Happiness, I watched NASA launch Ares I-X via the net on the BBC site.  It was magical, the Tallest rocket ever built. I remeber seing the inards of this might vehicle on a TV program about future NASA projects. This is a new type of rocket and its believed that it might be instrumental in Future Moon missions or even the Trip to Mars which does appear to be the target.

Although the launch was successful, this test flight could well be its last flight. But , I am optimistic. People will find a way , God willing, to continue the adventure into space. Ares I-X might be a footnote, but what a glorious one she is. Bravo

So Guy Laliberte is back on Earth after visiting the International Space Station(ISS) Via the Russian Soyuz TMA-14 space craft.

He was in Space for about 11 days and its thought that the trip cost him a considerable amount of money. Happily for him, the overall financial cost to him probably hasn't serious dented his Billion Dollar Fortune.

When the first Space tourist went up, There was quite a lot of commentary in the Newspapers about how in appropriate it was to allow visitors at the ISS.  How things have changed, with all the problems the USA has launching Shuttles, the ISS survival probably now depends heavily on the Russian Soyez flights.  Soyuz probably benefits a lot from the money paid over by the space tourists.

NASA deliberately crashed a space vehicle into the Moon a few hours ago and did not get what they where expecting. It was a space craft called LCROSS. Apparently, crashing the craft into the moon at 5600 mph should have raised a massive plume of dust which should have remained visible for a long time in the moons airless low gravity environment. In theory, the scientists back at NASA would then have been able to analyse the plume for its content and search for signs of water. It did not work out, there is no visible dust cloud,  the early readings don't support a dust cloud either. But they're still checking.

Anyway, I have a wild theory for anyone who's interested. Perhaps the Crater they targeted did contain water, a lot more than they imagined, and that this water has turn ed Crater surface into a gelatinous bog They the ejecta from the crash would have been heavier than expected and settled back down rapidly, ego , no dust cloud.

So Saturn has a previously unknown ring of debris circling it at a distanse of About  eight million miles from the Planet.  However, its very thin and some believe that all the material in this ring would just fill in a Crate on the Moon Phoebe.

For me, One of the things this really illustrates is the number of Navigational hazards in our Solar System. A saterllite or a manned Space craft travelling unknowingly into  this ring of dust could suffer heavy damage thanks to the relative velocities of the space craft and the debris.