NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden delivered opening remarks at the Humans to Mars Summit 2015, on May 5 at The George Washington University, in Washington. Bolden outlined NASA’s Journey to Mars and the agency’s clear, affordable, and sustainable plan to explore the Red Planet. NASA’s associate administrator for Science John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations Bill Gerstenmaier, and Steve Jurczyk, the associate administrator for the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate participated in a panel discussion at the Summit about the development of capabilities NASA needs to send humans first to an asteroid and then to Mars in the 2030s. Also, One-year mission update, SpaceX pad abort test, FINDER technology update, Small Business Week and Improving vertical flight.

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Humans to Mars Summit

NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden delivered opening remarks at the Humans to Mars Summit 2015, on May 5 at The George Washington University, in Washington. Bolden outlined NASA’s Journey to Mars and the agency’s clear, affordable, and sustainable plan to explore the Red Planet. Others attending included NASA’s associate administrator for Science John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations Bill Gerstenmaier, and Steve Jurczyk, the associate administrator for the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate. They participated in a panel discussion about the development of capabilities NASA needs to send humans first to an asteroid and then to Mars in the 2030s.

One-year mission update

Additional steps on the human Journey to Mars are underway aboard the International Space Station. NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian Federal Space Agency cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko are just over a month into their one-year mission, conducting a host of research to gain beneficial knowledge on the medical, psychological and biomedical challenges faced by astronauts during long-duration spaceflight. For more details on the one-year crew and the research on the station, go to www.nasa.gov/oneyear.

SpaceX pad abort test

The May 6 pad abort test of the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station simulated an emergency abort situation and evaluated the ability of the spacecraft’s system to carry crew members to safety, following a launch abort or a launch pad emergency. This capability is a critical element for the next generation of crew spacecraft being developed by NASA’s commercial partners to fly astronauts to and from the International Space Station. The test is a major step in regaining our ability to launch astronauts into space from American soil.

FINDER technology update

NASA and the Department of Homeland Security held a May 7 demonstration at the Virginia Task Force ONE Training Facility outside Washington to showcase the final prototype of the Finding Individuals for Disaster and Emergency Response or FINDER—a radar technology designed to detect heartbeats of victims trapped in wreckage. FINDER, which previously showed the capability to find people buried under up to 30 feet of rubble, hidden behind 20 feet of solid concrete and from a distance of 100 feet in open spaces, can now also determine the approximate location of trapped individuals. And in a real-world demonstration of the technology’s life-saving potential, FINDER was deployed to assist in the recent earthquake rescue effort in Nepal. It located four individuals trapped under as much as 10 feet of bricks, mud and other debris.

Small Business Week

In a video message to celebrate Small Business Week, NASA Administrator Bolden recognized small businesses that help the agency achieve its goals while boosting the U.S. economy. Meanwhile, associate administrator for Small Business Programs, Glenn Delgado, toured the California facilities of Made In Space, a small 3-D technology company near Ames Research Center, which provided the 3-D printer that recently produced a wrench onboard the International Space Station.

Improving vertical flight

During a May 8 ceremony at NASA’s Langley Research Center, the American Helicopter Society International formally named the Hampton, Virginia facility a Vertical Flight Heritage Site, recognizing Langley’s decades of contributions to improving helicopters and other vertical flight aircraft. Administrator Bolden and Jaiwon Shin, the agency’s associate administrator for Aeronautics, accepted the designation on behalf of the agency. Langley’s groundbreaking vertical flight research dates back to 1917.

And that’s what’s up this week @NASA.