NASA Outsources To High School

Source: NASA

You may have heard something of the recent Japanese unmanned spacecraft Hayabusha that was destroyed while in orbit above the Australian outback in order to retrieve its precious contents (the first ever harvested asteroid material).

What you may not have known those responsible for recording the planned detonation of the Hayabusha were a few high schoolers and their science teacher. Turns out the students were out of the loop assuming that what they were working on was just another school assignment and they didn't find out it was actually the real deal until 6 months into the project.

High school science teacher and expert in "optical observations, tracking, and spectroscopy" Ron Dantowitz had actually been tapped by NASA to record "The Hayabusa Re-entry Airborne Observing Campaign" and he figured it was time to introduce a few of his students to the wonderful world of applied sciences.

So the hypothetical science project turned real culminated in the students boarding a NASA DC-8 plane after months of work to record the Hayabusha event.

Here is the amazing footage that a few high school students captured; do your self a favor and watch it. Do it for the explosions but most of all do it for science!

Damn, I remember doing similar space related projects in middle school, like colonizing Mars and such. My astronauts almost always died.

How many brave souls lives were lost to my rushed miscalculations?! I need a drink ...

RIP Martian Lander

Source: Popular Science

One of the most successful unmanned missions to the Martian surface comes to a close with the end of the the Phoenix lander.

The lander, which essentially went into hibernation for the long Martian winter back in 2008 did not survive intact. As pictures from the Mars Odyssey orbiter proved last week that the solar panels had been damaged by ice buildup.

There was hope for continuing the Phoenix's mission if all had gone smoothly and while it is disappointing to see this conduit of information cease to function it has been invaluable in it's research. One of the most astonishing discoveries of the mission was that of the Martian soil, which is similar to what is found here on Earth and should have the ability to sustain life.

That is cool and all but many (me) deemed completely unsuccessful as it failed to find even one, not even one, little green man.

While scientists continue to study the findings of the Phoenix mission they have already planned for the future. NASA doesn't like to waste time as late next year yet another lander, called Curiosity, will arrive to Mars to set up a small unmanned laboratory on the surface.

The Martian lander is dead, long live the Martian lander.