August 24 News Items

NFIRE Satellite Successfully Tracks Missile (Source: AIA)
The U.S. Near Field Infrared Experiment research satellite successfully carried out a data-collection experiment that will aid in the development of space-based missile defense technology. The satellite tracked a modified Minuteman II booster vehicle that was fired from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

CSR Wins $816 Million Contract (Source: Reuters)
Computer Sciences Raytheon, a joint venture of Computer Sciences Corp. and Raytheon, won an Air Force contract valued at $816.2 million for range support for space launches.

Editorial: NASA at 50: Looking for That Second Wind (Source: SpaceRef.com)
NASA loves to try and push ideas at people. Often times, the pictures and information beamed back to Earth are so astonishing and filled with raw excitement that it almost does not matter how things are presented. More often than not, the relevance is not apparent and some additional pushing needs to be done. Alas, that pushing does not always work. Also, there is more to space exploration - and its relevance - than pretty pictures or complicated intellectual discussions. Yet as amazing as this stuff is - a lot of what NASA does is boring (yet still important). However, no real effort is expended to explain its relevancy to everyday life - and the expenditure of tax dollars - dollars people always seem to feel would be better spent elsewhere (even if they can't always say why). After all, NASA is a part of the Federal government - and we pay them to do things for us. Visit http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=1229 to view the article.

Colorado University Wins $92M Contract for Satellite Gear to Forecast Solar Disturbances (Source: AIA)
The University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics has landed a $92 million contract to build satellite instruments to forecast solar disturbances. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA tapped the school to build four satellite instruments for detecting and measuring solar flare activity and radiation. LASP will deliver the first of the four instruments in 2012.

Evidence of Extra-Terrestrial Life Near, Says NASA Scientist (Source: ABC Tasmania)
A NASA scientist says new technology may be able to provide a definitive answer to the question of whether there's extra-terrestrial life within our generation. Dr Jack Bacon says that the strong evidence of microbial life on Mars indicates that Earth is not the only planet capable of sustaining life. "I am personally convinced that it is abundant and possibly near," he said. I doubt that we see UFO's flying around our skies, but I believe that within the generation we will probably find very significant evidence of its existence."

Publicity-Seeking Virgin Galactic Keeps Low Profile After Blast (Source: KOLO)
As a female voice coos, "Welcome to space," six passengers in skintight spacesuits unbuckle their seatbelts and somersault in zero gravity, occasionally peeking back at Earth through the private spaceship's large portholes. Virgin Galactic showed off this animated video promoting the weightless joys of commercial space travel at a trade show for experimental aircraft last month. But the excitement was overshadowed three days later when a deadly flash explosion rocked a Mojave Desert facility where top-secret tests were under way for Virgin's yet-unbuilt spaceship. The accident at the remote site run by famed aerospace designer Burt Rutan rattled the fledgling space tourism industry, which has enjoyed a honeymoon period since 2004 when Rutan launched SpaceShipOne, the first private manned rocket into space.

It also offered insight into how two pioneering companies that forged an unlikely partnership two years ago to fly civilians to space reacted to the tragedy. In a reversal of roles, Richard Branson's publicity-seeking Virgin Galactic kept a low profile while its usually silent partner, Rutan's Scaled Composites LLC, took to the Internet to mourn its workers. Some space experts believe Virgin Galactic is following the right strategy because the accident was of an industrial nature and not directly related to spaceflight.

Gulf Coast Key to NASA's Future Exploration Plans (Source: NASA)
Future NASA astronauts who land on the moon will owe their success in part to the men and women of the Gulf Coast, who are already at work on the next generation of space travel. NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi and NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans both will have critical roles in the Constellation Program, which aims to land astronauts on the moon by the end of the next decade. A Stennis test stand ground breaking ceremony was attended by Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, Sen. Thad Cochran, Sen. Trent Lott and Rep. Gene Taylor, and is a sign of the futuristic changes on the Gulf Coast.

NASA Jobs in Transition (Source: Florida Today)
About 100 small business representatives gathered in Cocoa Beach on Thursday, learning how to participate in NASA's Constellation program, the next generation of the agency's space exploration. The six-hour NASA Constellation Small Business Forum included talks from Kennedy Space Center representatives, and also from prime contractors, such as Boeing, Harris Corp., Lockheed Martin and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. Representatives of small businesses from all across Florida attended the forum.

One of the small-business executives at Thursday's forum was Ron Cobb, vice president of the West Melbourne-based Soneticom Inc., a designer and manufacturer of communication devices. Cobb said, as NASA transitions away from space shuttle technology, there now is more of a willingness to use small, high-tech companies like his for work.