Monthly Archives: February 2014

Space Station Live: Student Science Reaches Higher Orbits
NASA Public Affairs Officer Brandi Dean speaks with Michelle Ham, U.S director of ISSET and president and founder of Higher Orbits, about opportunities for s...

By: ReelNASA

See the original post here:
Space Station Live: Student Science Reaches Higher Orbits - Video

Minecraft: Deadly Orbit with IronStoneMine - 10 - Totally Safe! [F]
F tackle their first custom map together; Deadly Orbit! Fabe and I are stranded in the deserted space station and need to gather supplies to survive, and es...

By: Phedran

Link:
Minecraft: Deadly Orbit with IronStoneMine - 10 - Totally Safe! [F] - Video

Astronaut Scott E. Parazynski works with cables associated with the Space Station Remote Manipulator System (SSRMS) or Canadarm2. NASA/Courtesy of Apercu.

About 100 representatives from industry, academia and government are meeting at the Canadian Space Agency for whats being billed as the countrys first annual space conference.

The Tuesday event is taking place just a few weeks after Industry Minister James Moore unveiled Canadas new space policy framework.

Space agency boss Walt Natynczyk opened the conference and it continued with presentations from several senior government officials who are in charge of the use of Canadian space assets.

The federal policy framework makes sovereignty and security the top priority and one presentation focused on the Department of National Defences involvement in space activities.

Federal officials with Defence Research and Development Canada, the National Research Council and Environment Canada also spoke.

The conference is taking place under tight federal budget restraints. Moore said earlier this month the Canadian Space Agency under Natynczyk has plenty of money to achieve its goals.

The current CSA budget is $260 million.

Continue reading here:
Space agency boss speaks about future of space program

Fire, water and the threat of exploding chemicals are an astronauts biggest worries aboard the International Space Station, where NASA astronaut Christopher Cassidy spent March to September last year.

The experience was the latest in his almost a decade of space flight for NASA, and Cassidy shared some of the highlights Monday with an audience of medical personnel in a conference room at Good Samaritan Regional Medical Center.

Cassidy, 45, a former Navy SEAL, was keeping a promise to his uncle, Bill Monscko of Monmouth, when he spoke in the morning to local students at Ash Creek Elementary School in Monmouth about his time in space, and also addressed the group from Samaritans Graduate Medical Education program in the afternoon.

With a witty, self-deprecating air, Cassidy, 45, said he took a roundabout route to membership in two of the nations most elite groups: He applied to the Navy SEALs program at 21, after graduating from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Md.

Yes, he said, the training at the SEALs facility on Coronado Island off San Diego and at the SEALs facility in Norfolk, Va., was tough but it was the down time that was brutal.

SEAL doesnt stand so much for Sea, Air and Land as it does for Sleep, Eat and Lay around.

He applied to become an astronaut, and in May 2004 reported to NASAs facilities in Houston for rigorous training.

He flew the Space Shuttle Endeavor to the space station July 15-31 in 2009 and performed three space walks, totalling 18 hours and five minutes.

It was during a space walk, he said, that he actually got nervous.

You have a box in your hands labeled 001, and you know that if something goes wrong, the space station isnt going to work right. Never mind the whole problem of what would happen if you let go and float off into space. The main preventative strategy there, he said, is hang on.

Read more from the original source:
Life in space: NASA astronaut speaks in Corvallis

February 24, 2014

Image Caption: International Space Station in orbit. Credit: NASA

NASA

Over the past two years, NASA and its American industry partners have returned International Space Station resupply launches to U.S. soil, established new national space transportation capabilities and helped create jobs right here on Earth. More than 250 miles overhead, hundreds of science experiments not possible on Earth are being conducted by an international team of astronauts, enabled by these new cargo delivery and return services.

In January, the Obama Administration announced plans to extend the life of the space station through at least 2024 marking another decade of discoveries to come that will benefit Earth while increasing the knowledge NASA needs to send astronauts to an asteroid and Mars.

NASA has issued a Request for Information (RFI) seeking industry feedback on options to meet the future needs of the International Space Station for cargo delivery of a variety of new science experiments, space station hardware and crew supplies.

View the Request For Information

The International Space Station is a convergence of science, technology and human innovation that demonstrates new technologies and makes research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. The space station has had crew members continuous on board since November 2000. In that time, it has been visited by more than 200 people and a variety of international and commercial spacecraft. The space station remains the springboard to NASAs next great leap in exploration, including future missions to an asteroid and Mars.

Source: NASA

Read this article:
NASA Seeks US Industry Feedback On Options For Future Space Station Cargo Services

Crew members of Expedition 38, currently aboard the International Space Station, will make space-to-Earth connections with students and faculty in Pennsylvania and Missouri this week to share what it is like to live and work in space.

Both calls will be broadcast on NASA Television and live-streamed on the agency's website.

Students from Temple University's School of Media and Communication and College of Engineering will speak with NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Koichi Wakata at 11:50 a.m. EST Thursday, Feb. 27.

On Friday, Feb. 28, Mastracchio and Hopkins will talk with students and teachers at Hopkins' alma mater, School of the Osage, in Osage Beach, Mo., at 10 a.m. EST.

Media are invited to cover both events. Journalists interested in covering the event at Temple University should contact Paul Gluck at 215-204-2807 or pageone@temple.edu. The event will take place at the TUTV-Temple University Television Studios located at 2020 N.13th Street in Philadelphia.

To attend the event at School of the Osage, members of the media should contact Bryce Durbin at 573-348-0115 or durbinb@osage.k12.mo.us. School of the Osage is located at 636 Hwy. 42 in Osage Beach, Mo.

Linking students directly to space station astronauts provides them with an authentic experience of space exploration, scientific studies and the possibilities for future human space exploration. NASA activities have been incorporated into classes at the schools in preparation for these conversations.

These in-flight education downlinks are part of a series with educational organizations in the United States to improve science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), teaching and learning. It is an integral component of NASA's Teaching From Space education program, which promotes learning opportunities and builds partnerships with the education community using the unique environment of space and NASA's human spaceflight program.

To keep up with Hopkins' research and life on the ISS through Twitter, follow:

Tweets by AstroIllini

More:
Missouri and Pennsylvania Students to Talk Live with Space Station Crew