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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - NASA chief Sean O'Keefe faced withering questions from senators on Wednesday over his handling of the shuttle Columbia disaster, a week after investigators blamed the U.S. space agency's culture for the accident that killed seven astronauts. "When do you expect this culture to be fixed?" Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, asked O'Keefe at a hearing of the Senate's Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. "This is going to be a long, long haul," O'Keefe replied, adding that the "beginnings of this change" would be evident in six months to a year. O'Keefe told the senators he planned...

Aug. 29, 2003 — In pledging to enact every recommendation of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe has committed the agency to climb a technological mountain: Design a band-aid that can withstand temperatures hot enough to melt lead, iron and titanium. "That's something that NASA is really working [on] very intensely," said board member Sheila Widnall, an expert on flight aerodynamics who teaches at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "There are very few materials that can withstand those kinds of temperatures. It's a tremendous problem," she said. Accident investigators, who delivered their findings and recommendations this week,...

EDWARDS AFB - Although it is not involved in the day-to-day operations of the space shuttle program, NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base still will feel the effects of Tuesday's released Columbia Accident Investigation Board report. Agencywide reforms are promised by NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe in response to the recommendations of the accident board. Precisely how those reforms will play out at the individual centers is not yet known, said Bob Meyer, acting deputy director at Dryden. One way Dryden likely will be affected is by an independent safety organization. This safety center, recommended by the...

<p>CAPE CANAVERAL -- NASA's prime shuttle contractor is hiring up to 300 workers to speed modifications to Endeavour, a post-Columbia move aimed at putting all three remaining orbiters back into service as quickly as possible.</p> <p>United Space Alliance began hiring additional workers in July. The new hires will undergo about six months of training to prepare them to work on the $1.8 billion spaceship, which was built as a replacement for Challenger.</p>

<p>CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - A Nobel Prize-winning member of the board investigating the space shuttle Columbia disaster says he fears NASA may be doomed to suffer more tragedies unless it changes the culture that has led to flawed decision-making.</p> <p>The "same faulty reasoning" that led to the 1986 Challenger accident also led to Columbia, said Douglas Osheroff, one of the 13 board members wrapping up the report on the Columbia accident.</p>

CAPE CANAVERAL — NASA officials are delicately seeking advice about what to do with the 84,000 shattered pieces from Columbia, cautiously broaching the idea of putting some shuttle parts on display. There are mixed feelings among the survivors of the astronauts. “It touches everybody who sees it,” said Jonathan Clark, husband of astronaut Laurel Clark. “It has a tremendous impact on you. It makes you realize the importance of space exploration.” Kirstie McCool Chadwick, sister of pilot Willie McCool, said she supports the debris being used for research, but “I don’t know what the purpose of displaying it in public...

DAYTON, Ohio -- NASA Administrator Sean O’Keefe has instructed the agency to accelerate development of the Orbital Space Plane and to have a vehicle ready to send to the international space station by 2008 to serve as a crew rescue vehicle. "In light of Columbia, the administrator has asked us to accelerate by two years," said Daniel Dumbacher, manager of the second generation reusable launch vehicle program office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. He said O’Keefe requested the new schedule about two weeks ago.

Once again, NASA has proposed to develop a replacement for the troubled Space Shuttle. This year's project goes by the ungrammatical moniker "Orbital Space Plane". An interim version of OSP called the CRV (Crew Rescue Vehicle) to be developed by 2010 will take over the International Space Station lifeboat task now done by Soyuz.

The US manned space program has at best only a few more years of missions left in it, until its cost, complexity and design flaws results in another failure that grounds all US manned launches until a new transport system is designed and built. by Jeffrey F. BellHonolulu - Jul 10, 2003 Once again, NASA has proposed to develop a replacement for the troubled Space Shuttle. This year's project goes by the ungrammatical moniker "Orbital Space Plane". An interim version of OSP called the CRV (Crew Rescue Vehicle) to be developed by 2010 will take over the International Space Station...

Portrait of a WahhabiBy Stephen Schwartz FrontPageMagazine.com | June 30, 2003 On Thursday, June 26, I testified before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security, chaired by Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz).  My topic was “Wahhabism and Islam in the U.S.”  I outlined the outrageous degree to which Saudi-funded Wahhabi extremists, who are supporters of terrorism, have come to dominate Islam in the U.S. My testimony was not greeted with enthusiasm by James Zogby, the phony civil rights leader who heads the “Arab American Institute." Zogby, a Lebanese Christian once known for his moderate camouflage on Israel, but...

In a major shake-up of the space shuttle program, NASA yesterday announced the transfer or replacement of three top managers who participated in key decisions that led up to the Feb. 1 destruction of Columbia. Linda Ham, who headed the mission management team during the flight, and Ralph R. Roe Jr., manager of the vehicle engineering office, both at Johnson Space Center in Houston, were among those replaced by shuttle program manager William Parsons, who assumed his own post only last month. Ham and Roe were key players in decisions that have been targeted for criticism by investigators. These included...

March, 2003 For Those In Peril By Dr. Harold Koenig Those who labor in service to others-warriors, political and religious leaders, educators, reporters, physicians, nurses, scientists, explorers, pioneers and others-often do so in peril. Early on a Saturday morning this February, the space shuttle COLUMBIA broke apart during re-entry just minutes before its scheduled landing. All seven astronauts aboard perished, two Navy Flight Surgeons among them, Captain David Brown and Commander Laurel Clark. A friend sent me an email with this picture attached: (Editorial cartoon showing the space shuttle entering the gates of heaven--) Another friend mentioned she thought there...

Former space shuttle commander, Richard Searfoss, has been selected as Chief Judge of the X Prize competition. And none too soon. A recent flurry of activity shows that the race to first fly a three-person, private-sector reusable launch vehicle is speeding ahead. "The competition is heating up. We could see a winner within the next 12 months. It's time to complete our judging panel," said Peter Diamandis, Founder and Chairman of the X Prize Foundation, based in St. Louis, Missouri. The Foundation is set up to provide incentives in the private sector to make space travel frequent and affordable for...

Link post: Geology Picture of the Week, June 29-July 5, 2003

Click on this image to see the large version, which is very impressive!

<p>For more than two decades, people from around the world have lined the shores near Kennedy Space Center to watch humans fly into orbit aboard NASA's space shuttles. It's a sight that never fails to take the breath away.</p> <p>Going from a standstill to 17,400 mph in slightly more than eight minutes, the ships have a remarkable record of achievement, from rescuing stranded satellites to fixing the Hubble Space Telescope to building the International Space Station.</p>

Dateline: Tewksbury Massachusetts: Balloon PATRIOT, a Hot Air Balloon shaped like a Space Shuttle, was lifted into the air under hot air power today for a tethered lift at approcimately 14:30 hours Patriot is the new balloon owned by Freeper in Good Standing Abner and her loving Husband!

Source: Space News, June 16, 2003, page 3 NASA would consider paying the Russian space agency for Progress and Soyuz space-transport vehicles should all other options for supporting the international space station without the space shuttle fail, the U.S. agency's top foreign relations official told Congress June 11. John Schumacher, NASA associate administrator for external relations, sought to reassure members of the House Science space and aeronautics subcommittee that Russia and the other partners in the 16-nation space station program are stepping up and helping out as NASA tries to recover from the Feb. 1 Space Shuttle Columbia disaster. Schumacher...

Next Shuttle Launches to Be Daylight-Only By PAUL RECER, AP Science Writer WASHINGTON - The space shuttle in the future will only be launched in daylight, under the scrutiny of powerful cameras, and astronauts may be trained for spacewalking inspections if engineers suspect the heat shield was damaged during the launch, NASA (news - web sites) administrator Sean O'Keefe said Wednesday. Despite extensive analysis of the space shuttle program and hardware following the Columbia accident, there are "no show stoppers" that would keep the shuttle fleet grounded for safety reasons, O'Keefe told reporters. He expects the flights to resume in...

America's Space Program: What We Should Do Next BY BUZZ ALDRIN Buzz Aldrin was backup Command Module pilot for Apollo VIII, man's first flight around the moon. On July 20, 1969, he and fellow Apollo XI astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first humans to walk on the moon. Aldrin holds a doctorate in manned space rendezvous from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He currently heads Starcraft Boosters and is a leading voice in charting the course of future space efforts. My thoughts about our next steps in space remain fundamentally the same as they were before the Columbia accident on...