Technology in Space

Who doesn’t love a good conspiracy theory? Americans are particularly susceptible to them, and, why not? We seem to have been the victims of so many conspiracies – Pearl Harbor, JFK, RFK, MLK, Watergate, IranContra, the Bush Jr. elections, 9/11, Wall Street, entrenched bureaucracy, to mention just a few.

But to doubt that American astronauts in the Apollo program landed on the Moon seems downright un-American. To not believe in the lunar landings is a slap in the face to science and the American space program, and to the thousands of people who assisted in the lunar landings.

MLAS Launches

NASA successfully demonstrated an

alternate system for future astronauts. The launch of the Max Launch Abort System, or MLAS,

took place on July 8, 2009, at 6:26 a.m. at NASA's Wallops

Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va.

The crescent Earth rises above the lunar horizon in this spectacular photograph taken from the Apollo 17 spacecraft in lunar orbit during final lunar landing

mission in the Apollo program.

http://www.nasaimages.org/

In the darkened interior of NASA's

SOFIA flying

observatory, NASA

and German scientists study the results of system

tests on the telescope assembly,

including the gyroscope, system software and wide-field and fine-field

imagers.

Hybrid Wing Body Model

NASA's Glenn Research Center dedicated a model of the hybrid wing body, a futuristic aircraft concept, on July 8, 2009. The center is testing parts of a new propulsion system that can be embedded in the wing of the airplane. Developed by NASA and Boeing, the plane is called a hybrid wing body because its wings and fuselage blend together in a triangular shape.

Unlike Earth the moon does not have air, food and water, so it would take a lot of effort for humans to live and work there, wrote Raina Huang, a student at Bexley High School in Columbus, Ohio, and finalist in the second annual NASA Lunar Art Contest.