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aamukherjee A Slice of Entropie -
alchymista Alchymista -
crownedrose Fading Like A Dead Star -
expose-the-light Quarks to Quasars -
ikenbot CWL -
abluegirl A Blue Girl -
perscientiamlibertas A Matter of the Most Pleasant Fraternal Confidence
Astronaut Thomas P. Stafford, command pilot of the Gemini 9-A space flight, is photographed during the Gemini 9 mission inside the spacecraft by Astronaut Eugene Cernan, Gemini 9 pilot.
(via ikenbot)
ikenbot
$12.8 Billion Budget Approved for European Space Agency
I know for a fact that Tumblr science readers hold a special place in their hearts for anything astronomy-related (along with Brian Cox, Carl Sagan and Neil deGrasse Tyson…)
So, without further ado, rejoice!
aamukherjeeNew Spaceship For Asteroid Missions
As of 2010, Obama has challenged NASA to get astronauts to an asteroid by 2025, and on to Mars by the mid-2030s. Whether or not the space agency can stick to that schedule largely depends on itsfuture budget, experts say, but regardless of the pace, work on the asteroid mission is already under way.
The Multi-Mission Space Exploration Vehicle (SEV) is a prototype that began its design life as a wheeled moon rover. When the president shifted NASA’s focus from the moon-oriented Constellation program set up by the Bush administration, the space agency adapted the SEV to meet the needs of an asteroid mission instead.
That meant taking off the wheels and converting the vehicle into two parts: a robotic sled that will be used for propulsion and guidance, and a detachable crew cabin that can be fitted on top.
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Just a reminder: Doubling NASA’s budget can transform the country.
Vintage Koppel postcards from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, featuring the Apollo 11 Saturn V rocket, and the Apollo 11 crew; Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins.
(via ikenbot)
Goodbye Neil Armstrong.
1930 - 2012
“It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn’t feel like a giant. I felt very, very small.”
(via hydrogeneportfolio)
crownedrose
All 135 Space Shuttle launches, playing simultaneously.
Wow. I would recommend going full screen on this one.
At 0:35, my life was forever changed by the simultaneous eruption of 270 solid rocket boosters and 405 main shuttle engines.
At 1:58, my heart sank, adn all the other launches drifted away, invisible in the shadow of the tragedy of STS-51.
Joe said it perfectly.
anhnaken Asks:
scinerds Said:
We’ve received a variety of messages raising this and my personal (Abhishek here) view starts with the fact this that is a completely fair statement. Money from an area such as space exploration (or arguably many other fields of scientific study) could definitely have a more immediate benefit to humanity if spent on helping the poor or aiding the economy.
However, there are a variety of points as to why space exploration or research of a similar vein deserve funding and one of the major points is that spin-off technology ranging from vehicles to food to medical procedure can often be created as a result and has direct benefits for both economies and people. There is even a Wikipedia page detailing this. The second point is that there are other areas where a great deal of money goes into currently such as defence which are all areas that lead to lessened human development in comparison to scientific development and space exploration.
At the end of the day, we’re just human. The want to explore is something that drives almost everyone and, as selfish as it may sound, the carrying out of space exploration can often bring people closest to achieving this.
An engineer for the space exploration company SpaceX has outlined an elaborate plan to build Star Trek’s USS Enterprise, which he says could be ready to fly within the next 20 years.
“We have the technological reach to build the first generation of the spaceship… so let’s do it,” writes BTE Dan on his website, BuildTheEnterprise.org (which has been loading intermittently because of heavy traffic).
The website includes conceptual blueprints, budgeting proposals, a timeline for research and development, and almost every other conceivable detail.
Blueprint for 1970s Planetary Exploration (1968)
↳ Click the title to read the full post on Wired.
On this day 43 years ago, Apollo 8 was en route to the moon on the first human flight to lunar orbit. Three days later, on Dec. 24, astronauts Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders became the first people to see the moon’s far side, did a memorable reading from Genesis and took this famous Earth-rise photo.
