Latest Posts by nasa - Page 10

Update your phones with our #CountdownToMars wallpapers, like this one, today: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/perseverance-mars-rover-wallpaper-images/

It's LANDING DAY for our Perseverance Mars Rover and her mission to search for ancient signs of life on the Red Planet!

Watch LIVE coverage today starting at 2:15pm ET (18:15 UTC):

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Next stop: Mars! Watch NASA's Perseverance Rover Attempt the Most Dangerous Landing to Date on Feb. 18

Tomorrow, Feb. 18, 2021, our most advanced rover named Perseverance will attempt a precision landing in Mars' Jezero Crater. Her mission is to search for signs of ancient life in the planet's geology and test technology that will pave the way for future human missions to the Moon and Mars. Excited yet? Get this:

Perseverance is ferrying 25 cameras to the Red Planet — the most ever flown in the history of deep-space exploration — so get ready to see Mars like never before! For more mission quick facts, click here.

When to watch:

Date: Feb. 18

Time: Live coverage starts at 2:15 p.m. EST (19:15 UTC)

SET A REMINDER & WATCH LIVE HERE

Want to join the #CountdownToMars? We created a virtual Mars photo booth, have sounds of Mars to listen to and more for all you Earthlings to channel your inner Martian. Check out ways to participate HERE.

If you want to follow Perseverance's journey on the Red Planet, be sure to follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Mars Helicopter: 6 Things to Know About Ingenuity

When our Perseverance Mars rover lands on the Red Planet on Feb. 18, 2021, it will bring along the Ingenuity helicopter.

This small-but-mighty craft is a technology demonstration that will attempt the first powered, controlled flight on another planet. Its fuselage is about the size of a tissue box, and it weighs about 4 pounds (1.8 kg) on Earth. It started out six years ago as an implausible prospect and has now passed its Earthbound tests.

Here are six things to know about Ingenuity as it nears Mars:

1. Ingenuity is an experimental flight test.

This Mars helicopter is known as a technology demonstration, which is a project that aims to test a new capability for the first time with a limited scope. Previous technology demonstrations include Sojourner, the first Mars rover, and the Mars Cube One (MarCO) CubeStats that flew by Mars.

Ingenuity does not carry any science instruments and is not part of Perseverance’s science mission. The only objective for this helicopter is an engineering one – to demonstrate rotorcraft flight in the thin and challenging Martian atmosphere.

2. Mars won’t make it easy for Ingenuity.

Mars’ atmosphere is around 1% the density of Earth’s. Because of that lack of density, Ingenuity has rotor blades that are much larger and spin faster than a helicopter of Ingenuity’s mass here on our planet. It also must be extremely light to travel to Mars.

The Red Planet also has incredibly cold temperatures, with nights reaching minus 130 degrees Fahrenheit (-90 degrees Celsius) in Jezero Crater, where our rover and helicopter will land. Tests on Earth at the predicted temperatures indicate Ingenuity’s parts should work as designed, but the real test will be on Mars.

3. Ingenuity relies on Perseverance for safe passage to Mars and operations on the Martian surface.

Ingenuity is nestled sideways under Perseverance’s belly with a cover to protect the helicopter from debris during landing. The power system on the Mars 2020 spacecraft periodically charges Ingenuity’s batteries during the journey to the Red Planet.

In the first few months after landing, Perseverance will find a safe place for Ingenuity. Our rover will shed the landing cover, rotate the helicopter so its legs face the ground and gently drop it on the Martian surface.

4. Ingenuity is smart for a small robot.

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory will not be able to control the helicopter with a joystick due to delays communicating with spacecraft across interplanetary distances. That means Ingenuity will make some of its own decisions based on parameters set by its engineering team on Earth.

During flight, Ingenuity will analyze sensor data and images of the terrain to ensure it stays on a flight path designed by project engineers.

5. The Ingenuity team counts success one step at a time.

Ingenuity’s team has a long list of milestones the helicopter must pass before it can take off and land in the Martian atmosphere.

Surviving the journey to and landing on Mars

Safely deploying onto the Martian surface from Perseverance’s belly

Autonomously keeping warm through those intensely cold Martian nights

Autonomously charging itself with its solar panel

Successfully communicating to and from the helicopter via the Mars Helicopter Base Station on Perseverance

6. If Ingenuity succeeds, future Mars exploration could include an ambitious aerial dimension.

The Mars helicopter intends to demonstrate technologies and first-of-its-kind operations needed for flying on Mars. If successful, these technologies and flight experience on another planet could pave the way for other advanced robotic flying vehicles.

Possible uses of a future helicopter on Mars include:

A unique viewpoint not provided by current orbiters, rovers or landers

High-definition images and reconnaissance for robots or humans

Access to terrain that is difficult for rovers to reach

Could even carry light but vital payloads from one site to another

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❤️🧡💛 Color the Cosmos 💚💙💜

📣 Attention, space explorers! Our Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope presents: two new coloring pages! Unleash your creativity to bring these celestial scenes to life.

Nancy Grace Roman, NASA’s first chief astronomer, smiles out at us from our first coloring page. She’s considered the mother of our Hubble Space Telescope because she helped everyone understand why it was important to have observatories in space – not just on the ground. If it weren’t for her, Hubble may have never become a reality.

The Roman Space Telescope is named after her to honor the legacy she left behind when she died in 2018. Thanks to Nancy Grace Roman, we’ve taken countless pictures of space from orbiting telescopes and learned so much more about the universe than we could have possibly known otherwise!

The second coloring page illustrates some of the exciting science topics the Roman Space Telescope will explore. Set to launch in the mid-2020s, the mission will view the universe in infrared light, which is like using heat vision. We’ll be able to peer through clouds of dust and see things that are much farther away.

We anticipate all kinds of discoveries from the edge of our solar system to the farthest reaches of space. This coloring page highlights a few of the things the Roman Space Telescope will help us learn more about. The mission will find thousands of planets beyond our solar system and hundreds of millions of galaxies. It will also help us unravel the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy, represented by the gray web-like pattern in the background. With so much exciting new data, who knows what else we may learn?

Download the coloring pages here!

Learn more about the Roman Space Telescope at: https://roman.gsfc.nasa.gov/

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Amazing Earth: Satellite Images from 2020

In the vastness of the universe, the life-bringing beauty of our home planet shines bright. During this tumultuous year, our satellites captured some pockets of peace, while documenting data and striking visuals of unprecedented natural disasters. As 2020 comes to a close, we’re diving into some of the devastation, wonders, and anomalies this year had to offer. 

NASA’s fleet of Earth-observing satellites and instruments on the International Space Station unravel the complexities of the blue marble from a cosmic vantage point. These robotic scientists orbit our globe constantly, monitoring and notating changes, providing crucial information to researchers here on the ground. 

Take a glance at 2020 through the lens of NASA satellites:

 A Delta Oasis in Southeastern Kazakhstan

Seen from space, the icy Ili River Delta contrasts sharply with the beige expansive deserts of southeastern Kazakhstan.

When the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 acquired this natural-color image on March 7, 2020, the delta was just starting to shake off the chill of winter. While many of the delta’s lakes and ponds were still frozen, the ice on Lake Balkhash was breaking up, revealing swirls of sediment and the shallow, sandy bed of the western part of the lake.

The expansive delta and estuary is an oasis for life year round. Hundreds of plant and animal species call it home, including dozens that are threatened or endangered. 

Fires and Smoke Engulf Southeastern Australia

A record-setting and deadly fire season marred the beginning of the year in Australia. Residents of the southeastern part of the country told news media about daytime seeming to turn to night, as thick smoke filled the skies and intense fires drove people from their homes. 

This natural-color image of Southeastern Australia was acquired on January 4, 2020, by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. The smoke has a tan color, while clouds are bright white. It is likely that some of the white patches above the smoke are pyrocumulonimbus clouds—clouds created by the convection and heat rising from a fire.

Nighttime Images Capture Change in China

A team of scientists from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) and Universities Space Research Association (USRA) detected signs of the shutdown of business and transportation around Hubei province in central China. As reported by the U.S. State Department, Chinese authorities suspended air, road, and rail travel in the area and placed restrictions on other activities in late January 2020 in response to the COVID-19 outbreak in the region.

A research team analyzed images of Earth at night to decipher patterns of energy use, transportation, migration, and other economic and social activities. Data for the images were acquired with the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the NOAA–NASA Suomi NPP satellite (launched in 2011) and processed by GSFC and USRA scientists. VIIRS has a low-light sensor—the day/night band—that measures light emissions and reflections. This capability has made it possible to distinguish the intensity, types, and sources of lights and to observe how they change.

The Parched Paraná River

Though a seemingly serene oasis from above, there is more to this scene than meets the eye. On July 3, 2020, the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8 captured this false-color image of the river near Rosario, a key port city in Argentina. The combination of shortwave infrared and visible light makes it easier to distinguish between land and water. A prolonged period of unusually warm weather and drought in southern Brazil, Paraguay, and northern Argentina dropped the Paraná River to its lowest water levels in decades. The parched river basin has hampered shipping and contributed to an increase in fire activity in the delta and floodplain.

The drought has affected the region since early 2020, and low water levels have grounded several ships, and many vessels have had to reduce their cargo in order to navigate the river. With Rosario serving as the distribution hub for much of Argentina’s soy and other farm exports, low water levels have caused hundreds of millions of dollars in losses for the grain sector, according to news reports.

Historic Fires Devastate the U.S. Pacific Coast

Climate and fire scientists have long anticipated that fires in the U.S. West would grow larger, more intense, and more dangerous. But even the most experienced among them have been at a loss for words in describing the scope and intensity of the fires burning in West Coast states during September 2020.

Lightning initially triggered many of the fires, but it was unusual and extreme meteorological conditions that turned some of them into the worst conflagrations in the region in decades. 

Throughout the outbreak, sensors like the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) and the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS) on the NOAA-NASA Suomi NPP satellite collected daily images showing expansive, thick plumes of aerosol particles blowing throughout the U.S. West on a scale that satellites and scientists rarely see. 

This image shows North America on September 9th, 2020, as a frontal boundary moved into the Great Basin and produced very high downslope winds along the mountains of Washington, Oregon, and California. The winds whipped up the fires, while a pyrocumulus cloud from the Bear fire in California injected smoke high into the atmosphere. The sum of these events was an extremely thick blanket of smoke along the West Coast.

The Sandy Great Bahama Bank

Though the bright blues of island waters are appreciated by many from a sea-level view, their true beauty is revealed when photographed from space. The underwater masterpiece photographed above is composed of sand dunes off the coast of the Bahamas. 

The Great Bahama Bank was dry land during past ice ages, but it slowly submerged as sea levels rose. Today, the bank is covered by water, though it can be as shallow as two meters (seven feet) deep in places. The wave-shaped ripples in the image are sand on the seafloor. The curves follow the slopes of the dunes, which were likely shaped by a fairly strong current near the sea bottom. Sand and seagrass are present in different quantities and depths, giving the image it’s striking range of blues and greens.

This image was captured on February 15th, 2020, by Landsat 8, whose predecessor, Landsat 7, was the first land-use satellite to take images over coastal waters and the open ocean. Today, many satellites and research programs map and monitor coral reef systems, and marine scientists have a consistent way to observe where the reefs are and how they are faring. 

Painting Pennsylvania Hills

Along with the plentiful harvest of crops in North America, one of the gifts of Autumn is the gorgeous palette of colors created by the chemical transition and fall of leaves from deciduous trees. 

The folded mountains of central Pennsylvania were past peak leaf-peeping season but still colorful when the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on the Landsat 8 satellite passed over on November 9, 2020. The natural-color image above shows the hilly region around State College, Pennsylvania overlaid on a digital elevation model to highlight the topography of the area.

The region of rolling hills and valleys is part of a geologic formation known as the Valley and Ridge Province that stretches from New York to Alabama. These prominent folds of rock were mostly raised up during several plate tectonic collisions and mountain-building episodes in the Ordovician Period and later in the creation of Pangea—when what is now North America was connected with Africa in a supercontinent. Those events created the long chain of the Appalachians, one of the oldest mountain ranges in the world. 

A Dangerous Storm in the Night

Ominous and looming, a powerful storm hovered off the US coastline illuminated against the dark night hues. 

The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on NOAA-20 acquired this image of Hurricane Laura at 2:20 a.m. Central Daylight Time on August 26, 2020. Clouds are shown in infrared using brightness temperature data, which is useful for distinguishing cooler cloud structures from the warmer surface below. That data is overlaid on composite imagery of city lights from NASA’s Black Marble dataset.

Hurricane Laura was among the ten strongest hurricanes to ever make landfall in the United States. Forecasters had warned of a potentially devastating storm surge up to 20 feet along the coast, and the channel might have funneled that water far inland. It did not. The outcome was also a testament to strong forecasting and communication by the National Hurricane Center and local emergency management authorities in preparing the public for the hazards.

A Windbreak Grid in Hokkaido

From above, the Konsen Plateau in eastern Hokkaido offers a remarkable sight: a massive grid that spreads across the rural landscape like a checkerboard, visible even under a blanket of snow. Photographed by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8, this man-made design is not only aesthetically pleasing, it’s also an agricultural insulator. 

The strips are forested windbreaks—180-meter (590-foot) wide rows of coniferous trees that help shelter grasslands and animals from Hokkaido’s sometimes harsh weather. In addition to blocking winds and blowing snow during frigid, foggy winters, they help prevent winds from scattering soil and manure during the warmer months in this major dairy farming region of Japan. 

Shadows from a Solar Eclipse

Formidable, rare, and awe-inspiring — the first and only total solar eclipse of 2020 occurred on December 14, with the path of totality stretching from the equatorial Pacific to the South Atlantic and passing through southern Argentina and Chile as shown in the lower half of the image above. The Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) on Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite 16 (GOES-16) captured these images of the Moon’s shadow crossing the face of Earth. 

The “path of totality” (umbral path) for the eclipse was roughly 90 kilometers (60 miles) wide and passed across South America from Saavedra, Chile, to Salina del Eje, Argentina. While a total eclipse of the Sun occurs roughly every 18 months, seeing one from any particular location on Earth is rare. On average, a solar eclipse passes over the same parcel of land roughly every 375 years. The next total solar eclipse will occur on December 4, 2021 over Antarctica, and its next appearance over North America is projected for April 8, 2024.

For additional information and a look at more images like these visit NASA’s Earth Observatory.  

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That's a wrap! Thank you all for the wonderful questions.

NASA Mars Perseverance Rover Mission Engineer Chloe Sackier answered questions about how we prepared for the mission, Perseverance’s entry, descent, and landing, and what Perseverance will do once on Mars.

Check out her full Answer Time for more: Career | Preparation | Entry, Descent, & Landing | Operation

We hope you had fun today and learned a little bit about our robotic astrobiologist landing on Mars on February 18th. You won't want to miss this! Tune in to NASA TV HERE starting at 2:15 p.m. EST.

If today’s Answer Time got you excited, team up with us to #CoutdownToMars! We created a virtual Mars photo booth, have sounds of Mars to listen to and more for all you Earthlings to channel your inner Martian. Check out ways to participate HERE.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Hello!! Its wonderful to be able to ask questions, thank you!

About Perseverance, does it have a self-repair option? And as Curiosity is still operational, will they run missions together? Or will they split up to cover more distance?

Is this a sign that we're close to being able to set foot on Mars?

My final question is how do you receive the messages from such a long distance?

Thanks for all your hard work! 加油/Good luck!

“Is this a sign that we are close to being able to set foot on Mars?”

What do you hope to find on the mars? / What would be the best possible outcome?

How will the audio feed from Perseverance make its way back to Earth?

What kind of math is needed to get to Mars? How is the path of the lander calculated?

Will the robot be able to send vedio footage?

I've been very curious about the basis on which the landing site is decided! I read that it will land in the Jerezo crater, so is there a particular reason behind choosing that place for the landing?

Why is the final phase so difficult?Sorry if I sound dumb,I'm just curious.Also,what will be the rover's first task after landing?

Is there any chance that something could go wrong?

What is the weirdest thing you had to account for when building the perseverance rover?

what has nasa and jpl learned from opportunity that has helped with developing this new project?

what is the biggest challenge in the preparation of such a mission and how do you handle it?

What do you hope to find using this new technology? When you were a kid, did you ever dream of landing on Mars? Even if you may not be visiting, tech that you have sway over is.

“When you wer a kid, did you ever dream of landing on Mars?”

how much (or are you at all) treated differently for being a women in your field? I know it’s a different experience for everyone and I just wanted to hear your perspective

hi! i hope you're doing well. i wanted to ask, how do you land a job at nasa?

thanks!

What led you to this job? (what’s your degree in/what are your passions)

What's your favorite part of the job?

Thank you for joining the #CountdownToMars! The Mars Perseverance Answer Time with expert Chloe Sackier is LIVE!

Stay tuned for talks about landing a rover on Mars, Perseverance's science goals on the Red Planet, landing a career at NASA and more. View ALL the answers HERE. 

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Earth Facts that Live Rent-Free in Our Heads

Earth is a big weird planet. With so much going on, it’s easy to forget some of the many, many processes happening here. But at the same time, some stuff is so unexpected and just plain strange that it’s impossible to forget. We asked around and found out lots of people here at NASA have this problem.

Here are some facts about Earth that live rent free in our heads:

Earth has a solid inner core that is almost as hot as the surface of the Sun. Earth’s core gets as high as 9,800 degrees Fahrenheit, while the surface of the Sun is about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

Dust from the Sahara fertilizes the Amazon rainforest. 27.7 million tons blow all the way across the Atlantic Ocean to the rainforest each year, where it brings phosphorus -- a nutrient plants need to grow.

Ice in Antarctica looks solid and still, but it’s actually flowing -- in some places it flows so fast that scientific instruments can move as much as a kilometer (more than half a mile!) a year.

Speaking of Antarctica: Ice shelves (the floating part of ice sheets) can be as big as Texas. Because they float, they rise and fall with the tide. So floating ice as big as Texas, attached to the Antarctic Ice Sheet, can rise and fall up to ~26 feet!

Melting ice on land makes its way to the ocean. As polar glaciers melt, the water sloshes to the equator, and which can actually slow the spin of Earth.

Even though it looks it, the ocean isn’t level. The surface has peaks and valleys and varies due to changes in height of the land below, winds, temperature, saltiness, atmospheric pressure, ocean circulation, and more.

Earth isn’t the only mind-blowing place out there. From here, we look out into the rest of the universe, full of weird planets and galaxies that surprise us.

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Curious about how NASA will land the next mission to the Red Planet – the Perseverance Mars rover? Here’s your chance to ask our expert! 

After nearly 300 million miles, our Perseverance rover completes its journey to Mars on Feb. 18. To reach the surface of the Red Planet, it has to survive the harrowing final phase known as Entry, Descent, and Landing. Mission engineer Chloe Sackier will be taking your questions in an Answer Time session on Thursday, Feb. 4 from noon to 1pm ET here on our Tumblr! Make sure to ask your question now by visiting http://nasa.tumblr.com/ask. 

Chloe Sackier is a systems engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California. She works on the Mars 2020 Entry, Descent and Landing team, tasked with safely delivering the Perseverance rover to the surface of Mars.

Landing Perseverance on Mars – fun facts: 

The landing system on the mission includes a parachute, descent vehicle, and an approach called a "skycrane maneuver" for lowering the rover on a tether to the surface during the final seconds before landing.

Perseverance will use new technologies for landing, including Terrain-Relative Navigation. This sophisticated navigation system allows the rover to detect and avoid hazardous terrain by diverting around it during its descent through the Martian atmosphere. 

A microphone allows engineers to analyze entry, descent, and landing. It might also capture sounds of the rover at work, which would provide engineers with clues about the rover's health and operations.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

One Hot Year after Another

Globally, 2020 was the hottest year on record, effectively tying 2016, the previous record. Overall, Earth’s average temperature has risen more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit since the 1880s.

Temperatures are increasing due to human activities, specifically emissions of greenhouse gases, like carbon dioxide and methane. 

Heat and the energy it carries are what drive our planet: winds, weather, droughts, floods, and more are expressions of heat. The right amount of heat is even one of the things that makes life on Earth possible. But too much heat is changing the way our planet’s systems act.

My World’s on Fire

Higher temperatures drive longer, more intense fire seasons. As rain and snowfall patterns change, some regions are getting drier and more vulnerable to damage, setting the stage for more fires.

2020 saw several record-breaking fires, both in Australia in the beginning of the year, and in the western U.S. through northern summer and fall. Smoke from fires in both regions reached so high into the atmosphere that it formed clouds and continues to travel around the globe today.

In the Siberian Arctic, unusually high temperatures helped drive at least 19 fires in the region. More than half of them were burning peat soil -- decomposed organic materials -- that stores a lot of carbon. Peat fires release vast amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, potentially leading to even more warming.

The Water’s Getting Warm

It wasn’t just fire seasons setting records. 2020 had more named tropical storms in the Atlantic and more storms making landfall in the U.S. than any hurricane season on record.

Hurricanes rely on warm ocean water as fuel, and this year, the Atlantic provided. 30 named storms weren’t the only things that made this year’s hurricane season notable.

Storms like Eta, Delta, and Iota quickly changed from smaller, weaker tropical storms into more destructive hurricanes. This rapid intensification is complicated, but it’s likely that warmer, more humid weather -- a result of climate change -- helps drive it.

The Ice Is Getting Thin

Add enough heat, and even the biggest chunk of ice will melt. That’s true whether we’re talking about the ice cubes in your glass or the vast sheets of ice at our planet’s poles. Right now, the Arctic region is warming about three times faster than the rest of our planet, which has some major effects both locally and globally.

This year, Arctic sea ice hit a near-record low. Sea ice is actually made of frozen ocean water, and it grows and thaws with the seasons, typically reaching an annual minimum extent in September.

Warmer ocean water led to more ice melting this year, and 2020’s annual minimum extent continued a long trend of shrinking Arctic sea ice extent.

A Long Trend

We study Earth and how it’s changing from the ground, the sky, and space. Using data from sensors all around the planet, we calculate the global average temperature, working with our partners at NOAA.

Many other organizations also track global temperature using their own instruments and methods, and they all match remarkably well. The last seven years were the hottest seven years on record. Earth is getting warmer.

We also study the effects of increasing temperatures, like the melting sea ice and longer fire seasons mentioned above. Additionally, we can study the cause of climate change from space, with a bird’s eye view of increasing carbon in the atmosphere.

The planet is changing because of human activities. We’re working together with other agencies to monitor changes and understand what this means for people in the future.

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Question: would you rather be on the beach or would you rather gawk at it from space? For some, it’s a tough choice.

Astronaut Soichi Noguchi of the Japan Space Agency recently took this image of Andros Island, the largest island in the Bahamas. He and his three crew mates, NASA astronauts Victor Glover, Mike Hopkins and Shannon Walker, are currently living and working aboard the International Space Station for a six-month science mission. The crew launched on Nov. 15 from Kennedy Space Center and are conducting a number of scientific research, including Earth observation.

Every 90 minutes, the International Space Station completes one orbit around Earth. Because Earth rotates below them while they orbit, the crew get to see most of their beautiful blue marble of a planet from the unique vantage point of space. By photographing Earth from about 250 miles above the surface, astronauts can record phenomena such as storms in real time, and even provide input to ground teams. Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com.

Orion’s top images of 2020

The Orion program showed its resilience this year during an unprecedented time, racking up several success stories building and testing the spacecraft in preparation for upcoming Artemis missions to the Moon. From hot fire and structural testing, to crew and service module assembly activities, progress on Orion brought the agency closer to sending the first woman and next man to the Moon by 2024, and sustainable lunar exploration by 2028.

Ensuring crew safety, a hot fire test was conducted on the Northrop Grumman-built attitude control motor – which provides steering for Orion’s  launch abort system in the event of an emergency during ascent – at the company’s facility in Elkton, Maryland. The 30-second hot fire was the third and final test to qualify the motor for human missions, beginning with Artemis II.

During a three-month testing campaign at NASA’s Plum Brook Station in Sandusky, Ohio, the Orion spacecraft was subjected to the extreme temperatures and electromagnetic environment it will experience on Artemis I – Orion’s first uncrewed test flight to the Moon atop the agency’s  Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. Testing wrapped up early and the vehicle was readied for its journey back to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center aboard the agency’s one-of-a-kind Super Guppy.

Before NASA astronauts fly Orion on missions to the Moon and back, testing is necessary to verify the spacecraft’s ability to withstand the stresses of launch, climb to orbit, the harsh conditions of deep space transit, and return to Earth. Engineers from NASA and its prime contractor, Lockheed Martin, completed testing on Orion’s Structural Test Article (STA) for Artemis I. The STA is structurally identical to Orion’s main spacecraft elements: the crew module, service module and launch abort system.

The first element machined for the Artemis III Orion crew module – a cone panel with openings for windows, which will provide a spectacular view – was designed by Lockheed Martin, and manufactured by AMRO Fabricating Corp., of South El Monte, California. The completed panel made its way to NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility near New Orleans, where engineers will weld it with other elements as part of Orion’s pressure vessel.

Orion’s European Service Module primary structure for the Artemis for the Artemis III mission arrived at the Airbus facility in Bremen, Germany, from its Thales Alenia Space manufacturing site in Turin, Italy. The service module will be equipped with components to power Orion and provide life support to astronauts – such as air, water, heat and cooling – during the mission that will land the first woman and next man on the Moon.

Three spacecraft adapter jettison fairing panels were fitted onto Orion’s service module inside the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building at Kennedy. Once secured, the panels encapsulate the service module to protect it from harsh environments such as heat, wind, and acoustics as the spacecraft is propelled out of Earth’s atmosphere atop the SLS rocket during NASA’s Artemis I mission.

Rocket Launches and Rising Seas

At NASA, we’re not immune to effects of climate change. The seas are rising at NASA coastal centers – the direct result of warming global temperatures caused by human activity. Several of our centers and facilities were built near the coast, where there aren’t as many neighbors, as a safety precaution. But now the tides have turned and as sea levels rise, these facilities are at greater risk of flooding and storms.

Global sea level is increasing every year by 3.3 millimeters, or just over an eighth of an inch, and the rate of rise is speeding up over time. The centers within range of rising waters are taking various approaches to protect against future damage.

Kennedy Space Center in Florida is the home of historic launchpad 39A, where Apollo astronauts first lifted off for their journey to the Moon. The launchpad is expected to flood periodically from now on.

Like Kennedy, Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia has its launchpads and buildings within a few hundred feet of the Atlantic Ocean. Both locations have resorted to replenishing the beaches with sand as a natural barrier to the sea.

Native vegetation is planted to help hold the sand in place, but it needs to be replenished every few years.

At the Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, instead of building up the ground, we’re hardening buildings and moving operations to less flood-prone elevations. The center is bounded by two rivers and the Chesapeake Bay.

The effects of sea level rise extend far beyond flooding during high tides. Higher seas can drive larger and more intense storm surges – the waves of water brought by tropical storms.

In 2017, Hurricane Harvey brought flooding to the astronaut training facility at Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Now we have installed flood resistant doors, increased water intake systems, and raised guard shacks to prevent interruptions to operations, which include astronaut training and mission control.

Our only facility that sits below sea level already is Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans. Onsite pumping systems protected the 43-acre building, which has housed Saturn rockets and the Space Launch System, from Hurricane Katrina. Since then, we’ve reinforced the pumping system so it can now handle double the water capacity.

Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley is going one step farther and gradually relocating farther south and to several feet higher in elevation to avoid the rising waters of the San Francisco Bay.

Understanding how fast and where seas will rise is crucial to adapting our lives to our changing planet.

We have a long-standing history of tracking sea level rise, through satellites like the TOPEX-Poseidon and the Jason series, working alongside partner agencies from the United States and other countries.

We just launched the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite—a U.S.-European partnership—which will use electromagnetic signals bouncing off Earth’s surface to make some of the most accurate measurements of sea levels to date.

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Celebrating 81 Years of Ingenuity

Eighty-one years ago, our world-class research center in California’s Silicon Valley was born. Ground broke on Ames Research Center on Dec. 20, 1939. It was the second aeronautical laboratory established by the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics to perform fundamental research on all things flight. From its very beginnings, Ames was a place for innovation. Tests performed in its wind tunnels transformed military aircraft during World War II and paved the way for air travel at supersonic speeds. In the 1950s and ‘60s, its researchers looked to the stars and came up with new designs and materials for spacecraft that would make human spaceflight a reality. Fast-forward to the present, and the center contributes to virtually every major agency mission through its expertise in spacecraft entry systems, robotics, aeronautics, supercomputing, and so much more! Here are things to know about Ames.

Ames Research Center is home to the world’s largest wind tunnel.

The center is also home to Pleiades, our most powerful supercomputer.

Its modeling and simulation work plays a key role in designing new vehicles for exploring space.

The center invented heat shield materials for landing rovers on Mars.

It built robots to assist astronauts living and working aboard the International Space Station.

It launched a space telescope that revealed thousands of worlds beyond our solar system.

The center has also led multiple missions to explore the Moon.

It found water on the Moon ... more than once, and in places no one would have guessed.

The Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover is the latest lunar exploration mission led by Ames. Launching in 2023, the mobile robot will search for water ice inside craters and other places at the Moon's South Pole. Its survey will help pave the way for astronaut missions to the lunar surface beginning in 2024 as part of the Artemis program.

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