Space Stories: NASA Aircraft Assist with Texas Flood, Chinese Satellites Do Something New, and Venus May be Probed by the UK

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: Image by Photorama from Pixabay.

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—NASA “NASA Aircraft, Sensor Technology, Aid in Texas Flood Recovery Efforts“

In response to recent flooding near Kerrville, Texas, NASA deployed two aircraft to assist state and local authorities in ongoing recovery operations. The aircraft are part of the response from NASA’s Disasters Response Coordination System, which is activated to support emergency response for the flooding and is working closely with the Texas Division of Emergency Management, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and the humanitarian groups Save the Children and GiveDirectly.

—Newsweek: “China Appears to Pull Off Satellite Feat That NASA Has Never Achieved“

Two remote-controlled Chinese satellites appear to have docked in high orbit to allow refueling and servicing for the first time. The achievement, which has yet to be matched by the U.S, involved autonomous spacecraft Shijian-21 and Shijian-25, completing the task in geostationary orbit earlier this month. Geostationary orbits occur at 22,236 miles above the surface, and are typically used for communications satellites so that they can move with the rotation of the Earth. However, the high orbit and need for satellites to maintain speeds with the Earth’s rotation makes docking extremely difficult.

—Royal Astronomical Society: “Life on Venus? UK Probe Could Reveal the Answer“

The answer to whether tiny bacterial lifeforms really do exist in the clouds of Venus could be revealed once-and-for-all by a UK-backed mission. Over the past five years researchers have detected the presence of two potential biomarkers – the gases phosphine and ammonia – which on Earth can only be produced by biological activity and industrial processes. Their existence in the Venusian clouds cannot easily be explained by known atmospheric or geological phenomena, so Cardiff University’s Professor Jane Greaves and her team are plotting a way to get to the bottom of it. Revealing a new mission concept at the Royal Astronomical Society’s National Astronomy Meeting 2025 in Durham, they plan to search and map phosphine, ammonia, and other gases rich in hydrogen that shouldn’t be on Venus.

The Next Mission for Starliner

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): The Starliner capsule outside the ISS in July 2024. (Boeing)

The good news is that Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft will be returning to the International Space Station (ISS). However, the not so good news is that NASA may not trust it enough to carry humans – what it was designed to do – so it will probably be carrying cargo on its next mission instead.

Overall, this is good news in that Boeing is not throwing in the towel. We need a backup to SpaceX’s Dragon, and Boeing’s spacecraft is the best bet at the moment.

The Starliner is designed to carry seven crew members or a mix of crew and cargo. That means it can carry quite a bit of cargo if that is all it is doing on its next trip.

NASA is still sorting things out, but this cargo mission, if it occurs, is expected to take place next year.

Space Quote: What’s the Strategy, NASA?

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Credit: Image by Petra from Pixabay.

“You’re losing the managerial and core technical expertise of the agency…What’s the strategy and what do we hope to achieve here?”

-Comment by Casey Dreier, chief of space policy at The Planetary Society, regarding recent news that 2,145 senior-ranking NASA employees will be departing NASA as part of the ongoing downsizing of the agency. It is not clear whether these cuts align with the White House’s earlier statements that it wanted to put humans on the Moon and Mars. The saying used to be measure twice, cut once. With this White House it is cut twice and toss out the measuring tape.

Podcast: Winter is Coming? I Hope Not

Posted on by onespaceman2000

If you missed this podcast three years ago, you will want to catch it now. I listened to it again and enjoyed it just as much as last time.

The Startalk podcast episode it titled “Nuclear Winter with Ann Druyan and Brian Toon” was first broadcast on August 9, 2022, but it was shared again this past July 4th.

Here is a summary of what you will hear:

Are advanced civilizations doomed to destroy themselves? On this episode, Neil deGrasse Tyson and co-host Chuck Nice explore the Cold War, The Drake Equation, and Carl Sagan’s work on the nuclear winter hypothesis with producer of Cosmos and Carl Sagan’s widow Ann Druyan and atmospheric scientist Brian Toon.

Learn about the Future of Life award (details here) and how scientists came up with the nuclear winter hypothesis. How close to annihilation were we? Ann tells us about working with Carl Sagan on Cosmos and his research on this world and others. Find out how Carl Sagan’s research on the climate of Venus inspired work on the runaway greenhouse effect in our own atmosphere. Are scientists always supposed to be dispassionate?

What are the long-term consequences of nuclear war? How did they discover nuclear winter? Find out about volcanic eruptions and how the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs helped spark the idea of a nuclear winter. What happened after the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? We learn about what smoke does to the atmosphere and what a post-nuclear world would look like. Why haven’t we seen any other advanced civilizations in the universe? Where are they? We talk about the Drake Equation, the fate of the Earth, and the current state of weapons of mass destruction. How much food would be needed to save up to survive a nuclear winter? Is there anywhere that would be safe?

What was the public’s reaction to nuclear winter? How did it impact geopolitics? Discover how Carl Sagan publicized the hypothesis to US and Russian politicians. Has the global amount of nuclear weapons gone down? We discuss the role of science communication and the concerning instability in the world today. Finally, are we safe?

I don’t want to repeat myself here, so you can read my comments in my earlier post.

Given the continued nasty war between Ukraine and Russia, as well as the recent bombing of nuclear sites in Iran, this episode is still sadly relevant. The discussion about the Reagan administration trying to block scientific inquiry also seems all too familiar today as the Trump administration guts our science programs, including NASA.

I just hope we are in a better place three years from now, both domestically and overseas.

Pic of the Week: Open Clusters NGC 460 and NGC 456

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Open clusters NGC 460 and NGC 456 within the Small Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy orbiting the Milky Way. (NASA, ESA, and C. Lindberg (The Johns Hopkins University); Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America))

This week’s image combines images from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Hubble Space Telescope to create a compressive view of open clusters NGC 460 and NGC 456, which are located within the Small Magellanic Cloud orbiting the Milky Way. If you go to the NASA website hosting this image, you can see the original JWST and Hubble images that were combined to create that you see above.

Here is a little more from NASA explaining what you are seeing:

A riotous expanse of gas, dust, and stars stake out the dazzling territory of a duo of star clusters in this combined image from NASA’s Hubble and Webb space telescopes.

Open clusters NGC 460 and NGC 456 reside in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf galaxy orbiting the Milky Way. Open clusters consist of anywhere from a few dozen to a few thousand young stars loosely bound together by gravity. These particular clusters are part of an extensive complex of star clusters and nebulae that are likely linked to one another. As clouds of gas collapse, stars are born. These young, hot stars expel intense stellar winds that shape the nebulae around them, carving out the clouds and triggering other collapses, which in turn give rise to more stars.

In these images, Hubble’s view captures the glowing, ionized gas as stellar radiation blows “bubbles” in the clouds of gas and dust (blue), while Webb’s infrared vision highlights the clumps and delicate filamentary structures of dust (red). In Hubble images, dust is often seen silhouetted against and blocking light, but in Webb’s view, the dust – warmed by starlight – shines with its own infrared glow. This mixture of gas and dust between the universe’s stars is known as the interstellar medium.