Shuttle Update for July 17

Shuttle Atlantis:

Shuttle Atlantis is being temporarily stored in the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Atlantis is scheduled to return to Orbiter Processing Facility-2 in August to complete transition and retirement processing. Atlantis is being prepared for public display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex and is scheduled to roll over to the complex in November. The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex is targeting a July 2013 grand opening for Atlantis’ new home.

Shuttle Endeavour:

On July 11-13, technicians in Orbiter Processing Facility-2, installed Endeavour’s replica shuttle main engines. Endeavour is being prepared for permanent public display at the California Science Center in Los Angeles. Its ferry flight to California is targeted for mid-September.

NASA's space shuttle fleet began setting records with its first launch on April 12, 1981 and continued to set high marks of achievement and endurance through 30 years of missions. Starting with Columbia and continuing with Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour, the spacecraft has carried people into orbit repeatedly, launched, recovered and repaired satellites, conducted cutting-edge research and built the largest structure in space, the International Space Station. The final space shuttle mission, STS-135, ended July 21, 2011 when Atlantis rolled to a stop at its home port, NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

As humanity's first reusable spacecraft, the space shuttle pushed the bounds of discovery ever farther, requiring not only advanced technologies but the tremendous effort of a vast workforce. Thousands of civil servants and contractors throughout NASA's field centers and across the nation have demonstrated an unwavering commitment to mission success and the greater goal of space exploration.

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Tips to be Followed during Property Auction

When you find a property at auction, you will immediately think about the loss that the owner of the property must have gone through for the property to come for public auction. Auctions have become very common these days due to the financial crunch that came forth in the recent past leaving a lot of home owners to take this bitter decision. We can see auctions as one of the methods that are in practice for selling and buying properties.

Mostly auctions are considered as loss for the property owner and a big gain for the ones who take the property in auction for the best bid. But the actual truth is that there are equal possibilities for the seller and the buyer to enjoy profit if they follow a few points while managing a property auction. But the saddest point is that in many cases neither the buyer nor the seller gets profit but the agent who makes the best use of the situation gets the best revenue. It is a real blunder if you let the third party to earn money without any actual work done over the whole process. You will have to be well informed about a few points and tips to follow even before you plan to place your bid at a Property auction .

Before the Auction you will have to keep yourself informed about the actual rate of a similar property at the same location. Do a proper property valuation check before you buy or sell your property. Don't let people to under estimate the property value if you are the seller or the brokers to over value the property in case you are the buyer.

If you are going to buy a property, study about the property and find if it's useful for your and if it is your kind before going for a property auction to place your bid. When you want to buy a property you will have to find out about the repair works that needs to be done for the property after buying it. Do a rough calculation of the estimated amount that you will have to spend on the property after you buy it in the auction. See if the total amount falls within your budget, this will avoid any financial scarcity. 

If you are planning to earn some money out of the rent that you might get from the building, do check with people about the area value and the possible amount of rent that you can expect from the property after you repair it. Check if there is any major local development that might affect the property that you are going to place the bid for. During the auction, always try to make note of the other auctioneers moves so that you can place your bid effectively and never turn emotional. Keep yourself calm and plan thing well before you place your bid.

The Writer has written about Investment Houses and UK auction list. He has written many articles in various topics like Residential Home , and UK property auctions.

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NASA Satellites Examine a Powerful Summer Storm

As a powerful summertime storm, known as a derecho, moved from Illinois to the Mid-Atlantic states on June 29, expanding and bringing destruction with it, NASA and other satellites provided a look at various factors involved in the event, its progression and its aftermath.

According to NOAA's Storm Prediction Center web site, a derecho (pronounced "deh-REY-cho") is a widespread, long-lived wind storm that is associated with a band of rapidly moving showers or thunderstorms. Damage from a derecho is usually in one direction along a relatively straight track. By definition an event is classified a derecho if the wind damage swath extends more than 240 miles (about 400 kilometers) and includes wind gusts of at least 58 mph (93 km/h) or greater along most of its length.

These storms are most common in the United States during the late spring and summer, with more than three quarters occurring between April and August. They either extend from the upper Mississippi Valley southeast into the Ohio Valley, or from the southern Plains northeast into the mid-Mississippi Valley.

The movie begins on June 28 at 1515 UTC (11:15 a.m. EDT) and ends on June 30, 2012 at 1601 UTC (12:01 p.m. EDT). In the animation, the derecho's clouds appear as a line in the upper Midwest on June 29 at 1432. By 1602 UTC, they appear as a rounded area south of Lake Michigan. By 2132, the area of the derecho's clouds were near Lake Erie and over Ohio expanding as the system track southeast. By 0630 UTC, the size appears to have almost doubled as the derecho moves over West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia. At 0232 UTC on June 30 (10:32 p.m. EDT), the Derecho was over the mid-Atlantic bringing a 100 mile line of severe storms and wind gusts as high as 90 mph to the region.

The process of a derecho can become self-sustaining as hot and humid air is forced upward by the gust front and develops more (reinforcing) towering clouds. When one adds in a rear low level jet stream, there is nothing to stop the repeating process.

NASA's Aqua satellite flew over the derecho on June 29 and June 30, using the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder instrument (AIRS) onboard to capture infrared imagery of the event.

The AIRS images for June 29, shows the crescent shape of the initial stage of the derecho as it gathered strength on the Michigan-Indiana-Ohio border and began its rapid eastward movement. "The AIRS infrared image shows the high near-surface atmospheric temperatures blanketing the South and Midwestern U.S., approaching 98 degrees Fahrenheit," said Ed Olsen of the AIRS Team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

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