Slashdot Mirror

The battery affects the capsule's re-entry into the atmosphere. If it fails, scientists might not get their hands on solar wind particles.

This was a typical NASA mission. NASA is not the premier science/engineering organization anymore.

Maybe selling the particle catchers for jewelry can be profitable!

space.com image of 'UFO'

Here's one. And another.

Here's one. And another.

Ok, that's pretty nifty! Since I don't have mod points, I'll just play along


--
GMail invites for iPod referrals

Sipping my first coffee of the day, I almost spit it out when I saw "Breaking News" on CNN's site, and a picture of a man staring over a flying saucer.

This looks like a great opportunity to play a round of Fun With Captions!

They should have sent this guy to catch it mid-flight and bring it down.

Space.com is carrying this story about the Genesis return capsule that returned to Earth today in a big way. I guess there won't be any trophies for the stunt pilots.

Space.com is carrying this story about the Genesis return capsule that returned to Earth today in a big way. I guess there won't be any trophies for the stunt pilots.

StarTrek is....oops wrong obligatory quote.

Seriously though, the StarTrek franchise has seemed like it was on it's last legs for a couple of years now. I'm not even sure the Genesis probe could bring it back at this point.

I would prefer much more that they were going to the moon to harvesting helium 3 and trying to fuse it with deuterium, the fact that helium 3 lacks something and dueterium has bit to much of something could make a fusion reaction easier to achieve. A link here. http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/helium3_0006 30.html/

Considering New Scientist's recent track record of poor reporting skills, I'm cautious at best about the actual feasibility and practicality of such a device.

It's also doubtful if that story originated in China in the first place, and China haven't had any possibility of verifying it.

Wikipedia claims the story originated from Richard Halliburton in 1938, before the PRC was even established.

There's also a fundamental difference between the nuclear project and the moon base gaffe you link to: In the case of the moon base claims, a single official made a claim that was retracted publicly soon after they were published. In the case of the nuclear projects, it is official Chinese policy, backed by multiple reports that indicate it is an absolute necessity, and is already subject to negotiations with some of the companies that have already delivered nuclear reactors to China.

It's really sad when you hear about china making these ambitious pans and really moving forward.
When I was a kid, my mother used to tell me to eat all my food because there were poor kids in china dying of starvation.
Technologically and economically we used to use china as an example of what is wrong with communism. Now china is growing.

1. A space Program
2. A nuclear power program, based on the safest design available.
3. An economy that is growing
4. More land mass
5. and more people.

It is obvious that the grandchildren of todays china will be telling their children to eat all their food because of the poor starving children in America. People will look at America with pity and revulsion. And our country will probably no longer be a superpower (we'll probably be speaking mandarin).
WHY
because.
Like fahrenheit, 451 this country is being torn apart by petty monopolistic groups bent on dominating each other.
If were lucky this might happen.

Not only that, but the US manned space program shouldn't necessarily be limited to government efforts. Besides the great suborbital work being done by the X Prize contestants, SpaceX is looking very promising.

In a couple of months, SpaceX will start launching their Falcon I vehicle, which can carry about 500 kg of payload to low earth orbit for $6 million, a fraction of what it currently costs. Next year they're scheduled to launch their Falcon V, which will be considerably larger, carrying about 4000 kg to LEO. This is all being done without government funding.

Notably, the maiden flight of the Falcon V will carry a prototype of the inflatable space station module being produced by Bigelow Aerospace. Additionally, the Falcon V is planned to be man-rated, the first spacecraft to have such a rating since the space shuttle.

for the hardcorest tinfoil hatters among us in the news today, as silent, flying Big Black Triangles sightings are on the rise...

Personally, I'm hoping this is some kind of military craft that is going to be unveiled soon, so we can check out whatever cool tech is inside.

>Even if it looks like the eye will hit KSC dead-on, they've still got enough
> time to stick an orbiter on the 747 and get one of them out of there...
>It's looked like that for several days now, and they haven't done this. A good reason is that the shuttles are being
>retrofitted with safety improvements, and aren't really in a state to be put on a 747,
>let alone flown hundreds of miles away.
Furthermore, at a cost of about $1 million dollars, and a weeks worth of time, I don't think there is time or money to afford the effort.

"...bolt the spaceplane to the back of a 747 and ferry it cross-country, an exercise that costs about $1 million and a week's worth of time" http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/missions/disc over_plane_001122.html

Will this also be the end of the Mystery Clouds? I hope not. I use them as an opportunity to alarm my neighbors. "HURRY! QUICK! It must be a radioactive puffy thing from the nucular plant!"

The scientist, that claimed the Viking Probes showed signs of microbial life, now has a new theory.
He seems to see signs of water on recent Rover images, squished out by the wheels and the RAT tool.

Even if there is/ever was no life, interesting find though, that liquid water exists on such a world. I think this raises the odds of finding life somewhere else quit a bit. Maybe Europa?

The scientist, that claimed the Viking Probes showed signs of microbial life, now has a new theory.
He seems to see signs of water on recent Rover images, squished out by the wheels and the RAT tool.

Even if there is/ever was no life, interesting find though, that liquid water exists on such a world. I think this raises the odds of finding life somewhere else quit a bit. Maybe Europa?

Mars Rovers != Mars Odyssey.

Ice on Mars
Odyssey Mission to Mars

This is very interesting, however it isn't the most "Earthlike" planet found yet. There are three planets generally ignored by scientists because they are dead and orbit a neutron star. However they are Earth sized and there is a possibility that in the distant past they may have harbored life.

It would be monumental to find evidence that life on Earth isn't a singleton freak accident, even if we found it on worlds that could never harbor life again.

You could read this link to a more intersting story I tried to submit that was rejected. (Flamebait modding unnecessary - just mentioning)
Here =======} *

Reminds me of the space.com headline Space storm hits, Earth Survives! during the solar activity last year.

Reminds me of the space.com headline Space storm hits, Earth Survives! during the solar activity last year.

they made a desktop wallpaper out of this image only... 3 years ago.

Sorry, that was the wrong test I just linked to.
This is the one that actually worked

" In 1954, a man named Maruice Allais spent a month studying and measuring the swing of a Foucault pendulum in his Paris laboratory. He dutifully recorded the direction of rotation, which corresponds to the spin of the Earth. Allais' experiment happened to coincide with a solar eclipse, and while the moon blotted out the sunlight, something strange happened to the pendulum: It slowed. "

Unfortunately inside the economist article http://www.economist.com/science/displayStory.cfm? story_id=3104321 the editors claim the opposite :

""ASSUME nothing" is a good motto in science. Even the humble pendulum may spring a surprise on you. In 1954 Maurice Allais, a French economist who would go on to win, in 1988, the Nobel prize in his subject, decided to observe and record the movements of a pendulum over a period of 30 days. Coincidentally, one of his observations took place during a solar eclipse. When the moon passed in front of the sun, the pendulum unexpectedly started moving a bit faster than it should have done."

Geez if one tells a nice story, get all the contributing parties synchronized :)

Robert

Mind you, it's NASA, so you might not want to hold your breath too long.

And Arthur C. Clarke believes Martian life exists to this day. It's easy to see that the so-called spiders look life-like, and I'd like very much for that to turn out to be the case. Mind you, the human brain is pretty good forming patterns out of just about anything.

Thank you for taking the time for your response.

Saturn's missing ring spokes.
"scientists are already puzzling over the noticeable absence of the ghostly spoke-like dark markings in the rings first seen by Voyager on its approach to the planet 23 years ago"

Oxygen on Venus
"An unexpected sign of atomic oxygen has been found in spectroscopic data of Venus' atmosphere. This comes as a major surprise since data from earlier studies had shown molecular oxygen, O2 and ozone, but not single oxygen atoms.

It wasn't just a weak trace of atomic oxygen either. The data shows a green line nearly as intense as the glow from Earth's atmosphere, even after taking that effect into account in the ground based data.

"I certainly trust those data," stated Dr. Crisp. "Something weird is going on in the upper atmosphere of Venus."

The first bottom line is that we just don't know what's going on."

Hot Io Temperatures
"In its chilly corner of the universe, Io needs to release its inner heat, just as a cup of hot coffee cools by releasing steam. Scientists have known for a while that Io is the solar system's most volcanically active planetary body. Yet scientists were surprised by the extreme temperatures.

"Given Io's intense vulcanism, we expect extreme differentiation," McEwen says. "The evidence suggests we're seeing heavy magma erupt to the surface. How do we explain that? It's harder for dense material to rise through a low-density crust, although this has occurred on Earth's moon. Perhaps some process mixes the crust back into Io's interior, so the crust has a higher density."

On Earth, the tectonic plates move slowly around the surface, forming new crust at mid-ocean ridges, for example, and recycling oceanic crust into the hot mantle where two plates collide, one diving under the other. Scientists don't know yet how to explain what's happening on Io."

I am interested in your explanation about precipitative heating, but I don't see any information on it. A quick google for "precipitative heating" "gas giants" returns zero results. I have to say I still find it hard to believe that denser elements sinking would cause greater energy radiation than the entire planet is receiving from the Sun though, or that this process is still going strong after billions of years.

Puzzling Seasons and Signs of Wind Found on Pluto
"Seasonal change on Pluto is causing the planet to warm up even as it moves away from the Sun, according to two studies that also detected the first firm signs of weather on the tiny planet.

In a deeper analysis of data first announced in October, researchers now say Pluto's atmospheric pressure doubled since 1988. They say the average global temperature must have climbed, too, by about 2 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius)."

Pluto is undergoing global warming, researchers find
"Pluto is undergoing global warming, as evidenced by a three-fold increase in the planet's atmospheric pressure during the past 14 years

"This is a very complex process, and we just don't know what is causing these effects" on Pluto's surface, Elliot said."

---------------

So it still appears to me, regardless of Hoagland's wild rantings, that there are indeed large scale planetary phenomena going on in the solar system which scientists are at a loss to adequately explain. The bottom line is that we seem to have a rather limited understanding of planetary climate change.

Subsequently, I am concerned that similar rapid and global change coul

I have read a great deal of his stuff, and his critics too. I am not talking about his THEORIES though, I am talking about his OBSERVATIONS, specifically concerning the planets in the solar system.

I checked into a few of his planetary findings (including Saturn's now missing ring spokes), and they checked out as advertised. Mars' ice caps are dissapearing rapidly, and had a 3 month long global dust storm a few years back. Solar activity is insane.. more sunspots in the last 40 years than the previous 1150. There's stuff like this described for every single planet. I haven't checked them ALL out myself yet, but the claims have been disturbingly true so far...

Some interesting thoughts about what exactly is a moon can be found here

From what i understand from the article is that nobody is sure what exactly the definition of a moon is.

There's a very interesting article at space.com entitled 'What is a Moon?'.

errr...my bad. article here

There doesn't seem to be a mention of Armadillo Aerospace here, and since Carmack runs the company, I think it should be mentioned in a "what we're up to" story, even if the story is basically about id Software. So, here it is:

Armadillo Aerospace is based in Mesquite, Texas, and is a rocketry research firm that is one of those trying to win the X-Prize. The Armadillo prototype crashed during its last flight test and it doesn't look like they'll be able to compete for the prize because of what it will take to get their vehicle rebuilt and flying again (in terms of money and time), but they'll keep going and see what they can do to reach the point where they're ready to launch manned flights.

Armadillo Aerospace's X Prize Prototype Crashes

And there's a video available of the crash in MPEG format.

I'm still expecting the Scaled Composites team (led by Burt Rutan) to win, but I'm still intrigued by AA and the Canadian Arrow team; I'm still dubious about the DaVinci Project, which has yet to actually fly anything.

This is exactly what the X-Prize is meant to do, though: spur the development of a new industry by providing an incentive for privately held teams and individuals to step in and make space accessible to the public.

I applaud Carmack for not being afraid to try. It's amazing what ingenuity can do even when you don't have the deep pockets of government-funded space efforts. Or maybe especially when; necessity, as they say, is the mother of invention.

And yes, I bought the game; I'm proud to say that I, no matter if it was not done directly, helped to support an effort to put civilians into space with civilian launch systems.

that ABC has messed up the story. What is really getting into the voids is water vapor or nitrogen. Either that or the tank is so poorly constructed that dangerously flammable liquid hydrogen is leaking out, in which case it is a wonder that the shuttle hasn't exploded right on the launch pad.

Ditching it isn't free either, unless you're talking about an uncontrolled reentry. From one proposal it would cost $300M (not including launch costs) to build an automated booster to attach to Hubble and safely deorbit it.

Perhaps you're thinking of the Humble space telescope, or properly MOST? (Darn thing looks like a suitcase-size Kodak.)

Parent may have been joking, but couldn't Soyuz be used for this sort of thing? AFAIK, its safety record is better than the Shuttle's, and they're still being built (in fact, Starsem can build 60 a year) so no worries about losing another 33% of the Shuttle fleet. Even a mission with a Soyuz plus a Progress launch (to get all the materials needed into orbit) would be feasible. And I've seen the cost of a Soyuz launch quoted at $35M, ie peanuts compared to a Shuttle launch.

They need more Astronauts like Story to gain interest. Am I the only one who remembers their kickass EVA on STS-61 ? Of course, adding in a Zero-G sex act would probably increase viewership way more than the intellectual challenge.

I don't believe the proportion of costs of launch vs development are clear cut enough to justify the "Uh" at the beginning of your post. While I don't have figures at hand, launch prices appear to be in the order of US$80m-US$100m. I'm sure it costs a lot more than that to develop and build most satellites. This article suggests value in some sort of satellite support system, though it's discussing pushing satellites into higher orbits or repairing/refueling them in space, rather than returning them to Earth.

• NASA Press Release
• Space.com

Space.com has a free article which deals in part with Titan's glowing nature. The last four paragraphs, specifically: Click Here

"Earth is Rare, New Study Suggests". Or, so before the study we thought that one in 10000000000 stars had habitable Earth-like planets, not it appears it's more like one in 1000000000 (because we haven't found the second Jupiter yet). Interesting, but not a big deal.

I say, let's wait until 7-10 years, when the results from the Kepler mission will tell us for sure whether Earth-like planets are common or not.

"If there were gas giants around at 12.7 billion years ago, I would think that there could be a few terrestrial-like planets too," Boss said in an e-mail interview. "Presumably some of them [would have] experienced a more gentle history than this poor world, and so some might have experienced some sort of flirtation with life, if not something much more serious."

"If there were gas giants around at 12.7 billion years ago, I would think that there could be a few terrestrial-like planets too," Boss said in an e-mail interview. "Presumably some of them [would have] experienced a more gentle history than this poor world, and so some might have experienced some sort of flirtation with life, if not something much more serious."

Beckham has a reputation for missing penalty shots at goal by skying the ball high into the air, so someone has a sense of humour.

"A collector has paid more than $45,000 for the ball David Beckham booted high into the crowd during England's [national soccer team] penalty shootout loss to Portugal in the European Championship quarter-finals ... the auction website said the successful bidder was "goldenpalacecasino." That appears to be an online casino."
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20040722.wbeck0722/BNStory/Sports/

Golden Palace are the new sponsors of what is now called the "Golden Palace.com Space Program powered by the da Vinci Project."
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/davinci_xpriz eupdate_040805.html

I have every head

here is one head you'll never have. Laugh if you want about the name, but that is one big dick.

Just ask Jar-Jar about battle droids! He knows a lot more than he lets on.