa, using improved new calibrations to introduce colours, in a bid to have a closer look at the Jovian satellite.

In the splendid images shared on Instagram, Europa's long erratic winding lines throw new light on its varied landscape. As explained by NASA, the image shows a region where ice blocks have moved sideways, rotated or tilted before refreezing in their new locations and to understand how it might have happened, scientists study these ice blocks like they were jumbled pieces of a puzzle. While geologists have dubbed these as 'chaos terrain', the remastered images are simply fascinating.

Read:Perseverance Rover To Get The Most Advanced Pair Of 'eyes' Ahead Of NASA's Mars Mission

Read:NASA Artemis Mission: SpaceX, Blue Origin And Dynetics Chosen To Design HLS

The long curving lines in the remastered images hint at subsurface liquid water. While releasing these images on the NASAwebsite, scientists elucidated that tidal motion experienced by Europa in its elliptical orbit around Jupiter supplies the energy to keep the ocean in a liquid state under an ice shell of 15 to 25 kilometres. The cosmic ocean is estimated to be 60 to 150 kilometres deep. Therefore, while the Jovian satellite is only one-fourth the diameter of Earth, Europa's ocean is estimated to contain twice as much water as our planet.

Most recent observations from the Hubble telescope, and reanalysis of old Galileo data, have suggested that Europa's ocean may be leaking into space. In fact, in November 2019, an international team of scientist announced detecting water vapours for the first time above Europe's surface. The observation was made using a spectrograph at NASA's Hawaii observatory as it measured the chemical composition of Europa's atmosphere comparing infrared light emission and absorption.

Read:NASA To Laser Check Moon's Darkest Craters For Signs Of Water Before Artemis Mission

Read:NASA Celebrates 30 Years And 1.4 Million Observations Of Hubble With 'Cosmic Coral Reef'

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NASA uncovers alluring chaos terrain in its quest to find ocean on Jupiters moon Europa - Republic World - Republic World