NASA Wants More Long-Term Guinea Pigs to Study How Space Changes Us

Two years ago, NASA began a unique experiment. It put a person in space for an entire year to see what happens. The person it chose to be its guinea pig was Scott Kelly, an experienced astronaut who also happened to have a twin on Earth. When Kelly got back from his year in space, NASA scientists could compare him and his brother to find out what living long-term in space does to the human body.

NASA has spent the past year learning all about the effects of zero-gravity on the human body, and one thing’s clear: It needs more test subjects. Now that Kelly has provided the agency with basic information, many of NASA’s scientists are hoping that follow-up experiments with more astronauts can provide them with a more detailed picture.

Read more at: Popular Mechanics

Orion Spacecraft Enjoying Calmer Seas Ahead of All-Hands Review

Preparations involving the Exploration Mission -1 (EM-1) Orion are enjoying a relatively trouble-free processing flow at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC). Milestones are being reached on all of the crew module elements, ahead of an All-Hands review that will take place in both the US and Italy. The only issue reported of late related to bracket attach hole threaded inserts, highlighting the lack of more pressing problems that Orion has struggled with over the years.

Over a decade in the making and several billion dollars later, Orion will finally get to fly on the first Space Launch System (SLS) mission. However, that launch won’t take place until deep into 2020, after NASA recently admitted the “risk-informed” target was the realistic goal for EM-1, despite continued wishes to launch by the end of 2019.

Read more at: NASA Spaceflight

Astroscale to Partner with SSTL on Orbital Debris Removal Mission

Astroscale, a company developing technologies for removing orbital debris, announced Nov. 21 it has awarded a contract to Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) to develop one part of an upcoming demonstration mission.

In a ceremony during a Royal Aeronautical Society conference here on the commercialization of space, leaders of the two companies signed the contract for the target spacecraft that will be used on the End-of-Life Service by Astroscale demonstration, or ELSA-d, mission launching in the first half of 2019. Terms of the contract were not disclosed.

Read more at: Spacenews

SpaceX Resuming Launches from Damaged Pad40 on Dec. 4 with Station Resupply Flight for NASA; Covert Zuma Remains on Hold

After postponing last week’s liftoff of the covert ‘Zuma’ spy satellite due to last minute concerns about the reliability of the payload fairing encapsulating it while poised for liftoff at KSC pad 39, SpaceX is set to at last resume launches from their previously damaged and now repaired Cape Canaveral pad 40 with a cargo resupply mission for NASA to the International Space Station (ISS) on Dec 4.

NASA and SpaceX have jointly decided to move forward with the Dragon CRS-13 cargo blastoff apparently because the mission does not involve use of the problematical payload fairing that halted last weeks planned Falcon 9 launch with the rocket and the mysterious Zuma payload.

Zuma was ready and waiting at pad 39A for the GO to launch that never came.

Read more at: Universe Today

This Man is About to Launch Himself in his Homemade Rocket to Prove the Earth is Flat

Seeking to prove that a conspiracy of astronauts fabricated the shape of the Earth, a California man intends to launch himself 1,800 feet high on Saturday in a rocket he built from scrap metal.

Assuming the 500-mph, mile-long flight through the Mojave Desert does not kill him, Mike Hughes told the Associated Press, his journey into the atmosflat will mark the first phase of his ambitious flat-Earth space program.

Hughes’s ultimate goal is a subsequent launch that puts him miles above the Earth, where the 61-year-old limousine driver hopes to photograph proof of the disc we all live on.

Read more at: Washington Post

XCOR Files Financials with Bankruptcy Court

Beleaguered XCOR Aerospace has filed its financials with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of California. XCOR filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy Nov. 8. Chapter 7 involves liquidation to pay off creditors; however, the Midland-headquartered space company doesn’t have much in assets.

XCOR claims it has $1.1 million in assets — mostly through receivables — while liabilities totaling nearly $27.5 million, according to bankruptcy documents filed Friday. The company reported just $1,424.66 in cash.

No value was given to the Lynx MK1, a spaceplane in development that would take off and land horizontally. Documents say the Lynx would require between $15 million and $20 million to finish. An estimated $25 million to $30 million was invested. The promise of the Lynx enticed the Midland Development Corp. in 2012 to offer XCOR an upfront incentive of $10 million to relocate its headquarters from Mojave, California, to Midland. XCOR never completely moved operations to the Tall City.

Read more at: MRT

The Short Life and Death of a Space Tourism Company

In October 2016, spacecraft and rocket engineering firm XCOR Aerospace tweeted a link to a video. In it, the company’s co-founder, Jeff Greason, outlined his vision for a spaceplane that would be almost as easy and reliable to operate as a commercial jet. “The way to make money in space transportation is the Southwest Airlines model,” he told a documentary film crew. “You keep the wheels in the wheel well. Every minute that [a vehicle] is not in the air gathering revenue is a minute wasted.”

XCOR’s Lynx would be just such a vehicle: a two-seat spaceplane that could take off from conventional runways, use its innovative rocket engines to blast into space, swoop back down to Earth, and do it all over again, up to four times daily. The Lynx promised to revolutionize high-altitude research and unlock suborbital tourism for the masses

Read more at: Air and Space Magazine

Virgin Orbit Wins First Defense Department Launch Contract

Virgin Orbit announced Nov. 16 that it has received its first launch contract for a LauncherOne mission from a Defense Department agency.

The company said the U.S. Air Force’s Space Test Program partnered with the Defense Innovation Unit Experimental (DIUx) to make the launch award to Virgin Orbit through an other transactions agreement. The launch will carry a selection of Space Test Program payloads to be chosen closer to launch.

The award was the result of months of talks between the company and the Defense Department. “We spent the better part of six months or so in discussions,” said Dan Hart, chief executive of Virgin Orbit, in a phone interview. The company found common ground with DIUx, whose mission is to accelerate development of commercial capabilities with defense applications. “DIUx has the mission to be agile and really drive forward, so we were able to really approach things quickly and efficiently.”

Read more at: Spacenews

Paul Allen’s Stratolauncher, the Biggest Airplane Ever, Gets Ready for Takeoff

When you have the wealth of billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen what do you want for Christmas? After all, the guy has two yachts, one of them one of the world’s largest, a 414-foot vessel named Octopus (suggestions of a Bond villain) with two helicopters and a 10-person submarine, plus nine mansions on Mercer Island in Seattle and homes in London, France, New York, Beverly Hills, and Hawaii.

How about the world’s largest airplane?

During the last two months the desert around Mojave, California, has reverberated with the deep thunder of jet engines being tested. The Mojave airfield is home to a private collective of aerospace futurists, so the folks who live there are used to the sudden eruption of rocket motors flaring up on short runs. But this was different: recurrent and long runs of multiple jet engines.

Read more at: Daily beast

Dream Chaser Through Critical Landing Test, Prepares for Orbital Flights

With Sierra Nevada Corporation’s Dream Chaser spaceplane through a successful and critical Approach and Landing Test milestone, the company is now shifting gears to focus on the all-important first orbital flight of Dream Chaser No Earlier Than 2020.  That orbital flight will be part of Sierra Nevada Corporation’s fulfillment of NASA’s CRS2 Commercial Resupply Services cargo transportation effort for the International Space Station.

Dream Chaser’s second Approach and Landing Test (ALT-2) was a resounding success, with Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) noting that all flight objectives were achieved and data points obtained – including some regarding the Thermal Protection System and flight avionics software that flew for the first time on the second ATL flight.

Read more at: NASA Spaceflight

MIT Team Wins Mars City Design Contest for ‘Redwood Forest’ Idea

A team of engineers and architects from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has won the top prize for architecture in 2017’s international Mars City Design competition, which asks participants to design habitats that could one day be built on the Red Planet.

The competition, sponsored by both NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA), is one of many that asks participants to come up with creative solutions to the problems these agencies anticipate in the journey to Mars.

Like other contests before it, the Mars City Design competition aims to solve the problem of building livable and sustainable spaces on the Red Planet, from either the limited cargo astronauts would be able to bring with them or indigenous Martian resources.

Read more at: Space.com

Building for a Future in Space

Since the dawn of the human race, mankind has looked up at the night sky and wondered ‘what’s out there?’ The ancient Greeks and Romans saw the constellations and wove them into their myths of warring gods. The native Americans’ creation story is based on the movements of the sky. The past few hundred years brought with them the birth of a new age, an age of science and deeper understanding of the cosmos, the universe, and our place in it. With this greater understanding, mankind started to dream of flying from Earth into the unknown, of walking on distant planets, floating amongst the stars.

We tend to separate science and imagination into hard facts, and whimsical daydreams, but without the merger of the two, space exploration would never have begun. A certain amount of fantastical thinking is needed to imagine that humans could actually leave planet Earth, a great feat of science and engineering.

Read more at: University Observer

Companies Agree FAA Best Agency to Regulate Non-traditional Space Activities

Representatives of four major companies agreed yesterday that the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation (FAA/AST) is the best federal agency to be placed in charge of regulating non-traditional space activities to ensure compliance with the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.  They also agreed that regulatory certainty is key to the success of their ventures, so although they want a “light hand” of regulation, they do want some.

Lockheed Martin, Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC), Orbital ATK, and Astrobotics were represented on a panel organized by the Space Transportation Association (STA) that also included George Nield, the head of FAA/AST, and was chaired by Mike Gold of MAXAR Technologies.  MAXAR Technologies is the new name of MacDonald Dettwiler & Associates (MDA), which already owned Space Systems Loral and recently purchased DigitalGlobe.  Radiant Solutions is a fourth component of the newly branded company.

Read more at: Space policy online

Progress Slow at SpaceX’s Planned South Texas Spaceport

More than three years ago, SpaceX founder Elon Musk gathered with state leaders at this remote South Texas beach to trumpet it as the future location of the world’s first commercial spaceport.

But so far, the only liftoffs from the shifting dunes are being achieved by seagulls and pelicans.

SpaceX — the Hawthorne, Calif., company started by the Musk with the aim of reducing the cost of space travel and one day facilitating the colonization of Mars — still counts the Boca Chica site in its plans. The company installed two large tracking antennas at the location this year, perhaps the most tangible indication yet of its intended purpose as a launch point for commercial satellites and, eventually, exploration of the solar system.

Read more at: 512tech

Canada’s Early Deep Space Gateway Plans

In January 2018 the International Space Exploration Coordination Group will release third edition of the Global Exploration roadmap.

The roadmap is essentially a step-by-step plan of how a group of 15 national space agencies plans to launch humans past low earth orbit, where the International Space Station (ISS) is, into deep space.

“Mars is the ultimate destination,” Says Pierre Jean. The current director of space exploration and strategic planning for the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) served as the CSA program manager for the International Space Station for six years.

Read more at: SpaceQ

NASA’s Interplanetary War

Is there life on Mars? This is one of the most salient questions in extraterrestrial exploration, but it could be jeopardized by dirty spacecraft carrying Earth microbes. Part of Dr. Catharine Conley’s job, as NASA’s planetary protection officer since 2006, is to prevent that from happening.

In 2011, she discouraged planned visits to “dark streaks” and other “Special Regions” on Mars that might prove breeding grounds for Earth microbes, since the rover was not fully sterilized.

But one does not protect planets without making enemies along the way. With her job now up for grabs, some scientists have unleashed criticisms of Conley’s decision to limit the Curiosity rover’s exploration on Mars.

Read more at: Harvard Politics

Khrunichev Space Center: Successful Hot-fire Test of Angara 1.2 Service Module Conducted

The propulsion system of the light-weight Angara 1.2 Launch Vehicle Service Module, manufactured by the Khrunichev Space Center (part of ROSCOSMOS State Corporation), completed successful hot-fire testing at the Federal State Enterprise “Rocket & Space Industry Research & Test Center” (RSI RTC) test facility (Peresvet, Moscow Region).

The hot-fire tests are the most important and final stage of ground based propulsion system tests prior to flight testing.

During the tests, specialists from the Salyut Design Bureau (a subdivision of Khrunichev Space Center) performed comprehensive checks of the propulsion system components on a test stand. RSI RTC personnel assured safe testing conditions and processed the test results expeditiously.

Read more at: ILS Launch

Why Net Neutrality’s Peril Raises the Stakes for Future Satellite Broadband Options

The Federal Communication Commission’s plan to start rolling back regulations on net neutrality comes as bad news for streaming video providers like Amazon and Netflix, and potentially for consumers as well, but it could also bring more attention to an emerging avenue for broadband: satellite constellations in low Earth orbit.

Put extra emphasis on “could”: Even though net neutrality has been debated for years, the effects of removing the equal-access requirements for the broadband marketplace are by no means clear. And legal challenges could tie up any policy shift for a long time to come.

Simply put, lifting the net neutrality requirements would free up internet service providers to ratchet down or gear up data streams based on what’s being streamed, and by whom.

Read more at: Geekwire

Successful First International Moon Village Workshop at ISU

This week, more than 150 experts, engineers, educators and students from around the world gathered in Strasbourg, France to participate in the first International Moon Village Workshop. The Workshop was jointly organized by the recently-formed Moon Village Association (MVA) and the International Space University (ISU), and was held at the permanent campus of the ISU. The products of the two-day Workshop comprised some two-dozen Moonfocused presentations, as well as the results of eighteen working sessions during which participants discussed topics ranging from the technical framework of the Moon Village concept, prospective government missions and commercial markets for the Moon (including cis-lunar space), future coordination and cooperation vis-à-vis the Moon Village, and the ways in which human culture will influence choices and later be impacted by the expansion of humanity to the Moon.

Read more at: ISU

The Hindu Explains: What is the Space Activities Bill, 2017?

A Bill pending before the Parliament is to encourage both the public and private sectors to participate in the space programme.

It is a proposed Bill to promote and regulate the space activities of India. The new Bill encourages the participation of non-governmental/private sector agencies in space activities in India under the guidance and authorisation of the government through the Department of Space.

According to the draft, as few start-up companies in India have shown interest in space systems activities and as space activities need participation from private sector agencies, “there is an urgent need for a legal environment for orderly performance and growth of space sector.”

Read more at: Hindu

Sweden Eyes Small Satellite Market with Expanded Space Center

The Swedish government has commissioned a feasibility study on the possibility to adapt the country’s Esrange Space Center to launch small satellites.

Built in 1964 and located in Sweden’s north, the Esrange facility was used last April to launch Europe’s largest sounding rocket. The center was officially opened in 1966, and since then, more than 550 sounding rockets and 520 stratospheric balloons have been launched from Esrange, according to data from the state-owned Swedish Space Corporation (SSC) which manages the facility.

The feasibility study is to be jointly prepared by the SSC and the Swedish National Space Agency. The SSC is tasked with managing launch services for sounding rockets and stratospheric balloons from Esrange, operating a network of ground stations for satellite data download, and engineering services for space programs.

Read more at: Spacenews

Marco Rubio’s Reservations Put Trump’s NASA Nominee in Jeopardy

Florida GOP Sen. Marco Rubio continues to harbor deep reservations about Rep. Jim Bridenstine’s nomination to be NASA’s next administrator, dimming the Oklahoma Republican’s chances of running the space agency.

“I remain very concerned about the politicization of NASA, not even because he would do it on purpose but just given some of the resistance he’s already engendered,” Rubio said in an interview Friday. “I don’t think NASA at this critical stage of its history can afford that … As of this moment, I can’t assure anyone that I would support his nomination if it came to a vote.”

Rubio’s comments are his strongest yet and suggest that his initial misgivings when President Donald Trump announced Bridenstine’s nomination in early September have only grown.

Read more at: News-press

Dark features previously proposed as evidence for significant liquid water flowing on Mars have now been identified as granular flows, where sand and dust move rather than liquid water, according to a new article published in Nature Geoscience by the U.S. Geological Survey.

These new findings indicate that present-day Mars may not have a significant volume of liquid water. The water-restricted conditions that exist on Mars would make it difficult for Earth-like life to exist near the surface of the planet.

Scientists from the USGS, the University of Arizona, Durham University (England) and the Planetary Science Institute analyzed narrow, down-slope trending surface features on Mars that are darker than their surroundings, called Recurring Slope Lineae, or RSL. These RSL features grow incrementally, fade when inactive and recur annually during the warmest time of year on Mars. RSL are mostly found on steep rocky slopes in dark regions of Mars, such as the southern mid-latitudes, Valles Marineris near the equator, and in Acidalia Planitia on the northern plains. The appearance and growth of these features resemble seeping liquid water, but how they form remains unclear, and this research demonstrated that the RSL flows seen by HiRISE are likely moving granular material like sand and dust.

Read more at: USGS

Private Spacesuit Undergoes Zero-G Testing to Prepare for Commercial Flights

Next stop, space? A spacesuit from Final Frontier Design did its third round of Canadian flight testing last month in preparation for eventual space tourist flights.

Between Oct. 2 and 5, the company flew its 3G Intra-Vehicular Activity suit on three flights over Ottawa on Falcon 20 jets; each flight had 18 parabolas to simulate microgravity for a few seconds. For the first time, testing was “visor down” on the suit — meaning that the subjects were fully sealed inside.

It was an important challenge for Final Frontier to meet, co-founder Ted Southern told Space.com. During previous Canadian flights in 2015 and 2016, the suit’s visor was up.

Read more at: Space.com

Data From Van Allen Probes Mission Helps Scientists Locate Whistling Space Electrons’ Origins

Scientists have long known that solar-energized particles trapped around the planet are sometimes scattered into Earth’s upper atmosphere where they can contribute to beautiful auroral displays. Yet for decades, no one has known exactly what is responsible for hurling these energetic electrons on their way. Recently, two spacecraft found themselves at just the right places at the right time to witness first hand both the impulsive electron loss and its cause.

New research using data from NASA’s Van Allen Probes mission and FIREBIRD II CubeSat has shown that a common plasma wave in space is likely responsible for the impulsive loss of high-energy electrons into Earth’s atmosphere. Known as whistler mode chorus, these waves are created by fluctuating electric and magnetic fields. The waves have characteristic rising tones — reminiscent of the sounds of chirping birds — and are able to efficiently accelerate electrons. The results have been published in a paper in Geophysical Review Letters.

Read more at: Colorado spacenews

WEF Council on the Future of Space Technologies Discusses Incentives for Space Sustainability

SWF Director of Program Planning Dr. Brian Weeden participated in the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting of the Global Future Councils 2017 held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. from November 11-12, 2017. The annual meeting brought together more than 700 global experts from the WEF’s network of Global Future Councils to identify the latest trends and risks, explore interconnections among issues, and collectively develop solutions to promote innovative thinking on the future.

Dr. Weeden participated as a member of the Council on Future of Space Technologies for the seventh year. The Space Council met to discuss possible incentives for encouraging responsible behavior in space that will enhance space sustainability and help ensure space can continue to enable and accelerate the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Read more at: SWF

Space Firms Focus on Potential Workforce Shortage

Space industry officials say bolstering the industry’s future workforce to offset an expected wave of retirements must become a priority, or some firms will be left scrambling for workers.

The talent pool has attracted newer companies such as SpaceX and Blue Origin, which creates informal hiring competition with legacy companies long established in Central Florida. But the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast found last year that 61.9 percent of all engineers in Brevard were 45 or older, meaning a majority could retire in the next decade or two — and slow innovation.

So building the future talent pipeline, a challenge that also applies to other STEM-related fields, remains a major obstacle.

Read more at: Orlando Sentinel

Weaponisation of Outer Space Must be Prevented, Says Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar

Making a case for protecting outer space as global heritage, Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar said that weaponisation of the frontier needs to be prevented.

Speaking at the “Indian Space Programme: Trends and Opportunities for Industry”, Jaishankar termed Indian space efforts as a “people’s programme”, referring to Prime Minister Modi’s commitment to space diplomacy. “Outer space is an expanding frontier of exploration, and all space-faring countries should protect outer space as heritage,” added Jaishankar. “We must prevent the weaponisation of outer space.”

India does not have a space weapons programme, despite provocations by Chinese tests in the past that included the demonstration of Beijing’s capability to destroy a satellite in orbit. While in theory, similar tests can be carried out by India — scientists say that having mastered the art of putting satellites in orbit, making them collide or take down others can be achieved — a conscious decision has been taken not to open up the new domain.

Read more at: Print

Op-ed | Is the U.S. Ready for China’s ‘Space Militias’?

Economic interests in space continue to rise. In 2016 the global space economy represented $329 billion, and 76 percent of the total was produced through commercial efforts. With some of the most lucrative endeavors like asteroid mining, space tourism, micro satellites, and space colonies still in the early stages of development and application, it’s no wonder economic projections estimate the space sector will grow to $2.7 trillion over the next three decades.

Nations’ militaries will continue to protect vital economic interests, and outer space will be no exception. But how will it happen? Will the United States see peer competitor militaries expand more aggressively into outer space? The answer lies in gray zone tactics and space militias.

Read more at: Spacenews

We’re Drafting a Legal Guide to War in Space. Hopefully We’ll Never Need to Use it

We and our colleagues from around the world – including experts from Australia, Canada, the United States, Russia and China – are undertaking a multi-year project to provide a definitive guide on how law applies to military uses of outer space.

The aim is to develop a Manual on International Law Applicable to Military uses of Outer Space (MILAMOS) that covers times of tension and outright hostility.

The ultimate goal is to help build transparency and confidence between space-faring states. This should reduce the possibility of a war in space, or if it does happen, reduce the impact on the space infrastructure that we have all come to rely on so heavily.

Read more at: Conversation

As the US Air Force Turns its Focus to Space, This Small Team Could Lead the Way

“I believe we will be fighting in space in the next 10 years,” Gen. David Goldfein warns the dozen-or-so Air Force officers gathered in a conference room here. What’s more, the fighter pilot-turned-chief of staff says, “Space superiority is going to be central to who we are as a service.”

As the Air Force — and policymakers at the Pentagon and in Congress — rethink how the military should build and retain this space superiority, it’s clear that the service needs faster, cheaper ways to put spacecraft on orbit. This small office at Kirtland just might show the way.

Created in 2007 by order of the deputy defense secretary, the Operationally Responsive Space office is a handful of uniformed officers who build satellites relatively quickly and cheaply using small teams of contractors and a unique on-base factory. After several years in which Air Force leaders tried to kill the shop — it competes, somewhat, with the Space and Missile Systems Center that has long produced many of the service’s most advanced and costly spacecraft — ORS is now getting praise from the chief of staff.

Read more at: DefenseOne

AFSPC Unveils Tribute to Astronaut Airmen

A group of astronaut Airmen along with Gen. Jay Raymond, Air Force Space Command commander, unveiled a new heritage display at AFSPC headquarters at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado, on November 13, 2017.

“Since 1991, all Air Force astronauts have fallen under the administrative control of Air Force Space Command. We are absolutely proud to have you as AFSPC Airmen,” said Raymond. “In all, 92 Airmen have served as astronauts, and today we dedicate this wall in honor of those who have served.”

Read more at: Colorado Spacenews

Insider Exclusive: America’s ”Booster Belt” – Part One

We only knew that we were traveling to see where rocket components and rockets were made – and little else. SpaceFlight Insider photographer, Vikash Mahadeo, who accompanied me on our week-long foray to several rocket manufacturing facilities along with myself were as prepared as we could be – but we had no idea what to expect. What followed was an experience that would redefine the way we looked at space flight.

When one thinks of space, locations such as Cape Canaveral and Houston spring to mind. Iuka, Mississippi – likely does not top, or even appear on that list. However, Iuka is where Orbital ATK produces the composite components for the Antares, Atlas V, Delta IV, Minotaur and Pegasus rockets – so, perhaps it should be given greater consideration.

With a population just shy of 3,000, Iuka is the county seat of Tishomingo County, Mississippi and Woodall Mountain, the highest point in Mississippi, is located just south of Iuka.

Read more at: Spaceflight Insider

Insider Exclusive: America’s ”Booster Belt” Part Two – Decatur

Located near the Tennessee River, United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Decatur facility is where its Atlas V and Delta IV rockets are assembled and where the new Vulcan launch system is coming together. Situated on some 35 acres, the roughly 1.6 million-square-foot facility is so massive that its roughly 1,000 employees have to get around via golf carts and bicycles. It was day two of our tour and we were looking forward to learning more about the aerospace workers that produce some of the nation’s rockets.

We were greeted at the exterior of the building by a row of geese marching single file, this helped establish the relaxed mood that would be prevalent throughout the day.

We met Lyn Chassagne, a public and media relations officer who we have worked with in the past and, as always, her calm; professional demeanor was a guide in terms of letting us know parameters.

Read more at: Spaceflight Insider

‘Survival in the Skies’: Miniseries Explores Space and Aviation Inventions

One windy day in December 1903, Orville Wright took to the sky in the first heavier-than-air vehicle to stay aloft. The Wright brothers’ first flight lasted 12 seconds, but it ushered in a new era of transportation. Less than 66 years later, Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon. Within the span of a human lifetime, humanity had progressed from being a terrestrial species to becoming a spacefaring one.

A new show from Smithsonian Channel, premiering Tuesday, Nov. 28, will tell the stories behind the incredible pieces of space and aviation technology that made this possible. The four-part series “Survival in the Skies” will feature the stories of the people who made these breakthroughs and the individuals who relied on them for survival as they explored new frontiers.

Read more at: Space.com

Space Safety and Human Performance 1st Edition

Space Safety and Human Performance provides a comprehensive reference for engineers and technical managers within aerospace and high technology companies, space agencies, operators, and consulting firms. The book draws upon the expertise of the world’s leading experts in the field and focuses primarily on humans in spaceflight, but also covers operators of control centers on the ground and behavior aspects of complex organizations, thus addressing the entire spectrum of space actors.

During spaceflight, human performance can be deeply affected by physical, psychological and psychosocial stressors. Strict selection, intensive training and adequate operational rules are used to fight performance degradation and prepare individuals and teams to effectively manage systems failures and challenging emergencies. The book is endorsed by the International Association for the Advancement of Space Safety (IAASS).

Read more at: Elsevier

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