From gabe at educatemotivate.com Mon May 21 07:12:14 2018 From: gabe at educatemotivate.com (Gabe Gabrielle) Date: Mon, 21 May 2018 08:12:14 -0400 Subject: [Spacetalk] https://spaceflightnow.com; https://www.nasa.gov Message-ID: <0BCF60CD-48AE-4C4E-8F26-50A582057A3C@educatemotivate.com> good morning all, I am am back in Florida after 4 days of school visits in Missouri? I was with kids from 2nd grade through high school... it has been an amazing week? fantastic?the interface with the kids is always so magical and something that i cherish each and every time?for many of you the school year is winding down?it amazes me how fast time goes?I feel so very fortunate to have these opportunities and always want to thank the teachers: Kelly, Adrian, and Bruce for their support. Today I am going to Mims Elementary, which will be fun, as Danine, the teacher and I have been friends for years?I have visited her schools many times...it is always wonderful when I get asked back or follow teachers around from school to school?there was a launch early this moring to the ISS, I hope you will share it with your students on https://www.nasa.gov or share tomorrow's launch live on nasa/tv wishing you a wonderful day...we have to remember to always do our best, enjoy everything we do, live in the present, make each day special, let those we care about most know, smile and have fun? :-) :-) love ya, Gabe To see the ISS: www.spotthestation.nasa.gov To see the Mars Rover Curiosity go to: https://nasasearch.nasa.gov/search?query=curiosity&affiliate=nasa&utf8=? NASA Television Updates Coverage of Earth-Observing Satellite Duo Launch Artist's rendering of the twin spacecraft of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO) mission. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech Full image and caption Media are invited to cover the prelaunch briefing and launch of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment Follow-On (GRACE-FO ), NASA?s latest Earth-observing satellite mission. The briefing, now scheduled for Monday, May 21, and launch no earlier than Tuesday, May 22, will air on NASA Television and the agency?s website . A joint mission with the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ), GRACE-FO will provide critical measurements that will be used together with other data to monitor the movement of water masses across the planet and mass changes within Earth itself. Monitoring changes in ice sheets and glaciers, underground water storage, and sea level provides a unique view of Earth?s climate and has far-reaching benefits. The mission is planned to fly at least five years. The prelaunch news briefing will be held at 1:30 p.m. EDT (10:30 a.m. PDT) May 21 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Media who wish to participate by phone must contact Elena Mejia at elena.mejia at jpl.nasa.gov or 818-354-1712, no later than 1 p.m. May 21. The satellites are targeted to launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at 3:47 p.m. EDT May 22 from Space Launch Complex-4E at Vandenberg. GRACE-FO will share its ride to orbit with five Iridium NEXT communications satellites as part of a commercial rideshare agreement. Launch coverage begins at 3:15 p.m. on NASA Television and the agency?s website. JPL manages the GRACE-FO mission for the agency?s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. GFZ contracted GRACE-FO launch services from Iridium, and SpaceX is providing the Falcon 9 launch service. NASA Sends New Research on Orbital ATK Mission to Space Station The Orbital ATK Antares rocket, with the Cygnus spacecraft onboard, launches from Pad-0A, Monday, May 21, 2018 at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. Orbital ATK?s ninth contracted cargo resupply mission with NASA to the International Space Station will deliver approximately 7,400 pounds of science and research, crew supplies and vehicle hardware to the orbital laboratory and its crew. Photo Credit: (NASA/Aubrey Gemignani) Credits: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani Astronauts soon will have new experiments to conduct related to emergency navigation, DNA sequencing and ultra-cold atom research when the research arrives at the International Space Station following the 4:44 a.m. EDT Monday launch of an Orbital? ATK Cygnus spacecraft. Cygnus lifted off on an Antares 230 rocket from NASA?s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Orbital ATK?s ninth cargo mission under NASA?s Commercial Resupply Services contract. The spacecraft is carrying about 7,400 pounds of research equipment, cargo and supplies that will support dozens of the more than 250 investigations underway on the space station. NASA astronauts Scott Tingle and Ricky Arnold will use the space station?s robotic arm to capture Cygnus when it arrives at the station Thursday, May 24. Live coverage of the rendezvous and capture will air on NASA Television and the agency?s website beginning at 3:45 a.m. Installation coverage is set to begin at 7:30 a.m. Included in the cargo in the pressurized area of Cygnus is a centuries-old method of celestial navigation. The Sextant? Navigation investigation will explore the use of a hand-held sextant for emergency navigation on missions in deep space as humans look to travel farther from Earth. The ability to sight angles between the Moon or planets and stars offers crews another option to find their way home if communications and main computers are compromised. Monitoring crew health and the biological environment of the space station, and understanding long-term effects of space travel on both, are critical to NASA?s plans for long-duration, deep space exploration. The Biomolecule Extraction and Sequencing Technology (BEST ) study is the agency?s next step toward advancing in-space DNA sequencing technologies that can identify microbial organisms living on the space station and understanding how the DNA of humans, plants and microbes are affected by microgravity.BEST will use a process that sequences DNA directly from a sample, with minimal preparation, rather than using the traditional technique of growing a culture from the sample. In the realm of modern physics, the new Cold Atom Lab (CAL ) on Cygnus could help answer some big questions. CAL creates a temperature 10 billion times colder than the vacuum of space, then uses lasers and magnetic forces to slow down atoms until they are almost motionless. In the microgravity environment of the space station, CAL can observe these ultra-cold atoms for much longer than possible on Earth. Results of this research could lead to a number of improved technologies, including sensors, quantum computers and atomic clocks used in spacecraft navigation. Cygnus is scheduled to depart the station in July with several tons of trash and burn up during re-entry into Earth?s atmosphere, over the Pacific Ocean. The vehicle is named after James ?J.R.? Thompson , a leader in the aerospace industry. For more than 17 years, humans have lived and worked continuously aboard the International Space Station, advancing scientific knowledge and demonstrating new technologies, making research breakthroughs not possible on Earth that will enable long-duration human and robotic exploration into deep space. A global endeavor, more than 200 people from 18 countries have visited the unique microgravity laboratory that has hosted more than 2,400 research investigations from researchers in 103 countries. Get breaking news, images and features from the space station on social media at: https://instagram.com/iss and https://www.twitter.com/Space_Station Science Launching to Space Station Looks Forward and Back The Universe?s Fastest-Growing Black Hole Eats Suns like Ours for Breakfast An artist's illustration depicts a quasar, or supermassive, ultra-luminous black hole, like the one Australian astronomers just discovered roughly 12 billion light-years away. Credit: NASA/ESA A newfound black hole is so mighty, it eats suns like ours for breakfast. Well, sort of. According to a new paper published online May 11 in the preprint journal arXiv , astronomers have discovered the fastest-growing black hole known in the universe. The supermassive object is estimated to be more than 12 billion years old, have a mass greater than 20 billion suns and could be growing at a rate of about 1 percent every 1 million years. And, like all growing boys, this supermassive black hole has a hefty appetite. The newly described object consumes roughly the mass of Earth's sun every two days, the researchers wrote ? and all that guzzling is leaving a mark on the surrounding galaxy. [Stephen Hawking's Most Far-Out Ideas About Black Holes ] Aliens May Well Exist in a Parallel Universe, New Studies Find Could alien life exist in a parallel universe? Computer simulations from two new studies suggest the idea might not be out of this world. Credit: Shutterstock Should the search for alien life in our universe come up empty-handed, it might be worth checking in on a neighboring universe instead. According to a new pair of studies in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, there?s a decent chance that life-fostering planets could exist in a parallel universe ? even if that universe were being torn apart by dark energy. The idea that our universe is just one of many, perhaps infinite, other universes is known as the multiverse theory . Scientists have previously thought that such parallel universes, if they exist, would have to meet an extremely strict set of criteria to allow for the formation of stars, galaxies and life-fostering planets like those seen in our own universe. [5 Reasons We May Live in a Multiverse ] Einstein's Theory of General Relativity Einstein's theory of general relativity predicted that the space-time around Earth would be not only warped but also twisted by the planet's rotation. Gravity Probe B showed this to be correct. Credit: NASA In 1905, Albert Einstein determined that the laws of physics are the same for all non-accelerating observers, and that the speed of light in a vacuum was independent of the motion of all observers. This was the theory of special relativity. It introduced a new framework for all of physics and proposed new concepts of space and time. Einstein then spent 10 years trying to include acceleration in the theory and published his theory of general relativity in 1915. In it, he determined that massive objects cause a distortion in space-time, which is felt as gravity. Mars Helicopter to Fly on NASA?s Next Red Planet Rover Mission NASA's Mars Helicopter, a small, autonomous rotorcraft, will travel with the agency's Mars 2020 rover, currently scheduled to launch in July 2020, to demonstrate the viability and potential of heavier-than-air vehicles on the Red Planet. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA is sending a helicopter to Mars. The Mars Helicopter, a small, autonomous rotorcraft, will travel with the agency?s Mars 2020 rover mission, currently scheduled to launch in July 2020, to demonstrate the viability and potential of heavier-than-air vehicles on the Red Planet ?NASA has a proud history of firsts,? said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. ?The idea of a helicopter flying the skies of another planet is thrilling. The Mars Helicopter holds much promise for our future science, discovery, and exploration missions to Mars.? U.S. Rep. John Culberson of Texas echoed Bridenstine?s appreciation of the impact of American firsts on the future of exploration and discovery. ?It?s fitting that the United States of America is the first nation in history to fly the first heavier-than-air craft on another world,? Culberson said. ?This exciting and visionary achievement will inspire young people all over the United States to become scientists and engineers, paving the way for even greater discoveries in the future.? Animation of Mars helicopter and Mars 2020 rover. Credits: NASA/JPL-CalTech Started in August 2013 as a technology development project at NASA?s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), the Mars Helicopter had to prove that big things could come in small packages. The result of the team?s four years of design, testing and redesign weighs in at little under four pounds (1.8 kilograms). Its fuselage is about the size of a softball, and its twin, counter-rotating blades will bite into the thin Martian atmosphere at almost 3,000 rpm ? about 10 times the rate of a helicopter on Earth. ?Exploring the Red Planet with NASA?s Mars Helicopter exemplifies a successful marriage of science and technology innovation and is a unique opportunity to advance Mars exploration for the future,? said Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate at the agency headquarters in Washington. ?After the Wright Brothers proved 117 years ago that powered, sustained, and controlled flight was possible here on Earth, another group of American pioneers may prove the same can be done on another world.? The Mars Helicopter is a technology demonstration that will travel to the Red Planet with the Mars 2020 rover. It will attempt controlled flight in Mars' thin atmosphere, which may enable more ambitious missions in the future. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech The helicopter also contains built-in capabilities needed for operation at Mars, including solar cells to charge its lithium-ion batteries, and a heating mechanism to keep it warm through the cold Martian nights. But before the helicopter can fly at Mars it has to get there. It will do so attached to the belly pan of the Mars 2020 rover. ?The altitude record for a helicopter flying here on Earth is about 40,000 feet. The atmosphere of Mars is only one percent that of Earth, so when our helicopter is on the Martian surface, it?s already at the Earth equivalent of 100,000 feet up,? said Mimi Aung, Mars Helicopter project manager at JPL. ?To make it fly at that low atmospheric density, we had to scrutinize everything, make it as light as possible while being as strong and as powerful as it can possibly be.? Once the rover is on the planet?s surface, a suitable location will be found to deploy the helicopter down from the vehicle and place it onto the ground. The rover then will be driven away from the helicopter to a safe distance from which it will relay commands. After its batteries are charged and a myriad of tests are performed, controllers on Earth will command the Mars Helicopter to take its first autonomous flight into history. ?We don?t have a pilot and Earth will be several light minutes away, so there is no way to joystick this mission in real time,? said Aung. ?Instead, we have an autonomous capability that will be able to receive and interpret commands from the ground, and then fly the mission on its own.? The full 30-day flight test campaign will include up to five flights of incrementally farther flight distances, up to a few hundred meters, and longer durations as long as 90 seconds, over a period. On its first flight, the helicopter will make a short vertical climb to 10 feet (3 meters), where it will hover for about 30 seconds. As a technology demonstration, the Mars Helicopter is considered a high-risk, high-reward project. If it does not work, the Mars 2020 mission will not be impacted. If it does work, helicopters may have a real future as low-flying scouts and aerial vehicles to access locations not reachable by ground travel. ?The ability to see clearly what lies beyond the next hill is crucial for future explorers,? said Zurbuchen. ?We already have great views of Mars from the surface as well as from orbit. With the added dimension of a bird?s-eye view from a ?marscopter,? we can only imagine what future missions will achieve.? Mars 2020 will launch on a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, and is expected to reach Mars in February 2021. The rover will conduct geological assessments of its landing site on Mars, determine the habitability of the environment, search for signs of ancient Martian life, and assess natural resources and hazards for future human explorers. Scientists will use the instruments aboard the rover to identify and collect samples of rock and soil, encase them in sealed tubes, and leave them on the planet?s surface for potential return to Earth on a future Mars mission. The Mars 2020 Project at JPL in Pasadena, California, manages rover development for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. NASA?s Launch Services Program, based at the agency?s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, is responsible for launch management. For more information about NASA?s Mars missions, go to: https://www.nasa.gov/mars -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... 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Name: mars_helicopter_animation_with_2020_rover.gif Type: image/gif Size: 2321950 bytes Desc: not available URL: From gabe at educatemotivate.com Wed May 30 09:43:27 2018 From: gabe at educatemotivate.com (Gabe Gabrielle) Date: Wed, 30 May 2018 10:43:27 -0400 Subject: [Spacetalk] https://www.nasa.gov/index.html; https://spaceflightnow.com Message-ID: <2883114E-134D-42B3-ABCA-22E2467E3E58@educatemotivate.com> good morning all, Hard to believe many of you are finished for the year while over the next few weeks all will be on summer break?so deserving?I know many teach during the summer?I am sure you need the financial support but wish you all could enjoy the summer free to do whatever you choose?you deserve the break away from all of the challenges teaching provides, if only to you can give your minds a rest from everything it takes to be a teacher?to me, the most challenging job in the world?I want to take a minute say thanks so very much for all you do, for all you sacrifice, and for how you shapes kids for life?you all are simply amazing :-) :-) I wanted to share this article about Alan Bean?s passing as we are losing more of these amazing astronauts who did something many thought was impossible?yet, through determination, dedication, and desire to explore?their goals were achieved opening so many doors to the future?. wishing you a wonderful day...we have to always remember to do our best, enjoy everything we do, live in the present, be appreciative of the good in our lives, let those we care about most know, make each day special, smile & have fun! hugs & love ya, Gabe . Sally Ride Is Getting Her Own Forever Stamp Credit: ?2018 USPS Physicist Sally Ride, the first American woman in space and the first astronaut to come out as having a same-sex partner , will be getting her own stamp. Ride, who first launched into space on June 18, 1983 aboard the space shuttle Challenger, was herself an avid stamp collector, her partner of 27 years Tam O'Shaughnessy, said in a statement provided by the United States Postal Service. "Sally started collecting stamps when she was a girl, and she continued to do so her whole life ? especially stamps of the Olympics and space exploration," O'Shaughnessy said. "Sally would be deeply honored to have her portrait on a U.S. stamp." Astronaut Alan Bean, Apollo moonwalker-turned-artist, dies at 86 May 26, 2018 ? Apollo astronaut Alan Bean, who shared his experiences as the fourth human to walk on the moon through paintings sprinkled with lunar dust, has died at the age of 86. Bean died on Saturday (May 26) at Houston Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, as confirmed by his wife, Leslie. His death followed his suddenly falling ill while on travel in Fort Wayne, Indiana two weeks ago. "Alan was the strongest and kindest man I ever knew. He was the love of my life," said Leslie Bean in a statement released by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation Saturday. "A native Texan, Alan died peacefully in Houston, surrounded by those who loved him." A member of NASA's third group of astronauts selected in 1963, Bean flew twice into space, first as the lunar module pilot on the Apollo 12 moon landing mission in November 1969, and then as the commander of the second crewed expedition to the United States' first space station, Skylab, in July 1973. In total, he logged 69 days, 15 hours and 45 minutes in space, including 31 hours and 31 minutes on the lunar surface. He then spent four decades interpreting what he saw as a professional artist. An astronaut's journey Bean's journey to the moon almost ended in a flash. Or rather two flashes, had it not been for his memory of an obscure switch in his spacecraft. Launched on top of a Saturn V rocket on Nov. 14, 1969, Bean and his two Apollo 12 crewmates, Charles "Pete" Conrad and Richard "Dick" Gordon , were less than a minute into flight when their booster was struck by lightning, twice. The electrical discharge knocked out their power and garbled the telemetry streaming to Mission Control. A quick-thinking flight controller, John Aaron, recalled a test from a year earlier that produced a similar data pattern and suggested the crew take "SCE to AUX," which would switch the spacecraft's signal conditioning equipment (SCE) to its backup. "What the hell is that?" replied Conrad, saying out loud what Gordon and many of those in Mission Control were also thinking. Fortunately, Bean remembered the switch ? which was located over his shoulder ? from an earlier training simulation. "They call[ed] to get me to throw a switch, which I did," Bean recounted in a 1998 NASA oral history. "I didn't remember what the switch was for, either ... but it was giving them telemetry data." With data again flowing, and with more switch throws by Bean and his crewmates during the remainder of the ascent into Earth orbit, the spacecraft recovered and was able to continue on its planned path to the moon. Surveyor III, I presume Five days after their launch, Bean and Conrad left Gordon in orbit about the moon on the command module "Yankee Clipper" and landed the lunar module "Intrepid" in the Ocean of Storms on the moon. "My, that Sun is bright," remarked Bean as he took his first steps onto the surface. Unlike Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin who preceded them to the moon on Apollo 11 four months earlier, Conrad and Bean had made a precision landing, touching down within walking distance of a target. "There that thing is! Look at that!" exclaimed Bean, spotting the Surveyor 3 robotic lander, which NASA had sent to the moon in 1967. During the second of two moonwalks together, Bean and Conrad retrieved several pieces of the Surveyor, which they returned to Earth for study, along with some 75 pounds (35 kilograms) of moon rock that they collected along the way. Bean also left something of his behind . Stepping away from Intrepid to the lip of a large crater, Bean tossed his silver astronaut pin, a symbol worn by those who had yet to fly in space. (He would replace it with a gold pin after returning to Earth.) "It'll be there for millions and millions of years," wrote Bean in 2000, "or until some tourist finds it and brings it back to Earth." Bean, Conrad and Gordon splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on Nov. 24, 1969. Like the Apollo 11 crew before them, the three were recovered by the USS Hornet aircraft carrier and quarantined for 21 days as a precaution against any possibility of "moon germs." A new frontier Bean's second space mission was six times as long as Apollo 12 had been and it covered a distance 100 times that of the Earth to the moon. Beginning with a launch on a Saturn IB rocket on July 28, 1973, Bean led the crew of Skylab II (or Skylab 3) of Owen Garriott and Jack Lousma for a 59-day stay on the United States' first space station. "We now hold the world record for space flight," wrote Bean in his in-flight diary on Aug. 25, 1973. "We will be half [way] into our mission tomorrow night." During their time aboard the orbital workshop, Bean, Garriott and Lousma carried out medical and biological experiments (including observing web formation with a pair of cross spiders named Arabella and Anita) and made observations of Earth and the Sun. On the second of the mission's two spacewalks, Bean and Garriott went outside of the space station to collect experiments and replace film cassettes. "Great EVA today ? all happy tonight," Bean recorded in his diary. The three crew members undocked their Apollo command module and returned to Earth on Sept. 25, 1973. In flight Alan LaVern Bean was born on March 15, 1932 in Wheeler, Texas. Bean received his Bachelor of Science degree in aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas in 1955. A Navy ROTC (Reserve Officer Training Corps) student, Bean was commissioned as an ensign upon graduation. Following flight training, he was assigned to a jet attack squadron in Jacksonville, Florida, where he served for four years before reporting to the U.S. Navy Test Pilot School at Patuxent River, Maryland. As a test pilot, he logged 5,500 hours of flying time in 27 different types of aircraft. "When I was doing that, the space program was born ? Al Shepard, John Glenn and others ?and when I saw them doing that, I thought, 'Wow! I never thought of this, but this is just an extension of what I'm doing. It looks like it'd be more fun,'" Bean told a NASA interviewer in 1998. After his astronaut selection, but before his assignment to Apollo 12, Bean served alongside Clifton "CC" Williams on the backup crew for the Gemini 10 mission in 1966 and the support crew for Conrad's and Gordon's Gemini 11 mission later that year. Bean was then relegated to the Apollo Applications Program, a development effort that would eventually produce the Skylab space station. "I wanted to go to Apollo. Everybody did , but I wasn't fitting in," Bean admitted. "So I got shuffled over there, and I then didn't learn that much either, other than I was out in left field and I just had to accept it and had to make the best of it." Then tragedy struck. Williams, who was assigned to fly with Conrad and Gordon to the moon, was killed in a jet crash on Oct. 5, 1967. In the wake of the accident, Conrad personally requested that Bean fly with him as the Apollo 12 lunar module pilot. After flying to the moon and living on board Skylab, Bean served as the backup to the commander of the U.S. side of the 1975 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project jointly flown with the Soviet Union. That's how it felt to walk on the moon In October 1975, Bean retired from the Navy with the rank of Captain but stayed at NASA through June 1981, leading the astronaut candidate operations and training group as the first of the space shuttle astronauts were recruited in 1978 and 1980. Bean also served as acting chief of the Astronaut Office while John Young was off training for STS-1, the first launch of the shuttle program. Around that time, Bean began considering what he would do next. "Was I going to fly the shuttle?," he asked himself. "I was doing all the things you do to be a shuttle commander. I was getting as much simulator time as anybody, flying the Shuttle Training Aircraft, flying T-38 [jets] and everything like that." "I was thinking, 'I don't know what to do.' But finally I decided that they had enough good young men and women that could fly the space shuttle as good as I could or better," he told a NASA interviewer in 1998. An aspiring artist since he took a fine art class as a student at the Navy Test Pilot School, Bean followed the advice of a friend and decided to leave NASA and try his hand at becoming a professional painter focusing on the things he saw and felt while exploring the moon. "I had a skill, and an experience, and I said, 'in my opinion someone needs to do this job, to record this great human adventure in fine art so that it will remain,'" he recalled. "It doesn't replace the movies, it doesn't replace the books other people write. But it was a great enough event in human history that recording it this way is something that only I am interested in doing, but it's worth doing." Bean's approach to his paintings was to blend an eye for technical accuracy with an impressionistic use of color. His subjects included landscapes that he first-hand witnessed, the activities of his fellow Apollo astronauts and fantasy scenes based on what he thought could have or should have been possible. Bean further set his creations apart by embedding small pieces of his moon-dust-stained mission patches in his acrylic paint and texturing his canvas using the sole of a replica lunar boot and the head of a geology hammer he used on the moon. "Every painting that I do, I put that texture, get those moon boots and all that other texture. Then I sprinkle a little bit of the patch in there so that symbolically there's dust from the Ocean of Storms," he described. Remembrance of a moonwalk At the time of his death, his online collection index listed more than 160 paintings. More than 40 of those works were exhibited by the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC in 2009 in celebration of the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 and 12 moon landings. A mural of one his paintings, "Reaching for the Stars," adorned the entrance wall to the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in Florida from 1990 through 2015. Bean's art was also published in two collections: "Apollo: An Eyewitness Account By Astronaut/Explorer Artist/Moonwalker" (Greenwich Workshop Press, 1998) and "Painting Apollo: First Artist on Another World" (Smithsonian Books, 2009), both of which were written with Andrew Chaikin. For his service to his country, Bean was awarded distinguished service medals by the Navy and NASA. He shared in the Robert J. Collier Trophy in 1973 and Robert H. Goddard Memorial Trophy in 1975 as part of the Skylab team. Bean was inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 1997 and the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2010. Bean was the last living member of the Apollo 12 crew. He was preceded in death by Conrad in 1999 and Gordon in 2017. With Bean's death, only four of the twelve Apollo moonwalkers are still alive: Buzz Aldrin (Apollo 11), David Scott (Apollo 15), Charles Duke (Apollo 16) and Harrison Schmitt (Apollo 17). He is survived by his wife Leslie, a sister Paula Stott, and two children from a prior marriage, a daughter Amy Sue and son Clay. (NASA) (NASA) (NASA) (NASA) (NASA) (NASA) (Smithsonian/Carolyn Russo) (Alan Bean) What's the Absolutely Amazing Theory of Almost Everything? Artist's illustration of NASA's InSight lander cruising toward Mars. InSight, which launched May 5, performed its first course-correction maneuver on Tuesday (May 22). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA's InSight Mars lander performed its first engine burn on Tuesday (May 22), refining its course toward the Red Planet. The 40-second burn, which involved four of InSight's eight thrusters, was designed to change the lander's velocity by about 8.5 mph (13.7 km/h). Mission team members will perform up to five additional burns before InSight's Nov. 26 touchdown, but none will be more substantial than Tuesday's, NASA officials said. InSight didn't have Mars squarely in its sights when it lifted off atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket on May 5 . That's perfectly normal; Mars spacecraft are scrubbed meticulously before liftoff to minimize the chances that they'll contaminate the Red Planet with Earth microbes, but the rockets they ride on remain "dirty." [NASA's InSight Mars Lander: Here's 10 Surprising Facts ] NASA Remembers Shuttle Astronaut Don Peterson Shuttle Astronaut Don Peterson Credits: NASA NASA today is remembering Don Peterson, who flew aboard the first flight of the Space Shuttle Challenger and took part in the first spacewalk of the shuttle program . His May 27 death was reported by the Association of Space Explorers on its Facebook page. His mission, STS-6, launched from Kennedy Space Center, Fla., on April 4, 1983. The other crew members were commander Paul J. Weitz, pilot Karol J. Bobko and mission specialist Story Musgrave. During the flight, the crew conducted numerous experiments in materials processing, recorded lightning activities and deployed the first Tracking and Data Relay Satellite. Peterson and Musgrave conducted a spacewalk to test the new suit, the Shuttle airlock and new tools and techniques for construction and repair outside a spacecraft. After 120 hours of orbital operations, the mission landed April 9. Peterson was born in Winona, Miss., on Oct. 22, 1933. He graduated from Winona City High School and received a bachelor of science degree from the United States Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., in 1955. He earned a master?s degree in Nuclear Engineering from the Air Force Institute of Technology, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, in 1962. Over his career, he was awarded the Air Force Commendation Medal, the Meritorious Service Medal and the JSC Group Achievement Award. After graduating from West Point, Peterson completed a variety of assignments. He spent four years as a flight instructor and military training officer with the Air Training Command. The Air Force Systems Command utilized him as a nuclear systems analyst for three years. He also served as a fighter pilot with Tactical Air Command for one year, including three months of combat weapons training. He was a graduate of the Aerospace Research Pilot School, Edwards Air Force Base, California, and was one of the third group of astronauts assigned to the Air Force's Manned Orbiting Laboratory Program. He logged more than 5,300 hours of flying time--including more than 5,000 hours in jet aircraft. Peterson became a NASA astronaut in September 1969 and served on the astronaut support crew for Apollo 16. Peterson retired from the Air Force with the rank of colonel after more than 24 years of active service, but he continued his assignment as a NASA astronaut in a civilian capacity. His areas of responsibility included engineering support, man/machine interface and safety assessment. Peterson resigned from the Astronaut Office in November 1984, working after that as a consultant in manned aerospace operations. Last Updated: May 29, 2018 Editor: Brian Dunbar -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: apple-teacher.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 40777 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... 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