U.S. contractors face layoffs unless NASA moves faster, Reuters “U.S. contractors involved in human spaceflight will have to lay off up to 10,000 workers unless NASA accelerates orders for a new lunar lander and the space shuttle replacement program, a senior Boeing Co official said on Tuesday. The five-year gap between the end of the space shuttle program in 2010 and the follow-on Constellation program’s first flight in 2015 is […]

Colbert: He Demands the Name, Newsday “Or some part of it…like a node. That’s the name that the vox populi (Read: viewers of “The Colbert Report”) has chosen as its name for some room on the ‘station and as you know from various reports last week, NASA is balking.” Stephen Colbert challenges NASA: “Name that node after me”, TV Guy “Colbert isn’t in the mood for cooperation. He scoffs at […]

Final Memorandum on Audit of the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) Program Management Effectiveness “SOFIA Program management had made significant progress in identifying and addressing past problems associated with management structure, schedule, and quality assurance. Program management had established adequate risk assessment and quality assurance processes to oversee contractor performance with respect to the accomplishment of near-term goals. However, we found that Program management had not yet completed actions […]

Prosecutor: Faulty part could have destroyed shuttle, Houston Chronicle “A Friendswood man pleaded guilty Monday to selling NASA a space shuttle part that prosecutors allege could have endangered astronauts’ lives. Richard J. Harmon, 60, the former owner of Cornerstone Machining Inc. in Alvin, pleaded guilty to a federal felony charge of fraud involving a space vehicle part. U.S. District Judge Lynn Hughes scheduled Harmon’s sentencing for June when he could […]

Top 10 Worst Space Foods, Discovery “Discovery Space previously featured some of the best foods ever gobbled up in space. Yet it left readers asking: What are the worst space foods? If anyone would know, it’s Vickie Kloeris — NASA’s Johnson Space Center space food manager who has been whipping up zero-gravity recipes for 23 years. Below are her most notorious space menu picks, some so bad that they never […]

Mini-SAR nears completion of its first mapping cycle, Paul Spudis, Air&Space “A particularly interesting and unusual feature was imaged by Mini-SAR almost by accident. Because of a timing error, we started a few mapping passes of the south pole early, before the scheduled start at 80 degrees south latitude. Good thing we did! We covered the fresh, spectacular Schroedinger impact basin, on the lunar far side. Schroedinger shows an unusual, […]

Report: cosmonaut grumbles about space bureaucracy, AP “Squabbles on Earth over how cosmonauts and astronauts divide up the space station’s food, water, toilets and other facilities are hurting the crew’s morale and complicating work in space, a veteran Russian cosmonaut said, according to an interview published Monday. Gennady Padalka told the Novaya Gazeta newspaper as saying space officials from Russia, the United States and other countries require cosmonauts and astronauts […]

Senate budget panel: Shuttle can fly another year “A $2.5 billion spending provision that would allow NASA to fly the space shuttle well beyond its scheduled retirement next year cleared a major legislative hurdle today, according to U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson. The provision, requested by Nelson, was included in the broader five-year spending plan that passed the Senate Budget Committee. The shuttle is scheduled to be retired in the fall […]

The last one out can turn off the lights…, Opinion, Dwayne Day Space Review “There are other reasons why professional space reporting remains important. Professional media can pay to send reporters to get the story, or pay a reporter to operate in places–Houston, Cape Canaveral–where the stories are generated. Yes, the space blogosphere can operate from anywhere, but people won’t do certain things, like call up sources or knock on […]

“Backdropped by the blackness of space and the thin line of Earth’s atmosphere, the International Space Station is seen from Space Shuttle Discovery as the two spacecraft begin their relative separation. Earlier the STS-119 and Expedition 18 crews concluded 9 days, 20 hours and 10 minutes of cooperative work onboard the shuttle and station. Undocking of the two spacecraft occurred at 2:53 p.m. (CDT) on March 25, 2009.” Images: high […]