October
19
WSC Astronote: NGST:
What's in a Name? For Astronomers, a Lot
Russian
Space Official: Humans to Mars a Priority
The Russians are itching to send a human crew to Mars…and are
miffed that NASA remains undecided on such
an
undertaking.
Read the complete
story.
October 18
NASA-U.S.
Military Explore Joint Technologies
The prowess of U.S. space technology is to
be increased through a partnership struck up between NASA, the
U.S.
Strategic Command, the National Reconnaissance Office, Air
Force Space Command and the Pentagon’s Director
of Defense
Research and Engineering.
Read the complete story.
October 17
Florida
Senator Urges NASA to Commit to 7-Person ISS
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) called for NASA to develop a crew rescue
vehicle and to "stop pretending" that a three-
person
International Space Station will live up to its billing as a
world-class science facility
Read
the complete story.
Next 25 Years Should
Feature Return To Titan
The former director
of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory identified Saturn’s largest moon Titan as
a compelling target for
future
robotic exploration.
Read the complete
story.
October
16
Solving the Mysteries of Mars Reveals More Under the
Surface
Water is a key to the future
exploration of Mars and new evidence shows that as the liquid altered the
planet's
surface in the past, colossal reservoirs of water ice
may still exist below the surface and profoundly impact the
red
planet today.
Read the complete
story.
Blanket Space Imagery Purchases by U.S. Gov't. Likely a
Thing of the Past
The U.S.
government's decision in late 2001 to purchase every high-resolution
satellite image of Afghanistan
produced by Space Imaging
Corp. was a purely commercial deal that should not be confused with a
government-
ordered denial of access, according to a U.S.
government official involved in that decision.
Read the complete story.
Proposal: Space Station Ideal for Spinal Cord Injury
Research
NASA should send a scientist with
a spinal cord injury to the International Space Station (ISS) to conduct
medical
research, said Rick Hansen, a paraplegic who has raised
millions for spinal-cord studies.
Read the complete story.
NASA to Study New Deep Space Radio Telescope
Array
NASA will spend $4 million in 2003
designing and studying a new radio telescope array as a possible strategy
for
alleviating pressure on the agency’s Deep Space Network
communications system.
Read the complete story.
October 15
French Role in Mars
Exploration At Risk
The French
participation in a long-term Mars-exploration program remains in doubt
following budget cuts at its space
agency, CNES, and pending a
government review of space-spending priorities.
Read the complete story.
"Power Play" For the Moon
Predicted
University of
Houston (UH) researchers are proposing here at the World Space Congress
novel ways to harness
sunlight energy not only to feed an
energy-starved Earth, but also energize industrial bases and colonies on
the
moon.
Read the complete story.
Summit Covers Little New
Ground; Military Session Postponed Until
Spring
A closed-door
Space Policy Summit billed as a unique get-together for an international
group of government and
industry officials produced no striking
conclusions and was hampered by the absence of several important
space
powers and institutions.
Read the complete story.
ISS
Partners Laud Station’s Potential, Yet Funding Problems
Persist
All but sidestepping the most
pressing questions about the future of the International Space Station
(ISS), senior
U.S., Russian, European, Canadian and Japanese
space officials presented on Tuesday what amounted to little
more
than a guided tour of 16-nation orbital outpost.
Read the complete story.
October 14
Walter
Cronkite: Humanity Just at the Dawn of the Space Era
Walter Cronkite, the American television broadcaster whose
coverage of the Apollo moon program inspired a
generation amid
the turbulent 1960s, assured those gathered here for the World Space
Congress that they are living
in an age not unlike the dawn of
the Renaissance.
Read the complete story.
Head of Hubble
Science: Best is Yet to Come for Space
Telescope
Thanks to the
inspirational images it has captured, and its surprising longevity, the
Hubble Space Telescope (HST)
has far-outstripped the early
expectations of its space scanning skills.
Read the complete story.
Industry Applauds Bill to Add $15
million for Government Imagery Purchases
U.S. commercial remote sensing companies were pleased to see that
the 2003 Defense Appropriations Act
approved by the U.S. House of
Representatives Oct. 10 included $15 million for government purchases of
satellite
imagery.
Read the complete story.
Firm
Moves Closer To Commercial Zero-Gravity
Flights
A group of entrepreneurs,
including former NASA officials, claims to be only a few months away from
offering
commercial airplane flights that mimic NASA’s famous
Vomit Comet, allowing passengers to experience
weightlessness
without the expensive rocket ride.
Read the complete story.
CIA and NASA Linked During
Cold War Space Race
A space history
sleuth has documented cooperative ties between NASA and the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA)
during the heated U.S.-Russian space race in the late
1950s through the 1960s.
Read the complete story.
October 13
Ambitious Plans for Next 50 Years of Space
Exploration Proposed
The
International Academy of Astronautics presented its outline for a 50-year
exploration program here Oct. 13.
Read the complete
story.
