Friday, January 03, 2025

A New Blueprint Will Be Unveiled for America's Next Flagship Mission to the Red Planet...

An illustration depicting the joint NASA/ESA Mars Sample Return mission architecture...which will undergo a major revision.
NASA / JPL - Caltech

NASA to Host Media Call Highlighting Mars Sample Return Update (News Release)

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, will host a media teleconference at 1 p.m. EST on Tuesday, January 7, to provide an update on the status of the agency’s Mars Sample Return Program.

The briefing will include NASA’s efforts to complete its goals of returning scientifically-selected samples from Mars to Earth while lowering cost, risk and mission complexity.

Audio of the media call will stream live on the agency’s website.

Media interested in participating by phone must RSVP no later than two hours prior to the start of the call to: dewayne.a.washington@nasa.gov. A copy of NASA’s media accreditation policy is online.

The agency’s Mars Sample Return Program has been a major long-term goal of international planetary exploration for more than two decades. NASA’s Perseverance rover is collecting compelling science samples that will help scientists understand the geological history of Mars, the evolution of its climate, and prepare for future human explorers. The return of the samples will also help NASA’s search for signs of ancient life.

Source: NASA.Gov

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An artist's concept of Rocket Lab's Neutron launch vehicle...which would have an integral part in the company's Mars Sample Return architecture.
Rocket Lab

Thursday, January 02, 2025

SOLAR PROBE PLUS Relays More Details about its Christmas Eve Flyby with our Host Star...

An artist's concept of NASA's Parker Solar Probe spacecraft approaching the Sun.
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Reports Healthy Status After Solar Encounter (News Release)

Eight days after its record-breaking closest approach to the Sun’s surface on December 24, 2024, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has confirmed that the spacecraft’s systems and science instruments are healthy and operating normally, including collecting science data as it swung around our star.

Breaking its previous record by flying just 3.8 million miles above the surface of the Sun, Parker Solar Probe hurtled through the solar atmosphere at 430,000 miles per hour — faster than any human-made object has ever moved. A beacon tone, received in the mission operations center at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, late in the evening of Thursday, December 26, confirmed that the spacecraft had made it through the encounter safely.

The telemetry (or housekeeping data) that APL began receiving on January 1 provided more detail on the spacecraft’s operating status and condition. It showed, for example, that Parker had executed the commands that had been programmed into its flight computers before the flyby, and that its science instruments were operational during the flyby itself.

Telemetry transmission, through NASA’s Deep Space Network, continues through Thursday. Science data transmission will begin later this month, when the spacecraft and its most powerful onboard antenna are in better alignment with Earth to transmit at higher data rates. Parker Solar Probe’s next two close passes of the Sun, at approximately the same distance and speed, will occur on March 22 and June 19.

Parker Solar Probe was developed as part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to explore aspects of the Sun-Earth system that directly affect life and society. The Living With a Star program is managed by the agency’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Applied Physics Laboratory designed, built and operates the spacecraft and manages the mission for NASA.

Source: NASA.Gov

Wednesday, January 01, 2025

Celebrating 25 Years of Online Narcissism!

My main website and Blog for PARMAN'S PAGE turn 25 this year!
Richard T. Par

Happy New Year, everyone! So this year marks a quarter century since I created this Blog and my main website, Parman's Page.

I started working on this iteration of Parman's Page back in January of 2000...using Crosswinds.net as my webhost. I originally used Angelfire for my page, but it got deleted in 1999 because of the many photos I posted of beautiful models who I met at import car shows when I attended them on a regular basis back in college! (Prudes.)

In regards to this Blog, I set it up in October of 2000—with my very first entry being this witty gem.

I was 20 when I created my main webpage, and 21 when I set this Blog up several months later (my birthday is on October 4)...meaning that I've had these two sites for a bit more years than I did without them! Wow.

In case you're wondering, the layout for my website has essentially been the same since 2000. And no, I have no intention of doing a major redesign anytime soon!

Hope y'all have a wonderful 2025.