Moon Water! NASA's Moon Blast Was A Success!...Theory: Science Or Religion? (Noah's Ark Flood)

NASA: Water like any other water on Moon. NASA officials discuss water being discovered on the moon, and what form it may take on, and below the surface.

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NASA's moon blast lands with a thud. NASA's highly touted crash landing on the moon may have been a dud for viewers, but scientists said Friday it will help them gather a wealth of information. NBC's Tom Costello reports.

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Significant amount of water found on Moon


It's official: There's water ice on the moon, and lots of it. When melted, the water could potentially be used to drink or to extract hydrogen for rocket fuel.

NASA's LCROSS probe discovered beds of water ice at the lunar south pole when it impacted the moon last month, mission scientists announced Friday. The findings confirm suspicions reported previously, and in a big way.

"Indeed, yes, we found water. And we didn't find just a little bit, we found a significant amount," said Anthony Colaprete, LCROSS project scientist and principal investigator from NASA's Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, Calif.

The LCROSS probe impacted the lunar south pole at a crater called Cabeus on Oct. 9. The $79 million spacecraft, preceded by its Centaur rocket stage, hit the lunar surface in an effort to create a debris plume that could be analyzed by scientists for signs of water ice.

Those signs were visible in the data from spectrographic measurements (which measure light absorbed at different wavelengths, revealing different compounds) of the Centaur stage crater and the two-part debris plume created by the impact. The signature of water was seen in both infrared and ultraviolet spectroscopic measurements.

"We see evidence for the water in two instruments," Colaprete said. "And that's what makes us really confident in our findings right now."

How much?

Based on the measurements, the team estimated that there was about 220 pounds (100 kilograms) of water in the view of their instruments, which took in the area of the impact crater (about 80 feet or 20 meters across) and the ejecta blanket (about 200 to 260 feet across, or 60 to 80 meters), Colaprete said. That amount of water is roughly the equivalent of a dozen 2-gallon buckets.

"I'm pretty impressed by the amount of water we saw in our little 20-meter crater," Colaprete said.

"What's really exciting is we've only hit one spot. It's kind of like when you're drilling for oil. Once you find it one place, there's a greater chance you'll find more nearby," said Peter Schultz, professor of geological sciences at Brown University and a co-investigator on the LCROSS mission.

This water finding doesn't mean that the moon is wet by Earth's standards, but is likely wetter than the driest deserts on Earth, Colaprete said. And even this small amount is valuable to possible future missions, said Michael Wargo, chief lunar scientist for Exploration Systems at NASA Headquarters.

Scientists have long suspected that permanently shadowed craters at the south pole of the moon could be cold enough to keep water frozen at the surface, based on detections of hydrogen by previous moon missions. Water has already been detected on the moon by a NASA-built instrument on board India's now-defunct Chandrayaan-1 probe and other spacecraft, though it was in very small amounts and bound to the dirt and dust of the lunar surface.

Water wasn't the only compound seen in the debris plumes of the LCROSS impact.

"There's a lot of stuff in there," Colaprete said. What exactly those other compounds are hasn't yet been determined, but the ingredients could include organic materials that would hint at comet impacts in the past.

More questions

The findings show that "the lunar poles are sort of record keepers" of lunar history and solar system history, said Greg Delory, a senior fellow at the Space Sciences Laboratory and Center for Integrative Planetary Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley. Delory explained that these permanently shadowed regions are very cold, "and that means that they tend to trap and keep things that encounter them. ... So they have a story to tell about the history of the moon and the solar system climate."

"This is ice that's potentially been there for billions of years," said Doug Cooke, associate administrator at Exploration Systems Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters.

The confirmation that water exists on the moon isn't the end of the story, though. One key question to answer is where the water came from. Several theories have been put forward to explain the origin of the water, including debris from comet impacts, interaction of the lunar surface with the solar wind, and even giant molecular clouds passing through the solar system, Delory said.

Scientists want to examine the data further to figure out what state the water is in. Colaprete said that based on initial observations, it is likely water ice is interspersed between dirt particles on the lunar surface.

Delory said scientists also want to figure out what kinds of processes move, destroy and create the water on the surface, and how long the water has been there.

Link to Chandrayaan?

Scientists are looking to see if there is any link between the water observed by LCROSS and that discovered by Chandrayaan-1.

"Their observation is entirely unique and complementary to what we did," Colaprete said. Scientists still need to work out whether the water observed by Chandrayaan-1 might be slowly migrating to the poles, or if it is unrelated.

Bottom line, the discovery completely changes scientists' view of the moon, Wargo said. The discovery gives "a much bigger, potentially complicated picture for water on the moon" than what was thought even just a few months ago, he said.

"This is not your father's moon," Wargo said. "This is not a dead planetary body, but one with a lot of dynamism in it."

Let's go?

NASA plans to return astronauts to the moon by 2020 for extended missions on the lunar surface. Finding usable amounts of ice on the moon would be a boon for that effort since it could be a vital local resource to support a lunar base.

"Water really is one of the constituents of one of the most powerful rocket fuels, oxygen and hydrogen," Wargo said.

The water LCROSS detected "would be water you could drink, water like any other water," Colaprete said. "If you could clean it, it would be drinkable water."

The impact was observed by LCROSS's sister spacecraft, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, as well as other space and ground-based telescopes.

The debris plume from the impacts was not seen right away and was only revealed a week after the impact, when mission scientists had had time to comb through the probe's data.

NASA launched LCROSS — short for Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite — and LRO in June.


Sources: NASA, MSNBC, National Geographic, Youtube

NASA: Its Future Lies In White House's Hands

White House panel questions NASA's spending. A blue ribbon, White House panel on space travel is raising doubts over whether only the government can keep financing NASA. NBC's Chris Clackum reports.

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NASA's Moon plans questioned.

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NASA invites Twitter users to next launch.

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Countdown begins for NASA's uncertain future


Is America's space effort due for a major course correction? Or is staying the course and sticking with NASA's five-year-old plan to return to the moon the best strategy?

In the wake of an independent panel's report on future spaceflight, the answers to those big questions about the nation's next giant leap ... or smaller step ... in outer space are now being debated in the White House and on Capitol Hill. And although projecting the outcome is murky business at best, the countdown is ticking down toward multibillion-dollar decisions that need to be made.

In short, the gearheads have had their say. Now it's up to the politicians.

If it were up to the gearheads — that is, the review panel headed by retired aerospace executive Norman Augustine — the space effort would likely be in for an extreme makeover. Although their mission was only to lay out the options for future exploration, rather than recommend which option to take, the way the options were framed in their 155-page report suggested a dramatically different path for NASA:

* The space agency would give more consideration to buying rides into low Earth orbit on other people's spaceships, and give more thought to its own Ares I rocket project, which went through a largely successful test flight last week.

* The International Space Station and the space shuttle fleet, which a now-departed NASA chief once said were serious mistakes, would be given a reprieve — and the station would remain America's main base in space for the next decade.

* The long-term goal of exploration would shift from a high-tech replay of the Apollo moon effort to an incremental program with different, lower-gravity destinations, such as near-Earth asteroids or Martian moons.

"We have identified, I think, a relatively new approach ... to conducting a spaceflight program somewhat different than what's in the current plan," Augustine told reporters when the final report was released on Oct. 22.

That wasn't necessarily the takeaway for the politicians, however. In Congress, the influential players in space policy tend to come from places where the jobs are. The prevailing view among those player was that $3 billion a year in additional funding would fix what ails the current space program, and that no further course correction was necessary.

U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson — a Florida Democrat who flew on the space shuttle and helped persuade President Barack Obama to give NASA's top spot to his former mission commander, Charles Bolden — said the president assured him "NASA will get enough money to do what it does best: go explore the heavens."

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords — an Arizona Democrat who is married to an astronaut and chairs the House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee — said the report confirmed her view that the Ares rocket project and other aspects of NASA's Constellation program were "well-managed" and "executable" as long as enough resources were provided.

Giffords cited last week's Ares I-X prototype test flight as further confirmation that NASA was "on track with its human space exploration program."

So should NASA stay the course, or change course?

Fertile ground for disagreement

"If what was wanted out of the Augustine exercise was clarity, we didn't get it," said John Logsdon, a space policy expert at George Washington University. "In the process of arriving at and analyzing the various options, the committee created fertile ground for disagreement."

However, the report did deliver at least three important conclusions that are largely beyond dispute, Logsdon told msnbc.com. The first conclusion? "We got the statement that 'the emperor has no clothes,'" he said. "The program that was being carried out could not be successful with the budget profile that was assigned to it."

NASA currently receives about $18 billion per year, or roughly 0.5 percent of the total federal budget. But the Augustine panel estimated that the space agency's plan to return to the moon by 2020 would cost at least $145 billion, which is $45 billion more than originally projected. At the same time, the amount budgeted for space exploration has actually been below the original projections. That's what led the committee to say NASA was on an "unsustainable trajectory."

Logsdon said the report also made clear that NASA's space shuttles couldn't safely finish up their remaining missions by next October as scheduled, and that the schedule would likely have to be stretched out into 2011. And the third point was that "it makes no sense to shut down the space station after five years of operation," even though NASA's current plan calls for quitting the orbital outpost in 2015.

The key point of disagreement focuses on where NASA goes next, and how it gets there.

Ares I in the Spotlight

The Augustine report dwelled on private-sector options for getting to destinations in low Earth orbit, such as the space station. Those options include upgraded versions of existing rockets currently used for commercial and military launches, such as the Delta 4 and the Atlas 5. They also include SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Orbital Sciences Corp.'s Taurus 2, which are currently being developed with NASA support to transport cargo to the space station.

Such options are already being considered in parallel with NASA's $6 billion Ares I development effort. In fact, this month NASA is due to award $50 million in stimulus funds for adapting commercial rockets to carry astronauts. So if NASA goes the commercial route, why should it bother building Ares I?

The Augustine report raises questions about Ares I, saying that the rocket is unlikely to be crew-worthy until 2017 or later. By that time, commercial options might be available for getting to the space station in low Earth orbit, Ares I's prime destination, and thus the project suffered from "a mismatch with the programs it is intended to serve," the report said.

Some panel members said NASA might be better-served by moving directly to the development of a more powerful "Ares V Lite," which would mesh more easily with heavy-lift missions to go beyond Earth orbit. One of the members, XCOR Aerospace's Jeff Greason, said it was his "personal opinion" that commercial rockets would provide a better value than Ares when it came to reaching low Earth orbit.

Others, however, were wary about disrupting what they considered a successful Ares I program. "I personally want to see Ares I going and the program going as it's currently structured," said retired Air Force Gen. Lester Lyles, a panel member who was on the rumored list of prospects for NASA administrator early this year.

Last week's Ares I-X test cost an estimated $445 million, but the Augustine report estimated that the cost of a full-up Ares I launch would be about $1 billion — comparable to the cost of a shuttle launch, or roughly 10 times the cost of an Atlas or Delta launch. But Ares' proponents say that the NASA-led program would result in a safer and more reliable rocket than the commercial alternatives — and that the extra margin of safety is worth the extra cost.

"There are aspects of our safety culture which do increase costs," Wayne Hale, a former shuttle program manager who is now NASA's deputy associate administrator for strategic partnerships, said last month at a spaceflight conference in New Mexico. "To make it will be expensive. It will not be cheap."

The Political Pros and Cons

Will the politicians be persuaded to stick with Ares I, along with the other elements of the back-to-the-moon Constellation program? The members of Congress closest to the space effort are likely to argue for staying the course. If last week's launch had gone seriously wrong, that almost certainly would have spelled the end of the program. As it is, Ares' fans have a success to point to, and Ares' foes have been left to grumble about the relatively few flaws seen during the test flight.

Bigger questions about cost vs. benefit remain, however. Just this week, The Orlando Sentinel editorialized that it was time to "pull the plug on Ares" despite last week's success. The newspaper pointed out that the Augustine panel as well as the Government Accountability Office projected that developing the Ares system and other elements of the Constellation flight system would cost billions more than NASA has estimated.

"NASA and its friends will be hard-pressed to persuade the president and lawmakers outside of districts with Ares jobs to pump billions more into a rocket panned by a presidential panel and the GAO," the editorial predicted.

Greason acknowledged that the jobs issue played a role in the debate over Ares but insisted that employment shouldn't be the main issue. "To put it brutally, this trade to my mind is a trade between a space program and a jobs program," he said.

Even NASA's commercial partners are hedging their bets: Brian Duffy, a former astronaut and Lockheed Martin executive who is overseeing the development of NASA's Orion crew exploration vehicle, hinted that a space trip on Ares may not be strictly necessary. The Orion craft "will be capable of riding on whatever launch vehicle is provided," he said at the New Mexico space conference.

Deadlines for decisions

So when will Ares' fate become clear? Logsdon said the first definitive signals could come a few weeks from now, once Congress passes an omnibus spending bill that applies to NASA. The space agency would then have to indicate how much of the current fiscal year's budget is to go toward Ares I development — or not.

"The next question is whether the president is going to identify himself with any decision [on space policy], either separately or in the State of the Union Address," Logsdon said. Back in 2004, then-President George W. Bush heralded the back-to-the-moon plan during a high-profile speech at NASA Headquarters. It remains to be seen whether Obama will do something similar for his own space vision.

Further signals should come in early February, when the White House traditionally issues its spending plan for the next fiscal year. "At least some of the decisions have to be reflected in the 2011 budget," Logsdon said. But even after the budget is announced, NASA and the White House are likely to launch more detailed studies into the options for future space exploration.

Ultimately, it's up to President Barack Obama to lay out his own vision for America's place on the final frontier — and then hope that future policymakers will stay the course once he's out of office.

"I remain guardedly optimistic," Logsdon said. "Mr. Obama has given every indication that he wants a program that is inspirational in character, which means human spaceflight and eventual exploration. But he's facing an extremely tough challenge. It's not as big as what to do in Afghanistan, but in our parochial sector it's a big challenge."



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Sources: MSNBC, BNET, Google Maps

NASA LCROSS Moon Crash Was Awesome!...But Yields No Immediate Results

NASA's moon blast lands with a thud. NASA's highly touted crash landing on the moon may have been a dud for viewers, but scientists said Friday it will help them gather a wealth of information. NBC's Tom Costello reports.

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(Lunar explosion yields no naked-eye results. A NASA mission to intentionally crash a spacecraft into the moon goes off as planned but yields no immediate visible debris.)

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(Keith Olbermann of "Countdown" explains NASA's most recent mission. A purposeful collision with the Moon.)

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No big flash from NASA’s moon crash


A pair of NASA spacecraft smashed into the moon at twice the speed of a bullet, as part of a mission aimed at blasting up signs of water ice.

Pictures of the impact zone were beamed back live to Earth, but the video imagery did not show any signs of a flash.

"It's hard to tell what we saw there," said Michael Bicay, director of science at NASA's Ames Research Center in California.

The first crash took place at 7:31 a.m. ET. That’s when an empty rocket that weighed 2.2 tons hit the crater Cabeus. It was expected to create a minicrater about 66 feet (20 meters) wide, which is half the length of an Olympic pool. The blast should have kicked up a plume of lunar debris about six miles (10 kilometers) high.

Scientists hoped an analysis of the debris would confirm the theory that water — a key resource if people are going to go back to the moon — is hidden below the barren moonscape.

Trailing behind the rocket was the lunar probe LCROSS, short for Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite and pronounced L-Cross. The LCROSS shepherding spacecraft sent Earth live pictures of the expected impact zone.

Visible-light images showed little sign of the debris plume, but Bicay noted that thermal imagery did pick up evidence of a crash.

Just four minutes after the rocket stage hits the moon, the LCROSS spacecraft completed its own fatal plunge. Data sent back before LCROSS' crash will be analyzed for signs of water ice.

Telescopes around the world — including the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope — aimed their cameras at the big event to provide more views of the dust-up.

LCROSS and its bigger rocket stage launched together last June and only separated Thursday night, the last major milestone before the big crash.

The lunar demolition derby was broadcast live on NASA television. Museums and observatories planned early-morning events to show the crashes, which can be seen with backyard telescopes in the predawn darkness west of the Mississippi River.

The LCROSS probe cost $79 million and was an add-on to a bigger NASA satellite now circling the moon.



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Sources: NASA, MSNBC, Guardian.co.uk, Google Maps

NASA's Endeavor Delayed Again Due To More Bad Weather

MSNBC----

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Thunderstorms forced NASA to call off Sunday evening's launch of the shuttle Endeavour, the fourth delay for the space station construction mission.

The launch team came within minutes of sending Endeavour and seven astronauts to the international space station. But storms quickly moved in from the west and violated NASA's safety rules, leading managers to halt the countdown. They will try again Monday, despite an outlook calling for more bad weather.

"We got the vehicle ready, and the weather unfortunately did not cooperate with us today," launch director Pete Nickolenko told the seven astronauts aboard Endeavour.

"We understand and we'll be ready," replied commander Mark Polansky.

Monday's launch attempt is scheduled for 6:51 p.m. ET.

NASA has until Tuesday, possibly Wednesday, to launch Endeavour with the final piece of Japan's space station lab. Otherwise, it will have to wait until the end of July because of a Russian supply ship that's awaiting liftoff.

No gas leaks this time:

The three previous countdowns never made it this far.

Saturday's launch attempt was foiled by a series of lightning strikes around the pad that required extra checks of the many critical shuttle systems. Back in June, hydrogen gas leaks held everything up.

No leaks popped up this time, thanks to all of the repairs. The tight plumbing allowed Polansky and his crew to board the shuttle for the first time for a real launch try.

Endeavour holds the third and final segment of Japan's enormous $1 billion space station lab, named Kibo, or Hope. It's a porch for experiments that need to be exposed to the vacuum of space. The shuttle also is loaded with large spare parts for the space station and hundreds of pounds of food for the six station residents.

When the shuttle astronauts finally arrive at the space station, they will make up the biggest crowd ever in a single place in orbit: 13 people. All of the major space station partners will be represented: the United States, Russia, Canada, Europe and Japan.

Tight schedule:

Endeavour is scheduled to spend nearly two weeks at the space station. In all, the flight will last 16 days. Five spacewalks are planned to hook up the Japanese lab's new porch, replace space station batteries and perform other maintenance.

Eight shuttle flights remain, including this one, before NASA retires the fleet. All involve space station work.

NASA is aiming to wrap up the space station construction job and retire the shuttle fleet by the end of 2010 — which makes for a tight schedule ahead.

While NASA prepared for Sunday's launch attempt, Russian controllers tested an automated rendezvous system on the space station, using an unmanned Progress cargo ship that had been shadowing the station since its undocking last month.

The ship was successfully commanded to come within about 33 feet (10 meters) of the station, and then back away. The Progress craft then began executing a series of commands that would lead to its safe de-orbiting.

The system could smooth out the process of docking with future Progress spacecraft, which are Russia's robotic workhorses for space station resupply.

Over a radio link with the station, the Russian ground team recalled that a similar test led to a collision between Russia's now-defunct Mir space station and a cargo craft back in 1997. They remarked that the near-disaster left some of them with "gray hairs" 12 years ago.


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Sources: MSNBC, NASA, Google Maps

NASA Space Shuttle Endeavor Approved For Lift-Off, Set To Launch...5, 4, 3, 2, 1

MSNBC----

(Space shuttle Endeavour and crew depart for the International Space Station.)

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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - After enduring a month's delay, seven astronauts boarded the space shuttle Endeavour on Sunday for an evening flight to the International Space Station.

NASA was hoping thunderstorms would stay away. Forecasters said there was a 70 percent chance the weather would cooperate.

"Look at that!" astronaut David Wolf said, pointing up at the sunshine with both hands.

It was NASA's fourth attempt to send Endeavour on a space station construction mission. Saturday's try was foiled by a series of lightning strikes around the pad that required extra checks of the many critical shuttle systems. Back in June, hydrogen gas leaks held everything up twice.

No leaks popped up this time, thanks to all of the repairs, as NASA fueled Endeavour's external tank for the planned 7:13 p.m. ET liftoff. The tight plumbing allowed commander Mark Polansky and his crew to board the shuttle for the first time for a real launch try. None of the previous countdowns got that far.

The astronauts grinned, waved and gave a thumbs-up as they headed to the pad.

Final segment for Japan’s lab:

Endeavour holds the third and final segment of Japan's enormous $1 billion space station lab, named Kibo, or Hope. It's a porch for experiments that need to be exposed to the vacuum of space. The shuttle also is loaded with large spare parts for the space station and hundreds of pounds of food for the six station residents.

When the shuttle astronauts arrive at the space station, they will make up the biggest crowd ever in a single place in orbit: 13 people.

All of the major space station partners will be represented: the United States, Russia, Canada, Europe and Japan.

An estimated 60 Japanese were on hand for Sunday's launch attempt, a considerably smaller group than back in mid-June for NASA's initial tries.

One of the Americans flying up on Endeavour will trade places with the lone Japanese astronaut on the space station, who has been there since March.

Busy schedule:

Endeavour will spend nearly two weeks at the space station. In all, the flight will last 16 days. Five spacewalks are planned to hook up the Japanese lab's new porch, replace space station batteries and perform other maintenance.

Eight shuttle flights remain, including this one, all involving space station work. NASA is aiming to wrap up the space station construction job and retire the shuttle fleet by the end of 2010 — which makes for a tight schedule ahead.

NASA has until Tuesday or possibly Wednesday to send up Endeavour before it has to make way for the launch of an unmanned Russian supply ship. After that, the shuttle flight would be off until late July.

While NASA prepared for launch, Russian controllers tested an automated rendezvous system on an unmanned Progress cargo ship that had been shadowing the space station since its undocking last month. The ship was successfully commanded to come within about 33 feet (10 meters) of the station, and then back away. The Progress craft then began executing a series of commands that would lead to its safe deorbiting.

The system could smooth out the process of docking with future Progress spacecraft, which are Russia's robotic workhorses for space station resupply.

Over a radio link with the station, the Russian ground team recalled that a similar test led to a collision between Russia's now-defunct Mir space station and a cargo craft back in 1997. They remarked that the near-disaster left some of them with "gray hairs."


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Sources: MSNBC, Wikipedia, Google Maps

Lunar Probes On Collision Course With Moon

News Scientist----

Two NASA probes are on their way to the moon in the hopes of finding water ice and safe landing sites that could pave the way for the return of astronauts to the lunar surface.

The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and a piggyback mission called Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) took off at 2132 GMT on Thursday aboard an Atlas V rocket from a launch pad at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

The two lunar missions, which together cost some $580 million, are NASA's first since 1998 and are intended to pave the way for a potential human settlement on the moon. "We will prepare ... the guidebook for future exploration of the moon," LRO project scientist Richard Vondrak told reporters on Tuesday.

LRO will arrive at the moon after about four days and is expected to spend several years in orbit, mapping the lunar surface using a suite of instruments including cameras and an advanced laser altimeter. The altimeter will fire five laser beams 28 times per second to build up 3D maps of the surface.

Landing sites:

The orbiter's first year will focus on NASA's human exploration goals, mapping the moon in unprecedented detail, while honing in on 50 'high-priority' locations that have been identified as prime landing sites for future manned missions. The mission may then be extended for three years to conduct scientific observations.

Meanwhile, the short-lived LCROSS mission has just one target. After several months in Earth orbit, in early October the spacecraft will shepherd the 2400-kilogram upper stage of the launch rocket into a collision course with the moon's south pole.

NASA believes the moon's poles are the best places for a potential lunar outpostMovie Camera. That's partly because some portions of the poles are almost continuously lit, which could be a boon for solar power collection.

Double impact:

But the regions could also be rich in water needed for long stays on the lunar surface. In 1998, NASA's last moon probe, Lunar Prospector, found that large areas of the poles seemed to contain hydrogen. That hinted that water deposited by ancient impacts could be preserved in some craters whose high rims keep their interiors permanently shaded from the sun (though other lines of evidence have yielded contradictory findings on the question of ice).

The LCROSS mission will excavate some of this long-hidden material so it can be illuminated by sunlight and observed by ground and space telescopes, including Hubble, LRO, and India's lunar orbiter Chandrayaan-1.

LCROSS will follow behind the Centaur stage to take its own measurements of the impact before crashing into the moon about four minutes later.

The Centaur impact is expected to excavate more than 350 tonnes of lunar material, creating a crater 20 metres wide and sending a plume of material several kilometres above the surface. The LCROSS probe itself will throw up an estimated 150 tonnes of material, gouging out a crater 14 metres wide.

Sources: News Scientist, Wikipedia, Youtube

President Obama Taps First African-American NASA Agency Lead Administrator

Today the White House announced President Obama's nominee to lead NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration).

Charles F. Bolden (61), a former Astronaut, a Marine General and current Space Science Advocate with an impressive resume, was recently tapped by the Obama administration to become NASA's 51st Human Space Program leader.

Bolden a native of Columbia, SC grew up attending Segregated Public Schools where African-American students were exposed to fiercely substandard educational environments.

However Bolden was determined not to allow his sub par circumstances ruin his destiny.

He worked hard to earn good grades, graduated from C.A. Johnson High School and with help from a Northern Congressman, was allowed entry into the prestigious U.S. Naval Academy where he became president of his class.

Bolden graduated from the Naval Academy in 1968 with gold bars as a Marine second lieutenant and from USC in 1977.

He was later awarded his Aviator Wings and went on to become a decorated combat pilot.

After completing 100 plus flying missions including some in North and South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, Bolden worked as a Marine Corps test pilot and a NASA astronaut.

Thus far he has recorded 680 hours orbiting Earth, navigating his first shuttle flight approximately 23 years ago.

If confirmed Charles F. Bolden will become the agency's first permanent African-American "Top Brass" Administrator.

Excellent Choice!

Thank you Presidents John F. Kennedy and Barack Hussein Obama for changing America's History books, especially in the field of Science.

Note: NASA has a pretty cool site. It's filled with interesting Space Science knowledge for visitors of basically all age groups.

A link to the site can be found here. (www.nasa.gov)


(MSNBC helps explain why Bolden is a great choice for NASA's future.)

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(Space Shuttle Discovery Launch at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, July 4Th, 2006.)




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Sources: Whitehouse.gov, NASA, MSNBC, Day Life, Reuters, Wltx.com, Wikipedia, Youtube, Google Maps