Manama, June 3 (ANI): Kuwait security officials have warned that wearing bikinis at public beaches is an act of indecency.
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Litchfield Hills Astronomy Club Holding Venus Transit Event at White Memorial June 5
The Litchfield Hills Amateur Astronomy Club is to host a Star Party on Tuesday, June 5, at White Memorial in Litchfield
Arare event -- a Venus transit -- will occur. The planet Venus will pass between Earth and the sun. The last Venus transit was in 2004 and the next one will be in 2117. There will not be a talk; the group will meet at the observatory at WMCC at 5:30pm. At about 6:03pm EDT Venus will start to cross the disc of the Sun. Although it will takesix hours to pass all the way across, we'll only see the first two hours because of sunset. Do not bring binoculars or a telescope unless you have a proper solar filter. (Club members will have telescopes with the proper filters.) If the weather is cloudy or rainy, the event is cancelled.
There is no charge. Children must be accompanied by an adult.
For more information, see the club's web site: http://lhaac.shutterfly.com/calendar or contact the club secretary at lhaacsec@gmail.com.
Arare event -- a Venus transit -- will occur. The planet Venus will pass between Earth and the sun. The last Venus transit was in 2004 and the next one will be in 2117. There will not be a talk; the group will meet at the observatory at WMCC at 5:30pm. At about 6:03pm EDT Venus will start to cross the disc of the Sun. Although it will takesix hours to pass all the way across, we'll only see the first two hours because of sunset. Do not bring binoculars or a telescope unless you have a proper solar filter. (Club members will have telescopes with the proper filters.) If the weather is cloudy or rainy, the event is cancelled.
There is no charge. Children must be accompanied by an adult.
For more information, see the club's web site: http://lhaac.shutterfly.com/calendar or contact the club secretary at lhaacsec@gmail.com.
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Litchfield Hills Astronomy Club Holding Venus Transit Event at White Memorial June 5
Timescapes 4k: a time lapse of super hi-res beauty | Bad Astronomy
Listen, I dont usually hawk stuff on this blog. When I do urge you to give up your hard-earned lucre, I only link to stuff that I really like, and from people I really support.
Having said that: go buy this video.
Tom Lowe is an amazing photographer, and his time lapse videos are simply astonishing (see Related Posts at the bottom of this post). I could throw lots of words around, but why waste your time? Just watch the trailer for his new video, Timescapes 4k:
[Make that full screen and turn your speakers up.]
Stunning. Jaw-dropping. Mind-blowing. Drop-dead gorgeous. Seriously, wow.
The whole thing was shot in very hi-def (4096 x 2304 pixels) on a Red camera Ive seen this camera at work, and the video from it is breath-taking. Tom uses this to its full potential, creating a time lapse movie that, seriously, has set a new standard of beauty and awe for the genre.
Its not just land and skyscapes, either. His shots of people are enthralling. I love the dancing native American the sparks from the fire make that scene and for some reason the rodeo dude is strangely compelling shot in slow motion. The people dancing at an outdoor concert are surreal, too.
You can order the video from Toms website, and its available on iTunes, too.
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Timescapes 4k: a time lapse of super hi-res beauty | Bad Astronomy
Watch Venus transit with astronomy club
On June 5, as Venus passes between Earth and the sun for the last time this century, members of the Big Sky Astronomy Club will make their telescopes available for the public.
At 2:30 p.m. Tuesday at Flathead Valley Community College, club president Mark Paulson will give a presentation on the significance of this celestial event and what to expect.
Afterwards, anyone can safely view the transit of Venus through telescopes that have special solar filters in place. Venus will be seen as a small dark circle against the bright backdrop of the sun.
The transit begins at 4:05 p.m. and will be in progress as the sun sets at 9:35 p.m.
People are reminded never to look directly at the sun, especially with unfiltered binoculars or telescopes. Even a brief glimpse can cause permanent blindness.
The best method for viewing the transit is through telescopes equipped with solar filters, since the telescope will magnify the image and the filter will prevent eye damage. Other options for safely viewing the transit include pinhole projectors, specially made filters, or watching on TV or online.
Following closely on the heels of the Ring of Fire solar eclipse, the Venus transit promises something much more rare a precise alignment of the sun, the Earth, and another planet. Venus transits usually occur in pairs that are separated by more than 100 years. The upcoming transit had a partner event in 2004, with previous events occurring in 1874 and 1882.
The next Venus transit is not until 2117.
The Big Sky Astronomy Club offers other opportunities for viewing the night sky through telescopes. The club is hosting events at Lone Pine State Park on July 14 and Logan Pass in Glacier National Park on July 20 and Aug. 17.
More information about the astronomy club and the transit can be found at http://www.bigskyastroclub.org or http://www.transitofvenus.org.
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The Early Space Age (Fortune, 1959)
Editor's note: Every Sunday, Fortune publishes a story fromour magazine archives. This week, Elon Musk's company SpaceX celebrated the landing of the Dragon capsule, the world's first commercial spacecraft, marking a new era in space exploration in which private companies will step in to help NASA push the final frontier. This week's classic turns to 1959, ten years before the Apollo 11 mission landed on the moon. Companies were starting to build the crafts that would enable U.S. astronauts to fly. Then as now, scientists and government officials debated the costs and benefits of space travel and the possibility of discovering life.
"...Suppose when we get to the moon we find sitting in the middle of a crater a strange little marker bearing a carefully chiseled but totally incomprehensible inscription," one scientist told Fortune writer Bello; "Then space would really get exciting."
The space business, not counting missiles, already amounts to a billion dollars a year. U.S. industry is at work on rocket engines of awesome power, and on a vehicle to carry a man to the moonand back.
By Francis Bello
FORTUNE -- Anyone who has wondered what it was like to live in the era that followed Columbus' voyage to America now has his chance to find out. Then, as now, thoughtful men disputed the merits of pressing into the unknown, argued that the possible fruits could not justify the cost, warned that the hazards to life and limb were immense. And then as now, the young, the venturesome, and the insatiably curious plunged ahead. "What we are witnessing," says one prominent member of the President's Science Advisory Committee, "is another irresistible urge of the human race. The justifications given for going into space have no more relevance than the desire for spices had for the discovery of America."
Privately, and sometimes openly, many scientists deplore the fact that enormous funds are going into space when there are so many unfinished problems, both scientific and human, lying much closer at hand. One persuasive answer to this viewpoint is offered by Herbert F. York, the young physicist who is Director of Defense Research and Engineering. "Everyone would agree," he says, "that we should be trying to raise the standard of living in India, and building dams in the Middle East. But no one is asking us to choose between dams and space--we could easily afford both. The space effort isn't a plot; it's something that appeals to a great many people for a great many reasons."
No one has responded to space more spontaneously and enthusiastically than U.S. industry. And the vigor of the response is out of all proportion to the money to be made in the space business, at least. in the foreseeable future. Companies have been setting up "space" and "astro" divisions (see box, page 88) with much the same exuberance with which they created atomic and nuclear divisions five or six years ago. (This article is not concerned with military missiles except as they can be used as power stages for space propulsion.) Space, however, is much less hedged about with secrecy than the atom was in 1953 and 1954, and it offers a far wider range of technical challenges. Moreover, the investment needed to make a useful contribution to space technology, especially its electronic aspects, is far smaller than that needed to contribute to nuclear technology. For example, the instruments that James Van Allen used to detect the great belts of radiation that now bear his name were built in a basement of the physics department at the State University of Iowa.
The Space Age has already created sharp geographical rivalries. Southern California, particularly Los Angeles, sees an opportunity to be to space what Pittsburgh is to steel and Detroit to the automobile. California's claim to be the heartland of the space industry is only slightly diluted by the presence of Patrick Air Force Base at Cape Canaveral in Florida, of Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, and of Martin's Titan ICBM plant near Denver. Canaveral can be explained away as an accident of geography that provided a matchless pattern of islands for down-range tracking stations. (And, of course, California's Vandenberg Air Force Base and the Pacific Missile Range will eventually rival Canaveral in size and importance.) The selection of Redstone Arsenal as the home of the Army Ballistic Missile Agency can be explained largely by its proximity to Canaveral and to the Pentagon. And as for Martin in Denver--at least this old Baltimore outfit had to come two-thirds of the way to the Coast.
The cosmic testing range
Progress in space technology will dramatize a nation's total technological capabilities in a way that nothing else ever could. In the momentous years ahead, the world may compare U.S. and Soviet industrial and scientific resources less and less in terms of steel, oil, and electric-power production, and more and more in terms of the number, weight, and complexity of vehicles the two countries have been able to thrust into outer space.
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Transit of Venus 2012: How to Safely Photograph a Rare Sky Sight (Photo Guide)
Venus Transit in Hydrogen-Alpha
There is an art to photographing major solar events like the 2012 transit of Venus across the sun on June 5-6, 2012. Here's a look at how to snap effective sun photos with telescopes, cameras and even smartphones.
Here, Paul Hyndman captured a stunning view of Venus crossing the face of the sun in hydrogen-alpha light on the morning of June 8, 2004 from Roxbury, Connecticut. He used an Astro-Physics 105-millimeter Traveler telescope fitted with a Coronado Solarmax90/T-Max and 30-mm blocking filter, a TeleVue 2X Powermate lens, and an SBIG STL-11000M CCD camera.
This still from a NASA video shows the position of Venus on the sun's disk in Pacific Daylight Time on June 5, 2012 during the last transit of Venus for 105 years.
Veteran space photographers Imelda Joson and Edwin Aguirre led two tour groups to Italy for the 2004 transit Edwins group was stationed at the Astronomical Observatory of Rome near Monte Porzio while Imeldas group was at the Vatican Observatory in Castel Gandolfo. For the photo above, Edwin used a Takahashi FC-60 apochromatic refractor and his trusty Nikon Coolpix 990 digital camera to document Venuss passage across the suns disk in white light.
WARNING: Never look at the sun directly with your naked eyes or through telescopes, binoculars, telephoto lenses, or cameras. Doing so can result in serious eye injury called solar retinopathy. Always use a filter (shown above) that is specifically designed for viewing or photographing the sun, and make sure its mounted securely on the front of your camera lens or telescope.
World visibility of the transit of Venus on 5-6 June 2012. Spitsbergen is an Artic island part of the Svalbard archipelago in Norway and one of the few places in Europe from which the entire transit is visible. For most of Europe, only the end of the transit event will be visible during sunrise on 6 June.
To mount your digital SLR camera securely to your telescope, use a standard T-adapter and a T-ring that mates to your particular camera brand (check your local camera store for availability). In this setup, the authors use the DSLRs mirror-lockup feature and a cable release to trip the shutter, thereby minimizing camera shake. They also use a right-angle 2.5X magnifier to help achieve sharp focus.
Your automatic point-and-shoot camera is great not only for taking photos of birthday parties and family vacations but also pictures of Venus in transit through a solar-filtered telescope. Simply insert an eyepiece with a wide field and long eye relief into the telescope focuser and hold your camera lens close to the eyepiece as steady as you can. Use the cameras built-in LCD screen to center the sun and compose your shot. Zoom in as needed.
You can even use your cell-phone camera to take decent shots of the transit through a solar-filtered telescope and share them immediately with other people. This view of the sun speckled with small sunspots was captured by the authors on May 13 using their Samsung Droid Charge smartphones built-in 8-megapixel camera in auto-focus/auto-exposure mode. The phone was held by hand over the eyepiece of a 3-inch refractor fitted with a metal-coated glass solar filter.
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Transit of Venus 2012: How to Safely Photograph a Rare Sky Sight (Photo Guide)
Tonight! Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant: An Illustrated Lecture and Screening with Mel Gordon, Author of "Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant" at Observatory
Tonight at Observatory! Mel Gordon is one of our all-time most fascinating and charismatic speakers, and an inspiring historian of all things fringe, forgotten, and perverse. His lectures are simply not to be missed. Hope to see you at Observatory this evening!
Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant: An Illustrated Lecture and Screening with Mel Gordon, Author of "Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant"
An illustrated lecture and screening of "lost footage" with Mel Gordon, author of Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant and Grand Guiginol: Theatre of Fear and Terror
Date: Sunday, June 3 (please note date change from Monday, June 4)
Time: 8:00
Admission: $8
Presented by Morbid Anatomy
"Historians digging into the archives to reconstruct the chronicle of the Twentieth Century will have to deal with this strange phenomenon of Erik Jan Hanussen, born Herschmann Steinschneider in the humble home of a poor Jewish actor in Vienna. It will be their task to unravel a complex maze of reality and legend, myth and romance, to reach the core of the true personality of Steinschneider, alias Hanussen, and his influence on one of the most significant chapters of European history, the ascent and reign of Adolf Hitler." --Pierre van Paassen, Redbook Magazine, "The Date of Hitler's Fall," May 1942
When Pierre van Paassen, the prominent Dutch author and foreign correspondent, wrote the above for McCall's Redbook Magazine, the "amazing exploits of Erik Jan Hanussen" were still hot international filler. What could have been more titillating than the true and enigmatic story of a Jewish mystic who helped usher in the Third Reich before becoming one of its first victims?
Tonight, join Mel Gordon--author of Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant--for an illustrated lecture on the amazing story of Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant featuring a special screening of "lost" film footage from Hanussen's 1919 "Hypnosis: Hanussen's First Adventure," a Caligari-like story of sex magic and the occult, and other documentary sources. Books will also be available for sale and signing.
Mel Gordon is the author of Erik Jan Hanussen: Hitler's Jewish Clairvoyant, Grand Guiginol: Theatre of Fear and Terror, Voluptious Panic: The Erotic World of Weimar Berlin, and many other books. Voluptious Panicwas the first in-depth and illustrated book on the topic of erotic Weimar; The lavish tome was praised by academics and inspired the establishment of eight neo-Weimar nightclubs as well as the Dresden Dolls and a Marilyn Manson album. Now, Mel Gordon is completing a companion volume for Feral House Press, entitled Horizontal Collaboration: The Erotic World of Paris, 1920-1946. He also teaches directing, acting, and history of theater at University of California at Berkeley.
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World Cup Qualifying Preview: Uruguay play Venezuela, Chile travel to Bolivia and Peru face Colombia
A busy round of action in South America sees the table-topping Celeste take on Cesar Farias' men, while Claudio Borghi takes his Roja side to the dizzying heights of La Paz
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World Cup Qualifying Preview: Uruguay play Venezuela, Chile travel to Bolivia and Peru face Colombia
Stem cell therapy for cornea treatment
Hyderabad, June 2:
Picking stem cells from a patients body, sending it to a sophisticated laboratory to culture a tissue and then implanting it are pass.
A team of doctors at L.V. Prasad Eye Institute has used the tea bag or sprinkler approach to regenerate stem cells. The organisation has developed a lab-free technique that could be available off-the-shelf. This allows eye surgeons with usual facilities to perform the procedure.
The team, led by Dr Virender Singh Sangwan, used this technique to treat those who suffered chemical injuries, resulting in bleeding in the cornea.
Instead of sending stem cells to the lab for culture, the doctor picked the required number of stem cells around the cornea and sprinkled on the damaged area and then put a contact lens. In 15 days, he sees development of a good layer in the place of injured area, Prof. Balasubramanian, Head of Research at LVPEI, said.
A winner of the prestigious Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar prize, Dr Sangwan said he had conducted the procedure on about 25 patients with good results. This had been published in international scientific magazines.
He is now in the process of developing tools to help doctors.
Leber Congenital Amaurosis
Children down with the rare ocular disorders that result in gradual loss of sight can hope for a cure. Doctors are working on a gene therapy to correct this problem caused by consanguineous marriages.
Though this therapy is in vogue abroad, LVPEI says it is the first centre to carry out research on this procedure. Technically called LCA or Leber Congenital Amaurosis, doctors would refer patients to a gene analysis after studying them for indications.
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Mogato: Never-ending lessons
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Back on Earth, SpaceX planning more private flights to space
The Hawthorne firm, celebrating its mission to the International Space Station, now turns to sending astronauts as well as cargo, and to building a huge new rocket to launch U.S. security satellites. SpaceX, the upstart Hawthorne company that shot a capsule to the International Space Station and back this week, won't have much time to savor its first major success.
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Back on Earth, SpaceX planning more private flights to space
Space travel agent's creativity takes flight
Craig Curran, an accredited travel agent for Virgin Galactic, the world's first space tourism business, has sold exactly two tickets since getting the job in early 2011. And one of those tickets was to himself.
To be fair, it's not easy selling $200,000 tickets (with a $20,000 deposit payable up front) for a suborbital day cruise in which the inaugural flight hasn't even been announced. It's basically selling a promise for something that will probably happen in the vague near future.
But as Curran prefers to think of it, his customers are "investing in the birth of an industry."
"They're not getting shares or a piece of the company," he clarified. "But they are trailblazers. They'll be among the first 500 civilians to leave the Earth's atmosphere."
Before Curran was picked to join Virgin Galactic's global sales team - he's one of 140 agents worldwide - the 30-year travel agent vet from Rochester, N.Y., had to prove that he has, as Tom Wolfe might say, the right stuff. In addition to marketing plans and a resume, he was asked to demonstrate an "enthusiasm for space travel."
And how does one demonstrate such a thing?
"I explained to them that I've been a passenger in fighter jets at air shows," Curran said. "I own a Ferrari. I've gone to high-speed driving schools. I like guns. I'm mechanically inclined and scientifically wired."
In other words, he represents the type of person who'd feasibly spend big money to be shot about 60 miles above the Earth's surface. Finding customers - gun-toting, science-loving, Ferrari-driving people like Curran - has been a unique challenge.
It's not like it was back in Curran's travel agent heyday in the '80s and '90s, when customers would actively seek him out. For space tourism, he's had to be creative.
"I do speaking engagements," he said. "I'll speak in front of anybody who'll have me."
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Big week for commercial space flight, big week for Louisville-built Dream Chaser
LOUISVILLE -- Images from space dominated the week and fired up imaginations all over again.
An unmanned capsule launched by a private company docked with the International Space Station 240 miles above Earth, exchanged cargo with the astronauts living there and then plummeted through the atmosphere into a picture-perfect splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Thursday morning.
The accomplishment was a first for the burgeoning commercial space sector and California-based SpaceX, helmed by 40-year-old South Africa-born billionaire Elon Musk, was lauded worldwide for its success.
But just two days before the heralded return of SpaceX's Dragon capsule 560 miles off the coast of Baja California, a company much closer to home
Engineering Technician Richard Santos wipes down the surface on the Dream Chaser space vehicle at Sierra Nevada Space Systems in Louisville on May 31, 2012. ( MARK LEFFINGWELL )
Sierra Nevada Corporation Space Systems, headquartered on the Colorado Technology Center campus in Louisville, passed one of the most complex tests it has faced in its attempt to launch a seven-person orbital vehicle -- called the Dream Chaser -- into space by 2016. Known as a captive-carry test, the effort required the 40-foot-long and 25-foot-wide Dream Chaser to be lifted by an Erickson Air-Crane helicopter into the skies above Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport and put through a battery of tests measuring its aerodynamic flight performance.
Last week's successful result paves the way for the sleek space plane to undergo autonomous approach and landing tests at Edwards Air Force Base in California this fall before finally heading skyward on an Atlas V rocket.
"We're really excited because after taking it on paper for many years, we're actually starting to fly the real thing that NASA is going to be taking to space," said Mark Sirangelo, who heads up Sierra Nevada's 230-employee space systems division in Louisville.
He doesn't begrudge SpaceX's day in the sun
In this image provided by NASA with clouds and land forming a backdrop, the SpaceX Dragon commercial cargo craft is grappled by the Canadarm2 robotic arm at the International Space Station on May 25. (AP Photo/NASA)
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Big week for commercial space flight, big week for Louisville-built Dream Chaser
Dixon heads pre-qualifying practice
Scott Dixon provided a rare bit of sunshine for Ganassi, on a chilly Saturday morning in Detroit that proved not to many Honda-powered cars' liking ahead of qualifying at Belle Isle.
The session had barely got underway when there was a quick red flag for a spin by Ryan Briscoe on his out lap, and the 2.07-mile, 14-turn street course had only just reopened when Oriol Servia then spun and went into the wall at turn 14 with a heavy impact that badly damaged the right-front of the Panther/DRR car.
Emphasising how much everyone was really pushing things close to the limit on this unfamiliar circuit, Dario Franchitti was next to spin five minutes into the next green session just before the midpoint of the one hour practice session. He lost the #10 car at turn 5, but mercifully in his case kept the car off the barriers.
After Franchitti's mishap, there was a finally a decent period of green flag running for the remainder of the session, which survived a brief bit of off-roading for Helio Castroneves out of turn 12, Ed Carpenter taking to the run-off area at turn 8 with around six minutes remaining, and a harmless spin by Justin Wilson that he was able to deal with without assistance.
Off the track in pit lane, there was also some wheel-to-wheel contact between the two Ryans in the field when Ryan Hunter-Reay was ushered out of his pit box right into the path of Penske's Ryan Briscoe who was also exiting the pits and returning to the track. No serious harm was done, but Hunter-Reay was given a 60 second stop-and-hold penalty for the unsafe pit release.
During this time, Scott Dixon had gone top of the timesheets with a lap of 1:11.3913, over a quarter of a second faster than Will Power who had a similar margin over Hunter-Reay. Both drivers at the front would shave a little more time off with their last flying laps of the morning.
In total, there were seven Chevrolet cars in the top ten - including all three Penske cars - and just three Hondas, with Dixon joined by Justin Wilson and Simon Pagenaud. Graham Rahal briefly nudged his way into the top ten in the final minutes, but was summarily hustled out again by Tony Kanaan and JR Hildebrand before the chequered flag came out to end proceedings.
Qualifying for the Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix takes place at 11.45am (4.45pm BST). After the unique format seen at Indianapolis, qualifying reverts to the usual road/street system with two groups having 15 minutes to set a time, and the top six from each group moving forward into a single ten minute Top 12 session. The top six from this round fight it out for pole in the Firestone Fast Six to complete the grid order.
The race itself is scheduled to take place on Sunday afternoon at 3.45pm (8.45pm BST) after a final early morning half-hour warm-up opportunity.
Full practice 3 times available.
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Queen heads to the races as Jubilee kicks off
The Queen spent the first official day of her Diamond Jubilee celebrations indulging in one of her favorite passions - horses.
The 86-year-old monarch, who is celebrating six decades on the throne with four days of festivities, attended the Epsom Derby - considered one of the most exciting and prestigious horse races in the world.
She and her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, 90, were given an affectionate welcome from a crowd of about 130,000 race-goers as the royal motorcade entered the stadium in Surrey, southeastern England, and took a quick spin along the course.
The Queen, wearing an elegant floral print dress and royal blue jacket and hat, joined a large party including the Duke of York and his daughters Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, before visiting the paddock to inspect some of the horses running in the Diamond Jubilee Coronation Cup.
Her Majesty's love of all things equine is well known - she is a racehorse owner, breeder and trainer, and her horses have competed at the highest level. While one of her animals has yet to win the Epsom Derby, in 1953 her horse Aureole came a close second. This year, she had no runner in the race.
With the jubilee party officially kicking off Saturday across Britain, thousands of miles of bunting was festooned over England and Wales, and almost 9500 road closure applications were granted for street parties.
Heathrow Airport rehearsed worst-case baggage-handling situations to prepare for the arrival of nearly 800,000 overseas travelers and well-wishers, and supermarket chain Tesco expects to sell 200,000 bottles of champagne.
Despite the countrywide excitement, there was a dark cloud hanging over the celebrations, literally - but although the day started out bleak for parts of England, the weather began to clear in several places by the afternoon.
The extended public holiday weekend began with a bang Friday night in Portsmouth, on the southern coast of England, where the HMS Diamond fired a 21-gun salute in honour of the queen.
On Sunday, Her Majesty will board a royal barge on the River Thames and lead a flotilla of 1000 vessels in a grand maritime pageant. More than a million people are expected to gather along the river to witness the spectacular event.
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After a 41-Gun Salute, Queen Elizabeth Heads to the Races
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SpaceX's Success Should Lead to NASA Being Cut to the Bone
SpaceX?s Dragon capsule is now safely down from the ISS, showing that private enterprise can do at least some of this space stuff at vastly lower cost than a creaking governmental bureaucracy like NASA. Bloomberg then makes the entirely incredible argument that this means that NASA should aim to think big and bump up its ...
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Nasa sets sights on U-tapao for study base
SINGAPORE : Nasa has asked the Thai government and army for permission to use U-Tapao airport in Rayong as a base to conduct atmospheric studies, a military source says.
The source said Nasa aims to begin its studies at the airport next month.
"Nasa will work in an open and transparent way and will welcome Thai officers to join them in their studies and to transfer knowledge to local scientists. This involves Nasa and is unrelated to military or security concerns," the source said.
US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta lays out the new US Asia-Pacific strategy at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) 11th Asia Security Summit in Singapore on Saturday. (Reuters photo)
Defence Minister Sukumpol Suwanatat added that the US was also interested in setting up a regional humanitarian and disaster relief centre at the airport.
He said he agreed with the idea of the centre on humanitarian grounds.
But the decision would be made by the Thai government, ACM Sukumpol said during his trip to Singapore to attend the Shangri-La Dialogue, an intergovernmental security forum, which will conclude today.
ACM Sukumpol also met US Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta at the event.
"Do not fear that the US will set up a military base in U-Tapao," ACM Sukumpol said after a 15-minute talk with the US secretary of defence on Friday.
"It has not been like that in the past. As we are friends, we need to support each other," he said. "The US can under normal circumstances use U-Tapao in accordance with our agreement."
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NASA expects quick start to SpaceX cargo contract
The top NASA manager in charge of the agency's commercial cargo transportation program hailed SpaceX's demonstration flight to the International Space Station as a success and indicated approval for continued resupply missions under a $1.6 billion contract would be a mere formality.
Dragon spent six days at the International Space Station. Credit: NASA The Dragon spacecraft made an on-target splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on Thursday, ending a nine-day mission that set out to prove the capsule's ability to safely reach the space station, deliver supplies, and return equipment to Earth.
The SpaceX-owned spacecraft will be the only vehicle in the space station's fleet of resupply freighters able to return to Earth intact with cargo. Other robotic cargo spacecraft built in Russia, Europe and Japan dispose of trash and burn up in the atmosphere.
Alan Lindenmoyer, manager of NASA's commercial cargo development program, said the flight looked to be 100 percent successful.
"We'll get a quick-look report from SpaceX next week, and then we'll await a final post-flight report several weeks later," Lindenmoyer said.
NASA invested $396 million into SpaceX under a public-private partnership agreement signed in 2006. The space agency released payments to the California-based company as it met design, testing and flight milestones.
Following the announcement of the space shuttle's retirement, NASA started investigating new ways to transport critical spare parts, food, experiments, and other geat to the space station. But no companies had the ability to do the job, and NASA wished to set its sights on more ambitious expeditions into the solar system.
After surveying the market, NASA established the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program to help fund private development of rockets and spacecraft to resupply the space station.
"You have turned those hopes into a reality today," Lindenmoyer said to Elon Musk, SpaceX's CEO and chief designer, following Thursday's splashdown.
SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corp. won agreements with the COTS program. Orbital's first flight to the space station could launch as soon as October.
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NASA ISS On-Orbit Status 02 June 2012
ISS On-Orbit Status 06/02/12
All ISS systems continue to function nominally, except those noted previously or below. Saturday - Crew off duty.
After wakeup, CDR Kononenko performed the routine inspection of the SM (Service Module) PSS Caution & Warning panel as part of regular Daily Morning Inspection.
The six Exp-31 crewmembers joined in conducting the regular weekly three-hour task of thorough cleaning of their home, including COL (Columbus Orbital Laboratory) and Kibo JPM (JEM Pressurized Module). ["Uborka", usually done on Saturdays, includes removal of food waste products, cleaning of compartments with vacuum cleaner, damp cleaning of the SM dining table, other frequently touched surfaces and surfaces where trash is collected, as well as the sleep stations with a standard cleaning solution; also, fan screens and grilles are cleaned to avoid temperature rises. Special cleaning is also done every 90 days on the HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air) bacteria filters in the Lab.]
As part of Uborka house cleaning, Oleg, Gennady & Sergei completed regular weekly maintenance inspection & cleaning of fan screens in the FGB (TsV2), Group E fan grilles in the SM (VPkhO, FS5, FS6, VP), and the weekly checkup on the Russian POTOK-150MK (150 micron) air filter unit of the SM's & FGB's SOGS air revitalization subsystem.
FE-2 Revin also handled the routine daily servicing of the SOZh system (Environment Control & Life Support System, ECLSS) in the SM. [Regular daily SOZh maintenance consists, among else, of checking the ASU toilet facilities, replacement of the KTO & KBO solid waste containers, replacement of EDV-SV waste water and EDV-U urine containers and filling EDV-SV, KOV (for Elektron), EDV-ZV & EDV on RP flow regulator.]
FE-6 Pettit conducted the regular (~weekly) inspection & maintenance, as required, of the CGBA-4 (Commercial Generic Bioprocessing Apparatus 4) and CGBA-5 payloads in their ERs (EXPRESS Racks) at Lab O2 & O1, focusing on cleaning the muffler air intakes.
Kononenko, with Padalka attending for "knowledge handover", completed the periodic maintenance of the active Russian BMP (Harmful Impurities Removal System) by starting the "bake-out" cycle to vacuum on absorbent bed #1 of the regenerable dual-channel filtration system. The process will be terminated at ~4:55pm EDT. Bed #2 regeneration will be done tomorrow. [Regeneration of each of the two cartridges takes about 12 hours and is conducted only during crew awake periods. The BMP's regeneration cycle, normally done every 20 days, is currently performed four times more frequently (last time: 5/14 & 5/15).]
FE-3 Acaba sequentially initiated and monitored charging of four Makita batteries for use with the Cardiopres blood pressure device during the next 24-hr ESA ICV (Integrated Cardiovascular) Ambulatory Monitoring session.
Don Pettit closed the protective shutters of the JAXA Kibo laboratory window to avoid its heating during the upcoming high Beta angle regime. [Shutter closure should be verified 12 hrs (as a margin) before the Betas reach more than +60 deg.]
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