Kerbal Space Program: Docking Module Delivery – Video


Kerbal Space Program: Docking Module Delivery
A quick launch of the newest module for my space station. This module is meant to serve as a space plane docking port (particularly for ones using the lateral docking port aka the "Hull-mounted Clamp-O-Tron").From:Kyle SmithViews:0 0ratingsTime:21:11More inGaming

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Kerbal Space Program: Docking Module Delivery - Video

Chris Hadfield ready for 'surreal' space station odyssey

When Chris Hadfield was a southern Ontario farmboy dreaming of being an astronaut, it just couldn't happen.

Canada had no astronaut program and no Canadian could realistically expect to follow in the American footsteps Neil Armstrong had planted as the first man on the moon in that steamy summer of 1969.

Forty-three years later, the trail-blazing Hadfield is in quarantine in Kazakhstan, waiting to blast off in a Soyuz capsule for the International Space Station, making history again when he takes over as its first Canadian commander in March.

"For me, it is just surreal," the 53-year-old astronaut said in an interview this week from Star City, Russia, where he spent several weeks training ahead of the Dec. 19 liftoff.

Hadfield talks thoughtfully of the professional and national significances of his upcoming command.

"As an astronaut, it's a pinnacle," he says. "It is the highest level of responsibility of an astronaut to command a spaceship because of course, the lives of the people on board are my responsibility."

As a Canadian, he sees it as the latest notable step in the country's 50-year-old space program, which began when a 145-kilogram Alouette-1 satellite piggybacked on a U.S. rocket.

"It did very well, but still was, in perspective, a fairly small thing to the point now where you go through all of the satellites, the technologies, Radarsat, Canadarm, Marc Garneau, the other astronauts that have flown, now to the point that a Canadian is commanding a spaceship," he says.

But when Hadfield considers the personal significance of his upcoming command, that giddy schoolboy enthusiasm he had in Milton, Ont., in the late 1960s seeps out again.

"To be able to command the space station, yes, it's professional, and yes I'll take it seriously and yes it's important for Canada, but for me as just a Canadian kid, it makes me want to shout and laugh and do cartwheels."

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Chris Hadfield ready for 'surreal' space station odyssey

Space Station Crew Grow Plants Without Gravity

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online An experiment reported in the journal BMC Plant Biology studied the effects of growing plants without gravity, helping to disprove one theory about how gravity kick-started plant behaviors on Earth. Astronauts growing Arabidopsis plants on the International Space Station tried to determine what plant growth patterns could be influenced by ...

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Space Station Crew Grow Plants Without Gravity

SpaceX Launches Sales of Falcon, Dragon Space Patches

The company responsible for the first private spacecraft to resupply the International Space Station introduced a different type of space supply for sale mission patches.

Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, updated its online shop on Friday (Dec. 7) to offer embroidered emblems for its rocket and spacecraft flights for the first time. Based in Hawthorne, Calif., SpaceX is led by millionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, who also co-founded PayPal and Tesla Motors.

"The limited-edition mission patch collection includes a full set of all SpaceX mission patches, a total of 9," SpaceX wrote on its website at shop.spacex.com. "From the first launch of the Falcon 1 rocket to the most recent Falcon 9 mission to the International Space Station, you can review and relive SpaceX's historic launches."

The colorful, 4-inch wide (10.2 centimeters) cloth patches are based on the official emblems that were created by the company for each of its launches, from its ill-fated first Falcon 1 launch in March 2006 through its history-making Falcon 9 launch in October that lofted the first of a dozen NASA-contracted Dragon capsules to deliver to and return cargo from the space station. [Photos: Dragon's 1st Space Cargo Delivery]

The insignias also include the patch for the June 2010 maiden flight of the Falcon 9 the booster's first stage nine Merlin engines are highlighted on the emblem and the company's first flight of the Dragon in December 2010 that established the capsule as the world's first private craft to orbit the Earth and be safely recovered.

The gumdrop-shape Dragon, which from its start has been designed to eventually carry astronauts to space, too, is one of two commercial spacecraft contracted by NASA for resupply services and one of three such vehicles currently being developed for the space agency's commercial crew program.

The Dragon is currently the only cargo craft that launches from the United States, and the only vehicle worldwide that can return significant amounts of cargo to Earth, after the retirement of NASA's space shuttle fleet in 2011.

All but three of the nine SpaceX patches share a common design element: a four-leaf clover. It wasn't until the fourth flight of SpaceX's Falcon 1 in September 2008 that the company achieved its first successful spaceflight and as that mission's emblem included the small green icon, all of the company's flight patches have since included a clover for good luck.

SpaceX is offering just 200 of the nine-patch sets for $30 each through its website. The package ships with a color information card embossed with a metallic Dragon logo.

Previously, only one of the patches in the set, that of the emblem for the May 2012 second test flight of the Dragon spacecraft, was authorized for sale to the public.

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SpaceX Launches Sales of Falcon, Dragon Space Patches

Ford Drives Conversation from Station – Video


Ford Drives Conversation from Station
Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 34 Commander Kevin Ford discussed life and research on the orbital laboratory and his thoughts regarding the yearlong Expedition by two crewmembers set to begin in 2015 with reporters from CBS News and CNN during a pair of in-flight interviews December 6, 2012.From:NASAtelevisionViews:338 28ratingsTime:18:08More inScience Technology

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Ford Drives Conversation from Station - Video

Next Station Crew Departs for Launch Site – Video


Next Station Crew Departs for Launch Site
Video of Cosmonaut Roman Romanenko, the Canadian Space Agency #39;s Chris Hadfield and NASA astronaut Tom Marshburn, the Expedition 34/35 crew members set to become the next residents of the International Space Station, leave for Baikonur, Kazakhstan, where they #39;re scheduled to launch aboard their Soyuz spacecraft on Dec. 19.From:NASAtelevisionViews:82 8ratingsTime:10:39More inScience Technology

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Next Station Crew Departs for Launch Site - Video

.18! Space Stations Redux! Kerbal Space Program: Let’s Play #63 – Video


.18! Space Stations Redux! Kerbal Space Program: Let #39;s Play #63
I #39;ve fixed up the Manley Space Station design and it #39;s time to launch it into orbit! Thanks for watching! Kerbal Space Program is a fantastic indie game developed by Squad, download it from http://www.kerbalspaceprogram.comFrom:hillstacheViews:0 0ratingsTime:15:05More inGaming

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.18! Space Stations Redux! Kerbal Space Program: Let's Play #63 - Video

Astronaut Alvin Drew Speaks With Phoenix Students – Video


Astronaut Alvin Drew Speaks With Phoenix Students
From NASA #39;s International Space Station Mission Control Center, NASA astronaut Alvin Drew participates in a Digital Learning Network (DLN) event with students at Monterey Park in Phoenix. The DLN connects students and teachers with NASA experts and education specialists using online communication technologies like video/web conferencing and webcasting. Register for free, interactive events listed in the catalog or watch the webcasts. dln.nasa.govFrom:ReelNASAViews:6 0ratingsTime:25:54More inScience Technology

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Astronaut Alvin Drew Speaks With Phoenix Students - Video

Conservatives Fear the "Obama Death Star" – Video


Conservatives Fear the "Obama Death Star"
May the force be with you, Conservatives...you #39;ll need it. A joke petition has gone up on the White House "We the People" website asking Obama to begin construction on a Death Star. If you #39;re a Star Wars fan, you #39;ll know the Death Star as the Empire #39;s enormous space station that was powerful enough to destroy entire planets. Conservative "news" website World Net Daily, however, is taking the petition very seriously...From:SamSederViews:0 0ratingsTime:03:38More inNews Politics

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Conservatives Fear the "Obama Death Star" - Video

Canadian astronaut packs new wedding ring in his luggage for space station trip

MONTREAL - So what exactly does an astronaut bring with him on a visit to the International Space Station that could last up to six months?

If you're Chris Hadfield, a newly minted wedding band is at the top of the list.

When he blasts off on Dec. 19, the Canadian astronaut will have the ring as a constant reminder of his wife Helene.

The 53-year-old Hadfield said in an interview from Russia on Wednesday that he and Helene decided he should take something small and light given that space aboard the Soyuz capsule is limited.

"Something that can remind you on a daily basis, something that is both personal and also that is not just a collector's item," he told The Canadian Press.

"We thought about jewelry, earrings and a necklace, but it just seemed to make sense so I'm flying a ring for my wife."

The couple will celebrate its 31st wedding anniversary four days after Hadfield soars into space aboard a Russian spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The veteran astronaut is also taking up a watch belonging to his 26 year-old daughter Kristin.

"On my first flight I flew a watch from my first son, on my second flight I flew a watch from my other son and so on this one, I'm flying a watch for my daughter that she chose," he said.

Hadfield's first space trip was in November 1995 when he visited the Russian Space Station Mir. His second voyage was a visit to the International Space Station in April 2001, when he also performed two space walks.

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Canadian astronaut packs new wedding ring in his luggage for space station trip