Just a few days ago, in this space, I defended NASA’s Ares booster against opponents testifying at the Augustine Commission—the committee that is re-evaluating America’s manned space program. After reading an interview with Buzz Aldrin, I’m having second thoughts. Moon rocket, not Mars rocket Ares is designed to return to the moon. Aldrin thinks this [...]

An ad in the Wall Street Journal caught my attention. Someone is selling a boilerplate Apollo command module. Unless it’s a scam, it seems to be a real Apollo spacecraft, used for testing recovery procedures. Oh, and it comes with an extra: a Dairy Queen in Franklin, PA. Yeah, it’s strange…but a real interesting artifact. [...]

Space “tourist” Richard Garriott is schedule to return to earth tonight, along with two cosmonauts. But it might be rough. The Soyuz spacecraft, which has been in operation since the 1960′s (in earlier iterations) has been having bumpy—seriously bumpy—landings recently. The last 2 Soyuz landings, both in 2007, came down hard. They call it a [...]