The ’90s may’ve given us Blink 182 and stonewashed denim, but I very much doubt NASA will be reviving 1993′s virtual reality system alongside those other comebacks, seen here modelled on a (presumably) taken-advantage-of intern.
Aussie artist Peter Hennessey spends his time creating 1:1 scale models of spacecraft. The Hubble is above, but he’s also done the Voyager, Mission Control and even a Lunar Rover. [Hennessey via MAKE via DesignBoom via BoingBoing]
Falcon 9 rocket for the first time, carrying a Dragon spacecraft prototype. In theory, the new ship will haul cargo and crews of seven astronauts to the ISS.
Following the trail of SpaceShipTwo, Dassault has been working on a new suborbital civilian spacecraft. Not to be confused with the Future High-Altitude High-Speed Transport 20XX, the new aircraft could be an 11-ton vehicle derived from their VEHRA satellite launcher.
newVideoPlayer("/msl1_gizmodo.flv", 460, 280,""); When I read that the UFO-looking Mars Science Laboratory’s aeroshell would use a floating crane–called Sky Crane by NASA–to softly land the rover on Mars, I couldn’t believe it. Now, watching this hyperrealistic NASA simulation showing how the mechanism actually floats, lowers the rover, and then flies away, I still can’t believe it. This is the kind of stuff that makes the kid in me wake up and pay attention with my eyes and mouth wide open.
The USAF and Boeing will launch the X-37B–the first military orbital space plane if you discount the secret military shuttle–on top of an Atlas V rocket in November. They want to test its flying features in space and during atmospheric reentry. And probably its anti-matter rays and nuclear bays and hyperspace engines too (but of course, they are never going to tell you that). However, there seems to be a conflict with the civilian space program which may push one of the Moon exploration missions to 2009.
Here it is, fellow space-geeks, the first official image of the new joint Russian-European manned spacecraft, and we’ll be damned if it doesn’t look like something out of the Ikea Kitchen Collection. It’s made to ferry up to four people (cosmonauts or astronauts?) to the moon and back, with a two-stage orbiter-and-lander design much like the original American lunar missions. What’s interesting is that the craft uses thrusters to slow its descent to the moon’s surface as well as to launch itself off the surface. The Russians state that they expect a launch in 2018, though a launch could happen sooner if stock rockets currently available are modified, which sounds perfectly and totally safe to us. [BBC]
Putting rest to fears that the Phoenix Lander might be DOA, the lander wagged its robotic arm on Thursday. NASA was worried that a stuck piece of plastic casing could prohibit the 2.3m titanium appendage from extending, making it impossible for the Phoenix to carry out crucial drilling experiments.
