ART PRINTS BY ERQING XU

SEMPER PARATUS ALWAYS READY The Coast Guard Marching Song (sheet music)

Figuring out our logo color palette. Going for representations of Earth, Mars, the moon, and Venus (plus a rocket). Thoughts?

Marvin created a displacement map from the moon landscape by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). He's still working on this, but it looks like it's coming along!

Haleakala Observatory atop a volcano

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NASA vs Amtrak vs the National Park Service

Space tourism is still a ways off, but NASA, everybody’s favorite government agency, released some pretty sweet posters for destinations you’ll (hopefully!) be able to visit someday. 

Turns out, they’re not the only agency with some pretty rad graphic design. Here’s one of Amtrak’s iconic rail lines. 

And this poster for Yellowstone National Park, from 1938. 

Although NASA claims there might be a few more geysers to see on Enceladus

Or maybe take a trip closer to home.

Or go visit the histroic Sequoia National Park. This poster is from the early 40′s. 

For the history buff, see some of NASA’s historic sites, on Mars!

But even NASA knows, there’s only one Earth, “Your Oasis in Space.” 

See the full NASA collection over at their website. 

-Austin

Star Trek fans protest the cancellation of the show (1968)

     This SR-71 Blackbird cockpit got more flight time than all of the other Blackbird aircraft put together, and every single SR pilot, at one point or another, had their hands on these stick and throttles. This is the one and only SR-71 simulator, used for crew selection and training, on display at the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas, Texas.

     Even though this is a simulator, this is truly a Blackbird cockpit. Every component is the same, and the only visual difference are the windows are not transparent. At one point, the Air Force considered installing a virtual reality display system in the windows, but it was decided that the Blackbird simulator did not need a visual reference to the world surrounding them, because in this bird, you were more of a systems operator than a pilot. 

     This simulator, operating from 1965 to 1999, was just as top secret as any of the Blackbird aircraft, for obvious reasons. Every Blackbird pilot went through a selection process, and a year of training. During the selection process, applicants spent 30 hours in the simulator. If you were lucky enough to be selected as a pilot, you spent 100 hours in the sim before you would even touch one of the two-seat SR-71B or SR-71C trainer aircraft. This training process was longer and more intensive than any aircraft in the world, excluding the space shuttle. This was because each Blackbird was truly a national asset, and there were so few of them.

     Nearly every Blackbird pilot author, at one point or another, has mentioned this simulator in their book. They recount tales of sweating bullets during the selection process, spending hours in the sim at a time, learning hard lessons. They also tell about how good the sim was, and how once they finally flew an actual Blackbird, they felt right at home.

     The Frontiers of Flight Museum was gracious enough to let Project Habu inside the cockpit to photograph up close, which is typically not open to the public. It was truly surreal to sit in this cockpit and touch the controls, knowing every one of the pilots whom I admire so much, started right here. You can view the outside of the simulator in a previous post (click here to view). 

A Mechanical Harmony to NASA’s Webb Telescope Sunshield

NASA’s Webb telescope sunshield, opened for inspection. In this photo, engineers and scientists examine the sunshield layers on this full-sized test unit.    Image courtesy Northrop Grumman and Alex Evers. For a larger version of this image please go here. Watch a video on the research here and here.

Read more ~ SpaceDaily

Here’s how fast you’d have to go to leave every planet in the solar system: