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Project Paperclip: Dark side of the Moon
Sixty years ago the US hired Nazi scientists to lead pioneering projects, such as the race to conquer space. These men provided the US with cutting-edge technology which still leads the way today, but at a cost.
The end of World War II saw an intense scramble for Nazi Germany's many technological secrets. The Allies vied to plunder as much equipment and expertise as possible from the rubble of the Thousand Year Reich for themselves, while preventing others from doing the same.
The range of Germany's technical achievement astounded Allied scientific intelligence experts accompanying the invading forces in 1945.
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Supersonic rockets, nerve gas, jet aircraft, guided missiles, stealth technology and hardened armour were just some of the groundbreaking technologies developed in Nazi laboratories, workshops and factories, even as Germany was losing the war.
And it was the US and the Soviet Union which, in the first days of the Cold War, found themselves in a race against time to uncover Hitler's scientific secrets.
In May 1945, Stalin's legions secured the atomic research labs at the prestigious Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in the suburbs of Berlin, giving their master the kernel of what would become the vast Soviet nuclear arsenal.
US forces removed V-2 missiles from the vast Nordhausen complex, built under the Harz Mountains in central Germany, just before the Soviets took over the factory, in what would become their area of occupation. And the team which had built the V-2, led by Wernher von Braun, also fell into American hands.
Crimes
Shortly afterwards Major-General Hugh Knerr, deputy commander of the US Air Force in Europe, wrote: "Occupation of German scientific and industrial establishments has revealed the fact that we have been alarmingly backward in many fields of research.
"If we do not take the opportunity to seize the apparatus and the brains that developed it and put the combination back to work promptly, we will remain several years behind while we attempt to cover a field already exploited."
Thus began Project Paperclip, the US operation which saw von Braun and more than 700 others spirited out of Germany from under the noses of the US's allies. Its aim was simple: "To exploit German scientists for American research and to deny these intellectual resources to the Soviet Union."
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Arthur Rudolph: "100% Nazi"
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Events moved rapidly. President Truman authorised Paperclip in August 1945 and, on 18 November, the first Germans reached America.
There was, though, one major problem. Truman had expressly ordered that anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi party and more than a nominal participant in its activities, or an active supporter of Nazism militarism" would be excluded.
Under this criterion even von Braun himself, the man who masterminded the Moon shots, would have been ineligible to serve the US. A member of numerous Nazi organisations, he also held rank in the SS. His initial intelligence file described him as "a security risk".
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And von Braun's associates included:
Arthur Rudolph, chief operations director at Nordhausen, where 20,000 slave labourers died producing V-2 missiles. Led the team which built the Saturn V rocket. Described as "100 per cent Nazi, dangerous type".
Kurt Debus, rocket launch specialist, another SS officer. His report stated: "He should be interned as a menace to the security of the Allied Forces."
Hubertus Strughold, later called "the father of space medicine", designed Nasa's on-board life-support systems. Some of his subordinates conducted human "experiments" at Dachau and Auschwitz, where inmates were frozen and put into low-pressure chambers, often dying in the process.
All of these men were cleared to work for the US, their alleged crimes covered up and their backgrounds bleached by a military which saw winning the Cold War, and not upholding justice, as its first priority.
And the paperclip which secured their new details in their personnel files gave the whole operation its name. Sixty years on, the legacy of Paperclip remains as vital as ever.
With its radar-absorbing carbon impregnated plywood skin and swept-back single wing, the 1944 Horten Ho 229 was arguably the first stealth aircraft.
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The Stealth bomber: Based on a 1944 German design
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The US military made one available to Northrop Aviation, the company which would produce the $2bn B-2 Stealth bomber - to all intents and purposes a modern clone of the Horten - a generation later.
Cruise missiles are still based on the design of the V-1 missile and the scramjets powering Nasa's state-of-the-art X-43 hypersonic aircraft owe much to German jet pioneers.
Added to this, the large number of still-secret Paperclip documents has led many people, including Nick Cook, Aerospace Consultant at Jane's Defence Weekly, to speculate that the US may have developed even more advanced Nazi technology, including anti-gravity devices, a potential source of vast amounts of free energy.
Cook says that such technology "could be so destructive that it would endanger world peace and the US decided to keep it secret for a long time".
But, while celebrating the undoubted success of Project Paperclip, many will prefer to remember the thousands who died to send mankind into space. - BBC
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Werner Von Braun (second from right) and pals tour the Nazi rocket facility at Peenemünde. Between 7,000 and 20,000 slave laborers were worked to death at various German rocket facilities during the war.
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Former Nazi removed from Space Hall of Fame
Museum visitor complained after spotting name during tour
ALAMOGORDO, N.M. - MSNBC - A former Nazi scientist has been booted from the International Space Hall of Fame.
The New Mexico Museum of Space History's commission unanimously voted last week to remove Hubertus Strughold.
He had been inducted in 1978 for work in developing the spacesuit and space capsule, and contributions to space medicine.
But Strughold was also linked to experiments on prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp in his native Germany.
A museum visitor noticed Strughold's name in the hall last fall and told the New Mexico Anti-Defamation League - which then uncovered records on his past.
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from one death cult to another - Aum Shinrikyo
Hideo Murai, the late Aum Shinrikyo science and technology
minister, was one of the most intelligent Japanese who ever lived, with an
IQ higher than Einstein's. He studied astrophysics, concentrating on X-ray
detection. His field, it turns out, was the key to developing new types of
weapons more powerful than nuclear bombs, which are still being developed
and tested by Japan's military-industrial complex after his death. Murai's
most outrageous claim was that Kobe was destroyed with laser-powered seismic
weapons -- a claim many in the media scoffed. But a closer look at Murai's
own research in Kobe shows that the possibility should not be discounted.
Info about Electromagnetic Weapon
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The Russians have spacecraft called "COSMOSPHERES",
which were originally built and used for "Starwars" defense.
They are spherical in shape, INvisible to radar beyond about
50 miles away, atomic-powered [possibly Migma fUsion],
electro-gravitic (can hover against gravity), and equipped
with "Psycho-energetic Range Finding" (PRF) which tunes-in to
the actual atomic signature of an object or target.
The 3rd-generation JUMBO Cosmospheres occupy more volume
than the Hindenburg blimp, and are ELECTRO-MAGNETICALLY
PROPELLED (can accelerate continuously and rapidly, and make
it to Saturn in three WEEKS!). [Many of them are armed with
charged-particle beam weapons, neutron beam weapons, and/or
microwave brain-scrambling equipment!] -
source
INFORMATION REGARDING UFOs (ALIENS)
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SMALL ORBS FILMED AROUND CHEMTRAILS IDENTIFIED?
In other developments, video of small white orbs filmed near Italian chemtrails have been identified as advanced robot drones originally developed by the Italian military's 'Project Cipher'. The program, says Vincent, was sold to the US military after funding ran out in the Seventies. - Rense
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In the Eye of the Galaxy
Few people around the world suspect the existence of electromagnetic
weapons, and most would probably disbelieve the power, accuracy and variety
of these weapons. Even the scientists and engineers at the center of the
world's most powerful electronics-producing nation -- Japan -- were stunned
to discover that long-range EM weapons with global reached were being
secretly deployed by the superpowers. It happened by sheer accident, in
February 1987.
GINGA satellite |
The Japanese satellite called Ginga, or Galaxy, was launched that month in a
high orbit, searching the skies for X-ray emissions from distant stars. But
it also had another, secret mission -- to detect gamma radiation from
Chinese underground nuclear weapons explosions at the Lop Nor test site and
Soviet nuclear tests in Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan. Such military
intelligence was crucial because trans-continental air currents would carry
fallout from leakage from Central Asian tests sites directly over the
Japanese archipelago -- an environmental and public health nightmare.
When Ginga crossed the Equator in early June, it picked up massive staccato
bursts of gamma rays, at twice the frequency of stellar sources. Astronomers
linked to ground control at the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science
wondered if they had found some sort of mutant quasar, but the data did not
come close to any known source. Then, they realized the gamma ray discharges
had come from below Ginga -- but below it there was just a vast body of
water, far from any nuclear plant, cyclotron or test site. They contacted
NASA, which ran a computer check on satellite orbits.
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NASA replied that the probable source was a Russian spacecraft, Japanese
scientists came to the chilling realization that another satellite in lower
orbit was irradiating the ionosphere. Each time Ginga overflew the path of
Cosmos 1900-- a craft that the Soviets claimed was an oceanic observation
satellite -- the readings were the same: massive bursts of radioactivity.
Accidental leakage? Not likely because Cosmos had not been launched until 10
months after Ginga, in December 1987. Therefore, Ginga had detected
radiation-seeding by a predecessor satellite that burned on reentry, which
was soon replaced by Cosmos. The Soviets were using a series of satellites
to deliberately irradiate the Van Allen belts of the upper atmosphere. But
why?
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Cosmos 1900 satellite
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What satellite Ginga stumbled upon was an electromagnetic "mirror," a
ionized reflector for transmission of low-frequency beams, which was a part
of the Russian EMW arsenal. The electromagnetic technology has been used to
alter the climate in the Northern Hemisphere to lessen the economic cost of
Russia's severe winters. It is also used for advanced global communications,
for anti-missile defenses and to induce earthquakes. In other words, it is
extremely sophisticated and dangerous technology, wide open for abuse in the
wrong hands. A similar system was patented by Bernard Eastlund, former chief
of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, which forms the core of the U.S.
Navy's HAARP program in Alaska. (V2, the companion article provides an
overview on this technology.)
If this artificially ionized belt acts like a mirror, then electromagnetic
waves sent from ground stations in the Southern Hemisphere would be
reflected back to a roughly equal longitude and a roughly equidistant
latitude in the Northern Hemisphere, and vice versa. For example, to change
the weather patterns on the steppes of Kazaldistan (Nikita Khruschev's
hare-brained scheme was to grow wheat there; after initial failures, it is
now one of the world's top breadbaskets, thanks to milder weather), one
would have to place a EM transmitter in the vicinity of French-controlled
Kerguelen Island, south of the Indian Ocean.
The ability to focus the EM waves, however, is the most technically
difficult problem, which can be solved by using two intersecting beams of
scalar energy to create an interference pattern, that is, a third standing
wave. This standing wave could be applied in different formats to create
various electromagnetic effects or to ionize the atmospheric gases to create
deadly plasma. This would account for a diversity of shapes and light
effects, that is, UFOs, seen by many thousands of observers around the world
that cannot be attributed to passing planes and other physical objects.
STARWARS & THE FINAL WAR
Cosmos 1900 had nuclear reactor onboard? cover story?
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Cosmos 1900 Nation: USSR. Program: RORSAT. Mass: 3,800 kg. Class: Surveillance. Type: Naval Radarsat.
Spacecraft: US-A. Agency: MO SSSR. Perigee: 696 km. Apogee: 735 km. Inclination: 66.1 deg. Period: 99.1 min.
COSPAR: 1987-101A. USAF Sat Cat: 18665.
source
The Lincoln Laboratory's Haystack radar system near Boston supported a NASA research in charaterizing the size
of space debris. They detected that the Cosmos 1900 spacecraft, is leaking coolant (sodium potassium)
from its nuclear power source. Cosmos 1900, a Radar Ocean Reconnaissance Satellite using a nuclear reactor
to power its surveillance equipment, was launched in december 1987, but suffered a boost problem that left
it in a lower than planned orbit. One year later the satellite was turned off and transferred to a higher
orbit.
source
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In April 1988 the Soviet radar reconnaissance satellite
Cosmos 1900 failed to separate and boost the reactor core
into a storage orbit. This failure of the basic system
raised the possibility that the reactor could re-enter the
Earth's atmosphere some time in late summer or early fall.
The Soviet Union announced that the satellite was equipped
with both a basic system for radiological protection and a
redundant system. The redundant system apparently
succeeded in separating the nuclear core of Cosmos-1900 on
Sept. 30 at which time the reactor core was boosted into a
"stable" storage orbit at about 720 km altitude. The
intended storage orbit, however, was to have been at more
than 800 km altitude. -
source
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Satellite defense shield patent acknowledges EM / kinetic weapons
Several systems are known which are used to cripple or destroy orbiting satellites or other space vehicles. These systems may be ground based or space based. Typical systems used for destroying satellites include kinetic energy weapons delivered by anti-satellites; directed energy weapons such as high energy lasers, neutral particle beams, high-powered microwave radiation, and other nuclear radiations; and broad-area electromagnetic pulses. Before the satellite can be destroyed, however, it must be detected in space, and the weapon must be aimed such that the destructive force will intercept the path of the satellite. This invention relates to a device which makes it difficult or impossible to locate and track the satellite. When the word "satellite" is used in this specification, other space based mechanisms and vehicles are considered to be within the realm of the invention.
To destroy a satellite, the weapon operator must aim his weapon either to lead the satellite such that the energy beam (or the like) and target arrive at the same location at the same time, or the weapon must be able to track the satellite's location. Should the aim of the gunner be off, in the case of an unguided projectile, the gunner will miss the target. In the case of a guided projectile, the target position, velocity and acceleration information must be accurate enough to enable the projectile to come near enough to its target to be effective. If the input data is inaccurate or too late, the operator will not be able to make the appropriate corrective actions, and the weapon will miss.
Cryptome
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| Is Electro-Magnetic Warfare a satellite based project?
Manipulating the planet from the outside in?
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"Space itself will become a theater of war, as nations gain access to space capabilities and come to rely on them; further, the distinction between military and commercial space Systems combatants and noncombatants will become blurred."
'Rebuilding Americas Defences' -
The Project for the New American Century
[file under 'NUTBALLS']
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The
distinction between military and commercial???
| "This is amazing. It's really getting fairly bright out there."
McCool.
"Yeah, you definitely don't want to be outside now." Husband.
[my emphasis] source
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Did somebody want to be outside earlier? to check something...
maybe it's all just a strange co-incidence
odd images
of an bright blue electrical bolt hitting the shuttle were taken nearby by an amatuer on video...
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S.F. man's astounding photo mysterious purple streak is shown hitting Columbia 7 minutes before it disintegrated
Wednesday, February 5, 2003
Top investigators of the Columbia space shuttle disaster are analyzing a startling photograph -- snapped by an amateur astronomer from a San Francisco hillside -- that appears to show a purplish electrical bolt striking the craft as it streaked across the California sky.
The digital image is one of five snapped by the shuttle buff at roughly 5: 53 a.m. Saturday as sensors on the doomed orbiter began showing the first indications of trouble. Seven minutes later, the craft broke up in flames over Texas.
The photographer requested that his name not be used and said he would not release the image to the public until NASA experts had time to examine it.
Although there are several possible benign explanations for the image -- such as a barely perceptable jiggle of the camera as it took the time exposure -- NASA's zeal to examine the photo demonstrates the lengths at which the agency is going to tap the resources of ordinary Americans in solving the puzzle.
Late Tuesday, NASA dispatched former shuttle astronaut Tammy Jernigan, now a manager at Lawrence Livermore Laboratories, to the San Francisco home of the astronomer to examine his digital images and to take the camera itself to Mountain View, where it was to be transported by a NASA T-38 jet to Houston this morning.
A Chronicle reporter was present when the astronaut arrived. First seeing the image on a large computer screen, she had one word: "Wow."
Jernigan, who is no longer working for NASA, quizzed the photographer on the aperture of the camera, the direction he faced and the estimated exposure time -- about four to six seconds on the automatic Nikon 880 camera. It was mounted on a tripod, and the shutter was triggered manually.
In the critical shot, a glowing purple rope of light corkscrews down toward the plasma trail, appears to pass behind it, then cuts sharply toward it from below. As it merges with the plasma trail, the streak itself brightens for a distance, then fades.
"It certainly appears very anomalous," said Jernigan. "We sure will be very interested in taking a very hard look at this."
Jernigan flew five shuttle missions herself during the 1990s, including three on Columbia. On her last flight, the pilot of the craft was Rick Husband, who was at the controls when Columbia perished.
"He was one of the finest people I could ever hope to know," said Jernigan.
It was an astounding day for the San Francisco photographer, who said he had not had any success in reaching NASA through its published telephone hot lines.
He ultimately reached investigators through a connection with a relative who attends the same church as former astronaut Jack Lousma, who flew 24 million miles in the Skylab 3 mission in 1973.
Lousma put him in direct touch with Ralph Roe Jr., chief engineer for the shuttle program at Johnson Space Flight Center in Houston.
After a series of telephone conversations Tuesday afternoon, the photographer had a veteran shuttle mission specialist knocking at his door by dinnertime. Within hours, he was left with a receipt, and his camera was on its way to Houston.
-- sfgate.com
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Bearing in mind that only NOW have NASA issued a plan to enable
in-flight
repairs on board the shuttle...
a little late in the procedure, don't you think?!!!
The cover up...? The shoot down...?
Columbia Strike Linked To
Ariane Rocket Explosion
?
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"One aspect not covered in the Sentinel expose was the possibility of the transcripts and other information being classified as confidential, secret or top secret by NASA or the board. Board members would be in jeopardy of criminal prosecution if they disclosed any information so classified.
On March 25, 2003 President Bush signed an Executive Order (EO 13292) amending the authority to classify information. It allows an agency head to designate anyone he wishes with the authority to classify information. It is not known if that authority has been given the board or if any documents have been classified. The delegation of that authority is required to be in writing, but then that document itself might be classified. "
SHUTTLE PROBE -
WHAT THEY ARE HIDING
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Electromagnetic Scalar energy weapons?
"A scalar-burst strike on the US space shuttle Columbia has dealt a debilitating preemptive blow to Anglo-American plans for a Middle-East takeover.
Psychological warfare tactics were to the fore in continuing pre-conflict skirmishing over the planned US-UK invasion of the Middle-East. This time the blow was devastating, as the Columbia ran into an electromagnetic wall, in the sky over Texas."
Scalar Strike On Columbia Ends WW3?
High Profile Target Makes For Devastating Blow
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The 'ignorosphere?'!!! US dumbs down it's science
The space shuttle Columbia's troubles began as it dropped like a meteor from orbit into a mysterious and poorly understood atmospheric region that scientists have dubbed the "ignorosphere."
The Concorde, the supersonic jet, flies in the bottom of this region at more than 11 miles above the Earth's surface. Nothing but a rocket can fly at its upper limit of 53 miles. The "ignorosphere" encompasses the mesosphere and upper stratosphere.
Invisible clouds, strange electrical flashes called red sprites and blue lightning bolts that strike upward from the tops of clouds inhabit the thin air. This is the place where falling stars are made.
The "ignorosphere" earns its nickname from the fact that you can't get there from here without a rocket. It is too high for weather balloons and too low for satellites to dip down to gather information.
USA today
[Who] can ignore the childlike language used by one of the Americans most read national newspapers in addressing its citizens in their use of the make believe word Ignorosphere instead of its proper name, ionosphere? -
Western World Sleeps as Global Cataclysms Approach
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sprites, jets and elves in the upper atmosphere 
All these phenomena are caused by the discharge of lightning from storm clouds into the upper atmosphere and ionosphere, which begins at an altitude of about 100 kilometers (63 miles). These discharges produce much different effects from the craggy lightning discharges to the ground. But little is known about them because they occur between 50 and 100 kilometers above the earth's surface, too high for airplanes to study and too low for most satellites. - [my emphasis]Satellite experiment snaps photos
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NASA Scientific community - A culture of Programmed complacency?
One NLP guru, Dale Kirby, informs us that one of the presuppositions of NLP is "No one is wrong or broken." So why seek remedial change? On the other hand, what Mr. Kirby does have to say about NLP which is intelligible does not make it very attractive. For example, he says that according to NLP "There is no such thing as failure. There is only feedback." Was NLP invented by the U.S. Military to explain their "incomplete successes"? When the space shuttle blew up within minutes of launch, killing everyone on board, was that "only feedback"? If I stab my neighbor and call it "performing non-elective surgery" am I practicing NLP?
skepdic.com
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History not learned - doomed to repeat it...
NASA Postpones Shuttle Launch
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla., April 29, 2005
(CBS/AP) NASA on Friday delayed by another two months the first space shuttle flight since the Columbia disaster, saying it needs more time to ensure that the fuel tank does not shed dangerous pieces of ice or foam at liftoff.
Discovery is now scheduled for launch no earlier than July 13. The flight had been targeted for late May.
A large chunk of foam insulation from the external fuel tank punched a hole in Columbia's wing that led to the shuttle and crew's demise during re-entry in February 2003. Now, the lingering concern involves the possible buildup of ice on the tank once it's filled with super-cold fuel, and the hazard such shards would pose if they came off during the launch and hit the shuttle.
NASA's new administrator, Michael Griffin, announced the delay at a midmorning televised news conference, saying it was the result of recent launch-debris reviews.
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"This is consistent with our overall approach to return to flight, which is that we're going to return to flight. We are not going to rush to flight, and we want it to be right, so we're doing what we need to do to ensure that," Griffin said.
Extra repairs to Discovery's fuel tank will be needed, namely the addition of a heater, said NASA's top spaceflight official, Bill Readdy.
The foam responsible for Columbia's demise was intended to prevent ice from building up around the fittings that attach struts holding the nose of the shuttle to the tank, reports CBS News Space Consultant Bill Harwood. The so-called bipod foam has been eliminated in favor of small heaters.
Foam application techniques were changed to minimize the chances for foam shedding in general. Engineers believe the largest piece of foam that can come off the tank today is less than a half ounce. The piece that hit Columbia weighed some 1.67 pounds.
But recent testing shows ice buildups in two areas of the tank still pose a threat. One of those areas is in the so-called inter-tank region between the upper oxygen tank and the lower hydrogen tank where an oxygen feedline bellows is located. The bellows allows the line to flex slightly during launch.
The testing shows ice can build up on the bellows or on a bracket holding the line in place. Another ice problem area is near the tip of the tank around a bracket that holds a repressurization line.
NASA managers held a second debris verification review, or DVR, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston earlier this week and still were unable to conclusively demonstrate ice was not a threat, according to sources who requested anonymity.
cbsnews
UPDATE:
Shuttle Atlantis Mission Delayed Again; Faces Slip Until September
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Did the shuttle disaster help in the final steps towards the militarisation of NASA...?
The culmination of a programme that was started way back in 1946 [ CIA ]
and continued with the development of the U2 spyplane, sattelite intelligence and
continued with primo nutso Ronald Reagen and his 'Star wars' programme...
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"In 1973, the Office of Special Projects, established in 1965 to manage CIA satellite reconnaissance operations became the Office of Development and Engineering (OD&E), with a mission that extended beyond satellite development. In 1987, Deputy Director for Science and Technology Evan Hineman established a new Special Projects Staff, which soon became a new Office for Special Projects. This version of the office was concerned not with satellites, but with emplaced sensors sensors that could be placed in a fixed location to collect signals intelligence or measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT) about a specific target. Such sensors had been used to monitor Chinese missile tests, Soviet laser activity, military movements, and foreign nuclear programs."
Science technology and the CIA
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"To ensure Congressional and Presidential support, NASA began making concessions. To ensure a steady supply of DOD (Department of Defense) payloads, NASA made several concessions to the USAF (United States Air Force). On-board air-breathing engines were sacrificed to increase the payload mass capabilities. The required cross-range capabilities with no air-breathing engines further compromised the design."
Doomed from the Beginning-
The Solid Rocket Boosters for the Space Shuttle by Kurt Hoover and Wallace T. Fowler
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Here is a picture
of a spaceman,
go back to sleep... |
We haven't been to the moon since 1972! HONEST!???
CNN report September 8, 2004
"We hope to have the first manned mission to the moon by 2020," Foing said from the British Association Science Festival in Exeter. Foing said the moon -- which man last visited in 1972 -- [oh really?] had an environment most similar to that of Earth so it was a "wise investment"
CNN news for idiots....
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in 1999 Russians were flying their spacecraft via remote control
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Here is a report from 1999 -
an UNMANNED spaceship docks with the MIR space station...Progress delivered 1,256 kilogrammes of cargo - including vital supplies of food, water and medical equipment for the cosmonauts, as well as fuel and equipment needed to prepare the aging space station for unmanned orbiting.
so an unmanned craft thats capable of docking...would be a remote controlled Spaceship, then...wouldn't it? hmmm....?
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Now that's progress!
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| 6 years later: International Space Station receives cargo vessel
BY SPACEFLIGHT NOW - Posted: March 2, 2005
A Russian cargo-delivery freighter safely docked to the International Space Station today, ferrying more than two tons of supplies and equipment for the outpost and its resident crew. While flying over the equator west of Africa, the Progress M-52 spacecraft made an automated linkup to the rear docking port of the station's Zvezda service module at 2010 GMT (3:10 p.m. EST). The ship was launched Monday from Baikonur Cosmodrome.
The docking happened a few minutes ahead of schedule since it was not required to happen over Russian ground tracking stations. Video from the Progress' nose-mounted video camera was routed to the Russian mission control center via U.S. communications assets.
Expedition 10 commander Leroy Chiao and flight engineer Salizhan Sharipov plan to open hatches and enter the Progress later today. Unloading of its contents will begin Thursday. This was the 17th Progress flown to the station.
The cargo includes 2,932 pounds of equipment, experiment hardware and life support system gear, 1,071 pounds of water, 386 pounds of propellant and 242 pounds of oxygen and air. The delivery of 86 food containers will provide more than 160 days of provisions for Expedition 10 and continuing into Expedition 11, which is due to arrive in April.
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In preparation for the space shuttle return-to-flight mission in May, the digital cameras and lenses that station residents will use to photograph Discovery's thermal tiles in the search for damage were brought by the Progress. The shuttle performs a quick backflip before docking with the station, presenting Discovery's belly for Expedition 11's crew to take the pictures during a 90-second window. The shuttle will be 600 feet below the station.
Also aboard the resupply ship are spare parts for the station's toilet, oxygen-generating and carbon dioxide-scrubbing units, and a new heat exchanger device for the Quest airlock module. The device, which is used for cooling U.S. spacesuits, will replace a faulty unit that forced all recent spacewalks to be performed from the Russian-side of the outpost.
Proximity Communication Equipment that will aid Europe's Automated Transfer Vehicles during their future dockings to the station is packed inside the Progress, too. After installation in the Zvezda module, tests of the equipment will occur this spring.
The PCE hardware enables two fully redundant S-band communications paths during the last 19 feet of an ATV's approach. The first ATV cargo ship, dubbed Jules Verne, is scheduled for shipment to the Ariane 5 rocket launch site in South America by year's end. - spaceflightnow
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The smokescreen: Bright lights, camera, action....
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This Apollo 8 reentry photograph was taken by U.S. Air Force ALOTS (Airborne Lightweight Optical Tracking System) camera mounted on a KC-135-A aircraft flown at 40,000 ft altitude. Apollo 8 splashed down at 10:15 a.m., December 27, 1968, in the central Pacific approximately 1,000 miles south-southwest of Hawaii.
source
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At the start of re-entry, hot ionized gases surround the shuttle. Throughout the decent the friction between the shuttle and the earth's atmosphere create even more and more heat beneath the orbiter. The black ceramic tiles located on the bottom and along the wing tips and nose of the orbiter protect it from the nearly 1,648 degrees Celsius (3000 degrees F) temperatures. To rid the orbiter of some of this heat, it makes a series of small rolls from left and right throughout its fiery fall.
The space shuttle
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It's the physics of spaceflight that make re-entry so risky: All the energy required to get the spaceship into orbit ? enough power to make objects move 17,500 mph ? has to be dissipated relatively quickly to return to the planet's surface. The high speed of a spaceship plowing through the atmosphere generates heat in excess of 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. At these speeds, if the angle of entry isn't perfect, the spacecraft could burn up during descent or bounce out of the atmosphere and become stranded in space.
discovery channel
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Space ship 1 - silenced re-entry...?
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Under its own power it will soar to a height of 100 kilometres - where space begins - before gliding back to
the runway.
It does not have enough speed to go into orbit.
The $US20 million ($A30 million) craft, sponsored by
billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and built by Scaled Composites, is one of 20 competing for the
$US10 million Ansari X prize. The prize is awarded to a reusable craft that can launch three people into
orbit, return them safely home, and repeat the feat two weeks later...INN - BBC watch Real-movie of first flight
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SpaceShipOne glided very briefly after its launch from White Knight before firing up its rocket for about 80 seconds.
It then blasted off to reach its target height in a vertical climb at Mach 3 (three times the speed of sound).
The vehicle then altered its wing configuration to allow for high drag, and started to fall back towards Earth during which the pilot was weightless.
At re-entry, the ship's special wing configuration allowed it to glide back down to Earth in about 20 minutes.
Private craft makes space history - BBC watch Real-movie of second 'historic' flight
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Can this privately funded project launch from high altitude,
fly out into space and re-enter the atmosphere by dropping in...?
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As SpaceShipOne leapt into the sky, its bright white contrail shot up vertically, at a striking right angle to the horizontal contrails of the White Knight carrier ship and chase planes.
After a brief firing, the rocket motor shut down, and the craft coasted to the top of its trajectory, before dropping back into the atmosphere and gliding to its landing.
Rutan said the flight was remarkable because SpaceShipOne both reached space and then returned so smoothly.
"It's the first time that a winged vehicle can have a carefree re-entry," Rutan said.
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[snip]
The space shuttles, for example, require extensive computerized control mechanisms to maintain proper attitude and stability during the plunge back into the atmosphere.
SpaceShipOne, however, employs a novel design in which its twin tailbooms and the back half of each wing rotate upward to create drag for a brief time, much like feathers slow and stabilize the flight of a badminton shuttlecock. The tailbooms and wings then return to normal for the glide back to Earth.
The mechanism worked flawlessly, Rutan said.
Plane leaps into space, sails back
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Did SpaceShipOne break the barrier or not?
SpaceShipOne cracked the barrier to manned commercial space flight in June by flying 328,491 feet, or about 62 miles, above Earth about 400 feet above the distance scientists widely consider to be the boundary of space. The flight lasted 90 minutes.
SpaceShipOne's effort was bankrolled by billionaire Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen.
Virgin said its agreement to license technology from Allen's company, Mohave Aerospace Ventures, could be worth up to $25 million over the next 15 years, depending on the number of spaceships built by Virgin. - Yahoo news
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Can this craft re-enter the atmosphere by dropping in?
If so...It begs the question...why couldn't NASA... with it's Gazillions of dollars?
Was the 'fireworks show' of previous space-craft re-entry
a distraction from the money laundering NASA was secretly set up for?
Will Spacecraft 1 be stopped from going into orbit?
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US export rules frustrate Virgin
Cape Canaveral, Florida - Sir Richard Branson's plans to offer a commercial sub-orbital spaceflight service have run into some difficulty.
His Virgin Galactic company wants to license the technology in the record-breaking SpaceShipOne vehicle created by US designer Burt Rutan.
But the process is being obstructed by US export control rules, particularly those that address technology with potential military applications.
The issue is likely to delay the service debut of Virgin's space liners.
BBC
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The mars / moon project - an excuse for extortion
For those of us who don't realize that NASA is actually a Pentagon project...Bush's (Read Carl Rove) decision to go "Buzz Lightyear" on us is a pathetic, if not blatantly obvious, attempt to dodge Congressional oversight on fund this administration is desperate trying to "re-distribute" to favorite sons, daughters and political groups throughout the Planet Earth! At the same time, NASA funding would also avoid certain limitations on Pentagon contractors. There is so much buried deep in that "lofty" goal, it's truly scary that My Favorite Martian President has now given unfettered discretion to the totalitarian nightmare-team fantasies of Carl Rove and Tom Delay.
memes.org
US wants to own space
"Earlier this year, the General Accounting Office issued a report that showed 27,000 contractors owe the government as much as $3 billion. "
Local 6 News
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more distractions:
Genesis - Billions in the Sand...
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Two Hollywood stunt pilots and a space capsule full of stardust were on track for a historic mid-air
encounter above the Utah desert on September 8, 2004 at the end of a three-year mission to probe the
origins of the solar system. The Genesis spacecraft was expected to swing by Earth and jettison a
capsule containing particles that may yield insights about the early formation of planets. [Reuters]
China Daily
stunt pilot Cliff Fleming will be waiting to snag it around 10:15 am.
Cliff Fleming?
OR Cliff Lemming?
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...scientists on NASA's Genesis mission, due to return Sept. 8, use sapphire, silicon, gold and diamond to collect raw solar wind particles in outer space.
"The exciting thing about Genesis is that the data it returns will be important for understanding how our solar nebula developed into a planetary system," said Genesis Project Scientist Dr. Amy Jurewicz at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "Genesis data can bridge much of this gap because independent evidence suggests that the outer portion of the Sun, what we are sampling, hasn't changed in the past 4.5 billion years."
NASA
The Genesis sample return capsule's drogue and parafoil did not deploy as expected. The image at left
shows the capsule where it has landed on the ground. The recovery team is
currently analyzing and assessing the condition of the sample return capsule. - NASA
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Scientists use disaster - Asteroid tracking?
Asteroid-tracking scientists who had been following the craft with optical measurements got a more realistic enactment of an asteroid crashing to Earth. Rather than deploying its parachutes and floating gently toward Earth to be snagged by awaiting helicopters, as planned, the capsule made a beeline for the desert sand.
This may not bode well for the capsule's precious contents of delicate solar wind particles, but the crash was more like the path of would-be Armageddon asteroid.
"It was indeed a true Earth impact," said Donald Yeomans, manager of the Near-Earth Asteroid Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "From that point of view it's interesting, but I'm not suggesting it's good news."
People like Yeomans who focus on tracking potentially devastating asteroids and other objects whizzing near Earth had been in need of some practice. Their network of optical telescopes keeps tabs on objects near Earth and could potentially offer critical information in the event that they find a large asteroid or comet heading our way.
Before today's return of the Genesis spacecraft, the closest they've come to tracking a collision was in 1994 when a comet plunged into Jupiter. The chances of a large asteroid or comet striking Earth are small, but scientists are preparing for the possibility.
By compiling observational readings of near-Earth objects and calculating their speed and course, scientists could predict when and where an object might strike. Just last March, an asteroid the size of a trailer zoomed within 4,100 miles of Earth, making it the closest encounter ever recorded.
ABC
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Aerogel is the least dense solid substance yet discovered, 1,000 times less dense than glass. It is 99.8 percent empty space, and appears eerily indistinct, as in the unaltered image [above]
Aerogel is an excellent thermal insulator, up to 39 times as effective as fiberglass. NASA first used aerogel as insulation aboard the Sojourner rover that went to Mars in 1997, and it protects the electrical systems of the Spirit and Opportunity rovers that have been exploring the red planet since 2004.
Aboard the Stardust probe, blocks of aerogel are arranged in a grid to trap samples of interstellar particles and comet dust. Aerogel has previously been used as a capture medium in experiments on the space shuttle, Spacelab II and the Eureca probe.
High-speed particles that collide with aerogel leave a conical trail. The length and direction of the trail tell scientists the velocity and direction at which the particle hit. At the point of the cone, the particle is captured, not deformed by heat or impact.
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Stardust capsule lands in Utah
Scientists hopes for clues to formation of solar system
Sunday, January 15, 2006 Posted: 1636 GMT (0036 HKT)
Scientists and engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory react Sunday to the return of Stardust.
(CNN) -- A capsule carrying dust particles from the tail of a comet parachuted to Earth on Sunday, and elated NASA scientists were eager to examine the samples for clues about how the solar system formed.
The Stardust mission capsule landed two minutes ahead of schedule at the Air Force's Utah Test and Training Range southwest of Salt Lake City.
"We traveled almost 3 billion miles in space," principal investigator Don Brownlee said from nearby Dugway Proving Grounds. "We visited a comet, grabbed a piece of it, and it landed here this morning. It's an incredible thrill."
The canister containing the samples was taken to a "clean room" at the proving grounds; it will be shipped to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, this week. Complete analysis of the material, some of which will be conducted on the molecular level, should take years.
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Brownlee has said scientists would have some results, such as the number of particles recovered, within days and more detailed findings within weeks.
The material, expected to be about a thimble full, must be separated from a substance called aerogel, used to help trap the particles. Aerogel is a strong, lightweight silica glass that is 99.8 percent air and looks like frozen smoke. (What is aerogel)
Brownlee has likened the discovery process to the ongoing study of rocks brought back from the moon. "The last Apollo mission was 1972. And people are still discovering very exciting things on the Apollo samples," he said. "Samples are a resource that are unending. And so unless we consume all the samples, they will certainly be studied decades from now."
Safe landing
NASA's last sample return mission did not go as planned. In 2004, the parachutes on the Genesis spacecraft didn't open, and it crashed into the ground at full speed. Stardust appeared to land without a hitch. Applause swept the mission control room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, as "All stations, we have touchdown!" was announced at 3:10 a.m.
"We pushed about every frontier you can think of," said Project Manager Tom Duxbury. "We went half way to Jupiter on solar cells. Coming back into Earth faster than anything has ever done before. So many, many things that we did in this little project."
Saturday night, the spacecraft flew by Earth after nearly 3 billion miles traveled, and released the 100-pound capsule containing the samples. It entered the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, traveling almost 29,000 miles per hour, and crossed over Oregon and Nevada on its way to its landing zone on the Utah salt flats. (Watch how cosmic duster collector was to make its return -- 1:57)
Skywatchers in Nevada saw the capsule streak across the sky, officials at JPL mission said.
At 105,000 feet, a small parachute deployed to begin to stabilize the craft, and at 10,000 feet the main parachute opened to bring it in for a soft landing. Because of the dark sky, NASA tracked the capsule using infrared cameras and helicopters found the capsule once it landed.
Nearly 7-year voyage
Launched in 1999, Stardust orbited the sun on a long intercept course with the comet Wild-2 (pronounced Vild-two). On January 2, 2004, it flew through the comet's tail, collecting bits of dust in a tennis racket-shaped collector filled with aerogel.
Brownlee compared the process to a police ballistics test. "You know, when they want to test a bullet, they shoot it into a box full of cotton to capture it, because it is traveling at high speed. And we are essentially doing that," he said. "Except instead of using a box of cotton, we're using this very low density aerogel, so the particle goes into the aerogel and stops."
Scientists say comets are icy, rocky debris left over from the beginning of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago. They expect analysis of the Stardust samples will help them better understand how the planets formed and evolved.
"The fundamental reason for this mission is that we are collecting what we believe are the best preserved samples of the formation of our solar system and they are preserved because they formed these comet bodies beyond the major planets out beyond Neptune," Brownlee had told CNN. "So we're just using the comet as a storage device," he added.
Wild 2 is thought to come from the Kuiper Belt, a band of debris that orbits the sun beyond Neptune. Stardust has transmitted photographs and other measurements that provided some valuable data.
"The appearance of the nucleus of this comet was kind of surprising, and different from other comet nuclei that have been recording in spacecraft type detail, so that was quite exciting," David Jewitt, an astronomer at the University of Hawaii, said. Jewitt and astronomer Jane Luu discovered the Kuiper Belt in 1992.
Jewitt said that Kuiper Belt objects appear as faint, unresolved points of light, even in the world's largest telescopes. He said astronomers can count them and track their orbits and even learn some things about their surface composition, but they are too far away to learn about their geography. "The dust that it hopefully picked up in the aerogel collectors in some sense is a sample of materials from the Kuiper Belt so that's very exciting, too, because we don't have the technology to go out to the Kuiper Belt grab some stuff and then come back with it. It's just too hard to do," Jewitt said. - cnn.com
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This has been happening for years. The history of space shuttle development shows that NASA's
designs for the payload size within the cargo bay were compromised, because the Defense dept. needed to get
military equipment into orbit quickly during the 80's.
now...twenty years on, it seems that the US defense dept.
is readying itself for the final push towards
FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE.
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Colonization of space? new space race with China?
Looking back NASA's early successes in human spaceflight and looking forward to more of it, legendary physicist and space colonization visionary Freeman Dyson suggested the space agency has crucial roles to play in the future.
"Keep the space science going," the 81-year-old Dyson advised the agency. And "build the infrastructure" and set policies that encourage private enterprise to enter space.
Dyson worked on the Orion project in the late 1950s. Orion was a parallel program to Apollo. It planned to detonate nuclear devices to launch a spacecraft. "The thing could have flown," he said. The project was dropped because of the now-obvious nuclear fallout problem, he said.
Dyson sees humans eventually colonizing space; "because it is there, Howeve, he says there must first be "huge advances in propulsion." He thinks space travel should be for pleasure and sport. Competition with the Chinese, who now have their sights on the Moon, will be good for NASA, Dyson said.
"If the Chinese push us, we'll go faster," he said. - NASA Offers Big Bucks To Privatize Space
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"National Aeronautics and Space Administration sources said the plan could call for resuming manned lunar missions by around 2015 and to use the Moon as a springboard for putting people on Mars or even beyond at a later date. "
Bush Could Announce New Manned Space Missions To Moon And Mars
[Space daily]
"Sources stressed that under the new space plan NASA would have to abandon its current approach of maintaining separate programs for manned and unmanned missions. Both efforts would have to be combined, using the advantages and best features of each to explore the moon, Mars, and other parts of the solar system, which is the goal at the heart of the new Bush space doctrine."
UPI Exclusive: Space plan to push robots
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Meanwhile: Satellites launch from modified oil platforms?
what are they building up there?
Enclosure: Transmittal No. DDTC 008-04.
Hon. J. Dennis Hastert, Speaker of the House of Representatives. March 30, 2004.
Dear Mr. Speaker: Pursuant to Section 36(c) of the Arms Export Control Act, I am transmitting, herewith, certification of a proposed license for the export of defense articles or defense services sold commercially under a contract in the amount of $50,000,000 or more.
The transactions contained in the attached certification concern future commercial activities with Russia, Ukraine and Norway related to the launch of commercial satellites from the Pacific Ocean utilizing a modified oil platform beyond the period specified in DTC 015-04; DTC 023-03 dated February 28, 2003, DTC 002-03 dated January 24, 2003; DTC 148-02 dated July 26, 2002; DTC 123-02 dated May 22, 2002; DTC 023-02 dated May 1, 2002; DTC 048-01 dated April 30, 2001; DTC 026-00 dated May 19, 2000; DTC
Cryptome
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Space army?
"Four servicemembers were among 11 candidates NASA has chosen to be the next generation of space explorers, officials announced May 6.
Maj. James Dutton, 35, and Marine Corps Maj. Randolph Bresnik, 36, were chosen to be space shuttle pilots. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Christopher Cassidy, 34, and Army Maj. Shane Kimbrough, 36, will be mission specialists."
Air force link
2004 Astronauts named
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NASA has and always will be,
a smokescreen for the
militarization of SPACE
Exploration for the Benefit of mankind? BULLSHIT!!!
Take a look at this!
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NASA REGULATES CONTACTS WITH THE PUBLIC
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration adopted a
new policy this week to regulate contacts with the general
public. The policy seems intended in part to insulate the
agency from unscripted and unapproved interactions with the
public.
Instead of responding directly to public inquiries, NASA
employees are instructed to forward such inquiries to an
authorized public affairs representative.
"Effective immediately, if you receive an e-mail from a member
of the public, promptly forward it to the designated e-mail
address for your Center," the NASA message stated.
And then forget about it.
"You will not receive a reply that the e-mail has been
successfully accepted, nor will you receive a copy of the
response."
The new policy, which also addresses messages that are sent to
NASA by mistake, is needed "to ensure a responsive public
communications program and enhance public perception of
NASA," the message states.
FAS
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THE AIR FORCE SPACE COMMAND PLAN 2004 5 Nov 02
page 7
"Consider the following words extracted from AFDD 2-2:
Just as the advent of airpower greatly enhanced military operations of
the time, space forces, likewise, greatly enhance modern military
operations across the spectrum of conflict.
Air Force doctrine views air, space, and information as key ingredients
for dominating the battlespace and ensuring superiority.
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Effective use of space-based resources provides a continual and global
presence over key areas of the world satellites permanently "forward
deployed" add another dimension to the capability of our force's ability
to quickly position themselves for employment.
Military forces have always viewed the "high ground" position as one of
dominance and warfare advantage. With rare exception, whoever owned the
high ground owned the fight.
This capability (Space) is the ultimate high ground of US military
operations. Today, control of this high ground means superiority in
information and significant force enhancement. Tomorrow, ownership may
mean instant engagement anywhere in the world.
Planners should consider integrating future development capabilities,
such as the capability to deliver attacks from space, into the campaign
plan when determining how best to strike adversary Centers of Gravity
(COG). Space force application Systems would have the advantages of rapid
global access and the ability to effectively bypass adversary
defenses."
page 28
"No matter how it is structured, the end result is a fiscally
reasonable and technologically achievable plan--one that produces a fully
integrated Air and Space Force that is persuasive in peace, decisive in
war and pre-eminent in any form of conflict."
[space command plan 2004 -.pdf file] WARNING!! THIS IS A CURE
FOR INSOMNIA!!!
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Beep! er...Houston, we have a problem!!!
... to these jokers a
nuclear war is both 'thinkable
and doable'
Atomic Midnight is declared... The Nuclear posture review.
search
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Atomic Rockets! Nuts!
To send astronauts back to the moon, NASA is planning to begin by making maximum use of existing U.S. and foreign rockets as launching systems. Vehicles under consideration may use updated propulsion systems that could blast a flotilla of spacecraft from the Earth to the vicinity of the moon.
For voyages of longer duration, however -- to Mars and possibly even more distant destinations -- NASA is designing a whole new system for both space propulsion and space power. If successful, the system could provide future astronauts a swifter means of voyaging far beyond the moon and equip their ships and robotic scouts with far more electrical power than ever has been available to space missions before.
Named for the Greek God that gave humans fire, Project Prometheus was first announced in 2002, well prior to President Bush's space exploration proposals.
Prometheus originally was conceived as a revamped package under NASA's Nuclear Systems Initiative. It was intended to develop and flight-demonstrate an advanced, atomic-powered space vehicle. The vehicle, which NASA prefers not to call a rocket -- rather, a nuclear electric propulsion system -- might be able to triple the speed at which spacecraft travel beyond the Earth.
The heart of the Prometheus research effort -- a $3 billion project planned across five years -- would be a set of power systems evolved from the powerplants and electric thrusters carried aboard existing space probes.
Instead of conventional rockets, which start out with a maximum thrust of short duration, a nuclear-electric space vehicle would fly away from Earth slowly, then gradually increase its speed via continuous, long-lasting thrust from relatively small, electric engines
Exclusive: NASA's new space 'hot rod'
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Anti-Nuke Activists Protest Pluto Mission
By MIKE SCHNEIDER Associated Press Writer - CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -- More than eight years ago, hundreds of protesters chanted anti-nuclear slogans before NASA launched a spacecraft to Saturn carrying 72 pounds of plutonium fuel. The noise before this week's launch of a craft with a similar payload has been more muted.
Only 30 anti-nuclear protesters showed up recently to oppose a plutonium-fueled mission to Pluto. The most raucous it got was when protesters tied colorful origami birds to the fence of the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
"Folks tend to forget," said protest organizer Maria Telesca of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. But Telesca and other protesters said the threat of a nuclear accident is no less real with the New Horizons mission to Pluto than it was with the launch of Cassini to Saturn in 1997.
Plutonium fuel has been used on two other spacecrafts taking off from the Cape Canaveral area since Cassini's launch. The two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, sent up in 2003, had much smaller amounts of plutonium, which creates energy from natural radioactive decay.
Twenty-four pounds of radioactive plutonium is located in New Horizon's radioisotope thermoelectric generator, an aluminum-encased, 123-pound cylinder, 3 1/2 feet long and 1 1/2-foot wide, that sticks out of the spacecraft like a gun on a tank. Inside the cylinder are 18 graphite-enclosed compartments, each holding 1 1/3 pounds of the plutonium dioxide. Similar generators previously have been used to power six Apollo flights and 19 other U.S. space missions. NASA and the U.S. Department of Energy have put the probability of an early-launch accident that would cause plutonium to be released at 1 in 350 chances. NASA last year estimated the cost of decontamination, should there be a serious accident with plutonium released during the launch, at anywhere from $241 million to $1.3 billion per square mile, depending on the size of the area.
If there was an accident during an early phase of the launch, the maximum mean radiation dose received by an individual within 62 miles of the launch site would be about 80 percent of the amount each U.S. resident receives annually from natural background radiation, according to NASA's environmental impact statement.
The space agency is setting up two radiological control centers and deploying 16 mobile field teams that can detect radiation around the launch site. Medical personnel at local hospitals also have been trained in the treatment of patients exposed to radioactive materials, and the launch required the approval of the White House.
The emergency plans are ready for Tuesday, "if need be, but hopefully not," NASA launch director Omar Baez said Sunday at a news conference.
Some NASA safety managers had raised concerns about the New Horizons mission when a fuel tank similar to the one expected to be used failed a pressure test during factory evaluation.
The original launch date was pushed back a few days to allow more time to examine the flight tank, but the decision ultimately was made to fly since the flight tank was in pristine condition and had no signs of any defects, Baez said.
Even if plutonium were released during an accident at launch, the risk to the population would be low because of the small amount of nuclear material and the remoteness of the launch pad from populated areas, said Alice Caponiti, nuclear material and safety manager at the Department of Energy's Office of Space and Defense Power Systems.
"Once you get a probability of an accident occurring, the question is what's the impact to people?" Caponiti said. "That's where the risk is low."
On the Net: Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space: http://www.space4peace.org">
New Horizons Mission: http://pluto.jhuapl.edu
mercury news
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Journey to the edge of the Solar System
Blackanthem Military News, PATRICK AIR FORCE BASE, Fla., January 21, 2006 11:10
The 45th Space Wing supported the successful launch of the NASA Pluto New Horizons spacecraft on an Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 here Jan. 19. The wing provided Eastern Range and launch base support to Lockheed Martin and International Launch Services, who served as the commercial spacecraft and booster vehicle provider to NASA.
Launch officials scrubbed the mission twice earlier due to weather issues.
This launch marked the first time an Atlas V has flown with five boosters strapped-on. Prior to this mission, three was the most. This was the fastest rocket to leave the Earth's atmosphere with about two and a half million pounds of thrust at launch and ending up traveling to Pluto at 36 thousand mph.
The spacecraft passed by our moon in nine hours. It took the Apollo astronauts three days to get that far on a Saturn V rocket, the largest rocket ever launched from Earth. New Horizons needed to launch prior to Feb. 14 in order to arrive at Jupiter in 13 months. That timeframe was necessary to achieve the right trajectory between the planets and receive a gravity-assist slingshot from the giant planet. Slingshotting around Jupiter will cut about five years off the mission time. It is projected to reach Pluto, which is three billion miles from Earth, in 2015, utilizing the slingshot.
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The New Horizons mission is the first mission solely dedicated to the exploration of Pluto, its moon Charon and then another one to two years to the Kuiper Belt, a region of icy objects at the edge of our solar system.
The $700-million mission's payload is about the size of a grand piano and weighs 1,060 pounds. It will carry seven scientific instruments, which will help scientists examine the geologic features, determine temperature, map the terrain and surfaces and examine Pluto's atmosphere. Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930 at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz., is the only planet to be discovered in a U.S observatory.
This mission will give high-resolution photos of Pluto and Charon. Earlier pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope were grainy and fuzzy.
Following the 30-minute flyby of Pluto, and once it reaches the Kuiper belt, scientists hope to gather more information on Xena, considered by some to be the solar system's tenth planet.
"The men and women of the 45th Space Wing once again came through with the success of the New Horizons mission," said Brig. Gen. Mark Owen, commander of the 45th Space Wing. "It is going to be exciting to see the outcome of this mission in 2015 and everyone who was involved will be looking forward to seeing Pluto and Charon up close and personal," he said.
By 1st Lt Kevin Coffman - 45th SW Public Affairs
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NASA as a tool of the Pentagon...
 Nighttime takeoff of space shuttle Atlantis in February 1990.
This mission is believed by analysts to have deployed a MISTY spysat.
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The United States is building a new generation of spy satellites designed to orbit undetected, in a highly classified program that has provoked opposition in closed congressional sessions where lawmakers have questioned its necessity and rapidly escalating price, according to U.S. officials.
The previously undisclosed effort has almost doubled in projected cost -- from $5 billion to nearly $9.5 billion, officials said. The National Reconnaissance Office, which manages spy satellite programs, has already spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the program, officials said.
The stealth satellite, which would probably become the largest single-item expenditure in the $40 billion intelligence budget, is to be launched in the next five years and is meant to replace an existing stealth satellite, according to officials. Non-stealth satellites can be tracked and their orbits can be predicted, allowing countries to attempt to hide weapons or troop movements on the ground when they are overhead.
Anatomy of a Spy Satellite
Cooperative Satellite Tracking and Low Observable Satellites
Spy satellite debate comes out in the open
Is the missile defense sheild yet Another bogus distraction project?
- Scott Ritter: US missile defense sheild is useless!!!
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AIR FORCE SPACE COMMAND
factsheet
 [Global security]
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"We need to learn how to better protect our space assets. In this way will we be better able to develop our future plans."
Wargames: Air Force Space Command's Battle Plans
[space.com]
"Planners should consider integrating future development capabilities, such as the
capability to deliver attacks from space, into the campaign plan when determining
how best to strike adversary Centers of Gravity (COG). Space force application
systems would have the advantages of rapid global access and the ability to
effectively bypass adversary defenses..."
Air Force Space Command:
"Strategic Master Plan FY04 and Beyond"
[memory hole]
Air Force Space Command Doctrine
[Federation of American Scientists]
What better place to dictate full spectrum dominance than from the moon...?
I mean, who's going to attack them up there?
LUKE SKYWALKER, where are you!!!
"Space operations enhance combat operations and play an increasingly critical role in ensuring U.S. military forces can see, shape, and dominate the battlespace in the coming decades. In truth, the Army cannot achieve the Objective Force's characteristics or its Transformation goals without fully exploiting space. Space assets provide capabilities to a rapidly moving force while minimizing the logistics tail and deployed infrastructure. Today, space assets deploy where needed and when needed. Tomorrow, space assets must respond to the highly mobile warfighter and be tailored to the Objective Force's needs. Only through the continued efforts of all space operations elements can space-based products enable warfighting. Lucky Sentinel 01 proved that timely, accurate space products can ensure warfighters' success. The 1st Space Battalion, USSPACECOM, brings space to the warfighter."
51 Space Meets Sand at Lucky Sentinel
Major Terry Torraca, U.S. Army , Military Reveiw Nov 2001, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas
U.S. Deploys Satellite Jamming System
Fri Oct 29, 2004
The U.S. Air Force quietly has put into service a new weapon designed to jam enemy satellite communications, a significant step toward U.S. control of space.
The so-called Counter Communications System was declared operational late last month at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, the Air Force Space Command said on Friday in e-mailed replies to questions from Reuters.
The ground-based jammer uses electromagnetic radio frequency energy to knock out transmissions on a temporary and reversible basis, without frying components, the command said.
"A reversible effect ensures that during the time of need, the adversary's space-based capability to threaten our forces is diminished," said Capt. Angie Blair, a spokeswoman. "Following the time of need, the space-based capabilities used by the adversary can return to its original state."
The device appears to have been put into service considerably earlier than had been projected by the Air Force as recently as February.
At that time, a long-range planning document, dubbed the Transformation Flight Plan, said such a system would let the United States by 2010 "deny and disrupt an adversary's space-based communications and early warning" of attack.
reuters
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Northrop Grumman [..] supported the Air Force in 2005 when it used converted retired Minuteman II ICBMs to launch the Experimental Satellite System-11 and Space Test Program R-1 missions. These missions continued the use of refurbished Minuteman II ICBMs to place research and development payloads into space. -
source
XSS-11 is an experimental Air Force technology demonstrator designed to track other satellites. Controllers simply tell the spacecraft where to look for a piece of orbiting hardware-another U.S. satellite, for instance-and the XSS-11 autonomously plots a course, accelerates to the object, and begins to orbit and observe. It's the first step toward automatic satellite inspection and repair. - popsci.com
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U.S. Air Force Plans for Future War in Space
By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 22 February 2004
The U.S. Air Force has filed a futuristic flight plan, one that spells out need for an armada of space weaponry and technology for the near-term and in years to come.
Called the Transformation Flight Plan, the 176-page document offers a sweeping look at how best to expand Americas military space tool kit.
The use of space is highlighted throughout the report, with the document stating that space superiority combines the following three capabilities: protect space assets, deny adversaries access to space, and quickly launch vehicles and operate payloads into space to quickly replace space assets that fail or are damaged/destroyed.
From space global laser engagement, air launched anti-satelli | |
