MAIN ARTICLE: International Space Development Conference.
Page 2: NASA Announces Members of Human Space Flight Review Committee
Poll Results: Yesterday's poll had a lower than average turnout with mixed results.
Star Trek: In the News. Star Trek's ex-chief movie praise
Yesterday's Comments: "Shaq would miss free throws by 3 miles instead of 3 feet..." - Hedwig
Today's Poll: Do you approve of the choice of members for the Augustine Panel?
ISDC 2009:
The National Space Society blog had some snippets from the International Space Development Conference last weekend. I am including a video of the CEO of XCOR, Jeff Greason, giving the keynote address, who will also be on the newly formed Augustine Panel that will review America's human spaceflight program.
ISDC 2009 update:
Update from Jason Rhian in the afternoon SIS 6 sessions...
"The afternoon panel was moderated by Daniel Gruenbaum of the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex and consisted of Jane Reifert the president of Incredible Adventures, Bernie McShea vice-president of business development for Space Florida, John Cassanto CEO of Instrumentation Technology Association and Robert Ward, president of Strategic Insights & Creative Imagination. While the topic governed how the hospitality industry and space tourism industry should and will work hand in hand, the discussion topics also drifted to how better market the space story.
"Those inspirational moments are the things required to create aspirational goals," Ward said. "We need to tell the story in a less technical and more emotional way."
Another interesting quote from Jane Reifert of Incredible Adventures: " The easier it is to do, the easier it is to sell."
The last panel of the day was comprised of the following: Emerging Business Technology Practice Group Chair, Brent Britton, Vice-President of 4Frontiers Corporation and NewSpace LLC Joseph Palaia, Global Entrepreneur, Per Wimmer and SGS Deputy Chief of Operations and Northrop Grumman Chairman Roy Tharpe. The panelists decided that the mold for how panels would be held – needed to be broken. Britton’s introductions were laden with pop-culture references, Palaia openly disagreed with comments made by earlier panelists and Wimmer jumped off the stage to give his presentation."
--end quote--
PAGE 2:
NASA Announces Members of Human Space Flight Review Committee
"WASHINGTON -- NASA announced Monday the members of the Review of U.S. Human Space Flight Plans Committee. They are:
- Norman Augustine (chair), retired chairman and CEO, Lockheed Martin Corp., and former member of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush
- Dr. Wanda Austin, president and CEO, The Aerospace Corp.
- Bohdan Bejmuk, chair, Constellation program Standing Review Board, and former manager of the Boeing Space Shuttle and Sea Launch programs
- Dr. Leroy Chiao, former astronaut, former International Space Station commander and engineering consultant
- Dr. Christopher Chyba, professor of Astrophysical Sciences and International Affairs, Princeton University, and member, President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology
- Dr. Edward Crawley, Ford Professor of Engineering at MIT and co-chair, NASA Exploration Technology Development Program Review Committee
- Jeffrey Greason, co-founder and CEO, XCOR Aerospace, and vice-chair, Personal Spaceflight Federation
- Dr. Charles Kennel, chair, National Academies Space Studies Board, and director and professor emeritus, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California, San Diego
- Retired Air Force Gen. Lester Lyles, chair, National Academies Committee on the Rationale and Goals of the U.S. Civil Space Program, former Air Force vice chief of staff and former commander of the Air Force Materiel Command
- Dr. Sally Ride, former astronaut, first American woman in space, CEO of Sally Ride Science and professor emerita at the University of California, San Diego"
--end quote--
POLL RESULTS:
The poll yesterday had a lower than average turnout but DKOS members, who participated, had mixed feelings on a low Earth orbit commercial sports complex.
Star Trek's ex-chief movie praise
"For the first time in 45 years I entered the fictional prequel of that world - that Star Trek world I developed, sold, executive-produced, oversaw and kept alive as long as I could.
I was Head of Desilu Studios (later bought by Paramount), charged with creating and developing successful television series for the struggling studio owned by Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz of I Love Lucy fame (hence Desi-Lu).
Star Trek was the first project I commissioned. Mission:Impossible was the second. Happily, lightening struck twice.
When Gene Roddenberry made an appointment with me 45 years ago, he came into my office with one sheet of paper.
From this unlikely source, the entire franchise was born. In the two years that followed, I made a lot of changes to that piece of paper - and added to it considerably.
I changed Spock from a red-skinned fairly sinister alien with a pointed tail into the intellectually superior, green-blooded Vulcan he is today.
I named characters, developed Starfleet, talked with Gene about the need to infuse the series with a purpose. I created the idea of the Captain's log, to set up each episode, and a thousand other things. Gene had a great idea. He didn't have a saleable idea until we developed the pilot."
--end quote--
YESTERDAY'S COMMENTS:
Magnifico - "Alpha Centauri - here we come
Astronomers Seek New Home Closer to Home
By Joel Achenbach, Washington Post
Two teams of astronomers, one from the United States and one from Europe, are in a race to find a planet orbiting our near neighbors Alpha Centauri A and Alpha Centauri B, twin stars that appear from Earth as a single point of light.
"I'm betting that there are planets like Earth or Mars or Venus around either or both of those stars, and the only question is whether we'll be able to detect them," said Debra Fischer, an astronomer at San Francisco State University. Backed with U.S. government funding, she is using a telescope in Chile to assemble 100,000 observations of the Centauri system.
If the astronomers succeed in detecting a planet there, it will be a scientific bombshell -- and it will raise the question of how we might someday send a probe to get a closer look. Alpha Centauri A and B may be our nearest sunlike neighbors (a third, smaller star in the Centauri system, the red dwarf Proxima Centauri, is a hair closer to the Earth), but it's still a long haul from here.
The problem with interstellar spaceflight is the "interstellar" part. We happen to live in a universe that is strikingly vacuous. The Centauri system is nearly 26 trillion miles away.
"How could the super laser help space exploration?
Park the rocket on the laser. Rocket has a really thick nozzle and no fuel.
Fire the laser. Reaction mass is vaporized rocket motor. More weight and room for payload, plus the engine is handy to fix if it breaks.
Float mirrors for course corrections, deploy a light sail, and you have an interplanetary probe. Plus, you could modulate the laser to provide system commands.
Super lasers kick ass for space exploration. Literally." - Moody Loner
TODAY'S POLL:
Read other NASA and Space diaries on DKOS.