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By NASA
This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter. The mission is targeting an Oct. 10, 2024, launch. NASA/JPL-Caltech NASA will host a news conference at 11 a.m. EDT Tuesday, Sept. 17, at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California to discuss the upcoming Europa Clipper mission to Jupiter’s icy moon Europa.
The briefing will be open to media and will air live on NASA+ and the agency’s website, plus Facebook, X, and YouTube. Learn how to stream NASA content through a variety of platforms, including social media.
Participants in the news conference include:
Gina DiBraccio, acting director, Planetary Science Division, NASA Headquarters Jordan Evans, project manager, Europa Clipper, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory Bonnie Buratti, deputy project scientist, Europa Clipper, JPL Stuart Hill, propulsion module delivery manager, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Armando Piloto, senior mission manager, NASA’s Launch Services Program To ask questions by phone, members of the media must RSVP no later than two hours before the start of the event to Rexana Vizza at: rexana.v.vizza@jpl.nasa.gov.
Members of the news media from the U.S. and non-designated countries who are interested in covering the event in person at JPL must arrange access in advance by contacting Rexana Vizza at: rexana.v.vizza@jpl.nasa.gov no later than 3 p.m. EDT (12 p.m. PDT) on Thursday, Sept. 12. Media representatives must provide one form of government-issued photo identification. Non-U.S. citizens will need to bring a passport or a green card. NASA’s media accreditation policy is available online.
Questions can be asked on social media during the briefing using the hashtag #AskNASA.
Europa is one of the most promising places in our solar system to find an environment suitable for life beyond Earth. Evidence suggests that the ocean beneath Europa’s icy surface could contain the ingredients for life — water, the right chemistry, and energy. While Europa Clipper is not a life-detection mission, it will answer key questions about the moon’s potential habitability.
Europa Clipper’s launch period opens on Thursday, Oct. 10. The spacecraft, the largest NASA has ever built for a planetary mission, will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California, JPL leads the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The main spacecraft body was designed by APL in collaboration with JPL and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The Planetary Missions Program Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission. NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy, manages the launch service for the Europa Clipper spacecraft.
To learn more about Europa Clipper, visit:
https://europa.nasa.gov
-end-
Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov
Val Gratias / Gretchen McCartney
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-318-2141 / 818-393-6215
valerie.m.gratias@jpl.nasa.gov / gretchen.p.mccartney@jpl.nasa.gov
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By NASA
On Sept. 10, 2009, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched its first cargo delivery spacecraft, the H-II Transfer Vehicle-1 (HTV-1), to the International Space Station. The HTV cargo vehicles, also called Kounotori, meaning white stork in Japanese, not only maintained the Japanese Experiment Module Kibo but also resupplied the space station in general with pressurized and unpressurized cargo and payloads. Following its rendezvous with the space station, Expedition 20 astronauts grappled and berthed HTV-1 on Sept. 17, and spent the next month transferring its 9,900 pounds of internal and external cargo to the space station and filling the HTV-1 with trash and unneeded equipment. They released the craft on Oct. 30 and ground controllers commanded it to a destructive reentry on Nov. 1.
Left and middle: Two views of the HTV-1 Kounotori cargo spacecraft during prelaunch processing at the Tanegashima Space Center in Japan. Right: Schematic illustration showing the HTV’s major components. Image credits: courtesy JAXA.
The HTV formed part of a fleet of cargo vehicles that at the time included NASA’s space shuttle until its retirement in 2011, Roscosmos’ Progress, and the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Automated Transfer Vehicle that flew five missions between 2008 and 2015. The SpaceX Cargo Dragon and Orbital (later Northrup Grumman) Cygnus commercial cargo vehicles supplemented the fleet starting in 2012 and 2013, respectively. The HTV weighed 23,000 pounds empty and could carry up to 13,000 pounds of cargo, although on this first flight carried only 9,900 pounds. The vehicle included both a pressurized and an unpressurized logistics carrier. Following its rendezvous with the space station, it approached to within 33 feet, at which point astronauts grappled it with the station’s robotic arm and berthed it to the Harmony Node 2 module’s Earth facing port. Space station managers added two flights to the originally planned seven, with the last HTV flying in 2020. An upgraded HTV-X vehicle will soon make its debut to carry cargo to the space station, incorporating the lessons learned from the nine-mission HTV program.
Left: Technicians place HTV-1 inside its launch protective shroud at the Tanegashima Space Center. Middle left: Workers truck the HTV-1 to Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB). Middle right: The HTV-1 atop its H-II rolls out of the VAB on its way to the launch pad. Right: The HTV-1 mission patch. Image credits: courtesy JAXA.
Prelaunch processing of HTV-1 took place at the Tanegashima Space Center, where engineers inspected and assembled the spacecraft’s components. Workers installed the internal cargo into the pressurized logistics carrier and external payloads onto the External Pallet that they installed into the unpressurized logistics carrier. HTV-1 carried two external payloads, the Japanese Superconducting submillimeter-wave Limb Emission Sounder (SMILES) and the U.S. Hyperspectral Imager for Coastal Ocean (HICO)-Remote Atmospheric and Ionospheric detection System (RAIDS) Experiment Payload (HREP). On Aug. 23, 2009, workers encapsulated the assembled HTV into its payload shroud and a week later moved it into the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), where they mounted it atop the H-IIB rocket. Rollout from the VAB to the pad took place on the day of launch.
Liftoff of HTV-1 from the Tanegashima Space Center in Japan. Image credit: courtesy JAXA.
Left: The launch control center at the Tanegahsima Space Center in Japan. Middle: The mission control room at the Tsukuba Space Center in Japan. Image credits: courtesy JAXA. Right: The HTV-1 control team in the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
On Sept. 10 – Sept. 11 Japan time – HTV-1 lifted off its pad at Tanegashima on the maiden flight of the H-IIB rocket. Controllers in Tanegashima’s launch control center monitored the flight until HTV-1 separated from the booster’s second stage. At that point, HTV-1 automatically activated its systems and established communications with NASA’s Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System. Control of the flight shifted to the mission control room at the Tsukuba Space Center outside Tokyo. Controllers in the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston also monitored the mission’s progress.
Left: HTV-1 approaches the space station. Middle: NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott grapples HTV-1 with the station’s robotic arm and prepares to berth it to the Node 2 module. Right: European Space Agency astronaut Frank DeWinne, left, Stott, and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk in the Destiny module following the robotic operations to capture and berth HTV-1.
Following several days of systems checks, HTV-1 approached the space station on Sept. 17. Members of Expedition 20 monitored its approach, as it stopped within 33 feet of the orbiting laboratory. Using the space station’s Canadarm2 robotic arm, Expedition 20 Flight Engineer and NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott grappled HTV-1. Fellow crew member Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk berthed the vehicle on the Harmony Node 2 module’s Earth-facing port. The following day, the Expedition 20 crew opened the hatch to HTV-1 to begin the cargo transfers.
Left: Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk inside HTV-1. Middle: NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott transferring cargo from HTV-1 to the space station. Right: Stott in HTV-1 after completion of much of the cargo transfer.
Over the next several weeks, the Expedition 20 and 21 crews transferred more than 7,900 pounds of cargo from the pressurized logistics carrier to the space station. The items included food, science experiments, robotic arm and other hardware for the Kibo module, crew supplies including clothing, toiletries, and personal items, fluorescent lights, and other supplies. They then loaded the module with trash and unneeded equipment, altogether weighing 3,580 pounds.
Left: The space station’s robotic arm grapples the Exposed Pallet (EP) to transfer it to the Japanese Experiment Module-Exposed Facility (JEM-EF). Right: Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk and NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott operate the station’s robotic arm to temporarily transfer the EP and its payloads to the JEM-EF.
Left: The Japanese robotic arm grapples one of the payloads from the Exposed Pallet (EP) to transfer it to the Japanese Experiment Module-Exposed Facility (JEM-EF). Right: European Space Agency astronaut Frank DeWinne, left, and NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott operate the Japanese robotic arm from inside the JEM.
Working as a team, NASA astronauts Stott and Michael R. Barratt along with Thirsk and ESA astronaut Frank DeWinne performed the transfer of the external payloads. On Sept. 23, using the station’s robotic arm, they grappled the Exposed Pallet (EP) and removed it from HTV-1’s unpressurized logistics carrier, handing it off to the Japanese remote manipulator system arm that temporarily stowed it on the JEM’s Exposed Facility (JEM-EF). The next day, using the Japanese arm, DeWinne and Stott transferred the SMILES and HREP experiments to their designated locations on the JEM-EF. On Sept. 25, they grappled the now empty EP and placed it back into HTV-1’s unpressurized logistics carrier.
Left: Astronauts transfer the empty Exposed Pallet back to HTV-1. Middle: NASA astronaut Nicole P. Stott poses in front of the now-closed hatch to HTV-1. Right: European Space Agency astronaut Frank DeWinne, left, and Stott operate the station’s robotic arm to grapple HTV-1 for release.
Left: The space station’s robotic arm grapples HTV-1 in preparation for its unberthing. Middle: The station’s robotic arm has unberthed HTV-1 in preparation for its release. Right: The arm has released HTV-1 and it begins its separation from the space station.
Following completion of all the transfers, Expedition 21 astronauts aboard the space station closed the hatch to HTV-1 on Oct. 29. The next day, Stott and DeWinne grappled the vehicle and unberthed it from Node 2. While passing over the Pacific Ocean, they released HTV-1 and it began its departure maneuvers from the station. On Nov. 1, the flight control team in Tsukuba sent commands to HTV-1 to execute three deorbit burns. The vehicle reentered the Earth’s atmosphere, burning up off the coast of New Zealand, having completed the highly successful 52-day first HTV resupply mission. Eight more HTV missions followed, all successful, with HTV-9 completing its mission in August 2020.
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By NASA
Almost a decade ago, then-grad student Kyle Helson contributed to early paperwork for NASA’s EXCITE mission. As a scientist at Goddard, Helson helped make this balloon-based telescope a reality: EXCITE launched successfully on Aug. 31.
Name: Kyle Helson
Title: Assistant Research Scientist
Organization: Observational Cosmology Lab (Code 665), via UMBC and the GESTAR II cooperative agreement with NASA Goddard
Dr. Kyle Helson is an assistant research scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Photo credit: Dr. Amy Bender How did you know you wanted to work at NASA Goddard?
When I was finishing my physics Ph.D. at Brown University in 2016, I was talking to Ed Wollack and Dave Chuss at Goddard about the NASA postdoc program, and they suggested I apply. Luckily, I got the postdoc fellowship to come here to Goddard to work on cosmic microwave background detector testing and other related research.
I don’t think I would have realized or been interested in coming here had I not had that NASA Space Technology Research Fellowship when I was in grad school and gotten the opportunity to spend some time here and work with Ed and Dave.
What is the name of your team that you’re working with right now?
One of the projects I work on is the Exoplanet Climate Infrared TELescope (EXCITE). EXCITE is a scientific balloon-borne telescope that is designed to measure the spectra of hot, Jupiter-like exoplanet atmospheres in near-infrared light.
Related: NASA’s EXCITE Mission Prepared for Scientific Balloon Flight What is your role for that?
I do a little bit of everything. During grad school, I worked on the first few iterations of the proposal for EXCITE back in 2015 and 2016.
Over the past few years here at Goddard, I’ve been responsible for parts of a lot of the different subsystems like the cryogenic receiver, the gondola, the electronics, and integration and testing of the whole payload.
Last year, we went to Fort Sumner, New Mexico, for an engineering flight. Unfortunately, we were not able to fly for weather reasons. We went back last month, and I was again part of the field deployment team. We take the whole instrument, break it down, carefully ship it all out to New Mexico, put it back together, test it, and get it ready for a flight.
Kyle Helson (far right) and part of the EXCITE team stand in front of EXCITE Fort Sumner, New Mexico in Oct. 2023. EXCITE successfully launched on Aug. 31, 2024. Photo credit: Annalies Kleyheeg What is most interesting to you about your role here at Goddard?
What I like about working on a project like EXCITE is that we get to kind of do a little bit of everything.
We’ve been able to see the experiment from concept and design to actually getting built, tested and hopefully flown and then subsequent data analysis after the flight. What I think is really fun is being able be with an experiment for the entire life cycle.
How do you help support Goddard’s mission?
We’re studying exoplanets, which definitely fits within the scientific mission of Goddard. We’re also a collaboration between Goddard other academic institutions, like Arizona State, like Brown University, Cornell, and several other places, and so we’re also members of the larger scientific research community beyond NASA.
We also have a number of graduate students working on EXCITE. Ballooning is a good platform for training students and young researchers to learn how to build and design instruments, do data analysis, etc. One of the missions of NASA and Goddard is to train early career scientists like graduate students and post docs, and balloons provide a good platform for that as well.
Balloon missions like EXCITE also provide a good platform for technology advancement and demonstration in preparation for future satellite missions.
How did you know cosmology was what you wanted to pursue?
When I was a kid, I loved space. I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid. I even went to space camp.
The first time I ever got to see physics was a middle-school science class. That was the first time we ever learned physics or astronomy that was deeper than just identifying planets or constellations. We started to learn how we could use math to measure or predict experiments.
When I was in college, I remember talking to my undergraduate academic adviser, Glenn Starkman, and talking about what research I might like to do over the summer between sophomore and junior year of college. I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do or what I was interested in, and he suggested I talk to some of the professors doing astrophysics and cosmology research and see if they had space for me in their lab.
I ended up finding a great opportunity working in a research lab in college — so it was working in the physics department in Case Western.
That’s where I first started learning about computer-aided design (CAD), and designing things in CAD, and that’s where I first learned how things get made in a machine shop, like on a mill, or a lathe. These skills have come in handy ever since, because I do a lot of design work in the lab. And I was lucky growing up that my dad was really hands-on and liked to fix things and build things and he taught me a lot of those skills as well.
“When I was a kid, I loved space,” said Kyle Helson. “I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid. I even went to space camp.”Photo courtesy of Kyle Helson Who has influenced you in your life?
My dad had a big influence. I think all the different people I’ve had the opportunity to learn from and work with who have been mentors along the way. My research advisers, professor John Ruhl in college, professor Greg Tucker in grad school, and Dr. Ed Wollack as a postdoc have all been very influential. Additionally, I have had the opportunity to work with a lot of very good post docs and research scientists during my career, Dr. Asad Aboobaker, Dr. Britt Reichborn-Kjennerud, Dr. Michele Limon, among others.
Throughout a career, there are tons of other people on the way from whom you pick up little things here and there that stick with you. You look back and you realize five years later you still do this one thing a certain way because someone helped you and taught you this skill or technique.
Where is a place you’d like to travel to?
Since I was lucky enough to go to Antarctica in graduate school, I figured that is the hardest continent to travel to, so now I have a mission to go to every continent. I’ve been to North America, I’ve been to South America, I’ve been to Asia, Europe, and Australia and New Zealand, but I’ve never been to Africa.
Kyle Helson (second from left) races the keirin at the Valley Preferred Cycling Center in Breinigsville, PA. Photo Credit Dr. Vishrut Garg What are your hobbies, or what do you enjoy doing?
I’m a competitive track cyclist. I started racing bikes in collegiate racing as a grad student at Brown. Many summers I’ve spent many weekends driving and flying all over the U.S. to race in the biggest track cycling events in the country.
What would be your three-word-memoir?
Curious, compassionate, cat-dad.
By Tayler Gilmore
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md
Conversations With Goddard is a collection of Q&A profiles highlighting the breadth and depth of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s talented and diverse workforce. The Conversations have been published twice a month on average since May 2011. Read past editions on Goddard’s “Our People” webpage.
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Last Updated Sep 10, 2024 EditorMadison OlsonContactRob Garnerrob.garner@nasa.govLocationGoddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
People of Goddard Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Balloons Wallops Flight Facility Explore More
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By NASA
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Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
The HASP 1.0 (High-Altitude Student Platform) scientific balloon mission launched Sept. 4, 2024, during NASA’s fall balloon campaign in Fort Sumner, N.M.NASA/Erin Reed NASA’s Scientific Balloon Program’s fifth balloon mission of the 2024 fall campaign took flight Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2024, from the agency’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. The HASP 1.0 (High-Altitude Student Platform) mission remained in flight over 11 hours before it safely touched down. Recovery is underway.
HASP is a partnership among the Louisiana Space Grant Consortium, the Astrophysics Division of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, and the agency’s Balloon Program Office and Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility. The HASP platform supports up to 12 student-built payloads and is designed to flight test compact satellites, prototypes, and other small experiments. Since 2006, HASP has engaged more than 1,600 undergraduate and graduate students involved in the missions.
Teams participating in the 2024 HASP 1.0 flight included: University of North Florida and University of North Dakota; Arizona State University; Louisiana State University; University of Colorado Boulder; College of the Canyons; Fort Lewis College; Capitol Technical College; University of Arizona; Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería (Peru); and McMaster University (Canada).
A new, larger version of the High-Altitude Student Platform (HASP 2.0) had its engineering test flight a few days prior. HASP 2.0 will be able to accommodate twice as many student experiments as HASP 1.0 once operational in the next year.
The remaining three balloon flights scheduled for the 2024 Fort Sumner fall campaign await next launch opportunities. To follow the missions, visit NASA’s Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility website for real-time updates on balloons altitudes and GPS locations during flight.
For more information on NASA’s Scientific Balloon Program, visit:
https://www.nasa.gov/scientificballoons
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Last Updated Sep 06, 2024 EditorOlivia F. LittletonContactOlivia F. Littletonolivia.f.littleton@nasa.gov Related Terms
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