DRAGON CONTAMINATION CLEANUP FORCES LAUNCH DELAY - Launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying an unmanned cargo ship bound for the International Space Station has been delayed from Sunday to no earlier than March 30, because of what sources described as apparent contamination that could pose problems for research hardware carried by the Dragon cargo craft. SpaceX engineers were preparing the rocket for launch at 4:41 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) Sunday to boost the Dragon capsule, loaded with about 4,600 pounds of equipment and supplies, on an automated flight to the International Space Station. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 14)
SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW POSSIBLE MALAYSIA AIRLINES FLIGHT 370 WRECKAGE AS FINAL WORDS OF FLIGHT REVEAL - Chinese satellites have reportedly captured images of what may be wreckage taken near where the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 dropped off the radar. The "suspected crash area at sea," according to a Chinese government agency, is roughly 140 miles from where the missing flight's transponder turned off, CNN reported. In addition to the one large object pictured, "three suspected floating objects" were also found, according to China's State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense. More (Source: New York Daily News - Mar 13)
US SATELLITE IMAGING FIRM HELPS TO CROWDSOURCE SEARCH FOR MH370 - With Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 still missing as search and rescue operations enter their fourth day, an American satellite imaging company has started an initiative to crowdsource the search for the jet. In this initiative, the public will help analyse high-resolution images for any sign of the missing plane. ABC News reported that DigitalGlobe, based in Longmont, Colorado, has trained cameras from its five orbiting satellites on Saturday on the Gulf of Thailand region from where MH370 was last heard. More (Source: The Malaysian Insider - Mar 12)
SPACE STATION CREW RETURNS TO EARTH, LANDS SAFELY IN KAZAKHSTAN - Three crew members from the International Space Station returned to Earth Monday after 166 days in space, during which they made 2,656 orbits around the planet and traveled almost 70.5 million miles Expedition 38 crew members Michael Hopkins of NASA, and Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) touched down southeast of the remote town of Dzhezkazgan, Kazakhstan, at about 11:24 p.m. EDT (9:24 a.m., March 11, in Dzhezkazgan). During Expedition 38, the crew members participated in a variety of research, including protein crystal growth studies and biological studies of plant seedling growth to technology demonstrations that are helping to improve our understanding of how liquid moves in microgravity. More (Source: Phys.org - Mar 12)
WEATHER DELAYS RETURN FROM SPACE OF RUSSIAN TORCHBEARERS, U.S. ASTRONAUT - An American astronaut and two Russians who carried a Sochi Olympic torch into open space will have to stay in orbit one day longer than planned because of bad weather on the steppes of Kazakhstan, officials said on Monday. Cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Sergei Ryazansky had been scheduled to leave the International Space Station (ISS) along with NASA's Mike Hopkins early on Tuesday and touch down in Kazakhstan at 0924 local time (2324 EDT Monday). Instead, their Soyuz TMA-10M craft is now expected to depart about a day later and land on Wednesday at about 1015 (0015 EDT), Russian news agencies cited officials at the Gagarin cosmonaut training centre outside Moscow as saying. More (Source: Reuters - Mar 11)
SOYUZ CREW CLEARED FOR ON-TIME LANDING IN KAZAKHSTAN - Despite strained relations over Russian actions in Ukraine, superpower cooperation in space continues unabated with two cosmonauts and a NASA astronaut set for a fiery plunge back to Earth late Monday aboard a Russian Soyuz ferry craft to close out a 166-day stay in space. "One of the great things about leaving home is coming home," Mike Hopkins, who left a wife and two sons behind on Earth last September, said in a NASA interview. "Being reunited with my family, I think, is going to be absolutely wonderful." More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 11)
SPACEX FIRES FALCON 9 ROCKET ENGINES FOR PRELAUNCH CHECK BY STEPHEN CLARK - SpaceX fired up the nine-engine first stage of a Falcon 9 rocket Saturday in a major preflight rehearsal before the March 16 launch of nearly 5,000 pounds of experiments and supplies to the International Space Station. The brief ignition of the Falcon 9's nine Merlin 1D engines occurred with the rocket firmly fastened to SpaceX's Complex 40 launch pad at Cape Canaveral, Fla. The engines generate about 1.3 million pounds of thrust at sea level. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 10)
NASA TEAMS DEPLOY TO KAZAKHSTAN FOR SOYUZ LANDING - As diplomatic tensions flare over Russia's armed incursion into Ukraine, preparations for Monday's landing of two Russian cosmonauts and an American astronaut continue unabated as recovery crews converge on the Kazakhstan touchdown zone. Nearly two dozen NASA officials and medical personnel are on the way to Kazakhstan to greet the three-man crew, led by veteran Russian commander Oleg Kotov, a native of the Crimea region at the center of a standoff between Russian forces and the Ukrainian government. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 9)
NAVIGATIONAL SATELLITE IRNSS 1-B LAUNCH SET FOR MARCH 31 - India’s latest navigational satellite IRNSS 1-B would be launched onboard PSLV C-24 rocket from the spaceport at Sriharikota on March 31. There would be a two-and-a-half day countdown which would be preceded by a launch rehearsal on March 26, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) sources said today. “The launch of IRNSS 1-B from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre atPSLV C-24 rocket is scheduled at 5.20 pm on March 31,” they told PTI. More (Source: Indian Express - Mar 8)
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