Fwd: nasa news --my version

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Begin forwarded message:

From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: January 2, 2015 at 10:56:52 AM CST
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: nasa news --my version

Welcome to 2015 ===  have a great weekend everyone.!

 

 

LEADING THE NEWS

• ISS Experiences The New Year 16 Times.

NASA NEWS

• NASA Continues To Make Summaries Of 2014.

HUMAN EXPLORATION AND OPERATIONS

• SpaceX Booster Landing Could Change Spaceflight.

• World Conducted 92 Launches In 2014.

• FIRST Robotics Competition Starts Saturday.

• Cosmonaut Morukov Passes.

• Hadfield Skeptical About Mars Mission Right Now.

LEADING THE NEWS

ISS Experiences The New Year 16 Times.

The ABC News (12/31, 5.02M) website continued coverage of how the ISS would celebrate the new year, noting that the station would "be over midnight somewhere on earth sixteen times." ISS commander Barry Wilmore said in a video, "We plan to celebrate New Year's sixteen times with our comrades, our people down on Earth that are doing it at that very moment, so we're going to do the same thing, that's our plan."

       

NASA NEWS

NASA Continues To Make Summaries Of 2014.

The WBUR-FM Boston (12/31, 97K) "Here & Now" website continued summaries of the year 2014 in space with an interview with NPR science correspondent Geoff Brumfiel. Brumfiel was asked about the "new spacecrafts, new missions, and space triumphs and failures of 2014."

        In an article for the WTOP-FM Washington (12/31, 32K) website, Greg Redfern wrote that he almost named the launch of Orion the top space story of 2014. However, because it lacked "empathy," Redfern considered Philae's comet landing the top story.

HUMAN EXPLORATION AND OPERATIONS

SpaceX Booster Landing Could Change Spaceflight.

Quartz (12/31, Fernholz, 294K) reported that when SpaceX launches its next mission on January 6, it may "change space-flight as we know it," not by its cargo mission to the ISS, but by its attempt to land the first stage of the rocket on a barge. If the company can develop the technology to reuse its rockets, there could be a "disruptive access to orbit" because of the large amount of savings generated. According to the article, while SpaceX has been "overly optimistic" in the past, it is "likely" that SpaceX will be able to recover one stage "for re-flight during one of its 12 flights in 2015" as it now predicts.

    

World Conducted 92 Launches In 2014.

Space News (12/31, Foust, Subscription Publication, 481) continued coverage of total launch activity in 2014, which experienced "a surge of launch activity late in the year." With 92 launches, 2014 had the "highest level in 20 years," with the US coming in second for total number of launches at 23. Russia led with 32 and China came in third at 16. The US will make the first launch of the year when SpaceX conducts its mission to the ISS on January 6.

        Blog Coverage. Matt Williams at Universe Today (1/1, 9K) writes that with 2014 being a "banner year" for Russian launches of the Soyuz-2 rocket, this year could be better with 20 scheduled missions, including "holdovers from 2014."

FIRST Robotics Competition Starts Saturday.

The WTVA-TV Columbus, MS (12/31, 7K) website reported on the upcoming FIRST Robotics competition, which will feature 11 teams from Alabama, Tennessee, and Mississippi. The competition, "hosted by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center and the U.S. Space & Rocket Center," starts on Saturday and will feature teams who will build robots using identical materials for a chance to go to the FIRST Championship in April.

Cosmonaut Morukov Passes.

collectSPACE (1/1, Pearlman) reports that yesterday, cosmonaut Boris Morukov, "who visited the International Space Station and led a 520-day simulated Mars mission," passed away. The article noted that no official cause of death was reported. John Charles, chief of NASA's international science office in its human research program, said, "[Morukov] was well known to many of us in the space life sciences community for the breadth of his knowledge and his enthusiasm for understanding the effects of space on human physiology. ... As the senior researcher in metabolism and immunology at [the Institute for Biomedical Problems...Boris was directly involved in planning the Russian component of our joint investigations on the upcoming year-long ISS expedition."

        Russia's ITAR-TASS News Agency (1/2, 1K) also covers the story.

Hadfield Skeptical About Mars Mission Right Now.

In a column for the Bristol (UK) Post (1/1, 344), Ashley Dove-Jay writes that he asked astronaut Chris Hadfield for dating tips while he was promoting his "gorgeous" book, "You Are Here," which features the images he took while at the ISS. Meanwhile, Dove-Jay notes that Hadfield is skeptical about going to Mars now, saying there is a lack of a "great compelling reason" to sustain the project's costly development.