Panoramic view of SpaceX ship Interior - Dragon

Click on the Image to visit the SpaceX Panoramic website.

Dragon is a free-flying, reusable spacecraft being developed by SpaceX under NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program.

Initiated internally by SpaceX in 2005, the Dragon spacecraft is made up of a pressurized capsule and unpressurized trunk used for Earth to LEO transport of pressurized cargo, unpressurized cargo, and/or crew members.

The Dragon spacecraft is comprised of 3 main elements:

• the Nosecone, which protects the vessel and the docking adaptor during ascent; 
• the Spacecraft, which houses the crew and/or pressurized cargo as well as the service section containing avionics, the RCS system, parachutes, and other support infrastructure; and 
• the Trunk, which provides for the stowage of unpressurized cargo and will support Dragon’s solar arrays and thermal radiators.

In December 2008, NASA announced the selection of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 launch vehicle and Dragon spacecraft to resupply the International Space Station (ISS) when the Space Shuttle retires.

The $1.6 billion contract represents a minimum of 12 flights, with an option to order additional missions for a cumulative total contract value of up to $3.1 billion.

Though designed to address cargo and crew requirements for the ISS, as a free-flying spacecraft Dragon also provides an excellent platform for in-space technology demonstrations and scientific instrument testing.

SpaceX is currently manifesting fully commercial, non-ISS Dragon flights under the name “DragonLab”. DragonLab represents an emergent capability for in-space experimentation.

Dragon Spacecraft with Solar Panels deployed

Dragon Highlights:

• Fully autonomous rendezvous and docking with manual override capability in crewed configuration
• 6,000 kg (13,228 lbs) payload up-mass to LEO; 3,000 kg (6,614 lbs) payload down-mass
• Payload Volume: 10 m3 (350 ft3) pressurized, 14 m3  (490 ft3) unpressurized
• Supports up to 7 passengers in Crew configuration
• Two-fault tolerant avionics system with extensive heritage
• Reaction control system with 18 MMH/NTO thrusters designed and built in-house; these thrusters are used for both attitude control and orbital maneuvering
• 1290 kg of propellant supports a safe mission profile from sub-orbital insertion to ISS rendezvous to reentry
• Integral common berthing mechanism, with LIDS or APAS support if required
• Designed for water landing under parachute for ocean recovery
• Lifting re-entry for landing precision & low-g’s
• Ablative, high-performance heat shield and sidewall thermal protection

To ensure a rapid transition from cargo to crew capability, the cargo and crew configurations of Dragon are almost identical, with the exception of the crew escape system, the life support system and onboard controls that allow the crew to take over control from the flight computer when needed.

This focus on commonality minimizes the design effort and simplifies the human rating process, allowing systems critical to Dragon crew safety and ISS safety to be fully tested on uncrewed demonstration flights.

For cargo launches the inside of the spacecraft is outfitted with a modular cargo rack system designed to accommodate pressurized cargo in standard sizes and form factors.

For crewed launches, the interior is outfitted with crew couches, controls with manual override capability and upgraded life-support.

To Read More about the Dragon visit the SpaceX website

No Toilet for Tiangong - China Spacestation

We're getting closer to the launch of China's Tiangong 1 space laboratory.

We've seen video footage and artwork of the exterior of this vehicle, but so far, information on Tiangong's interior has been scarce.

We don't know exactly what lies inside Tiangong, but we can take some educated guesses.

Tiangong is a small spacecraft, and its interior fixtures allow little room for unnecessary items.

This leads this author to reach one conclusion. There's probably no toilet on Tiangong.

Astronauts who visit the Tiangong 1 laboratory will travel aboard Shenzhou spacecraft, which are roughly the same size as the Tiangong module itself.

The Shenzhou spacecraft has enough room for three astronauts, along with all the equipment needed to keep them alive and functioning. Two Shenzhou spacecraft are expected to carry crews to Tiangong 1.

These will be Shenzhous 9 and 10, expected to fly in 2012.

During an astronaut visit to Tiangong, the Shenzhou spacecraft will remain docked to the laboratory. The astronauts will also use this spacecraft for their return to Earth.

Shenzhou carries simple toilet facilities, as well as food preparation equipment and stores. These will all be within easy reach of the astronauts during their mission.

Given this fact, it seems reasonable to assume that the toilet, as well as some of the food preparation gear, will not be replicated on Tiangong.

This will allow more space for experiments and other gear on board Tiangong itself. It also helps to solve a hygiene problem. Toilet and food preparation gear can be cleaned and emptied, but they still remain potential sources of odours and bacteria.

Leaving this type of gear on board the laboratory for an extended period could be messy for subsequent crews who visit the laboratory. If the toilet and kitchen are both replaced when each mission flies, then the gear should be kept relatively clean.

There's also another good reason for flying a fresh toilet with each crew. It minimizes the chance that the gear will break down. A broken toilet on board a cramped spacecraft would be a serious nuisance, as astronauts who have lived with the problem can attest.

Given the relatively small size of the Tiangong laboratory, it is probable that the astronauts will work inside it, but still spend much of their flight inside their own Shenzhou spacecraft.

This will not only allow them to use the facilities on board Shenzhou, but give them extra personal space. Shenzhou will offer more than a bathroom and kitchen. It will probably also serve as a bedroom.

Overall, the combined space aboard Shenzhou and Tiangong will not be large, but there will still be more personal space per crewmember than many other space missions. The astronauts themselves should also be fairly comfortable with the facilities and the food.

ESA Mar's Moon Phobos - Ancient Spacestation

Phobos is doomed. It is gradually spiralling towards Mars and eventually could slam into the planet’s surface, leaving a large crater as its parting gift.

Believe it or not, this discovery led to the USA’s President Eisenhower being briefed in 1960 that Phobos could be a space station launched by an advanced Martian civilisation.

At the time, calculations showed that the moon’s orbit was decaying at around 5 cm per year. Phobos is in an unusually low orbit around Mars, and so it was thought that this drag could be caused by the upper atmosphere of the planet.

Russian astrophysicist Iosif Samuilovich Shklovsky set about calculating whether the atmosphere could indeed be responsible. What he found surprised not only him, but many others too.

For the atmosphere to be responsible, Phobos would have to be hollow, like an Easter Egg. If the moon were solid rock, the atmosphere would have little effect.

A hollow moon would be susceptible because it contained so much less mass. But if the moon were hollow, it could not be a natural object.

Dr S. Fred Singer, special advisor to President Eisenhower on space developments, briefed the White House on this matter, emphasizing that Phobos could be an ancient abandoned spacecraft.

That's no moon, it's a... no wait, it is a moon.

Credits: ESA/ DLR/ FU Berlin (G. Neukum)

NASA ISS Spacestation water problem: Calcium levels in Urine too high

The £62 billion space station project involving 16 nations has been under construction 220 miles above the Earth for more than a decade Photo: AP

Engineers investigating a problem with the system, which processes urine into clean water for drinking, said they believed the cause for the back-up was a high concentration of calcium in the astronauts' urine.

Scientists do not yet know if the high calcium concentration is due to bone loss, a consequence of living in a zero-gravity environment, or other factors.

"We've learned a lot more about urine than we ever needed or wanted to know - some of us anyway," said David Korth, the station flight director.

The £62 billion space station project involving 16 nations has been under construction 220 miles above the Earth for more than a decade.

Before the urine recycler was started up in November 2008, it was fully tested by Nasa.

"Folks had good knowledge of the content of the urine going in, but the chemistry changes as it works through the processor are not always understood," said Julie Robinson, a scientist working on the project. "There are a lot of parameters including urine calcium and pH (acidity) that everyone is looking at."

Engineers at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, are hoping to come up with a fix in time to fly replacement parts out on the shuttle Endeavour, which is scheduled for launch on Feb 7 on a construction mission

NASA; Debris from Ariane rocket threatens ISS Spacestation

Space Shuttle Discovery astronauts Danny Olivas and Nicole Stott exit the International Space Station's Qwest airlock at the beginning of their spacewalk in this image from NASA TV.

The U.S. space agency is tracking debris from a portion of a European Artiane 5 rocket, that was launched more than three years ago.


The debris could pass close enough to require astronauts to fire thrusters to move the station and shuttle Discovery that is docked there out of the way, NASA officials said at a briefing.

The debris posed no immediate danger to the station or the shuttle, the agency said.

The debris, which is in an oval-shaped orbit that makes it difficult to track, will make its closest approach to the station at 11:06 a.m. EDT (3:06 p.m. GMT) on Friday, NASA said.

The debris will not force NASA to delay the second of three spacewalks planned outside the station on Thursday. NASA might decide to take no action, or could "reboost" the station from its current orbit 220 miles above the Earth after astronauts complete their second space walk, it said