Issue #5 (January 2014)
The Auroras of Planet Earth
Nature has an uncanny knack of producing some of the most spectacular astronomical events we can witness, the likes of Solar eclipses, meteor showers and other phenomenon that never fail to impress. There is one event however, that once you witness it, it will be burnt into your memory and will stay with you for …
Watching Earth’s winds, on a shoestring
Built with spare parts and without a moment to spare, the International Space Station (ISS)-RapidScat isn’t your average NASA Earth science mission. Short for Rapid Scatterometer, ISS-RapidScat will monitor ocean winds from the vantage point of the space station. It will join a handful of other satellite scatterometer missions that make essential measurements used to …
A new era of winged spacecraft launching
Learn more about these future spacecraft ! Virgin Galactic’s SS2 soars during supersonic test flight Dream Chaser nears piloted tests Bond’s Skylon to achieve dream of single-stage-to-orbit vehicle How the Skylon fleet would operate It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No…it’s a spaceplane! Lynx spacecraft to give big boost to space tourism Lynx spacecraft making …
Virgin Galactic’s SS2 soars during supersonic test flight
Virgin Galactic, the world’s first commercial spaceline, successfully completed on January 11 the third rocket-powered supersonic flight of its passenger carrying reusable space vehicle, SpaceShipTwo (SS2). In command on the flight deck of SS2 for the first time under rocket power was Virgin Galactic’s Chief Pilot Dave Mackay. Mackay, along with Scaled Composites’ (Scaled) Test …
Lynx spacecraft to give big boost to space tourism
Like a scene out of a futuristic movie, imagine an airplane that could take off from a runway, fly sub-orbital, and return to the ground with a runway landing. The concept seemed pretty far-fetched not even ten years ago. Now, a handful of commercial spaceflight companies are breathing life into what was once only sentiment. …
Lynx spacecraft making big screen debut
There is a lot of excitement coming in the near future for the Lynx spacecraft and everyone involved in its development at XCOR Aerospace. In a partnership with Centerboro Productions, XCOR’s Lynx spacecraft is going to be making its acting debut in the upcoming Science Fiction/Action/Thriller 3D movie “Newcomers”, where a NASA astronaut becomes the last …
Dream Chaser nears piloted tests
On Oct. 26, 2013, Sierra Nevada Corporation put their Dream Chaser engineering test article through its first free flight Approach and Landing Test, or ALT-1, at NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center in southern California. The important flight test, a first since the late 1970s with NASA’s space shuttle test article Enterprise, performed flawlessly up until …
Bond’s Skylon to achieve dream of single-stage-to-orbit vehicle
In the UK’s Oxfordshire country-side, the legacy of British invention is being passed from Sir Frank Whittle to a new group of dedicated aerospace engineers and one man in particular; Alan Bond. The long held dream of UK spaceflight is coming closer to reality, and his dream could be a game-changer. Despite decades of lacklustre …
How the Skylon fleet would operate
A fleet of Skylon vehicles can operate from a spaceport. A Vehicle Loading Hall receives and processes payloads which are installed in the Skylon payload bay. Skylon is then towed to the spaceport’s Refuelling Apron. Liquid Oxygen and Liquid Hydrogen propellants are loaded through connections in the wheel wells. Skylon is towed to the runway for …
It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No…it’s a spaceplane!
Vocabulary • Latitude: The number of degrees north (or south) from the equator. • Orbital Altitude: The height above Mean Sea Level of an orbiting spacecraft. • Orbital Inclination: The angle that an orbit makes as it crosses the equator. Narrative Across the pond is an innovative rocket company that toils away in relative obscurity …