Mars Archives

September 16, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Construction of Crew Access Tower Starts at Atlas V Pad for Boeing ‘Starliner’ Taxi to ISS

The first tier of seven tiers for Crew Access Tower is moved from its construction yard to Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Sept 9, 2015. The tower will provide access at the pad for astronauts and ground support teams to the Boeing CST-100 Starliner launching atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. Photo credit: NASA/Dmitrios Gerondidakis
Story/photos updated[/caption]

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FL – Restoring America’s human path back to space from US soil kicks into high gear at last as construction starts on erecting the new crew access tower on the Atlas V launch pad that will soon propel Americans astronauts riding aboard the commercially developed Boeing CST-100 ‘Starliner’ taxi to the Earth-orbiting International Space Station (ISS).

The last hurdle to begin stacking the crew access tower at the United Launch Alliance Atlas V complex-41 launch pad on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida was cleared with the magnificent predawn blastoff of the U.S. Navy’s MUOS-4 communications satellite on Sept. 2 – following a two day weather delay due to Tropical Storm Erika.

“Everything is on schedule,” Howard Biegler, ULA’s Human Launch Services Lead, told Universe Today during an exclusive interview. “The new 200-foot-tall tower structure goes up rather quickly at launch pad 41.”

The access tower essentially functions as the astronauts walkway to the stars.

“We start stacking the crew access tower [CAT] after the MUOS-4 launch and prior to the next launch after that of Morelos-3,” Beigler said in a wide ranging interview describing the intricately planned pad modifications and tower construction at the Atlas V Space Launch Complex 41 facility at Cape Canaveral.

Depending on the always tricky weather at the Cape, more than half the tower should be “installed prior to MORELOS-3’s launch on Oct. 2. The balance of the CAT will take form after the launch.”

The first tier of the new Crew Access Tower for the Boeing CST-100 Starliner arrives at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The tower will provide access at the pad for astronauts and ground support teams to the Boeing CST-100 Starliner launching atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. Photo credit: NASA/Dmitrios Gerondidakis — The first tier of the new Crew Access Tower for the Boeing CST-100 Starliner arrives at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Sept 9, 2015. The tower will provide access at the pad for astronauts and ground support teams to the Boeing CST-100 Starliner launching atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. Photo credit: NASA/Dmitrios Gerondidakis

The crew access tower is a critical space infrastructure element and absolutely essential for getting Americans back to space on American rockets for the first time since NASA’s shuttles were retired in 2011. That action forced our total dependence on the Russian Soyuz capsule for astronaut rides to the space station.

Boeing was awarded a $4.2 Billion contract in September 2014 by NASA Administrator Charles Bolden to complete development and manufacture of the CST-100 space taxi under the agency’s Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) program and NASA’s Launch America initiative. SpaceX also received a NASA award worth $2.6 Billion to build the Crew Dragon spacecraft for launch atop the firms man-rated Falcon 9 rocket.

Starliner is a key part of NASA’s overarching strategy to send Humans on a “Journey to Mars” in the 2030s.

The tower is of modular design for ease of assembly at the always busy Atlas launch pad.

“The crew tower is comprised of seven major tiers, or segments,” Beigler explained. “The building of the tiers went right on schedule. Each tier is about 20 feet square and 28 feet tall.”

Five of the seven tiers will be installed ahead of the next Atlas launch in early October, depending on the weather which has been difficult at the Cape.

“Our plan is to get 5 tiers and a temporary roof installed prior to MORELOS-3’s launch on October 2.”

“We have been hit hard with weather and are hopeful we can gain some schedule through the weekend. The balance of the CAT will take form after the 10/2 launch with the 7th tier planned to go up on 10/13 and roof on 10/15,” Biegler explained.

The first tier of the new Crew Access Tower for the Boeing CST-100 Starliner is installed at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Sept 9, 2015 where United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets will lift Boeing Starliners into orbit. Photo credit: NASA/Dmitrios Gerondidakis — The first tier of the new Crew Access Tower for the Boeing CST-100 Starliner is installed at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida where United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets will lift Boeing Starliners into orbit. Photo credit: NASA/Dmitrios Gerondidakis

The newly named ‘Starliner’ space taxi will launch atop a newly human-rated Atlas V booster as soon as mid-2017, say NASA, ULA and Boeing officials.

But before astronauts can even climb aboard Starliner atop the Atlas rocket, ULA and Boeing first had to design, build and install a brand new tower providing access to the capsule for the crews and technicians.

Pad 41 is currently a “clean pad” with no gantry and no walkway to ‘Starliner’ because the Atlas V has only been used for unmanned missions to date.

The CST-100 ‘Starliner’ is at the forefront of ushering in the new commercial era of space flight and will completely revolutionize how we access, explore and exploit space for the benefit of all mankind.

This is the first new Crew Access Tower to be built at the Cape in decades, going back to NASA’s heyday and the Apollo moon landing era.

The tier segments were assembled about four miles down the road at the Atlas Space Operations Center on Cape Canaveral – so as not to disrupt the chock full manifest of Atlas rockets launching on a breakneck schedule for the NASA, military and commercial customers who ultimately pay the bills to keep ULA afloat and launch groundbreaking science probes and the most critical national security payloads vital to national defense.

“Each segment was outfitted with additional steel work, as well as electrical, plumbing and the staircase. Then they will be transported 3.9 miles out to the pad, one at a time on a gold hoffer and then we start erecting.”

The first two tiers were just transported out to pad 41. Installation and stacking of one tier on top of another starts in a few days.

Artist’s concept of Boeing’s CST-100 space taxi atop a human rated ULA Atlas-V rocket showing new crew access tower and arm at Space Launch Complex 41, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fl. Credit: ULA/Boeing

“We are very pleased with the progress so far,” Biegler told me. “Everything is on schedule and has gone remarkably well so far. No safety or workmanship issues. It’s all gone very well.”

“The first tier is obviously the most critical [and will take a bit longer than the others to insure that everything is being done correctly]. It has to be aligned precisely over the anchor bolts on the foundation at the pad. Then it gets bolted in place.”

“After that they can be installed every couple of days, maybe every three days or so. The pieces of the tower will go up quickly.”

Artist’s concept of Boeing’s CST-100 space taxi atop a human rated ULA Atlas-V rocket showing new crew access tower and arm. Credit: ULA/Boeing

The steel tiers and tower are being built by Hensel Phelps under contract to ULA.

“Construction by the Hensel Phelps team started in January 2015,” Biegler said.

Erecting the entire tower is the next step. After stacking the tiers is fully completed later this year then comes structure, testing and calibration work over the next year.

“After tower buildup comes extensive work to outfit the tower with over 400 pieces of outboard steel that have to be installed. That takes much longer,” Biegler said.

“Designed with modern data systems, communications and power networks integrated and protected from blast and vibration, plus an elevator, the Crew Access Tower has been built with several features only a fully suited astronaut could appreciate, such as wider walkways, snag-free railings and corners that are easy to navigate without running into someone,” according to NASA officials.

Just like the shuttle, “the tower will also be equipped with slide wire baskets for emergency evacuation to a staged blast-resistant vehicle.”

“At the very top is the area that protects the access arm and provides the exit location for the emergency egress system. It will all be stick built from steel out at the pad,” Biegler elaborated.

The access arm with the walkway that astronauts will traverse to the Starliner capsule is also under construction. It is about 180 feet above ground.

Astronauts will ride an elevator up the tower to the access arm, and walk through it to the white room at the end to board the Starliner capsule.

“The arm along with the white room and torque tube are being fabricated in Florida. It will all be delivered to the pad sometime around next June [2016],” Biegler stated.

“We built a test stand tower for the access arm at our Oak Hill facility to facilitate the installation process. We mount the arm and the hydraulic drive system and then run it through its paces prior to its delivery to the pad.”

“The access arm – including the torque tube out to the end – is just over 40 feet in length.”

“We will integrate it off line because we don’t have a lot of time to troubleshoot out at the pad. So we will hook up all its drive systems and electronics on the test structure stand.”

“Then we will spend about 3 months testing it and verifying that everything is right. We’ll use laser lining to know it all precisely where the arm is. So that when we bring it out to the pad we will know where it is to within fractions of an inch. Obviously there will be some minor adjustments up and down.”

“That way in the end we will know that everything in the arm and the hydraulic drive system are working within our design specs.”

When the arm is finally installed on the crew access tower it will be complete, with the white room and environmental seal already attached.

“It will stow under the crew access tower, which is located west and north of the launch vehicle. The arm will swing out about 120 degrees to the crew module to gain access and was strategically picked to best fit the features and foundation at the existing pad structure.”

Tower construction takes place in between Atlas launches and pauses in the days prior to launches. For example the construction team will stand down briefly just ahead of the next Atlas V launch currently slated for Oct. 2 with the Mexican governments Morelos-3 communications satellite.

The Crew Access Tower is now being erected at Pad 41 following MUOS-4 blastoff here. MUOS-4 US Navy communications satellite and Atlas V rocket at pad 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL for launch on Sept. 2, 2015 at 5:59 a.m. EDT. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com

Starliners’ actual launch date totally depends on whether the US Congress provides full funding for NASA’s commercial crew program (CCP).

Thus far the Congress has totally failed at providing the requested CCP budget to adequately fund the program – already causing a 2 year delay of the first flight from 2015 to 2017.

Boeing is making great progress on manufacturing the first CST-100 Starliner.

Barely a week ago, Boeing staged the official ‘Grand Opening’ ceremony for the craft’s manufacturing facility held at the Kennedy Space Center on Friday, Sept 4. 2015 – attended by Universe Today as I reported here.

ULA has also already started assembly of the first two Atlas V rockets designated for Starliner at their rocket factory in Decatur, Alabama.

Read my earlier exclusive, in depth one-on-one interviews with Chris Ferguson – America’s last shuttle commander, who now leads Boeings’ CST-100 program; here and here.

First view of the Boeing CST-100 'Starliner' crewed space taxi at the Sept. 4, 2015 Grand Opening ceremony held in the totally refurbished C3PF manufacturing facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center. These are the upper and lower segments of the first Starliner crew module known as the Structural Test Article (STA) being built at Boeing’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility (C3PF) at KSC. Credit: Ken Kremer /kenkremer.com — First view of the Boeing CST-100 ‘Starliner’ crewed space taxi at the Sept. 4, 2015 Grand Opening ceremony held in the totally refurbished C3PF manufacturing facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. These are the upper and lower segments of the first Starliner crew module known as the Structural Test Article (STA) being built at Boeing’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility (C3PF) at KSC. Credit: Ken Kremer /kenkremer.com

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

September 12, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Curiosity Investigates Petrified Martian Sand Dunes, Contemplates Next Drill Campaign

Large-scale crossbedding in the sandstone of this ridge on a lower slope of Mars’ Mount Sharp is typical of windblown sand dunes that have petrified. NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover used its Mastcam to capture this vista on Aug. 27, 2015, Sol 1087. Similarly textured sandstone is common in the U.S. Southwest. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
See Sol 1100 mosaic below [/caption]

NASA’s SUV-sized Curiosity rover has arrived at a beautiful Martian vista displaying a huge deposit of magnificently petrified sand dunes that look remarkably like some commonly found on Earth and native to the deserts of the U.S. Southwest.

The dunes are keenly fascinating to Red Planet researchers as the NASA robot celebrates 1100 fabulous Sols of exploration and discovery on Mars and contemplates plans for the next drill campaign later this month. See dune mosaic above and our Sol 1100 mosaic below.

The petrified sand dunes were discovered amongst an area of dark sandstone along a ridge at the lower slope of Mars’ Mount Sharp. They are now being explored in detail by the six wheeled rover in a geologic feature dubbed the Stimson unit.

“The team is considering where to drill next within the Stimson sandstone and we are looking for the best light toned areas to check for mineralogical signs of water-rock reaction,” says John Bridges, rover team member from the University of Leicester, England, in the latest mission update from today, September 12, 2015.

Curiosity looks toward fabulous canyons and buttes at the base of Mount Sharp from the Stimson sand dunes on Mars on Sol 1100, Sept. 10 2015 in this photo mosaic stitched from Mastcam color camera raw images. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo

Curiosity also discovered large-scale crossbedding in the sandstone that were formed by the action of Martian winds.

“This sandstone outcrop — part of a geological layer that Curiosity’s science team calls the Stimson unit — has a structure called crossbedding on a large scale that the team has interpreted as deposits of sand dunes formed by wind,” according to the rover team.

So Curiosity was commanded by her handlers back on Earth to capture an array of high resolution imagery as part of detailed investigation of the area for up close and contact science.

Dozens of images were taken with the pair of high resolution Mastcam color cameras on the robots mast and combined into the panoramic scene show above and another shown below with a scalebar the length of a tall human, 6.6 feet or 200 centimeters.

The images were taken on Aug. 27, 2015, corresponding to Sol 1087 of the rover’s work on Mars, using both the 34 millimeter-focal-length lens and the 100 mm millimeter-focal-length telephoto Mastcam camera lenses that function as Curiosity’s left and right eyes.

The panorama spans the Martian terrain looking from the east, at left, to the south-southwest at right.

“Some of the dark sandstone in the area …. shows texture and inclined bedding structures characteristic of deposits that formed as sand dunes, then were cemented into rock” say officials.

“Sets of bedding laminations lie at angles to each other.”

Since taking the panorama in late August, the team has driven Curiosity around the area to collect more measurements with her state of the art science instruments.

Later this month, Curiosity will drill into an outcrop at the Stimson unit sandstone for collection and feed it for analysis into the pair of on board chemistry labs – SAM and CheMin- located inside the rover’s belly.

Curiosity already carried out initial contact science in the area by extending the robotic arm to rock targets for investigation with the arm mounted instruments, including the MAHLI camera and APXS spectrometer.

Curiosity “investigated an outcrop of the Stimson unit … and conducted successful contact science,” says Lauren Edgar, Research Geologist at the USGS Astrogeology Science Center and an MSL science team member, in a mission update.

Scientists will select the Stimson drill target soon.

Curiosity rover explores around the Stimson unit at the base of Mount Sharp on Mars on Sol 1095, Sept. 5, 2015 in this photo mosaic stitched from Mastcam color camera raw images. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com

Why explore outcrops at Stimson?

“The Stimson unit overlies a layer of mudstone that was deposited in a lake environment. Curiosity has been examining successively higher and younger layers of Mount Sharp, starting with the mudstone at the mountain’s base, for evidence about changes in the area’s ancient environment.”

Curiosity’s prior drill campaign was recently conducted at the “Buckskin” outcrop target in early August 2015. Buckskin was very notable for being the first high silica rock drilling target of the mission.

Curiosity extends robotic arm and conducts sample drilling at “Buckskin” rock target at bright toned “Lion” outcrop at the base of Mount Sharp on Mars, seen at right. Gale Crater eroded rim seen in the distant background at left, in this composite multisol mosaic of navcam raw images taken to Sol 1059, July 30, 2015. Navcam camera raw images stitched and colorized. Inset: MAHLI color camera up close image of full depth drill hole at “Buckskin” rock target on Sol 1060. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo

Stimson and Buckskin sit at the base of Mount Sharp, a huge layered mountain that dominates the center of the 96 mile-wide (154 kilometers-wide) Gale Crater landing site.

Exploring the sedimentary layers of Mount Sharp, which towers 3.4 miles (5.5 kilometers) into the Martian sky, is the primary destination and goal of the rovers long term scientific expedition on the Red Planet.

Curiosity recently celebrated 1000 Sols of exploration on Mars on May 31, 2015 – detailed here with our Sol 1000 mosaic by Marco Di Lorenzo and Ken Kremer also featured at Astronomy Picture of the Day on June 13, 2015.

As of today, Sol 1102, September 12, 2015, she has driven some 6.9 miles (11.1 kilometers) kilometers and taken over 268,000 amazing images.

Curiosity has already accomplished her primary objective of discovering a habitable zone on the Red Planet – at the Yellowknife Bay area – that contains the minerals necessary to support microbial life in the ancient past when Mars was far wetter and warmer billions of years ago.

Curiosity rover scans toward south east around Marias Pass area at the base of Mount Sharp on Mars on Sol 1074, Aug. 14, 2015 in this photo mosaic stitched from Mastcam color camera raw images. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Marco Di Lorenzo/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

September 8, 2015December 23, 2015 by Bob King

Start Your Day with a Full House – Three Planets and a Pair of Crescents

The Moon, just a couple days before new phase and the upcoming partial solar eclipse, joins Venus and Mars in the dawn sky on Thursday Sept. 10. Well below the triplet, look for returning Jupiter. Source: Stellarium

The dawn sky’s where it’s happening. With Saturn swiftly sinking westward at dusk, bright planets have become scarce in the evening hours. But if you get up early and look east, you’ll discover where the party is. Venus, Mars and now Jupiter have the dance floor.

Tale of two crescents. A montage of the thick crescent Moon and crescent Venus photographed earlier this month. Credit: Tom Ruen

What’s more, the sky gods have seen fit to roll a thin crescent Moon alongside Venus Thursday morning (Sept. 10). This lovely twinning of crescents is best seen about 75 minutes to an hour before sunrise. All you need is a pair of 10x binoculars to see the peewee Venusian version. Its waning crescent phase closely mimics the Moon’s.

From the U.S., the separation between the two will vary from 3° for the East Coast to 4.5° for the West. European and African skywatchers will witness the actual conjunction with the Moon gliding 2.5° north of the planet.

Venus is very bright, making it easy to see in the daytime if you know where to look. Try using the thin Moon soon after sunrise (7:30 a.m. local time shown here) to spot Venus. Aim and focus your binoculars on the Moon, then glide up and to the right to find Venus. If you succeed, lower the binoculars and see if you can spot it without optical aid. Source: Stellarium

Much fainter Mars, checking in at magnitude +1.8, lies 6° to the left or east of the Moon. It thrills me to see Mars begin a new apparition with its return to the morning sky. Next year, the Red Planet reaches opposition on May 22 in the constellation Scorpius, when it will be brighter than Sirius and more than 18 arc seconds across, its biggest and closest since 2005.

Remember Jupiter? We lost it in the solar glare more than a month ago, but if you can find a location with a nice, open eastern horizon, you can welcome the ever-jovial planet back Thursday. Bring binoculars just in case! Jove’s only a few degrees high in moderately-bright twilight.

The bright sunlit crescent contrasts with the darker lighting of twice-reflected light supplied by sunlight reflecting off our own planet. Credit: Bob King — The bright sunlit crescent contrasts with the darker lighting of twice-reflected light contributed by own planet. Credit: Bob King

When you look at the Moon Thursday, most of it will be illuminated not by sunlight but by Earth-light called earthshine. This smoky, dark glow results from sunlight bouncing off the globe into space to softly light the otherwise shadowed portion of the Moon. The effect is most pleasing to the eye and remarkable in binoculars, which reveal lunar seas and even larger craters shrouded in blue-dark. Don’t miss it!

August 23, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

‘One Direction’ Heads to Space in new NASA Themed Music Video – ‘Drag Me Down’

‘One Direction’ band mates don spacesuits to board NASA’s Orion deep space crew capsule. Credit: One Direction/NASA

When it comes to space exploration it’s resoundingly clear that rock band ‘One Direction’ is headed in the right direction – To Infinity and Beyond! – with the release of their new NASA themed music video ‘Drag Me Down.’

The new single – ‘Drag Me Down’ – by the world famous boy band is out now and out of this world!

Just click on the Vevo video above and enjoy their musical tour through space exploration themed videos filmed on location at NASA facilities, including the Johnson Space Center – home to astronauts training to explore ‘Where No One Has Gone Before.’

Over 18,100,000 views so far!! Millions of eyeballs exposed to NASA activities like never before!

As you’ll see in the video (published on Aug. 20) the quartet got a first hand look at a host of NASA’s cutting edge technology and hardware like NASA’s Orion deep space crew capsule that’s destined to propel our astronauts back to deep space and explore wondrous destinations including the Moon, asteroids and the Red Planet, as part of the agency’s ‘Journey to Mars’ initiative.

Motivating our young people to study and excel in math, science, engineering, technology and the arts is what it’s all about to inspire the next generation of explorers and advance all humanity to fulfilling and prosperous lives.

“#DragMeDownMusicVideo @space_station Gravity can’t drag me down! Great to see @NASA inspire our next gen #YearInSpace,” tweeted NASA astronaut Scott Kelly currently working aboard the International Space Station.

Lets join “One Direction’s” space tour.

So the guys donned NASA’s spacesuits as they began ‘training’ to fly aboard NASA’s Orion spaceship.

Orion flew its first uncrewed mission on the EFT-1 flight in December 2014, launching aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket.

Harry, Niall, Louis and Liam all got suited up to check out and sit inside an Orion trainer. Next you’ll see them ‘blast off’ for space atop the Delta IV rocket from the Florida Space Coast in their music video.

But first they rollick with the astronauts T-38 training jets which are used by real-life astronauts to practice spacecraft operations at supersonic speeds up to Mach 1.6 and experience blistering accelerations of more than seven Gs!

Here we join Louis to rove around Johnson Space Center in NASA’s Space Exploration Vehicle that will one day be used for awe-inspiring interplanetary journey’s to the surface of alien bodies like the moon, near-Earth asteroids and Mars!

Even though Louis is roving around Johnson Space Center in our Space Exploration Vehicle, its intended destination is quite different. The SEV will be used for in-space missions and for surface explorations of planetary bodies, including near-Earth asteroids and Mars!

Wouldn’t you like to join Louis!

Meanwhile Harry got to hang out with Robonaut at the Johnson Space Center during the filming of the music video.

Simultaneously the Robonauts twin brother, Robonaut 2, is hanging out in space right now with other humans. Robonaut 2 is working side-by-side with NASA astronauts Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren and the rest of the six man crew floating aboard the International Space Station and soaring some 250 miles (400 kilometers) overhead.

“Going where the risks are too great for people, robots will make it so we never get ‘dragged down’!” says NASA.

“Currently living in space, @StationCDRKelly is 1 of 6 people that literally cannot be dragged down. #DragMeDown,” NASA tweeted.

The twin brother of the R2 Robonaut launched to the ISS on Space Shuttle Discovery on the STS-133 mission, its 39th and final flight to space. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com

And here’s Niall experiencing reduced gravity in the Partial Gravity Simulator & Space Station Mockup Bike. This simulator is where astronauts learn how to work effectively in the partial gravity of space and on the surface of other worlds

I’ve been a fan of ‘One Direction’ and now nothing will ‘hold me back’ following #DragMeDown.

And don’t forget that you can watch Commander Scott Kelly and his five international crew mates on a regular basis as they soar overhead. Just click on NASA’s Spot the Station link and plug in your location.

And make sure you sign up to ‘Send Your Name to Mars’ on InSight – NASA’s next Mars Lander. The deadline is Sept 8 – sign up details in my story here.

Orion’s inaugural mission dubbed Exploration Flight Test-1 (EFT) was successfully launched on a flawless flight on Dec. 5, 2014 atop a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket Space Launch Complex 37 (SLC-37) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Here’s what the real Orion EFT-1 looked like after the mission was successfully completed and it was recovered from splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.

Homecoming view of NASA’s first Orion spacecraft after returning to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Dec. 19, 2014 after successful blastoff on Dec. 5, 2014. Credit: Ken Kremer - kenkremer.com — Homecoming view of NASA’s first Orion spacecraft after returning to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Dec. 19, 2014 after successful blastoff on Dec. 5, 2014. Credit: Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com

Right now NASA is building the next Orion.

If you desire to be aboard a future Orion, don’t let anything ‘Drag You Down.’

And tell Congress and the White House to ‘Support Full Funding for NASA!’ – – Because Congress has significantly slashed funding for the commercial crew capsules in the upcoming 2016 Fiscal Year budget!

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

NASA’s first Orion spacecraft blasts off at 7:05 a.m. atop United Launch Alliance Delta 4 Heavy Booster at Space Launch Complex 37 (SLC-37) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Dec. 5, 2014. Credit: Ken Kremer - kenkremer.com — NASA’s first Orion spacecraft blasts off at 7:05 a.m. atop United Launch Alliance Delta 4 Heavy Booster at Space Launch Complex 37 (SLC-37) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Dec. 5, 2014. Credit: Ken Kremer – kenkremer.com

August 21, 2015December 23, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Tricks to Remember the Planets

Need an easy way to remember the order of the planets in our Solar System? The technique used most often to remember such a list is a mnemonic device. This uses the first letter of each planet as the first letter of each word in a sentence. Supposedly, experts say, the sillier the sentence, the easier it is to remember.

So by using the first letters of the planets, (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune), create a silly but memorable sentence.

Here are a few examples:

My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Noodles (or Nachos)
Mercury’s Volcanoes Erupt Mulberry Jam Sandwiches Until Noon
Very Elderly Men Just Snooze Under Newspapers
My Very Efficient Memory Just Summed Up Nine
My Very Easy Method Just Speeds Up Names
My Very Expensive Malamute Jumped Ship Up North

The Sun and planets to scale. Credit: Illustration by Judy Schmidt, texture maps by Björn Jónsson

If you want to remember the planets in order of size, (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Earth, Venus Mars, Mercury) you can create a different sentence:
Just Sit Up Now Each Monday Morning
Jack Sailed Under Neath Every Metal Mooring
Rhymes are also a popular technique, albeit they require memorizing more words. But if you’re a poet (and don’t know it) try this:

Amazing Mercury is closest to the Sun,
Hot, hot Venus is the second one,
Earth comes third: it’s not too hot,
Freezing Mars awaits an astronaut,
Jupiter is bigger than all the rest,
Sixth comes Saturn, its rings look best,
Uranus sideways falls and along with Neptune, they are big gas balls.

Or songs can work too. Here are a couple of videos that use songs to remember the planets:

If sentences, rhymes or songs don’t work for you, perhaps you are more of a visual learner, as some people remember visual cues better than words. Try drawing a picture of the planets in order. You don’t have to be an accomplished artist to do this; you can simply draw different circles for each planet and label each one. Sometimes color-coding can help aid your memory. For example, use red for Mars and blue for Neptune. Whatever you decide, try to pick colors that are radically different to avoid confusing them.

Or try using Solar System flash cards or just pictures of the planets printed on a page (here are some great pictures of the planets). This works well because not only are you recalling the names of the planets but also what they look like. Memory experts say the more senses you involve in learning or storing something, the better you will be at recalling it.

Planets made from paper lanterns. Credit: TheSweetestOccasion.com

Maybe you are a hands-on learner. If so, try building a three-dimensional model of the Solar System. Kids, ask your parents or guardians to help you with this, or parents/guardians, this is a fun project to do with your children. You can buy inexpensive Styrofoam balls at your local craft store to create your model, or use paper lanterns and decorate them. Here are several ideas from Pinterest on building a 3-D Solar System Model.

If you are looking for a group project to help a class of children learn the planets, have a contest to see who comes up with the silliest sentence to remember the planets. Additionally, you can have eight children act as the planets while the rest of the class tries to line them up in order. You can find more ideas on NASA’s resources for Educators. You can use these tricks as a starting point and find more ways of remembering the planets that work for you.

If you are looking for more information on the planets check out Universe Today’s Guide to the Planets section, or our article about the Order of the Planets, or this information from NASA on the planets and a tour of the planets.

Universe Today has numerous articles on the planets including the planets and list of the planets.

Astronomy Cast has an entire series of episodes on the planets. You can get started with Mercury.

August 20, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Curiosity Snaps Stunning One of a Kind Belly Selfie At Buckskin Mountain Base Drill Site

This low-angle self-portrait of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover shows the vehicle at the site from which it reached down to drill into a rock target called “Buckskin.” The MAHLI camera on Curiosity’s robotic arm took multiple images on Aug. 5, 2015, that were stitched together into this selfie. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
More selfie and drilling mosaics below[/caption]

NASA’s Curiosity rover has snapped a stunningly beautiful, one of a kind ‘belly selfie’ amidst the painstaking ‘Buckskin’ drill campaign at the Martian mountain base marking the third anniversary since her touchdown on the Red Planet.

The unique self portrait was taken from a low-angle for the first time and shows the six wheeled rover at work collecting her seventh drilled sample at the ‘Buckskin’ rock target earlier this month in the “Marias Pass” area of lower Mount Sharp.

‘Buckskin’ is also unique in a fabulously scientifically way because the rover discovered a new type of Martian rock that’s surprisingly rich in silica – and unlike any other targets found before.

The low camera angle is what enables the awesome Buckskin belly selfie. It’s a distinctively dramatic view and actually stitched from 92 images captured by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on Aug. 5, 2015, or Sol 1065 of the mission.

The high resolution MAHLI color camera is located on the end of the 7 foot-long (2.1 meter-long) robotic arm.

This version of a self-portrait of NASA's Curiosity Mars rover at a drilling site called "Buckskin" is presented as a stereographic projection, which shows the horizon as a circle. The MAHLI camera on Curiosity's robotic arm took dozens of component images for this selfie on Aug. 5, 2015. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS — This version of a self-portrait of NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at a drilling site called “Buckskin” is presented as a stereographic projection, which shows the horizon as a circle. The MAHLI camera on Curiosity’s robotic arm took dozens of component images for this selfie on Aug. 5, 2015. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Indeed the car-sized rover has taken spectacular selfies several times before during her three year long trek across the Martian surface, since the August 2012 landing inside Mars’ Gale Crater. But for those past selfies the MAHLI camera was hoisted higher to give the perspective of looking somewhat downward and showing the rovers top deck and trio of sample inlet ports.

In this case, the rover team specifically commanded Curiosity to position “the camera lower in relation to the rover body than for any previous full self-portrait of Curiosity,” said NASA officials.

Two patches of gray colored powdered rock material drilled from Buckskin are visible in the selfie scene, in front of the rover.

“The patch closer to the rover is where the sample-handling mechanism on Curiosity’s robotic arm dumped collected material that did not pass through a sieve in the mechanism. Sieved sample material was delivered to laboratory instruments inside the rover. The patch farther in front of the rover, roughly triangular in shape, shows where fresh tailings spread downhill from the drilling process.”

Prior selfies were taken at the “Rocknest” (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA16468), “John Klein” (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA16937), “Windjana” (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA18390) and “Mojave” drill sites.

Basically in the Sol 1065 belly selfie at “Buckskin” we see the underbelly of the rover and all six wheels along with a complete self portrait.

On several prior occasions, MAHLI was used to image just the underbelly and wheels to aid in inspecting the wheels to look for signs of damage inflicted by sharp-edged Martian rocks poking holes in the aluminum wheels.

Underbelly view of Curiosity rover and wheels on Sol 34. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo — Underbelly view of Curiosity rover and wheels on Sol 34, Sept. 9, 2012. Credit: NASA/JPL/MSSS/Ken Kremer/Marco Di Lorenzo

Each wheel measures 20 inches (50 centimeters) in diameter and about 16 inches (40 centimeters) wide. And the MAHLI monitoring images have shown the effects of increasing wear and tear that ultimately forced the rover drivers to alter Curiosity’s driving route on the crater floor in favor of smoother and less rocky terrain imparting less damage to the critical wheels.

If you take a close look at the new selfie up top, you’ll see a small rock stuck onto Curiosity’s left middle wheel (on the right in this head-on view). The rock was seen also in prior wheel monitoring images taken three weeks ago.

“The selfie at Buckskin does not include the rover’s robotic arm beyond a portion of the upper arm held nearly vertical from the shoulder joint. With the wrist motions and turret rotations used in pointing the camera for the component images, the arm was positioned out of the shot in the frames or portions of frames used in this mosaic,” according to officials.

The drilling campaign into “Buckskin” was successfully conducted on Sol 1060 (July 30, 2015) at the bright toned “Lion” outcrop to a full depth of about 2.6 inches (6.5 centimeters) and approximately 1.6 cm (0.63 inch) diameter.

You can also see another perspective of the rover at work while reaching out with the robotic arm and drilling into ‘Buckskin’ as illustrated in our mosaics of mastcam and navcam camera raw images created by the image processing team of Ken Kremer and Marco Di Lorenzo.

The main bore hole was drilled next to the initial mini hole test and shows the indicative residue of grey colored tailings from the Martian subsurface seen distributed around the new hole.

Curiosity rover successfully drills into Martian outcrop at Buckskin rock target at current work site at base of Mount Sharp in August 2015, in this mosaic showing full depth drill hole and initial test hole, with grey colored subsurface tailings and mineral veins on surrounding Red Planet terrain. This high resolution photo mosaic is a multisol composite of color images taken by the mast mounted Mastcam-100 color camera up to Sol 1060, July 31, 2015. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/Marco Di Lorenzo

Curiosity has now moved on from the “Marias Pass” area.

Curiosity recently celebrated 1000 Sols of exploration on Mars on May 31, 2015 – detailed here with our Sol 1000 mosaic also featured at Astronomy Picture of the Day on June 13, 2015.

As of today, Sol 1080, August 20, 2015, she has driven some 6.9 miles (11.1 kilometers) kilometers and taken over 260,000 amazing images.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

August 19, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

NASA Invites Public to ‘Send Your Name to Mars’ on InSight – Next Red Planet Lander

Sign up to send your name to Mars on InSight, NASA’s next mission to Mars launching in March 2016. Credit: NASA
Sign up link below – don’t delay![/caption]

Calling space fans worldwide: Now is your chance to participate in NASA’s human ‘Journey to Mars’ initiative and NASA’s next robotic mission to Mars – the InSight lander launching to the Red Planet next spring.

NASA invites you to ‘Send Your Name to Mars’ on a silicon microchip aboard the InSight probe slated for blastoff on March 4, 2016 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

InSight’s science goal is totally unique – to “listen to the heart of Mars to find the beat of rocky planet formation.”

The public can submit their names for inclusion on a dime-sized microchip that will travel on a variety of spacecraft voyaging to destinations beyond low-Earth orbit, including Mars.

“Our next step in the journey to Mars is another fantastic mission to the surface,” said Jim Green, director of planetary science at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

“By participating in this opportunity to send your name aboard InSight to the Red Planet, you’re showing that you’re part of that journey and the future of space exploration.”

In just the first 24 hours over 67,000 Mars enthusiasts have already signed up!

But time is of the essence since the deadline to submit your name is soon: Sept. 8, 2015.

How can you sign up to fly on InSight? Is there a certificate?

NASA has made it easy to sign up.

To send your name to Mars aboard InSight, click on this weblink posted online by NASA:

http://go.usa.gov/3Aj3G

And you can also print out an elegant looking ‘Boarding Pass’ that looks like this:

Boarding Pass for NASA’s InSight Mission to Mars - launching from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California in March 2016. Credit: NASA — Boarding Pass with frequent flyer miles for NASA’s InSight Mission to Mars – launching from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California in March 2016. Credit: NASA

Furthermore the ‘Boarding Pass’ also comes with a listing of your “frequent flier” points accumulated by your participation in NASA’s ‘fly-your-name opportunity’ that will span multiple missions and multiple decades beyond low Earth orbit.

InSight represents the second ‘fly-your-name opportunity’ in NASA’s journey to Mars program. The uncrewed Orion EFT-1 mission launched on Dec. 5, 2014 was the first chance for space fans to collect ‘Journey to Mars’ points by sending your names to space.

The ‘Send Your Name to Mars’ campaign for Orion EFT-1 was a huge success.

Over 1.38 million people flew on the silicon chip aboard the maiden flight of Orion, the NASA capsule that will eventually transport humans to the Red Planet in the 2030s.

Don’t dawdle. Because after InSight, you’ll have to wait about three years until late 2018 and the blastoff of the next Orion capsule on NASA’s Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1) for you next chance to accumulate “frequent flier” points on a ‘Journey to Mars’ mission.

Orion EM-1 will launch atop NASA’s mammoth Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, and NASA just conducted a key test firing on Aug. 13 of the first stage engines that will power the stack to on a mission to the Moon – detailed in my recent story here.

InSight, which stands for Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, is a stationary lander.

It will join NASA’s surface science exploration fleet currently comprising of the Curiosity and Opportunity missions which by contrast are mobile rovers.

InSight is the first mission to understand the interior structure of the Red Planet. Its purpose is to elucidate the nature of the Martian core, measure heat flow and sense for “Marsquakes.”

“It will place the first seismometer directly on the surface of Mars to measure Martian quakes and use seismic waves to learn about the planet’s interior. It also will deploy a self-hammering heat probe that will burrow deeper into the ground than any previous device on the Red Planet. These and other InSight investigations will improve our understanding about the formation and evolution of all rocky planets, including Earth,” says NASA.

NASA's InSight Mars lander spacecraft in a Lockheed Martin clean room near Denver. As part of a series of deployment tests, the spacecraft was commanded to deploy its solar arrays in the clean room to test and verify the exact process that it will use on the surface of Mars. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Lockheed Martin — NASA’s InSight Mars lander spacecraft in a Lockheed Martin clean room near Denver. As part of a series of deployment tests, the spacecraft was commanded to deploy its solar arrays in the clean room to test and verify the exact process that it will use on the surface of Mars. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Lockheed Martin

The countdown clock is ticking relentlessly towards liftoff in less than seven months time in March 2016.

Insight promises to ‘science the sh**’ out of the heart of Mars!

It is funded by NASA’s Discovery Program as well as several European national space agency’s and countries. Germany and France are providing InSight’s two main science instruments; The HP3 heat probe and the SEIS seismometer through the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt. or German Aerospace Center (DLR) and the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES).

“Together, humans and robotics will pioneer Mars and the solar system,” says Green.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

August 19, 2015December 30, 2015 by Jason Major

Watch the You-Know-What Out Of This New Trailer for The Martian

The second full trailer for 20th Century Fox’s upcoming film The Martian dropped this morning and it looks like a whole red-planetful of awesome space adventure! Directed by Ridley Scott and based on the runaway hit novel of the same name by Andy Weir, The Martian stars Matt Damon as Mark Watney, a member of a fictional yet not-too-distant-future NASA mission to explore the surface of Mars. After a violent dust storm batters the camp the team is forced to abort the mission, abandoning the base and Watney, who was injured and assumed dead. Except, of course, he’s not, thus beginning his new mission to remain alive on Mars long enough to be rescued — a feat which will require bravery, brains, luck… and a whole you-know-what-load of science. (If you haven’t read the book yet, it’s a lot of fun. I highly suggest it.) So check out the trailer above, and feel free to repeat as necessary.

The Martian opens in U.S. theaters on Oct. 2. Visit the official movie site here.

August 17, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Indian Mars Orbiter Shoots Spectacular New Images of Sheer Canyon and Curiosity’s Crater

This view over the Ophir Chasma canyon on the Martian surface was taken by the Mars Colour Camera aboard India’s Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM). Ophir Chasma is a canyon in the Coprates quadrangle located at 4° south latitude and 72.5° west longitude. It is part of the Valles Marineris canyon system. Credit: ISRO

India’s space agency has released a spectacular new batch of images taken by everyone’s favorite MOM – the Mars Orbiter Mission – the nation’s first probe ever dispatched to the Red Planet and which achieved orbit nearly a year ago.

The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) has published a beautiful gallery of images featuring a steep and stunning Martian canyon and the landing site of NASA’s Curiosity Mars Science Laboratory rover, and more.

The lead image was taken over the Ophir Chasma canyon on the Martian surface by the Mars Colour Camera aboard India’s Mars Orbiter Mission.

Ophir Chasma is a canyon in the Coprates quadrangle located at 4° south latitude and 72.5° west longitude. It is part of the Valles Marineris – the ‘Grand Canyon of Mars’ – and the largest known canyon in the Solar System.

The image was captured on July 19, 2015 from an altitude of 1857 kilometers (1154 miles). It has with a resolution of 96 meters.

The steep walled Ophir Chasma canyon contains many layers and the floors contain large deposits of layered materials, perhaps even sulfates.

Ophir Chasma is about 317 kilometers long and about 8 to 10 kilometers deep located near the center of Valles Marineris – see map below.

Valles Marineris stretches over 4,000 km (2,500 mi) across the Red Planet, is as much as 600 km wide and measures as much as 10 kilometers (6 mi) deep. It is nearly as wide as the United States.

Here’s an illuminating and magnificent 3D portrayal of Ophir Chasma created by Indian scientists that gives a sense of the canyons scale, sheer walls and cliffs and depth:

3D portrayals of Ophir Chasma terrain based on images taken by India’s Mars Orbiter Mission color camera on 19 July 2015 . Credit: ISRO

The newest images were snapped after the spacecraft exited the communications blackout encountered by all of Earth’s invasion fleet of Red Planet orbiters and rovers during the recent conjunction period when Mars was behind the sun during much of June.

See the prior image release from ISRO in my MOM story – here.

Here’s a wider view of Valles Marineris showing Ophir Chasma in a previously published MOM image from ISRO.

Valles Marineris from India’s Mars Mission. Credit: ISRO

ISRO also released a delightful new image of Gale Crater and the surrounding vicinity.

Gale Crater is the landing site of NASA’s Curiosity rover. MOM took the image from an altitude of 9004 kilometers.

Gale Crater - landing site of NASA’s Curiosity rover - and vicinity as seen by India’s Mars Orbiter Mission from an altitude of 9004 km. Gale crater is home to humongous Mount Sharp which rises 5.5 km from the crater floor and is easily visible in this photo. Credit: ISRO — Gale Crater – landing site of NASA’s Curiosity rover – and vicinity as seen by India’s Mars Orbiter Mission from an altitude of 9004 km. Gale crater is home to humongous Mount Sharp which rises 5.5 km from the crater floor and is easily visible in this photo. Credit: ISRO

Gale Crater is home to humongous Mount Sharp, a mountain that rises 5.5 kilometers (3.4 miles) from the crater floor and is easily visible in the photo from MOM. The crater is 154 kilometers (96 mi) wide.

Curiosity is currently exploring the foothills of Mount Sharp around the top of the image – which shows a rather different perspective from what we’ve seen from prior familiar orbital imagery snapped by several NASA and ESA orbiters.

The 1 ton rover recently celebrated the 3rd anniversary since its nailbiting touchdown inside Gale crater. And the new wider angle image from MOM gives a fabulous sense of exactly why a highly precise landing was essential – otherwise it would have been doomed.

Curiosity recently drilled into the “Buckskin” target at an outcrop at the foothills of Mount Sharp. See the mountain in our ground level mosaic from the crater floor. And its kind of neat to actually imagine Curiosity sitting there while perusing MOM’s photo.

MOM’s goal is to study Mars atmosphere, surface environments, morphology, and mineralogy with a 15 kg (33 lb) suite of five indigenously built science instruments. It is also sniffing for methane, a potential marker for biological activity.

MOM is India’s first deep space voyager to explore beyond the confines of her home planets influence and successfully arrived at the Red Planet after the “history creating” orbital insertion maneuver on Sept. 23/24, 2014 following a ten month journey from Earth.

The Indian probe arrived just after NASA’s MAVEN Mars orbiter, the first mission specifically targeted to study Mars tenuous upper atmosphere and the escape rates of atmospheric constituents.

MOM swoops around Mars in a highly elliptical orbit whose nearest point to the planet (periapsis) is at about 421 km and farthest point (apoapsis) at about 76,000 km, according to ISRO.

It takes MOM about 3.2 Earth days or 72 hours to orbit the Red Planet.

MOM was launched on Nov. 5, 2013 from India’s spaceport at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota, atop the nations indigenous four stage Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) which placed the probe into its initial Earth parking orbit.

The $73 million MOM mission was expected to last at least six months. In March, ISRO extended the mission duration for another six months since its healthy, the five science instruments are operating fine and it has sufficient fuel reserves.

Including MOM, Earth’s invasion fleet at the Red Planet numbers a total of seven spacecraft comprising five orbiters from NASA, ESA and ISRO as well as the sister pair of mobile surface rovers from NASA – Curiosity and Opportunity.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

Location of Ophir Chasma canyon inside this annotated map of Valles Marineris created from the THEMIS camera on NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter. Credit: NASA

Olympus Mons, Tharsis Bulge trio of volcanoes and Valles Marineris from ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission. Note the clouds and south polar ice cap. Credit: ISRO — Olympus Mons, Tharsis Bulge trio of volcanoes and Valles Marineris from ISRO’s Mars Orbiter Mission. Note the clouds and south polar ice cap. Credit: ISRO

August 13, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Milestone Test Firing of NASA’s SLS Monster Rocket Engine Advances Human Path to Deep Space

During a 535-second test on August 13, 2015, operators ran the Space Launch System (SLS) RS-25 rocket engine through a series of tests at different power levels to collect engine performance data on the A-1 test stand at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Credit: NASA
Story/imagery updated
See video below of full duration hot-fire test[/caption]

With today’s (Aug. 13) successful test firing of an RS-25 main stage engine for NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) monster rocket currently under development, the program passed a key milestone advancing the agency on the path to propel astronauts back to deep space at the turn of the decade.

The 535 second long test firing of the RS-25 development engine was conducted on the A-1 test stand at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi – and ran for the planned full duration of nearly 9 minutes, matching the time they will fire during an actual SLS launch.

All indications are that the hot fire test apparently went off without a hitch, on first look.

“We ran the full duration and met all test objectives,” said Steve Wofford, SLS engine manager, on NASA TV following today’s’ test firing.

“There were no anomalies.” – based on the initial look.

The RS-25 is actually an upgraded version of former space shuttle main engines that were used with a 100% success rate during NASA’s three decade-long Space Shuttle program to propel the now retired shuttle orbiters to low Earth orbit. Those same engines are now being modified for use by the SLS.

Spectators enjoy the view during the Aug. 13, 2015 test firing of the RS-25 engine for NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) on the A-1 test stand at NASA's Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Credit: NASA — Spectators enjoy the view during the Aug. 13, 2015 test firing of the RS-25 engine for NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) on the A-1 test stand at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi. Credit: NASA

“Data collected on performance of the engine at the various power levels will aid in adapting the former space shuttle engines to the new SLS vehicle mission requirements, including development of an all-new engine controller and software,” according to NASA officials .

The engine controller functions as the “brain” of the engine, which checks engine status, maintains communication between the vehicle and the engine and relays commands back and forth.

The core stage (first stage) of the SLS will be powered by four RS-25 engines and a pair of the five-segment solid rocket boosters that will generate a combined 8.4 million pounds of liftoff thrust, making it the most powerful rocket the world has ever seen.

Since shuttle orbiters were equipped with three space shuttle main engines, the use of four RS-25s on the SLS represents another significant change that also required many modifications being thoroughly evaluated as well.

RS-25 test firing in progress on the A-1 test stand at NASA's Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, on Aug. 13, 2015. Credit: NASA — RS-25 test firing in progress on the A-1 test stand at NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, on Aug. 13, 2015. Credit: NASA

The SLS will be some 10 percent more powerful than the Saturn V rockets that propelled astronauts to the Moon, including Neil Armstrong, the human to walk on the Moon during Apollo 11 in July 1969.

SLS will loft astronauts in the Orion capsule on missions back to the Moon by around 2021, to an asteroid around 2025 and then beyond on a ‘Journey to Mars’ in the 2030s – NASA’s overriding and agency wide goal.

Each of the RS-25’s engines generates some 500,000 pounds of thrust. They are fueled by cryogenic liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. For SLS they will be operating at 109% of power, compared to a routine usage of 104.5% during the shuttle era. They measure 14 feet tall and 8 feet in diameter.

They have to withstand and survive temperature extremes ranging from -423 degrees F to more than 6000 degrees F.

This video shows the full duration hot-fire test:

NASA has 16 of the RS-25s leftover from the shuttle era and they are all being modified and upgraded for use by the SLS rocket.

Today’s test was the sixth in a series of seven to qualify the modified engines to flight status. The engine ignited at 5:01 p.m. EDT and reached the full thrust level of 512,000 pounds within about 5 seconds.

The hot gas was exhausted out of the nozzle at 13 times the speed of sound.

Since the shuttle engines were designed and built over three decades ago, they are being modified where possible with state of the art components to enhance performance, functionality and ease of operation, by prime contractor Aerojet-Rocketdyne of Sacramento, California.

One of the key objectives of today’s engine firing and the entire hot fire series was to test the performance of a brand new engine controller assembled with modern manufacturing techniques.

“Operators on the A-1 Test Stand at Stennis are conducting the test series to qualify an all-new engine controller and put the upgraded former space shuttle main engines through the rigorous temperature and pressure conditions they will experience during a SLS mission,” says NASA.

“The new controller, or “brain,” for the engine, which monitors engine status and communicates between the vehicle and the engine, relaying commands to the engine and transmitting data back to the vehicle. The controller also provides closed-loop management of the engine by regulating the thrust and fuel mixture ratio while monitoring the engine’s health and status.’

Video caption: RS-25 – The Ferrari of Rocket Engines explained. Credit: NASA

“The RS-25 is the most complicated rocket engine out there on the market, but that’s because it’s the Ferrari of rocket engines,” says Kathryn Crowe, RS-25 propulsion engineer.

“When you’re looking at designing a rocket engine, there are several different ways you can optimize it. You can optimize it through increasing its thrust, increasing the weight to thrust ratio, or increasing its overall efficiency and how it consumes your propellant. With this engine, they maximized all three.”

Engineers will now pour over the data collected from hundreds of data channels in great detail to thoroughly analyze the test results. They will incorporate any findings into future test firings of the RS-25s.

NASA says that testing of RS-25 flight engines is set to start later this fall.

“The RS-25 engine gives SLS a proven, high performance, affordable main propulsion system for deep space exploration. It is one of the most experienced large rocket engines in the world, with more than a million seconds of ground test and flight operations time.”

NASA plans to buy completely new sets of RS-25 engines from Aerojet-Rocketdyne taking full advantage of technological advances and modern manufacturing techniques as well as lessons learned from this hot fire series of engine tests.

The maiden test flight of the SLS is targeted for no later than November 2018 and will be configured in its initial 70-metric-ton (77-ton) version with a liftoff thrust of 8.4 million pounds. It will boost an unmanned Orion on an approximately three week long test flight beyond the Moon and back.

Artist concept of the SLS Block 1 configuration. Credit: NASA

NASA plans to gradually upgrade the SLS to achieve an unprecedented lift capability of 130 metric tons (143 tons), enabling the more distant missions even farther into our solar system.

The first SLS test flight with the uncrewed Orion is called Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1) and will launch from Launch Complex 39-B at the Kennedy Space Center.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer