Augustine Commission has harsh conclussions for NASA

The entire article is worth reading, but this quote summarizes many of the issues for me:

Full Augustine Commission Report - Surprises from the Full Review of Human Spaceflight - Popular Mechanics:
"6) NASA is handicapped by rules that limit the way it does business.
Unlike other federal departments, NASA's relationship with the industrial world is antiquated, discourages innovation and suffers from inflexible bureaucracy."

NASA unveils rocket for shuttle's replacement

Things seem to happen slowly at NASA, but at least some things are still happening . . .

Ares1X rollout - NASA unveils shuttle's replacement:
"NASA's pristine white Ares I-X rocket rolled out of the enormous Vehicle Assembly Building just after 1:30 a.m. Tuesday. Reporters and space center employees joined program engineers and executives for the grand unveiling which took place under bright white spotlights.

>> Photos of the rollout

“This is really the first chance we've had to see it in all its glory,” offered John Cowart, deputy manager for the Ares test flight. “Not since about 1975 has something this large come out of the VAB.”

The Ares I-X is 327 feet tall – much taller than the space shuttles that usually make the slow roll to the launch pads. But it's primarily built from a space shuttle solid rocket booster, and is meant to test the flight characteristics of NASA's planned shuttle replacements.

“It's a different shape than what people are used to. It's that tallest rocket in the world, it's very thin for its height. But we're very confident it's going to work and we've done all that we can possibly do,” Cowart continued.

The two-minute flight, planned for next week, should give engineers plenty of data about rotation, vibration, and even parachute deployment before the rocket splashes down in the Atlantic. It's taking place early enough in the design process that lessons learned from this flight can be applied to the final design."

Space Debris Removal coming

Here we go - if this ends up being a commercial project, access to space might just become affordable. I'm thinking of robots that can sling nets over the debris and then toss the net down into the atmosphere to burn up. I would love to return the junk and sell it as souvenirs, but that approach is probably still too costly.

Pentagon Wants ‘Space Junk’ Cleaner | Danger Room | Wired.com:
"The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency put out a notice yesterday requesting information on possible solutions to the infamous space debris problem.

“Since the advent of the space-age over five decades ago, more than thirty-five thousand man-made objects have been cataloged by the U.S. Space Surveillance Network,” the agency notes. “Nearly twenty-thousand of those objects remain in orbit today, ninety-four percent of which are non-functioning orbital debris.”

These figures do not even include the objects too small to count. There are estimated to be hundreds of thousands of these smaller objects, and as debris hits other debris, it creates even more small pieces, exponentially increasing the amount of objects that could threaten satellites and spacecraft."

Dealing with hazardous space debris

As I've written before, trash collection is space has the potential to be a profitable business for some bright entrepreneurs.

Building an Electronic Fence to Track Space Junk | Popular Science:
"Thousands of manmade pieces of space junk orbit the Earth, threatening astronauts and unmanned missions alike. Now the U.S. Air Force Space Command wants an electronic 'space fence' that could track any orbital object larger than two inches in width.

Such a surveillance system would require a global network of sensitive S-band radar stations that operate in the gigahertz range of the electromagnetic spectrum. The U.S. Air Force currently relies on a system dating back to 1961, which only covers the continental United States, and can only track objects 20 inches in width or larger.

The growing cloud of space debris in Earth orbit includes more than 16,000 pieces of debris larger than four inches in width. And that only seems likely to grow . . . "

Beyond tracking the debris, some folks are coming up with a variety of methods to destroy or collect it. I'm in favor of collecting the debris to sell as souvenirs, but that technology may be too pricey.

Taking Out the Space Trash | Popular Science:
"Scientists at NASA and private companies have devised several ways for clearing the sky. Although some methods are admittedly outlandish, says Nicholas Johnson, the chief scientist for orbital debris at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, a few are possible with today’s technology.

One early idea was to have robotic trash collectors shove large pieces of junk through the atmosphere so that they mostly burn up before hitting the ground. But the fuel costs for destroying a significant amount of debris with such craft has quashed this approach.

A more feasible plan is to attach miles-long “electrodynamic tethers,” wound on a spool, to all new satellites. Once a satellite ends its mission, it would deploy the cable and Earth’s magnetic field would induce an electric current in it. This interaction imparts a force on the craft that pushes it through the atmosphere until most of it burns up harmlessly,"

Hubble serviced for last time

One of NASA's successes (eventually) - the Hubble Telescope has changed humanity's understanding of the universe.

Gearlog - Gadget Guide by Geeks for Geeks: "And that's a wrap: Space shuttle Atlantis crew member Megan McArthur used the shuttle's robotic arm to release the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit at 8:57 a.m. EST Tuesday, CNN reports. The mission marks the last time humans will touch the 19-year old telescope. Hubble has taken hundreds of thousands of high-resolution images--all free of the earth's murky atmosphere.

'With soft separation burn, Atlantis now is slowly backing away from the telescope,' NASA said in a statement. '"