Spaceport America Hosts Public Open House Day
The second Spaceport America Open House Day occurs April 2 at the 7,280-hectare (18,000-acre) facility with 3,700-meter ‘spaceway’ in a New Mexico desert basin. Organizers expect to welcome at least 1,600 participants in 2 sessions that include demonstrations at the horizontal launch area, hands-on fun and educational activities. A fly-in is planned by Aviators from New Mexico Chapters of Experimental Aircraft Association and New Mexico Pilots Association. Anchor tenant Virgin Galactic, lead by Chairman Sir Richard Branson and CEO George Whitesides, is building back up to test flights after the SpaceShipTwo / VSS Enterprise catastrophe in 2014. Virgin Galactic has not yet been able to offer long-promised operational flights, 10 years on from the State legislature enacting the law providing for the world’s first purpose-built commercial spaceport and 6 years on from the grand opening. This has caused revenue to fall well below official projections for the ~US$220M publicly funded development, although SpaceX Falcon 9R testing, development programs for UP Aerospace and Armadillo Aerospace rockets, and a number of other companies’ activities have tallied up 20+ suborbital test flights from the location. Interest and investment in space technologies and space access continue to grow in Florida, Virginia, Texas, California, Alaska, Hawai`i, and elsewhere, as forward looking and productive contributions to the innovative spirit of America applied in reaching for the Stars. (Image Credit: Spaceport America, Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, Up Aerospace, Armadillo Aerospace)
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MONDAY
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= All times
for terrestrial events in local time unless noted.
= All times for international terrestrial events in local time unless noted.
= All times for space events, and…
= All times for international space / astro events in Hawaii Standard Time unless noted. Add 10 hours to obtain UT (‘Universal Time;’ Greenwich, England).
Weekly Planet Watch – Evening Planets: Mars (S), Jupiter (E), Saturn (S), Uranus (W).
USA National Academies Experts Convene for Space Science Week and CAPS Meeting
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Mar 28 — Moon: 4.1° N of Mars, 10:00; 9.7° N of Antares, 16:00.
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The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in Washington DC is holding the Committee on Astrobiology and Planetary Science (CAPS) Meeting, and Space Science Week featuring a lecture by Alan Stern on New Horizons, Mission to Pluto: Exploring the Frontier of Our Solar System between March 29-31. Space Science week will include updates from Alvaro Gimenez (ESA), Chi Wang (CAS), Saku Tsuneta (JAXA), Pascale Ehrenfreund (DLR), Paul Hertz (NASA), Ames Ulvestad (NSF), Mike Gold (Bigelow), Frank Culbertson (Orbital ATK), and John Olson (Sierra Nevada). Alan Stern will discuss the dynamic world of Pluto and its 5 moons, its “active geology, exotic surface chemistry, a complex atmosphere, [and] puzzling interaction with the Sun.” The CAPS meeting will cover space-based and supporting ground-based planetary research within the Solar System, including planets, moons, small bodies, astrobiology, planetary astronomy and planetary protection. Future CAPS meetings are already scheduled to be held twice a year, March and September, through 2020. The National Academies produces around 200 reports each year, has a total membership of over 6,300 scientists, engineers, and health professionals, and was created by an Act of Incorporation in 1863 signed by Abraham Lincoln. (Image Credit: The National Academies, NASA) Pictured: Bottom: Alan Stern; Top L-R: Ralph Cicerone – President of National Academy of Sciences, C. Dan Mote Jr. – President of National Academy of Engineering, Victor Dzau – President of National Academy of Medicine. Mar 30 — Hawai’i Preparatory Academy, Gates Performing Arts Center, Kamuela HI: Life in the Universe: The Science of Astrobiology; Dr. Carl Pilcher, Interim Director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute, 19:00.
Mar 30 – Apr 1 — University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom: 3rd UK Exoplanet Community Meeting (UKEXOM).
Mar 30 — Aten Asteroid 2010 GD35: Near-Earth flyby (0.039 AU).
Mar 30 — Aten Asteroid 2008 BX2: Near-Earth flyby (0.049 AU).
Mar 30 — Apollo Asteroid 2016 EQ84: Near-Earth flyby (0.071 AU).
THURSDAY
Mar 31 — RSA, Launch Soyuz / Progress 63P, Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan: An RSA Soyuz rocket set to launch 63rd Progress cargo ship to ISS.
Mar 31 — JAXA, Tokyo, Japan / Online: Applications Due: United Nations / Japan Cooperation Programme on CubeSat Deployment from ISS Japanese Experiment Module “KiboCUBE”.
Mar 31 – Apr 1 — UCLA Institute for Planets and Exoplanets, Los Angeles CA: The Asteroid-Meteorite Connection Workshop.
Mar 31 — Moon: At last quarter, 05:17.
Mar 31 — Mercury: 0.56° NNW of Uranus, 10:00.
FRIDAY
NET Q2 — Interorbital Systems Corp., Launch Neptune single CPM (SR 145), Mojave CA: Planning suborbital test flight of Neptune single Common Propulsion Module (CPM) with 6 confirmed payloads this quarter.
NET Apr — Akatsuki, 400 x 440 km Venus Orbit: JAXA first successful interplanetary orbiter with a period of 13 days 14 hours, will begin data acquisition this month; planned to image atmosphere, monitor weather changes at Venus for at least 2 years.
NET Apr — JAXA, Japan: JAXA hoping to secure funding for Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) mission beginning this April (fiscal year 2016) to develop / launch mission mid-2018-2019.
NET Apr — RSA, Vostochny Cosmodrome, Russia: Russia hopes for new Cosmodrome to be completed this month; will use site to launch most missions from its own soil, including crewed missions and Lunar / Planetary missions.
Apr 1 — Deep Space, Milky Way Galactic Center: Cosmic rays & radiation being tracked, most sensitive instrument able to record rays is High Energy Stereoscopic System (HESS) located in Namibia; Milky Way can produce rays with energies of up to ~100 teraelectronvolts (~1 Trillion times larger than energy of visible light).
Apr 1 — Cassini OTM-445, Saturn Orbit: Spacecraft conducts Orbital Trim Maneuver #445 today.
Apr 1 — AIAA, Reston VA / Online: Fellow Candidate nominations open, nomination forms due Jun 15.
SATURDAY
Apr 2 — ISS, Launch Soyuz / Progress 63P, LEO: Progress 63P resupply ship to dock to ISS with 2,381 kg of cargo and supplies.
Apr 2 — Spaceport America, Las Cruces NM: Spaceport America Open House with Virgin Galactic crew members, Aviators from New Mexico Chapters of the Experimental Aircraft Association and New Mexico Pilots Association.
Apr 2 — Mauna Kea Astronomy Outreach Committee, Mauna Kea HI 2,800-meter level: The Universe Tonight; presentation on current research & discoveries occurring on Mauna Kea 18:00, followed by stargazing program, at Mauna Kea Visitor Information Center.
Apr 2 — Moon: 3.3° N of Pluto, 17:00.
SUNDAY
Apr 3 — Moon: 1.1° SSE of asteroid 18 Melpomene, 16:00.
Apr 3 — Aten Asteroid 2008 FX6: Near-Earth flyby (0.070 AU).