Category Archives: Space Systems

Events, Space Science, Space Systems

Videos: 40th Anniversary of the Voyager missions

To mark the 40 years of the flights of the two Voyager spacecraft through the solar system and into interstellar space, NASA held an event with several of the scientists involved in the project to discuss what it has accomplished:

This segment with William Shatner is about public messages transmitted to Voyager 1:

From the caption:

On Sept. 5, 2017—the 40th anniversary of Voyager 1’s launch—NASA revealed the winning #MessageToVoyager and beamed it into space. “Message to Voyager” is a social media campaign inspired by the messages of goodwill carried on the Golden Record aboard each Voyager spacecraft.

NASA invited the public to submit short, uplifting messages to the Voyager 1 spacecraft and all that lies beyond it. These messages were a maximum of 60 characters and were tagged #MessageToVoyager. NASA tracked more than 30,000 submissions. The Voyager team together with JPL and NASA headquarters selected their 10 favorites, which were then put to a public vote. The winning message was sent into interstellar space by a command that originated from the Deep Space Network (DSN) mission control at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory with help from the original Captain Kirk, actor William Shatner; Tracy Drain, Juno mission deputy chief engineer; Jeff Berner, DSN chief engineer; and Annabel Kennedy, DSN command engineer.

To see all 10 finalist messages and get more details about the #MessageToVoyager campaign, visit https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/message/

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Eyes in the Sky, Living in Space, Space Systems

Videos: ‘Space to Ground’ weekly ISS report – Sept.8.2017

Here is NASA’s latest Space to Ground report on activities related to the International Space Station

More imagery of Hurricane Irma from the ISS:

A “Speedy-Time” video by the ISS crew members about taking photos of the earth from the station:

 

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Europa, Titan, & other deep space sites, Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al, Space Systems

Videos: Cassini and the wonders of Saturn + An overview of the Voyager mission

A video of highlights of the many discoveries and marvelous images made by the Cassini mission to the Saturn system:

Checkout the Cassini: The Grand Finale: Cassini’s ‘Inside-Out’ Rings Movie:

This movie sequence of images from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft offers a unique perspective on Saturn’s ring system. Cassini captured the images from within the gap between the planet and its rings, looking outward as the spacecraft made one of its final dives through the gap as part of the mission’s Grand Finale. Using its wide-angle camera, Cassini took the 21 images in the sequence over a span of about four minutes during its dive through the gap on Aug. 20, 2017. The images have an original size of 512 x 512 pixels; the smaller image size allowed for more images to be taken over the short span of time. [Full caption]
A talk by Alan Cummings, Senior Research Scientist at Caltech and Voyager team member since 1973, about the two Voyager spacecraft and their travels out into interstellar space:

From the caption:

In 1977, NASA’s twin Voyager spacecraft embarked on an incredible journey to the outer planets and beyond. After delivering stunning images of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, the probes sailed on to study the boundary of our heliosphere, the bubble that encompasses our sun, planets and solar wind. Voyager 1 crossed that frontier in August 2012, becoming the first human-made object in interstellar space, while Voyager 2 is expected to enter the space between the stars in the coming years. This live public talk at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, revisits highlights of the last 40 years and discuss what may lie ahead for the intrepid Voyagers.

Living in Space, Space Systems, SpaceCasts

Videos: “Space to Ground” ISS report for Aug.25.2017

The latest Space to Ground video report from NASA on activities related to the International Space Station :

A couple more of the fun “SpeedyTime” short videos about various aspects of the station and living there:

 

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Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al, Space Science, Space Systems

After 40 years, Voyagers 1 and 2 still talk to us from billions of kilometers away

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This summer marks the 40th anniversary of the launches of the two Voyager spacecraft, which are still in contact with earth as they head out into interstellar space:

More about the two deep space explorers:

A longer documentary about the Voyager missions:

 

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