Announcing a new mission to Saturn’s largest
Moon …
Launching new missions and landing astronauts
… on the same night!
And …
Restoring the glory to the Apollo Mission
Control Room …
… a few of the stories to tell you about
–
Just announced, our next destination in the
solar system is Saturn’s icy moon Titan,
a unique organic world similar to early Earth.
The Dragonfly mission will fly, sample and
examine sites around Titan to search for the
building blocks of life.
Dragonfly is expected to launch in 2026 and
arrive in 2034, and will fly to dozens of
locations on Titan to study the chemistry
and processes that could have led to life
on Earth.
Dragonfly is part of the New Frontiers program
that also brought us missions that explored
Jupiter, Pluto and the asteroid Bennu -- all
part of our ongoing planetary exploration.
NASA Astronaut Anne McClain is back on Earth
after more than six months of science and
four spacewalks aboard the International Space
Station.
McClain and her crewmates, Russia’s Oleg
Kononenko and Canada’s David Saint-Jacques
touched down late Monday night in their Soyuz
spacecraft in Kazakhstan.
Just a few hours later, four NASA payloads
caught a ride on the SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket
that launched from the Kennedy Space Center.
The payloads will
Test greener propellant to fuel our spacecraft,
Discover new ways to navigate in space,
Explore Earth’s atmosphere to improve GPS,
And study the harsh space environment
The historic Apollo Mission Operations Control
Room – or MOCR – at our Johnson Space
Center in Houston is now restored to its Apollo
11-era appearance, so that future visitors
will see the room exactly as it was when an
unparalleled team of experts landed the first
humans on the Moon 50 years ago.
We’re going to cut this ribbon remembering
the history, but we’re also going to do it
not only honoring the people who got us to
the moon the first time, this time when we
cut this ribbon were thinking about going back
to the moon.
3-2-1 Liftoff!
The effort to restore the National Historic
landmark began in 2017 after five years of
planning.
You can see more of the MOCR – and some
of the Apollo legends who worked there – as
part of our live Apollo anniversary show airing
on NASA TV and nasa.gov/live at 1 p.m. Eastern
on July 19.
Our 380-foot tall mobile launcher has made
its last solo trek to Kennedy Space Center’s
Launch Pad 39B for final testing.
Its next roll to the pad will be with the
Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft
for the launch of Artemis 1.
The first in a series of missions, the uncrewed
Artemis 1 flight will test SLS and Orion as
an integrated system – as we prepare to
return astronauts to the Moon and eventually
go to Mars.
How will your packages ship…or fly to you…
in the future?
Flying through downtown Reno, Nevada, we tested
Unmanned Aircraft Systems, or UAS, capablities.
The test focused on operations in higher-density
urban areas for future flights such as news
gathering and package delivery.
That’s what’s up this week @NASA …
For more on these and other stories follow
us on the web at nasa.gov/twan.
