Apparently, some people (here for example) thought that the Sea Launch explosion spelled near-certain doom for the launch platform. Rocket explosions look amazing, with all the fuel and oxidizer burning rather quickly, but they're often confused with a detonation, as happens when a bomb goes off. Turns out, the launch platform has returned to port, and it doesn't look so bad. I guess I should have put an entry up stating that would be the case (I just have a comment on Rand's site), so I could bask in the glow of having 'called it'

Here is a web page showing the orbital elements of all the pieces being tracked from the China ASAT test. Note that each piece gets a letter. When they run out of letters, they go to two letters, then three. If they ever have to go to four letters, a breakup would have to go into more than 17,000 pieces. Here's hoping that never happens. Of course, hope is kind of what our space defenses rely on right now...

Here's an image taken by the Rosetta spacecraft as it flew past Mars. While pristine pictures of just the planet are the norm, there's something awesome about seeing parts of the human construct that took the picture.

Sometimes, I'm awed by what humans can accomplish. Other times, I'm horrified by what humans can accomplish.

Some thoughts on The UN, Apophis, and Iraq from Lileks. I find it kinda cool how various space-related news items (like Apophis' 1 in 45,000 chance of hitting Earth in 2036) get dropped into comentaries.

The Request for Proposal for the Ares I upper stage hit the street yesterday. This is the formal document where NASA (or any other government agency) says "Tell us how you'd build something and how much it would cost, and we'll choose the best plan." At least in theory. Potential builders have seen drafts of this document in the past, and the cover letter describes changes. Anyway, I downloaded sections A-I, to see what was specified about the stage's performance. Nothing jumped out at me as being related to performance or size, so I did a word search for "mass." No dice. Searches for "kg" and "thrust" were negative too. I'd like to think that the terms are in one of the documents, (there are more than 40) and if I knew more about contracting I could probably pick the one on sight, but I'm not that interested. Update: I wasn't quite happy with being unable to find anything, so I poked around a little more and found section J-6, which lists applicable documents. Unfortunately, a quick web search for the "Upper Stage Element Requirement Document" publication ID came up blank.

Alan Boyle has a pretty thorough article here on hazardous asteroids. The comments get interesting pretty quickly, on one hand because someone pointed out that a new asteroid, 2007 CA19, has just appeared on the Torino Scale. It's currently reading a 1, but it is a big one based on some of the early readings. I expect that it'll fall off the chart like most asteroids do after initial discovery. It also looks like the new data are coming in quite quickly, as the animation for CA19 didn't show anywhere near a collision in 2012 when I checked it this moring, though the orbit crosses Earth's at the proper positions to be a problem around Marth 13th.

The potential impact date for CA 19 (2012) does bring to light an important point that I haven't heard discussed too much. Even the discussion related to Apophis, and to whether or not we should send a small craft to the rock so we can characterize its orbit better was related only to Apophis. A more important issue is whether we should have a craft built and ready to be sent to any new asteroid we discover that doesn't drop off the Torino scale immediately. Having a stable of such craft available to carry out missions is probably a really good idea. If you agree, and have some ideas of how it can be done, be sure to sign up for the Apophis Competition by March 1st.

Another thought came to mind when I read in the comments by some people who think we shouldn't worry about asteroids because, in their minds, global warming is a much greater threat which is already happening, etc. My current theory is that enough people are excited about global warming to last us a while. I drive a hybrid car, take public transit when I can, and am in the process of replacing incandescent bulbs with flourescents as they burn out. People becoming more shrill about global warming will be unlikely to make me take any further action. We face many threats in this world today on a personal, local, national, and global scale. Some people will devote time to face each particular threat. While I wish no one ill in an honest attempt to point out difficulties or dangers that we may face in the future, I'm much more likely to listen to someone who has a reasoned case that isn't based on a sensationalistic media outlet or single scientist who believes they've had their opinion squelched. Being able listen to alternative views without reverting to tired attempts to end an argument (I was once called a Hollocaust denier because I said I'd seen a show that said only tens people died during the initial radiation exposure of the Chernobyl Disaster) is a plus. Also, as a general rule, a discussion which starts with a dismissal of any particular presidential administration loses a lot of ground fast with me. Update on 25 Feb: Spaceweather.com has another cool view of the breakup from an astronomer who watched it most of the night. Same drill as before, no permalink. Set the archive date to Feb 23rd.

I'll comment very lightly on the Lisa Nowak story as it develops for a multitude of reasons. The talking heads are having their fun, and there are a lot of ways that this case could go. One comment that caught my ear was on Larry King Live, where Buzz Aldrin said (copied directly from the transcript, spellng errors left in):

ALDRIN: So that's competitive, yes. And it continues on that way.

Now, let me say that Deek Slayton, who was the head of the astronaut business, he made an observation. He says, your personal behavior is up to you. Just don't embarrass NASA.

And I think that is an attitude that may be giving just a tad more maturity to this highly competitive group of people as astronauts. And I might also say that -- I'll get a lot of criticism for this -- but I think the "friendly competition" between inter- services is not helpful.

KING: Not helpful?

ALDRIN: Not helpful. It promotes more competitiveness and more "got you" type situations. We're all part of a team. You know, a college or a university has an alumni homecoming and the people all get together and they talk about what they're all doing today.

I'm a member of a fighter squadron that was in Germany between 1956 to '59. That was 50 years ago. And we still get together.

But do the astronauts get together, the people who reached the moon, 24 people?

KING: Don't they?

ALDRIN: No. They're going their different ways. They're still competitive. They have a certain amount of ongoing, for various reasons -- and there are a lot of reasons why.

Earlier, I talked about the pictures taken from an aircraft claimed to be pictures taken by the ISS crew of a shuttle launch. At the time, I knew I'd seen a picture taken from ISS that made me think the shuttle lift-off shot could be legit. I found the image today, thanks to space.com's gallery of top ISS images.

Grid computing hit the "mainstream" with SETI@Home, now a part of the larger group of collaborative project called BOINC. A user can take active part in a search for stardust here.

Now things appear to have gone a step further. The Bad Astronomer links to a search for a missing man and his boat. No word on the source of the image, though I'm guessing it's one of the commercial satellite imagery providers. On a serious note, I hope the effort is successful in locating Jim Gray.