...word NASA? Do you think of the first man on the moon, the Challenger or Columbia disasters, or how far they have made it when it comes to space? Do you think NASA is doing its job or do you think NASA fails to accomplish their goals? NASA had beat Russia in the space race to go to the moon and is still more technologically advanced than Russia. NASA in its whole carrier has had only two major disasters out of a total 135 space launches. Seven hundred and eighty nine astronauts have returned to earth alive out of 833(Space:Overview). NASA's Hubble telescope has reached and seen further than any telescope made for deep space exploration. NASA has a few upcoming events a new telescope build and a new...
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...Abstract This paper entitled Stardust is about none other than the famous Stardust mission by NASA. This paper will go in depth about how the mission was conceived and who was the primary funder of the mission. After the introduction of the mission stardust we go in depth of how the spacecraft was designed. What material was used for the frame of the spacecraft and why that certain material was used instead of anything else. This paper will also go over how the spacecraft communicated back to earth when it was thousands of miles away. Another interesting thing that will be explained is how the spacecraft was powered. What was or were the technologies implemented on the spacecraft to make it active for so long. Like anything else that is unmanned and automated, there has to have been a computer on board and this paper will go through the details of what computer was on board and why that particular computer was chosen if possible. Since this was a spacecraft with a set trajectory, what else controlled it to make it stay in place? That’s when this paper talks about the attitude control and propulsion systems onboard the stardust spacecraft. The last thing that will talked about in the spacecraft design section of this paper is the scientific instruments the stardust spacecraft carried in order to fulfill its primary objective. Its primary objective was to do a fly by and collect samples from preset meteor targets. The next major body of this paper is the actual mission profile...
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...Mars in the future, because Mars is very similar to Earth in many ways. Mars rotation is 24 Earth hours, 37 minutes, 23 seconds that is very close to Earth's rotation (23 hours 56 minutes and 4 seconds). Mars also has ice and when the planet is warmer, water comes out of its solid state during summer, as a morning dew substance. They also think that there may have been oceans and rivers at one time on Mars surface. About Mars Mars has the largest Volcano in the solar system as well as the largest canyon in the solar system. The surface is red because of how much rust is on the surface, it is also very rocky. The revolution (length of year) is almost two Earth years or 687 Earth days. Mars atmosphere is made of 95. 32%Carbon dioxide and 2.7% Nitrogen. The atmosphere of Mars is also about 100 times thinner than Earth's. If you weigh 100 pounds on Earth you would weight 38 pounds on Mars, so Mars has 3.711 m/s². Earth...
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...called Mars Nergal - the great hero, the king of conflicts. The Egyptians were the first to notice that the stars seem "fixed" and that the sun moves relative to the stars. They also noticed five bight objects in the sky (Mercury, Mars, Venus, Jupiter, and Saturn) that seemed to move in a similar manner. They called Mars Har Decher - the Red One. Greeks called the planet Ares after their god of war, while the Romans called it Mars. Its sign is thought to be the shield and sword of Mars” (NASA, 2015). Mars is the fourth planet from the sun and referred to as the god of War. The planet probably got this name due to its red color; Mars is sometimes referred to as the Red Planet. Mars has been known since prehistoric times, and of course, it has been extensively studied with ground-based observatories. But even very large telescopes find Mars a difficult target, it's just too small. It is still a favorite of science fiction writers as the most favorable place in the Solar System (other than Earth!) for human habitation. “The first person to watch Mars with a telescope was Galileo Galilei, and in the century after him, astronomers discovered its polar ice caps. In the 19th and 20th centuries, researchers...
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...continue to progressively learn and to explore the famous red planet. Mars is the same age as Earth. The whole solar system and everything in it was formed the same time, about 4.56 billion years ago. One of the greatest scientific questions is if there's life on Mars. Since scientists know that Earth and Mars both experienced similar weather conditions in early history, and life eventually happened on Earth. Therefore life may have begun on Mars too. The big question is if life did start their, then how did it die out? Maybe there is still life on Mars, and it’s buried underground where conditions may be less hostile. The only way to answers all these questions is to explore Mars. Scientist call comparisons between Earth and Mars analogs. Scientists say that even though, the two planets are mostly different when it comes to the atmosphere, temperature, size, and the geologic processes on the two planets. Surprisingly there are similarities between the two planets, also. An example is, on Mars there are volcanoes, channels, and basins that have been impacted just like the ones that are here on Earth. Since there are similarities scientists can study a certain part of the geologic features on Earth to learn about or even the same features that are on Mars (“Just the FAQs”). Mars orbits around 1.5 times faster from the sun than Earth. Here on Earth it takes about 365 days to orbit around the...
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...TABLE OF CONTENT Executive Summary…………………………………….. 3 Introduction……………………………………………… 4 Mechanical Problems……………………………………. 4 Administrative or Management Problems………………. 5 Weather conditions and delays…………………………... 5 Communication Problem ……………………………….. 6 Organizational Pressure…………………………………. 6 Using of reusable part…………………………………… 7 Recommendations………………………………………. 8 Conclusion………………………………………………. 9 Bibliography…………………………………………….. 10 Executive Summary This Report attempts to unfold the management flaws and terrible decision making that marked the morning of the 28th of January 1986 as a terribly tragic disaster. What it sadder is that this disaster was mainly due to inhumane practices conducted by the NASA and the management bodies of companies associated with this project than natural reasons. The whistleblowing led to the loss of billions of dollars and more importantly loss of 7 innocent lives. The space shuttle was propelled by the two attached Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) and an external fuel tank. The SRBs were joined to the External Tank. aOnce the SRBs ignited, hot gases heated the rubber O rings and they eroded to seal the joints. SRB joint design had a serious flaw in it and the engineers knew it meant a catastrophe and yet they passed the design for flight. The O rings worked only down to a temperature limit of 12 ̊ C, but the morning of the launch saw temperatures as low as -1 ̊ C which was much lower than the prescribed limit. Many engineers voiced to...
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...United States upon re-entry. There was some controversy surrounded this disaster, mainly how the Mission Management Team (MMT) (leader, Linda Ham handled the entire situation. Could this disaster been prevented? NASA could have prevented the issue with all the new age technology that they posses. How are teams like Debris Assessment Team (DAT) and MMT prepared now to take action against problems that arise in the future? This disaster should not have occurred but it did, why did it? Who is responsible? Will it happen again? If more time was spend of trying to rectify the issue before it got out of hand, maybe the crew of the Columbia would have landed safely as it was supposed to. The space shuttle Columbia STS-107 launched on January 16, 2003 from Kennedy Space Center. During the launch a briefcase-size chunk of foam insulation fell away from a bi-pod ramp on the ships external tank 81.7 seconds after liftoff (Harwood). The foam chunk with velocity smashed a hole in one of the protective shields panels that make up the left wing leading edge. Photos and video shows this happening very clearly. What you cannot see is where the foam actually hit. The only thing that is visible is when the foam explodes after it hits the wing. So at this point the damage is done, NASA knows about it, MMT knows about it, and DAT knows about it. The engineers were getting worrisome with not knowing the extent of the damage. Then they all concluded that the foam did not pose a safety risk. As MMT...
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...making process that allowed on space shuttle, called the Challenger to go up into space, but was destroyed upon take off. I will analyze the reasons why NASA allowed this aircraft to take off, and the reason why it should not have. I will also research the aftermath and how this huge error could have been avoided. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration was created on October 1, 1958 by the President of the United States and Congress. It was to provide research into the problems of flight within and outside the Earth’s atmosphere. The main reason NASA was invented was due to World War 2. The United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in a cold ward. During this time, space exploration become the one of the highest priority discussions. This became known as the space race. (American Psychological Association, 2011) The United States launched its first Earth satellite on January 31, 1958. It was called Explorer 1. Then the United States started several missions to the moon and other planets in 1950 and the 1960’s. It had 8,000 employees and an annual budget of $100 million. Nasa rapidly grew. They had three main laboratories. First, Langley Aeronautical Laboratory, Second, Ames Aeronautical Laboratory, and thirdly, Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory. They also created two small testing laboratories. As NASA was becoming more and more successful, they eventually created even more centers. Today they have 10 across the country. They also conducted several large...
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...of the following was adapted from the sci.space FAQ. Past Missions Luna 2 impact on the surface of the Moon 1959 (USSR) Luna 3 first photos of the far side of the Moon 1959 (USSR) Mariner 2 the first successful probe to flyby Venus in December of 1962, and it returned information which confirmed that Venus is a very hot (800 degrees Fahrenheit, now revised to 900 degrees F.) world with a cloud-covered atmosphere composed primarily of carbon dioxide. (more info from NASA Spacelink) Mariner 3 launched on November 5, 1964, was lost when its protective shroud failed to eject as the craft was placed into interplanetary space. Unable to collect the Sun's energy for power from its solar panels, the probe soon died when its batteries ran out and is now in solar orbit. It was intended for a Mars flyby with Mariner 4. Mariner 4 the sister probe to Mariner 3, did reach Mars in 1965 and took the first close-up images of the Martian surface (22 in all) as it flew by the planet. The probe found a cratered world with an atmosphere much thinner than previously thought. Many scientists concluded from this preliminary scan that Mars was a "dead" world in both the geological and biological sense. Mariner 9 Mariner 9, the sister probe to Mariner 8 which failed on launch, became the first craft to orbit Mars in 1971. It returned information on the Red Planet that no other probe had done before, revealing huge volcanoes on the Martian surface, as well as giant canyon systems...
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...The proposal of the Spritzer was originally proposed in 1983, since the shuttle challenger failure, the kick motor that used to put the Spritzer in an earth trailing orbit was banned from use on the shuttle, for safety reasons. It took nineteen to nineteen and a half to get the proposal confirmed and funding after a few redesigns. The spacecraft was launched in 2003 and it was complete 6-12 months before. The Spritzer was made at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, it took $1.19 billion dollars to launch, to be part of observatory, and to make operations and data analysis. The launching took place at Pad 17-B, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. on the Delta II, Model 7920H. NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has to be warm and cold at the same time to properly function only a few degrees above zero. They do this using a tank of liquid helium or cryogen, while a electric piece of equipment in the spacecraft portion need to operate in room temperature. The Spritzer has highly sensitive instruments in it to operate properly. Astronomers in the early 1960s attached huge balloons to telescopes to get around the...
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...follows is either accepted fact, or will be denoted as being disputable or an opinion. Regards, Robert Bast - Melbourne, Australia, 2010 The Long Count Calendar The ancient Mayans had roughly 20 calendars, all of which were short in duration, with the cycles equating to astronomical phenomena, or were intended to relate to history repeating over and over again via prophecy. Except for the Long Count calendar. The Long Count is the Mayan equivalent of our calendar, in that it assigns unique dates over a long period of time. A short numerical description (like 12/6/1976 in our calendar) pinpoints a place in time. Unlike our calendar, which starts with the birth of Christ and heads towards infinity in two directions, the Long Count has a definite beginning and a definite end. The start date of the Long Count calendar rarely gets a mention, and few experts have attempted to explain why this date, August 11, 3114BC, was chosen. Many independent researchers have noticed that the era of 3114BC includes the rise of multiple civilizations (especially the Egyptians), and the construction of the Egyptian pyramids, Stonehenge, and other ancient monuments. The end date is accepted by scholars to be Dec 21, 2012. The only fact...
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...payloads of less than 2500 kilograms. The launch window opens on 13 February. LARES's orbit will be tracked by bouncing ground-based lasers off the reflectors. General relativity states that gravity arises from the curvature of space and time. If this is true, Earth should drag space-time around with it as it spins, slightly perturbing the orbits of satellites. Though general relativity is the accepted theory of gravity, it might break down if measured with greater accuracy. The beleaguered Gravity Probe B satellite achieved an accuracy within 19 per cent of the expected orbit change; earlier satellites got within 10 per cent. Researchers hope to achieve 1 per cent with LARES, built by the Italian Space Agency. Expect to see more launches from the Kourou spaceport, which is ESA-owned, in future. Vega is due to launch an experimental ESA craft in 2014 to test technologies – such as a heat shield – for a possible crewed mission. Vega could also launch small astronomy and climate satellites, says Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts. One of the few other small launchers, McDowell says, is the troubled Taurus rocket, built by US-based Orbital Sciences Corporation. It has had two failed launches of climate satellites in recent...
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...speech. As the second speaker for side affirmative, I will begin by refuting and deconstructing some of the arguments put forth by side opposition, and then I will continue with the affirmative case. As side opposition has said that we should help starving and homeless people by ending the funds towards space research, and yes, there are issues that do plague us as a race. There is poverty and injustice in the world. While these issues exist and should certainly not be ignored, the funds put forth to space exploration have a major impact and are no less of a priority. Remember, our goal here is to create a balance, not completely give...
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...America is a very competitive country, they always have to be number one in everything they do. During the twelve year space race, if the Soviet Union would have been the first to put a man on the moon, then America would have had to retaliate by spending more money, doing endless research on going to Mars and possibly starting a settlement. The space race would descend, but America would never settle being in second place for long. “President Kennedy was convinced that with a strong commitment of a free people, America could get there first. He appealed to the spirit of adventure, to patriotic pride, and to the cause of freedom. America responded with one of the greatest mobilizations of resources and manpower in U.S. history.”1 The love for...
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...fascinated people across the globe. This was not the only event from the lunar missions to seize the world’s collective attention. On April 11, 1970 NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) launched the ill-fated Apollo 13 mission, also known as Odyssey (Journey Through the Galaxy). About two and a half days after take-off Apollo 13 experienced an explosion to an oxygen tank which then led to many systems’ failure and put the lives of the crew on board in danger (Dumoulin). The other famous quote from these lunar missions was born when Jack Swigert, the command module pilot, radioed in to report, “Houston, we’ve had a problem here.” (Dumoulin). While these two incidents made heroes out of men, the less talked about discoveries made from the Apollo missions are truly remarkable. Scientists were able to study information gathered and form new theories on how and what formed the moon. In addition to that, the technologies involved in getting men to the moon and allowing them to explore led to innovations used here on Earth. During the early 1960’s America was locked in a bitter cold war with the Soviet Union. Tensions and the threat of war were incredibly high. The space race was in full effect and the Americans were losing. In 1957, the Soviets became the first to put a man-made object into orbit around the Earth when they launched the satellite Sputnik (Garber). Just four years later, the Soviets bested America again when cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the...
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