NASA's Successful 'Can Crush' Will Aid Heavy-Lift Rocket Design

In this week, NASA put the squeeze on a large rocket test section. Results from this structural strength test at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., will help future heavy-lift launch vehicles weigh less and reduce development costs.This trailblazing project is examining the safety margins needed in the design of future, large launch vehicle structures. Test results will be used to develop and validate structural analysis models and generate new "shell-buckling knockdown factors" -- complex engineering design standards essential to launch vehicle design.

"This type of research is critical to NASA developing a new heavy-lift vehicle," said NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden. "The Authorization Act of 2010 gave us direction to take the nation beyond low-Earth orbit, but it is the work of our dedicated team of engineers and researchers that will make future NASA exploration missions a reality."

The aerospace industry's shell buckling knockdown factors date back to Apollo-era studies when current materials, manufacturing processes and high-fidelity computer modeling did not exist. These new analyses will update essential design factors and calculations that are a significant performance and safety driver in designing large structures like the main fuel tank of a future heavy-lift launch vehicle.During the test, a massive 27.5-foot-diameter and 20-foot-tall aluminum-lithium test cylinder received almost one million pounds of force until it failed. More than 800 sensors measured strain and local deformations. In addition, advanced optical measurement techniques were used to monitor tiny deformations over the entire outer surface of the test article.

See Mercury in 3D

Going to the cinemas these days offer us an option – to watch a movie in 3D or not? Well, NASA’s MESSENGER has started to orbit the planet at 01:45 CET, where this little transport that could will carry the necessary scientific instruments required to map Mercury from a distance, analyzing the structure and composition of its surface in the process while creating what some might call a 3D model in the end. Scientists at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) will be the brains that analyze collected data from three of the instruments on the MESSENGER. Being the smallest among the terrestrial planets, Mercury is still a huge mystery since it possesses an unusually high density with an interior that comprises of an iron core surrounded by a thin rocky mantle and crust. You won’t need to wear a dorky pair of 3D glasses to see the planet in 3D glory, that’s for sure.

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NASA Testing Of Commercial Engine Flies High

You see a lot of smiles around the E-1 Test Stand at John C. Stennis Space Center these days. Engineers involved in testing Aerojet's AJ26 rocket engine for Orbital Sciences Corporation's Taurus II space launch vehicle have good reason to smile.
In fact, they have several good reasons given that the partnership between NASA
, Orbital and Aerojet is off to such an impressive start. Two successful tests of an AJ26 engine that will power the first stage of Orbital's Taurus II rocket recently wrapped up at Stennis.
The two tests were so successful that Orbital engineers decided a planned third test was unnecessary. The AJ26 engine used in the testing was removed from the E-1 stand on Jan. 24, and will be returned to Aerojet in Sacramento, Calif. to be refurbished and used on an upcoming Taurus II mission.
The same day the engine was removed, the first flight engine was installed to begin regularly planned "acceptance testing" at Stennis.
The AJ26 flight unit will be tested in February, and then delivered to Orbital at the Wallops Flight Facility launch site in Virginia for integration with the rocket's first stage core.
Orbital's Taurus II rocket will first be used to carry out commercial cargo supply mission to the International Space Station.
Orbital is developing the cargo logistics system under the joint Commercial Orbital Transportation Services research and development project with NASA, and is scheduled to carry out the first of eight cargo missions under the Commercial Resupply Services contract beginning in early 2012.

Second STS-132 Spacewalk

Control has revised the timeline for Atlantis' crew, moving it 30 minutes earlier beginning with the planned "campout" for spacewalkers Steve Bowen and Michael Good. The schedule change will allow the spacewalkers time to release the snagged portion of the cable on the camera used for imaging the space shuttle's heat shield. The camera is at the end of the Orbiter Boom Sensor System.

The campout now will begin at 4:45 p.m. EDT, and crew sleep will begin at 6:20 p.m. On May 19, the crew will wake up at 2:20 a.m. and begin the spacewalk at 7:15 a.m.

Bowen and Good will camp out in the station’s Quest airlock at a reduced air pressure, a procedure that helps purge nitrogen from their bloodstreams and prevents the “bends” when they exit the airlock.

Honoring Apollo 13's Fred Haise

At a 1 p.m. ceremony on Dec 2, 2009, Administrator Charles Bolden presented NASA's Ambassador of Exploration Award to Apollo 13 astronaut Fred Haise, a Biloxi, Miss., native. The ceremony took place at Biloxi's Gorenflo Elementary School. Pictured from left to right are school principal Tina Thompson, Administrator Bolden, Fred Haise, Biloxi Public School District Superintendent Paul Tisdale and Stennis Space Center Director Gene Goldman.

70th Anniversary Exhibits

In celebration of NASA Ames' 70th anniversary, 12 businesses in downtown Mountain View are showcasing exhibits of the center's past. Shown here is a spacesuit replica at Red Rock Cafe.

Cabeus Crater

Most mountains on the Earth are formed as plates collide and the crust buckles. Not so for the Moon, where mountains are formed as a result of impacts. Images taken looking across the landscape rather than straight down really bring out topography and help us visualize the lunar landscape. However such images can only be taken as the spacecraft rolls to the side, in this case about 70°, so the opportunities are limited. Foreground is about 15 km wide, view is northeast across the north rim of Cabeus crater. Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University.

Cabeus crater is relatively old, 100-km in diameter, and contains significant areas of permanent shadow. Such regions are of great interest because they may harbor significant deposits of ices (water, methane, etc). Cabeus crater is most famous as the site of the LCROSS Centaur impact (9 October 2009) that was intended to excavate and eject any volatiles that may be in the regolith (what we call the lunar soil). Though analyses of data collected during the impact are still ongoing, preliminary results suggest that yes, significant amounts of water ice may be trapped in these shadowed regions (at least at this one spot).

Two and a half days after the LCROSS impact the LRO spacecraft slewed 70° back towards Cabeus crater to allow LROC to acquire an overview image of a portion of the northern rim. The large mountain (or massif) in the right background (full panorama below) is a portion of the ancient rim of the South Pole Aitken basin, it rises some 6000 meters (19,685 feet) above the surrounding plains, and more than 9200 meters (30,184 feet) above the floor of Cabeus crater -- taller than any mountain on the Earth. On the Moon mountains are formed in only minutes as huge amounts of energy are released when asteroids and comets slam into the surface at velocities greater than 16-km per second (more than ten times faster than a speeding bullet). In contrast, mountains on the Earth typically form over millions of years during slow motion collisions of tectonic plates.

Panoramic view looking across the North rim of Cabeus crater from the SW. The distance from left to right is about 75-km and from foreground to background in the center is about 50-km. The LCROSS impact was just off the bottom center of the panorama Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University.

Future astronauts will see the same view as they descend to the surface for a polar landing. Explore the rim of Cabeus on your own as you plan your landing spot!

LRO Gets Additional View of Apollo 11 Landing Site

With those eight words, astronaut Neil Armstrong let the world know that Apollo 11 had landed safely on the moon, beginning humankind's first exploration of another world. The landing certainly kept the mission operations crew in suspense as Armstrong maneuvered around the bouldery ejecta on the northeast flank of West Crater, finally settling down almost a kilometer to the west with only tens of seconds of fuel remaining.

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera team earlier released two pictures of the Apollo 11 landing site, each taken under different lighting conditions and at lower resolution than this image. This is LROC's first picture of Apollo 11 after LRO dropped into its 50 km mapping orbit. At this altitude, very small details of Tranquility Base can be discerned. The footpads of the LM are clearly discernible. Components of the Early Apollo Science Experiments Package (EASEP) are easily seen, as well. Boulders from West Crater lying on the surface to the east stand out, and the many small craters that cover the moon are visible to the southeast.

Landslides in Marius Crater

Impact events, volcanism, and tectonism form the majority of features found on the Moon. However landslides are an important modifier of the landscape at small scales. Ultimately, the source of landslides are seismic events triggered by impacts or movements deep inside the Moon. These shaking events cause poorly consolidated material on steep slopes to slide downhill. In this case the slide spreads out in a complex of narrow finger-like streamers. What controls this distinctive pattern? The process is controlled by the energy of the shaking, the size of particles in the slide, the steepness of the slope, and volume of the source deposit. Mars also has many landslide deposits, so scientists are using the new LROC data to compare with these martian counterparts.

Marius crater (41 km diameter) is located in Oceanus Procellarum (11.9°N, 50.8°W) and is notable for its mare filled floor - unequivocal evidence that it formed before before the surrounding mare basalts flooded the region.

This Month in Exploration - November

Visit "This Month in Exploration" every month to find out how aviation and space exploration have changed throughout the years, improving life for humans on Earth and in space. While reflecting on the events that led to NASA's formation and its rich history of accomplishments, "This Month in Exploration" will reveal where the agency is leading us -- to the moon, Mars and beyond.

100 Years Ago

November 3, 1909: Lt. George C. Sweet became the first naval officer to fly in the Wright airplane during the military trials of the Wright Flyer at College Park, Md. On the same day, Dr. William H. Greene set a passenger-carrying record at Morris Park, N.Y. A. Leo Stevens, an aviation pioneer in his own right, and two others rode as passengers for short flights in the Greene biplane.

90 Years Ago

November 12, 1919: Ross MacPherson Smith commenced his historic, 11,500-mile intercontinental flight in a British Vickers-Vimy heavy bomber aircraft in Heston, London. He completed the trip at Port Darwin, Australia on December 10, 1919 and was knighted for his efforts.

80 Years Ago

November 28-29, 1929: Commander Richard E. Byrd made the first flight over the South Pole in a Ford trimotor piloted by Bernt Balchen and two American pilots. During this first expedition to Antarctica, Byrd established a base he named Little America that was located on the Bay of Whales.

75 Years Ago

November 18, 1934: The United States Navy issued a contract to the Northrop Corporation for the XBT-1: a two-seat scout and 1,000-pound dive bomber. The aircraft was the first prototype in a sequence that led to the SBD Dauntless series of dive bombers used throughout World War II.

60 Years Ago

November 22, 1949: The Douglas D-558-II Skyrocket, a research plane, exceeded the speed of sound at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. It was powered by both a Westinghouse J-34 turbojet engine and a Reaction Motors rocket motor.

50 Years Ago

November 4, 1959: NASA launched a second LJ-1A rocket (nicknamed Little Joe) from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Va. to test the Mercury escape system under severe dynamic pressure. The launch vehicle functioned perfectly, but the escape rocket ignited ten seconds too late.

November 11-22, 1959: The United States contributed 10 rocket firings to an internationally coordinated program of rocket sounds of the upper atmosphere sponsored by the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR).

45 Years Ago

November 28, 1964: NASA launched the Mars explorer Mariner 4 spacecraft at 9:22 a.m. EST from the Eastern Space and Missile Center. The first successful mission to Mars, it encountered the planet on July 14, 1965.

40 Years Ago

November 14, 1969: NASA launched Apollo 12, the second lunar landing mission, at 11:22 a.m. EST from NASA's Kennedy Space Station, Fla. Astronauts Charles Conrad, Jr., Richard F. Gordon, and Alan L. Bean were aboard. The event was witnessed by Richard Nixon, the first U.S. President to attend the launch of a manned space flight.

30 Years Ago

November 21, 1979: The Eastern Space and Missile Center hosted the launch of the U.S. Air Force's Defense Satellites DSCS II-13 and 14.

25 Years Ago

November 8, 1984: NASA launched the Space Shuttle Discovery (STS-51A) from Kennedy Space Center at 7:15 a.m. EST. The satellites TELESAT-H (ANIK) and SYNCOM IV-I (also known as LEASAT-1) were deployed, while disabled satellites PALAPA-B2 and WESTAR-VI were retrieved. The mission marked the first retrieval and return of two disabled communications satellites. The mission duration was 7 days, 23 hours, 44 minutes

20 Years Ago

November 18, 1989: NASA launched the Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE ) at 6:34 a.m. PST from Vandenberg Air Force Base. This satellite was designed to measure diffuse infrared and microwave radiation from the early universe. COBE determined the temperature of the cosmic microwave background -- essentially the afterglow of the big bang.

15 Years Ago

November 3, 1994: NASA launched Space Shuttle Atlantis (STS-66) at 11:59 a.m. EDT from Kennedy Space Center. The primary payload was the Atmospheric Laboratory for Applications and Sciences - 3 (ATLAS-03), which measured and studied the hole in Earth's ozone layer. The mission duration was 10 days, 22 hours, 34 minutes.

10 Years Ago

November 26, 1999: NASA's Galileo spacecraft completed a historic flyby of Jupiter's moon, Io. Through Galileo's instruments, scientists determined that some of the volcanoes located on Io are hotter than any on Earth.

Five Years Ago

November 12, 2004: NASA's X-43A research vehicle set a new world speed record by a jet-powered aircraft when it traveled at Mach 10 - nearly 7,000 miles per hour. The X-43A's air-breathing scramjet engine has no moving parts. The aircraft is part of NASA's Hyper-X Program

Present Day

November 16, 2009: Space shuttle Atlantis (STS-129) will launch from Kennedy Space Center to deliver components including two gyroscopes, two nitrogen tank assemblies, two pump modules, an ammonia tank assembly and a spare latching end effector for the International Space Station's robotic arm.

X-38 Crew Return Vehicle Finds New Home

One of NASA's three X-38 Crew Return Vehicle technology demonstrators that flew at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., a decade ago has found a new home in America's heartland.

In this image from test flights in 1999, the X-38 research vehicle drops away from NASA's B-52 mothership immediately after being released from the B-52's wing pylon. More than 30 years earlier, this same B-52 launched the original lifting-body vehicles flight tested by NASA and the Air Force at what is now called the Dryden Flight Research Center and the Air Force Flight Test Center.

The wingless lifting body craft was transferred this past weekend from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston to the Strategic Air and Space Museum, located just off Interstate 80 at Ashland, Neb., about 20 miles southeast of Omaha. The X-38 adds to the museum's growing collection of aerospace vehicles and other historical artifacts.

The move of the second X-38 built to the museum has a fitting connection, as the X-38 vehicles were air-launched from NASA's famous B-52B 008 mothership. The B-52 bomber served as the backbone of the Air Force's Strategic Air Command during the command's history.

Prior to cancellation, the X-38 program was developing the technology for proposed vehicles that could return up to seven International Space Station crewmembers to Earth in case of an emergency. These vehicles would have been carried to the space station in the cargo bay of a space shuttle and attached to station docking ports. If an emergency arose that forced the ISS crew to leave the space station, a Crew Return Vehicle would have undocked and returned them to Earth much like the space shuttle, although the vehicle would have deployed a parafoil for the final descent and landing.