The United States is OUT OF THE SPACE BUSINESS

[Ryan Ruck]

Just on FNC, big budget cuts for NASA expected on Monday. They'll be scrapping planned manned missions to Mars.

Guess we need more money for the government cell phone program.

[American Patriot]

I am going fishing.... fuck itt

[American Patriot]

Call for new astronauts garners 6,000 applicants




Monday - 2/13/2012, 9:20am ET
By Michael O'Connell

@moconnellWFED


Listen

Duane Ross, manager of astronaut selection, NASA's Johnson Space Center

Download



Even without a manned space launch program, NASA needs to keep about 60 astronauts trained and ready to meet its mission at the International Space Station. And a significant number of people left the astronaut corps when the shuttle program ended. Luckily, a near-record number of people applied to join the astronaut program for this year's incoming class — a number NASA hasn't seen since the late 1970s.
"The astronaut job is a pretty cool job," said Duane Ross, manager of astronaut selection and training at NASA's Johnson Space Center. "You get to train and go fly in space, and so it's obviously a position folks would be interested in applying for."
Duane Ross, manager, astronaut selection and training at NASA's Johnson Space Center (NASA.gov)

Ross told The Federal Drive with Tom Temin Monday that NASA conducted an extensive outreach effort in order to ensure it had a sufficient number of applicants. "We need a variety of different people with a variety of different backgrounds — engineers, scientists, pilots, medical doctors, those kinds of things," Ross said. "The thing we need for them to be able to do when they get here is the operational job that an astronaut does. It's a practical, technical, hands-on type of activity."
Now that the shuttle program has ended and the focus has shifted to longer missions aboard the International Space Station, NASA has altered its astronaut training accordingly.
"It's primarily International Space Station systems training," Ross said. "Anybody we send to the space station, you have to expect them to do everything that comes along. So everyone may have to do a space walk. Everyone may have to do robotics. All of that training is part of their basic training program."
Since NASA is working closely with the Russian space program, new astronauts will receive Russian language training as well.
One of the challenges facing this new class will be adapting to the technology that has yet to be developed for the commercial crew launch systems, which they'll likely be working on, given NASA's long-term schedule.
"The systems for the commercial vehicle certainly aren't mature enough at this point that we could start building any kind of training scenario around them," Ross said. "But once you get the basic skills of working with systems and dealing with systems, no matter what your spaceship looks like, a lot of those systems are going to be similar."
NASA has until spring 2013 to review the 6,372 applications it's received and winnow it down to the final 10 to 15 slots it needs to fill.
RELATED STORIES
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[Ryan Ruck]

Mars Lost: NASA Cutting Mission To Red Planet

February 10, 2012

Scientists say NASA is about to propose major cuts in its exploration of other planets, especially Mars. And NASA’s former science chief is calling it irrational.

With limited money for science and an over-budget new space telescope, the space agency essentially had to make a choice in where it wanted to explore: the neighboring planet or the far-off cosmos.

Mars lost.

Two scientists who were briefed on the 2013 NASA budget that will be released next week said the space agency is eliminating two proposed joint missions with Europeans to explore Mars in 2016 and 2018. NASA had agreed to pay $1.4 billion for those missions. Some Mars missions will continue, but the fate of future flights is unclear, including the much-sought flight to return rocks from the red planet.

The two scientists, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the budget, said the cuts to the Mars missions are part of a proposed reduction of about $300 million in NASA’s $1.5 billion planetary science budget. More than $200 million in those cuts are in the Mars program, they said. The current Mars budget is $581.7 million.

“To me, it’s totally irrational and unjustified,” said Edward Weiler, who until September was NASA’s associate administrator for science. “We are the only country on this planet that has the demonstrated ability to land on another planet, namely Mars. It is a national prestige issue.”

Weiler said he quit last year because he was tired of fighting to save Mars from the budget knife. He said he fought successfully to keep major cuts from Mars in the current budget but has no firsthand knowledge of the 2013 budget proposal.

Mars “has got public appeal, it’s got scientific blessings from the National Academy,” Weiler said in a phone interview from Florida. “Why would you go after it? And it fulfills the president’s space policy to encourage more foreign collaboration.”

Two years ago, President Barack Obama said his ultimate goal was to send astronauts to Mars.

NASA spokesman David Weaver said that, just like the rest of the federal government, the space agency has to make “tough choices … and live within our means.”

To do so, Weaver said in an email, “NASA is reassessing its current Mars exploration initiatives to maximize what can be achieved.”

Weaver said the United States is the only country to land on Mars and has a car-sized rover on its way to the planet.

One of the big problems for NASA’s science budget is the replacement for the wildly successful Hubble Space Telescope. The James Webb Space Telescope, which would be about 100 times more powerful and would gaze farther into the universe than ever before, is now supposed to cost around $8 billion. It was originally estimated to cost $3.5 billion.

The other big part of NASA science spending — Earth sciences — is not being cut, the two scientists said.

The cut comes in the same week President Obama hosted the Second Annual White House Science Fair, touting the advancements of science and technology students.

[American Patriot]

The other big part of NASA science spending — Earth sciences — is not being cut, the two scientists said.

AH HA! Now we know the TRUTH don't we? Fucking Envirowhackos.

[Ryan Ruck]

High Joblessness In The Home Of U.S. Space Flight

[vector7]

Companion Attachment:

• NASA, Obama and Russia.mp3

Obama Ruins Kid’s Day

Ex-astronaut's advice to child: 'Study Russian'

BY: Washington Free Beacon Staff - April 17, 2012 11:50 am




The Discovery shuttle flew for the last time Tuesday, beginning in Cape Canaveral, Fla., on the back of a 747, looping around the monuments in Washington D.C., and landing in Virginia, where it will ultimately be transferred to the Udvar-Hazy annex of the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

In Washington, onlookers left buildings and stood on rooftops to watch the shuttle and its escort circle the city.


NASA retired the shuttle program last month with Discovery’s final space flight, and as P.J. O’Rourke recently wrote, the state of the U.S. program is unclear:

But the U.S. space program is short of machinery, muddled about goals, and low in morale. The space shuttle has been retired. Thousands of NASA employees and contractors lost their jobs. We have no way to get a man into space except by asking Vladimir Putin, “Mother Russia, May I?”


The Bush-era Constellation program, with its moon and Mars capabilities, was canceled. Neil Armstrong called the decision “devastating.” The Augustine Commission, an Obama administration panel of scientists, retired astronauts, and aerospace experts chaired by former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine, judged Constellation to be hopelessly behind schedule, underfunded, and over budget. I’m glad they didn’t judge me.


The new Space Launch System or SLS, the heavy launch vehicle that will replace Constellation’s Ares I and Ares V rockets, won’t be ready for a manned flight until at least 2021. Where the SLS will go is, as it were, up in the air. Lunar orbit? Asteroid? Lagrange point? (A Lagrange point is the place between two gravitational bodies where an object is held stationary in perfect equilibrium.) What if Jack Kennedy had declared we were going to put a man on a Lagrange point by the end of the decade? The nation would have been inspired to watch ballet in a suburb of Chicago.

In 2011, China launched more rockets into orbit than the U.S.—the first time ever, according to Gizmodo. Though the U.S. retains advantages in funding, the Chinese launched 19 rockets last year, while the U.S. launched 18; both were eclipsed by Russia, which sent 31 rockets into space.


When asked for advice Tuesday by a WUSA9 reporter, former Discovery astronaut Dr. Anna Fisher told a boy watching the shuttle, “Study Russian.”

[American Patriot]

SpaceX Tests Rocket to Prepare for First Commercial Docking With ISS

By James Mulroy, PCWorld May 2, 2012 9:49 AM
SpaceX tests Falcon 9's engines, Credit: SpaceXThis week, SpaceX test-fired its Falcon 9's nine Merlin rocket engines while out on the company's leased space at Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral. The test was part of a dress rehearsal for the upcoming launch of the second Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) cargo vessel.
Lasting only two seconds before a planned abort, this test of the Merlin rocket engine appeared to be successful. SpaceX will now evaluate the data collected from the test and make any final preparations for a launch set to take place in only a few days--on May 7.
The May 7 launch will propel the Dragon spacecraft into low-Earth orbit (LEO) via the Falcon 9 rocket. The Dragon craft contains both a pressurized capsule and an unpressurized trunk for taking either cargo, crew, or both into space. This mission will be unmanned, but it will be a major stepping stone toward commercial spaceflight.
During the first COTS mission, which took place in December 2010, SpaceX was the first commercial company to put a spacecraft into orbit and return it back to Earth safely. During this second COTS mission, SpaceX will attempt to dock its Dragon spacecraft with the ISS--assuming that NASA gives it the go-ahead if everything looks good once in LEO. Once at the ISS, astronauts will open the Dragon's hatch and unload the cargo.
If this mission is successful, not only will it be a monumental moment in commercial spaceflight history, but it'll kick off SpaceX's Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract with NASA, where the company will launch at least 12 missions to bring cargo to and from the ISS. SpaceX says that while this mission is not guaranteed to succeed, the company says that it'll try again should it fail.
Make sure to stay tuned to GeekTech for updates on the upcoming Falcon 9 May 7 launch!

[American Patriot]

Might NASA be Forced to Kill the Commercial Space Race?

Analysis by Amy Shira Teitel
Tue May 15, 2012 02:29 PM ET

Commercial space competition may be over before it's even really begun.


Last week, Congress approved a spending bill that demands NASA immediately choose one company for its Commercial Crew Program, and this week they will be voting on it. Killing the private competition is meant to save money and speed up development, but it may cause problems for NASA's already stretched budget.


ANALYSIS: Money: The Next Human Spaceflight Incentive?
There are a lot of interesting and promising commercial programs under development right now. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin project is working on a launch vehicle, Sierra Nevada is working on the Dream Chaser orbital vehicle, ATK just announced its intention to add a spacecraft to its Liberty rocket, SpaceX has its Falcon 9 and Dragon, and Orbital Sciences has its Antares rocket and Cygnus spacecraft.


SpaceX and Orbital Sciences are the front runners, both planning cargo flights to the ISS this year to demonstrate their capabilities. SpaceX is scheduled to launch this coming Saturday. But these missions are unmanned cargo flights; manned mission aren't expected until 2017. So why throttle the competition before NASA has a viable commercial system in place?


The Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program was started in 2006 with the goal of easing the transition out of the shuttle era by having private companies take over the low-Earth orbit cargo launches allowing NASA to focus on its loftier goals of deep space manned missions on Saturn V-type powerful rockets. There's no money for the COTS program in NASA's 2013 budget.


The Commercial Crew Program, however, is separate and distinct from COTS and President Obama requested $830 million for Commercial Crew in 2013 (although the House countered with $500 million). The ultimate aim for the program is to end NASA's dependence on Russia for manned launches to the space station.


The bill, if passed, would streamline the commercial launch effort by giving one company more money to develop its crewed system faster.

WATCH VIDEOS: SPACEFLIGHT AND EXPLORATION

ANALYSIS: NASA Deputy Administrator Faces the Tough Questions
The problem with the short answer is that it's short sighted. The layered approach with multiple companies vying for the contract to build a new manned space transportation system is exactly what NASA needs right now. The competition has yielded creativity and innovation. The rockets and spacecraft these companies have come up with has cost NASA millions instead of billions since the agency isn't alone in footing the bill, and there are clearly viable systems on the horizon.


If the competition goes away, the need to come up with the most reliable, cost-effective, and flexible system will go with it. "It is unfortunate that Congress would direct an agency to pick a company before the magic of the marketplace had a chance to work," said Dale Ketcham, director of the Spaceport Research & Technology Institute at the University of Central Florida.


We've seen this before. In the early days of the shuttle program, NASA was directed to pick the contractor that promised the lowest overall cost without seeing a demonstration of abilities first.


During the Space Race NASA chose contractors based on designs and previous experience rather than demonstration. In both cases the program costs were huge and staying on schedule was an ongoing battle. The only difference with Apollo-era programs was that money was no object.


ANALYSIS: Neil DeGrasse Tyson Seeks New Inspiration for Space
"Ending competition by down-selecting to a sole commercial space company could double the cost of developing a privately built human spaceflight system and it will leave us in the same position we find ourselves today -- having only one option for getting our astronauts to the space station," NASA administrator Charles Bolden told an FAA commercial space advisory committee last week.


We should know this week what changes we'll see in the commercial space venture.


Image: The SpaceX Falcon 9 launches -- a thing of the past? Credit: SpaceX

(Editor's note: An earlier version of this article stated that commercial crew projects fall under the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS). This is not correct, they are two independent programs.)

[American Patriot]

Dream Chaser, new space shuttle in development, runs on laughing gas, NASA says




Like NASA's shuttle, Dream Chaser is reusable. It's also got wings that allow it to fly back to Earth. But it's a lot smaller.
Photographer: NASA

Regular Photo Size

---

Related Links






Posted: 06/12/2012
Last Updated: 22 hours and 2 minutes ago

• By: Thom Patterson, CNN

Have you been listening to all the kvetching and tooth-gnashing about America paying Russia $65-to-$70 million for each astronaut to ride to the space station?


You should hear what people at NASA and elsewhere in the U.S. aerospace industry are telling their friends: They're embarrassed - even angry - that the guys who won the Cold War space race are no longer in the driver's seat.


Why, oh, why, they moan, did Washington end the shuttle program before building a replacement? How fast can the United States develop a new machine to deliver Americans into orbit so they can make scientific and technological breakthroughs?


How fast? Last month, less than a year after the final space shuttle mission, a SpaceX unmanned Dragon became the first private spacecraft to reach the orbiting space station.


But you probably knew that. Here's what you may have missed: A few days after SpaceX's triumph, a winged mini-space shuttle took to the air in its first flight test.


Wait. What? There's a new space shuttle in development?
Yep, it's called Dream Chaser. And it's made to fly on laughing gas.
But more on that in a second.


During the May 29 aerodynamic test, Sierra Nevada Corp. engineers hung the company's 25,000-pound spacecraft from a helicopter flying about 10,000 feet above Jefferson County, Colorado.


"It performed perfectly and did exactly what our team designed it to do," said Col. Jim Voss, a retired NASA astronaut and Sierra Nevada's vice president of space exploration systems.


Perhaps many folks who don't closely follow the space industry are completely unaware of this sleek orbiter.


Like NASA's shuttle, Dream Chaser is reusable. It's also got wings that allow it to fly back to Earth. But it's a lot smaller. Unlike the shuttle, it's designed to blast off on top of an Atlas V rocket, carrying up to seven astronauts to the orbiting space station.


Then, if everything goes as planned, the thing is supposed to use its onboard rockets to cross into the atmosphere and land on a conventional runway.


Among the several firms competing to be NASA's new astronaut taxi, Dream Chaser is the only system with wings, according to Sierra Nevada.


Why aren't more people aware of Dream Chaser? "We're pretty quiet as a company," Voss said. Sierra Nevada develops special aircraft for the Defense Department and devices for communication and intelligence gathering, Voss said. "Because of that, I think the company has just not felt like it has needed to do a bunch of advertising."


A few quick Dream Chaser tidbits:


--Its engine system is a hybrid. It burns a solid tire-like rubber called HTPD (hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene) and nitrous oxide. That's right, laughing gas, the same stuff some dentists use to kill the pain when you get a tooth pulled or a root canal. "We picked this system because it is the safest possible configuration there is," Voss said. "But you don't get as much performance per pound of fuel that you use."


--The Dream Chaser is based on a design concept that was originally developed decades ago by the Soviets. NASA reverse engineered it to learn how it worked. Sierra Nevada is using that engineering information to develop the spacecraft.


--It can go from roll-out to the launch pad in as fast as two hours, according to Sierra Nevada.


--During re-entry, it's designed to inflict on passengers a very light g-force of 1.5 times gravity, which will make it less likely that passengers would blackout.


Dream Chaser is just one of several systems being developed by private firms in hopes of winning additional NASA funding.


Also in the mix with Sierra Nevada and SpaceX is Boeing, which is developing a spacecraft of its own - a capsule-based vehicle called CST-100, which it tested in a Nevada helicopter drop last month.



Capsules are less complicated than a winged craft, but they have fewer landing options. To deal with that, SpaceX plans to develop a capsule that can land with rockets.


Although SpaceX is widely seen as leading the pack in this private space race, insiders say it's too early to know whether Sierra Nevada or Boeing poses a threat. It's hard to know which systems will be the most reliable, the cheapest and most efficient.


"I don't know if you'd call it a space race," Voss said. "But we're the only competitors with a vehicle that will physically fly back to runway, so we think we're in a good position to provide the type of transportation that NASA will want for their crews."


More than a few data-head aerospace engineers acknowledge they have a romantic soft-spot for a winged spacecraft so reminiscent of NASA's shuttle.


So what's the next giant leap for Dream Chaser? Autonomous flight.


This August or September, Voss said, they'll drop the spacecraft from a powerful helicopter above California's Edwards Air Force Base.


Perhaps a military CH-46 Sea Knight or CH-47 Chinook might be brought in to let Dream Chaser spread its wings from as high as 20,000 feet, said Voss. If all goes well, this bird will fly on its own for the first time, before it glides to a landing.

[American Patriot]

Bill Nye: U.S. risks losing its space edge

By Richard Galant, CNN
updated 11:43 AM EDT, Mon July 2, 2012




STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Bill Nye, the Science Guy on TV, also heads Planetary Society
• He is speaking out against proposed cuts in NASA planetary exploration budget
• Nye says the U.S. has unmatched expertise in landing spacecraft on other planets
• If America loses its edge, it could take decades to rebuild, Nye says

(CNN) -- Years before Bill Nye became the Science Guy, he was a mechanical engineering student at Cornell University, where he took a course with astronomer Carl Sagan.


Sagan, who was instrumental in the planning of NASA missions to other planets and became widely known for his research, writing and public television series, was one of the founders of the Planetary Society. And his student dutifully signed up to become a member.


"I've been a member for over 30 years. And now I'm the head guy. It's quite odd," a surprised-sounding Nye told CNN in an interview in March at the TED2012 conference in Long Beach, California.


So today, the bow-tied, jauntily professorial Nye has a new role aside from his television work as a popularizer of science: As the society's chief executive, he's become a leading voice against the Obama administration's proposed $300 million cut in NASA's planetary exploration budget. And it's a subject about which he's passionate.


Remembering retired NASA astronaut, Alan Poindexter.

President Obama greets Bill Nye during a science fair event at the White House on February 7.




"This is a deep, deep concern. All the budgets are being cut. We gotcha, budgets are being cut, budgets are being pulled back, yes, yes, all good," he says, acknowledging the pressure to cut spending.


"But investment in space stimulates society, it stimulates it economically, it stimulates it intellectually, and it gives us all passion. Everyone, red state, blue state, everyone supports space exploration. So I understand the budget has got to be cut, but something has gone a little bit wrong."


Nye says the planetary exploration budget, facing a reduction of 21% from this fiscal year's budget, is taking a deeper cut than other parts of NASA.


"This wouldn't matter. except it's not a faucet. It's not a spigot you can turn off and on. You stop planetary exploration, those people who do that extraordinary work are going to have to go do something else."


His worry is that the U.S. is in danger of losing its unmatched scientific expertise to plan and execute missions to other planets.


"To try to really land a spacecraft really on another world is really difficult, and if we lose that ability, it's going to be heartbreaking," says Nye, who adds that it could take decades to recoup.


Nye makes another argument for investing in exploring the solar system. He says there are two kinds of natural disasters that can be prevented: One is climate change, and the other is the Earth getting hit by an asteroid.


Telescope aims to head off asteroids' impact on Earth

NASA's Curiosity rover heads for space November 26 atop an Atlas 5 rocket at Cape Canaveral, Florida.




"If the Earth gets hit by an asteroid, it's game over. It's control-alt-delete for civilization." Nye says he figures "sea jellies, squid, cockroaches will be fine," but an asteroid could wipe out humankind.


"So what we want to do is to develop the capability to redirect, to deflect an asteroid, ever so slightly. If you're going to do that, you've got to have space exploration. And sooner or later, you're going to want to send people out there to look around. It's just our nature, and one day it would be exciting to send people to Mars."


NASA is in the midst of active exploration of Mars.


In August, Curiosity, the Mars Science Laboratory rover, is due to land on the planet's surface. David Weaver, NASA's associate administrator for communications, says the rover is the "Hubble of Mars missions" and "the most sophisticated scientific system ever sent to another planet."
Space junk diplomacy
Its mission is to determine whether the red planet could have ever hosted life. Weaver said in June that the agency is reformulating its Mars strategy in light of budget constraints and scientific priorities and "the president's challenge of sending humans to Mars in the 2030s."


Nye says his concern isn't about current missions but about whether the next series of missions and the ones beyond that will have enough funds to proceed.


Taking a larger view, Nye says there are two questions everyone should ask themselves at some time in their lives: "Where did we come from? And are we alone?"


"To seek the real answers to those questions, you have to explore space, and if you stop exploring, if you say, 'I don't care; I'm not going to look up and out and beyond the horizon,' what does that say about you? It's not good," Nye said.


"If we found life on Mars, or evidence of life on Mars, it would change the way everybody thinks about everything. It would change the way you think about your place in space."

[vector7]

OBAMA slashed the entire NASA budget except for his 'outreach to MUSLIMS ONLY'



And you thought the Regime had backpedaled on this outrageous idea? Think again. Using your tax dollars, Obama is inviting Muslims to U.S. Space Camps, even Muslims from enemy countries like Libya, home of the now set free Lockerbie bomber.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said in a recent interview with Al Jazeera that his “foremost” mission as director of the space agency is to improve relations with the Muslim world. “[President Obama] wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science … and math and engineering,” Bolden said.

Nearly 50 future Libyan leaders (terrorists like Ghaddafi?) have trained as astronauts at the U.S. National Space & Rocket Center’s Space Camp since 2009, and media coverage and a film of the students’ experiences have helped ease U.S.-Libya tensions and inspired other Muslim-majority nations to pursue the program. (Oh really? So why is the Lockerbie bomber not in jail?)



The Libyan Space Camp program, now in its second year, was developed through a unique relationship among the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, NASA, the U.S. State Department, the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, the Libyan General People’s Committee for Foreign Liaison and the Libyan General People’s Committee for Education and Scientific Research. (Riiiight, and Libya is renowned for its scientific achievements)

The chronicles of the 24 participants in the 2009 Space Camp were documented and made into the film One Small Step, One Giant Leap. And hundreds of young Libyans have now applied to Space Camp.”The 2010 Libyan Space Camp, July 16–25, was followed August 1–6 by a Space Camp adventure for a dozen



Moroccan students.

The two student groups from North Africa joined other young people from around the world in Huntsville, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, to participate in simulated space shuttle missions, training simulators, rocket building and launches, scientific experiments and lectures on space exploration. They also met and received graduation certificates from four-time NASA shuttle commander Robert “Hoot” Gibson.

In August 2009, the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli sent the first group of



24 Libyan students, along with two teachers and a professional Libyan-American film crew that included two Libyan student interns, on their way to Huntsville.They were the first group from North Africa to attend Space Camp and only the second group from an Arab country since 1982, when Space Camp was founded to promote the study of math, science and technology, teamwork, decisionmaking and leadership.(So how many American kids don’t get to go now to make room for the Muslims?)

This year, 24 Libyan students aged 14–18 participated, traveling with the same Libyan-American film director, members of Al Shababiya Television, and a representative of the Libyan General People’s Committee for Education and Scientific Research.

In international and technical teams, the students were presented with challenges that included what to do with a damaged fuselage,



miscalibrated steering mechanisms and punctured air filtration systems. Together, they applied advanced principles of physics, chemistry and mathematics to solve some of the same problems experienced by U.S. and Russian astronauts on the International Space Station and during the historic Apollo 13 mission. (Just what they need to know. Maybe they can apply it in their bomb making school for American airplanes)

The students’ training has helped expand their educational and professional interests at home and abroad. Since attending Space Camp, one 2009 Libyan student participant is seeking a career in aeronautics and flight communications by studying at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Another received a full scholarship to Harvard University in Massachusetts.(One less scholarship for Americans)

Libya and Morocco plan Space Camp programs in summer 2011, Lawrence said, and U.S. officials in Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, the Palestinian Authority and Egypt are seeking to establish programs. (I bet they are) AMERICA.gov H/T Creeping Sharia

[Ryan Ruck]

NASA Puts Shuttle Launch Pad In Florida Up For Lease

May 23, 2013

Nearly two years after space shuttle Atlantis blasted off for the last time, NASA on Thursday put out a "For Lease" notice for one of its shuttle launch pads in Florida.

In a notice posted on its procurement website, the U.S. space agency said it was looking for one or more companies to take over operations and maintenance of Launch Complex 39A.

The facility is one of two launch pads at the Kennedy Space Center built in the 1960s to support the Apollo moon program. Both were later modified for the space shuttles, which began flying in 1981.

NASA intends to refurbish Complex 39B for its heavy-lift Space Launch System rocket and Orion deep-space capsule, designed to carry astronauts to destinations beyond the International Space Station, a $100 billion research complex that flies about 250 miles above Earth.

Pad 39A, however, is among the hundreds of shuttle-era facilities that NASA no longer needs.

"We're on track for significant commercial operations here at the Cape," Kennedy Space Center Director Robert Cabana said last week at a National Space Club Florida meeting in Cape Canaveral.

NASA's Florida spaceport has demolished or transferred to commercial users more than 150 shuttle facilities, reducing its footprint by 1 million square feet (93,000 square meters), Cabana said.

Among the companies that have expressed interest in the pad are privately owned Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, which leases a launch pad at the adjacent Cape Canaveral Air Force Station for its Falcon 9 rockets. SpaceX has a second launch site in California and is shopping for at least one more U.S. site to accommodate its burgeoning manifest.

NASA is looking to have a five-year or longer lease on the property by October 1.

[vector7]

In 2011, China launched more rockets into orbit than the U.S.—the first time ever, according to Gizmodo. Though the U.S. retains advantages in funding, the Chinese launched 19 rockets last year, while the U.S. launched 18; both were eclipsed by Russia, which sent 31 rockets into space.


When asked for advice Tuesday by a WUSA9 reporter, former Discovery astronaut Dr. Anna Fisher told a boy watching the shuttle, “Study Russian.”

Now that Obama has more flexibility maybe he can openly turn it over to the Russians.



I mean it's not like the Russians don't have an interest in the region.

Russia Said It'll Rebuild Ties With Old Ally Cuba, put in an AK-47 Ammo Factory and even use its Airfields.

In return Russia will finalize plans to integrate Cuba and Venezuela into Russian Strategic Forces while Hezbollah (Iran) also opens a base in Cuba.

[Ryan Ruck]

Saw this coming...

$71M: Russia Triples Price to Fly U.S. Astronauts to Space Station

August 2, 2013

Russia will charge the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) $71 million to transport just one American astronaut to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard its Soyuz spacecraft in 2016.

That’s more than triple the $22 million per seat the Russians charged in 2006, according to a July 8 audit report by NASA’s inspector general. (See NASA IG-13-019.pdf)

NASA spent $60 billion of U.S. taxpayer dollars to help build the ISS and that figure would increase to $100 billion if the cost of using space shuttles to assemble the ISS was factored in, the IG report noted.

NASA still contributes $3 billion annually to cover the space station’s operating costs, and signed an agreement to provide the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space an additional $15 million annually “to manage non-NASA research on the ISS.”

But NASA has little choice but to pay Russia's inflated ticket prices. Ever since August 2011, when the U.S. space agency mothballed its 30-year-old space shuttle program, NASA has had no way of getting American astronauts to the space station. The Russian Soyuz is now “the only vehicle capable of transporting crew to the ISS,” the IG report noted.

Monopoly has its advantages. In 2006, the price tag for the one seat NASA purchased on the Soyuz was $22 million. Four years later, the Russians increased the cost to $25 million. It went up again - to $28 million - in the first half of 2011.

“During the second half of 2011, the price per seat jumped to $43 million. The price has continued to increase. For example, the price of purchased seats for launches in 2014 and 2015 are $55.6 million and $60 million, respectively,” the audit report noted.

“In April, NASA signed another deal with Russia valued at $424 million for six additional seats to carry NASA astronauts to the Station during 2016 through June 2017, and the price per seat has increased to $71 million” – more than triple what the Russians charged in 2006.

NASA’s attempts to “end its reliance on the Soyuz for crew transportation to the ISS” is not only due to concerns about the escalating costs, the IG noted. “Reliance on the Soyuz limits the amount of research conducted on the ISS because the Soyuz does not have the capacity to support the maximum number of crew members that can inhabit the Station.”

Because of the Soyuz’s three-person capacity, and the need to keep two Soyuz capsules at the ISS at all times in case the need for emergency evacuation arises, only six crew members can safely live aboard the ISS at any particular time. But this greatly limits the amount of time the space station crew is able to devote to scientific research, the main mission of the ISS.

“According to the ISS Program Office, a seventh crew member could potentially add about 33 hours per week to the current amount of crew time devoted to research – a 94 percent increase,” according to the report.

But CASIS was only able to enroll 50 paid members in fiscal year 2012, collecting “a total of $3,200 in membership fees.” And NASA’s attempts to enlist commercial partners through its 2010 Commercial Crew Program has had only limited results thus far.

Attracting private investment for the ISS is proving difficult, the IG noted, in part because “less costly ground-based research options may be available in some cases,” and “potential users may be reluctant to allocate funds towards research when the likelihood of profitable results is risky.”

[American Patriot]

Well... at some point the United States becomes "That which was...."

I think we're pretty much there.

I can't really say what day it might be but I think it was yesterday.

[Ryan Ruck]

NASA Seeks Bidders To Demolish Shuttle Facilities, Storied Cape Hangar

September 2, 2013

While NASA has made some progress finding outside money to maintain surplus space shuttle infrastructure at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the historic launch center will inevitably shrink in the post-shuttle era, as an Aug. 23 solicitation for demolition services shows.

NASA wants to demolish 46 structures covering some 17,000 square meters of property at the Kennedy and nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Kennedy covers about 600 square kilometers of Florida coastline. The much smaller Cape, which is just southeast of the NASA center, covers about 5 square kilometers. NASA estimates the cost of the envisioned fixed-price contract — including four options that would stretch its performance period to 2.5 years — will be between $5 million and $10 million. Responses to the solicitation are due Sept. 20.

The base contract calls for a complete stripping down of office space in Towers D, E and F of Kennedy’s Vertical Assembly Building, after which only bare concrete flooring would be left in those spaces, according to NASA’s request for proposals. The Vertical Assembly Building itself will be maintained for the Space Launch System (SLS) heavy-lift rocket NASA is building and plans to launch from Kennedy’s Launch Complex 39B.

The base period also includes demolition of one of the three buildings at Kennedy’s Hypergolic Maintenance Facility, a three-building complex about 13 kilometers south of the Vertical Assembly Building. The Hypergolic Maintenance Facility is where the space shuttle orbiters’ reaction control thrusters — which were used for fine maneuvering and deorbit burns — were processed and stored. A concession building and a waste water treatment facility are also slated for demolition, under the base contract.

Also up for demolition are Cape Canaveral’s Hangar AF and Hangar S. In the early days of the U.S. crewed space program, the first U.S. astronauts were quartered at Hangar S. Alan Shepard, the first American in space, and John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth, both stayed at Hangar S before their historic flights.

In 2012, NASA decided it would not spare Hangar S from the wrecking ball by designating it as a historic place. The decision sparked local outcry in Florida, which has not prevented NASA from seeking proposals for tearing the building down.

The center’s shrinking footprint is only beginning to reflect the radical drop-off in work done there. Today, the Kennedy Space Center employs 2,085 civil servants and 5,771 contractors and tenants, NASA spokeswoman Amber Philam wrote in an Aug. 29 email. At the end of 2008, when the shuttle program was still going strong and the international space station was still being built, Kennedy supported 2,194 civil servants and 12,710 contractors and tenants.

Rescued From Razing

Since January 2011, NASA has been looking for ways to avoid demolishing idle infrastructure at Kennedy by finding someone else to pay for its upkeep. One notable success includes turning one of three shuttle Orbiter Processing Facilities over to Space Florida, the state’s aerospace economic development agency. In 2012, Space Florida sublet Orbiter Processing Facility-3 to Boeing Space Exploration of Houston, which plans to construct its CST-100 space capsule there. CST-100 is one of three NASA subsidized spacecraft competing to replace the shuttle as the agency’s means of sending astronauts to the international space station.

The infrastructure preservation effort that began in 2011 also birthed the lately contentious plan to lease Pad 39A, one of two disused shuttle launch facilities at Kennedy, to a commercial user.

In May, NASA released a call for proposals to lease Pad 39A that was answered by both Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX), Hawthorne, Calif., and Blue Origin, Kent, Wash.

SpaceX, which has flown two contracted cargo delivery missions to the space station for NASA and amassed a large backlog of commercial satellite launches with its Falcon 9 rocket, wants exclusive use of Pad 39A. The pad is a potential launch site for the Falcon Heavy launcher SpaceX is developing. Blue Origin, which is working on orbital rockets and spacecraft but has so far tested only suborbital craft, would turn 39A into a pay-to-play multiuser facility.

Under SpaceX’s proposal, all but one commercial user wishing to launch from Kennedy would share Pad 39B with SLS. Under Blue Origin’s proposal, SLS would get 39B to itself and commercial users would share Pad 39A — something SpaceX has said it would not do.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden has said Pad 39B is better suited to be a multiuser facility, but that has not stopped Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.) — whose district is nearby NASA’s lead SLS center, the Marshall Space Flight Center — from questioning the wisdom of a one-customer lease at 39A.

Aderholt, along with House Appropriations commerce, justice, science subcommittee chairman Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), wrote Bolden in July to express their concerns. The lawmakers said SLS would need a backup launch pad if it did not have exclusive control of Pad 39B, and that Pad 39A would not be an option if SpaceX were awarded an exclusive lease.

An official response was delivered Aug. 2 in a letter from L. Seth Statler, NASA’s associate administrator for intergovernmental affairs, who said SLS’s prelaunch operations would be significantly streamlined, compared with the shuttle’s, and that the big rocket required no backup pad.

“Unlike the Space Shuttle, Space Launch System payloads, including the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, will be integrated with the rocket before the rocket is rolled to the pad,” Statler wrote in his letter. “Accordingly, even at launch rates considerably higher than forecasted for SLS, [Pad] 39B will have a considerable amount of availability for other uses, and a second pad for SLS is not needed.”

Statler added that, one way or another, NASA would decide what to do with Pad 39A before Oct. 1, after which the agency will no longer pay to maintain the facility.

[vector7]

Rogozin advised the USA to use trampolines instead of "Unions" for delivery of astronauts to ISS



Against sanctions entered against Russia the astronauts to ISS by means of a trampoline. "Having analysed sanctions against ours kosmoproma, I suggest the USA to deliver the astronauts to ISS by means of a trampoline" — the Deputy Prime Minister in the microblog wrote to Twitter on Tuesday, April 29. Earlier on Tuesday Rogozin declared to journalists that the anti-Russian sanctions will surely return to the USA and the European Union a boomerang. "I will honestly tell, the question of sanctions causes in me certain emotions though as the member of the administrative board of the government should restrain, but they already got the sanctions. Behave outrageously, behave in an unseemly way, don't understand that sanctions — it always the boomerang which will return and will very painfully strike on the one who started it" — quotes it RIA Novosti news agency. Speaking about restrictions against space-rocket branch of Russia, the Deputy Prime Minister emphasized that by means of sanctions of the USA try "to smooth out the Russian markets of industrial services".

However, according to him, first of all the European Union and the European space agency are endangered. On the eve of the USA expanded the list of sanctions against Russia in connection with a situation in Ukraine. Seven high-ranking officials and 17 companies entered it — in particular, Rostekh state corporation. It is remarkable that today delivery of crews to ISS is carried out by exclusively Russian ships "Union". Moreover, Americans pay about 70 million dollars for one place in a ship cabin. Expanded the list of sanctions of the European Union, published on Tuesday, the Russian corporations of space branch didn't mention. Nevertheless 15 people entered it.


US astronauts should use trampolines to get into space, Russian official says

Published April 30, 2014FoxNews.com

A Russian official angered over new sanctions that the United States imposed on Russia over the Ukraine crisis is suggesting that American astronauts get to the International Space Station by using trampolines instead of rockets.

"The United States introduced sanctions against our space industry... We warned them, we will reply to statements with statements, to actions with actions," Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin, who heads Russia's defense industry, said on Twitter, according to Reuters.

American astronauts depend on Russian rockets to get to the ISS, but after the U.S. imposed sanctions – which deny export licenses for high-tech items that could aid Russia’s military -- Rogozin offered up a different idea.

"I propose that the United States delivers its astronauts to the ISS with the help of a trampoline," he said.

But analysts told Reuters that Russia is unlikely to suspend its shuttle service to the ISS, as NASA provides essential financing for the effort, paying more than $60 million per person to get them into space.

Still, Russia is expected to be hit hard by the sanctions, and five upcoming commercial satellite launches -- contracted by foreign clients at a Russian space center -- could be at risk.

Earlier this month, NASA was also banned from contacting the Russian government.

"This is a very sensitive issue since our defense industry was completely unprepared for such developments," Sergei Oznobishchev, the director at the Institute for Strategic Assessments think tank in Moscow, told Reuters. "Both sides will suffer but Russia will lose out more in terms of technology transfer."

Analysts say Russia lags behind in production of high-tech electronic equipment, such as microchips for satellites, and is reliant on imports from Western nations.

[American Patriot]

We could totally do that!

[American Patriot]

Russia to Ban US From Space Station in Sanctions Retaliation

14 Wednesday May 2014
Posted by Mary W. in Foreign Policy, Russia, Space, Ukraine, US News
≈ Leave a comment

Tags
International Space Station, ISS, retaliation, Russia, Sanctions, Ukraine

Russia cast doubt on the long-term future of the International Space Station, a showcase of post-Cold War cooperation, as it retaliated on Tuesday against U.S. sanctions over Ukraine.
Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said Moscow would reject a U.S. request to prolong the orbiting station’s use beyond 2020. It will also bar Washington from using Russian-made rocket engines to launch military satellites.
Moscow took the action, which also included suspending operation of GPS satellite navigation system sites on its territory from June, in response to U.S. plans to deny export licenses for high-technology items that could help the Russian military.
“We are very concerned about continuing to develop high-tech projects with such an unreliable partner as the United States, which politicizes everything,” Rogozin told a news conference.
Washington wants to keep the $100 billion, 15 nation space station project in use until at least 2024, four years beyond the previous target.
Moscow’s plan to part ways on a project which was supposed to end the “space race” underlines how relations between the former Cold War rivals have deteriorated since Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimea region in March.
Since the end of the Space Shuttle project, Russian Soyuz spacecraft have been the only way U.S. astronauts can get to the space station, whose crews include mostly Americans and Russians, as well as visitors from other countries.
At a time when Moscow is struggling to reform its accident-plagued space program, Rogozin said U.S. plans to deny export licenses for some high-technology items were a blow to Russian industry. “These sanctions are out of place and inappropriate,” Rogozin said. “We have enough of our own problems.”
Moscow’s response would affect NK-33 and RD-180 engines which Russia supplies to the United States, Rogozin said. “We are ready to deliver these engines but on one condition that they will not be used to launch military satellites,” he said.
RD-180 engines are used to boost Atlas 5 rockets manufactured by United Launch Alliance (ULA), a partnership of Lockheed Martin and Boeing that holds a virtual monopoly on launching U.S. military satellites.
Read more at Newsmax