March 18, 2011 Grey Hautaluoma Headquarters, Washington 202-358-0668 grey.hautaluoma-1@nasa.gov MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-062 NASA ADMINISTRATOR PARTICIPATES IN CEREMONY HONORING ASTRONAUT RON MCNAIR WASHINGTON -- NASA Administrator Charles Bolden will travel to his home state of South Carolina Monday, March 21, to participate in the dedication of the Dr. Ronald E. McNair Life History Center in Lake City. McNair, a Lake City native, was a member of the space shuttle Challenger crew lost in the January 1986 acci ...Continue Reading

March 18, 2011 Ann Marie Trotta Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1601 ann.marie.trotta@nasa.gov MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-060 NASA LEADERS TO MENTOR NEW YORK STUDENTS ON MARCH 22 WASHINGTON -- NASA is hosting a March 22 forum in New York City to share the excitement of space exploration and encourage students - especially girls - to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). NASA's Deputy Administrator Lori Garver and NASA's Associate Administrator for Education Leland Me ...Continue Reading

March 17, 2011 Dwayne Brown Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1726 dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov Paulette Campbell Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md. 240-228-6792 paulette.campbell@jhuapl.edu RELEASE: 11-079 NASA'S MESSENGER SPACECRAFT BEGINS HISTORIC ORBIT AROUND MERCURY WASHINGTON -- NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft successfully achieved orbit around Mercury at approximately 9 p.m. EDT Thursday. This marks the first time a spacecraft has accomplished this engineering and scienti ...Continue Reading

:Product: Solar Region Summary :Issued: 2011 Mar 18 0030 UTC # Prepared jointly by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, NOAA, # Space Weather Prediction Center and the U.S. Air Force. # Joint USAF/NOAA Solar Region Summary SRS Number 77 Issued at 0030Z on 18 Mar 2011 Report compiled from data received at SWO on 17 Mar I. Regions with Sunspots. Locations Valid at 17/2400Z Nmbr Location Lo Area Z LL NN Mag Type 1169 N18W89 063 0100 Hsx 03 02 Alpha 1173 S29E26 308 0060 Cao 08 11 Beta 1174 N22W36 ...Continue Reading

March 17, 2011 Dwayne Brown Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1726 dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov Paulette Campbell Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md. 240-228-6792 paulette.campbell@jhuapl.edu MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-061 NASA TV TO COVER MESSENGER SPACECRAFT ENTERING MERCURY'S ORBIT WASHINGTON -- NASA Television and the agency's website will carry live coverage from 8 to 10 p.m. EDT Thursday as the first spacecraft enters Mercury's orbit. The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physi ...Continue Reading

March 17, 2011 Ann Marie Trotta Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1601 ann.marie.trotta@nasa.gov Sandra L. Nagy Glenn Research Center, Cleveland 216-433-9079 sandra.l.nagy@nasa.gov MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-058 NASA GLENN "DROPS" STUDENT MICROGRAVITY EXPERIMENTS CLEVELAND -- NASA has selected four high school teams of students to test their science experiments in a competition that simulates the microgravity in space. The experiments will be dropped next week into a ...Continue Reading

March 17, 2011 Joshua Buck Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1100 jbuck@nasa.gov Nicole Cloutier-Lemasters Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 nicole.cloutier-1@nasa.gov MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-059 ASTRONAUT SCOTT KELLY AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS HOUSTON -- After a five-month stay aboard the International Space Station, astronaut Scott Kelly will be available for live satellite interviews on Tuesday, March 22, from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. Kelly will be available from 6 to 8 a.m. ...Continue Reading

March 17, 2011 J. D. Harrington/Michael Braukus Headquarters 202-358-5241/1979 j.d.harrington@nasa.gov/michael.j.braukus@nasa.gov Jennifer Stanfield Marshall Space Flight Center, Ala. 256-544-0034 jennifer.stanfield@nasa.gov MEDIA ADVISORY: M11-057 NASA "CAN CRUSH" TEST WILL AID FUTURE ROCKET DESIGN WASHINGTON -- NASA will conduct an innovative engineering test on March 23 to help improve future heavy-lift launch vehicles design. The 10:30 a.m. EDT test, ...Continue Reading

:Product: Solar Region Summary :Issued: 2011 Mar 17 0030 UTC # Prepared jointly by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce, NOAA, # Space Weather Prediction Center and the U.S. Air Force. # Joint USAF/NOAA Solar Region Summary SRS Number 76 Issued at 0030Z on 17 Mar 2011 Report compiled from data received at SWO on 16 Mar I. Regions with Sunspots. Locations Valid at 16/2400Z Nmbr Location Lo Area Z LL NN Mag Type 1169 N17W75 062 0260 Dhi 09 09 Beta-Gamma 1172 N11E02 345 0000 Axx 01 01 Alpha 1173 S28 ...Continue Reading

Jonathan's Space Report No. 639 2011 Mar 16 Somerville, MA, USA -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Best wishes to my colleagues and readers in Japan. I understand that ISAS/Sagamihara is largely undamaged, but the ISS control center at JAXA/Tsukuba is out of action for the time being, thankfully with no casualties. I have not yet heard reports from the Kakuda hypersonic propulsion research center at Miyagi, near the epicenter. I expe ...Continue Reading