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From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: January 17, 2014 10:34:16 AM CST
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: FW: NASA and Human Spaceflight News Jan. 17, 2014
Flex Friday so no JSC Today have a great weekend everyone…NASA and Human Spaceflight NewsFriday – Jan. 17, 2014INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION:The ISS Facebook page began 2013 with 104,096 followers and ended the year with 261,232 followers, an increase of 151% for the year. Here is the top post from 2013: http://go.nasa.gov/1dceRduHEADLINES AND LEADSSaving the Planet One Tiny Satellite at a TimeIrene Klotz - Discovery NewsA Silicon Valley startup is turning its technical acumen and passion for space into an innovative venture that uses a fleet of relatively inexpensive, tiny satellites to take non-stop pictures of Earth.Congress passes $1.1 trillion spending billAssociated PressCongress sent President Barack Obama a $1.1 trillion government-wide spending bill Thursday, easing the harshest effects of last year's automatic budget cuts after tea party critics chastened by October's partial shutdown mounted only a faint protest.Astronaut-Sen. Bill Nelson praises Shelby, Mikulski for saving 'a very robust' space programLee Roop – Huntsville TimesSen. Bill Nelson (D-Florida) went to the Senate floor today to praise Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Tuscaloosa) and his Democrat counterpart for helping save "a very robust space program" with the new NASA budget. The Democrat drawing Nelson's praise was Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland).California NASA center renamed for Neil ArmstrongAssociated PressThe memory of Neil Armstrong lives on at a NASA center. President Barack Obama on Thursday signed a bill into law that rebrands the Dryden Flight Research Center in Southern California in honor of the late astronaut. Armstrong was a test pilot at the Mojave Desert facility and later became the first moonwalker.NASA doesn't analyze its strategic sourcing program, IG saysRyan McDermott – Fierce GovernmentAlthough NASA developed a strategic sourcing procurement plan, it failed to analyze and track spending through the program, meaning the space agency can't determine its efficiency, a Jan. 15 NASA inspector general report says.Space Station Required No Evasive Maneuvers in 2013 Despite Growing Debris ThreatPeter B. de Selding – Space NewsThe international space station required no collision-avoidance maneuvers in 2013, after a record four such moves in 2012, despite a growing orbital-debris population intersecting its orbit, according to NASA data compiled from the U.S. Space Surveillance Network (SSN) of ground- and space-based sensors.Dream Chaser flies through another CCiCAP milestoneChris Bergin – NASA Space FlightSierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) successfully completed another key milestone for their Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) contract with NASA this week. Known as Milestone 7, the Certification Plan Review for the entire Dream Chaser Space System (DCSS) covered the vehicle's full design certification and outlined how SNC would operate its first crewed flight to the International Space Station (ISS).What's that? New rock in Mars rover photos baffles scientists, fansCarol Christian – Houston ChroniclePractically overnight, an unexplained piece of rock has shown up on photos from NASA's Mars rover Opportunity, according to the digital Russian TV network RT (Russia Today).NASA's Morpheus lander takes test flight at KSCJames Dean – Florida TodayNASA's Morpheus lander today completed its third test flight at Kennedy Space Center.COMPLETE STORIESSaving the Planet One Tiny Satellite at a TimeIrene Klotz - Discovery NewsA Silicon Valley startup is turning its technical acumen and passion for space into an innovative venture that uses a fleet of relatively inexpensive, tiny satellites to take non-stop pictures of Earth.The company, called Planet Labs, flew four prototype satellites in 2013. Those proved successful, enabling the firm to quickly follow up with production of a 28-member network that already is aboard the International Space Station and awaiting launch.The constellation, called Fleet 1, is comprised of 4 inch-sided, cube-shaped satellites stuffed with mostly off-the-shelf consumer electronics components, including imagers."Things that were once the province of huge 10-ton satellites are now in these tiny things. That's what enables us to generate a data set that is unprecedented in terms of coverage and cadence," company co-founder and chief executive Will Marshall told Discovery News.The nano-satellites will be released, two at time, over a span of one to two weeks early this year via a cubesat deployer set up in Japan's Kibo laboratory module. The equipment was part of nearly 1.5 tons of cargo that reached the station Sunday aboard Orbital Sciences Corp's Cygnus freighter.Fleet 1 will orbit beneath the station's 250-mile-high altitude to prevent any potential collisions. Like the station, the satellites will circle Earth in an orbit inclined roughly 52 degrees north and south of the equator, flying over most of the planet at some point.From that perch, the satellites will be able to photograph objects that are at least 10- to 15 feet in diameter. The resolution is sharp enough for the firm's humanitarian and commercial projects, while sidestepping potential military interests and privacy issues.With that resolution, "you can see the canopy of a tree, so we can count every tree on the Earth surface with our system on a really regular basis," Marshall said.He declined to reveal partners already signed up to use the data, but said the company plans to cast a very wide net to fulfill its objective of helping organizations and people take care of the planet."There are hundreds and hundreds of applications of the data," Marshall said.Possible humanitarian projects include tracking deforestation, identifying illegal fishing, improving agriculture and helping in disaster response.Congress passes $1.1 trillion spending billAssociated PressCongress sent President Barack Obama a $1.1 trillion government-wide spending bill Thursday, easing the harshest effects of last year's automatic budget cuts after tea party critics chastened by October's partial shutdown mounted only a faint protest.The Senate voted 72-26 for the measure, which cleared the House a little more than 24 hours earlier on a similarly lopsided vote. Obama's signature on the bill was expected in time to prevent any interruption in government funding Saturday at midnight.The huge bill funds every agency of government, pairing increases for NASA and Army Corps of Engineers construction projects with cuts to the Internal Revenue Service and foreign aid. It pays for implementation of Obama's health care law; a fight over implementing "Obamacare" sparked tea party Republicans to partially shut the government down for 16 days last October.Also included is funding for tighter regulations on financial markets, but at levels lower than the president wanted.The compromise-laden legislation reflects the realities of divided power in Washington and a desire by both Democrats and Republicans for an election-year respite after three years of budget wars that had Congress and the White House lurching from crisis to crisis. Both parties looked upon the measure as a way to ease automatic spending cuts that both the Pentagon and domestic agencies had to begin absorbing last year.All 53 Democrats, two independents and 17 Republicans voted for the bill. The 26 votes against it were all cast by Republicans.Shortly before the final vote, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, delivered a slashing attack on Senate Democrats, accusing them of ignoring the problems caused by the health care law. "It is abundantly clear that millions of Americans are being harmed right now by this failed law," Cruz said.Unlike last fall, when he spoke for 21 straight hours and helped force the government shutdown over defunding "Obamacare," this time he clocked in at 17 minutes and simply asked the Senate to unanimously approve an amendment to strip out Obamacare funding. Democrats easily repelled the maneuver.The 1582-page bill was really 12 bills wrapped into one in negotiations headed by Rep. Harold Rogers, R-Ky., and Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., respective chairmen of the House and Senate Appropriations committees, and their subcommittee lieutenants. They spent weeks hashing out line-by-line details of a broad two-year budget accord passed in December, the first since 2009.The bill, which cleared the House on a vote of 359-67, increases spending by about $26 billion over fiscal 2013, with most of the increase going to domestic programs. Almost $9 billion in unrequested money for overseas military and diplomatic operations helps ease shortfalls in the Pentagon and foreign aid budgets.The nuts-and-bolts culture of the appropriators is evident throughout the bill. Lower costs to replace screening equipment, for example, allowed for a cut to the Transportation Security Administration. Lawmakers blocked the Agriculture Department from closing six research facilities. And the Environmental Protection Agency is barred from issuing rules on methane emissions from large livestock operations.Another provision exempts disabled veterans and surviving military spouses from a pension cut enacted last month. House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, signaled in a brief hallway conversation with The Associated Press that he would oppose a broader drive to repeal the entire pension provision, which saves $6 billion over the coming decade by reducing the annual cost-of-living adjustment for working age military retirees by 1 percentage point.The National Institutes of Health's proposed budget of $29.9 billion falls short of the $31 billion budget it won when Democrats controlled Congress. Democrats did win a $100 million increase, to $600 million, for so-called TIGER grants for high-priority transportation infrastructure projects, a program that started with a 2009 economic stimulus bill.Civilian federal workers would get their first pay hike in four years, a 1 percent cost-of-living increase. Democrats celebrated winning an addition $1 billion over last year for the Head Start early childhood education program and excluding from the bill a host of conservative policy "riders" advanced by the GOP.Rogers won two provisions backed by the coal industry. One would block the EPA and Corps of Engineers from working on new rules on "fill material" related to the mountain top removal mining. Another would keep the door open for Export-Import Bank financing of coal power plants overseas.Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, a tea party favorite, didn't mention the measure's funding of Obamacare in a floor speech earlier in the week; instead he complained at length that the measure dropped funding of a federal program that sends payments to Western states in which much of the land is owned by the federal government and therefore can't be taxed by local governments.Astronaut-Sen. Bill Nelson praises Shelby, Mikulski for saving 'a very robust' space programLee Roop – Huntsville TimesSen. Bill Nelson (D-Florida) went to the Senate floor today to praise Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Tuscaloosa) and his Democrat counterpart for helping save "a very robust space program" with the new NASA budget. The Democrat drawing Nelson's praise was Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland).Mikulski is the Democrat chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Shelby is the ranking Republican. The two cooperated this year to write and pass a NASA budget of $17.6 billion, very close to the White House request and $1 billion more than the Republican-controlled House wanted. The spending plan is part of an overall $1 trillion Omnibus spending plan passed by the House Wednesday and by the Senate today.Nelson said the American space program was "potentially on a downward slope" after the new Obama administration canceled the Constellation rocket program in 2010. Congress forced the administration to fund a simpler big-rocket system called the Space Launch System, and it has become a NASA priority with White House backing since then. This year's budget "will keep us with a very robust space program," Nelson said today, adding "you all have got it right."Nelson, Mikulski and Shelby all represent states housing NASA centers, but the budget Mikulski and Shelby wrote for 2014 funds work across the space agency and country. Nelson was an astronaut who flew aboard the space shuttle Columbia in 1986 and has been a leading NASA advocate since then.California NASA center renamed for Neil ArmstrongAssociated PressThe memory of Neil Armstrong lives on at a NASA center.President Barack Obama on Thursday signed a bill into law that rebrands the Dryden Flight Research Center in Southern California in honor of the late astronaut. Armstrong was a test pilot at the Mojave Desert facility and later became the first moonwalker.The center is being renamed the NASA Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center. As a consolation, the center's test range will be named for Hugh Dryden, a former NASA executive.It's not the first name makeover for NASA.In 1999, the Lewis Research Center in Ohio — named for George Lewis, the first executive officer of NASA's predecessor agency — was changed to the John H. Glenn Research Center, after the first American to orbit Earth.NASA says it's developing a timeline to carry out the latest name change.NASA doesn't analyze its strategic sourcing program, IG saysRyan McDermott – Fierce GovernmentAlthough NASA developed a strategic sourcing procurement plan, it failed to analyze and track spending through the program, meaning the space agency can't determine its efficiency, a Jan. 15 NASA inspector general report says.NASA annually spends about 80 percent of its $17 billion budget on acquiring products and services, the report says.One of the first steps in NASA's strategic sourcing program requires a spend analysis to identify potential candidates for strategic sourcing, the IG says.But NASA only performed targeted spend analyses for a small number of commodities, the report says. It didn't conduct analyses for the majority of commodities acquired by the agency."Without regularly performing a comprehensive spend analysis, NASA is unable to review agency spending patterns for commodities and identify potential candidates for strategic sourcing efforts," the report says.NASA also never developed a standard methodology for performing spend analyses.The existing plan fails to identify what acquisition data should be used to complete the spend analysis, who is responsible for performing the analysis or how often the analysis should be performed.As of June 2012, NASA spent $25.7 million on 242 separate purchases of IT security assessment and monitoring tools as well as related annual maintenance across all levels of the agency.In numerous instances officials purchased the same or similar tools for the IT security control areas. Because of that, NASA missed opportunities to consolidate the procurements and save money."Had NASA officials performed a comprehensive spend analysis at an agencywide level, they would have identified multiple opportunities for consolidation and reduced duplication among IT security assessment and monitoring tools."For more:
- download the report, IG-14-010 (.pdf)Space Station Required No Evasive Maneuvers in 2013 Despite Growing Debris ThreatPeter B. de Selding – Space NewsThe international space station required no collision-avoidance maneuvers in 2013, after a record four such moves in 2012, despite a growing orbital-debris population intersecting its orbit, according to NASA data compiled from the U.S. Space Surveillance Network (SSN) of ground- and space-based sensors.NASA said the relatively quiet year from a debris-threat perspective reflects "the chaotic nature of the [debris] population," which has forced the station to fire its engines to avoid a debris threat on 16 occasions in the 15 years it has been in orbit.In addition to these 16 collision-avoidance maneuvers, one attempted maneuver failed and three others were never undertaken because the debris-proximity warnings came too late. In these three latter instances, the station crew was forced to retreat to the docked Soyuz spacecraft to be ready for an emergency undocking.Collision avoidance means spending costly fuel to move a facility that is as big as a football or soccer field and weighs some 420,500 kilograms. Maneuver orders are given if there is a greater than one-in-10,000 chance of a debris strike.SSN data shows that the amount of debris that passes through the station's orbit of 415-420 kilometers in altitude has increased by 60 percent since the first station module was launched in November 1998.But that figure, now more than 800 objects with a mass ranging from less than a kilogram to more than 1,000 kilograms, includes only those objects that have been identified and cataloged by the SSN. The network has recorded some 5,000 other objects intersecting the station orbit that are awaiting entry into the master catalog.Dream Chaser flies through another CCiCAP milestoneChris Bergin – NASA Space FlightSierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) successfully completed another key milestone for their Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) contract with NASA this week. Known as Milestone 7, the Certification Plan Review for the entire Dream Chaser Space System (DCSS) covered the vehicle's full design certification and outlined how SNC would operate its first crewed flight to the International Space Station (ISS).Dream Chaser Progress:SNC have been buoyed by a number of recent announcements, not least relating to their commercial crew efforts. Last week's announcement of a "cooperative understanding" with ESA and the German Space Agency (DLR) also boosted the vehicle's future potential as a multi-purpose, multi-mission spacecraft.The Dream Chaser Engineering Test Article (ETA) has since arrived back in her home port in Colorado, following her eventful exploits in California.Despite a red-faced landing for the baby orbiter, she earned her wings during an automated free flight over the famous Edwards Air Force Base, a flight that was perfectly executed, per the objectives of the Commercial Crew check list.The vehicle will now enjoy a period of outfitting and upgrading, preparing her for one or two more flights – listed as ALT-1 and ALT-2 – beginning later this year. Both will once again be conducted at the Dryden Flight Research Center in California.The ETA will never taste the coldness of space, with her role not unlike that of Shuttle Enterprise, a pathfinder vehicle used to safely refine the final part of the mission for the vehicles that will follow in her footsteps.The Dream Chaser that will launch into orbit will be called the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), which is currently undergoing construction at the Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF).Debuting atop of the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V, the OFT-1 (Orbital Test Flight -1) is scheduled to take place in late 2016. This flight will be automated, testing the entire Dream Chaser system, prior to the crewed OFT-2 mission in early 2017.The recently completed Milestone 7 in the CCiCAP requirements covers Dream Chaser's missions through to what will be a historic arrival at the orbital outpost."In passing Milestone 7, the DCSS has successfully completed one of the most critical milestones on the road to Dream Chaser full design certification and outlined how SNC would operate its first crewed flight to the International Space Station (ISS)," noted SNC in an announcement on Thursday.SNC, joined by NASA, reviewed the overall certification strategy, and verification and validation activities for the DCSS. Notably, the DCSS is not just the spacecraft, but also the Atlas V launch vehicle, along with the associated ground and mission systems.The company added the review resulted in nearly 6,000 pages of technical support documentation, successfully meeting the exit criteria in its agreement for Milestone 7."The passage of this milestone confirmed SNC's integrated certification strategy, process and plans are now complete, further documenting that the DCSS design is maturing toward compliance with the functional, performance and interface requirements to operate in its intended environments," SNC added.Dream Chaser is currently competing against two other main CCP contenders – SpaceX's Dragon and Boeing's CST-100 – for the honor of regaining American independence for the transportation of NASA astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). NASA is currently paying hundreds of millions of dollars to Russia for seats on the Soyuz spacecraft.That opening Commercial Crew Program (CCP) mission is called USCV-1 (US Crew Vehicle -1), currently manifested for a November 30, 2017 launch, followed by a docking on December 2, 2017 – per L2 long-range scheduling documentation.The USCV-2 through to USCV-6 are shown to launch at intervals of six months, with a Russian Soyuz penciled in to provide a backup role "in the event the US Crewed Vehicle is unavailable" through to the USCV-4 mission in 2019.Mark Sirangelo, corporate vice president and head of SNC's Space Systems, recently told the media he was confident his vehicle would receive the call sign of USCV-1, although Dream Chaser will have to avoid losing out in the upcoming CCP downselect process.Details of the downselect are sketchy, although it is understood one or two companies are likely to lose out on NASA funding. A potential scenario that has been put forward by sources claims two providers may survive, one at full funding, another with half funding – the "1.5″ scenario. It has also been suggested that SpaceX and SNC are classed as the front runners.Per Thursday's announcement, Mr. Sirangelo remains confident Dream Chaser will continue to gain NASA support and eventually return the domestic capability lost when Atlantis closed out the Space Shuttle Program (SSP) when she landed at the Kennedy Space Center at the conclusion to STS-135."The completion and validation by NASA of Milestone 7 is a major step in leading us to our first crewed, orbital flight of the Dream Chaser Space System," noted the head of SNC Space Systems. "We have now completed 70 percent of our CCiCap contract."With each day, each test, and each successful milestone passing, we are moving one step closer to restoring America's place as a leader in human spaceflight building the nation's next generation crew transportation system."What's that? New rock in Mars rover photos baffles scientists, fansCarol Christian – Houston ChroniclePractically overnight, an unexplained piece of rock has shown up on photos from NASA's Mars rover Opportunity, according to the digital Russian TV network RT (Russia Today).The rover hasn't moved in over a month, as it waits for better weather, but a photo taken on Sol 3540 (Jan. 8, or the 3,540th Martian solar day since the Opportunity rover landed) shows a rock that wasn't visible in previous photos taken on Sol 3536.(A solar day on Mars, as measured by the sun's movement, lasts about 24 hours and 40 minutes.)Staffers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California who maintain the rover camera (pancam) database for NASA have named the rock Pinnacle Island.Bloggers and other folks who follow this kind of thing don't know quite what to make of the mysterious chunk of something.Stuart Atkinson, who writes the blog "Road to Endeavour," about Opportunity's exploits as it explores the rim of the Martian crater Endeavour, offered four theories in a Jan. 12 post:1. It's a meteorite that fell from the sky and landed next to the rover. Atkinson admits that's a long shot, even longer than Opportunity's "cosmic hole-in-one" landing in Mars' Eagle crater on Jan. 25, 2004.2. It's a piece of Martian rock that was blown out of the ground by a meteoroid impact and landed next to the rover. Still unlikely, he said.3. The rock previously got stuck in a rover wheel and finally fell out in this spot. Very possible, according to Atkinson.4. It rolled down a slope from somewhere higher up. "That's the least crazy but also the most boring idea," Atkinson wrote.NASA's Morpheus lander takes test flight at KSCJames Dean – Florida TodayNASA's Morpheus lander today completed its third test flight at Kennedy Space Center.The prototype lander developed by the Johnson Space Center lifted off around 1:15 p.m. from a pad at the north end of the former shuttle runway and flew for 57 seconds.
Powered by liquid oxygen and liquid methane, the vehicle climbed to about 187 feet, nearly doubling its ascent speed from the previous test last year.
Then it flew forward about 154 feet and descend to another pad, landing within 11 inches of its target.
A continuing series of flight tests will add sensors designed to detect and navigate around rocks and craters in a hazard field resembling a lunar landscape.END
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