Enjoy this beautiful weather in the Houston Metro area while we can.
I inquired of Mike Kincaid in PAO/Head of External Relations Directorate about why the NASA News was being discontinued after Feb. 27. He reiterated that in these times of budget reductions—they PAO took a look at all the services they were providing that were "unnecessary" because they were somewhat redundant to what can be found online at various other sites. One daily news email he subscribed me to from the Coalition for Space Exploration is not too bad. Their website link is below if you wish to subscribe and as they noted among their list of available sites.
Of course I will continue to send out my version of NaSA daily news that I can harvest from the NASA Bulletin News summary that is sent to NASA employees if they subscribe.
Don't forget Ann Patterson's AMF party tomorrow at 11 am at 1800 Spacepark Drive Nassau Bay across from NASA
NASA and Human Spaceflight News
Thursday – Feb. 19, 2015
We've realized that the Human Space Flight news distribution is duplicating efforts when there are so many sources of virtually the same material made available to you quickly and easily these days. We'd like to point you to some of the resources we're aware of and discontinue collecting and distributing this edition after Feb. 27. We appreciate your attention to the news summaries over the years, and we will continue to focus our efforts on getting NASA's missions and your stories into the media.
Many external sources provide email distribution and/or website collection of stories, including:
Space Coalition
Space Today
Space Politics
Space Daily
Spaceflight Now
FAA News Updates
JSC External Relations
Public Affairs Office
HEADLINES AND LEADS
Why Can't We Design the Perfect Spacesuit?
Nancy Atkinson - Universe Today
So far, every spacesuit humans have utilized has been designed with a specific mission and purpose in mind. As of yet, there's been no universal or "perfect" spacesuit that would fit every need. For example, the US ACES "pumpkin" suits and the Russian Sokol are only for launch and reentry and can't be used for spacewalks. And the Apollo A7L suits were designed with hard soled boots for astronauts to walk on the Moon, while the current NASA EMU and the Russian Orlan are designed for use in space, but with soft soled booties so as not to damage the exterior of the space station.
U.S. must invest to keep ahead of China in space, hearing told
David Brunnstrom - Reuters
China's space program is catching up with that of the United States and Washington must invest in military and civilian programs if it is to remain the world's dominant space power, a congressional hearing heard on Wednesday.
Johnson-Freese: Why Wolf is Wrong About U.S.-China Space Cooperation
Joan Johnson-Freese explained to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission today why former Rep. Frank Wolf was wrong to effectively ban all U.S.-China bilateral space cooperation. Wolf retired at the end of the last Congress, but his successor as chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA holds similar views.
Slide Show: NASA's Sunstruck Golden Age
By The New Yorker
Last month, at the two hundred and twenty-fifth annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society, a team of scientists presented a newly assembled Hubble Space Telescope panorama of the Andromeda galaxy, our nearest major galactic neighbor. The image captures an area of almost indescribable proportions, some sixty-one thousand light-years from end to end, encompassing more than a hundred million stars. As Ray Villard, of the Space Telescope Science Institute, in Baltimore, wrote in an article that accompanied the image's release, "It's like photographing a beach and resolving individual grains of sand."
Cabana: Cape's multiuser spaceport taking shape
Bob Cabana – Florida Today
Kennedy Space Center has been hard at work repositioning itself for the future. It's clear that our NASA programs are doing well. Our Launch Services Program continues its longstanding success supporting NASA science missions and we continue to sustain cargo resupply missions to the International Space Station.
ISS spacewalks help set stage for commercial capsules
James Dean – Florida Today
If their spacesuits are cleared for duty, NASA astronauts on Friday could embark on the first in a series of spacewalks that will help ready the International Space Station for arrivals of Boeing and SpaceX crew capsules.
NASA video shows a fireball burning through the skies of Pennsylvania
Rachel Feltman – The Washington Post
Early on Tuesday morning, NASA's All-sky Fireball Network (which is a real thing that exists, for real) caught footage of a fiery space rock entering the atmosphere over Pennsylvania.
Magnetic field laboratory being readied for launch
Justin Ray – Spaceflight Now
A stack of four satellites, each one carrying 25 science sensors and together will perfect the art of formation flying, is being packaged inside an Atlas 5 rocket nose cone in preparation for mounting atop the booster next week.
Arianespace on pace for one launch per month in 2015
Stephen Clark – Spaceflight Now
Last week's successful launch of a Vega rocket with a European re-entry technology demonstrator marked the first of at least 11 flights planned this year by Arianespace to put communications satellites, Earth observatories and research probes into space.
Why Pluto Matters: A Short History of a Small (Non-)Planet
Jennifer Latson – TIME
Feb. 18, 1930: Pluto is first identified in photographs of the night sky
When it was first discovered, Pluto was the coolest planet in the solar system. Before it was even named, TIME surmised that "the New Planet," 50 times farther from the sun than Earth, "gets so little heat from the sun that most substances of Earth would be frozen solid or into thick jellies." New Horizons spots Pluto's smaller moons for the first time
Rachel Feltman – The Washington Post
It's not exactly a clean shot, but it's certainly a timely one: 85 years to the day after Pluto's discovery, NASA has released fresh images from New Horizons that show two of its smaller moons. The long-exposure images, which were taken between Jan. 27 and Feb. 8 from a distance of 125 to 115 million miles, show Hydra and Nix -- moons too small to show up in previous shots.
Mars One Suspends Work on Robotic Missions
Jeff Foust – Space News
A private organization that recently selected finalists for one-way human missions to Mars in the mid-2020s has quietly suspended work on a pair of robotic missions, putting into question plans to launch those spacecraft in 2018.
COMPLETE STORIES
Why Can't We Design the Perfect Spacesuit?
Nancy Atkinson - Universe Today
So far, every spacesuit humans have utilized has been designed with a specific mission and purpose in mind. As of yet, there's been no universal or "perfect" spacesuit that would fit every need. For example, the US ACES "pumpkin" suits and the Russian Sokol are only for launch and reentry and can't be used for spacewalks. And the Apollo A7L suits were designed with hard soled boots for astronauts to walk on the Moon, while the current NASA EMU and the Russian Orlan are designed for use in space, but with soft soled booties so as not to damage the exterior of the space station.
What would constitute the perfect spacesuit that could be used for any mission? It would have to be lightweight while being impervious to rips, impacts and radiation, but also be flexible, fit multiple sizes, and be comfortable enough to be worn for long periods of time.
With those specifications in mind, is it possible to create the perfect spacesuit?
"Designing a spacesuit turns into a battle between protection and mobility," said NASA astronaut trainer Robert Frost in an article on Quora."The more we try to protect the wearer, the less mobile they become. The more mobile we make them, the less protected they are." The perfect spacesuit would be, to quote Elon Musk, "badass."
That's the terminology the SpaceX used in their contract with suit-maker Orbital Outfitters, who are creating the pressure suit for SpaceX's future commercial passengers. Musk said SpaceX is looking for not just utility but esthetics, too. "It needs to both look like a 21st-century space suit and work well," he said during a reddit AMA.
But even with SpaceX's 'badass' suit, they are designing with one purpose in mind.
And there are obstacles to having a "badass space suit design," wrote Eric Sofge in an article in Popular Science. "A launch-entry suit is ungainly, an oversize one-piece embedded with rigid interfaces for the helmet and gloves, and enough room to inflate, basketball-like, when pressurized—especially in the seat, so an astronaut isn't forced to stand up." New Ideas
One of the best hopes on the horizon is a "shrink-wrap" type of spacesuit that MIT has been developing. It is a lightweight, form-fitting, flexible spacesuit — a la Seven of Nine on Star Trek: Voyager— lined with tiny, muscle like coils.
"With conventional spacesuits, you're essentially in a balloon of gas that's providing you with the necessary one-third of an atmosphere [of pressure,] to keep you alive in the vacuum of space," said one of the developers, Dava Newman. "We want to achieve that same pressurization, but through mechanical counterpressure — applying the pressure directly to the skin, thus avoiding the gas pressure altogether. We combine passive elastics with active materials. … Ultimately, the big advantage is mobility, and a very lightweight suit for planetary exploration."
MIT is using a nickel-titanium shape-memory alloy and they are continuing to test ideas. Some problems with this suit include the difficulty of putting on such a tight suit in a zero-gravity environment and how a gas-pressurized helmet can be connected to the compression-pressurized suit.
NASA recently revealed the winner of a public-voted spacesuit design called the Z-2. While it looks a bit like Buzz Lightyear's fictional suit, it has bearings in the joints that make more flexible than NASA's current EMU. It also has a rear-entry port, allowing it to be docked to the side of a mobile transporter or habitat, essentially turning the suit into its own air lock. This helps to avoid bringing in abrasive soil and dust such as lunar regolith Martian soil. NASA is currently testing the Z-2 prototype with plans to develop a better suit, the Z-3. If it works well, the Z-3 might be used in a spacewalk from the International Space Station by 2017.
So, still, the perfect spacesuit eludes us.
But here are some other additions that would make the perfect spacesuit:
Self-healing: Currently, having multiple layers is the best way to defend against rips or tears, which can be fatal in the vacuum of space. But MIT's body suit would utilize mechanical counterpressure to counteract a rip, and engineers at ILC Dover are looking into integrating self-healing materials, such as polymers embedded with microencapsulated chemicals that would create a foam to heal a torn suit.
Better gloves: gloves have been one of the hardest things to design in spacesuits. Making a glove that is both flexible and protective is a challenge. Astronaut Duane Carey compared spacewalks to trying to fix your car while wearing winter mittens. Astronauts have had skin rubbed until it bleeds and have lost fingernails because of how the current gloves wear. NASA is constantly working on better gloves.
Augmented Vision: Currently, NASA's polycarbonate helmets could be confused with fishbowls. One material that could be used for future helmets is a clear ceramic called ALON, which is thinner than bulletproof glass and three times as strong. Another addition could be an internal heads-up display — like ones used by F-16 pilots – to provide data and information.
A better cooling system: Current suits have "underwear" with about 300 feet of plastic tubing that circulate waters to draw away body heat. Purdue University engineers are developing a polymer using glass fibers coated with thermoelectric nanocrystals that absorb heat and discharge electricity.
Artificial Gravity: Remember the magnetic boots worn in Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country and Star Trek: Insurrection? The University of Massachusetts is developing a dry adhesive that could help astronauts and those pesky floating tools to "stick" to surfaces. It is made of a carbon fiber weave and mimics the skin and tendon structure of gecko feet. Another idea — while not quite the same – is a way to counter muscle and bone atrophy in zero-G: Draper Labs are developing gyroscopes that could be attached to the arms and legs of spacesuits that could provide resistance similar to the force of gravity on Earth.
Long-life Battery Power: One issue for long spacewalks is having enough battery power. Michigan Tech is developing units that can convert movement into electricity. Also, Elon Musk might have some ideas for long-lasting batteries…
So, while many entities are working on ideas and concepts, the perfect spacesuit has yet to be developed. If humans are going to go to an asteroid, back to the Moon, to Mars or on a mission to deep space, we'll need a suit as close to perfect as possible.
U.S. must invest to keep ahead of China in space, hearing told
David Brunnstrom - Reuters
China's space program is catching up with that of the United States and Washington must invest in military and civilian programs if it is to remain the world's dominant space power, a congressional hearing heard on Wednesday.
Experts speaking to Congress's U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said China's fast advances in military and civilian space technology were part of a long-term strategy to shape the international geopolitical system to its interests and achieve strategic dominance in the Asia-Pacific.
They also reflect an enthusiasm for space exploration which in the United States has faded since the Apollo Program which landed Americans on the moon in 1969, they said.
"China right now is experiencing its Apollo years," Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor at the U.S. Naval War College, told the hearing. "China gets the funding its needs."
While the budget of the U.S. space agency NASA has been cut substantially, China's space program has benefited from its economic boom and political support from President Xi Jinping down, said Kevin Pollpeter, a China technology expert at the University of California-San Diego.
"They are also able to program out their activities into five-year plans and 15-year plans and this gives them a long-range goal to work with," he told the hearing.
"If the United States is to remain the leading space power then it must continue to invest in both its civilian and military space programs."
Dean Cheng, of the Heritage Foundation think tank, said the U.S. space industrial complex is failing in long-term planning and is aging compared to China's. It is particularly lacking in Chinese speakers with the scientific skills needed.
"China's space industrial workforce is perhaps the youngest of the space industrial powers," Cheng added. "They will be working at this for a long time. Innovation at the end of the day does tend to come from young people."
Xi has said he wants China to establish itself as a space superpower, but Beijing has insisted its program is for peaceful purposes.
Fears of a space arms race mounted in 2007 after China blew up one of its own weather satellites with a ground-based missile.
Johnson-Freese: Why Wolf is Wrong About U.S.-China Space Cooperation
Joan Johnson-Freese explained to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission today why former Rep. Frank Wolf was wrong to effectively ban all U.S.-China bilateral space cooperation. Wolf retired at the end of the last Congress, but his successor as chairman of the House Appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA holds similar views.
Johnson-Freese is a professor at the Naval War College and author of "The Chinese Space Program: A Mystery Within a Maze" and "Heavenly Ambitions: America's Quest to Dominate Space." She was one of the witnesses at today's hearing on China's space and counterspace programs.
Wolf included language in several Commerce-Justice-Science (CJS) appropriations bills that prohibits NASA and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) from engaging in any bilateral activities with China on civil space cooperation unless specifically authorized by Congress or unless NASA or OSTP certifies to Congress 14 days in advance that the activity would not result in the transfer of any technology, data, or other information with national security or economic implications. His indefatigable opposition to cooperating with China was based largely on its human rights abuses and efforts to obtain U.S. technology. He was one of the strongest, but certainly not only, congressional critic of China, always stressing that he loved the Chinese people, but not the Chinese government.
Rep. John Culberson (R-TX) is Wolf's successor as chairman of the CJS subcommittee. In December 2013 when rumors swirled that he would replace Wolf, he was interviewed by a reporter for the Houston Chronicle and when asked whether he agreed with Wolf about China replied: "Yes. We need to keep them out of our space program, and we need to keep NASA out of China. They are not our friends."
It remains to be seen whether he will include the same language in this year's CJS bill, but Johnson-Freese spelled out why she thinks it is the wrong approach.
She provides a comprehensive rebuttal to Wolf's reasoning, but in essence her contention is that "the United States must use all tools of national power" to achieve its space-related goals as stated in U.S. National Space Policy, National Security Strategy, and National Security Space Strategy. Wolf's restrictions on space cooperation simply constrain U.S. options, she argues: "Limiting U.S. options has never been in U.S. national interest and isn't on this issue either." She disagrees with Wolf's assumption that the United States has nothing to gain from working with China: "On the contrary, the United States could learn about how they work -- their decision-making processes, institutional policies and standard operating procedures. This is valuable information in accurately deciphering the intended use of dual-use space technology, long a weakness and so a vulnerability in U.S. analysis."
For some issues, there really is no choice, she continues. China must be involved in international efforts towards Transparency and Confidence Building Measures (TCBMs) and space sustainability, especially with regard to space debris, a topic given urgency by China's 2007 antisatellite (ASAT) test that created more than 3,000 pieces of debris in low Earth orbit. She notes that since that test and the resulting international condemnation, "China has done nothing further in space that can be considered irresponsible or outside the norms set the United States."
Not that China has refrained from tests related to negating other countries' satellites, however. She and other witnesses detailed China's recent activities in that regard. Kevin Pollpeter of the University of California Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation and Dean Cheng of the Heritage Foundation joined her at the witness table. They reported on "missile defense tests" in 2010, 2013 and 2014 that are widely considered in the West to be de facto ASAT tests, along with a 2013 "high altitude science mission" and co-orbital satellite tests in 2010 and 2013, as potentially related to ASAT development. These tests were non-destructive, however, and did not generate space debris.
Former Sen. Jim Talent (R-Missouri), who co-chaired today's hearing, said that the Commission will publish a report by Pollpeter's institute on China's counterspace activities "in the coming days." The Commission was created by Congress in 2000 and submits an annual report on national security implications of the U.S.-China trade and economic relationship.
Slide Show: NASA's Sunstruck Golden Age
By The New Yorker
Last month, at the two hundred and twenty-fifth annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society, a team of scientists presented a newly assembled Hubble Space Telescope panorama of the Andromeda galaxy, our nearest major galactic neighbor. The image captures an area of almost indescribable proportions, some sixty-one thousand light-years from end to end, encompassing more than a hundred million stars. As Ray Villard, of the Space Telescope Science Institute, in Baltimore, wrote in an article that accompanied the image's release, "It's like photographing a beach and resolving individual grains of sand."
We have grown accustomed to seeing space this way—in color-corrected composites, measurable in gigapixels, that blend visible and invisible wavelengths of light. Next week, however, Bloomsbury Auctions, in London, plans to sell a reminder of space exploration's lower-res history—a collection of nearly seven hundred vintage NASA photographs, from the launch of the agency's first satellite, in 1958, through its last manned lunar landing, in 1972.
The series includes familiar imagery from the missions of the nineteen-sixties and seventies—Apollo 11's Buzz Aldrin descending a ladder onto the surface of the moon, Apollo 17's Harrison Schmitt posing with an American flag spread stiff in windless low gravity. But there are also views of less triumphant moments. Some of the photographs are sunstruck, overexposed by sunlight that leaked into the camera; others show the astronauts' difficulty in capturing a stable panorama. These images suggest a nascent reckoning with space's size and strangeness, with its difficult working conditions, and with the uncertainties of exploring it. "I realized up there that our planet is not infinite," Alan Shepard, the first American in space and the first to swing a six-iron on the moon, told the Los Angeles Times in 1994. "We look pretty vulnerable in the darkness." Cabana: Cape's multiuser spaceport taking shape
Bob Cabana – Florida Today
Kennedy Space Center has been hard at work repositioning itself for the future. It's clear that our NASA programs are doing well. Our Launch Services Program continues its longstanding success supporting NASA science missions and we continue to sustain cargo resupply missions to the International Space Station.
The new U.S. Space Launch System is well into design, build and test stages. When completed, it will represent the most advanced launch vehicle developed for a new era of exploration beyond Earth's orbit into deep space.
KSC's Ground Systems Development and Operations Program is making great strides for SLS's launch in 2018. Only last December, the first flight test of the Orion spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force station. The mission successfully completed a two-orbit, four-hour flight that met all mission objectives, building toward our long-term goal: boots on Mars.
In addition to the NASA programmatic work, KSC is working to solidify its position of becoming the world's premier multiuser spaceport. Since Congress tasked KSC to make improvements for multiple users and operations in 2010, we've developed a robust plan to execute that vision.
We're continually making advancements in our policies, planning and partnerships to become a commercially friendly center in the eyes of current and future commercial space partners. We've been updating our internal policies and working with other agencies, such as the Air Force and Federal Aviation Administration, to provide maximum autonomy and flexibility to commercial users.
We're updating our concept of operations to best integrate commercial space work with our programmatic work, still allowing maximum autonomy and operational independence. KSC fully supports and is actively enabling new customers in the development of commercial launch sites on space center property. With last year's selection of our commercial crew partners, Boeing and SpaceX, we're close to once again launching our astronauts from U.S. soil on American spacecraft. Both of NASA's commercial crew partners could have decided to go anywhere, but they chose KSC as their processing and launch sites.
KSC's 2014 Master Plan identifies more available land than ever for commercial operating zones with additional launch site capability. We will shortly issue a broad, commercially friendly Announcement for Proposals. This will encourage potential partners to propose land-use agreements for a broad range of activities never before considered, including vertical launch and landing, launch operations and support, and assembly, test and processing. KSC stands ready to support all interested parties.
KSC continues to deliver on NASA's programmatic work while leading the agency in commercial partnership developments. KSC has already granted leases of several of our assets: Orbiter Processing Facility Bay 3 to Space Florida for Boeing's CST-100 spacecraft for commercial crew transport to the ISS, OPF Bays 1 and 2 to the Department of Defense, Launch Complex 39A to SpaceX for Falcon vehicles, and the operation of the Shuttle Landing Facility is expected to be turned over to Space Florida very soon.
KSC is a cooperating agency in a Port Canaveral Rail Environmental Impact Study and the Shiloh Launch Complex EIS proposed by Space Florida. KSC continues to aggressively pursue our vision to make the center more accessible to commercial space industry.
KSC is anxious to work with current and future users of the spaceport and looks forward to continuing the cape legacy, which has made possible the launch of every American vehicle carrying a crew into space for more than 50 years.
Our success is attributed to the great working relationship with the state of Florida, Space Florida, DOD, FAA and commercial space companies. The result will be a win for KSC, NASA, the state of Florida and the nation.
Bob Cabana is the director of Kennedy Space Center.
ISS spacewalks help set stage for commercial capsules
James Dean – Florida Today
If their spacesuits are cleared for duty, NASA astronauts on Friday could embark on the first in a series of spacewalks that will help ready the International Space Station for arrivals of Boeing and SpaceX crew capsules.
Those vehicles aren't expected to launch from the Space Coast until 2017, but this year new docking systems will be delivered to the station and some of its ports will be rearranged.
NASA's Butch Wilmore and Terry Virts plan to route hundreds of feet of cables and install communications equipment during three upcoming spacewalks spanning nine days.
"The real goal . . . is to try to get us ready to prepare for the arrival of some of our Commercial Crew vehicles," said Kenny Todd, NASA's ISS operations and integration manager. "You hear a lot about what's going on with the development of those vehicles at the different vendor facilities, but on the station, we also have to do a lot of work to be ready to receive those vehicles."
The first six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk was scheduled for Friday, but could be delayed while NASA makes sure the astronauts' spacesuits are in good condition.
Engineers have been studying a problem with corrosion that apparently caused fan pump units in two suits not to start.
The same system was involved in a frightening 2013 episode in which water leaked into Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano's helmet, threatening to drown him.
Todd said an entirely different problem — clogged holes — caused that scare, but teams are still analyzing the corrosion issue.
The two fan pumps that did not start properly were returned to the ground last week on SpaceX's Dragon cargo capsule. The suits needed for the spacewalks have not had any trouble.
A failure by that component during a spacewalk would not be considered life threatening, with backup systems available to give astronauts time to get back inside. But NASA wants to be sure that's unlikely to happen and cut a spacewalk short.
Todd said he was confident the suits would be cleared for action, but the first spacewalk could be pushed back to Tuesday, when the second of three had been planned.
"We'll do these (spacewalks) when the timing is right, when we're sure we've got suits that we have high confidence we can go out the hatch with and do the tasks that are before us," he said.
Time to perform the spacewalks is limited because Wilmore is scheduled to return to Earth on March 12.
NASA video shows a fireball burning through the skies of Pennsylvania
Rachel Feltman – The Washington Post
Early on Tuesday morning, NASA's All-sky Fireball Network (which is a real thing that exists, for real) caught footage of a fiery space rock entering the atmosphere over Pennsylvania.
According to the NASA Meteor Watch Facebook page, the rock was about 2 feet across and weighed around 500 pounds. It was seen traveling at a blistering speed of 45,000 miles an hour just 60 miles above the Earth. The footage above comes from NASA's network of meteor-monitoring cameras. Below, you can watch an animation of the space rock's trajectory -- and a rock's-eye view of its approach to Earth.
By the time NASA's cameras lost track of the rock, it was only 13 miles above the ground. Most of the rock will have burned up during entry, but it's possible that little meteorites may have fallen somewhere east of Kittanning, Penn.
Magnetic field laboratory being readied for launch
Justin Ray – Spaceflight Now
A stack of four satellites, each one carrying 25 science sensors and together will perfect the art of formation flying, is being packaged inside an Atlas 5 rocket nose cone in preparation for mounting atop the booster next week.
The Magnetospheric Multiscale mission, or MMS, will explore explosions in the Earth's magnetic field after its March 12 launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
"This is the culmination of hundreds of people's work. It's been a decade of focus for the science team finally coming to fruition. We're very anxious to launch," said Craig Tooley. the MMS project manager from NASA-Goddard.
"The flow has gone very, very smooth," Tooley added.
Now fueled with hydrazine and mated in a "super stack" for launch, crews from United Launch Alliance are preparing to encapsulate the satellites on Monday.
"We are stacked, we are fueled, we're ready to go," said Brent Robertson, MMS deputy project manager at NASA-Goddard.
Given the towering height of the stack, the extra-extended payload fairing will be used for this launch to enclose the satellites during the climb through Earth's atmosphere.
One last chore before sealing up the spacecraft for liftoff will see protective covers removed from the satellites.
"It's actually quite an involved process. There's over 700 items that have to be removed from the spacecraft before we fly. Of course, we want to very, very careful to make sure we don't miss anything. That activity will take the next four days," Robertson said.
Next, the payload will be transported by road from the commercial Astrotech processing campus in Titusville to the Air Force station at Cape Canaveral to join the awaiting Atlas 5 rocket. The move is planned for next Thursday, Feb. 26.
The Atlas 5, flying in the 421 configuration, will feature a pair of strap-on solid motors to lift MMS into a highly elliptical orbit around the Earth. The orbit will be shaped by two firings of the Centaur upper stage.
It will be the 53rd Atlas 5 flight and the 12th for NASA.
"If you take an MMS with its booms out, it's about the same size as a baseball diamond," said Tooley.
"We have them spinning at three RPM with these long wires, and we have to carefully fire our rockets to maneuver them to adjust the attitude and the orbit. We have four of them in very similar but different orbits."
The flight dynamics is the most challenging project Goddard has ever flown, Tooley said.
"This is a pretty difficult mission. That is why it was built in-house at Goddard. Most missions have a contractor."
The mission will study magnetic reconnections, which happens when magnetic field lines break and reconfigure, releasing an explosive burst of energy. As the formation-flying satellites loop around Earth, they will measure in three dimensions the characteristics of magnetic reconnections.
"It's really a flying laboratory," Tooley said.
Arianespace on pace for one launch per month in 2015
Stephen Clark – Spaceflight Now
Last week's successful launch of a Vega rocket with a European re-entry technology demonstrator marked the first of at least 11 flights planned this year by Arianespace to put communications satellites, Earth observatories and research probes into space.
Arianespace is holding out hope for up to a dozen flights if payloads are ready on time and scheduling at the Guiana Space Center — Europe's spaceport in French Guiana — permits.
"The target is, on average, one launch per month," said Stephane Israel, Arianespace's chairman and CEO.
The mix on Arianespace's launch manifest this year includes six or seven Ariane 5 flights — each carrying two satellites — two or three launches of the Russian-made Soyuz rocket, and three missions using the lightweight Vega rocket, including the Feb. 11 launch already in the books.
The Soyuz and Vega rocket missions will all be for institutional customers — either the European Space Agency or the European Commission — while the launches of the heavy-lift Ariane 5 will primarily serve the commercial market.
Arianespace achieved 11 launches in 2014. One of the missions — a Soyuz launch — put two of Europe's Galileo navigation satellites in the wrong orbit, but officials expect the spacecraft can be salvaged to perform at least a partial mission.
After the Feb. 11 Vega launch of ESA's experimental space plane, the next flight on Arianespace's schedule is set for liftoff March 26, when a Soyuz rocket and Fregat upper stage will send up two satellites for Europe's Galileo navigation network.
The first Soyuz flight of the year from French Guiana's tropical spaceport is also the first launch of Galileo positioning satellites since a Fregat upper stage put two identical navigation spacecraft in the wrong orbit in August 2014.
Officials say they identified the cause of the failure — a frozen fuel line — and reworked Fregat upper stages have successfully flown since the mishap.
Europe's Ariane 5 rocket will make its first liftoff of 2015 on April 15 with the Thor 7 and Sicral 7 communications satellites.
Thor 7 will provide high-throughput Ka-band broadband services for the offshore sector in the North Sea, the Norwegian Sea, the Red Sea, the Baltic Sea, the Persian Gulf and the Mediterranean for Norway's Telenor Satellite Broadcasting. Sicral 2 carries communications payloads for Italian and French military authorities.
Another Ariane 5 mission is due to follow on May 20 with a pair of satellites for DirecTV and one of its subsidiaries.
DirecTV 15 — a sister satellite to a spacecraft launched on an Ariane 5 in December 2014 — will provide direct-to-home television broadcasts across the United States. Sky Mexico 1 will beam direct television programming to Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean for a broadcast company owned by Televisa, a leading Mexican media business, and DirecTV.
The second Vega launch of the year is scheduled for June 11 with Sentinel 2A, the second satellite to be launched for the European Commission's Copernicus Earth observation program. Sentinel 2A carries an optical imaging payload for land observation, gathering data complementary to the U.S. Landsat satellites.
An Ariane 5 flight will come next in late June or early July with the launch of Europe's MSG 4 geostationary weather satellite, the final spacecraft in the second generation of Meteosat observatories. MSG 4 will accompany a commercial communications satellite on the same Ariane 5 launch, but Arianespace has not confirmed the identity of the co-passenger.
The order of launches for the rest of 2015 is still to be finalized.
Arianespace's tandem launches with the Ariane 5 rocket sometimes require shuffling to pair up satellites appropriately sized for the upper and lower berths inside the launcher's paylaod fairing.
Satellites for the upper position are typically around 6 metric tons in mass, and spacecraft assigned to the lower spot are usually between 3 and 4 metric tons.
Communications spacecraft expected to launch on the Ariane 5 rocket before the end of the year include:
- Star One C4 for Brazilian operator Embratel Star One
- Arsat 2 for Argentina
- GSAT 15 for the Indian Space Research Organization
- Eutelsat 8 West B for Eutelsat
- NBN Co 1A for Australia's National Broadband Network
- Arabsat 6B (Badr 7) for Arabsat of Saudi Arabia
- EchoStar 18 for EchoStar Corp.'s DISH Network services
- Hispasat AG1 for ESA and Madrid-based Hispasat
The Star One C4, Eutelsat 8 West B, NBN Co 1A, Arabsat 6B and EchoStar 18 satellites are sized for launch in the Ariane 5's upper berth. The other satellites will fit into the lower position in Ariane 5 launcher's Sylda dual-payload adapter.
Two Intelsat communications satellites and a Japanese satellite to relay communications among military forces may also be ready for launch by the end of 2015, according to statements by the spacecraft's owners.
Arianespace's challenge is matching a big satellite and a smaller payload that are ready for launch at the same time. The powerful Ariane 5 is unable to lift two satellites over 5 metric tons — about 11,000 pounds — into geostationary transfer orbit, and pairing two lighter spacecraft on the same launch is not good for business.
"If we do that, we lose a lot of money," Israel said. "We need one small and one big satellite."
The launch provider won nine contracts for geostationary satellites in 2014, and eight of them are the right size to ride in the Ariane 5's lower berth, Israel said in an interview with Spaceflight Now.
SpaceX has emerged as the chief rival to the veteran French-based launch company, which started the commercial launch business when it was founded in 1980. SpaceX and Arianespace cinched the same number of commercial launch contracts last year.
Partly in response to SpaceX's bargain prices and partly as an initiative to ensure the Ariane 5 has a steady balance of heavier and lighter payloads, Arianespace cut prices for customers with smaller satellites.
"As a result, we have been very successful," Israel said. "We captured eight of these (small) satellites out of the 13 on the market. Our policy has been fully successful, allowing us to rebalance our order book for Ariane. It was the right thing to do."
Up to two more Soyuz rocket launches from French Guiana are on tap for the second half of 2015, both with pairs of Galileo navigation satellites.
In September, the third and final Vega flight of the year will deploy ESA's LISA Pathfinder probe on a journey to the L1 Lagrange point a million miles from Earth in line with the sun. The three flights of Europe's Vega rocket, the newcomer to the Arianespace launcher family, marks the most in a calendar year since the booster debuted in 2012.
LISA Pathfinder will test the concept of gravitational wave detection at the L1 point, a precursor to better understanding a key tenet of Einstein's theory of general relativity.
Arianespace's goals for the year in the marketing side of its business include attracting a more even mix of Ariane 5 contracts for heavy and small satellites, Israel told Spaceflight Now.
"In 2014, we captured one big satellite," Israel said. "We were not in competition for all big satellites because we have limited slots up to the end of 2017 … We think we will have a more balanced order intake in 2015 between small and big satellites."
Arianespace says it has enough contracts in its backlog for three years of launches, with an order book valued at 4.1 billion euros, or approximately $4.7 billion at current exchange rates.
As of January, the backlog included 25 launches of the Ariane 5 rocket — 18 flights to geostationary transfer orbit and four missions to place Galileo navigation satellites in space. Six Soyuz launches and nine flights of the Vega rocket also have confirmed payloads, Arianespace said in a press release.
Israel said the new Ariane 6 rocket approved by European governments in December will solve the problem of dual-payload manifesting.
"Ariane 6 will be cost-effective enough to be launched with two small satellites without losing money," Israel said. "This will be the big benefit of Ariane 6. If we are in a market scenario where there are a lot of small satellites, we will be in a position, with respect to money, to go with two small satellites."
Why Pluto Matters: A Short History of a Small (Non-)Planet
Jennifer Latson – TIME
Feb. 18, 1930: Pluto is first identified in photographs of the night sky
When it was first discovered, Pluto was the coolest planet in the solar system. Before it was even named, TIME surmised that "the New Planet," 50 times farther from the sun than Earth, "gets so little heat from the sun that most substances of Earth would be frozen solid or into thick jellies."
The astronomer Clyde W. Tombaugh, then a 24-year-old research assistant at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz., was the first to find photographic evidence of a ninth planet on this day, Feb. 18, 85 years ago.
His discovery launched a worldwide scramble to name the frozen, farthest-away planet. Since the astronomer Percival Lowell had predicted its presence 15 years earlier, per TIME, and even calculated its approximate position based on the irregularity of Neptune's orbit, the team at Lowell Observatory considered his widow's suggestion of "Percival," but found it not quite planetary enough. The director of the Harvard Observatory suggested "Cronos," the sickle-wielding son of Uranus in Greek myth.
But the team opted instead for "Pluto," the Roman god of the Underworld — the suggestion of an 11-year-old British schoolgirl who told the BBC she was enthralled with Greek and Roman mythology. Her grandfather had read to her from the newspaper about the planet's discovery, and when she proposed the name, he was so taken with it that he brought it to the attention of a friend who happened to be an astronomy professor at Oxford University. The Lowell team went for Pluto partly because it began with Percival Lowell's initials.
Pluto the Disney dog, it should be noted, had nothing to do with the girl's choice. Although the cartoon character also made its first appearance in 1930, it did so shortly after the planet was named, as the BBC noted.
And while Pluto was downgraded to "dwarf planet" status in 2006, it remains a popular subject for astronomers. They began discovering similar small, icy bodies during the 1990s in the same region of the solar system, which has become known as the Kuiper Belt. Just because Pluto's not alone doesn't make it any less fascinating, according to Alan Stern, director of a NASA mission, New Horizons, that will explore and photograph Pluto in an unprecedented spacecraft flyby on July 14 of this year.
"This epic journey is very much the Everest of planetary exploration," Stern wrote in TIME last month. "Pluto was the first of many small planets discovered out there, and it is still both the brightest and the largest one known."
NASA released its first images of Pluto from the New Horizons mission earlier this month, although the probe was still 126 million miles away from its subject; the release was timed to coincide with Tombaugh's birthday. Stern wrote, when the pictures were released, "These images of Pluto, clearly brighter and closer than those New Horizons took last July from twice as far away, represent our first steps at turning the pinpoint of light Clyde saw in the telescopes at Lowell Observatory 85 years ago, into a planet before the eyes of the world this summer."
New Horizons spots Pluto's smaller moons for the first time
Rachel Feltman – The Washington Post
It's not exactly a clean shot, but it's certainly a timely one: 85 years to the day after Pluto's discovery, NASA has released fresh images from New Horizons that show two of its smaller moons. The long-exposure images, which were taken between Jan. 27 and Feb. 8 from a distance of 125 to 115 million miles, show Hydra and Nix -- moons too small to show up in previous shots. Hydra is enclosed in a yellow diamond with Nix in orange. The image on the right has been specially processed to reduce the center glare, a result of the over-exposure of Pluto and its tidally-locked (and largest) moon Charon.
Hydra and Nix were only discovered recently (in 2005) and are probably between 25 and 95 miles in diameter. That's a lot of wiggle room, but scientists can't get more precise with the Hubble or other space telescopes -- they need New Horizons to keep saddling up towards Pluto and its moons so the spacecraft can figure out what's what.
New Horizons is expected to make a close encounter with Pluto on July 14.
Mars One Suspends Work on Robotic Missions
Jeff Foust – Space News
A private organization that recently selected finalists for one-way human missions to Mars in the mid-2020s has quietly suspended work on a pair of robotic missions, putting into question plans to launch those spacecraft in 2018.
Mars One, a Dutch-based nonprofit organization, announced in December 2013 it was starting work on two robotic missions it planned to launch in 2018 as precursors to its human expeditions to Mars. One spacecraft would orbit Mars and serve as a communications relay, while the other would be a lander to test technologies planned for later crewed missions.
At that time, Mars One announced it had selected Lockheed Martin to begin work on the lander mission and Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) to start work on the orbiter. Mars One awarded contracts to each company to perform concept studies of the planned missions.
"These missions are the first step in Mars One's overall plan of establishing a permanent human settlement on Mars," Bas Landsorp, Mars One chief executive and co-founder, said in a December 2013 press conference here announcing the missions. "We believe we are in very good shape to make this happen."
However, both companies confirmed with SpaceNews that, since the completion of those study contracts, they have not received additional contracts from Mars One to continue work on those missions.
"SSTL delivered the concept study for the Mars One communications system last year," SSTL spokeswoman Joelle Sykes said Feb. 16. "There are no follow-on activities underway at the moment."
"Lockheed Martin has concluded the initial contract with Mars One in which we performed mission formulation studies and developed payload interface specifications to support the selection of a payload suite for the 2018 Mars robotic lander," the company said in a statement Feb. 17. "We continue to maintain an open channel of communications with Mars One and await initiation of the next phase of the program."
Mars One has said little publicly about the status of its robotic missions since that December 2013 announcement. In January, it announced the winner of a university competition to develop an experiment that would fly on the lander. At that time, the organization said the lander was still scheduled to launch in 2018, but offered no details about the status of its development.
In a Feb. 17 email, Lansdorp said that Mars One was focused for the time being on addressing a study released last fall by a student-led group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). That report, which examined the life support requirements for Mars One's planned crewed missions, concluded that flaws in Mars One's designs could result in the deaths of crewmembers within months of landing.
"Especially with the recent MIT (student) report, we're focusing on releasing the mission concepts study on life support systems by Paragon," Lansdorp said, referring to Paragon Space Development Corp., a Tucson, Arizona-based developer of life support technologies. The Paragon study, he said, should be released in March.
Lansdorp offered no additional details about the status of Mars One's robotic missions, declining to answer questions about the timeline for awarding follow-on contracts. "As soon as we are ready to announce follow-up contracts, we will do so by means of a press release," he said.
In addition to the life support study, Mars One has also been working on selecting finalists for those first crewed missions. On Feb. 16, the organization revealed the group of 100 "Round Three" astronaut candidates, selected from a pool of 705 semi-finalists announced in May 2014. These 100 will participate in "group challenges" that will eventually lead to the selection of six groups of four people each to serve as initial crews for one-way missions to Mars that it plans to start launching in 2024.
Those plans, though, may depend on the progress Mars One makes on its robotic missions, and there time is of the essence. Lockheed Martin noted in its statement that its proposed Mars One lander is based on a "very mature" design used on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander mission launched in 2007 and the InSight lander it is building for launch in March 2016.
Despite that heritage, the company said, "we would have to start construction very soon to launch an InSight clone in the 2018 window."
END
| | JSC TODAY CATEGORIES - Headlines
- Joint Leadership Team Web Poll
- Save the Date: All Hands - March 4
- Expedition 40 Welcome Home Ceremony
- JSC Food Service Transition - Organizations/Social
- Texas Independence Trail Ride Happens Feb. 24
- Toastmasters Contests: Wild, Witty and Wise
- Rodeo BBQ Tickets & Carnival Packs - Last Chance
- Starport's Spring Break Camp
- Update: Craft Fair/Flea Market Vendor Applications
- Starport Youth Karate Classes - Free Class Feb. 21
- Latin Dance Introduction: Feb. 20, 5:30 to 6 p.m. - Jobs and Training
- Apply for the Formal Mentoring Program TODAY
- SharePoint 2010 Basic Training
- Behavioral Health & Performance Deputy Element Mgr
- Masters With Masters Webcast Rescheduled
- Practices & Guidelines for Cleanroom ViTS March 12
- Cleanroom Protocol & Contamination Control ViTS
- Investigating Aircraft, Flight Mishaps March 24 - Community
- Applications Being Accepted for Scholarship |  |
| Headlines - Joint Leadership Team Web Poll
While a good portion of you plan to "chill" when you retire, there were quite a few charitable retirees. Thank you for your service in advance. We just recently announced three new Expedition astronauts (Shane Kimbrough, Kate Rubins and Peggy Whitson). Check out how well you know them in question one and select the false answer. You didn't score so well on "The Walking Dead" quiz, but I agree that the preacher character is not long for this Earth. This weekend I watched the "SNL" anniversary show, and it got me to thinking which cast member I'd most like to take to my high school reunion. Would it be Martin Short? Cheri Oteri? Kristen Wiig? Select your partner in question two. Justin your Timberlake on over to get this week's poll. - Save the Date: All Hands - March 4
You are invited to attend an all-hands event for JSC team members on Wednesday, March 4, in the Teague Auditorium from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. Doors will open at 10:15 a.m. The All Hands will feature JSC Director Ellen Ochoa, NASA Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot and Deputy Associate Administrator for Mission Support Krista Paquin. Ochoa, Lightfoot and Paquin will also answer questions at the end of the program. If you would like to submit a question for consideration in advance or during the All Hands, please email it to: JSC-Ask-The-Director@mail.nasa.gov Those unable to attend in person can watch the All Hands on RF Channel 2 or Omni 3 (45). JSC team members with wired computer network connections can view the All Hands using the JSC EZTV IP Network TV System on channel 402. Please note: EZTV currently requires using Internet Explorer 32bit on a Windows PC connected to the JSC computer network with a wired connection. Mobile devices, Wi-Fi connections and newer MAC computers are currently not supported by EZTV. First-time users will need to install the EZTV Monitor and Player client applications: - For those WITH admin rights (Elevated Privileges), you'll be prompted to download and install the clients when you first visit the IPTV website
- For those WITHOUT admin rights (Elevated Privileges), you can download the EZTV client applications from the ACES Software Refresh Portal (SRP)
If you are having problems viewing the video using these systems, contact the Information Resources Directorate Customer Support Center at x46367, or visit the FAQ site. Event Date: Wednesday, March 4, 2015 Event Start Time:10:30 AM Event End Time:11:30 AM
Event Location: Teague Auditorium, IPTV
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JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x35111
[top] - Expedition 40 Welcome Home Ceremony
All NASA civil servants, contractors and International Partners are invited Wednesday, Feb. 25, to welcome home our International Space Station Expedition 40 crew members: Steve Swanson, Aleksandr Skvortsov, Oleg Artemyev, Reid Wiseman, Maksim Surayev and Alexander Gerst. The event will be held in the Gilruth Center Alamo Ballroom. Doors will open at 3 p.m., and the program will run until 5 p.m. There will not be an opportunity for autographs at this event. Come share in the welcome, highlights and stories with the crew and Expedition 40 support teams. For more information, contact Jennifer McCarter at x47885. Event Date: Wednesday, February 25, 2015 Event Start Time:3:00 PM Event End Time:5:00 PM
Event Location: Alamo Ballroom, Gilruth Cener
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Jennifer McCarter x47885
[top] - JSC Food Service Transition
Over the next 10 days, food service for the JSC cafés will be transitioning from Sodexo to CulinArt. To facilitate the transition, the Building 11 café will be closed from Feb. 25 to 27. The Building 1 café is closed now and will remain closed until late March. Building 3 café hours should not be affected by the transition. As Sodexo prepares to leave JSC, you may find less selection in the cafés. This is temporary—and you can look forward to a fresh approach beginning March 2. Organizations/Social - Texas Independence Trail Ride Happens Feb. 24
The Texas Independence Trail Ride will arrive at JSC on Tuesday, Feb. 24. The ride will leave from I-45 and NASA Parkway at approximately 2 p.m. (avoid NASA Parkway during that time). The anticipated arrival time at JSC is approximately 3 p.m. The trail riders will enter the site via Gate 2, turn right on 5th street, turn left on Avenue D and pass by Buildings 1, 2, 13 and 15 before making their way down 2nd Street. Dust off your boots and come on out and be part of the parade! A few of the riders will swing in by the JSC Child Care Center for a close-up with the kids.
You might want to avoid driving in this area during the on-site parade (approximately 3 to 3:30 p.m.). If possible, use Gates 3 and 4 instead of Gate 1, and please be extra careful when traveling in front of or behind the trail riders. Security will be assisting with trail ride. Please do not try and pass the riders; that can be dangerous for both the person on the horse and the person in the vehicle. The trail ride will head north on 2nd Street to the Gilruth Center and camp out there for the night. Please note: The Gilruth Center Basketball Gym will be closed all day Tuesday, Feb. 24, and reopen at noon on Wednesday, Feb. 25. The Fitness Center will remain open. The last group of exercise classes will be held at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 24.
Due to Flex Friday on Feb. 27, the official Go Texan Day is Thursday, Feb. 26. Get out the western duds and let's get ready to rodeo! Visit the Buildings 3 and 11 ShopNASA stores to round up barbecue cookoff tickets ($15), admission tickets (adults $10) and $50 or $10 carnival packs. For more information on available rodeo tickets, please call the Building 11 ShopNASA store at x47467. - Toastmasters Contests: Wild, Witty and Wise
You're invited to join Space Explorers Toastmasters for Tall Tales and International Speech Contests. On Friday, Feb. 20, Space Explorers Toastmasters will see which member can spin the wildest yarn taller than Mt. Everest and wider than the Grand Canyon in a Tall Tales contest. On Thursday, Feb. 26, members will impart wit and wisdom in the club's International Speech Contest. Both contests will be held during the regular club meeting time. - When: 11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m.
- Where: Building 30A, Room 1010
Don't miss it! - Rodeo BBQ Tickets & Carnival Packs - Last Chance
ShopNASA will be selling Rodeo barbecue tickets (only two left at Building 3) and $10 and $50 carnival packs until next Wednesday, Feb. 25. The $10 and $50 carnival packs are available in the Buildings 3 and 11 gift shops, as well as the Gilruth front desk. Stop by and get yours today before they're gone! - Starport's Spring Break Camp
Can you believe spring break is just around the corner? If you're looking for a fun, convenient and familiar place for your children to go for the school break, look no further. NASA Starport camps at the Gilruth Center are the perfect place. We plan to keep your children active and entertained with games, crafts, sports and all types of fun activities! Register your child before spaces fill up. Dates: March 16 to 20 Time: 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Ages: 6 to 12 Cost: $140 all week | $40 per day - Update: Craft Fair/Flea Market Vendor Applications
Starport will host its annual Spring Festival event at the Gilruth Center on Saturday, April 4, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Not only will there be the Aliens vs. Astronauts 5.05K Race, Children's Spring Fling complete with Easter bunny and egg hunt, bounce house, petting zoo and games, but we will also host a flea market and craft fair. Clean out those closets, attics and garages and sell your unwanted items and homemade crafts at one big event! Register now for booth rentals. Get a flea market booth to sell your unwanted items for just $10. Or, feature homemade crafts, baked goods or new items with a craft fair booth for $40 (tables and electricity available for an additional fee). All registrations and payments must be received by March 20. 50 spots available 45 spots available Event Date: Saturday, April 4, 2015 Event Start Time:9:00 AM Event End Time:2:00 PM
Event Location: Gilruth Center
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Cyndi Kibby x35352
[top] - Starport Youth Karate Classes - Free Class Feb. 21
Let Starport introduce your child to the exciting art of Youth Karate. Youth Karate will teach your child the skills of self-defense, self-discipline and self-confidence. The class will also focus on leadership, healthy competition and sportsmanship. Try a free class on Feb. 21! Please call the Gilruth Center front desk to sign your child up for the free class (only 25 available spots). Five-week session: Feb. 28 to March 28 Saturdays: 10:15 to 11 a.m. Ages: 6 to 12 Cost: $75 | $20 drop-in rate Register online or at the Gilruth Center. - Latin Dance Introduction: Feb. 20, 5:30 to 6 p.m.
This class is mostly an introduction to Salsa, but it also touches on other popular Latin dances found in social settings: Merengue, Bachata, and even a little bit of Cha-Cha-Cha. Emphasis is on Salsa and then Bachata. For the first-time student or those who want a refresher course. You will go over basic steps with variations and build them into sequences. Feb. 20 Regular registration: - $60 per person (Feb. 7 to 20)
Salsa Intermediate: Feb. 20 from 6:45 to 7:45 p.m. This class continues teaching Salsa beyond that taught in the introduction class. You should be comfortable and confident with the material from the introduction class before moving on to the intermediate class. This is a multi-level class where students may be broken up into groups based upon class experience. Jobs and Training - Apply for the Formal Mentoring Program TODAY
JSC's Formal Mentoring Program (FMP), formally known as YODA, is currently accepting applications for both mentors and protégés. FMP is excited to bring participants several new things this year, including reverse mentoring, interactive events, new website and a revamped application process! Visit the FMP's updated Web page to apply! * Website can only be accessed using Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox * - SharePoint 2010 Basic Training
The Information Resources Directorate (IRD) is providing a SharePoint 2010 Basic Training class from 9 to 11 a.m. Thursday, Feb. 26, in Building 12, Room 144. This class will teach you how to navigate a team site; add and modify list items; use document libraries; exchange information via discussion boards, blogs and wikis; and how to search for information using SharePoint. - Behavioral Health & Performance Deputy Element Mgr
The Biomedical Research and Environmental Sciences Division (SK) seeks qualified candidates to support the Behavioral Health and Performance (BHP) Element Manager as Deputy Element Manager (DEM). BHP manages the segment of the Human Research Program responsible for capturing evidence to expand our understanding the psychological and emotional stresses that occur to humans during space exploration. Where these changes are harmful or prohibitive to exploration missions, BHP develops monitoring strategies and subsequent countermeasures to enable long-duration human spaceflight. For additional information on this position, please see JSC's Job Tool, opportunity number 72BEH-0205-1529. - Masters With Masters Webcast Rescheduled
Join Dr. Ed Hoffman, NASA Chief Knowledge Officer, for this special Masters with Masters live webcast as he interviews two NASA knowledge practitioners about the agency's challenges of ensuring lessons are captured and distilled for easier access and application for project and mission success. "Capturing, Processing, Sharing and Learning Lessons at NASA" has been rescheduled for viewing TODAY, Feb. 19, from noon to 1:30 p.m. CST. RSVP to attend this live webcast session to ensure you receive the direct link to the webcast and allow us to communicate with you if necessary. Our webcasts use Silverlight Player, which must be installed on your computer prior to the event. To test your computer configuration and learn how to use the player controls to submit questions and find related material, please view this "Tour the Player" video in advance of the webcast. If you do not have Silverlight installed already, this video will redirect you to a location where you can download and install Silverlight. Please do this well in advance of the live event, as some centers require administrator privileges to install software. Event Date: Thursday, February 19, 2015 Event Start Time:12:00 PM Event End Time:1:30 PM
Event Location: Webcast
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NASA Masters with Masters Team http://km.nasa.gov/
[top] - Practices & Guidelines for Cleanroom ViTS March 12
SMA-SAFE-NSTC-0095: Practices and Guidelines for Cleanroom and Related Operations This course will provide the technician/engineer practical guidelines to modern cleanroom practices. Formal instruction will include: cleaning the cleanroom; cleanroom monitoring methods and practices; cleanroom entry and exit; Laminar flow bench; garment protocols; techniques for wiping; and personnel disciplines. There will be a final exam associated with this course, which must be passed with a 70 percent minimum score to receive course credit. Target Audience: technicians and engineers working in and around cleanrooms; Safety, Reliability, Quality Assurance and other personnel involved in monitoring, handling and managing cleanroom activities. Event Date: Thursday, March 12, 2015 Event Start Time:10:00 AM Event End Time:12:00 PM
Event Location: Bldg. 17 Room 2026
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Shirley Robinson x41284
[top] - Cleanroom Protocol & Contamination Control ViTS
This course addresses the operation and uses of cleanrooms and the associated cleanroom protocols to minimize contamination. The student will learn how to prevent contamination from spreading to the product or test article in and upon removal from the clean environment. The class will include a discussion of contamination control and cleanroom requirements documents, including SN-C-0005 and ISO 14644. The course discusses the nature and sources of contaminants, monitoring particle and film contamination, cleanroom protocols to prevent the spread of contamination and contamination removal methods. Also included are: NASA requirements for cleanliness levels; identification and monitoring of contamination; description and classifications of cleanrooms; personnel and garment protocols in cleanrooms and clean work areas; other do's and don'ts in cleanrooms and clean work areas; and removal methods. A comprehensive test will be offered at the end of the class. Use this direct link for registration. https://satern.nasa.gov/learning/user/deeplink_redirect.jsp?linkId=SCHEDULED_... Event Date: Thursday, March 12, 2015 Event Start Time:1:00 PM Event End Time:3:00 PM
Event Location: Bldg. 17 Room 2026
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Shirley Robinson x41284
[top] - Investigating Aircraft, Flight Mishaps March 24
This three-day course provides instruction in aviation and flight systems mishap investigation basics and policy. Topics discussed include: NASA NPR 8621.1 mishap investigation requirements and terminology; investigator qualifications; board composition; and field techniques. Evidence identification, recovery and protection, witness interviewing and site mapping, along with individual component systems and material failures, are key areas discussed during sessions on field investigation. The course contains extensive accident investigation information generally applicable to aviation accidents, which can be applied to other areas of flight systems mishaps such as unmanned aerial vehicles, rockets, balloons, and other spaceflight systems mishaps such as Genesis. To register for this course, you must first have completed the required four-part prerequisite: (SMA-002-07) Overview of Mishap Investigations; (SMA-002-08) Mishap Investigation Roles and Responsibilities; (SMA-002-09) Completing the Investigation and Mishap Report; and (SMA-002-10) Root Cause Analysis. Community - Applications Being Accepted for Scholarship
The NASA College Scholarship Program will award multiple scholarships agencywide to qualified dependents of NASA civil servant employees. Scholarship recipients must pursue a course of study leading to an undergraduate degree in science or engineering from an accredited college or university in the United States. Applications are available online. The application deadline is March 31. | |
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| JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles. Disclaimer: Accuracy and content of these notes are the responsibility of the submitters. |
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