• Tag Archives Mars

  • House bill threatens $1 billion in NASA funding cuts

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    The proposed $16.8 billion funding package would focus NASA’s long-term efforts on Mars exploration, set pre-determined milestones for development of commercial manned spacecraft — including a non-negotiable deadline for first flight — and sharply cut funding for Earth sciences.

    “This authorization bill reflects a sincere effort to maximize return to the taxpayer while working to protect America’s role as the world leader in space exploration,” Rep. Steven Palazzo, R-Miss., chairman of the Subcommittee on Space, said in opening remarks.

    “It is realistic and reflective of the hard choices we must make as a nation and provides support for agreed-upon priorities. The stark reality is that if we fail to reform mandatory spending, discretionary funding for space, science and research will continue to shrink.”

    He said the proposed “authorization discussion draft” was consistent with the 2011 Budget Control Act, mandating automatic spending cuts — sequestration — in the absence of legislation to trim $1.2 trillion from the federal deficit.

    via House bill threatens $1 billion in NASA funding cuts


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  • Mars Rover Opportunity Slips Into Standby Mode, NASA Says

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    NASA’s long-lived Opportunity Mars rover has gone into a self-imposed standby mode on the Red Planet, the robot’s handlers say.

    Mission controllers for Opportunity, which landed on Mars in January 2004, first learned of the issue on Saturday (April 27). On that day, the rover got back in touch after a nearly three-week communication moratorium caused by an unfavorable planetary alignment called a Mars solar conjunction, in which Mars and Earth are on opposite sides of the sun.

    The Opportunity rover apparently put itself into standby on April 22 after sensing a problem during a routine camera check, mission managers said.

    “Our current suspicion is that Opportunity rebooted its flight software, possibly while the cameras on the mast were imaging the sun,” Opportunity project manager John Callas, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., explained in a statement Monday (April 29).

    “We found the rover in a standby state called automode, in which it maintains power balance and communication schedules, but waits for instructions from the ground,” Callas added. “We crafted our solar conjunction plan to be resilient to this kind of rover reset, if it were to occur.”

    Opportunity’s handlers prepared new commands Monday designed to spur the rover into resuming operations, mission team members said.

    The golf-cart-size Opportunity landed on Mars more than nine years ago along with its twin, Spirit, on a three-month mission to search for signs of past water activity on the Red Planet. The two rovers found plenty of such evidence, and then kept trundling across Mars. Spirit was declared dead in 2010, but Opportunity is still going strong.

    Full article: http://www.space.com … de.html?cmpid=514630


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  • John Kelly: NASA still aiming for manned Mars mission

    Posted on by Azrael Comment

    NASA’s not giving up on flying people to Mars.

    Some critics of the space agency’s recent proposal to fly astronauts to an asteroid say we’re “settling” for something less than the big prize: humans walking on the red planet.

    Not true. The mission to an asteroid is part of a stepping-stone approach to sending human beings exploring deeper into the solar system. A sensible look at NASA’s current flight capabilities, human limitations and the space exploration budget means Mars isn’t possible yet.

    NASA’s top human spaceflight chief, Bill Gerstenmaier, recently went over the payoffs with a committee of the NASA Advisory Council.

    The mission being planned to the asteroid will be a big part in making a mission to Mars possible. Getting there will require developing and flying the super rocket NASA would ultimately need for a trip to Mars, as well as the first model of the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle called Orion. It will require more complex spacewalking equipment and capabilities. And new propulsion technology. And more extended flights.

    Full article: http://www.floridato … -manned-Mars-mission



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