Discovery launches for one final mission. Credit: Alan Walters (awaltersphoto.com) for Universe Today.
[/caption]
Overcoming a down-to the-last second problem, space shuttle Discovery made history today, launching on its final mission to orbit. The most-traveled orbiter is carrying a crew of six astronauts and one human-like Robonaut, along with a new permanent storeroom and supplies for the International Space Station. After waiting nearly four months following the detection of potentially dangerous cracks in Discovery’s external tank and a leak in the Orbiter Maneuvering System pod, a problem with a computer for the Air Force Range Safety Officer nearly thwarted the long-anticipated launch. The crew of STS-133 finally launched on their historic mission, with reinforced ribs, or stringers, in the tank’s “intertank” section and a leak-free OMS, and — two seconds before the launch window would have closed — a working computer in the Range. “That was about as last second as you can get,” said spokesman Allard Beutel from Kennedy Space Center.
Discovery set off on her final journey from a picture-perfect warm February day at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, thrilling enormous crowds of onlookers, a huge international press corp and dedicated Tweet-up attendees.
But the four month delay was not without consequences, as original STS-133 crew member Tim Kopra was injured in a bike accident, and Steve Bowen was chosen to replace him. The crew – which includes Commander Steve Lindsey, pilot Eric Boe, Nicole Stott, Michael Barratt, and spacewalkers Alvin Drew and Bowen — met at the base of the shuttle before climbing on board in a touching moment, giving each other a group hug before setting off on their mission.
In the payload bay is the Permanent Logistics Module – a glorified closet, with the first human-like robot, affectionately named R2, who will become a permanent crewmember on board the ISS.
STS-133 launch. Credit: Alan Walters (awaltersphoto.com) for Universe Today.
Discovery has been flying since Aug. 30, 1984. It’s first mission was 41-D, where astronauts deployed three communications satellites. Discovery has completed 30 successful missions, more than any other orbiter in NASA’s Shuttle fleet. The orbiter has undergone 99 different upgrades and 88 special safety tests – just since 2002. Discovery was named after several ships of exploration in human history.
Paving the way for the launch was today’s successful docking at the ISS of the ATV-2 Johannes Kepler, a European re-supply ship for the ISS. The Automated Transfer Vehicle 2 is the size of a double-decker bus, and carries 7 tons of supplies for the station’s six-person crew.
Watch the shuttle launch from a PlayStation. Image via the PlayStation Blog.
[/caption]
Get a dose of reality via Sony’s PlayStation gaming system. The final liftoff of space shuttle Discovery on February 24, 2011 at 4:50 pm EST will be the first live streaming event to be offered by PlayStationHome, the social gaming networking service, and provide a unique “social viewing” environment.
“We’re excited about this new way for people to experience the exhilaration of human spaceflight as part of a larger community,” said David Weaver, NASA associate administrator for the Office of Communications. “In addition to the other two shuttle launches planned for April and June, NASA looks forward to sharing more of our endeavors with PlayStation users.”
The event is offered by Sunset Yacht, a premium personal space from LOOT, Sony DADC’s interactive entertainment development team. Users will be able to chat via Bluetooth headsets with others watching the launch – all from inside the PlayStation Home social gaming environment.
In addition to live streamed events, the Sunset Yacht’s NASA TV channel will offer hundreds of videos offering spectacular views of the universe from past and current NASA missions. A gallery of podcasts showcasing several missions including the Mars Science Laboratory and Voyager spacecraft also will be available from the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena.
“The launch of the space shuttle Discovery provides a wonderful opportunity to introduce people to the fun of social viewing,” said LOOT Managing Director David Sterling. “Users can share this experience with their friends, regardless of where those friends happen to be in the world.”
On April 12, 2011, everyone with the least bit of interest in space should be rockin’ the house. It’s the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s flight, the first human to launch to space. As of this writing there are 109 Yuri’s Night events in 27 countries on 5 continents on 2 worlds (#2 is in Second Life.) Take a look at the Yuri’s Night website to see if there is an event near you. If not, start your own!
There is also a Yuri’s Night 2011 Video Contest, which is an open source competition to engage the public to create tribute videos for this 50th Anniversary of Human Spaceflight. The best videos will be shared at events around the world and the winners will receive $500. The deadline for submission is April 1, 2011. There will be online voting for the winner.
If a proposal by United Space Alliance is approved the shuttles Endeavour and Atlantis could continue to fly until at least 2017. Photo Credit: NASA
[/caption]
She is the youngest orbiter in NASA’s fleet – and she is being looked at to keep her country in space during a period when the U.S. will lack the capability to do so. Both Endeavour and her sister Atlantis are part of a proposal to keep the shuttles flying into 2017. United Space Alliance (USA) submitted the proposal in the latter part of 2010 as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Development Round 2 ( CCDev2).
NASA asked aerospace firms for concepts and ideas to advance the cause of commercial crew transportation. NASA has offered to provide funding to companies to look into various manned space flight systems. USA submitted the Commercial Space Transportation System (CSTS) – an adapted version of the shuttle’s Space Transportation System title.
USA wanted to make sure that all options for crew transportation to orbit were on the table. That included keeping the orbiters Atlantis and Endeavour in service until 2017. If this plan succeeds, the shuttles could conduct missions as quickly as by the year 2013. They would have to wait for new external tanks to be produced. Two flights annually would cost approximately $1.5 billion.
Although some are calling the proposal a “long shot” the plan has some very tangible merits. It would limit the “gap” between the end of the end of the shuttle era and when commercial space-taxis could begin ferrying astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). Keeping the shuttles in service would also help to significantly decrease dependence on the Russian Soyuz for access to the orbiting outpost.
“The CSTS could provide a near-term U.S. solution for crew transport until a new system is ready. It could provide a low-risk approach to bridging the gap in human spaceflight since the program has been flying since 1981 and is well understood,” USA spokesperson Tracy Yates told Universe Today. “It could also provide redundancy for human access to the ISS and therefore ensure the continued viability of an important national asset. The concept has the potential to offer a proven vehicle operated by a seasoned workforce at a market-driven price. It preserves down-mass capability, stabilizes a larger portion of the human spaceflight workforce for future NASA programs and keeps more crew transport dollars at home.”
For the Space Coast this proposal would also have the added benefit of staving off the crippling unemployment that has come as part of the one-two punch of the end of the shuttle era and the cancellation of the Constellation Program.
Although the CSTS has a specific date (2017) mentioned – it is capable of remaining in effect until the new commercial systems come online. This proposal would allow NASA to utilize a proven space vehicle and the overall idea of a “commercial shuttle program” is actually nothing new – the idea has been bandied about since the 90s.
However, while the cost is less than the $3 billion the shuttle program cost in 2010, it is basically the same amount that NASA is paying Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) for 12 missions to the space station. The NewSpace firm has stated that four manned flights would cost approximately $550 million.
Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) has stated that a flight on the manned version of the Dragon spacecraft would cost about $140 million. Image Credit: SpaceX
“The main thing that this program has going against it is this, what does the shuttle offer that the HTV, ATV, Soyuz and soon commercial craft can’t offer,” said noted space historian David M. Harland. “In today’s economic climate it makes more sense to pay $50 million or so for a seat on Soyuz.”
The second launch of the U.S. Air Force's X-37B OTV is slated for March 4, 2010. Photo Credit: Air Force
[/caption]
CAPE CANAVERAL – From all appearances the first flight of the U.S. Air Force’s secretive X-37B space plane was a complete success. As such, the Air Force is planning to launch a second Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV) on March 4 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on top of a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas rocket. The Air Force has not yet released a specific launch time.
The first flight of an OTV took place on Apr. 22, 2010 on top of an Atlas V 501 rocket and was designated USA-212. Built by Boeing, the spacecraft is unmanned and is in many ways similar to the space shuttle. It has a payload bay, maneuvering thrusters up front and to the rear of the spacecraft and a single, primary engine.
The OTV is different from the space shuttle in that it can operate on-orbit for up to 270 days. During the vehicle’s maiden flight it was spotted by a number of amateur astronomers who verified that the craft changed orbits a number of times before it landed safely at Vandenberg Air Force base on Dec. 3, 2010.
The first X-37B lifted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station last April. Photo Credit: ULA T.V.
“We are tremendously excited to launch the second OTV space vehicle for the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office. Our combined Air Force and ULA mission partner team has worked hard to prepare the Atlas V for this mission which is the first launch of the year for ULA from the east coast in 2011,” said ULA’s Director of Communications, Mike Rein. “I fully expect this launch to be a 100 percent successful mission – just like the first OTV launch in April 2010.”
Originally the OTV was to be deployed from the space shuttle’s payload bay, after the Columbia accident however, it was decided to launch from an EELV instead. At first a Delta II was given the nod to launch the space plane – before the Atlas V was confirmed as the launch vehicle that would be used.
The X-37B is similar in many ways to NASA's space shuttle - but it is far smaller and unmanned. Photo Credit: Air Force
The U.S. Air Force has disclosed only minimal information regarding the first mission and has said little about the upcoming mission as well. The Air Force has stated that the length of the OTV’s mission’s will be determined by the completion rates of the experiments that are onboard. Mission control is based out of Colorado with the 3d Space Experimentation Squadron.
The X-37B is only the second reusable spacecraft that is capable of conducting an automated landing. The only other reusable craft that has demonstrated this capability was Russia’s Buran shuttle which returned safely to Earth on Nov. 15, 1988.
The X-37B was a program initially handled by NASA; however the program was eventually turned over to the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the Pentagon. The OTV flew several times on Scaled Composites’ White Knight aircraft and was drop tested twice successfully in 2006.
As seen in this diagram, the X-37B is encapsulated within the fairing of the Atlas rocket. Image Credit: ULA[
Mars500 crew just seconds before ingressing their module for a 520 day stay in June 2010. Credit: ESA
[/caption]
Six men from Europe, Russia and China on a 520-day mock mission to Mars, have now reached the point in their mission where they have arrived ‘in orbit’ of Mars. Mars500, the first full-duration simulation, is like a real Mars mission, where the crew has been in isolation, living and working like astronauts, eating special food and exercising the same way as crews aboard the International Space Station, and even experiencing lag time in communications. Now after 244 days of virtual interplanetary flight, the crew is getting ready to ‘land’ on Mars on February 12 where they will make three EVAs onto simulated Martian terrain.
Mars500 is not a just a flight of fancy or fantasy, but scientists from Russia and the European Space agency say it is a “pioneering international study of the complex psychological and technical issues that must be tackled for long spaceflights.”
Mars500 crew just seconds before ingressing their module for a 520 day stay in June 2010. Credit: ESA
The simulation has been running for more than eight months in hermetically sealed modules imitating a Mars spacecraft at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) in Moscow.
“Mars500 is a visionary experiment,” said Simonetta Di Pippo, ESA Director for Human Spaceflight. “Europe is getting ready to make a step further in space exploration: our technology and our science grow stronger every day. Mars 500 today is only an enriching simulation, but we are working to make it real.”
The Mars500 facility has no windows, but a laptop running Celestia, a freeware space simulation software, acts as a virtual window as the crew approached the Red Planet. Credits: ESA
The crew has now opened a hatch between the mothership and the mockup of a lander that, according to script, was launched separately to Mars.
In the coming days, the cargo inside the ‘lander’ will be transferred into the habitat and the lander will be prepared for ‘undocking’ and ‘landing’.
The crew will then divide: Russian Alexandr Smoleevskiy, Italian Diego Urbina and Chinese Wang Yue will enter the lander, while the rest of the crew, Romain Charles from France and Sukhrob Kamolov and Alexey Sitev from Russia ‘remain in orbit’.
The hatch between the interplanetary spacecraft and lander will be closed on 8 February. The lander will undock and ‘touch down’ on Mars on 12 February.
The Mars terrain simulator of the Mars500 facility. The crew will drive a rover and place sensors during their sorties. Credits: IBMP/ Oleg Voloshin
The simulated Martian terrain is actually housed in a large hall alongside the Mars500 modules. The first EVA will take place on February 14, with subsequent sorties taking place on February 18 and 22.
Then the lander will return to orbit and dock with the mothership the following day.
The lander crew will stay in quarantine for three days before the hatch is opened on 27 February and the astronauts are reunited.
Mars500 participant Diego Urbina with a computer simulation in the Mars500 facility. Credits: ESA
After that, the crew is faced with another long, monotonous ‘interplanetary cruise’ before arriving home in early November 2011.
Atlantis at the pad for the STS-132 mission. Will she fly again? Credit: Alan Walters (awaltersphoto.com) for Universe Today
[/caption]
On Thursday, the Space Shuttle Program set a target launch date of June 28, 2011 for the STS-135 mission, the “extra” shuttle flight that was approved in the 2010 NASA Authorization Act. The STS-135 mission – if not required as a “Launch on Need” rescue flight for STS-133 or STS-134 — would have the shuttle Atlantis and a 4-member crew carry a fully-loaded Raffaello multipurpose logistics module to deliver supplies, logistics and spare parts to the International Space Station. Whether the mission actually flies, however, depends on if Congress decides to approve NASA’s proposed budget for 2011. There has been rumors that NASA’s budget could be on the chopping block. But NASA needs to begin preparing in case the flight is approved.
According to Jeff Foust’s Space Politics, the House is expected to vote next week on a resolution to cut discretionary spending back to 2008 levels, a move that, if backed up by later appropriations legislation, would cut NASA spending from the $18.7 billion in FY2010 (and $19 billion in the FY11 proposal) to $17.4 billion. There is sure to be a battle, however, from congressional districts in Texas and Florida who worked hard to get the 2010 Authorization Act passed.
After the Act was signed last fall, in late December the agency’s Space Operations Mission Directorate requested the shuttle and International Space Station programs take the necessary steps to maintain the capability to fly Atlantis on the STS-135 mission.
The Authorization Act of 2010 directs NASA to conduct the mission, and scheduling the flight enables the program to begin preparations for the mission. This would be the 135th and final space shuttle flight.
If approved, the mission also will fly a system to investigate the potential for robotically refueling existing spacecraft and return a failed ammonia pump module to help NASA better understand the failure mechanism and improve pump designs for future systems.
The crew consists of commander Chris Ferguson, Douglas Hurley, Sandra Magnus and Rex Walheim. The smaller crew size bypasses the need for a rescue shuttle, as if for some reason Atlantis is unable to return from space, the crew members would be rescued from the station using Russian Soyuz spacecraft.
As far as the next scheduled shuttle flight, STS-133, engineers continue to work on Discovery in the Vehicle Assembly Building Kennedy Space Center to modify the stringers on the external fuel tank. Discovery and its six astronauts are targeted to launch on Feb. 24.
With a bicycle injury to crewmember Tim Kopra, the crew is now joined by Steve Bowen, who flew on the on STS-132 in May 2010, as a replacement. He will be the first astronaut to fly on consecutive missions.
At a press conference on Wednesday, Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA’s Associate Administrator for Space Operations said the astronaut office worked together to figure out who should replace Kopra and figure out the logistics so that the flight would not be delayed even further. “We’ve been working hard on this since Tim had his accident and we think we’ve got a good plan in place,” he said.
“Its was obviously a disappointment for Tim to not be available for this upcoming launch window,” said chief astronaut Peggy Whitson. “He understands that we have to be prepared to fly.”
Whitson said Bowen is a very experienced spacewalker, with five previous spacewalks and very capable in terms of qualifications in the EMU (NASA’s spacesuit). “We felt with a very few additional training runs, he could pick up the timeline, and be able to pull them off with only an additional two runs in the NBL (Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory for each of those two activities.”
The crew also will review robotics procedures today and review spacewalk timelines at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
Asked if moral in the astronaut office was taking a hit, with Kopra’s injuries and the possibility of astronaut Mark Kelly stepping aside as commander for the STS-134 mission due to the shooting of his wife, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Whitson countered, “Moral here is maybe even better than usual since everyone is pulling together to help the crewmembers during their difficult times.”
The recent shootings in Arizona raise the question, what does NASA do when they have bad news to convey? Photo Credit: Rep. Gabrielle Giffords
[/caption]
Over the past decade, events have transpired on the ground that have both indirectly and directly impacted crews on orbit. With astronauts spending as long as six months in space on the International Space Station, some have had to deal with tragedies — both intimately personal and completely national — during a mission. NASA, for its part, has done everything it can do to prepare crews for life in space, and dealing with tragedies is factored into every flight.
When terrorists conducted the worst attack on American soil in U.S. history on September 11, 2001, there was a single U.S. astronaut orbiting high above on the ISS, left helpless to do anything but watch and photograph as his nation came under attack. Frank Culbertson, then commander of the orbiting outpost along with two Russian cosmonauts, spoke afterward of his sense of isolation as the country dealt with this tragedy.
Astronaut Frank Culbertson was aboard the ISS when his country was attacked. Photo Credit: NASA
A disaster a little closer to home struck on Feb. 1, 2003 – the space shuttle Columbia was lost on orbit with her crew of seven. Astronauts Donald Pettit and Kenneth Bowersox were on orbit on the ISS when Columbia broke apart in Earth’s atmosphere, returning from a non-space station mission. While the two crews were in space at the same time, astronauts Petit on the ISS and Willie McCool aboard Columbia played a friendly game of chess – separated by the void of space. Sadly, the game would never be finished. McCool and the rest of Columbia’s STS-107 lost their lives when the orbiter disintegrated in the skies above Texas. For Petit and Bowersox this cut them off from traditional forms of grieving as well as a way home.
When Columbia was lost, two of the crew's closest friends were on the ISS, causing difficulties in grieving and finding them a way home. Photo Credit: NASA
With the orbiter fleet grounded, how would they change out crews? The 16 nations involved in the ISS project worked to balance things out until the shuttles were back in action. Post-Columbia, crew rotations among numerous other things would be changed. NASA would survive, but tragedies would still strike the NASA family.
When astronaut Dan Tani was stationed aboard the ISS in 2007 he received the terrible news that his mother was killed in an automobile accident. A NASA flight surgeon along with Tani’s wife contacted the astronaut while he was serving aboard the ISS.
Astronaut Dan Tani found out that he lost his mother when he was a crew member aboard the International Space Station. Photo Credit: NASA
With the recent tragedy in Tucson, Arizona, NASA once again had to focus on emergency contingencies. This time a commander for an upcoming shuttle mission, Mark Kelly, had to be notified that his wife, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, had been seriously injured in a mass shooting while meeting with her constituents at an event called “Congress on your Corner.” NASA had to contact both Mark Kelly and his brother Scott, who was on-orbit aboard the ISS. NASA also had to deal with the potential that Mark might not be able to launch with his crewmates on Endeavour’s final mission – STS-134. As such, a backup commander was announced, four-time shuttle veteran Rick Sturckow.
“NASA’s goal is mission success and crew safety. Although NASA does not train crewmembers as backups for its shuttle crews or ISS crews, it has enough trained crewmembers that substitutions late in the training flow for medical or personal emergencies can succeed,” said Tom Jones Ph.D a four-time shuttle veteran and author of Sky Walking: An Astronaut’s Memoir. “NASA has replaced at least three crewmembers within a few months to launch since the Apollo era. They also moved an ISS crewmember in training to an earlier crew to replace a crewmember dealing with medical problems. Once in space, NASA will notify astronauts of family problems back on the ground if they have asked for such notification in discussions before launch.”
NASA works to ensure the safety and privacy of its astronauts during times like this. This point was emphasized during a recent press conference held to update the media about repairs conducted to the shuttle, Discovery. William Gerstenmaier; administrator for Space Operations stated emphatically from the outset – that this was not the appropriate time to discuss these issues. One wayward reporter tried anyway, taking the question at a different angle and to another member of the interview panel – John Shannon. Shannon made sure that the reporter understood and that NASA stood as one – behind Mark Kelly and his family.
There is no way that NASA can predict every single possible scenario – but the agency does the best it can.
“Crew members are informed as soon as possible of any family emergencies or other urgent news and issues. In advance of their mission, crew members meet with astronaut office management to discuss individual preferences regarding notification of such emergencies,” said Kylie Clem a public affairs officer with NASA. “NASA provides psychological support for all astronauts, including those in space. A NASA Flight Surgeon, psychological services and family support services are all available for Scott and Mark’s families. The astronaut office is a close knit organization.”
Not all the news NASA has relayed to its astronauts has been tragic. Astronaut Mike Fincke welcomed his daughter Tarali Paulina into the world from orbit in 2004 and astronaut Randy Bresnik did the same for his daughter, Abigail Mae Bresnik, while part of the STS-129 mission in 2009. In all cases, NASA works to ensure that, regardless of the situation, its astronauts will find out their most personal news – in the best way possible – given the circumstances.
Discovery in the VAB. Credit: Alan Walters (awaltersphoto.com)
[/caption]
NASA managers met on Thursday and ruled out any possibility of space shuttle Discovery’s external tank being ready in time for the launch window that opens on February 3. Now, NASA is shooting for the window that opens on Feb. 27, but is working to see if International Space Station on-orbit operations would allow a launch as early as Feb. 24. More will be known next week and managers hope to set a launch date by January 14.
The space agency reported that progress continues to be made in understanding the most probable cause of cracks discovered on Discovery’s external tank mid-section, known as the intertank. Cracks on support beams called stringers were found after the tank was loaded with cryogenic fuel for a subsequently scrubbed launch attempt on November 5th. Four additional small cracks were found during X-ray examinations of the backside of the tank after Discovery was returned to the Vehicle Assembly Building before Christmas.
Plans are for the repair work to continue through the weekend. The shuttle program also reviewed the plan to modify as many as 32 additional stringers with radius blocks, which will provide added structural support in areas known to carry much of the structural load of the external tank. These radius blocks essentially fit over existing stringer edges through which the securing rivets are installed to provide additional structural support. The radius block modification is a known and practiced structural augmentation technique used extensively on the intertank. This work should begin as soon as the repairs to the three stringers with the four additional small cracks have been completed, likely in the next day or so, and the modification of the additional 32 stringers is expected to be complete next week.
Whether further delays could cause a leapfrog of missions remains to be seen. Launch dates for Discovery and Endeavour will be discussed at the January 13 Space Shuttle Program Requirements Control Board meeting.
From Russia, with love. Here’s a video put together by Roscosmos of launch and mission highlights. Interestingly, in 2010, Russia has made almost a half of all launches in the world – 31 launches of 74. Next was the USA and China with 15 launches each. ESA sent 6 rockets to space, India had 3, South Korea had 1, Japan 2, and Israel 1. Four launches in the world were unsuccessful.
