Happy Birthday NASA! 64 Years old Today

On this day in 1958 President Dwight Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act. Cape Canaveral was the home of the Joint Long Range Proving Ground. That's the group my uncle worked for and they would be folded into NASA to become the launch center complex for all of NASA's major missions.

The Carina Nebula one of the first images from the James Webb telescope. My brother worked on the cooling system for the telescope. We have a couple generations now that have been directly involved with NASA and its missions.

NASA Memorabilia

The other house is under contract and that anchor is almost gone. What I have learned during this exercise is that I do like to collect things (I am a gamer after all). I need something that does not take up quite so much room but will engage me intellectually as well. We were at my mother's this weekend and I was, once again, admiring the NASA mission patches collection that my uncle had acquired.

Now its not a huge collection, but all of this must have had some significance to my uncle, he worked at Cape Canaveral his entire career beginning when it was just the Air Force Missile Test Center to it becoming NASA. He was an electrical engineer and worked on every major program; Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab and the Space Shuttle.

Here is my uncle's framed collection. Not huge but fun to look at and realize how much history is stuffed into this small space: Gemini, Apollo, Apollo/COI03 and Skylab

I have a few more interesting pieces as well mostly posters, but some other bits and pieces  including two more frames mostly with with postal memorabilia.  Stuff that would be fun to collect and add to and wouldn't take up a lot more than just wall space.

Here are a few other frames of memorabilia that is part of the collection: 

NASA Memorabilia

I was going through a box the other day and I stumbled across a ziplock bag of NASA stuff that my mom must have given me after my uncle passed away. Its an interesting snapshot of the later part of his career working, primarily, on the Space Shuttle.

This is an interesting artifact. It details all of the key positions and the people that filled them for STS-1 the first Space Shuttle mission which orbited the earth 37 times with a crew of 2.

Mission decals for STS-51A (on top), which was the 2nd launch for Discovery and STS-41G (on the bottom) which was the 6th flight for Challenger, the first mission  with a full crew of 7. These are the 13th and 14th Shuttle missions so I'm already lost on the numbering system.

Some buttons. The blue button in the upper right celebrates the 1st Challenger launch, mission STS-6. Challenger was his "bird" and he was a permanent part of that launch team. He was on vacation though during the Challenger disaster. He was the first one into the office the next day already working on what caused the explosion.

I think these hung from the back of his badge.

This is the name of the company formed by Boeing and Lockheed Martin to consolidate 30 heritage contracts in 1996

This is another interesting artifact. This is a Skylab coin about the size of a .50 piece. I think its made of aluminum.

Bad picture. A pin celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Kennedy Space Center. My uncle worked at the facility before NASA was even formed. At that time is was a missile launch test site.

I think this is a pin showing 5 years of service with Lockheed. Generally one of the big aerospace groups would win the contract but they would just continue to hire the engineers that were already working there. My uncle probably worked for every major aerospace firm in the US during his time with NASA.

This cartoon must have been pinned to his cube wall. He owned a Jaguar XKE. Study the cartoon and you should get the joke pretty quick.

We have Lift Off! Orion into Orbit

Today everything cooperated and Orion atop the Delta IV was 7:05 Eastern Time. Yes, I slept through it.

4 hours 24 minutes launch to splashdown. A flawless maiden flight!

Orion launch Scrubbed for Today

The unmanned launch of the US Orion deep space vehicle has been scrubbed for today. Cranky valves and high winds at the Cape caused the delay. There is another launch window tomorrow (12/5) at 7:05am EST.

I realized this morning that this is the first time that a member of my family has not been directly involved with a NASA manned space project. My uncle worked on all prior manned NASA projects from Mercury through the Space Shuttles. My brother works at Ball, but he is currently engaged on the James Webb Space Telescope.

US Mars Rover "Curiosity" Landing

This is a pretty amazing image. This is a shot of the latest Mars Rover, name Curiosity, making its parachute descent. This was photographed by  Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, an incredibly lucky photograph. This rover uses a plutonium battery, it should easily exceed its two year mission parameter.  You can go here for more shots of the event: Mars Rover Curiosity

Its really been an exciting year for space programs.

Dragon Coming Home

I have been going through a bit of a painting block, nothing seems to be coming out the way I want it. So the Rohan Helmingas that I started still only have a skintone on them and there are no pictures yet since I'm currently unhappy with them. However, today the Dragon capsule was swung away from the International Space Station and is headed home to Earth. Assuming everything goes well on the recovery side this will complete the first commercial delivery of supplies to the International Space Station and hopefully opens up a new era for man's presence in space. Space exploration is the one area I have a serious problem with the way the current administration is handling it. I don't have much hope that it will be any better handled by the next administration. After leading the way with landings on the moon and the development of the space shuttle the US space program has been pretty darn stagnant. I'm hoping that this will be the kick in the pants that the administration needs to get our space program back into shape. Anyway here are a couple of images of the Dragon capsule at the International space station.

Dragon being prepped

May 22, 2012 Dragon on the Falcon 9 Launches (Quite the birthday present)

 Dragon after being captured by the International Space Station's robotic arm

Dragon Docked At Dawn

Dragon being released today for return to Earth.

The Dragon has landed, May 31, 2012 off of Baja California

Here there be Dragons

The Dragon capsule approaching the International Space Station. My sister-in-law is so cool.

Dragon's thermal imager sees the space station about 820 feet away.