In space, Europe gets ahead of U.S.
The world’s astronomers are about to get a trio of powerful new eyes on the sky that can see better and farther than existing space telescopes.
As a result, Europe will hold a scientific and technological lead over the United States in some key areas of cosmology, at least for a while.
Kepler blasts off in search of Earth-like planets
NASA’s Kepler spacecraft blasted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Friday on a three-year mission to find Earth’s twin, a Goldilocks planet where it’s neither too hot nor too cold, but just right for life to take hold.
The Delta II rocket, carrying the widest-field telescope ever put in space, lifted off the launch pad at Cape Canaveral at 10:49 p.m. Eastern time.
The launch vehicle headed downrange, gathering speed as its three stages ignited, one after the other, passing over the Caribbean island of Antigua and tracking stations in Australia before climbing into orbit.
Chinese probe crashes into moon
A Chinese lunar probe has crashed into the moon in what Beijing has called a controlled collision.
The Chang’e 1 lunar satellite hit the moon’s surface at 1613 local time (0813 GMT) at the end of a 16-month moon-mapping mission.
China launched the spacecraft in late October 2007 on a mission to survey the entire surface of the moon.
China’s ever-more ambitious space programme includes plans for a space station and landing a man on the moon.
Scientists Mull Future After Carbon Satellite Crash
Nine years of work disappeared in five minutes yesterday when a NASA satellite crashed into the icy waters near Antarctica. Now climate scientists who worked on the ambitious effort to map the world’s carbon dioxide are trying to figure out what comes next.
The $278 million Orbiting Carbon Observatory was designed to monitor how CO2 enters and exits the Earth’s atmosphere — hoping to yield a picture of a rhythm that is much like taking a breath. Forests and oceans absorb the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere, while burning fossil fuels and decaying plant and animal life send more back.
There is a delicate balance between the two processes that shifts with seasons and weather patterns — plants, for example, pull in more CO2 in spring than in winter, when many lose their leaves.
Scientists Eye Debris After Satellite Collision
Scientists are keeping a close eye on orbital debris created when two communications satellites — one American, the other Russian — smashed into each other hundreds of miles above the Earth.
NASA said it will take weeks to determine the full magnitude of the unprecedented crash and whether any other satellites or even the Hubble Space Telescope are threatened.
Iran sends satellite to orbit
Iran has successfully sent its first domestically made satellite into orbit, state radio reported Tuesday, another development in the country’s ambitious space program that has worried many international observers.
The satellite called Omid, or hope in Farsi, was launched late Monday after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave the order to proceed, according to the radio report. State television also showed footage of what it said was the satellite blasting off in the darkness from an unidentified location in Iran.
The reports could not be independently verified by outside observers. Some western observers have accused Tehran of exaggerating its space program.
Armed with grease guns, astronauts leave station to fix faulty joint
Two U.S. astronauts walked out of the International Space Station on Tuesday to begin maintenance work on a faulty joint on the station’s solar arrays.
Mission specialists Heide Stefanyshyn-Piper and Steve Bowen left the station in their spacesuits at 1:09 ET p.m. armed with putty knives and grease guns, which they will use to scrape away metal grit and lubricate the starboard solar alpha rotary joint.
Indian space agency Isro to roll out a rival to Google Earth
Emboldened by its first mission to the Moon, India is to take on a target closer to Earth: Google.
The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro), which is based in Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of the sub-continent, will roll-out a rival to Google Earth, the hugely popular online satellite imagery service, by the end of the month.
The project, dubbed Bhuvan (Sanskrit for Earth), will allow users to zoon in to areas as small as 10 metres wide, compared to the 200 metre wide zoom limit on Google Earth.
NASA Loses Contact With Mars Lander and Ends Its Mission
Mission managers said Monday that they had not heard from the NASA spacecraft for a week and that they thought it had probably fallen quiet for good.
“At this time, we’re pretty convinced that the vehicle is no longer available for us to use,” said Barry Goldstein, the project manager. “We’re actually ceasing operations, declaring an end to mission operations at this point.”
U.S. space tourist set for blast-off
BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan (Reuters) – U.S. video game magnate Richard Garriott will blast off into space aboard a Russian spaceship on Sunday watched by his father, a NASA astronaut who went into space at the height of the Cold War.
Garriott, who paid $35 million for a ride to the International Space Station, will lift off aboard the Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft alongside U.S. astronaut Michael Fincke and Russian cosmonaut Yury Lonchakov at 1:03 p.m. (0503 GMT).
Russian-born Google co-founder Sergei Brin , who has put down a $5 million deposit on a seat on a private space flight, was on hand for a send-off at the Baikonur cosmodrome attended by the trio’s family and friends.