Editors' Picks
Area 51: Origins
America’s once-secret air base had humble beginnings.
Need for Speed
Airplanes with a mission: Fly faster.
Beyond the Moon
It’s not a place, exactly. But it could be NASA’s next destination.
The Invention of Flight
Inventors, dreamers, daredevils, charlatans: Aviation's early years had them all.
Vietnam Memoir
Stories from the war that shaped a generation.
Page 25 of 51
The Daily Planet Blog
The Human Touch
One thing I've always liked about the Russian space program is that it keeps the "human" in human spaceflight. NASA often seems more interested in technology than people. You can see it in the different feel of the international space station modules: the American, European and Japanese labs are f...
March 18, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Taxi or Rental Car?
That's one interesting question that a few former space shuttle astronauts and other experts were grappling with one day in early March at the National Research Council's Keck building in downtown Washington, D.C. Around a large conference table sat NASA veterans Fred Gregory, history's first black...
March 15, 2011
| By Mike Klesius
The View from 30,000 Feet Blog
Time for a Check-Up
I'm just back from recurrent training — two days of fun and games in the simulator. It's kind of like a trip to the dentist: not something you look forward to, but it feels pretty good when it's over. And it's definitely worthwhile.Each day we showed up at 5 a.m. for the briefing, then went into th...
March 11, 2011
| By Steve Satre
The Daily Planet Blog
One of the "Intrepid Birdwomen"
"Here is a group of feminine flyers who don't just fool around with flying," reported the Los Angeles Times in January 1934. "They hardly ever powder their noses. They don't even carry mirrors. They'd rather poke their not unhandsome little noses into a balky carburetor than riffle up a pack of bri...
March 11, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Daily Planet Blog
Formation Flight
A government-industry team is getting closer to demonstrating that unmanned vehicles can be refueled at high altitudes by other UAVs. In a January 21 test, Northrop Grumman's piloted Proteus aircraft flew as close as 40 feet to an unmanned NASA Global Hawk, also produced by Northrop Grumman, while...
March 09, 2011
| By Mike Klesius
The Daily Planet Blog
Discovery's Last... and First...Flight
With space shuttle Discovery having just wrapped up its career, we thought you might like this account of its first flight back in 1984, as narrated by the STS-41D crew.See here for more of these shuttle home videos.
March 09, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Lunney’s Legacy
These are emotional days for the folks who work on the space shuttle, as they watch vehicles and people retire. Today was the last day on the job for Bryan Lunney, a 22-year veteran NASA flight director who also happens to be the son of legendary flight director Glynn Lunney.Here's how Bryan summed...
March 07, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Spacewalker in a Telescope
Amazing what you can see in a 10-inch telescope if the conditions are right. Dutch amateur astronomer Ralf Vandebergh got a picture of STS-133 astronaut Steve Bowen spacewalking outside the International Space Station last week.
March 07, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Bad Day at Vandenberg
Ron Grabe, launch system manager for Orbital Sciences, didn't try to sugar-coat the news. "Tonight we're all pretty devastated," he said during a predawn press briefing at Vandenberg AFB today.Orbital's Taurus XL rocket had just dumped NASA's $424 million Glory climate satellite into the Pacific oc...
March 04, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Discarding Shuttle: The Hidden Cost
On February 15, 2011 a symposium entitled “U.S. Human Spaceflight: Continuity and Stability” was held at Rice University’s James A. Baker Institute of Public Policy. Organized by George Abbey, the resident space expert at the Baker Institute, one might have suspected that it would be Shuttle-centr...
March 01, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Daily Planet Blog
A Bottle of Nothing
Call it a thought experiment, a way to engage the public, or an expensive waste of time.Either way, the "Message in a Bottle" task on yesterday's spacewalk outside the International Space Station was one of the more unusual chores ever by an astronaut. At the behest of the Japanese Space Agency JAX...
March 01, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
The First Countdown?
Most histories of space travel credit the first use of the rocket countdown to a work of fiction: Fritz Lang's 1929 science fiction film, "Frau im Mond" (Woman in the Moon).http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaVLaD4vfBcMaybe not, though. British science fiction writer George Griffith used the same dram...
February 26, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
Tankers Away
And the winner is: The Boeing Company.Michael Donley, Secretary of the Air Force, announced today that Boeing will supply the U.S. Air Force with 179 tankers derived from the company's 767 widebody to replace the aging KC-135 refueler fleet. The contract is estimated at $35 billion and is expected ...
February 24, 2011
| By Mike Klesius
The View from 30,000 Feet Blog
Running Out of Time...
I should be in Stockholm right now, but instead I'm sitting at home typing this. We had several delays last night and ultimately timed out —i.e., we couldn't make the flight to Stockholm because we would have been on duty more than 16 hours by the time we landed, which is against the rules.The firs...
February 24, 2011
| By Steve Satre
The Once and Future Moon Blog
Vision statements for non-Visionaries
A seemingly trivial event has revealed some schadenfreude about NASA, along with a lot of irritation. Apparently (as is their wont) the fertile minds running our national space agency decided that the time has come (once again) for a new and improved vision statement – out with the old and in with...
February 23, 2011
| By Paul D. Spudis
The Daily Planet Blog
Photo Op for Soyuz
Busy days in Earth orbit.Space Shuttle Discovery is set to make its last voyage tomorrow, with liftoff planned for 4:50 p.m. Florida time. If all goes according to plan, Europe's Johannes Kepler unmanned cargo vehicle will have docked with the space station earlier in the day (at 10:45 U.S. Eastern...
February 23, 2011
| By Tony Reichhardt
The Daily Planet Blog
After Walking On the Moon
You're the first man to set foot on the Moon. You're also a Korean War veteran, and a former test pilot who has flown more than 200 types of aircraft. What do you do for fun?Well, we don't know what he does for fun nowadays, but for two days in February 1979, Neil Armstrong set five world records f...
February 22, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Daily Planet Blog
When Airmail Hazards Included Buffalo
India is an air-minded nation. Philatelist Pradip Jain notes in his 2002 book Indian Airmails that the Ramayama, the ancient Sanskrit epic, includes references to King Nala and Princess Damayanti sending "amorous messages to each other through the medium of a flying, talking swan." During the Maury...
February 18, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Daily Planet Blog
Who's First?
The things he carried: A sack of coffee. Fifty copies of the local newspaper, the Press Democrat. Three letters.Those letters are what put Fred Wiseman into the history books. On February 17, 1911, Wiseman—authorized by the Santa Rosa, California, postmaster—carried the first mail by airplane.To ce...
February 17, 2011
| By Rebecca Maksel
The Daily Planet Blog
Getting Up
Ever wonder what kind of takeoff a Viking Twin Otter can achieve with a stiff headwind and no sumo wrestlers on board?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PG6eJP7SBQI&feature=related
February 15, 2011
| By Mike Klesius
Advertisement
Follow Us
 | ||||||
|
|
 |
 |
| ||
Air & Space Videos
|
Flightseeing on Mount McKinleyA very close look at the mountaintops around North America’s highest peak. |
|
A New Way to NavigateGPS systems help pilots fly through rugged Alaskan terrain. |
|
X-47B Carrier LaunchAn unpiloted combat aircraft takes off from an aircraft carrier for the first time. |
|
SpaceShipTwo Fires UpVirgin Galactic sends its edge-of-space ship past Mach 1. |
|
How to Bag an AsteroidNASA's plan to retrieve an asteroid and bring it (close to) home. |
View All Videos » |
|
Need to Know
|
Why do NASA launch times depend on lighting conditions?It's all about the solar beta angle. |
Air & Space Interview
|
Bobby BraunNASA's outgoing Chief Technologist talks about what's in the R&D pipeline |
In the Magazine
