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If you know children who are sick with worry about the supposed end of the world in 2012, here’s the antidote: a six-page brief by NASA Ames Research Center astrobiologist David Morrison explaining why the whole Mayan calendar scare is a load of nonsense.

The doomsday scenario, in case you hadn’t heard, is that a mythical planet called Nibiru will collide with us on December 21, 2012. You can almost hear Morrison sigh as he patiently explains that there is no Nibiru, calendars can’t predict the future, and that the whole thing is being fueled by publicity for the film 2012, which comes out next month.

Also, about the asteroid that had an infinitesimal chance of colliding with Earth in 2036? That’s not going to happen, either. The odds of a collision with Apophis just went from one-in-45,000 to one-in-250,000, based on a recalculation of the object’s orbit.

…But not necessarily in that order, when you’re dealing with the world’s largest solid rocket motor. In fact, engineers who tried last Thursday to light the ATK five-segment motor planned for NASA’s Ares I rocket, were in an underground bunker half a mile away when ignition was to occur at a quarter past 1:00 in the afternoon (15 minutes past the planned time). I was standing above ground about a mile away under a brilliant Utah sun with temperatures in the mid-90s and the wind blowing away from us. This was to be the first static firing of the five-segment booster derived from the space shuttle’s twin, four-segment boosters. The new booster will loft NASA astronauts to orbit after the shuttle retires.

Instead, a hold was called with just 20 seconds to go, and an announcer shortly informed a crowd of 50 journalists and 500-plus NASA and ATK brass assembled at Promontory, Utah, two hours northwest of Salt Lake City, that the test was canceled. The problem was a faulty valve that feeds an auxiliary power unit that spools up a few tens of seconds prior to ignition and drives a hydraulic system in the booster’s aft skirt that gimbals the exhaust nozzle, which is how the rocket steers itself in flight. It was a critical part of the test, as engineers were going to run the nozzle, which is 18 inches longer than a shuttle booster nozzle, through some vigorous motions to see how it holds up under 24 percent more thrust than that produced by a shuttle booster.

In the press conference an hour later, one journalist asked a slightly weary-looking Pat Lampton, NASA’s chief engineer on the program, about all the “bureaucrats” who would be involved in the Monday-morning quarterbacking. He calmly replied, “Fortunately, at NASA, most of the bureaucrats are engineers.”

What it should have looked like. Photo: ATK

By 5:00, ATK dashed any remaining hopes for a test the next day. There were plenty of murmurs throughout the press corps about the timing of the test: A matter of days before the Augustine panel’s end-of-the-month  deadline to the White House, with a printed report ready by late September. The panel’s conclusions were becoming an open secret: Not only will NASA’s paltry 18-billion-dollar budget fail to return astronauts to the moon by 2020, but we may need a cheaper rocket, such as Elon Musk’s Falcon Nine, or Deltas and Atlases that have been building a strong record lofting satellites. That’s not what NASA and ATK want to hear after developing Ares I for the past five years.

As luck would have it, the space shuttle Discovery blasted off the next day, just before midnight on the 28th. On the 29th, ATK distributed a press release stating, “More than 100 RSRM (reusable solid rocket motor) flight sets have been launched to date, marking a two-decade track record of flawless performance.” Blake Larson, ATK Space Systems President, was quoted in the release, saying, “The launch of the Space Shuttle Discovery and the upcoming fall launch of the Ares I-X [a four-segment booster topped by a fifth empty segment], highlight the capabilities and progress ATK and NASA have made in developing the most reliable and affordable family of solid rocket motors ever produced….They will continue to be instrumental to the success of the remaining shuttle flights as well as the future human spaceflight programs.”

Earlier that day, we’d been piled into a bus and carted up the hill for a closeup look at the 12-foot-diameter, 154-foot-long booster, bolted horizontally to the ground for the static test. These ground connections keep it still while the real anchor, a house-size block of concrete weighing several million pounds, endures 3.6 million pounds of thrust via an Erector-Set-like assembly of steel beams sandwiched between the nose of the motor and the concrete. We wouldn’t have seen the rocket move forward, but it would have, about an inch at most points along its frame. If that flex weren’t designed in, the motor might rip itself apart. Its five reusable segments are durable—they’ve flown in space a total of 48 times. The rear segment flew on the very first shuttle mission in April 1981.

Twenty yards behind the exhaust cone, a mirror roughly eight feet square awaited obliteration atop a metal pole that emerged from its own block of concrete set firmly in the ground. Cameras forward of the motor are pointed at the mirror and record the first milliseconds of the ignition as the gases roar out the nozzle. Milliseconds later, the mirror gets annihilated, its pole and concrete pedestal uprooted and flung 50 yards up the barren hill where others lay after earlier tests. A large, foil-wrapped swing arm with a CO2 delivery system stood ready to insert a probe into the nozzle immediately after the test to cool the motor’s interior. This substitutes for frigid altitude and seawater that cools an operational booster. A six-inch blanket of gray sand covered the entire concrete terrace behind the motor. Some of the sand would be blown up onto the hillside, but much of it would remain and turn to glass in the 6,000-degree heat.

All I saw on Thursday was the sleeping rocket, not the one belching fire and smoke. I was still impressed. This hydraulic glitch had not caused a scrub of a static test or a shuttle launch that anyone could remember. Murphy’s Law had followed me to Utah.

But I had to remind myself that the one shuttle launch I’ve witnessed, a night launch with a full moon hanging above the Atlantic in a cloudless November sky, had gone off without a problem. I’ll admit, I’d rather see the shuttle fly any day than a rocket motor chained to the desert floor.

Interstellar travel won't just happen by itself, you know.

NASA used to have a research institute—a tiny one—that funded scientists and engineers to develop far-out ideas, stuff that was still 40 years in the future, or well beyond the horizon of the current space station or even the proposed moonbase. The NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts was among the coolest things going at the space agency, and it cost a measly $4 million a year, or less than what the Marshall Space Flight Center will spend next year to replace the asbestos siding on a single building. Nevertheless, the Institute was shut down in 2007, presumably to save money.

The National Research Council wants it back. In a report released today, the NRC suggests that a “NIAC 2″ be created based on the old institute, which, it turns out, did a pretty good job of incubating ideas like antimatter propulsion, biologically-inspired robots, and other visionary proposals (see the full list of funded studies here).

This time around, the NRC recommends that the institute foster near-term projects as well as the longer-range ideas, to better connect with NASA’s immediate needs. I’d be surprised if Congress (which requested the report) doesn’t order the NIAC to be reinstated, and well it should. A space agency has got to dream.

Since the first Space Camp opened in Huntsville, Alabama, in 1982, the idea has spawned many imitators. Today there are space camps in Turkey, Norway, Canada, and Japan, not to mention a host of smaller-scale space “experiences” at science museums around the world.

Now there’s a space camp at the cosmonaut training center in Star City, outside Moscow. Russia Today has the story, and a video:

A backpack, not a spacesuit: Bolden on his first day as Administrator (Photo: Bill Ingalls)

Say what you will about Michael Griffin, NASA’s last Administrator—the guy was a true space cadet, wholly committed to the idea of moving humanity beyond Earth orbit for the first time in 40 years. In fact, he seemed impatient with anyone who didn’t share that commitment. He professed to be driven by data only, and famously joked (in his dry-as-lunar-dust way) “I don’t do feelings. Just think of me as Spock.” I had some sympathy with Griffin on that point. Why should the director of the nation’s space program have to gush like Miss America? Yet his inability to communicate with ordinary terrestrials was his political downfall.

Now comes his replacement, Charles Bolden. An astronaut and Major General in the Marines, the new Administrator has the respect of his peers, an easy manner, and, by his own account, a full set of human emotions. Bolden comes from Earth. And he’s aware of societal concerns more pressing than “How do we begin the migration into space?” When he spoke to graduates of the Baylor College of Medicine last May, he invoked AIDS ambassador Nkosi Johnson, not Robert Goddard. Since retiring from the Marine Corps, Bolden has thought about fighting sickle cell anemia and improving education for military children, not figuring out how to land on Mars.

That sense of connection to the world beyond NASA should serve him well in his relations with his new boss. President Obama isn’t the only one clamoring these days for NASA to be “relevant,” and Bolden would be a fool not to listen. The National Academy of Sciences just called on the agency to align itself with “broader national goals” such as environmental stewardship and economic growth. Obama is especially keen on education. He mentions NASA often (at the end of this speech, for example), but usually in the context of inspiring children to study math and science.

Expect that to be a persistent theme during Bolden’s time in office. Norman Augustine, who’s leading the current review of NASA’s human spaceflight program, also counts education as a vital national need, and don’t be surprised if his report also challenges the space agency to help restock the nation’s supply of scientists and engineers.

There is one problem, though. NASA can’t inspire without doing something inspiring. Bolden admitted recently that, whereas school kids used to answer ‘yes’ when asked if they wanted to become astronauts, “I may see three hands go up” if he asks the same question today. The great challenge for any NASA administrator in 2009 will be revitalizing human spaceflight on a limited budget. If Bolden (and Augustine) can come up with something clever and cool, young people will line up to participate, just as they did in the 1960s. If they can’t, well…if you don’t build it, they won’t come. In which case Bolden’s ability to cry could end up being his most useful skill.