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https://www.yahoo.com/news/piece-space-junk-chipped-one-165222115.html

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36112137 I normally pass on this stuff, but I think the beeb finally got a Peake article that passes muster.

as the russian nodes are less encumbred with survival packages from Soyuz for The Crew upthere we can now enjoy visiting them too. dunno if someone already shared this, but anyway might interest some people so: http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multimedia/virtual-tour-iss/ watch for the notes, videos and all the dynamics stuff, there's a lot. Enjoy ; )

( http://spacenews.com/nasa-offers-more-details-on-cargo-contract-decision/) As we all know, SpaceX, OrbitalATK, and Sierra Nevada were awarded cargo contracts for ISS resupply, using their Cargo Dragon V1, Cygnus Extended, and Dream Chaser Cargo. NASA has now come out an explained how the 3 companies were selected- proposals were evaluated by price, past performance, and mission suitability, with price being the most important, followed by mission suitability, and then past performance. Of the 3 companies selected (Boeing and LockMart gave proposals too, but their proposals were rejected) SpaceX had the best score of the three companies selected in mission suitability- (922/1000) followed by OrbitalATK (880/1000) and Sierra Nevada (879/1000); meanwhile, all (including Sierra Nevada, apparently) of the companies selected got a "high" rating in past performance (NASA is being very secretive for some reason this time around...) However, things get more notable when NASA evaluated the companies by price (though all were considered reasonable). NASA evaluated their price score on the amount of pressurised cargo delivered per $ (this is the most important type of ISS cargo, and is common on all cargo resupply spacecraft); assuming each company delivered half of NASA's ISS cargo per year. OrbitalATK offered the lowest price per kg, followed by Sierra Nevada, then by SpaceX, who offered the highest pressurised cargo price per kg. Of course, this is slightly misleading- OrbitalATK's Cygnus can only deliver pressurised cargo (along with disposal capability for ISS trash), while Sierra Nevada's Dream Chaser can bring pressurised cargo, 500kg of unpressurised cargo, and ~3000kg back to Earth for return (along with disposal capability). SpaceX's Dragon can carry only ~3000kg of pressurised cargo, lower than its competitors, and ~3000kg of unpressurised cargo (however, the ISS almost never needs that amount of unpressurised cargo capacity), and brings ~3000kg back to Earth (the Dragon cannot dispose of ISS trash by burning.) However, this is still notable- SpaceX quietly agreed to deliver more launches for less pay than its fellow awardees with CRS-2. According to the official who made the final decision on who was awarded the CRS-2 contract, stated that the higer costs by SpaceX was due to the production and size of the Dragon V1 (cargo Dragon); having two production lines for crew and cargo Dragon (required due to the need to use different ISS ports for crew and cargo) along with an oversized rocket (due to Falcon 9 upgrades- it may be a good idea to revive Falcon 5, Elon) and small capsule volume (thus, able to carry less cargo- both Cygnus and Dream Chaser can carry more). However, NASA still belived the 3 companies met or exceeded their requirements, and thus, awarded all of them a contract. NASA has also confirmed Boeing and LockMart were the only others to submit CRS-2 proposals, but offered little information to why they were not selected.

So NASA announced that they're harvesting the Zinnias that astronaut Scott Kelly successfully grew on the ISS, and they also had a really cool backgrounder article on the story of plant-growing on the ISS that I liked because I could see the direct implications for future space missions. Apparently there have been other plants and flowers in space including one ISS 'naut's personal project where he grew them out of ziplock sandwich bags, as well as the batches of cabbage that Kelly and crew were able to eat a couple months ago. The plan is ultimately to grow tomatoes on the ISS by 2017. One of the comments in the articles that I found really interesting was that, in addition to being a dietary supplement, they're hoping that having plants and a zero-g garden will be good for the crew's mental health. My questions are: a)How significant an achievement are these Zinnias compared to the cabbage and the tomatoes? I wonder why they didn't just start with tomatoes, given everything else that they've grown? b)What kind of roles do you see plants serving on long-duration flights (i.e to Mars)? Just a small hobby for the 'nauts? Or a significant dietary supplement? Or large enough to function as life support food and CO2 scrubbing? c)Given that all of our food is (currently) grown under gravity on earth, what kind of traits should we change in the plants (DNA-engineering?) so they can flourish in zero-G? I know humans have a number of cardio and skeletal issues that hinders long-term spaceflight, do plants like tomatoes have any equivalent major weaknesses? (I figured this topic would have been covered before, but I didn't turn up anything when I searched. If the general topic is a duplicate, focus on the Scott Kelly ISS mission part!)

I'm a new streamer with a pretty decent Space Shuttle, that i'll be using in accordance with my Proton replica to build the ISS just as it was built. Including accurate docking, arm maneuvers, station function and station IVA's! This is why I made the shuttle, after all. Day 2, lets do this! http://twitch.tv/spitfireacademy

I was looking at Scott Kelly's pictures of the recent snow storm to hit the east coast. While looking at it I was trying to understand the orientation of the picture and to see which cities were visible. After some time with Google Earth and Microsoft Paint I labeled what I could distinguish in the photo. Just wanted to share and maybe see if anyone can see if something is mislabeled. Scott Kelly's - https://twitter.com/StationCDRKelly/status/690865242327351296/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Labeled - http://i.imgur.com/6O7Kfv4.jpg

http://www.planetary.org/blogs/jason-davis/2015/20151218-mt-jams-contingency-spacewalk.html?referrer=https://www.google.com/

http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=38959.msg1454018#new http://news.yahoo.com/russian-government-already-paying-space-195035280.html?nf=1 http://money.cnn.com/2015/04/27/news/economy/russia-space-crisis-cosmodrome/index.html Oh noes. "On Monday, Igor Komarov, the director of Roscosmos — Russia's version of NASA — announced that the space agency will receive a total of $22.5 billion dollars in government funding over the next 10 years. That might sound like a lot, but it's close to how much NASA gets from the federal government each year. In 2015, alone, NASA received approximately $18 billion, and is projected to get a similar amount each year through 2019 ." In other words: Rocosmos, with new cuts- $22.5 Billion Budget for the next 10 years. NASA Budget, currently- $18 Billion. (though this is not just space budget) These cuts have been made due to the deteriorating Russian economy. It's also the 3rd cut this YEAR, and is HALF the amount originally planned for in Rocosmos' long term plan. There goes Russia's plans to land people on the Moon...and PPTS (aka Orionski)...and OPSEK (Russia's next gen space station). Even the new Russian ISS modules are at risk at this point. Vostochny Cosmodrome is still happening though. Also, a comment from NovaSilisko, (former) KSP Developer: "So it sounds to me like this basically means the end of Russia's lunar and planetary exploration short of ExoMars, with most of the budget going into Earth-centric operations like the ISS. No Venera revival, no Luna revival, no Phobos-Grunt reflight..." This sucks.

http://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/7883/20151213/nasa-out-iss.htm http://www.fastcompany.com/3054332/fast-feed/nasa-were-leaving-the-space-station-to-the-private-sector NASA want to pull out support for ISS asap and wish to leave the space station bussiness to the private sector. Good or bad?

Hello everyone! XCLD, a Lego Ideas user has put together another awesome space set after his old ISS got disapproved (Despite reaching 10,000 followers, Lego decided not to produce it). He has come back with a Nice, Small, but not any less awesome Mini ISS. Here it is: He has made such an awesome little thing that I am sure a lot of people will support. Here is what he is including so far: He makes awesome sets, so check him out here and if you can, support his model here! Wish him luck, and just so everyone knows, I'm not XCLD but rather a person very excited about what he creates. I'll update this page so check back here if you are interested in this. [Edit]: Here's a link to his website for everyone!

It's happening. We've been waiting for this event for years now, and soon everyone (along with SpaceX, Boeing, & Sierra Nevada) will know who will be flying the first U.S. astronauts from U.S. soil since the Space Shuttle retired in 2011, on-board USCV-1 to the ISS, tentatively scheduled to make its first flight in 2017. Live Updates: [4:08 PM 16 September] BOEING AND SPACEX ARE THE WINNERS! [9:10AM 16 September] Lurio, you must be relieved! Stephen Clark via Twitter: "NASA: "Major announcement today about astronaut transport to the International Space Station." 4pm presser at KSC. Buckle your seat belts." [12:41AM 16 September]: Andy Pasztor has published another article on the WSJ, titled: "Amazon Founder Jeff Bezos's Startup Is Part of Bid to Deliver Astronauts". Read the full article here. [9:16 PM EST]: Mr. Lurio to the rescue again... "Latest from elsewhere: WSJ/Pastor item is wrong. Conclusion: We won't know it til we know it, so take stress tab of your choice.". Jeff Foust has also retweeted this. [9:14 PM EST]: Cnet is regurgitating Wall Street Journal's claims that Boeing is to win one of the spots in an article titled: "Boeing said to win NASA space taxi contract". Everyone should be aware that this is complete speculation. There is no evidence to support any of this information. [3:31PM]: "Yet another item: Supposedly someone saw a poster just delivered KSC re CCtCap - included SNC/SpaceX, not Boeing. But I advise caution." Link to Tweet. [3:27PM]: Charles A. Lurio again... "This just in from another re CCtCap: Award tomorrow between 10-11am EDT." [3:06PM]: Charles A. Lurio on Twitter advising that companies will be informed of CCtCap results tomorrow morning, with public announcements following shortly after! All times are in EST BackgroundWith the Retirement of the Space Shuttle, NASA had to pay the Russians for seats on the Soyuz to ferry Astronauts to the ISS. NASA did not like this and started 2 different competitions to resupply and recrew the station. They are known as CCDev and CCtCap respectively. CCDev was the easier of the two and 2 companies made designs and won contracts, SpaceX with the Dragon and Orbital Sciences with Cygnus. The original idea was for CCDev to be a stepping stone for CCtCap, but it did not work out. CCtCap is Commercial Crew. in the beginning there were 5 designs with 4 capsules. They were SpaceX with the Dragon on a Falcon 9, Sierra Nevada Corp with DreamChaser on Atlas 5, Boeing with CST100 on Atlas 5, Blue Origin with New Sheppard on Undecided, and ATK with a CST100 on Liberty (think Aires 1). After the first round money was awarded to Boeing, SpaceX, and Sierra Nevada Corp to continue developing their designs. Boeing got the most money, followed by SpaceX and then SNC. Instead of a lump sum, the awards are parsed out based on milestones. This announcement is the end of the second phase. At this point, NASA has the money for 1.5 Contracts and this announcement is for who gets the big contract to actually carry astronauts to the ISS. Current Speculation is that Boeing has the strongest case because they have completed 100% of their milestones, with SpaceX in second with something like 80%. The main difference is that SpaceX has proven technology that has flown in the last decade, last time a Boeing Capsule flew was the apollo capsule. Tomorrow is the BIG day when the three lean whether or not they will get money to continue building their craft. SpaceX has already said that if they do not get selected they will continue to build the Dragon V2, it will just take longer. AFAIK there has been no announcements from SNC or Boeing on what happens if they do not get selected. for more info on the designs CST 100 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CST-100 Dragon http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_V2 DreamChaser http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Chaser also reddit is a great place for more info and is where I am getting the updates from https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/2gi43x/rspacex_nasa_cctcap_downselect_official/