Attention Readers: Please pardon our dust. We are currently updating the theme.

UPDATE: 10/28/09 11:45AM: Ares 1-X has launched. Update tonight.

UPDATE 10/27/09 1:12PM: Launch scrubbed for today. Next attempt is tomorrow at 8a.m.

If your a Space geek like us, you were probably up watching NASA rollout it’s new rocket, the Ares 1 rocket early Tuesday morning. The Ares 1 is slated to be the replacement for the shuttle when the Space Shuttles are retired next year. This has been the first new human-carrying rocket to be introduced since the early 80s and is the highest rocket rolled out of the Vehicle Assembly Building since the Saturn V rocket was introduced for the Apollo program in the 60s. The whole rocket is is 327 feet tall (That’s 143 feet taller than the Space Shuttle!) This flight will not carry any people inside, it will just test the First stages of the rocket. The rocket is currently using a re-purposed 4 segment Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) from the Shuttle inventory with a dummy fifth segment. Lying atop of that is a dummy Orion crew capsule (often referred to as a “boilerplate“) and launch abort tower on the top. These dummy segments are used just for adding simulated weight to the top. According to NASA, this flight is only a test of the first segment and it’s parachutes, which are actually among, if not, the biggest parachutes ever made. I also have a feeling that they will be testing the vibration in the capsule as well.

I find this test really exciting but, we shouldn’t get too excited quite yet. The Augustine Commission, a commission appointed by the White House to determine the future of the U.S. space program, will submit their recommendations to president Obama tomorrow (Thursday). Some of those plans don’t even include the Ares 1 rocket. I hope that Obama does make the right decision to move on using a different, newer, mode of transportation to the International Space Station and beyond.

I would find it oddly humorous if I see the thing go “Boom” on the 27th. Lets hope not. Anyways, you can watch the Launch on NASA TV on Tuesday October 27th at 8am (Links Below). Be sure to start watching earlier than 8am because the candle will be lit exactly at 8. If the launch is scrubbed, there will be two more attempts, which will be announced accordingly.

How to watch:
Watch directly from NASA
Watch from Spacevidcast (Recommended!)

Tuesday’s launch of Space Shuttle Endeavour was scrubbed due to the same hydrogen leak that scrubbed the first attempt to launch this past saturday. The second attempt to lauch the shuttle for it’s STS-127 mission was supposed to take place at 5:15 am EDT Wednesday morning. The team decided to scrub the launch at 1:55am wednesday morning. The next attempt to launch will be on July 11,2009 at 7:39pm EDT, so that two lunar probes can launch and do their missions.

Launch Date: NET March 12,2009 21:20pm EDT

Landing Date: NET March 26,2009 (14 Days)

Crew
Lee Archambault – Commander
Dominic “Tony” Antonelli – Pilot
Joseph “Joe” Acaba – Mission Specialist 1/ Educator Astronaut
Stephen Swanson – Mission Specialist 2
Richard “Ricky” Arnold – Mission Specialist 3/ Educator Astronaut
John Phillips – Mission Specialist 4
Koichi Wakata – ISS Flight Engineer – JAXA (Switching with Sandra Magnus)

Crew Swap
During this mission, Koichi Wakata will switch places with Sandra Magnus. Magnus will then become part of the STS-119 crew and Wakata will then become flight engineer 2 with Expedition 18.

Mission

• Install Starboard 6 (S6) solar arrays, which will be the last of the four solar arrays to be installed.

Experiments

“Shuttle Exhaust Ion Turbulence Experiments (SEITE) will use space based sensors to detect the ionospheric turbulence inferred from the radar observations from a previous Space Shuttle Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) burn experiment using ground-based radar.”

Click here for more info.

Photo: NASA