SpaceX landed its rocket… on a barge!

By Benjamin Vermette

SpaceX launched its ninth unmanned cargo resupply mission to the ISS on April 8, 2016 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. (Alan Walters / awaltersphoto.com)

The ambitious company SpaceX launched its ninth unmanned cargo resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) on April 8 2016 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The mission, dubbed CRS-8, will be forever written about in history books.

CEO of Tesla Motors, PayPal, Solar City and SpaceX, young billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk proved his earnest intention of installing a permanent rocket-reusability strategy by landing, for the first time in human history, the first stage of its Falcon 9 rocket on a drone-like barge-ship.

Note that it’s not the first time they succeeded in landing the Falcon 9 on something; they did it on steady ground in Cape Canaveral in December 2015 (click here to read more about this mission).

The following youtube video posted by SpaceX captures their most recent feat. 

Uploaded by SpaceX on 2016-04-09.

Following a perfect launch on Friday afternoon by the Falcon 9 rocket, everyone was becoming excited for another ‘experimental’ rocket landing on a barge. After deploying its Dragon cargo spacecraft into orbit and towards the ISS, the first stage flipped over, found the right trajectory, slowed down from 20,000 km/h, and succeeded in landing on the barge in a non-explosive fashion.

It wasn’t SpaceX’s first try to complete this feat; they’ve already dedicated other rockets to this. In other words, the rockets blew up trying to land on the barge (read more about these attempts in my previous articles: Hubble, SpaceX, Falcon, Messenger and More... and SpaceX Failed to Land Their Rocket on a Barge-ship).Elon Musk called them RUDs (Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly).

But now, it’s a different story. Launching a rocket, deploying gear into space intended for some humans on the ISS, then landing the remaining part of the rocket, all inside 9 minutes, how can this even be physically possible? Well, ladies and gentlemen, I give you Elon Musk.

“It's another step toward the stars,” he said during a press conference.

It is indeed, but what does it mean for the future of space exploration?

Landing the rocket on steady ground, as they did in December 2015, is great. However, landing it at sea is essential for SpaceX’s reusability strategy. After launch, the rocket is hundreds of kilometers east of the Cape. Landing it on an autonomous drone-ship not only saves fuel but when mastered, will also diminish risks.

Adding extra fuel to a rocket for landing may not seem cost-effective, but building a rocket from scratch is way more expensive. As a matter of fact, building a Falcon 9 costs $60 million, while refueling it is only about $250,000.

Musk predicts his reusability strategy to contribute cutting the spending “100-fold”. According to his predictions, SpaceX’s launches’ fees could shrink from $61.2 million (compared to $225 million for its competitor ULA) down to $600 000. This 44 year-old visionary hopes that one rocket will be able to support up to 20 spaceflights.

Even if the space industry-leading company SpaceX performed an out-of-this-world accomplishment, its main mission was of course to respect its contract with NASA, which is to deliver goods to the ISS when needed.

As you may have guessed, this is exactly what they did, the Dragon cargo spacecraft that successfully launched on April 8th was flawlessly delivered to the ISS, where it arrived and docked on April 10th.

But what exactly was on the Dragon spacecraft?

First, there was equipment for an interesting science investigation, which is called the Rodent Research-3-Eli Lilly Investigation.

When humans reside in space, gravity no longer affects their body. This results in decreases in bone density, muscle strength and heart-pumping efficiency. This is why astronauts need to exercise so much in space!

This investigation will use mice to better understand the effects of a particular antibody known for its capability “To prevent muscle wasting in mice on Earth”.

Another science experiment, called Micro-10, “will study fungi in space for the purpose of potentially developing new medicine for use both in space and on Earth”. A couple similar science experiments, generally concerning the study of the human body in space, are now possible due to the arrival of the required equipment on the ISS.

But the major experiment that the Dragon spacecraft carried, was not typical. The Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) is an inflatable module that attaches to the station. It is only a prototype (for now), but the long-term goal is for BEAM to be used in NASA’s future missions to Mars.

After installation on April 16, the inflatable structure grew to attain almost 13 feet in length while having a 10.5-feet diameter.

It is scheduled to stay on the space station for a period of two years, during which the astronauts of the ISS will enter the module three-to-four times a year to retrieve data from the sensors onboard.

If everything goes as planned, Bigelow Aerospace, BEAM’s contractor, might launch another of their prototypes into space by 2020. But this time, it won’t be BEAM, but what they call the autonomous B330 expanding habitat. 

A depiction of how the B330 prototype is expected to look like in 2020. (Bigelow Aerospace)

As a matter of fact, Bigelow Aerospace announced, on April 11, that they have discussed a partnership with the private rocket manufacturer United Launch Alliance (ULA) to launch their B330 prototype in 2020.

The idea of an inflatable space module is promising: it takes less room on a rocket, but once in space, it provides a place for astronauts to live and work. NASA may even consider these modules when the time comes to plan a journey to Mars!

While the ISS is studying medicine in microgravity, hence its motto “Off the Earth for the Earth”, it is also considering prototypes for long-duration spaceflights and studying the effects it would have on a human.

The journey to Mars is happening!

By Benjamin Vermette

The above is an artist's depiction of the view from "Planet Nine". Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC)

Is there a 9th planet in our solar system?

Caltech researchers Konstantin Batygin and Mike Brown have found evidence of a ninth planet in our solar system. 

The planet, dubbed Planet Nine, would have a mass 10 times that of Earth and take 10,000 to 20,000 years to make a single revolution around the Sun, hence its late discovery (which shouldn’t be called a discovery yet). Planet Nine would be orbiting the Sun 20 times further out than does Neptune – the outermost planet –, if it exists, and on a highly-elliptical orbit.

Note that the planet was not observed directly: strange behaviours of some Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) lead to the conclusion that a ninth planet might be required. "Although we were initially quite skeptical that this planet could exist, as we continued to investigate its orbit and what it would mean for the outer solar system, we become increasingly convinced that it is out there," says Batygin, an assistant professor of planetary science. "For the first time in over 150 years, there is solid evidence that the solar system's planetary census is incomplete."

Evidence and a mathematical model was enough to get some astronomers – amateurs and professionals – started on a quest for the observation of Planet Nine.

The whole story started in 2014, when a student of Mike Brown found out that orbital features of some KBOs (small celestial objects beyond Pluto) were similar and thus suggested the presence of a small planet to explain this phenomenon.

Brown, an observer, took the problem to Batygin, who is a theorist, and for a year and a half they worked the problem out. Brown observed the sky as well as the KBOs while Batygin worked out what was possible on the physical standpoint using math and physics. “I would bring in some of these observational aspects; he would come back with arguments from theory, and we would push each other. I don't think the discovery would have happened without that back and forth," says Brown.

Shown here is the possible orbit of Planet Nine along with other distant bodies of our solar system with highly-eccentric elliptical orbits. Caltech/R. Hurt (IPAC) 

Note the irony: Mike Brown, potential discoverer of Planet Nine (if it gets officially discovered), was one of the active astronomers who led to Pluto losing its ‘planet’ status, hence his Twitter handle @plutokiller.

Even if the scientific community isn’t sure the planet exists yet, Brown showed a little confidence on his Twitter profile: “OK, OK, I am now willing to admit: I DO believe that the solar system has nine planets,” he wrote.

Evidence is evidence. Astronomers worldwide are on it: stay tuned for facts.

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New Canadian vision system for the ISS

On January 7 the Government of Canada awarded a $1.7-million contract to Neptec Design Group Ltd. of Ottawa, Ontario, to design and build a new high-technology space vision system for the International Space Station (ISS).

Mounted on Dextre, the vision system will be used to support the inspection and maintenance of the ageing structure of the ISS, as small meteorites and space debris regularly hit the Station. It’s not the first time that Neptec’s vision systems are used in space: it previously designed a laser camera system that, mounted on Canadarm2, was used to inspect the tiles of the retired US Space Shuttle while it was in space.

Using a combination of three sensors – an infrared and a high-definition camera, as well as a 3D laser – the vision system will also assist spacecrafts as they dock with the ISS.

Showing Dextre on the right held by Canadarm2 and holding the vision system (www.asc-csa.gc.ca). 

As the system will launch to the ISS in 2020, its imagery will be available to the public, offering a new view of the station no one ever saw before.

“The Government of Canada is pleased to contribute this new technology that combines these strengths, while giving the world a new vantage point on the International Space Station," said the Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development.

This investment enforces Canada’s role as a reliable space-technology innovator and as a driving force of the world’s space activities.

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SpaceX failed to land their rocket on a barge-ship

The promising private company SpaceX, owned by ambitious billionaire Elon Musk, succeeded in landing its rocket on a steady landing platform in Cape Canaveral on December 21st (Refer to my previous post on January 15 for details on this.)

But that was ‘easy’, they wanted a more challenging test: landing their rocket on a drone-like barge-ship, sailing freely on the sea, for example. 

On January 17, after flawlessly launching and deploying the Jason-3 ocean-mapping satellite, the first stage of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket called the ball. Hovering through 3- to 4-meter waves, the football-field-sized landing platform waited patiently for the booster to perform the final ‘touchdown’. 

The booster found the platform, deployed its landing legs and landed for a couple seconds, and then this happened. The linked video, posted on Elon Musk's instagram page, shows footage of Falcon 9's landing attempt.

This was the third time SpaceX tried to land the Falcon on a ship, and it was almost a charm.

As Musk said on his Instagram and Twitter accounts, a defective collet might have been the mishap’s cause. Collets are intended to secure the locking of the landing legs. As the leg was not locked tightly enough, it could not support the aircraft's weight, and down it went. The root cause may be that condensation from heavy fog at launch got in there and then froze when it got colder in the upper atmosphere, perhaps cracking the collet.

This is a hypothesis, but one thing is for sure: “Definitely harder to land on a ship. Similar to [land on] an aircraft carrier [versus on the ground]: much smaller target area [on the ship], [which is] also translating & rotating,” Musk tweeted.

It’s still a success to me. Launching a rocket at high speeds and making it deploy a satellite takes some innovation, especially when it’s a private company. But making the rocket flip-over in space and come back to Earth from more than 100 km of altitude, making it slow down and find the barge using its fins to control itself and deploy its landing legs is indeed a success to me.

“It’s a freakin’ technological triumph that they can get anywhere near a landing,” wrote Phil Plait, blogger for Slate.

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The Dream Chaser has won the ISS resupply contract award!

On January 14, after delaying the announcement multiple times, NASA finally awarded the second round contract of resupplying the International Space Station (ISS) to three commercial cargo companies. The first round contract was awarded to SpaceX and Orbital ATK in 2008.

The Dream Chaser, previously designed to be a human-carrying spacecraft, was adapted to be unmanned for the possible future cargo missions to the ISS, in case it won the second round contract. And it did!

This amazingly designed spaceship, owned by Sierra Nevada Corporation, will join SpaceX and Orbital ATK, the two other recipients, in 2019, date when the contract will begin service.

Designed by a 50-year-old soviet space shuttle mockup, the Dream Chaser will deliver up to 5500 kg of cargo to the ISS per trip. It will launch on top of a rocket, dock with the station, and when it’s ready it will detach from the orbiting lab and perform a runway landing, just like the American Space Shuttle did.

Image of the cargo version of the Dream Chaser docked to the ISS. (SNC)

Since the Dream Chaser has never flown into orbit, Sierra Nevada said they would drop the spacecraft from a helicopter for it to perform a landing demonstration in the coming months.

Originally, the contract was intended to only have two recipients, but having three is more advantageous. “One of the considerations from an operational standpoint with ISS is it’s really important to have more than one supply chain, and multiple offerers means that at any given time, the sequence of flights could be one Sierra Nevada, SpaceX, Orbital ATK, so if you lose one, you have the ability for another one being right after it from a dissimilar redundancy, or a different supplier, so that’s a big help to us,” said Kirk Shireman, NASA’s International Space Station program manager at the Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The contract provides a minimum of six flights per selectee, from 2019 to 2024, but “it is likely we will buy more than 18 flights, so we have three winners, and if we need more than 18 flights, then we’ll talk about what happens on those flights,” said Shireman.

The exact value of each recipient’s contract is not precisely known, but Orbital ATK said in a press conference that its six original flights are valued at $1.2 to $1.5 billion USD.

HUBBLE, SPACEX FALCON, MESSENGER and MORE...

By Benjamin Vermette

CANADA’S CONTRIBUTION TO SPACE TELESCOPES

April 24, 1990 saw Space Shuttle Discovery launch from Kennedy Space Center with the school-bus-sized Hubble Space Telescope in its payload. More than five years after the last of five shuttle servicing missions, the NASA community (and the whole scientific community around the world) celebrated Hubble’s 25th anniversary on April 24, 2015.

One hundred and fifty-six thousand gigabytes of scientific data transmitted to Earth later, Hubble’s officials are starting to think about its future, and it’s not a straightforward question.

NASA: Hubble alongside Discovery

Hubble’s lifespan “is the biggest question we keep getting from people, because everybody is used to something on Hubble breaking every five years,” explained Jason Kalirai, a researcher at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore.

Even though it’s getting old, Kalirai said NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center engineers are doing a wonderful job managing the telescope’s systems. For now, they estimate that Hubble will keep orbiting in Low Earth Orbit, exploring the mysteries of the universe until, at least, its 30th anniversary.

When Hubble eventually does break down, does NASA actually have a plan to replace it? Of course! The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was first scheduled to launch in 2011, but its launch was put off until October 2018. Unfortunately, the project isn’t just delayed, it’s also vastly over budget.

The JWST is a much bigger and more powerful space telescope than Hubble; it’s as big as a tennis court with a 6.5-meter-diameter primary mirror, compared to the 2.4 meter diameter mirror on the Hubble. Overall, the increased the JWST’s collecting area up to seven times more than Hubble.

When finally launched, the JWST will be placed 1.5 million km from the surface of the Earth, “The JWST … isn’t going to look back towards Earth, it’s going to look out into space and take these brilliant pictures and send them back,” explained Industry Minister James Moore. “So we’ll have a view into space that no other human-beings have ever seen before, and that’s incredibly exciting.”

NASA: Outside the enormous mouth of NASA's giant thermal vacuum chamber, called Chamber A, at Johnson Space Center in Houston, engineers and technicians prepare the chamber for testing the James Webb Space Telescope.

Canada is part of the three major contributors to get the JWST into orbit: NASA and the European Space Agency make up the other two. “What if I told you we were going to build a new space telescope? What if I told you Canada was helping to build that telescope?” asked Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen.

The Canadian Space Agency is providing JWST a Fine Guidance Sensor (FGS) as well as the Near-InfraRed Imager and Slitless Spectrograph (NIRISS), one of the Webb’s four science instruments. Both were designed, built and tested by the Canadian Space Agency.

What is an NIRISS? The light we can see is composed of what is called visible light. There are, however, many other kinds of light, such as infrared light. For instance, infrared light can offer astronomers different sources of information. Many celestial objects, like brown dwarfs and enormous red giant stars, emit mostly infrared light.

NIRISS will also have unique capabilities to find the earliest and most distant object of the Universe, such as the first galaxies ever formed.

The integration of FGS and NIRISS required CSA to add $2.6 million to its contract with COM DEV International Ltd., where the FGS and NIRISS are built and tested.

The Canadian contribution guarantees Canadian astronomers a slice of the action where the observations of space and time by the Webb telescope are concerned. “It’s going to open up a whole new world of scientific discoveries and new ways of looking at the future … It’s going to be a fantastic time of discovery for all Canadians,” said Industry Minister James Moore.

Federal Budget 2015: ISS Commitment Extended to 2024

On April 21, 2015, Minister of Finance Joe Olivier presented the 2015 Canadian federal budget to the Canadian House of Commons.

The budget assumed Canada’s implication in the International Space Station (ISS) until 2024. After previous commitments by NASA and the Russian Space Agency (Roscosmos), both the primary contractors of the station, Canada’s decision to extend its participation in the ISS until 2024 was confirmed.

NASA

As a consequence of this, Canada is responsible for 2.3% of the operating costs of the United States-led segment. That means Canada has the rights to use 2.3% of these module’s resources. For comparison, Japan holds 12.8% of the segments’ rights; European Space Agency (ESA) 8.3%; and NASA pays the remaining 76.6%. The Russians finance their own segments.

Japan and ESA officials said they are thinking of reducing their station’s holding rights. Also, neither has yet confirmed their commitment to the ISS beyond 2020. Does that mean Canada will take greater responsibilities within the space station?

SpaceX CRS-6: Still No Cigars

SpaceX is a private company that helps to resupply the International Space Station (ISS) with basic necessities and science-related equipment.

On April 14, 2015, they launched their 6th unmanned Dragon cargo spacecraft to resupply the ISS, something that needs to be done each 90 days or so. This mission, named SpaceX CRS-6, was postponed multiple times. To be honest, I can’t remember one time when a SpaceX launch wasn’t delayed.

SpaceX likes to try risky and out-of-the-ordinary things. For a second time, they tried to land the first stage of their Falcon 9 rocket on a drone barge, a feat that nobody has ever accomplished.

The first attempt was almost successful, but the first stage ran out of hydraulic fluid causing it to explode. The Falcon 9 rocket has two stages: the first one, also the biggest one, is on the bottom and powered by nine SpaceX Merlin engines. The second stage carries the Dragon spacecraft and is powered by one Merlin engine.

The launch was a success, and then the first stage separated from the second stage about three minutes after launch, as expected, and began falling back toward the landing platform.

After the considerable challenge that is landing a rocket, SpaceX wants the first stage to stand up on the barge.

Take a look at what happened after the second attempt.

Close, huh? The 14-story booster steadied for a brief moment on the “autonomous spaceport drone ship,” as SpaceX likes to call it, before toppling over and causing an impressive explosion caused by an issue with an engine throttle valve.

Everything else went perfectly. Astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, onboard the ISS, grappled the Dragon spacecraft with Canadarm2 on April 17. The payload, carrying more than 4,300 pounds of supplies and other material to support multiple scientific experiments, was delivered successfully to the ISS.

SpaceX’s next attempt to land the first stage of another Falcon 9 rocket will be in June.

R.I.P.: NASA’s MESSENGER Spacecraft

Since March 2011 NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft has been cruising in Mercury’s orbit. It became the second mission to reach Mercury, the first planet starting from the Sun, after Mariner 10’s 1975 flyby.

NASA

MESSENGER, acronym for MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging, helped a lot in characterizing the chemical composition of Mercury’s surface, studying the nature of Mercury’s magnetic field, determining the size and state of the core, and solved many other unprecedented scientific mysteries about the smallest of the four rocky planets. In four years of orbit, it has sent over a quarter of a million images of Mercury back to Earth.

Launched on August 3, 2004, MESSENGER conducted its final orbital manoeuvre on April 6, 2015. It ran out of fuel quickly as the Sun was close by and constantly changing MESSENGER’s orbit.

This lack of propellant lead to the death of the spacecraft: MESSENGER was expected to crash into the planet’s surface in late April or early May. “The sun is pulling on it. The planet is pulling on it. It’s just physics. It has to crash,” said Thomas Zurbuchen of Michigan’s University.

This was inevitable, and the scientists who were part of the MESSENGER group understood it even at the dawn of the mission’s planning. They even took advantage of it! During its hard-to-control orbit, the Mercury-exploring spacecraft went as low as 5km from the surface of the planet, sending back incredibly high-resolution pictures.

MESSENGER successfully completed its mission: to unmask the secrets of Mercury. “We’re at the end of a really successful mission, and we can’t do anything anymore to stop it from doing what it naturally wants to do,” continued Thomas Zurbuchen.

On April 30, 2015, NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft crashed into Mercury’s surface at 3.91 km/second, after traveling 7.8 billion kilometres over 11 years.

Hard Landings and more

By Benjamin Vermette

SpaceX CRS-5: “Kind of” Success

In my last article, I neglected to mention that SpaceX delayed its CRS-5 mission for a third time and finally launched on January 10.

SpaceX is a private company that helps to resupply the ISS (International Space Station) with basic necessities and science-related equipment. It is also known for delaying its missions to ensure successful launches, and as the title above may indicate, even postponing a rocket launch may result in nothing more than a “kind of” success.

CRS-5 was the fifth launch of the Dragon cargo spacecraft aboard a Falcon 9 rocket to resupply the ISS. SpaceX wanted to try something new on the CRS-5 mission: Land the 1st stage of the Falcon 9 rocket on a barge-like drone ship. The Dragon cargo spacecraft is on top of the rocket, with the cargo attached to the two other stages. The first stage is the bottom, powered by nine SpaceX Merlin engines.

At launch, everything went according to plan. About three minutes after launch, the 1st stage separated as expected and began to fall back towards the Earth, toward the landing platform. Normally, after such a landing, the 1st stage of a Falcon 9 rocket should be nicely standing on the barge, but check out this impressive video of what really happened to the 1st stage of SpaceX’s rocket:

Unlike most people, I am not calling this a failure, but rather “a near-success.” It’s very impressive that the booster could find — and actually hit — the barge. And yes, the barge was fine after the collision, needing only minor repairs. There is no doubt in my mind that this event was taken seriously inside SpaceX, but Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX did find some humour in the mishap. “Full RUD (rapid unscheduled disassembly) event. Ship is fine minor repairs. Exciting day!,” he tweeted immediately after the mishap.

Barring the big explosion, everything went great. The Dragon spacecraft carrying science-related equipment docked at the ISS on January 12th.

Maybe next time SpaceX will delay its launch long enough to be able to land the 1st stage of their Falcon 9 rocket on a drone ship. Delaying a mission however, may have nothing to do with success…

Hubble: 100 million stars in one picture

Two-and-a-half million light-years from Earth, the Andromeda Galaxy is slowly moving towards us, preparing to merge with our galaxy, the Milky Way, billions of years from now. The Andromeda Galaxy is our closest galactic neighbour, and the Hubble Space Telescope, a NASA telescope in orbit around the Earth, enjoys taking pictures of it.

But recently, it took an extraordinary picture. This panorama, regrouping over 100 million stars, stretches across about 48 thousand light-years of the galaxy’s disk. “Hubble traces densely packed stars extending from the innermost hub of the galaxy, seen at left,” reads the caption. “Moving out from this central galactic bulge, the panorama sweeps from the galaxy’s central bulge across lanes of stars and dust to the sparser outer disk.”

The picture was revealed at the 225th meeting of the American Astronomical Society, held from January 4-8, 2015, in Seattle. We can’t say exactly when Hubble took this picture, because its images are mostly kept in secret for up a year after they’re taken. One thing I am sure of, however, is that it was made into a mosaic: the image had many exposures and got assembled in this way due to 411 pointings of the telescope.

Scientists can use this image to help them understand other spiral-like alien galaxies that might have light distinctions similar to those of the Andromeda Galaxy, but are farther away.

 

ISS One-Year Expedition

On March 27, 2015, astronaut Scott Kelly (NASA) and cosmonauts Mikhail Kornienko and Gennady Padalka (Russian Federal Space Agency) will get onboard a Russian Soyuz TMA-16M spacecraft due to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, to the International Space Station (ISS).

With Roscosmos’ astronaut Gennady Padalka returning to Earth, Kelly and Kornienko will stay on the ISS until March 2016, completing a one-year space mission. There is however, a third astronaut participating in the ISS One-Year Expedition, even if he’s not on the International Space Station. It’s Mark Kelly, former Naval aviator, just like his twin brother: Scott Kelly. Mark is a retired astronaut, engineer and U.S. Navy Captain. NASA wanted him to participate in science experiments with his twin brother, Scott, who will spend one year on the ISS, while Mark will spend that same year in Houston, Texas, performing experiments that will answer a very interesting question: Identical twins, one on Earth and one in space. After a year, are they still… identical?

“Having Mark as the control subject is really very fortunate. Not only because we’re twins, but he’s also a former astronaut and NASA has data on him going back to 1995,” Scott Kelly said.

The human body was made to live in gravity. Strange things happen to the body in space: bones get fragile, the heart weakens, eyes lose their shape, etc. The brothers will undergo 10 medical and psychological tests each day, measuring bone density, taking sonograms of their eyes, counting the bacteria in their gut, etc. Tests like these will help NASA understand the function of the human body in space and will prove invaluable in preparing and protecting astronauts during lengthy trips in space.

“I’ll probably feel a little bit older than I am right now [when Scott returns to Earth]. But no, I don’t think I’ll feel older than [Mark]. I think according to Einstein’s theories I’ll be a little bit younger,” said Scott while laughing.

Scott was right. According to Einstein’s General Relativity theory, the faster you’re going, the slower time passes. So, with the ISS going at 27,600 km/h, in one year, Scott will gain microseconds. Scott will therefore be a tiny-bit younger than Mark when he comes back to Earth, in March 2016.

Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko will perform many other experiments on the ISS, but most of the experiments will be on the human body and how it adapts during long-term spaceflight.

This mission is a key step towards assuring that the health of astronauts is not compromised, as NASA prepares its next giant leap for humanity (on Mars!).

Two Planets Beyond Neptune?

“The analysis of several possible scenarios strongly suggests that at least two trans-Plutonian planets must exist.”

Maybe you’ve heard about this, but a team of astronomers announced recently that they have indirect evidence that there could be two massive planets beyond Neptune.

I’ve read their journal where they give all their arguments, and it is undoubtedly very interesting. But do not forget, they did not see two planets beyond Neptune, but rather they analysed the weird orbits of trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) and arrived at that conclusion. Note that the NASA infrared survey explorer (WISE) has shown that no planets bigger than Saturn can exist in our solar system, even way out there.

Beyond Neptune, there are a lot of objects similar to asteroids, but they look like comets too. These are called trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs).

The team of astronomers studied in particular what they call “Extreme TNOs,” which are described as TNOs that have really weird orbits and are pushed to the most outer regions of our solar system. They speculate that there may be an explanation for the TNO’s weird orbits: planets at distances of about 40 to 100 billion km out (10 times farther away from the Sun than Neptune is from us).

If you want more detailed explanation of their arguments you can read their journal article (http://arxiv.org/pdf/1410.6307v3.pdf). But again, their evidence is indirect and I am very sceptical about having new planets in our solar system. On the other hand, it is possible and astronomers see planets orbiting other stars at great distances — so why not?

11.2 billion years old: Dang! That’s old...

Using data from NASA Kepler’s mission, a group of astronomers have discovered a solar system in the Milky Way galaxy that they named Kepler-444.

Kepler-444 is a very, very old solar system created when our galaxy was only two billion years old. That makes Kepler-444 11.2 billion years old (the Universe itself is 13.8 billion years old). At two and a half times older than the Earth, Kepler-444 becomes the oldest known system of terrestrial-size planets.

This system is home to five small planets, the biggest one the size of Venus, the smallest close to the size of Mercury. All five planets revolve around their sun in about 10 days, and their orbits are very close to their sun-like star (in comparison, Mercury revolves around our Sun in 88 days and is the closest planet to it) making them very hot, despite the fact that their sun is relatively small (about 25% smaller than ours).

But how do astronomers know the age of a solar system 117 light-years away from us? This was calculated using a method called astroseismology. The surface of the star vibrates constantly, and the type of vibrations depend on the physical properties of the star — mass, gravity, density, size and age. Over many weeks, careful observation delivered the astroseismological results to the astronomers, and that result was: 11.2 billion years old.

Unfortunately, the planets of Kepler-444 are too hot to harbour life. “While this star formed a long time ago, in fact before most of the stars in the Milky Way, we have no indication that any of these planets have now or ever had life on them,” said Steve Howell, Kepler/K2 project scientist for NASA in California. “At their current orbital distances, life as we know it could not exist on these ancient worlds.”

In Memory

“Today we remember and give thanks for the lives and contributions of those who gave all trying to push the boundaries of human achievement.” – Charles F. Bolden. Jr., NASA administrator.

NASA Day of Remembrance, on January 28, remembered the loss of the Apollo 1 crew, STS-51L Challenger crew, STS-107 Columbia crew, and many others who lost their lives in test flights and aeronautic research throughout history.

On January 27, 1967, veteran astronaut Gus Grissom, first American spacewalker Ed White, and rookie astronaut Roger Chaffee were killed in their capsule on the launch pad for a pre-launch test. NASA thought putting pure oxygen in the capsule was easier than putting a mixture of air just like we breathe outside. A fire broke out in their Apollo capsule.

January 28, 1986: 73 seconds after launch, Space Shuttle Challenger with STS-51L crew breaks apart, leading to the death of all seven crewmembers. The day before launch the temperature was below freezing, which caused an O-ring to break in a Solid Rocket Booster (SRB). That same SRB exploded in the air causing the explosion of the whole Space Shuttle Challenger.

On February 1, 2003, 16 minutes before the planned landing, Space Shuttle Columbia breaks up in the American sky, carrying STS-107 crew. At launch, a piece of foam, falling from the external tank, opened a hole in the shuttle’s wing, breaking the heat shield, causing the break-up of Columbia upon re-entry, and the death of all seven astronauts onboard.

“Let us join together as one NASA Family, along with the entire world, in paying our respects, and honouring the memories of our dear friends. They will never be forgotten. Godspeed to every one of them.”

Launch Schedule

SMAP (Soil Moisture Active Passive) is a satellite designed to measure and map Earth’s soil moisture and freeze/thaw state. It will help NASA to better understand water, carbon and energy cycles. SMAP launched January 31 atop a Delta II rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada as well as five Canadians universities were participants in the mission, knowing this satellite will have great benefits for Canadian farmers.

Excluding SMAP, 19 launches are scheduled for February and March 2015: Passing by DSCOVR (NOAA’s Deep Space Climate Observatory), a satellite that will observe and monitor real-time solar wind. It will launch onboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

February 17 will host a Soyuz launch that will resupply the ISS

On March 12, MMS (Magnetospheric Multiscale), a satellite that will study the mystery of how magnetic fields around Earth connect and disconnect, as well as all the energy phenomena related to this, will launch onboard an Atlas V rocket, from Florida.

On Match 27, the launch of the ISS One Year Crew will (hopefully) go on-schedule.

Remember that every (or almost every) launch is streamed live on the Internet or on NASA’s website. Always impressive!

Rocket madness in January and February

By Benjamin Vermette

Space X CRS-4 Dragon orbiting above Earth. The recent launch of CRS-5 was delayed, prolonging the delivery of supplies headed for the ISS.

Orion EFT-1 Success

“And lift-off! At dawn! The dawn of Orion and a new era of American space exploration!”

Friday, December 5 marked a milestone in the world of cosmos exploration. NASA’s greatest hope, Lockheed Martin’s Orion Capsule, launched from Cape Canaveral, at dawn, on top of a 243 ft. rocket. NASA’s Exploration Flight Test 1 (EFT-1) was the first mission with the Orion capsule, designed for deep space expeditions. Even though it was a short flight to test some of the controls onboard the spacecraft, it was a success, and subsequently initiated a new era of space exploration.

Scheduled to launch the previous day on December 4, EFT-1 was postponed due to an issue with the fill and drain valves onboard the rocket that appeared during the launch attempt that day. “Recommend we scrub today’s operations […]. So please set up for a 24-hour recycle.” explained the launch director. Despite that minor complication, the promising mission virtually had a textbook space flight. Orion did fly 15 times higher than the International Space Station, its controls did correctly answer all the criteria, the capsule did splashdown in the Pacific Ocean about 4 hours after launch and did indeed get picked up by the USS Anchorage, one of the U.S. Navy’s ships.

The next flight of Orion is scheduled no earlier than September 30, 2018. It will be an unmanned mission, just like EFT-1, but this time around it will consist of sending Orion in a circumlunar trajectory, around the far side of the moon and back to Earth, extending the duration of the mission to 7-10 days.

Expedition 42/43

About a month ago, astronauts Terry Virts, Anton Shkaplerov, and Samantha Cristoforetti climbed onboard a Soyuz rocket on its way to the International Space Station (ISS) for a 6-month voyage. Expedition 42/43, as their mission is called, is the 42nd expedition and the one that is currently on the ISS. Virts, Shkaplerov and Samantha Cristoforetti docked with the station’s Rassvet module on November 23, 2014, joining the crew of expedition 41/42, who had been onboard the ISS since September 26, 2014. On the station, the crew operates multiple science experiments while staying tuned into social media via Twitter and posting amazing pictures of the Earth seen from a vantage point 415 km beyond its surface.

In light of the fact that NASA is still trying to get a future permanent rocket to send men into space again since the last shuttle mission in 2011, they have resorted to using the Russian Soyuz rocket to send their space expeditors to the ISS. With the Soyuz rocket, you can’t send more than three astronauts at a time. So the way it works, is that you send three of them to the ISS, joining three other cosmonauts already on board, then you take back the three that were previously there to send three others a few moments later. So you constantly have six bodies up there. This is why the mission’s name always carries two numbers (for example expedition 42/43), because the astronauts and cosmonauts of the 43rd expedition will join the members of the 42nd expedition in March 2015.

SpaceX CRS-5

The International Space Station needs to be resupplied every 90 days or so. This is why SpaceX, a private company, will send its unmanned Dragon cargo spacecraft on top of a Falcon 9 rocket, for the fifth time, to resupply the ISS with basic necessities such as air and water. However, the primary motivation for this mission is to deliver science-related equipment and systems needed to perform different experiments. This mission, dubbed SpaceX CRS-5, will launch on January 6, from Cape Canaveral. Originally, it was to launch on December 16, but as NASA explains, SpaceX CRS-5 was postponed to “allow SpaceX to take extra time to ensure they do everything possible on the ground to prepare for a successful launch.”

One interesting aspect of the SpaceX CRS-5 mission is a tiny experiment housed in the space of a 4-inch cube. Inside the tiny box may be the key to Alzheimer’s disease. Called SABOL (Self-Assembly in Biology and the Origin of Life), the experiment will be 100% automated and of course, will operate on the ISS. “We don't understand the true mechanism of the disease. If we’re lucky, then we’ll find out whether proteins will aggregate in space. Only in weightlessness can you produce an environment free of convection so you can see whether they form on their own. We expect to learn incrementally from this,” said Dan Woodard, a consultant of the ISS research team based at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

New Horizons is awake! Pluto awaits!

New Horizons is a NASA space probe launched in January 2006 with the primary objective to study the dwarf planet Pluto. This spacecraft is estimated to begin its Pluto main science mission and observations in February 2015.

On December 6, 2014, New Horizons spacecraft transitioned from hibernation, when most of the spacecraft is unpowered, to active mode. To wake the space explorer up, NASA send signals to perform critical systems checks, calibrate instruments, and perform corrections, if needed. After nine years and three billion miles of flight, the radio signal, moving at speed of light, needed about four hours to make its way from the probe to Earth. December 6 turned out to be the last “waking up” of the space probe, as NASA is now waiting for Kuiper belt’s object observation in January 2015.

“Symbolically, this [the waking up of New Horizons on Dec. 6th] is a big deal. It means the start of our pre-encounter [of Pluto] operations,” said Glen Fountain, New Horizons project manager.

A cool thing about New Horizons is that in May 2015, it will be so close to the Kuiper belt that it will take incredibly high-resolution pictures of it. The quality of these images will exceed the ones taken by Hubble Space Telescope, one of NASA’s most prestigious space telescopes.

A photo depicting known objects in the Kuiper belt, a region of the Solar System beyond the planets.

Overfilled Launch Schedule:

Due to a packed schedule, the odds of having a rocket launch at any moment in January and February are greatly in your favour.

The December 2014 launch schedule began on the 2nd with an Indian missile. It continued with another Japanese launch on the 3rd, which pre-empted Orion EFT-1. From Orion’s flight to New Year’s, there were 15 launches scheduled, forming a total of 18.

In January 2015, there were/are four major launches on the calendar; two from United Launch Alliance and the other ones from SpaceX.

You can find every major launch streamed live on the Internet or on NASA’s TV website. It’s always very impressive to see a controlled explosion boosting up a man-made rocket into space — you should check it out!