Japan Postpones Rocket Launch to Station

JAXA - H-II Transfer Vehicle 7 (HTV-7) patch.

September 15, 2018

Image above: JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) H-IIB rocket with the HTV-7 resupply ship atop sits at its launch pad at the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan. Image Credit: JAXA.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has postponed the scheduled launch of a Japanese cargo spacecraft from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan. The unpiloted H-II Transfer Vehicle-7 (HTV-7) is loaded with more than five tons of supplies, water, spare parts and experiments for the crew aboard the International Space Station.

A new launch date has not yet been determined.

Related links:

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA): http://global.jaxa.jp/

H-II Transfer Vehicle-7 (HTV-7): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/htv.html

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

NASA/Mark Garcia.

NASA, ULA Launch Mission to Track Earth's Changing Ice

ULA - Delta II / ICESat-2 Mission poster.

Sept. 15, 2018

Image above: The United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta II rocket with the NASA Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) onboard is seen shortly after the mobile service tower at SLC-2 was rolled back, Saturday, Sept. 15, 2018, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The ICESat-2 mission will measure the changing height of Earth's ice. Image Credits: NASA/ Bill Ingalls.

NASA’s Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) successfully launched from California at 9:02 a.m. EDT Saturday, embarking on its mission to measure the ice of Earth’s frozen reaches with unprecedented accuracy.

ICESat-2 lifted off from Space Launch Complex-2 at Vandenberg Air Force Base on United Launch Alliance’s final Delta II rocket. Ground stations in Svalbard, Norway, acquired signals from the spacecraft about 75 minutes after launch. It’s performing as expected and orbiting the globe, from pole to pole, at 17,069 mph from an average altitude of 290 miles.

Delta II ICESat-2 Launch Highlights

“With this mission we continue humankind’s exploration of the remote polar regions of our planet and advance our understanding of how ongoing changes of Earth’s ice cover at the poles and elsewhere will affect lives around the world, now and in the future,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.

ICESat-2 carries a single instrument, the Advanced Topographic Laser Altimeter System (ATLAS). ATLAS will be activated approximately two weeks after the mission operations team completes initial testing of the spacecraft. Then ICESat-2 will begin work on its science objective, gathering enough data to estimate the annual height change of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets to within four millimeters – the width of a pencil.

“While the launch today was incredibly exciting, for us scientists the most anticipated part of the mission starts when we switch on the laser and get our first data,” said Thorsten Markus, ICESat-2 project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “We are really looking forward to making those data available to the science community as quickly as possible so we can begin to explore what ICESat-2 can tell us about our complex home planet.”

Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2). Image Credit: NASA

The high-resolution data will document changes in the Earth’s polar ice caps, improve forecasts of sea level rise bolstered by ice sheet melt in Greenland and Antarctica, and help scientists understand the mechanisms that are decreasing floating ice and assess how that sea ice loss affects the ocean and atmosphere.

ICESat-2 continues the record of ice height measurements started by NASA’s original ICESat mission, which operated from 2003 to 2009, that were continued by the agency’s annual Operation IceBridge airborne flights over the Arctic and Antarctic, which began in 2009. Data from ICESat-2 will be available to the public through the National Snow and Ice Data Center.

Goddard built and tested the ATLAS instrument, and manages the ICESat-2 mission for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate. Northrop Grumman designed and built the spacecraft bus, installed the instrument and tested the completed satellite. NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, is responsible for launch service acquisition, integration, analysis and launch management.

For more information about other NASA Earth science activities, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/earth

Related links:

National Snow and Ice Data Center: https://nsidc.org/

Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2): https://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/icesat-2

Images (mentioned), Video (ULA), Text, Credits: NASA/Steve Cole/Katherine Brown/Goddard Space Flight Center/Patrick Lynch.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

The LHC prepares for the future

CERN - European Organization for Nuclear Research logo.

14 Sep 2018

The Large Hadron Collider is stopping proton collisions for five days this week to undergo numerous tests. Accelerator specialists need to test the LHC when it is not in production mode and there are only several weeks left in which they can do it. At the end of the year, CERN’s accelerators will be shut down for a major two-year upgrade programme that will result in a renovated accelerator complex using more intense beams and higher energy. Scientists are conducting research to prepare for this new stage and the next, the High-Luminosity LHC.

“We have many requests from CERN’s teams because these periods of machine development allow components to be tested in real conditions and the results of simulations to be checked,” says Jan Uythoven, the head of the machine development programme. No fewer than twenty-four tests are scheduled for what will be this year’s third testing period.

One of the major areas of research focuses on beam stability : perturbations are systematically tracked and corrected by the LHC operators. When instabilities arise, the operators stop the beams and dump them. “To keep high-intensity beams stable, we have to improve the fine-tuning of the LHC,” Jan Uythoven adds. Extensive research is therefore being carried out to better understand these instabilities, with operators causing them deliberately in order to study how the beams behave.

Image above: View of the CERN Control Centre where the operators control the LHC (Image: Maximilien Brice/CERN).

The operators are also testing new optics for the High-Luminosity LHC or, in other words, a new way of adjusting the magnets to increase the beam concentration at the collision points. Another subject of the study concerns the heat generated by more intense future beams, which raises the temperature in the magnet’s core to the limit of what is needed to maintain the superconducting state. Lastly, tests are also being carried out on new components. In particular, innovative collimators were implemented at the start of the year. Collimators are protective items of equipment that stop the particles that deviate from the trajectory to prevent them from damaging the accelerator.

After this five-day test period, the LHC will stop running completely for a technical stop lasting another five days, during which teams will carry out repairs and maintenance. The technical stop will be followed by five weeks of proton collisions before the next period of machine development and the lead-ion run.

Note:

CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is one of the world’s largest and most respected centres for scientific research. Its business is fundamental physics, finding out what the Universe is made of and how it works. At CERN, the world’s largest and most complex scientific instruments are used to study the basic constituents of matter — the fundamental particles. By studying what happens when these particles collide, physicists learn about the laws of Nature.

The instruments used at CERN are particle accelerators and detectors. Accelerators boost beams of particles to high energies before they are made to collide with each other or with stationary targets. Detectors observe and record the results of these collisions.

Founded in 1954, the CERN Laboratory sits astride the Franco–Swiss border near Geneva. It was one of Europe’s first joint ventures and now has 22 Member States.

Related links:

High-Luminosity LHC: https://home.cern/about/updates/2018/06/major-work-starts-boost-luminosity-lhc

Large Hadron Collider (LHC): https://home.cern/topics/large-hadron-collider

For more information about European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), Visit: https://home.cern/

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: CERN/Corinne Pralavorio.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Japan Set To Launch Resupply Ship to Station Today

JAXA - H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV-/7) patch.

September 14, 2018

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) is scheduled to launch a cargo spacecraft from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan today at 4:59 p.m. EDT (5:59 a.m. Sept. 15 Japan standard time).

Live coverage of the launch will begin at 4:30 p.m. on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

Image above: The H-IIB rocket that is carrying the HTV-7 resupply ship from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) arrives at the launch pad at the Tanegashima Space Center. Image Credit: JAXA.

The unpiloted H-II Transfer Vehicle-7 (HTV-7) is loaded with more than five tons of supplies, water, spare parts and experiments for the crew aboard the International Space Station. The spacecraft also is carrying a half dozen new lithium-ion batteries to continue upgrades to the station’s power system.

The launch vehicle will send the HTV-7 into orbit on a four-day rendezvous for an arrival at the orbiting laboratory on Tuesday, Sept. 18.

Related links:

H-II Transfer Vehicle-7 (HTV-7): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/htv.html

NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

New kid on the block picks up relay for ozone

ESA - Sentinel-5P Mission logo.

14 September 2018

For more than 20 years, changes in ozone over Antarctica have been carefully monitored by a succession of European satellites. This important long-term record is now being added to by the Copernicus Sentinel-5P mission, which is dedicated to atmospheric monitoring.

Protecting life on Earth from the Sun’s harmful rays of ultraviolet radiation, the ozone layer is a very important, yet fragile, part of Earth’s atmosphere.

Antarctic ozone September 2018

In the 1970s and 1980s, the widespread use of damaging chlorofluorocarbons in products such as refrigerators and aerosol tins damaged ozone high up in our atmosphere. This depletion led to a hole in the ozone layer above Antarctica.

Thankfully, the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer led to the phase-out and controlled use of damaging substances, which has, in turn, allowed the ozone layer to heal significantly.

The International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer is marked every year on 16 September.

While the ozone layer may be healthier than it was, it is critical that it continues to be carefully monitored – not just to look back at its history, but also to see how it changes in the future.

Antarctic ozone 1996–2017

ESA has been involved in monitoring ozone for many years. Satellites such as ERS-2 and Envisat carried instruments that measured ozone.

These data, along with measurements from Eumetsat’s MetOp and NASA’s EOS–AURA missions, span more than two decades and are used by ESA’s Climate Change Initiative to create long-term records.

Now, the Copernicus Sentinel-5P satellite is adding to this vital record.

Launched in October 2017, Sentinel-5P is the first Copernicus mission dedicated to monitoring our atmosphere.

Sentinel-5P

The satellite carries the state-of-the-art Tropomi instrument to map a multitude of trace gases that affect the air we breathe and our climate.

As well as measuring ozone, this new mission also measures gases such as nitrogen dioxide, formaldehyde, sulphur dioxide, methane, carbon monoxide, and aerosols.

Related links:

Sentinel-5P: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-5P

Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service – Ozone: https://atmosphere.copernicus.eu/node/352

UN International Day for Preservation of Ozone Layer: http://www.un.org/en/events/ozoneday/

DLR: http://www.dlr.de/dlr;internal&action=_setlanguage.action?LANGUAGE=en

BIRA: http://www.aeronomie.be/en/index.htm

Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute: http://www.knmi.nl/over-het-knmi/about

Copernicus: http://www.copernicus.eu/

Image, Animations, Text, Credits: ESA/contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2018), processed by DLR/BIRA/CCI/DLR/BIRA/KNMI/ATG medialab.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Juno Captures Elusive 'Brown Barge'

NASA - JUNO Mission logo.

September 14, 2018

A long, brown oval known as a "brown barge" in Jupiter's South Equatorial Belt is captured in this color-enhanced image from NASA's Juno spacecraft.

Brown barges are cyclonic regions that usually lie within Jupiter's dark North Equatorial Belt, although they are sometimes found in the similarly dark South Equatorial Belt as well. They can often be difficult to detect visually because their color blends in with the dark surroundings. At other times, as with this image, the dark belt material recedes, creating a lighter-colored background against which the brown barge is more conspicuous. Brown barges usually dissipate after the entire cloud belt undergoes an upheaval and reorganizes itself. Juno is giving us the first glimpses of the detailed structure within such a barge.

This image was taken at 6:26 p.m. PDT on Sept. 6, 2018 (9:26 p.m. EDT) as the spacecraft performed its 15th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time, Juno was 7,425 miles (11,950 kilometers) from the planet's cloud tops, above a southern latitude of approximately 22 degrees.

Citizen scientist Kevin M. Gill created this image using data from the spacecraft's JunoCam imager. The image has been rotated 90 degrees to the right from the original image.

JunoCam's raw images are available at http://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam for the public to peruse and process into image products.

More information about Juno is online at http://www.nasa.gov/juno and http://missionjuno.swri.edu.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory manages the Juno mission for the principal investigator, Scott Bolton, of Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. Juno is part of NASA's New Frontiers Program, which is managed at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, built the spacecraft. Caltech in Pasadena, California, manages JPL for NASA.

Image, Text, Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin M. Gill.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Cassini's Final View of Titan's Northern Lakes and Seas

NASA - Cassini Mission to Saturn patch.

September 14, 2018

During NASA's Cassini mission's final distant encounter with Saturn's giant moon Titan, the spacecraft captured the enigmatic moon's north polar landscape of lakes and seas, which are filled with liquid methane and ethane.

Image above: During NASA's Cassini mission's final distant encounter with Saturn's giant moon Titan, the spacecraft captured this view of the enigmatic moon's north polar landscape of lakes and seas, which are filled with liquid methane and ethane. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI.

They were captured on Sept. 11, 2017. Four days later, Cassini was deliberately plunged into the atmosphere of Saturn.

Punga Mare (240 miles, or 390 kilometers, across) is seen just above the center of the mosaic, with Ligeia Mare (300 miles, or 500 kilometers, wide) below center and the vast Kraken Mare stretching off 730 miles (1,200 kilometers) to the left of the mosaic. Titan's numerous smaller lakes can be seen around the seas and scattered around the right side of the mosaic. Among the ongoing mysteries about Titan is how these lakes are formed.

Another mystery at Titan has been the weather. With its dense atmosphere, Titan has a methane cycle much like Earth's water cycle of evaporation, cloud formation, rainfall, surface runoff into rivers, and collection in lakes and seas. During Titan's southern summer, Cassini observed cloud activity over the south pole (see PIA06112 and PIA06109).

PIA06112: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA06112

PIA06109: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA06109

However, typical of observations taken during northern spring and summer, the view here reveals only a few small clouds. They appear as bright features just below the center of the mosaic, including a few above Ligeia Mare.

"We expected more symmetry between the southern and northern summer," said Elizabeth ("Zibi") Turtle of the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab and the Cassini Imaging Science Subsystem (ISS) team that captured the image. "In fact, atmospheric models predicted summer clouds over the northern latitudes several years ago. So, the fact that they still hadn't appeared before the end of the mission is telling us something interesting about Titan's methane cycle and weather."

"Titan is a fascinating place that really teases us with some of its mysteries," said Turtle.

The images in this mosaic were taken with the ISS narrow-angle camera, using a spectral filter sensitive to wavelengths of near-infrared light centered at 938 nanometers.

The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 87,000 miles (140,000 kilometers) from Titan. Image scale is about 0.5 miles (800 meters) per pixel. The image is an orthographic projection centered on 67.19 degrees north latitude, 212.67 degrees west longitude. An orthographic view is most like the view seen by a distant observer looking through a telescope.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team consists of scientists from the U.S., England, France and Germany. The imaging operations center and team leader are based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado.

For more information about the Cassini Solstice Mission, visit http://ciclops.org, http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov.

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Dwayne Brown/JoAnna Wendel/JPL/Gretchen McCartney.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Station Preps For Japan Resupply Ship as Next Crew Readies for Mission

ISS - Expedition 56 Mission patch.

September 13, 2018

Japan is poised to launch its HTV-7 resupply ship, nicknamed the Kounotori, loaded with over five tons of cargo to the International Space Station on Friday, U.S. time. Back on Earth, a new crew is preparing for its launch from Kazakhstan next month to the orbital lab.

Image above: Astronauts Drew Feustel and Serena Auñón-Chancellor train on a computer in the U.S. Destiny laboratory practicing rendezvous procedures and robotics maneuvers ahead of the arrival of Japan’s HTV-7 resupply ship. Image Credit: NASA.

JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) H-IIB rocket is set to blast off from the Tanegashima Space Center Friday at 4:59 p.m. EDT and send the Kounotori cargo craft on a four-day ride to the station. Commander Drew Feustel and will be in the Cupola Tuesday, with Flight Engineer Serena Auñón-Chancellor as his backup, to command the Canadarm2 robotic arm to capture the Kounotori at 7:30 a.m. The duo trained Thursday morning on a computer and practiced rendezvous procedures and robotics maneuvers.

More rodent research continued today as four astronauts teamed up to study how microgravity affects the gastroinstestinal systems of mice. In particular, scientists want to know how gut microbes react to the space environment and the impact it may have on astronaut health. Results will help doctors devise plans and treatments to keep astronauts healthy on long-term missions in outer space.

Image above: Sunrise over Japan, seen by EarthCam on ISS, speed: 27'627 Km/h, altitude: 405,80 Km, image captured by Roland Berga (on Earth in Switzerland) from International Space Station (ISS) using ISS-HD Live application with EarthCam's from ISS on September 13, 2018 at 20:13 UTC. Image Credits: Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.

Two new Expedition 57 crew members are getting ready for their mission at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Moscow. Alexey Ovchinin from Roscosmos and Nick Nague from NASA are in Russia for qualification exams ahead of their launch and six-hour ride aboard the Soyuz MS-10 crew ship to the station on Oct. 11.

Related article:

NASA to Preview Two International Space Station Spacewalks, Provide Live Coverage
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-to-preview-two-international-space-station-spacewalks-provide-live-coverage

Related links:

Expedition 56: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition56/index.html

Expedition 57: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition57/index.html

Gastroinstestinal systems of mice: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7425

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) HTV: http://global.jaxa.jp/projects/iss_human/index.html

NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia/Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

New Hubble project provides wide-field view of the galaxy cluster Abell 370

ESA - Hubble Space Telescope logo.

13 September 2018

BUFFALO charges towards the earliest galaxies

BUFFALO’s view on Abell 370

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has started a new mission to shed light on the evolution of the earliest galaxies in the Universe. The BUFFALO survey will observe six massive galaxy clusters and their surroundings. The first observations show the galaxy cluster Abell 370 and a host of magnified, gravitationally lensed galaxies around it.

Learning about the formation and evolution of the very first galaxies in the Universe is crucial for our understanding of the cosmos. While the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has already detected some of the most distant galaxies known, their numbers are small, making it hard for astronomers to determine if they represent the Universe at large.

The last of the Frontier Fields — Abell 370

Massive galaxy clusters like Abell 370, which is visible in this new image, can help astronomers find more of these distant objects. The immense masses of galaxy clusters make them act as cosmic magnifying glasses. A cluster’s mass bends and magnifies light from more distant objects behind it, uncovering objects otherwise too faint for even Hubble’s sensitive vision. Using this cosmological trick — known as strong gravitational lensing — Hubble is able to explore some of the earliest and most distant galaxies in the Universe.

Numerous galaxies are lensed by the mass of Abell 370. The most stunning demonstration of gravitational lensing can be seen just below the centre of the cluster. Nicknamed “the Dragon”, this extended feature is made up of a multitude of duplicated images of a spiral galaxy which lies beyond the cluster.

Comparison between Frontier Fields and BUFFALO

This image of Abell 370 and its surroundings was made as part of the new Beyond Ultra-deep Frontier Fields And Legacy Observations (BUFFALO) survey. This project, led by European astronomers from the Niels Bohr Institute (Denmark) and Durham University (UK), was designed to succeed the successful Frontier Fields project [1]. 101 Hubble orbits — corresponding to 160 hours of precious observation time — have been dedicated to exploring the six Frontier Field galaxy clusters. These additional observations focus on the regions surrounding the galaxy clusters, allowing for a larger field of view.

Digitized sky survey image of Abell 370 (ground-based image)

BUFFALO’s main mission, however, is to investigate how and when the most massive and luminous galaxies in the Universe formed and how early galaxy formation is linked to dark matter assembly. This will allow astronomers to determine how rapidly galaxies formed in the first 800 million years after the Big Bang — paving the way for observations with the upcoming NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope.

Zooming onto the galaxy cluster Abell 370

Driven by the Frontier Fields observations, BUFFALO will be able to detect the most distant galaxies approximately ten times more efficiently than its progenitor programme. The BUFFALO survey will also take advantage of other space telescopes which have already observed the regions around the clusters. These datasets will be included in the search for the first galaxies.

Pan across Abell 370

The extended fields of view will also allow better 3-dimensional mapping of the mass distribution — of both ordinary and dark matter — within each galaxy cluster. These maps help astronomers learn more about the evolution of the lensing galaxy clusters and about the nature of dark matter.

Notes:

[1] Frontier Fields was a Hubble programme that ran from 2013 to 2017. Hubble spent 630 hours of observation time probing six notable galaxy clusters, all of which showed effects of strong gravitational lensing.

More information:

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.

Links:

BUFFALO project page: https://buffalo.ipac.caltech.edu/

Hubblesite release: http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2018-39

Press releases on the Frontier Fields: http://spacetelescope.org/news/?search=%22frontier+fields%22

NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope: http://spacetelescope.org/

NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope: http://sci.esa.int/jwst/

Images, Text, Credits: NASA, ESA, A. Koekemoer, M. Jauzac, C. Steinhardt, and the BUFFALO team/Hubble/HST Frontier Fields/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgment: Davide De Martin/Videos: ESA/Hubble, Digitized Sky Survey 2, Nick Risinger (skysurvey.org). Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin. Music: Stan dart.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

NASA, Roscosmos Statement on International Space Station Leak

ISS - International Space Station patch.

Sept. 13, 2018

The following is a joint statement from NASA and the Russian space agency Roscosmos about the investigation into a pressure leak on the International Space Station Aug. 29-30:

“NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine and Roscosmos General Director Dmitry Rogozin met for the first time yesterday via teleconference to discuss the status of International Space Station (ISS) operations in response to a request from Roscosmos.

“As part of their discussion, Dmitry Rogozin informed his American counterpart about Roscosmos’ decision to establish a Roscosmos-led Commission to investigate the cause of the leak in the Soyuz (MS-09/55S) spacecraft currently docked to the station.

International Space Station (ISS). Image Credit: NASA

“The Administrator and the General Director noted speculations circulating in the media regarding the possible cause of the incident and agreed on deferring any preliminary conclusions and providing any explanations until the final investigation has been completed.

“They affirmed the necessity of further close interaction between NASA and Roscosmos technical teams in identifying and eliminating the cause of the leak, as well as continuation of normal ISS operations and NASA’s ongoing support of the Roscosmos-led Soyuz investigation. They acknowledged the entire crew is dedicated to the safe operation of the station and all docked spacecraft to ensure mission success.

“The Administrator and the Roscosmos General Director agreed to conduct their first face-to-face meeting at the Baikonur Cosmodrome on or about Oct. 10 when the NASA Administrator will visit Russia and Kazakhstan in conjunction with the upcoming Soyuz crew spacecraft launch of American astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexy Ovchinin.” 

For information about the International Space Station, and its research and crews, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov/station and https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Bob Jacobs.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

HTV Launch Moves to Friday, Crew Looks at Life Science and Florence

ISS - Expedition 56 Mission patch.

September 12, 2018

JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) launch of its HTV-7 resupply ship to the International Space Station has been rescheduled to Friday. U.S. time. Meanwhile, the Expedition 56 crew members focused on life science and sent down imagery and video of Hurricane Florence on Wednesday.

Mission controllers in Japan have rescheduled the HTV-7’s launch to Friday at 4:59 p.m. EDT (5:59 a.m. Sept. 15 Japan standard time) due to weather in the Pacific. The JAXA cargo craft is now planned to deliver over five tons of food, fuel, crew supplies and new science gear to the station Tuesday, Sept. 18, at 7:25 a.m.

Image above: The Japanese HTV-6 cargo vehicle is seen during final approach to the International Space Station on Dec. 13, 2016. Image Credit: NASA.

In space, four Expedition 56 astronauts teamed up throughout Wednesday to study how living in space affects microbes living inside the gastrointestinal system of rodents. Results will help doctors devise plans and treatments to keep astronauts healthy on long-term missions in outer space.

Image above: Cameras outside the International Space Station captured a view of Hurricane Florence the morning of Sept. 12 as it churned across the Atlantic in a west-northwesterly direction with winds of 130 miles an hour. Image Credit: NASA.

In the Atlantic, Hurricane Florence is headed for the east coast of the United States and forecasted to gain strength before landfall early Friday. As the orbital lab flew 250 miles above the category four storm this morning, the crew took the opportunity to capture photo and video of Florence.

ISS Video of Florence
 

Hurricane Florence From Space on September 12

Video above: A high definition camera outside the International Space Station captured a stark and sobering view of Hurricane Florence at 7:50 a.m. EDT on Sept. 12. NASA satellites track the storm: https://go.nasa.gov/2CEmDGQ This video was taken as Florence churned across the Atlantic in a west-northwesterly direction with winds of 130 miles an hour. The National Hurricane Center forecasts additional strengthening for Florence before it reaches the coastline of North Carolina and South Carolina early Friday, Sept. 14. Video Credit: NASA.

Image above: Tweet from Alexander Gerst, an EU scientist on the International Space Station: “#HurricaneFlorence is so enormous, we could only capture her with a super wide-angle lens from the @Space_Station, 400 km directly above the eye. ” Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexnander Gerst an EU scientist on the ISS tweets this: “#HurricaneFlorence is so enormous, we could only capture her with a super wide-angle lens from the @Space_Station, 400 km directly above the eye. ” Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexander Gerst tweets: “Ever stared down the gaping eye of a category 4 hurricane? It’s chilling, even from space. #HurricaneFlorence #Horizons https://flic.kr/s/aHsmsk7Krv”. Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexander Gerst’s tweet on Florence’s eye: “Ever stared down the gaping eye of a category 4 hurricane? It’s chilling, even from space. #HurricaneFlorence #Horizons https://flic.kr/s/aHsmsk7Krv ”. Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexander Gerst’s image of Florence’s eye. Image  Credit: NASA.

Image above: ISS Astronaut Ricky Arnold tweets: “#HurricaneFlorence this morning with Cape Hatteras #NorthCarolina in the foreground. The crew of @Space_Station is thinking of those who will be affected.” Image Credit: NASA.

Related links:

Expedition 56: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition56/index.html

Gastrointestinal system of rodents: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7425

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) HTV: http://global.jaxa.jp/projects/iss_human/index.html

Spacewalk: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/spacewalks

NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Space Station Research and Technology:  https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html

International Space Station (ISS):  https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images (mentioned), Video (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

NASA Satellites and Space Station Crew Watching Powerful Hurricane Florence

NASA & NOAA - Suomi NPP Mission patch / ISS - Expedition 56 Mission patch.

September 10, 2018

Florence (was Potential Tropical Cyclone 6) 2018

NASA-NOAA’s Suomi NPP satellite passed over the eye of powerful Category 4 Hurricane Florence and found the storm over 400 miles in diameter and the capability to generate very heavy rainfall.

Image above: On Sept. 12 at 2:12 a.m. EDT (0612 UTC) the VIIRS instrument aboard NASA-NOAA’s Suomi NPP satellite captured an infrared image of powerful Hurricane Florence with a very distinct eye. Coldest cloud top temperatures (yellow) of strongest thunderstorms were in the eyewall, the area of thunderstorms surrounding the open eye. Those storms had cloud tops as cold as or colder than minus 80F/minus 62.2C. They were surrounded by powerful storms (red) with cloud tops as cold as minus 70F/minus 56.6C. Image Credits: NOAA/NASA/NRL.

At 8 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, Sept. 12, NOAA’s National Hurricane Center (NHC) warned “Dangerous Florence heading toward the U.S. southeast coast and is expected to bring life-threatening storm surge and rainfall to portions of the Carolinas and Mid-Atlantic States.”

Putting the Size and Surge of the Storm in Perspective

Florence is about 400 miles in diameter. For an understanding of how large the system is 400 miles is the distance from Baltimore, Maryland to Boston, Massachusetts.

This is a life-threatening situation. In some areas, the NHC said that storm surge could be as high as 13 feet, which is over the first floor of a house or building.

NHC said “Persons located within these areas should take all necessary actions to protect life and property from rising water and the potential for other dangerous conditions. Promptly follow evacuation and other instructions from local officials.” A Storm Surge Warning means there is a danger of life-threatening inundation, from rising water moving inland from the coastline, during the next 36 hours in the indicated locations.

Warnings and Watches: Storm Surge, Hurricane, Tropical Storm

 The warnings and watches are numerous from Virginia to South Carolina. A Storm Surge Warning and a Hurricane Warning are both in effect for South Santee River, South Carolina to Duck, North Carolina and the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds, including the Neuse and Pamlico Rivers. A Storm Surge Watch and a Hurricane Watch is in effect for Edisto Beach, South Carolina to South Santee River, South Carolina.

A Tropical Storm Warning and Storm Surge Watch is in effect for north of Duck, North Carolina to the North Carolina/Virginia border. A Tropical Storm Watch is in effect for north of the North Carolina/Virginia border to Cape Charles Light, Virginia and for the Chesapeake Bay south of New Point Comfort.

A NASA Satellite View of a Massive Rainmaker

On Sept. 12 at 2:12 a.m. EDT (0612 UTC) the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard NASA-NOAA’s Suomi NPP satellite captured an infrared view of Florence (above). VIIRS infrared imagery showed that the eye of Florence remains very distinct. There has been little change to the cloud top temperatures surrounding the eye overnight. The VIIRS imagery also showed that the overall structure has become slightly more symmetric.

Suomi NPP satellite. Image Credits: NASA/NOAA

Coldest cloud top temperatures of strongest thunderstorms were in the eyewall, the area of thunderstorms surrounding the open eye. Those storms had cloud tops as cold as or colder than minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 62.2 Celsius). They were surrounded by powerful storms with cloud tops as cold as minus 70 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 56.6 degrees Celsius).

NASA research has shown that cloud top temperatures in excess of 63F/53C can produce heavy rainfall. Florence has a very wide area of storms where cloud tops are colder than that threshold, indicating that the storm has the capability to generate very heavy rainfall over a large area.

NHC said Florence is expected to produce heavy and excessive rainfall in the following areas:  Coastal North Carolina…20 to 30 inches, isolated areas may see 40 inches; South Carolina, western and northern North Carolina…5 to 10 inches, isolated areas may see 20 inches; Elsewhere in the Appalachians and Mid-Atlantic states…3 to 6 inches, isolated areas may see 12 inches.

Florence’s Status on Sept. 12 at 8 a.m. EDT

At 8 a.m. EDT (1200 UTC) on Sept. 12, the NHC said the eye of Hurricane Florence was located near latitude 29.4 degrees north and longitude 70.7 degrees west. That’s about 530 miles (855 km) southeast of Cape Fear, North Carolina.

Maximum sustained winds are near 130 mph (215 kph) with higher gusts.  Florence is a category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. Hurricane-force winds extend outward up to 70 miles (110 km) from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 175 miles (280 km).

Strengthening is forecast through tonight. While some weakening is expected on Thursday, Florence is forecast to be an extremely dangerous major hurricane when it nears the U.S. coast.

Florence’s Current Forecast Path

Florence is moving toward the west-northwest near 17 mph (28 kph), and this motion is expected to continue this morning. A motion toward the northwest is forecast to begin by this afternoon and continue through Thursday. Florence is expected to slow down considerably by late Thursday into Friday, and move slowly through early Saturday. On the forecast track, the center of Florence will move over the southwestern Atlantic Ocean between Bermuda and the Bahamas today, and approach the coast of North Carolina or South Carolina in the hurricane warning area on Thursday and Friday.

NHC forecasters caution that the path may change and residents along the southeastern U.S. coast should stay vigilant.

Stark View of Florence from ISS

Stark View of Hurricane Florence from ISS

Video above: A high definition camera outside the International Space Station captured a stark and sobering view of Hurricane Florence at 7:50 a.m. EDT on Sept. 12. NASA satellites track the storm: https://go.nasa.gov/2CEmDGQ This video was taken as Florence churned across the Atlantic in a west-northwesterly direction with winds of 130 miles an hour. The National Hurricane Center forecasts additional strengthening for Florence before it reaches the coastline of North Carolina and South Carolina early Friday, Sept. 14. Video Credit: NASA.

Images from the International Space Station

Image above: Tweet from Alexander Gerst, an EU scientist on the International Space Station: “#HurricaneFlorence is so enormous, we could only capture her with a super wide-angle lens from the @Space_Station, 400 km directly above the eye. ” Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexnander Gerst an EU scientist on the ISS tweets this: “#HurricaneFlorence is so enormous, we could only capture her with a super wide-angle lens from the @Space_Station, 400 km directly above the eye. ” Image Credit: NASA.

Image above: Alexander Gerst’s image of Florence’s eye.  Image Credit: NASA

For updated forecasts, visit: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/

NASA's Suomi NPP satellite: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/NPP/main/index.html

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images (mentioned), Video (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, by Rob Gutro.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

‘Space debris – a journey to Earth’ nominated for design award

ESA - Clean Space logo.

12 September 2018

‘Space debris – a journey to Earth’ takes viewers on a voyage from the outer Solar System back to our home planet, passing some of the thousands of now defunct human-made objects that surround it. Produced for the 7th European Conference on Space Debris, this striking film has been shortlisted for the 2018 Beazley Designs of the Year exhibition at the Design Museum, London.

Reducing debris creation

In a collaboration between ESA, ID&Sense and ONiRiXEL, ‘Space debris — a journey to Earth’ looks at how past decisions in space have affected our ability to make use of this finite resource, limiting the future potential of space exploration unless we take action to counter the problem today.

Space debris includes all human-made, non-functioning objects in orbit around Earth, some of which regularly re-enter the atmosphere. As of the end of 2017, it was determined that 19 894 observable bits of space junk were circling our planet, with a combined mass of at least 8135 tonnes – that’s more mass than the entire metal structure of the Eiffel Tower.

Space debris

Originally designed to explore the universe, these remnants of past exploration are now a challenge for modern space flight. ‘Space debris — a journey to Earth’ takes a closer look at different regions around our planet, the ‘junk’ that inhabits them, and its effect on the present and future use of space.

The shortlisted film will be on display from 12 September 2018 - 6 January 2019 at the Beazley Designs of the Year exhibition at the Design Museum, London, alongside fascinating debris-related artefacts to accompany it. Winners will be announced in November.

Clean Space's e.Deorbit mission

Space debris — a journey to Earth’ can be viewed here: https://www.esa.int/spaceinvideos/Videos/2017/04/Space_debris_2017_-_a_journey_to_Earth

For more information on the Beazley Designs of the Year visit the website and follow #BeazleyDesignsoftheYear on twitter. https://designmuseum.org/exhibitions/beazley-designs-of-the-year-2018

Related links:

Design Museum: https://designmuseum.org/

Space Debris: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Operations/Space_Debris

Clean Space: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Engineering_Technology/Clean_Space

Space Situational Awareness: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Operations/Space_Situational_Awareness

Animation, Images, Text, Credits: ESA/David Ducros/CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.


Greetings, Orbiter.ch

A Galactic Gem

ESO - European Southern Observatory logo.

12 September 2018

ESO’s FORS2 instrument captures stunning details of spiral galaxy NGC 3981

A Galactic Gem

FORS2, an instrument mounted on ESO’s Very Large Telescope, has observed the spiral galaxy NGC 3981 in all its glory. The image was captured as part of the ESO Cosmic Gems Programme, which makes use of the rare occasions when observing conditions are not suitable for gathering scientific data. Instead of sitting idle, the ESO Cosmic Gems Programme allows ESO’s telescopes to be used to capture visually stunning images of the southern skies.

This wonderful image shows the resplendent spiral galaxy NGC 3981 suspended in the inky blackness of space. This galaxy, which lies in the constellation of Crater (the Cup), was imaged in May 2018 using the FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT).

Digitized Sky Survey image around the spiral galaxy NGC 3981

FORS2 is mounted on Unit Telescope 1 (Antu) of the VLT at ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile. Amongst the host of cutting-edge instruments mounted on the four Unit Telescopes of the VLT, FORS2 stands apart due to its extreme versatility. This ”Swiss Army knife” of an instrument is able to study a variety of astronomical objects in many different ways — as well as being capable of producing beautiful images like this one.

The sensitive gaze of FORS2 revealed NGC 3981’s spiral arms, strewn with vast streams of dust and star-forming regions, and a prominent disc of hot young stars. The galaxy is inclined towards Earth, allowing astronomers to peer right into the heart of this galaxy and observe its bright centre, a highly energetic region containing a supermassive black hole. Also shown is NGC 3981’s outlying spiral structure, some of which appears to have been stretched outwards from the galaxy, presumably due to the gravitational influence of a past galactic encounter.

NGC 3981 in the constellation of Crater

NGC 3981 certainly has many galactic neighbours. Lying approximately 65 million light years from Earth, the galaxy is part of the NGC 4038 group, which also contains the well-known interacting Antennae Galaxies. This group is part of the larger Crater Cloud, which is itself a smaller component of the Virgo Supercluster, the titanic collection of galaxies that hosts our own Milky Way galaxy.

NGC 3981 is not the only interesting feature captured in this image. As well as several foreground stars from our own galaxy, the Milky Way, FORS2 also captured a rogue asteroid streaking across the sky, visible as the faint line towards the top of the image. This particular asteroid has unwittingly illustrated the process used to create astronomical images, with the three different exposures making up this image displayed in the blue, green and red sections of the asteroid’s path.

Zooming into NGC 3981

This image was taken as part of ESO’s Cosmic Gems programme, an outreach initiative to produce images of interesting, intriguing or visually attractive objects using ESO telescopes, for the purposes of education and public outreach. The programme makes use of telescope time that cannot be used for science observations. In case the data collected could be useful for future scientific purposes, these observations are saved and made available to astronomers through ESO’s science archive.

Panning across NGC 3981

More information:

ESO is the foremost intergovernmental astronomy organisation in Europe and the world’s most productive ground-based astronomical observatory by far. It has 15 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, along with the host state of Chile and with Australia as a strategic partner. ESO carries out an ambitious programme focused on the design, construction and operation of powerful ground-based observing facilities enabling astronomers to make important scientific discoveries. ESO also plays a leading role in promoting and organising cooperation in astronomical research. ESO operates three unique world-class observing sites in Chile: La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor. At Paranal, ESO operates the Very Large Telescope and its world-leading Very Large Telescope Interferometer as well as two survey telescopes, VISTA working in the infrared and the visible-light VLT Survey Telescope. ESO is also a major partner in two facilities on Chajnantor, APEX and ALMA, the largest astronomical project in existence. And on Cerro Armazones, close to Paranal, ESO is building the 39-metre Extremely Large Telescope, the ELT, which will become “the world’s biggest eye on the sky”.

Links:

ESOCast 177 Light: A Galactic Gem: https://www.eso.org/public/videos/eso1830a/

ESO’s Cosmic Gems programme: https://www.eso.org/public/outreach/gems/

Images of the VLT: https://www.eso.org/public/images/archive/search/?adv=&subject_name=Very%20Large%20Telescope

ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT): https://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/paranal-observatory/vlt/

FOcal Reducer and low dispersion Spectrograph 2 (FORS2): http://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/vlt/vlt-instr/fors/

ESO’s Paranal Observatory: http://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/paranal/

Images, Text, Credits: ESO/Calum Turner/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgment: Davide De Martin/IAU and Sky & Telescope/Videos: ESO/James Creasey/Digitized Sky Survey 2/N. Risinger (skysurvey.org). Music: Astral Electronic.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch