William Harwood – Page 44 – Spaceflight Now

Soyuz makes pinpoint landing in Kazakhstan with crew of three

April 10, 2017 William Harwood

Astronaut Shane Kimbrough and his two Russian crewmates — Soyuz MS-02 commander Sergey Ryzhikov and flight engineer Andrey Borisenko — undocked from the International Space Station and plunged back to Earth Monday, landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan to close out an extended 173-day mission.

Whitson’s station expedition extended three months

April 5, 2017 William Harwood

NASA and Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, have agreed to extend astronaut Peggy Whitson’s stay aboard the International Space Station by three months to enable uninterrupted research aboard the orbital laboratory during a period when Russia is temporarily reducing its crew complement, the U.S. space agency said Wednesday.

Spacewalkers improvise after fabric shield floats away

March 30, 2017 William Harwood

Shane Kimbrough and Peggy Whitson, setting a new record as the world’s most experienced female spacewalker, floated outside the International Space Station Thursday and continued work to set up a second docking port for U.S. crew ferry ships. They also installed an upgraded computer relay box and protective shielding before calling it a day.

Astronauts gear up for spacewalks, resupply launch delayed

March 23, 2017 William Harwood

NASA is gearing up for an intense few weeks of work aboard the International Space Station, staging three spacewalks, moving a docking port from one module to another to support commercial crew ferry ships and capturing an Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo ship carrying nearly 4 tons of equipment and supplies.

Trump budget blueprint focuses on deep space exploration, commercial partnerships

March 16, 2017 William Harwood

The Trump administration is proposing $19.1 billion for NASA in its fiscal 2018 budget blueprint, a 0.8 percent decrease from 2017 funding levels, focusing on deep space exploration, both human and robotic, and increased public-private partnerships to lower costs and encourage private sector innovation.

NASA studying whether to add astronauts to first launch of new super booster

February 24, 2017 William Harwood

NASA managers said Friday they hope to know within a month or so whether it might be feasible — or advisable — to put two astronauts on board the first test flight of a huge 322-foot-tall Space Launch System super booster scheduled for its maiden launch late next year.

Star found with record seven Earth-size planets

February 22, 2017 William Harwood

Astronomers have discovered seven roughly Earth-size planets very close to a cool dwarf star some 39 light years from Earth, including three orbiting in the star’s habitable zone where liquid water, a key ingredient for life as it’s known on Earth, could be present, researchers announced Wednesday.

Apollo 1 tragedy remembered 50 years later

January 27, 2017 William Harwood

With the first Apollo launch less than a month away, America’s race to the moon was in high gear. The three-man crew of the first Apollo test flight — commander Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee — strapped into the cockpit of their spacecraft on Jan. 27, 1967 — 50 years ago Friday — for a dress-rehearsal countdown.

Astronaut Gene Cernan, last Apollo moonwalker, dies at 82

January 16, 2017 William Harwood

Former astronaut Gene Cernan, a Navy pilot and veteran of NASA’s pioneering Gemini program who was the second American to walk in space and then flew to the moon twice as an Apollo astronaut, becoming the last human to leave his bootprints on its dusty surface, died Monday after a long illness. He was 82.

Station astronauts complete second battery swap spacewalk

January 13, 2017 William Harwood

Two space station astronauts carried out a trouble-free five-hour 58-minute spacewalk Friday, completing complex battery replacement work on the right side of the lab’s solar power truss with enough time left over to carry out a variety of lower-priority “get-ahead” tasks.