Since the dawn of manned space flight more than 50 years ago, the most tense moment of any mission occurs while the spacecraft re-enters Earth’s atmosphere. Travelling at speeds exceeding 17,000mph during atmospheric re-entry, a spacecraft must dissipate the enormous amount of kinetic energy accumulated to achieve a stable orbit around the Earth. [...]
Posted in Military, Science, Space, Technology 
Tags: communications, NASA, plasma, radio communications, re-entry, space, space flight, spacecraft, SpaceX 
No Comments »We’ll miss the Space Shuttle when it finally enters retirement sometime next year. And although the private sector, namely Elon Musk’s SpaceX Corporation, seems poised to pick up where NASA and the shuttle program leave off, there’s something special about the enormity and complexity of NASA’s space transportation projects. The shuttle exemplifies this, and with [...]
As NASA prepares the Space Shuttle for its final missions, it does so knowing that the moment the shuttles retire, the U.S. will, for the first time since the dawn of manned space flight, lack a vehicle capable of transporting humans into Earth orbit. This precarious position will force NASA temporarily to rely on Russia, [...]
Posted in Science, Space, Technology Tags: Elon Musk, Falcon 9, Final Space Shuttle flight, NASA, Space Shuttle, SpaceX 3 Comments »
