Space Race 2.0 : The takeaway takeover

This is the news that India have launched their first unmanned moon probe (the brilliantly titled Chandrayaan 1). So between this, China's first space walk and Azerbijan's wacky space trampoline project - it looks like we've got a bonafide space race kicking off.

Personally, I'm slightly disapointed that we couldn't get Kim Jong Il to start the whole thing with waving a giant flag.

Project Space Cock : Step One.

So I was thinking about the X-Prise this morning.

Now, for those of you who don't know the current big X-Prize is to put a remote controlled vehicle on the surface of the moon and drive it around for a bit. Which is rather cool. But as I was reading some of the stuff on their internet forum, I came across some information on the Aquarius Launch Vehicle.

Now, the most important bit of information I found was the costs of getting something put into orbit via Aquarius. $1000 per kilo. So around 500 quid. Now maybe it's just me, but 500 quid to get something that weighs a kilo seems like a fucking bargain. I mean, if you were to build something out of polysterene foam it'd be pretty big before it weighs more than a kilo.

I think you can see where I'm going with this. I'm going to save my cash, and when Aquarius is up and running I'm going to pay them to put a giant glow in the dark foam penis into orbit. That'll teach those fucking astronomers to quit their bitching about light pollution.

Space rockery roundup

So let's talk about space rocks.

Specifically, lets talk about this space rock.

The Ivuna meteorite is important because scientists believe that it's chemical composition is the similar to the conditions that existed at the birth of the solar system, so it's a good way to look at what was going on way back then.

Which is pretty reasonable. I love the fact that the Natural History Museum are keeping half of it for public display, but they're sending the rest off to research labs around the world so that the space rock community can get some researching done.

Good for you Natural History Museum. Though if I'm honest, a chunk of space rock probably isn't as cool as your huge fucking dinosaur skeletons.

Here's a question

Where exactly is the International Space Station? I know it's a question that we'd all like answered.

Well thanks to n2yo.com, you can now find out for yourself.

By clicking here.

Yeah, it's unbelievably geeky.

NASA announce they're going to grow moonalgae

Actually this is kind of two space stories for the price of one. The first is that experiments have found that bacteria can grow in Lunar soil. This is one of those first step things - the bacteria's presence in the Lunar soil will then in theory make it possible for other basic plant forms to be cultivated, and that's a pretty big step toward terraforming.

The other news (which I'm a bit surprised I haven't seen anywhere else) is that NASA are now confirming that they'll be back on the moon by 2020, and they're aiming to build MoonBaseOne. Google no doubt won't be far behind.

X Prize 4 - Great Nephew of X Prize

For those of you who don't know, the original I'm talking about X Prize was a ten million dollar prize for the first privately funded craft to travel into space twice within a fortnight. It was won by SpaceShipOne, a 60s sci fi looking craft designed by Burt Rutan.

The whole point of the X Prize is that it's a catalyst to forward human endevour (something I'm in favour of) as a clear illustration of that, the original X Prize was ten million dollars. SpaceShipOne though, cost one hundred million dollars - so an accountant would tell you that it wasn't worth it. Which is because accountants are stupid and have broken minds.

Anyway, the fourth X Prize is being sponsored by Google, and offers up to 30 million dollars to the first private venture to put a robotic vehicle on the moon, drive it around and do some bunny hops. So yesterday, the Google Lunar X Prize had it's first official entrant. OdysseyMoon are a private company created specifically for the purpose of entering the X Prize, and are from the Isle of Man. That's right. The island that gave you cats with no tails and that funny flag with all the legs on it will soon be putting a robot car on the moon.

I can't wait for the next entrants!