Newest NASA weather satellite launches at Cape Canaveral

The $500 million Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-P (GOES-P) lifted off from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 6:57 pm on a United Launch Alliance Delta IV rocket which will hold the weather-watching satellite to its orbit around 22,000 miles above the Earth’s surface.

GOES-P is on its method into orbit to begin a 10-year mission to keep a watchful eye on our world, NASA said on the satellite’s launch blog, noting that all systems were performing precisely as expected.

Once it arrive at its orbit, GOES-P will collect and send back to Earth data that will be used by scientists to monitor weather, make forecasts and concern warnings about meteorological incidents. Meteorologists say they couldn’t track storms or issue the suitable warnings without them.

The satellite will also perceive ocean and land temperatures, monitor space weather, relay communications and provide search-and-rescue support. GOES-P is the newest in a long line of GOES satellites, the first of which was launched in 1975.

The spacecraft will undertake testing for the next six months and will finally be an orbiting spare in the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite network. The satellites are controlled by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

They give vital images of hurricanes and other storms that threaten the United States. The satellite will fall its letter suffix for a number, becoming GOES-15 once it is in space. The launch was passed out by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin. This is the 39th winning launch for ULA in 39 months.

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How Chile's quake may possibly have shortened a day?

NASA scientists consider Chile's devastating earthquake may have speeded up the Earth's rotation and shortened the length of a day.

Researcher Richard Gross and his colleagues at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California intended that Saturday's 8.8-magnitude quake could have cut 1.26 microseconds off the length of a day. Not that anyone would observe however - as that's one-millionth of a second.

How an earthquake could shorten a day explained below:

The Earth is not a perfect sphere. It is strained in slightly at the poles and bulges at the equator. As such, it rotates with a wobble just similar to a spinning top. However, changes in the distribution of mass can influence this spin. This is shown in the following figure:

In the same way a skater speeds up a spin by pulling in their limbs, a quake can make the Earth rotate quicker by nudging some of its mass closer to the planet's axis. Movements in atmosphere and oceans can have a related effect. This is shown in the following figure:


NASA calculates the quake in Chile shifted mass to such an extent that it altered the rotation rate to shorten a day by about 1.26 microseconds, or one millionth of a second. This is shown in the following figure:

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NASA’s Discovery getting prepared for the final trip to space

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which has flown 130 shuttle missions while the first flight in 1981, plans to retire its three aging space shuttles.

Discovery will make its penultimate trip to space on April 5 at 6:21 a.m. EDT (1021 GMT) to deliver original supplies and equipment to the International Space Station. Later this year in September, it will direct the last mission to space.

Recently, space shuttle Endeavour returned from the space station on February 21 after delivering a new room and stunning viewport that permits astronauts on the station to see Earth from space like never before.

Space shuttle Discovery arrives at pad 39A for launch preparations behind a six hour journey from the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Wednesday.

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Chandrayaan Helps Discover More Water on the Moon

NASA scientists expect to locate at least 600 million metric tons of water-ice there.

If you thought the Chandrayaan Mission was over a few months ago, please be prepared to be proven incorrect. After scrutinizing evidence garnered from different scientific instruments aboard the Chandrayaan, the NASA had last year announced the presence of "little" amount of water on the moon. It was back then, hailed a very important discovery. A few months down the lane, NASA's Mini SAR search aboard the Chandrayaan has managed to discover significant amount of water on the moon in an area near the north pole of our closest celestial neighbor. The mini SAR is extremely small scientific instrument that weighs less than 10 kgs.

The news was publicized by NASA this week. NASA scientists exposed that they expect to find at least 600 million metric tons of water- ice in the area riddled with craters. The number of these craters is supposed to be around 40 and range in 2 to 15 kms in diameter. These craters are typically colder than the surrounding areas and have been long thought to be the best places to look for water on the moon. Jason Crusan, a NASA spokesperson, said: After analyzing the data, our science team dogged a strong indication of water ice, a finding which will give future missions a new target to further explore and exploit.

The Chandrayaan I mission was India's first effort at sending its own probe to the moon. The spacecraft was launched aboard a customized PSLV rocket back in October 2008. The mission was formally declared abandoned after the ISRO lost contact with the Chandrayaan just a slight less than a year since the Chandrayaan was in Orbit. Though, in a short span of time, the Chandrayaan mission was able to unravel many secrets of the moon, which was hitherto unknown to us - the significant occurrence of water being the latest. Chandrayaan had, on board, eleven investigational payloads of which five were Indian, three from the European Space Agency (ESA), two from U.S. and one was from the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.

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China's space station plan postponed

China has delayed the next step in its ambitious space station programme until 2011 for technical reasons, state media said Wednesday.

China had formerly planned to place the Tiangong-1 space module in orbit late this year and undertake experimental docking manoeuvres in succeeding missions, Xinhua news agency cited rocket designer Qi Faren as saying. But the primary launch has now been delayed by a year due to "technical reasons", Qi said, with no elaborating.

Qi was speaking to the media on the sidelines of a meeting of a lawmaking advisory body, which convened on Wednesday, two days before the start of the annual session of China's rubber-stamp parliament.

China became the third nation to situate a man in space when Yang Liwei piloted the one-man Shenzhou-5 space mission in 2003. In September 2008, the Shenzhou-7, piloted by three "taikonauts" or astronauts, conceded out China's first space walk.

The Tiangong-1, or "Heavenly Palace," is observing as the building block of China's maiden space station. Weighing about 8.5 tonnes, it would give a "safe room" for Chinese astronauts to live in and conduct research in zero gravity.

After being placed in orbit, the Tiangong-1 would pier with the unmanned Shenzhou-8 spacecraft in the country's first space docking -- a feat to be controlled distantly by scientists on the ground.

Qi said Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10, carrying two to three astronauts, would also dock with the orbiting module in consecutive years. He said other key technologies being worked on in the space station programme include the replacement of propellant, air, water and food for the space module as well as a life support system.

The International Space Station began with the initiate into orbit of the first station element, a Russian-built module, in 1998. The first full-time crew arrived two years afterward.

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Discovery and Crew organize for STS-131 Mission

(NASA) – Commander Alan Poindexter is set to guide the STS-131 mission to the International Space Station aboard space shuttle Discovery.

Unification Poindexter will be Pilot Jim Dutton and Mission Specialists Rick Mastracchio, Clay Anderson, Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger, Stephanie Wilson and Naoko Yamazaki of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.
Discovery will take a multi-purpose logistics module filled with science racks for the laboratories aboard the station.

The mission has three planned spacewalks, with work to include replacing an ammonia tank assembly, retrieving a Japanese experiment from the station’s exterior, and toggle out a rate gyro assembly on the S0 segment of the station’s truss structure.

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Mars rover Spirit could wriggle free of its sandy catch

A NASA scientist has said that the Mars rover Spirit should be able to wriggle free of its sandy trap on Mars, and not befall a stationary lander mission.

In April 2009, Spirit’s wheels broke through a thin surface crust and got hindered in the loose sand below.

After months of trying disastrously to free the rover, NASA declared on January 26 that Spirit would hereafter be a stationary lander mission rather than a rover.

However, according to a report in New Scientist, rover scientist Ray Arvidson of Washington University in St Louis, Missouri, said that the announcement was “a little bit premature”.

In nine obliges between January 15 and February 8, mission members coaxed the rover into driving backwards by 34 centimetres – “pretty good for a lander”, Arvidson said.

That distant surpasses the mere millimetres of motion Spirit had managed in previous efforts.

The technique concerned swiveling the rover wheels from side to side, which cleared away some of the loose soil beneath the wheels and compacted what remained.

By alternating wheel swiveling with short drives, the rover was able to make slow and steady development.

We only blocked because we ran out of sunlight as winter approached, Arvidson said.

Spirit is hibernating now, with too slight power to continue driving.

After we come out from hibernation in September or October, my thought is that a couple weeks and we’ll back out (of the trap), he said.

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NASA resists to End Constellation Lunar Program

NASA still hesitant how to end Constellation and move forward

NASA has been beset with financial issues and a sustained lack of innovation, but now faces the equally intimidating task of leaving behind the Constellation program.

President Obama and numerous space observers have been revolted at how poorly operated NASA has been in the past, with internal struggle and political opposition expected to make change even more difficult. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden has acquired support from some politicians who said the White House is doing whatever it likes instead of working with experts.

As division of the agreement to end Constellation, NASA is expected to pay $2.5 billion to contractors previously working on the Ares Rockets, Altair lunar lander, and Orion space capsule. Though, it's mysterious how accurate the $2.5 billion estimate is, even though NASA relied on its own analysts and industry analysts to calculate the price.

NASA formerly hoped to return to the moon by 2025, as other space nations plan to send lunar spacecraft and manned missions in the same time frame. China, Japan, Russia, India, and several other developing space programs have uttered interest in landing on the moon by 2030 space industry observers think China will be the next country to reach the moon.

The 2011 budget has probable ended any chance of NASA returning to the moon, with private companies expected to help transport astronauts into space.

President Obama must now try to bind ongoing bickering as he works with NASA, private contractors, and legislators during his presidency. The U.S. space agency will now rely more on the private contractors until present funding problems are sorted out in the future.

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ULA Delta IV and NASA's commence Is a No-GOES

Launches need a delicate balance, and so with the slip of the ULA Delta IV NASA/NOAA GOES P launch to Wednesday, March 3rd, everything has slipped a day.

Formerly a United Launch Alliance Delta IV medium rocket, on behalf of Boeing Launch Services, was planned to launch the NASA/NOAA Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite P (GOES P) on March 2 from Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida.

The weather forecast specifies a probability of weather constraint violation: 20 percent with a primary concern of liftoff ground level winds. The probability of weather restraint violation for a 24 hour delay: 20 percent. The primary concerns are associated to liftoff ground level winds

Synoptic Discussion: Large scale upper level pattern will consist of a deep low pressure ditch over the eastern CONUS. At the surface, strong low pressure system and associated cold front will be located well offshore. Surface elevated pressure will be building in from the northwest. The main subject will be post frontal winds as they will have the possible for exceeding the liftoff wind constraint of 20 kt. Natural and Triggered Lightning constraint violation potential will be negligible.

The project is developed in partnership with the U.S. Air Force (USAF) Evolved dispensable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program, the Delta IV family of commence vehicles combines design simplicity, manufacturing efficiency, and streamlined mission and vehicle integration to meet customer requirements to launch high-priority USAF, National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), NASA, and commercial payloads to orbit. With outfitted launch pads on both coasts — Space Launch Complex-37 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, and Space Launch Complex-6 at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California — every Delta IV configuration is accessible to service the requirements of current and future satellite programs.

The Delta IV launch system is offered in five configurations: the Delta IV Medium (Delta IV M), three variants of the Delta IV Medium-Plus (Delta IV M+), and the Delta IV Heavy (Delta IV H). Each configuration is encompassed of a common booster core (CBC), a cryogenic upper stage and either a 4-m-diameter or 5-m-diameter payload fairing (PLF).

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Final ground check on shuttle rocket completes: NASA

A Utah Company that makes powerful booster rockets for space travel has conducted its final ground test for the nation's vanishing space shuttle program.

The firing, with the 38.4-metre rocket attached horizontally to the ground, ignited more than 450,000 Kg of propellant in a split second and took about two minutes to burn off, according to Alliant Techsystems and NASA.

About 5,000 people came to northern Utah's cape near the Great Salt Lake to watch it fire, a company spokeswoman said.

Anytime you test a rocket out here, it's cute impressive, said Trina Patterson.

NASA officials said the test went easily but that data collected from hundreds of sensors have not yet been fully analysed.

The solid motor is the same type that will help lift the space shuttle in its last four scheduled missions.

The space shuttle test - the 52nd since testing started in 1977 - was planned to ensure safe liftoff for the upcoming shuttle flights.

These solid rocket motors have verified themselves to be the safest and most reliable human-rated launch system, Charlie Precourt, an ATK vice president and shuttle astronaut said in a report.

The test symbols a turn for the company and the nation's space program.

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NASA preparing GOES-P for March 2 launch

NASA is all ready to launch the NOAA Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-P (GOES-P) aboard a Delta IV rocket which will be launched by United Launch Alliance for Boeing Launch Services.

According to NASA, the spacecraft will be commences from Space Launch Complex 37 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The launch is embattled for March 2, during a launch window from 6:19 to 7:19 p.m. EST (3rd March, 04:49 to 05:49 a.m IST).

GOES-P represents the latest generation of environmental satellites built by Boeing for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) under the technical guidance and project management of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

GOES are the backbone of NOAA's severe weather forecasts, examining fast-changing conditions in the atmosphere that spawn hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and other hazards, said Steve Kirkner, GOES program manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, according to the report.

The GOES satellites present observations of more than 50% of the Earth as well as environmental information and severe weather warnings.

GOES-P is the third and last spacecraft to be launched in the GOES N Series of geostationary environmental weather satellites. Other than forecasting weather on Earth GOES-P with the help of the Solar X-Ray Imager (SXI) will constantly monitor solar conditions.

GOES-P once in orbit will be designated as GOES-15 and will thus provide timely ecological information to meteorologists and the public, as per the report.

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New NASA Web Page discards Light on Science of Warming World

PASADENA, Calif. -- Will 2010 be the warmest year on testimony? How do the latest U.S. "Snowmageddon" winter storms and record low temperatures in Europe fit into the bigger picture of long-term global warming? NASA has launched a new Web page to assist people better understand the causes and effects of Earth's changing climate.

The new "A Warming World" page hosts a series of new articles, videos, data visualizations, space-based imagery and interactive visuals that presents unique NASA perspectives on this topic of global importance.

The page includes aspect articles that explore the recent Arctic winter weather that has gripped the United States, Europe and Asia, and how El Nino and other longer-term ocean-atmosphere phenomena may influence global temperatures this year and in the future. A new video, piecing mutually the Temperature Puzzle, illustrates how NASA satellites monitor climate change and help scientists better appreciate how our complex planet works.

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NASA’s Cassini locates plethora of plumes and hotspots at Enceladus

Newly released images from last November’s swoop over Saturn’s icy moon Enceladus by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft have exposed a forest of new jets spraying from prominent fractures crossing the south polar region and yield the most full temperature map to date of one fracture.

The new images from the imaging science subsystem and the complex infrared spectrometer teams also comprise the best 3-D image ever obtained of a “tiger stripe,” a fissure that sprays icy particles, water vapor and organic compounds.

There are also views of regions not well-mapped formerly on Enceladus, including a southern area with crudely circular tectonic patterns.

Enceladus persists to astound, said Bob Pappalardo, Cassini project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

With each Cassini flyby, we learn more about its great activity and what makes this weird moon tick, he added.

Scientists intended to use this flyby to look for new or smaller jets not visible in previous images. In one mosaic, scientists count more than 30 individual geysers, with more than 20 that had not been seen before.

A latest map that combines heat data with visible-light images shows a 40-kilometer (25-mile) segment of the longest tiger stripe, known as Baghdad Sulcus.

The map show the correlation, at the highest resolution yet seen, among the geologically youthful surface fractures and the anomalously warm temperatures that have been recorded in the South Polar Region.

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For NASA no easy reply for next space destination

For the record in decades, NASA has no particular space destination for its next stop, although it has lots of places it wants to go. Future space flight, NASA officials say, now depends on new rocket science and where it can acquire us.

That ambiguity may not sit well with Congress, which will be grilling NASA chief Charles Bolden on Wednesday and Thursday in the first hearings since the George W. Bush moon mission was shelved.

There are only little places in space where humans can go in the next couple of decades. NASA desires to go to all of them, with the ultimate destination, as always, being Mars.

The suite of destinations has not altered over time, NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver said in an interview. The moon, asteroids, Mars - if you're going to go anyplace - is where we are going.

But with any route there is a first stop, so what is that?

Check back in a pair of years. That's when new technology should be developed sufficient to answer that question, Garver said. President Barack Obama plans to divert billions of dollars from the Bush moon plan to developing better rocketry.

The best mode to get anywhere ... is in fact invest in technologies that will reduce the cost, reduce the time, reduce the risk and so forth, Garver said.

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NASA | Piecing Together the Temperature Puzzle

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Station Crew have the benefit of Off-Duty Time

(NASA) – In the wake of problems Sunday with the International Space Station’s Command and Control computers, the crew had a typically off-duty day Monday, taking time for an emergency egress drill that is conducted occasionally to maintain crew proficiency.

Space shuttle Endeavour is home behind two weeks in space, having delivered the final U.S. module and a “room with a view” to the station. STS-130 Commander George Zamka showed Endeavour to a landing at the Kennedy Space Center’s Shuttle Landing Facility at 10:20 p.m. EST Sunday, to cover up a 5.7-million-mile mission.

Meanwhile, flight controllers in Houston’s Mission Control Center secluded the issue that caused the three Command and Control computers to switch their roles as primary, backup and standby units.

Station Spacecraft Communicator Stan Love told Expedition 22 Commander Jeff Williams that the glitches were based by S-band telemetry software that takes Columbus laboratory data puts it into packets and sends it to the ground. For now, that particular piece of code will be avoided and flight controllers will command the remaining systems back to their normal configurations, including Ku-band communications.

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NASA Sets Coverage For Goes-P Weather Satellite Launch March 2

The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-P, or GOES-P, is scheduled for launch aboard a Delta IV rocket on Tuesday, March 2, from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The one-hour launch window extends from 6:19 to 7:19 p.m. EST.

GOES-P will provide expanded capability for space and solar environment-monitoring instruments. The satellite will enhance forecasts and warnings for solar disturbances. GOES-P data will help protect billions of dollars in investments by the government and private sector for assets on the ground and in space.

GOES-P will feature a highly stable pointing platform that will improve the performance of its Imager and Sounder, instruments used for creating daily weather-prediction models and hurricane forecasting. Data from GOES-P will be valuable for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Ocean Service, which provides oceanographic circulation models and forecasts for U.S. coastal communities.

As with all of NOAA's geostationary and polar-orbiting weather satellites, GOES-P will be able to relay distress signals detected from emergency locator beacons on the ground and at sea in support of the international search and rescue system. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., was responsible for designing and developing the spacecraft and its instruments for NOAA.

GOES-P is the last of three in the series of geostationary weather and environmental satellites built for NASA by Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems. The spacecraft will be checked out by Goddard and Boeing before being turned over to NOAA for operational use.

NASA will provide television, Internet and photo coverage of the launch starting with a prelaunch news conference at 4 p.m. on Monday, March 1, at NASA's Kennedy Space Centers Press Site.

Participating in the March 1 prelaunch news conference will be:
- Steve Kirkner, NOAA GOES Program manager, NOAA Satellite and Information Service
- Kris Walsh, Commercial Programs manager, United Launch Alliance
- Hieu Lam, Delta Commercial Program manager, Boeing Launch Services
- Andre Dress, GOES Deputy Project manager, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
- Charlie Maloney, GOES N-P Program manager, Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems
- Bart Hagemeyer, meteorologist in charge, NOAA National Weather Service forecast office, Melbourne, Fla.
- Joel Tumbiolo, Delta IV launch weather officer, 45th Weather Squadron, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station

NASA Television will carry the prelaunch news conference and launch day coverage live. On March 2 NASA TV countdown coverage will begin at 4 p.m., and will conclude 30 minutes after liftoff. For NASA TV downlink information, schedules and links to streaming video, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

Audio only of the prelaunch news conference and the launch coverage will be carried on the NASA "V" circuits which may be accessed by dialing 321-867-1220, - 1240, -1260 and -7135. On launch day, "Mission Audio," the launch conductor's countdown activities without NASA TV launch commentary, will be carried on 321-867-7135 starting at noon. Launch also will be available on local amateur VHF radio frequency 146.940 MHz heard within Brevard County.

Live countdown coverage on NASA's launch blog begins at 4 p.m. on March 2. Coverage features real-time updates of countdown milestones, as well as streaming video and a podcast of launch. To access these features, visit NASA's GOES-P mission Web site at:

http://www.nasa.gov/goes-p

Reporters attending the NASA prelaunch media briefing who also plan to cover launch may request accreditation by going to:

https://media.ksc.nasa.gov

The Kennedy Space Center Badging Office on SR-405 is open Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. For those needing credentials, more information about accreditation is available by contacting Laurel Lichtenberger at 321-867-4036.

For more information about the GOES-P launch, contact the NASA News Center at Kennedy at 321-867-2468 or visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/kennedy

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Shuttle program’s final launch - ATK, NASA to blaze last rocket motor

Alliant Techsystems and NASA will perform their last rocket test for the Space Shuttle program Thursday, marking the closure of a program that has spanned more than three decades.

The event is scheduled for 11:55 a.m.; a public performance area on Highway 83 about 20 miles west of Corinne will open at 9:30 a.m.

Spectators will obtain to see the horizontal firing of a solid rocket motor — a method that will allow engineers to look at 43 design objectives measured through 258 instruments. The ground test will be conducted to make sure the safe fly-out of the residual four missions of the space shuttle, which is being phased out this year.

A huge group of NASA officials and members of the national media are traveling to ATK’s Promontory location for the historic final test, said ATK spokeswoman Trina Patterson. She added that a number of employees at the aerospace company have worked on the shuttle for their whole careers.

To date, ATK has completed 52 tests for the shuttle. With the shuttle entering retirement, the prospect of America’s human space flight program is up in the air.

President Barack Obama cut funding for the effort in his planned budget for the next fiscal year, though some members of Congress support continuing the allocation.

As a result of the slow-down in contracts, ATK has let go of 970 employees in Utah since October, including 420 in late January. Another few hundred are predictable to be laid off later this year.

The company has been effective on Ares, the replacement for the shuttle, which would be shelved if Obama’s budget plan is adopted, though Patterson said engineers are continuing with the project for now. We’re on schedule and inside budget and we’ll continue to march forward and look forward to the future, she said.

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Media Get Shuttle Mission Update

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Endeavour foliage space station

The crews of the linked space shuttle and space station embraced and said farewell Friday as they equipped for Endeavour to begin its two-day trip home after a mission of Olympic proportions.

There were hugs and handshakes all roughly as the six Endeavour astronauts floated one by one out of the International Space Station, where they installed a stunning seven-window observation deck that gives astronauts supreme views of Earth. The hatches between the craft were then conserved in preparation for Friday night's undocking.

We are actually going to enjoy the view. I wish you guys could stay a little longer to participate in that view, the space station's skipper, Jeffrey Williams, told his shuttle friends. Yeah, it's hard to turn away from that window, shuttle commander George Zamka said of the atrium's domed centrepiece, the largest window ever launched into space.

Each of the astronauts spent a few moments alone in the dome late Thursday, taking in what they described as remarkable and stunning views of Earth. Arguably, mankind has been after this view for centuries, this viewpoint, this view of the world, and we finally have it, Zamka said. It culminates just about the meeting complete of the space station, Williams added.

The 11 space flyers teamed up over the past week to fit the dome and a new room, called Tranquility, marking the last of the major space station building blocks. They finished some last-minute packing, and then gathered for a ribbon-cutting ceremony on the eve of Endeavour's undocking.

Zamka offered a plaque to hang in the dome that contained four chips of moon rock and a stone retrieved from the top of Mt. Everest. A former astronaut agreed the moon fragments to the top of Everest last spring.

The lunar chips were composed from the Sea of Tranquility during man's first moon landing in 1969. The chamber was named after that important achievement. Zamka said the rocks will serve as a reminder of man's reach and man's grit as they go out and discover.

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