Wow! SpaceX Lands Orbital Rocket Successfully in Historic First
Today's launch was the first for SpaceX since June 28, when a Falcon 9 broke apart less than three minutes after blasting off from Cape Canaveral, scuttling the seventh uncrewed cargo mission the company is flying to the International Space Station for NASA. (SpaceX holds a $1.6 billion deal to make at least 12 such flights with the Falcon 9 and its robotic Dragon capsule.)
The June failure was likely caused by a faulty steel strut in the Falcon 9 upper stage. Musk has said that, going forward, the company will test every one of the hundreds of such struts that go into each Falcon 9.
SpaceX has also been revamping the Falcon 9 since the accident, adjusting its stage-separation system and electronics, among other features, Musk said.
"I think it's a significantly improved rocket from the last one," he said on Dec. 15 during a talk at the annual winter meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.
Today's launch was originally scheduled for Sunday night (Dec. 20), but analyses showed that lifting off tonight provided a 10 percent better chance of landing success, Musk said.
The 11 satellites that launched aboard the Falcon 9 all deployed successfully, and will complete a 17-spacecraft Orbcomm network in low-Earth orbit.By Mike Wall, Space.com Senior Writer |
Elon Musk is expected to urge Trump not to abandon the Paris climate agreement
The serial entrepreneur is a longtime fan of creating a carbon tax.
BY APRIL GLASER@APRILASER
Elon Musk is joining President-elect Trump’s policy advisory council, despite his comments before the election that Trump “doesn't seem to have the sort of character that reflects well on the United States."
Still, it’s probably in Musk’s favor to work with the incoming administration, especially as it starts to shape new policies that are dear to Musk’s heart, like regulations to bring self-driving cars to U.S. roadways and whether to abide by the 2015 Paris climate agreement or pull out, a threat Trump made on the campaign trail.
That doesn’t sit well with Musk, who will likely urge the Trump administration to remain a signatory on the international climate accord. Reps for Musk did not immediately respond to request for comment.
Shortly after Trump won the election, his team began sketching a plan to abandon the the Paris accord, reported Reuters. And Trump’s pick to head the EPA, Scott Pruitt, doesn’t think climate change science is real.
Musk, on the other hand, has long advocated for the U.S. to institute a gradual carbon tax, which he says is the only viable way to spur a transition from fossil fuels to more sustainable forms of energy.
Trump is unlikely to warm up to the idea of another tax — he’s promised to cut taxes across the board.
Even so, Musk might be able to persuade the president-elect not to renege on the Paris agreement, which already lacks strong mechanisms for enforcement.
Rex Tillerson, Trump’s pick for secretary of state and CEO of Exxon Mobil, also supported U.S. participation in the climate talks and endorsed the idea of a national carbon tax. Tillerson may also urge Trump not to leave the Paris deal.
Musk has a financial incentive for wanting the U.S. to start thinking progressively about transitioning from fossil fuel. Musk’s company Tesla acquired SolarCity, a leading U.S. firm building solar-powered energy systems, last month.
structure of lead WHO-Elon Musk WHEN-this week WHAT-some expected to urge Trump not to abandon the Paris climate agreement WHY-not given WHERE-not given Keywords 1.advisory-顧問的 2.council-議會 3.abide-忍受 4.signatory-簽約國 5.accord-協約
NASA’s Curiosity rover finds more evidence that Mars was once habitable
The robot is learning a lot from its mountain trek
by Loren Grush@lorengrush
As NASA’s Curiosity rover makes its way up a layered mountain on Mars, the little bot is finding even more signs that the Red Planet was once a habitable place — potentially capable of hosting microbial life billions of years ago. The rover has been drilling as it climbs, and the samples it has uncovered reveal this region of the mountain to have a variety of minerals, chemistry, and textures. These diverse samples are helping scientists paint a picture of how ancient groundwater interacted with these rocks and changed over time.
Since water is such a key ingredient for life here on Earth, its past presence on Mars may mean that life once thrived there, too. “We’re finding different habitable environments as we go along,” Joy Crisp, a deputy project scientist for the Mars Science Laboratory at NASA, tells The Verge.
Curiosity landed on Mars four years ago in an area called Gale Crater, where it has discovered things like organic matter and an ancient streambed that have raised the possibility of Mars’ past habitability. Since then, the rover has traveled over nine miles and is currently climbing up a mountain in Gale Crater called Mount Sharp. The farther up Curiosity gets, the more diverse types of rocks it finds.
Specifically, Curiosity has found boron for the first time on this trip. It’s an element that’s never been found on Mars before, and its presence on the planet is exciting because it’s very water soluble. Typically, boron is found in places where water has evaporated, leaving the element behind. Even more tantalizing is that Curiosity has found this boron inside mineral “veins” on Mount Sharp. These veins are cracks in the Martian rocks that are filled with chemicals. It’s thought that these chemicals used to circulate inside ancient groundwater on Mars. When the groundwater eventually evaporated, the chemicals were leftover in the cracks.
As for the source of this groundwater, one idea that NASA has is that there used to be a lake at Gale Crater, and boron was trapped in the rocks underneath it. Eventually that lake disappeared on the Martian surface, but it didn’t totally go away. Instead it retreated underneath the rocks as groundwater. And that groundwater had the right chemistry that allowed it to extract the boron from the rocks and deposit it in these mineral veins.
If that’s true, that means this groundwater may have been particularly habitable at some point. Not only was it a liquid, but it was probably warm and not too acidic in order to dissolve the boron. So even regular bacteria could have permeated these waters. “It’s telling us this water is very interesting and has this dynamic chemistry,” Patrick Gasda, a post-doctoral student at Los Alamos National Laboratory, tells The Verge. Researchers also think that the groundwater reacted with the bedrock over time, changing the chemistry of both the water and the rock. And it’s these types of chemical reactions that support life here on Earth.
Of course, no direct signs of ancient life have been found just yet on Mars. But the evidence of this groundwater system potentially extends the period of time when Mars could have been habitable. And that increases the odds that life formed there.
As exciting as Curiosity’s findings have been, the rover’s trip up Mount Sharp may be stalled for a bit. Last week, NASA said it was having trouble extending Curiosity’s drill, so NASA put Curiosity’s trip on pause while engineers at the space agency try to figure out what’s wrong. In the meantime, Curiosity is “studying its surroundings and monitoring the environment” on Mount Sharp, but it won’t be going anywhere for now.
structure of lead WHO-Curiousity rover WHEN-this week WHAT-finds more evidence that Mars was once hebitable WHY-it found more signs WHERE-Mars Keywords 1.rover-漫遊者 2.layered-層 3.habitable-適合居住的 4.thrive-繁榮 5.presence-存在 6.permeate-充滿
Hungarian journalist sacked for kicking refugees plans to sue one of them
A camera operator for a Hungarian nationalist television channel who was filmed kicking and tripping refugees has said she plans to sue one of them and Facebook.
Petra László apologised last month, saying “something snapped in me” when she kicked two refugee children and tripped up a man carrying a child at the border area of Röszke.
However, in an interview with the Russian newspaper Izvestia, she has said she plans to take legal action against Facebook for allegedly refusing to remove threatening groups on the site and deleting groups that supported her.
László also said she plans to sue Osama Abdul Mohsen, one of the Syrian refugees she kicked, saying: “He changed his testimony because he initially blamed the police. My husband wants to prove my innocence. For him it is now a matter of honour.”
László was fired by N1TV after footage of the incident was posted on Twitter by Stephan Richter, a reporter for the German television channel RTL.
N1TV – which has links to the far-right Jobbik party – said László’s behaviour was unacceptable and her job had been terminated “with immediate effect”.
Last week, Hungarian prosecutors said a criminal case for breach of the peace had been opened against her.
The incident happened as hundreds of people broke through a police line at Röszke,close to the Hungarian-Serbian border, where thousands of migrants and refugees have been crossing every day for the last month.
László also said she wanted to move her family to Russia because she felt unsafe in Hungary. She said: “We consider Russia and we think that we will begin to learn Russian. For us it is important to leave Hungary. We will decide after the trial.”
Meanwhile, Mohsen and his family are beginning a new life in the Spanish city of Getafe, near Madrid, after a Spanish football academy offered to help him rebuild his life and restart his career as a football coach.
The Syrian had been a coach for al-Fotuwa, a first-division football team in Deir Ezzor, before the civil war forced his family to flee their hometown.
Charlie Hebdo Office in Paris Attacked by Gunmen; 12 Killed
By INTI LANDAURO
,
NOÉMIE BISSERBE and
DAVID GAUTHIER-VILLARS
PARIS—Masked gunmen stormed the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday, killing a dozen people and decimating a newsroom that long took pride in defying the outrage—and death threats—stirred by its caricatures lampooning Islam.
The brutal rampage shocked a nation that has been living in dread of reprisal attacks since joining the fight against Islamist insurgents in Africa and the Middle East. The attack—by gunmen armed with AK-47 rifles—triggered an outpouring of public anger at home and expressions of solidarity from around the world.
French authorities late Wednesday identified three suspects, all Frenchmen: Said Kouachi, 34 years old; his brother Cherif Kouachi,32; and 18-year-old Hamid Mourad.
Police deployed a vast dragnet with hundreds of officers to conduct a manhunt, searching an apartment in the eastern French city of Reims.
Early on Thursday, officials said Mr. Mourad had turned himself into police at the eastern town of Charleville-Mézières and was in custody. Police also released photos of the brothers and issued an appeal for information on them.
It is unclear whether the gunmen acted alone or were part of a broader organization. But they appeared to have planned the attack and to have been motivated by radical Islamist beliefs.
French television showed footage of two men wearing balaclavas leaving Charlie Hebdo’s offices shouting in French: “We have avenged Prophet Muhammad. We have killed Charlie Hebdo.”
The gunmen also shouted “Allahu akbar,” or “God is great,” according to a witness cited by Paris prosecutor François Molins.
