We all know that bureaucracy can lead to overcomplicated situations. If you’ve never heard of UNOOSA then rest assured you will not be the only one. The acronym stands for United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, it’s history can be traced back to the late fifties and early sixties. How does this relate to … Read More “US Air Force X-37B” »
Glenn noun [U] /ɡlenn/ › Man. Legend. America’s first orbiting astronaut. You can read more about him in this piece about the Space Shuttle program, but today 15 years ago, John Glenn made history again by returning to space at the age of 77 which established his place in history not only as a pioneer … Read More “Today In History – October 29” »
Following from Hubble’s story in part two, the year is 1995 and in June of that year space shuttle Atlantis lifts off. It’s mission: to dock with MIR, the Russian space station that by some is seen as the predecessor to the International Space Station. This event led to what was at the time the … Read More “The Space Shuttle (1981 – 2011) – Part 3” »
The ill-fated Challenger, the second space shuttle to be built was the first to conduct a spacewalk. Unfortunately 3 years later in January of 1986, disaster struck when a seal on a rocket booster failed, leading to the shuttle’s destruction 72 seconds into its mission. It was a disaster on many levels for NASA, because … Read More “The Space Shuttle (1981 – 2011) – Part 2” »
Nearly 2 years ago, NASA retired its fleet of space shuttles, which started operating 30 years before. Several companies have thrown their hat in the ring to be its successor in different ways, so let us have a look back at the program that gave us the Magellan spacecraft, the Hubble telescope, and the International … Read More “The Space Shuttle (1981 – 2011) – Part 1” »
