STS-127 landing today

Mission: STS-127, 29th station flight
Mission Number: Shuttle flight No. 127
Orbiter: Endeavour (OV-105)
Launch Date: 18:03:10 EDT/22:03:10 UT, July 15, 2009
Launch Pad: 39A
Mission Duration: 16 days
EVAs: TBA
Landing Site: primary site: Kennedy Space Center
Landing: TBA
Inclination/Altitude: 51.6 degrees/122 nautical miles
Primary Payload:

Kibo Japanese Experiment Module Exposed Facility (JEM-EF)

Kibo Japanese Experiment Logistics Module - Exposed Section (ELM-ES)

Integrated Cargo Carrier-Vertical Light Deployable (ICC-VLD)

DRAGONSAT Payload - NASA GPS Demonstrator & Student Satellite with Dual Picosatellites

E-2 Payload - Spherical satellites designed by United States Naval Research Laboratory

Crew: Mission Commander: Mark L. Polansky; Pilot: Douglas G. Hurley; Mission Specialists: Christopher J. Cassidy, Thomas H. Marshburn, David A. Wolf, Julie Payette, launch: Timothy Kopra (Flight Engineer, Expedition 19), landing: Koichi Wakata (Flight Engineer, Expedition 18)
Contingency Shuttle Crew Support Mission: STS-328 (Rescue STS-127) - Atlantis (OV-104). 

 Mission STS-127: Space shuttle Endeavour and its crew of seven astronauts are wrapping up their mission to the International Space Station. Launch occurred on time at 6:03 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, July 15 from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Endeavour is due to return to Earth today with a late-morning touchdown on Kennedy's Shuttle Landing Facility.

 

Jupiter: A Black Spot observed by an Australian Astronomer

An Australian amateur astronomer spotted on the planet Jupiter a black spot having the size of Earth , which proved to come from the impact of an asteroid or a comet. NASA has confirmed the discovery with its infrared telescope at Mauna Kea, Hawaii. 

Anthony Wesley, 44-year-old a computer scientist made this observation while he scans the sky at home with a telescope of 37 cm in diameter.

The observed impact on Jupiter will be observable for a few days, says astronomers.

According to Glen Orton, a researcher at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA, it is indeed an impact and not a phenomenon similar to the cyclonic Great Red Spot of Jupiter.

Flash back - 40 years later

Review the best moment in the history of mankind.

Watch this featured video.

US flag on the moon.

Credit NASA

LRO and LCROSS lauched by NASA

The probes LRO and LCROSS are close to the moon after a successful launch Thursday 18th June The Atlas V rocket had torn the shooting from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 21h32 GMT and 45 minutes later the main probe, LRO, LCROSS separated from, which pursues its course with the upper level of Centaur rocket.
The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter should the Moon on Tuesday morning and was positioned on an elliptical orbit (stretching between 30 and 261 km of the Moon) for a period of 60 days. Then LRO was placed on its circumpolar orbit (passing over the poles) 50 km from the lunar surface, where it must provide for one year a lot of information about the presence or absence of hydrogen and iced Water on the Moon.

LRO for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter will conduct investigations that will prepare future human exploration to the moon.

LCROSS for Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite will include confirming the presence or absence of water ice in a permanently shadowed crater at the Moon’s South Pole.

The Launch of LRO and LCROSS via Nasa.