Next month SpaceX’s passenger capsule is expected to launch on an uncrewed mission—a big step towards bringing human spaceflight back to the US.
Category: space travel – Page 443
SpaceX Just Test Fired the Rocket That’ll Launch Its Crew Dragon
But it’s only the first of a series of tests before astronauts are allowed to…
Blue Origin breaks ground for BE-4 factory
WASHINGTON — As Blue Origin breaks ground on a new factory for producing rocket engines, the company says development of its BE-4 engine will be completed later this year.
Blue Origin held a groundbreaking ceremony in Huntsville, Alabama, Jan. 25 to formally mark the start of construction of a factory that will be used for building BE-4 engines. The company announced plans to build the factory there in June 2017, contingent on the selection of the engine by United Launch Alliance for its Vulcan rocket. ULA picked the BE-4 in September 2018.
The factory, scheduled for completion in March 2020, will build dozens of BE-4 engines a year for both Vulcan as well as Blue Origin’s own New Glenn vehicle. Both rockets are scheduled to make first launches in 2021. Vulcan will use two BE-4 engines in its first stage while New Glenn’s reusable first stage will be powered by seven BE-4 engines.
Blue Origin wants to launch a person into space by the end of this year
The company owned by Jeff Bezos is also expected to launch tickets sales later this year for space tourism flights.
NASA: Astronaut immune system cells affected by long-term trips
NK-cell function appears to be impaired during spaceflights over long durations according to a new study published this week. This means that immune systems could be broken down somewhat during the long trips NASA hopes to take with astronauts in the distant future. The research here was done by a team of researchers at the University of Arizona, the University of Houston, Louisiana State University, and NASA-Johnson Space Center.
Blue Origin Just Landed Its First Rocket of 2019 Ahead of Crewed Flight
It’s an important step for the firm.
Trump reportedly offered NASA ‘all the money you could ever need’ to land on Mars during his presidency
Some people on his communications staff at the time were not pleased.
Sims writes that he was “getting antsy” in the room due to Trump’s abrupt question shortly before a televised phone call with the Space Station. NASA officials were believed to have gone to great lengths to coordinate with the Space Station, which could only be reached during a certain time due to “orbital mechanics.”
“All I could think about was that we had to be on camera in three minutes … And yet we’re in here casually chatting about shaving a full decade off NASA’s timetable for sending a manned flight to Mars,” Sims reportedly wrote. “And seemingly out of nowhere.”
Trump, who appeared “distracted,” reportedly asked Lightfoot: “But what if I gave you all the money you could ever need to do it?”
Blue Origin to Launch 10th New Shepard Test Flight Monday
Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital spaceflight system will fly again on Monday (Jan. 21), if all goes according to plan.
Blue Origin, which is led by billionaire Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, had originally aimed to launch the 10th uncrewed New Shepard test flight in mid-December but was thwarted by an issue with the infrastructure at the company’s West Texas test site. That problem has now been resolved.
New Shepard will now launch Monday at 10 a.m. EST (1500 GMT/9 a.m. CST), Blue Origin representatives said in a statement.
Why it is dangerous to build ever larger big bang machines
CERN has revealed plans for a gigantic successor of the giant atom smasher LHC, the biggest machine ever built. Particle physicists will never stop to ask for ever larger big bang machines. But where are the limits for the ordinary society concerning costs and existential risks?
CERN boffins are already conducting a mega experiment at the LHC, a 27km circular particle collider, at the cost of several billion Euros to study conditions of matter as it existed fractions of a second after the big bang and to find the smallest particle possible – but the question is how could they ever know? Now, they pretend to be a little bit upset because they could not find any particles beyond the standard model, which means something they would not expect. To achieve that, particle physicists would like to build an even larger “Future Circular Collider” (FCC) near Geneva, where CERN enjoys extraterritorial status, with a ring of 100km – for about 24 billion Euros.
Experts point out that this research could be as limitless as the universe itself. The UK’s former Chief Scientific Advisor, Prof Sir David King told BBC: “We have to draw a line somewhere otherwise we end up with a collider that is so large that it goes around the equator. And if it doesn’t end there perhaps there will be a request for one that goes to the Moon and back.”
“There
This Photo of Earth and the Moon Was Shot from 71 Million Miles Away
Here’s a new photo that shows Earth and the Moon from a whopping 71 million miles away. It was captured by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx, which is currently on a mission to obtain a sample from a near-Earth asteroid and return it to Earth.
The photo was captured on December 19th, 2018, using the spacecraft’s NavCam 1 camera. Earth and the moon can be seen on the bottom-left side of the photo. The much larger white object in the upper-right side is asteroid Bennu.
Earth is 71 million miles (114M km) away in the photo, while Bennu is just 27 miles (43 km).