This guy couldn't be more wrong

James van Allen, Regent Distinguished Professor at the University of Iowa, is the noted discoverer of radiation belts encircling Earth. His seminal finding -- labeled the Van Allen radiation belts -- stemmed from the scientist's experiment that flew on Explorer 1, Americas first satellite to successfully orbit the Earth back on January 31, 1958.

He's written an article questioning manned space flight and I'm a little ticked off about it, so I'll be petty and ask him, "what have you done lately?"

"Almost all of the space programs important advances in scientific knowledge have been accomplished by hundreds of robotic spacecraft in orbit about Earth and on missions to the distant planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune," van Allen writes. Similarly, robotic exploration of comets and asteroids "has truly revolutionized our knowledge of the solar system," he adds.

Overstating the case I'd say, but there is some truth in that.

"Let us not obfuscate the issue with false analogies to Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, and Lewis and Clark, or with visions of establishing a pleasant tourist resort on the planet Mars," van Allen suggests.

Why not? Columbus and the rest didn't explore for the sake of science. I have a lot of respect for this man, but he's got his blinders on about the benefits of exploring space. Life is more than scientific fact-finding.

He writes from the viewpoint of someone who doesn't see the point of leaving the planet. Has the scientific viewpoint dulled his imagination and spirit?

Posted by: Ted at 04:34 AM | category: Space Program
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Astronaut Training

Ten days on the ocean floor is about as isolated as you can get on ol' Mother Earth. This sounds like an excellent way to prepare for long-term space missions.

Posted by: Ted at 08:32 AM | category: Space Program
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Can you hear me now, eh?

An Ariane-5 rocket has placed the world's largest telecommunications satellite into orbit Saturday evening after blasting off from the Kourou site in French Guiana.

Details here.

Built by Boeing Satellite Systems (BSS) in El Segundo, California, Anik-2F is to provide telecommunications services across North America for 15 years for the Canadian operator Telesat.

Posted by: Ted at 01:31 AM | category: Space Program
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There's an idea, just throw rocks at it until it goes away

Spain is proposing an interesting concept that could possibly provide Earth with some protection from those 'killer' rocks that's floating around up there (Bruce Willis ain't gonna live forever, ya know).

According to their plan, a pair of spacecraft will be launched together to intercept a selected asteroid. One will orbit the rock and take measurements and pictures, while the other slams into the asteroid in an attempt to alter its trajectory. The idea being if you do it far enough away, a smaller nudge is needed to make it miss Mother Earth.

Posted by: Ted at 06:42 AM | category: Space Program
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Burial in Space

Space Services Inc. is poised to resume service in September launching containers full of people's ashes into space, where they will circle the Earth for years to come.

$1,000 for a gram's worth of you, or you can super-size it to seven grams for $5,300.

The company also offers a video of the launch and provides software that allows families to track the orbital location of their loved ones' remains in real time.

The last funeral flight, in September 2001, failed to reach orbit, but three prior launches did.

The company pledges a free relaunch if the first attempt fails. Chafer said the families of 48 of the 50 people whose remains were on the last flight had opted for another attempt.

"The key to the business is the routine access to space," Chafer said, adding the company planned to make three to four launches a year if the Falcon program proves successful.

As much as this appeals to me, I have a couple of problems with the concept. Right up front, let me state that I have no knowledge of exactly what kind of containers they're using, how they're being orbited, nor what kind of orbit they're using. If they're keeping everything together in one larger piece holding all the smaller containers, then that's good. If they're in an orbit that's not useful for any other purpose, then that's good. But this is basically littering in orbit, and someone is making money to do it. It sounds like the orbit will decay in a few years, so the problem takes care of itself eventually. But I don't want to fall into the trap of "there's plenty of room up there" because that kind of thinking led to problems with Earth's oceans. "Plenty of room" implies big, not infinite, and you'd be amazed at how much crap humanity has already left floating around over our heads.

Posted by: Ted at 09:44 AM | category: Space Program
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Houston, we had a hiccup

Scaled Composites has released the telemetry data from the historic first flight into space by SpaceShipOne, and despite the success of the flight, it wasnÂ’t flawless. At one point near the end of the 76 second burn of the composite rocket motor, the automated pitch control quit functioning, forcing the pilot to switch over to the backup system. The slight loss of control cost SpaceShipOne some 6 miles from the expected altitude and caused the craft to reenter the atmosphere farther south than anticipated.

The data also shows that pilot Mike Melvill experienced weightlessness for over three minutes, and experienced 5gÂ’s during portions of the reentry.

This flight alone was not enough to win the X-Prize. The goal is to make two flights into space with the same manned craft (capable of carrying three people) within a two-week period. At a recent press conference, Burt Rutan would not rule out additional test flights before going for the prize.

Posted by: Ted at 09:42 AM | category: Space Program
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"America doing it right"

That's a quote from the director of Space Science for the European Space Agency, regarding the successful arrival of the Cassini mission to Saturn.

Cassini is a group effort of 17 nations, funded by the Italian Space Agency, the ESA and NASA, and continues the string of successes NASA has enjoyed this year - two Mars rovers, the "comet catcher" that's returning to Earth, and now Cassini.

The pictures are already spectacular. More please.

Posted by: Ted at 12:20 PM | category: Space Program
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