HOUSTON — Russia’s express crew mission to the International Space Station succeeded late March 28, as the Soyuz TMA-08M capsule carrying two cosmonauts and a U.S. astronaut docked to the orbiting science lab within 6 hr. of liftoff. A second Soyuz crew will attempt to duplicate the fast-track transit in May, as the ISS partnership assesses the merits and challenges of routinely expediting what is normally a 34-orbit journey over two days for ISS astronauts in the close confines of the venerable Russian capsules.
An article on page 54 of the March 18 issue should have said the December 2010 launch failure that led to the loss of three Russian Glonass satellites was due to overfueling of the Proton rocket's Energia-built Block DM-03 upper stage, while a manufacturing defect in the Breeze M upper-stage helium pressurization system led to the loss of Russia's Express-MD2 and the Indonesian Telkom-3 satellites.
Lawmakers came up with a budget penalty bad enough to prompt themselves to deal with taxes and entitlements. Until now, the consequences of the $85 billion budget penalty known as sequestration were largely an academic exercise, but the looming closure of FAA contract towers is already making that tangible (see p. 18).
A new NASA mission to bring an asteroid closer to Earth in time to meet President Obama's goal of landing humans on one by 2025 would do more than bring the mountain to Mohammed. It also would add relevance to some of lawmakers' favorite NASA programs—the Orion crew vehicle, heavy-lift Space Launch System and commercial human spacecraft. NASA's fiscal 2014 budget request will include $100 million for the mission to find a small asteroid, capture it with a robotic spacecraft and bring it into range of human explorers somewhere in the vicinity of the Moon.
The U.S. Air Force could clear the Delta IV rocket for flight as soon as May as an investigation into a mishap with the Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne RL10B-2 upper stage winds down.
To counter the mounting number of cyberattacks, a group of senators led by Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) are working on legislation urging the Pentagon to train members of the National Guard to respond to cyberthreats. The bill would establish Cyber Guard units in every state that could be activated by governors or the Defense Secretary and would draw on the private-sector information technology expertise of members of the National Guard. The bill is aimed at offsetting a shortage of cyberexperts across the government.
U.S. and Russian astronauts, strapped in Russia’s Soyuz TMA-08M spacecraft, lifted off late March 28 on the first “expedited” rendezvous and docking with the International Space Station, a four-orbit, 6-hr. transit that mission managers will evaluate as a replacement for the standard two-day voyage.
NASA’s fiscal 2014 budget request will include $100 million for a new mission to find a small asteroid, capture it with a robotic spacecraft and bring it into range of human explorers somewhere in the vicinity of the Moon.
An International Launch Systems Proton rocket orbited Satmex 8 in a 9-hr., 13-min. mission flying from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan late March 26, putting the big Russian rocket back in business after a Dec. 8 anomaly left a Russian telecom satellite in a low orbit. Liftoff of the Proton/Briz M stack came at 3:07 p.m. EDT, and the upper stage placed the Space Systems/Loral bird in a geostationary transfer orbit after its standard five-burn flight profile.
HOUSTON — SpaceX retrieval crews began recovery of the company’s Dragon CRS-2 resupply craft from Pacific waters off the coast of Baja, Calif., on March 26, following its departure from the International Space Station and a successful plunge through the Earth’s atmosphere. Slowed by three parachutes, the unpiloted capsule splashed down 200 mi. west of Baja at 12:34 p.m. EDT, with a nearly 2,700-lb. cargo of research gear and equipment for distribution to scientists, refurbishment or disposal.
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) closed the hatches on the SpaceX Dragon CRS-2 supply capsule March 25, after preparing a near 2,700-lb. cargo for a weather-delayed splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Baja, Calif. The splashdown under parachute is scheduled for March 26 at 12:34 p.m. EDT. Over the weekend, a forecast for rough seas in the recovery zone 200 to 300 mi. offshore prompted NASA and Hawthorne, Calif.-based SpaceX to call for a one-day postponement in the unpiloted capsule’s ISS departure and descent.
Contract-tower program supporters are appealing to the FAA to limit the number of airport tower closures set to start April 7 due to across-the-board budget cuts. Senate leadership rejected the efforts of Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) to keep the FAA from closing up to 189 contract towers and restore funding for the program in a short-term spending bill that passed Congress last week.
