Discovery 'Go' for May 31 Launch

NASA senior managers completed a review Monday of space shuttle Discovery's readiness for flight and selected May 31 as the official launch date for the STS-124 mission. Commander Mark Kelly and his six crewmates are scheduled to lift off to the International Space Station at 5:02 p.m. EDT. The Discovery's 14-day mission will include three spacewalks and is to be the second of three missions on which astronauts will install components of the Japanese Kibo laboratory.

Mars Landing Set for May 25 7:53 p.m.

NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander is preparing for touch down on the Red Planet May 25 and begin a three-month mission to taste and sniff fistfuls of Martian soil and buried ice. On landing day, May 25, live landing commentary will air on NASA TV as the spacecraft approaches a 7:53 p.m. EDT landing.

The Phoenix Mars Lander blasted-off from Cape Canveral, Flordia on Saturday, August 4, 2007. The mission is previewed here.

Florida and Virginia Await Launch Pad Decision for Taurus II/COTS

Minotaur-1 on Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport launch pad.

The Orbial Sciences Corporation Taurus II/COTS program launch base site location is eagerly being awaited by space advocates along the East Coast after an announcement delay. The Florida legislature enacted three initiatives to seek to boost the prospects for the commercial space industry - matching the Virginia offer.

Both Virginia and Florida now have enacted protections from lawsuits for the nascent space tourism businesses, tax incentives, and millions of dollars for investment in launch pad infrastructure improvements.

Virginia's most important advantages are: slightly easier boost inclination to the space station, less demand for range and launch delay conflicts, and Orbital being based in Virginia and not far from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport.

Russians Said to be Building Space Tourist Vehicle: No Timeline Set

A private Russian company has ordered the Myasishchev Experimental Machine-building Plant to design a tourist spacecraft to compete in the global market to loft humans to space and back.

"The enterprise is working on documentation and a draft design and is completing the technical feasibility study for the system. A privateRussian company is fully financing the project," a company spokesperson told Interfax-AVN but declined to name the exact firm.

As proposed the spacecraft would be raised to an altitude of several kilometers by a transport aircraft. Then the spacecraft boosts and flies to an altitude of about 100 kilometers, where space tourist passengers would experience zero gravity.

Amazingly, the Russian-made proposal is being designed for two pilots and 14 passengers with the number of passenger seats capable of being increased in the future. The spacecraftweighs about 27 tonnes, the press service said. It is expected that a Myasishchev VM-T Atlant will be used as atransport aircraft. There are two Atlant aircraft in Russia. "It is planned that both aircraft will be used under the flight program," the press service said.

Launch Pad Decision Time at Orbital

After being selected by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration last February to demonstrate a new space transportation system for delivering cargo to the International Space Station, Orbital Sciences Corporation is expected to make a final decision on launch pad utilization between the Wallops Island Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Virginia or Cape Canaveral, Florida this week.

In a three-year, $320 million cooperative program, NASA will invest $170 million and Orbital will contribute $150 million (including its planned Taurus II launch vehicle development investment) in the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) project. In its first phase, the COTS project will involve the development and flight demonstration of a commercial cargo delivery system to low Earth orbit with the potential to support ISS operations following the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2010.

The initial announcement included a proposal to launch from Virginia's fledgling FAA-licensed commercial spaceport. But after intense lobbying by Florida aerospace interests, Orbital Sciences Corporation opened the launch site to bid. Both states have reportedly offered packages to lure the new Taurus II medium-lift rocket.

Orbital’s COTS demonstration mission is scheduled to take place in the fourth quarter of 2010. Subject to NASA’s future requirements, Orbital will be prepared to carry out several follow-on operational COTS missions in 2011 and to conduct as many as eight operational ISS cargo flights a year by 2012 and 2013. The Cygnus spacecraft to be launched aboard the Taurus II rocket will be capable of delivering up to 2,300 kg of cargo to the ISS and will be able to return 1,200 kg of cargo from the ISS to Earth.

Virginia Provides Spaceport Bonds

The Virginia General Assembly today adopted a multi-million dollar public bond package known as the 21st Century Capital Improvement Program which includes new funding for the Virginia Commercial Space Flight Authority to make significant infrastructure upgrades to the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport. The spaceport bond package enjoyed strong bi-partisan support from Governor Tim Kaine and the Legislature. The funding measure comes on the heels of the Virginia ZeroGravity-ZeroTax in 2008 and the Space Flight Liability and Immunity Act in 2007.

2 in 3 Vote for Spaceport America Tax District in Sierra County New Mexico

Spaceport America moved more from vision-to-reality today with nearly a 2 to 1 majority favoring the .25c gross recepits tax on each $100 spent to aid in the construction of the first purpose-dedicated $200-million commercial spaceport at a spot in the high desert known to locals as "Upham."

The raw votes totals were 2,046 voting in favor of the spaceport and 1,066 voting against in a huge victory for New Mexico spaceport advocates leading New Mexico Spaceport Authority (NMSA) Executive Director Steve Landeene to say, “The people of Sierra County have made a commitment to improve the quality of life for themselves and their children."

The certified vote total will enable formation of a new spaceport tax district providing part of a small revenue stream to assist construction of Spaceport America. In November, voters in adjacent Otero County will go to the polls to decide on a similar tax in that county. The state of New Mexico will provide the bulk of the $200-million for the new facility.

In the meantime, NMSA officials will continue to seek their site operator’s license from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) along with a finalized agreement from Virgin Galactic as the spaceport’s anchor tenant, both of which conditions must be met prior to the project moving forward. More from MSNBC and the Las Cruces Sun-News.

New Mexico Spaceport Vote Tuesday

Sierra County, New Mexico voters will have their say on Spaceport America Tuesday as the polls open to decide a .25% gross receipts tax referendum to help fund the $198-million dollar state-supported commercial space launch facility. The first-of-its-kind commercial spaceport is now planned for operation in 2010.

Virgin Galactic has added more voter-incentive to pass the referendum by offering one local resident each year of operation the opportunity to fly to space for free - a $200,000 value - from Upham.

A rejection of the tax by Sierra County voters could cripple the entire spaceport project because of conditions that must be met to access state funding for the facility at the time of creation of the spaceport tax district.

Early voting continues in Sierra County through today (Saturday). The election will take place from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday. A high voter turnout is expected.

Ballistic Re-Entry for Soyuz TMA-11

Soyuz Re-Entry Capsule

Departing the International Space Station last evening, South Korean Spaceflight Participant Yi So-Yeon, Russian flight-engineer Yuri Malenchenko and the US Commander Peggy Whitson boarded the Soyuz TMA-11 capsule only to ride a flaming hot "ballistic re-entry" - an uncontrollable, steep trajectory, much shorter than the planned path home exposing the crew to 10 times normal Earth gravity. But all ended safely after the spacecraft landed near the Kazakh border, south-east of the Russian city of Orsk and 260-miles off course. [Video 1 and Video 2 and The New York Times]

Oddly, in a unusal statement to reports post-landing Russian Federal Space Agency chief Anatoly Perminov seemed to blame women being on the Soyuz for the spacecraft being off course and in the ballastic re-entry telling AP: "You know in Russia, there are certain bad omens about this sort of thing, but thank God that everything worked out successfully. Of course in the future, we will work somehow to ensure that the number of women will not surpass [the number of men]. This isn't discrimination. I'm just saying that when a majority [of the crew] is female, sometimes certain kinds of unsanctioned behavior or something else occurs, that's what I'm talking about."

Soyuz TMA-1 in May 2003 and Soyuz TMA-10 in October 2007 also made ballistic descents to Earth from the space station. The ballistic re-entry is a degraded mode for landing. Ideally reentering spacecraft need to generate a small amount of lift to keep them at high altitudes for as long as possible to avoid the strain of 10G's on the crew.

Peggy Whitson Sets New Space Record

Peggy Whitson, US Astronaut and the first international space station female commander, will set a new American record with 377 cumulative days in space by the time she lands in Kazakhstan aboard the Russian Soyuz TMA-11 on Saturday [Whitson bio video].

Whitson took the American spaceflight record from fellow NASA astronaut Mike Foale, who spent 373 days, 18 hours and 18 minutes in orbit during six career spaceflights that included a tour as ISS commander during the Expedition 8 mission between 2003 and 2004.

During Whitson's most recent tenure as the international space station commander, she participated in the installation of Harmony, Columbus, the first part of Kibo module additions as well as the docking of the Jules Verne space freighter, three space shuttles, and another Soyuz spacecraft. She commanded Americans, Russians, an Italian, a Frenchman, a German, a South Korean, and a Japanese crew at the station during the most recent stint as the ranking space station officer.

Russian cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev holds the record for the most days in orbit with stints aboard two U.S. shuttle flights and four long-duration missions to the Space Station Mir and ISS for a total of 803 days in space.

NASA Bets on Commercial Launch Firms to Resupply Station Post 2011

The National Aeronsautics and Space Administration is not asking the US Congress to reauthorize the purchase of the Russian Progress resupply spacecraft after 2011. Instead, the space agency is betting on commercial launch firms SpaceX or Orbital Sciences Corporation to fill the demand along with bartered trades with Europe and Japan for use of their respective cargo space freighters.

According to a Request for Proposal [RFP] issued last week, NASA will seek to purchase transportation to the ISS for at least 20 metric tons of cargo between 2010 and 2015, when NASA's Orion crew exploration vehicle is scheduled to begin flying astronauts and cargo.

Europe has lofted its forst new Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) to the station this year and Japan's planned H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) is slated to fly next year.

Moon People vs. Ring People at Saturn

Cassini mission planners have been extended by two-years into 2010 and sixty additional orbits of the Lord of the Rings - Saturn. The tour plan selected includes 26 more flybys of the hydrocarbon-filled moon Titan, ice-spewing Enceladus will get seven more encounters, close encounters with several other Saturnrian moons, more study of the planet's famous rings and the gas giant's magnetosphere. The route selected pitted the "moon people" against the "ring people." [VIDEO] The Cassini mission cost is estimated at $3.27 billion by NASA and the ESA - and worthy of every single penny.

Rocket Racing League to Takes to Sky

"Gentlemen, start your rocket engines!" -vid

The Rocket Racing League is ready to take to the skies at varied venues around the United States beginning August 1 and 2 with the first Exhibition Race of the Rocket Racing League® to be held at EAA AirVenture in Oshkosh, Wisconsin to be followed by the Reno National Championship Air Races (Reno, NV) - September 10-14; the X Prize Cup (Las Cruces, NM) - TBD 2008; and the Aviation Nation, Nellis AFB, (Las Vegas, NV) - November 8-9. [VIDEO Promo; an EZ-Rocket demo flight VIDEO in New Mexico in 2005; and earlier test in Majove VIDEO].

Full-fledged racing competition should begin in 2009, reports The New York Times. The news of the events is spreading through the media at MSNBC, New Scientist, Fox News, Wired, and the Las Cruces Sun-News.

ONE YEAR: ARES 1-X Countdown Begins

The countdown clock is ticking at Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39B to April 15, 2009 for the first "shakedown" test flight of NASA's new flagship - the developmental Ares 1-X. Three subsequent unmanned test flights of the Ares 1-X first stage will follow with a "dummy" second stage and Orion capsule providing "real-life" weight. The 327-foot booster rocket will loft humans on flights to the space station by 2015 and the Moon before the end of 2020 - if all goes as planned. [Ares 1 Test Flight Animation Videos One, Two, Three and Four.]

US Navy-JPL Bots May Put Telescope on the Moon in the Next Decade

The United States Naval Research Laboratory and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory are working to place a telecope on the moon using robot rovers sometime in the not-so-distant future. Called the Dark Ages Lunar Interferometer, the DALI mission is still in its conceptual stages, but the rovers that would be delivered to the moon via lander need to be agile, able to work together, lightweight and multitudinous. One such concept provided by JPL — is the insect-like ATHLETE [see video or video].

The larger problem is energy - how to power the robots to do the work over time? The 'bots need to run for long stretches, be able to recharge their power stores and can't use heavy components that would drastically increase the mission payload. Such is one of the challenges to advance energy technology as a part of the Decadal Survey Committee.

ONE HOT FOTO: ISS Transit of the Sun

John Stetson photographed the International Space Station transiting the sun on April 8th. "The transit movie lasts about 11 seconds," he says, "but the actual transit lasted less than one second." The silhouette traces the space station's impressively long and recently unfurled double solar arrays. The ISS appears to be skimming the surface of the sun, it is only 200 miles above Earth. Even so, this is one hot foto!