Tag Archives: space flight

science news

Fly, Artemis, fly!

Allow me this brief admission, which is that today for the first time in decades my eyes filled with tears of joy as I watched the Artemis II rocket fly into space en route to the moon.

Watching the rocket blast off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., reminded me of the many mornings I would watch and wait for Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts fly into history. Mom and I would do so together and we cried together too.

When was the most recent time I cried at the launch of a spaceship? I believe it was the 1998 launch of the shuttle Discovery as it contained, in the words of NASA’s announcement upon launch, a crew featuring “six astronaut heroes and one American legend.” The legend happened to be John Glenn, who was making his second flight into space 36 years after orbiting three times aboard his Mercury capsule.

We have once more seen American ingenuity score a huge triumph with the successful launch of the Artemis II rocket. We have returned to the effort of putting astronauts on a deep space target. The moon awaits. The Artemis II crew will visit the moon up close, orbiting the celestial body and coming home. Eventually, we’ll head for Mars … what happens next remains anyone’s guess.

I am thrilled to watch this effort unfold. Today, we took a relative baby step as Artemis II roared off the launch pad as it writes another chapter in our nation’s rich scientific history.

Godspeed, Artemis II crew!

science news

Glenn knew the lingo

John Glenn served his country with honor, as a Marine Corps fighter pilot during the Korean War, as an astronaut chosen to blaze our trail into space and as a U.S. senator from Ohio. This man led a full and rewarding life.

Sixty-three years ago today, Glenn got strapped into a Mercury space ship and launched into space for a three-orbit mission. He became the first American to orbit the planet. The Soviet Union already had put two men into orbit: Yuri Gagarin and Gherman Titov. President Kennedy had declared his intention to put a “man on the moon and return him safely to the Earth” before the end of the 1960s. The space race was on!

Kennedy didn’t live to see his mission accomplished.

Here’s the thing about Glenn: He always stayed alert to the space program and likely wished for a second trip into space. In 1998, 36 years after his first ride, Glenn got to spend several days aboard the shuttle Discovery. His mission was to expose his 77-year-old body to the rigors of space flight. He was the oldest human at the time ever to fly into space.

What is so cool about this flight, though, is the knowledge and fluency in astronaut lingo that Glenn brought to the mission. Two other members of Congress —  Republican Sen. Jake Garn of Utah and Democratic Rep. Bill Nelson of  Florida — had flown already. They, however, needed some schooling on the language that astronauts speak to communicate. Nelson, interestingly, is now director of the NASA space program.

Glenn  needed no such tutoring. He knew precisely how to communicate in astronaut jargon. It made his training easier and less cumbersome than it likely was with his congressional predecessors.

I just wanted to call attention to this great American patriot and honor his magnificent service to the nation he loved. His Mercury and shuttle flights were two leaps he  executed during his distinguished public service career.

national news

Wait a minute! Is it the moon, or Mars, or where, Mr. POTUS?

Here you go. Check out this Twitter message that flew into cyberspace today from the president of the United States of America.

He now says the United States needs to send human beings to Mars. That’s the big goal. The moon? Forget about it, says Donald Trump. We’ve been there already. Done that. Let’s not go back.

But wait a minute!

The president himself issued a directive in 2018 committing a return to the moon within the next five years. Vice President Mike Pence has spoken about the president’s stated desire to return to the moon, the celestial body we departed when Apollo 17 lifted off from the lunar surface in 1972.

So, which is it? Are we going to the moon or not? Or are we going to skip all that Mickey Mouse stuff and head straight for the Red Planet?

Don’t get me wrong. I am totally in favor of manned space travel. I want humans to return to the moon. I want them to fly to Mars, too. I am just flummoxed as to what the president wants to do. He cannot seem to deliver consistent and cogent messages.

Here again is what happens when we turn Donald Trump loose to make declarations via Twitter without a scintilla of thought or consideration.

Beam me up!

national news

Absent a NASA-sponsored effort, this is pretty cool

I normally would look with bemusement at a stunt that occurred today. Instead, though, I am utterly amazed at what I saw.

Elon Musk — a South Africa-born U.S. business tycoon — has this notion of building a colony on Mars. He has developed a rocket that he hopes will ferry human beings to the Red Planet eventually.

Today, he launched the largest rocket built since the Saturn V rocket launched astronauts to the moon from 1969 until 1972. The monstrous SpaceX rocket took off, jettisoned its boosters, which then made a soft landing near the launch pad from which NASA used to launch missions to the moon.

But … here’s the amazing part of the story.

The rocket carried a Tesla hot rod atop it and that vehicle — with a spacesuit-clad mannequin in the driver’s seat — is in Earth orbit. It will take off eventually on a lengthy trip around the sun. Musk plans to keep the car in space for a million years. He said maybe some extraterrestrials will find it. Maybe.

My preference, of course, would be for NASA to launch these missions. I want the federal government to get back into manned space exploration. I’m old-fashioned that way, you know?

Absent a NASA-sponsored and financed operation, though, I welcome Elon Musk’s investment in this kind of exploration.

Hey, a guy with $20 billion in his portfolio can afford the expense — and it provides a heck of a show to boot.

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Let’s get back into space

space_flight-wide

John Glenn’s death reminded many of us old enough to remember such things about how space travel once thrilled the nation.

It was a new thing back then, when Glenn orbited the planet three times in just a little less than five hours. We were riveted to our TV screens. We held our breath. We prayed for the safe return of these men.

Then, oh so strangely, space flight became “routine.” Routine! Are you kidding me?

How ridiculous! You put human beings on top of a missile loaded with flammable fuel, light the rocket and hurl these humans into orbit at 17,000 mph. That becomes routine?

We launched men into orbit during the Mercury space program. Then came the Gemini program that featured two-person space ships. After that, it was the big one, the Apollo program that sent men to the moon.

Those missions became so “routine” that the space agency stopped sending men to the moon, apparently believing they had done all they could do.

Skylab came later. The space shuttle program followed that.

About six years ago, we grounded the remaining shuttle fleet — after two of the ships, Challenger and Columbia, were lost, killing 14 crew members. Routine? Hardly.

I’m recalling the adventure associated with John Glenn’s first flight into space and hoping for a time when we can send human beings back into space aboard our own rocket ships. Today, we’re relying on Russia to ferry our men and women into Earth orbit — and I’m trying to imagine how President Kennedy, who challenged the nation to put men on the moon by the end of the 1960s, would react that knowledge.

I came of age watching the space program take flight. I am old enough to remember how these missions forced us all to hold our breath when these heroes were thrown into space.

The next step awaits. It no doubt will involve sending humans way past the moon and toward places like Mars. I hope to live long enough to see that occur.

I will wait anxiously for a day when we can view spaceflight once again as the spine-tingling adventure it’s always been.