NASA made a bittersweet announcment yesterday: they plan to send the space shuttle Discovery to service the Hubble Telescope one last time before the three remaining shuttles are retired. There has been some debate over whether this mission is worth the risk — in the new, ultra-cautious, post-Columbia era, safety protocols demand that the shuttle be able to reach the International Space Station in the event of a damaged heat shield or any other problems; however, orbital mechanics make it impossible for a Hubble-bound shuttle to meet up with the ISS if it had to.

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Another major milestone for the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit: today is its 1000th “sol” (i.e., Martian day) of operation. The Martian day is slightly longer than a 24-hour Earth day, so that plucky little skateboard of science has actually been running for about 1028 of our days. Recall if you will that it was originally intended to function for only 90 sols. I think the taxpayers have gotten their money’s worth on this project.

The image above (which looks like a postcard from Southern Utah to me) is a 360-degree panoramic view of the hilltop where Spirit has been perched with its solar panels tilted toward the sun as it waits out the long Martian winter. As always, click the picture for a larger view. Details on the image as well as what Spirit has been up can be found in this press release, and a hi-rez version of the photo is here.

Check out this photo that’s been making the rounds of the blogosphere this week:

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Among our various robotic minions currently exploring the solar system is a vehicle called the Mars Reconaissance Orbiter (MRO). As its name would suggest, the MRO is circling the red planet, mapping the martian surface in greater detail than ever before. It’s also taking some spectacular photographs with its on-board high-rez camera, including the one below, which Phil Plait of the Bad Astronomy Blog calls “the best Mars picture EVAH” (i.e., ever, for those who don’t speak Hipster):

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How’s about we start the day with a little jolt of wonder:

That’s the space shuttle Atlantis pulling away from the International Space Station. Cool enough on its own, but what makes this so wondrous is that the photo was taken from the ground and that it’s a shot of the two spacecraft transiting in front of the sun. Here’s the complete image:

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Have a look at this amazing photo, and don’t forget to click it for a larger view:

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The search for the missing Apollo 11 tapes continues, with NASA’s Goddard Flight Center now conducting a formal, “full-scale look” (previously, the search was pretty much the province of one man, Richard Nafzger, working in his spare time). Details for those who are interested are here. There’s a PDF of a nifty flyer about the search here, and here is an official report from May that lays out in the most detail I’ve yet encountered exactly what this is all about. Especially interesting are the side-by-side photo comparisons on page 9, which demonstrate the difference between the original transmissions recorded on those missing tapes and what the public actually saw on their televisions. Also, the report brings up a critical time issue:

• The Data Evaluation Lab (DEL) at the Goddard Space Flight Center is the only known place
  that has the equipment and expertise to playback the tapes and to recover the data.

• The DEL is slated for closure in October 2006.
  …

• It is vital that the DEL (or some elements of it) remain open and functional, otherwise none
  of the Apollo data tapes can ever be played back and the historic information recovered.

I hope they find those tapes in time. Meanwhile, in other news, we’re back down to eight planets in this system, and we didn’t even have to build a Death Star to do it. I know a lot of bloggers are expressing strong feelings on both sides of this whole Pluto “demotion” issue; me, I don’t care so much. My biggest complaint is that this decision has rendered obsolete all those episodes of classic Battlestar where characters make reverent mention of a semi-mythical system with nine planets…

The word about those missing Apollo 11 tapes that I wrote about the other day has hit the streets, and more information about what they are and where they may have gotten to is coming out. Here are a couple of worthy follow-up articles:

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Have you ever had a vivid dream of being at work, and then your alarm sounds and you end up all disoriented and bummed out because you thought you were already at work but now you realize you have to get up and actually go to work? Yeah, that’s how my day started, and it hasn’t gotten much better since then.

Luckily, I’ve had the InterWeb to provide me with some distraction: I’ve been catching up on my spaceflight-related news. Here are some highlights for any loyal readers who may be interested:

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A few days ago, I received an e-mail that breathlessly announced that we’re about to experience the once-in-a-lifetime spectacle of the planet Mars looming as large in the nighttime sky as our own Moon. Never mind the fact that the Moon is much, much closer to the Earth than the fourth planet of our solar system, and common sense tells you that the nearer object will always look bigger than the farther one. Astronomer Phil Plait debunks this urban legend/spam message here. He’s pretty testy about seeing it again (this same message has circulated before), but, on the positive side, it does give him the chance to post a way-cool image of Mars and the Moon, which I’ve borrowed and am posting here for the enjoyment of my three loyal readers:

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