Counting down to the return of human spaceflight
from Florida …
A successful space station resupply mission
…
And a virtual tool to help develop lunar landers
… a few of the stories to tell you about
- This Week at NASA!
We recently conducted a full launch to docking
simulation with SpaceX in preparation for
the upcoming flight to the International Space
Station of our Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken
aboard the company's Crew Dragon spacecraft.
The mission, known as Demo-2, will mark the
first launch of NASA astronauts from America
since we retired the space shuttle.
NASA and SpaceX are targeting May 27 for the
launch of the mission, from historic Launch
Complex 39A at our Kennedy Space Center in
Florida.
On May 11 Northrop Grumman's unpiloted Cygnus
cargo spacecraft left the International Space
Station - nearly three months after delivering
about 7,500 pounds of supplies and scientific
experiments to support dozens of new and existing
investigations on the orbital outpost.
This was Northrop Grumman's 13th cargo flight
to the space station.
A new simulator called the Lunar Flight Deck
at our Langley Research Center in Hampton,
Virginia is being used to help develop the
Human Landing System for our Artemis program
that will land the first woman and the next
man on the Moon.
Astronauts brought in to "fly" detailed simulations
with various lunar landers provide feedback
that helps researchers advance the technologies
used in the cockpits.
The Lunar Flight Deck can also be reconfigured
to help analyze landing human missions on
Mars.
Natural disasters, like wildfires and hurricanes,
can lead to many lives lost and billions of
dollars in costs.
But a new project called Scalable Traffic
Management for Emergency Response Operations,
or STEReO is looking at how drones might be
used to help emergency responders more safely
and efficiently carry out operations.
While STEReO is led by our Ames Research Center
in California's Silicon Valley, other federal,
state and local government agencies, first
responders, and private companies are also
involved in the project.
That's what's up this week @NASA …
For more on these and other stories, follow
us on the web at nasa.gov/twan.
