The Crew of STS-130 (Image: NASA)

Hello all and welcome to the latest edition of the GeekDad Space Report! The launch scheduled for last week of a Russian Military communications satellite was a success, lifting off on time. We have two launches scheduled for this week, both to the ISS so the launch schedule for the year is starting to pick up. Let’s take a look:

Launches (Sources: Spaceflight Now World Launch Schedule, Wallops Flight Facility Daily Range Schedule)

Wednesday, February 3 -
Launch Site: Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan
Launch Vehicle: Soyuz Rocket
Payload: Progress 36P
Launch Time: 03:45 GMT
Notes: Unmanned ISS supply mission.

Sunday, February 7-
Launch Site: Kennedy Space Center, Florida, USA
Launch Vehicle: Space Shuttle Endeavour
Launch Pad: Launch Complex 39A (Map View)
Mission: STS-130
Launch Time: 09:39 GMT (04:39 EST)
Notes: Delivery of the Tranquility Module to the ISS and the final scheduled night launch of the Space Shuttle program.

Interesting Hubble Observations

In many ways, all of the Hubble observations are interesting, but here is a list of some of the standouts in the coming week. A more complete list can be found at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) This Week On HST Website.

Narrowing in on the Hubble Constant and Dark Energy

The population of compact planetary nebulae in the Galactic Disk

The Wavelength Dependence of Accretion Disk Structure

This is a small list of the overall observations. You may also see some of these observations popping up in other weeks as many observation programs consist of several observations over time.

Mars Exploration Rovers

Alexis Madrigal has an article over at Wired Science about the new status of the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. Spirit is a rover no more and is, instead, now a stationary research platform. Controllers have given up on trying to move Spirit from the place it has been stuck for several months. The concern is now focused on Spirit’s ability to survive the Martian winter. The mission of Sprit, regardless of the outcome of the winter, can be called nothing but an amazing success. Sprit had a planned mission life of approximately 92 Earth days and has now operated for over 2219 Earth days.

WISE

The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, also known as WISE, was previously reported on at GeekDad and Wired Science. Now WISE has made its first discovery of an asteroid. Space.com is reporting the discovery of a near earth asteroid, designated 2010 AB78. The asteroid is now 98 million miles from earth and it doesn’t look like it poses any threat to the Earth.

India Manned Space Mission

According to a report on CNN World, India is planning to launch a manned space mission in 2016. From the article:

The cost of the proposed mission is estimated at $4.8 billion, said S. Satish, spokesman for the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).

Studies have begun on the design of the crew capsules that will be used to put a pair of astronauts 300 kilometers aloft for seven days, he said. The project budget has been sent for federal approval, he added.

A training facility for astronauts will also be built in southern India as part of the program, which Satish said would be solely Indian.

In 1984, Rakesh Sharma became the first Indian to explore space in what was a joint mission with the then Soviet Union.

Congratulations to India on the kickoff of this manned space program!

One Big Jump

Popular Mechanics has a great story about Austrian Skydiver Felix Baumgartner’s upcoming record-setting skydive from the edge of space.  Sponsored by Red Bull, the jump will take place from a high-altitude ballon from 120,000 feet, 23 miles up. During his plunge, Baumgartner will break the sound barrier. The jump will take place later this year.

Space Shuttle & Space Station

As mentioned above, the Space Shuttle Endeavour will launch at the end of this week on a mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The crew compliment is (from the STS-130 Mission overview):

George D. Zamka - Commander
Terry W. Virts Jr. - Pilot
Nicholas J.M. Patrick - Mission Specialist (Follow on Twitter)
Robert L. Behnken - Mission Specialist
Stephen K. Robinson - Mission Specialist
Kathryn P. Hire - Mission Specialist

The general mission overview from the same site is:

Endeavour will deliver a third connecting module - the Tranquility node - to the station and a seven-windowed cupola to be used as a control room for robotics. The mission will feature three spacewalks.

This is also scheuduled to be the final night-launch of the Space Shuttle program.  After STS-130, there will only be four flights left for the Space Shuttle. Good luck to the crew of Endeavour!

Have a great week everyone!

A Portion of the WISE First Light Image (Image: Berkeley SSL)

Greetings all and welcome to another edition of the GeekDad Space Report. No launches this week and none from last week to report on, so lets dive right into news in the world of space.

AAS Meeting

This past week, the American Astronomical Society (AAS) held a meeting in Washington, DC and the mission results reported have been very interesting! Here are a couple of the results that have been reported:

Hubble

More results are being reported from the new Hubble Deep Field, discussed previously on GeekDad. Some of the galaxies discovered in these results are only 600 to 800 million years after the Big Bang itself. More information can be found in an article on the discoveries on Space.com.

Kepler

As reported by Wired Science writer Alexis Madrigal, Kepler has already made several discoveries in the short time that it has been operating.  If you are not familiar with the Kepler mission, check out the Wired Science article by Clara Moskowitz about Kepler’s mission.

Interesting Hubble Observations

Before starting the usual list of observations for the week for Hubble, I want to congratulate Astronaut John Grunsfeld. Space News is reporting that Grunsfeld is leaving NASA to assume the role of Deputy Director of the Space Telescope Science Institute. I have had the opportunity of meeting John personally back in my Hubble days and can say he is a great pick and will prove to be extremely valuable to STScI.

Back to the listing of Hubble Observations. Here is a list of some of the standouts in the coming week. A more complete list can be found at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) This Week On HST Website.

Probing the early universe with GRBs

Resolving the Smallest Galaxies with ACS

The population of compact planetary nebulae in the Galactic Disk

This is a small list of the overall observations. You may also see some of these observations popping up in other weeks as many observation programs consist of several observations over time.

Elsewhere In The Solar System

Mars

The BBC is reporting that a group of researchers from the Imperial and University Colleges London have found geographic features on Mars which look like drainage channels from large lake beds. The team utilized data fro the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for their study.

The Sun

The Solar-Heliospherical Observatory (SOHO) captured images of a comet being consumed by the sun, as reported by the Daily Mail.

WISE Mission

A fantastic view of space has been captured by the WISE mission as one of its first light observations Wired Science reporter Lisa Grossman is reporting. Additionally, Space News is reporting that the image was captured just after the cover to the telescope was ejected and was part of an effort to calibrate the instruments aboard the observatory.

Manned Spaceflight

As reported by the Associated Press, this past week the Space Shuttle Endeavour moved to Launch Pad 39-A at the Kennedy Space Center. Endeavour is being prepared for a February 7 launch to the International Space Station (ISS).

Have a great week everyone!

A Festive View From Hubble (Image From HubbleSite)

This week, as there are no scheduled launches, I would like to highlight an image release from Hubble from this past week. Before I get to that, let me hit a couple highlights for the week.

The three launches scheduled for last week made it off the pad successfully, albeit with a 24 hour delay on the Helios 2B launch. The WISE mission has made it to space and is going through checkout and calibration. The Soyuz launch was also successful and is now making its way to the International Space Station. The Soyuz module will arrive at the station on Tuesday with three new crew members for the current ISS Expedition.

Since it is a relatively quiet week, I would like to highlight an image released from the Hubble Space Telescope last week. The new discoveries are starting to come fast and furious from the upgraded observatory but one release from last week is in keeping with the festive nature of the season. The image was released this past Tuesday with the subject being a portion of the Doradus Nebula within the Large Magellanic Cloud. Within the Nebula is a region that is clearer than other parts with many bright stars shining brightly. Shining like ornaments on a Christmas Tree.  Indeed, this area looks a little like a Christmas Tree in space. From the press release on hubblesite.org:

Christmas Tree Highlighted

The brilliant stars are carving deep cavities in the surrounding material by unleashing a torrent of ultraviolet light, and hurricane-force stellar winds (streams of charged particles), which are etching away the enveloping hydrogen gas cloud in which the stars were born. The image reveals a fantasy landscape of pillars, ridges, and valleys, as well as a dark region in the center that roughly looks like the outline of a holiday tree. Besides sculpting the gaseous terrain, the brilliant stars can also help create a successive generation of offspring. When the winds hit dense walls of gas, they create shocks, which may be generating a new wave of star birth.

A very nice treat from Hubble for sure. Happy Holidays to all our readers!

The Sombrero Galaxy in Infrared Light (image courtesy hubblesite.org)

Barring any unforeseen weather events at Vandenberg Air Force Base (I’m sure NASA is glad that they do not have launch facilities in upper Wisconsin right now), the WISE space telescope will be launched around 6 AM Pacific time on Friday, December 11th. Built as a part of NASA’s Explorers Program, WISE will observe our local planetary system as well deep space, hunting for objects in the mid-infrared spectrum.

The space telescope will be the most sensitive infrared-based scope to-date (up to 500,000 times more sensitive than a previous infrared telescope). To help achieve such a high-level of sensitivity, the components of WISE are kept extremely cold with the help of a cryostat, cooled by a solid block of hydrogen (below -430° F /15 Kelvins). After launch, WISE will settle into a polar orbit around our home planet, where it will take an image every eleven seconds. After six months WISE will have imaged the entire sky (an estimated 1.5 million images)!

We can expect to start seeing data from WISE in January 2010, after the project team has put it through a one month checkout period. Once the mission is over 7 months later, the infrared all-sky survey data will be combined with other surveys to help produce a full-spectrum picture of our galaxy and the surrounding universe from our perspective.

Data from WISE will also serve as guide for astronomers working with the currently flying Spitzer telescope,as well as the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope (the successor to Hubble). Any interesting images from WISE can be rendered in more detail with these mega-scopes.

Here’s to good weather and a great launch. You can catch it live on NASA TV on Friday morning. If you miss it, I’m sure the reruns will be listed on NASA’s YouTube page.