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This post is in: Because of wow., Open Threads, Science & Technology
__ PASADENA, Calif. — The future of NASA’s exploration of Mars now comes down to a struggle between gravity and a half-million lines of computer code. Currently snug in an interplanetary spacecraft, the plutonium-powered rover called Curiosity will end its eight-and-a-half-month journey from Earth on Sunday, plowing into the Martian atmosphere at 13,000 miles per …
Open Thread: “Seven Minutes of Terror” at NASAPost + Comments (166)
This post is in: Science & Technology
Can’t say how much I chortled in glee at this report (by old friend Dennis Overbye). It seems that one of our deep spook agencies, the National Reconnaissance Office (AKA the other NRO) somehow managed to accumulate not one, but a matched pair of Hubble-class space telescopes. These now belong to NASA. What’s coolest is …
32 Flavors of Awesome: NASA Peace Dividend EditionPost + Comments (22)
by Tim F| 60 Comments
This post is in: Republican Stupidity, Science & Technology
At least one commenter didn’t take very well to my suggestion that an addlebrained moonshot would steer NASA resources away from programs which actually serve some practical good, for example as robotic exploration and Earth science. Let’s leave aside the obvious point that a moonbase would absorb more resources than NASA spends on the rest …
by Tim F| 30 Comments
This post is in: Politics, Science & Technology, General Stupidity
Imagine that your’e the head of a biggish governmental agency in the middle of a budget crunch. You need a bit more cash to finish the year under budget, but you know that the government’s got its own fiscal problems to deal with. What do you do? If your first reaction was ‘make do with …
by Tim F| 18 Comments
This post is in: Republican Stupidity, Science & Technology
Some might have wondered why we would make a big deal over the amazing mismanagement and scientific intimidation recently revealed at NASA (for more, go to our search window at top left and type in ‘NASA’). It’s just one agency. Pardon the sarcasm, but must seem absolutely ridiculous to think that the pattern of mismanagement …
by Tim F| 83 Comments
This post is in: Politics, Science & Technology
We haven’t yet reached the point in the NASA story arc (more here, here, here and here) where the Deathmobile, representing science, triumphantly emerges from under the cake and crushes everything in its path. Doubtless that day will come, but in the meantime we can all have the pleasure of watching NASA flack and erstwhile …
by Tim F| 58 Comments
This post is in: Politics, Science & Technology
Following up on two earlier posts, today’s WaPo has an extended hit piece on NASA Inspector General Robert W. Cobb. The general theme should sound familiar to administration-watchers out there: inappropriately-appointed unqualified supervisors, waste, fraud and a hostile environment that drives the career professionals out the door. Let’s tick off the familiar aspects of a …