Powder at Kennedy Space Center tests positive for cocaine

By Rich Phillips, CNN

Miami (CNN) -- NASA's Inspector General's Office says an investigation is under way after a white powdery substance found at the Kennedy Space Center tested positive for cocaine.

"Law enforcement personnel field tested the substance, which indicated a positive test for cocaine," said Renee Juhans, an executive officer with the office.

"The substance is now at an accredited crime lab for further testing," she said.

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NASA Scientist Claims Evidence of Alien Life on Meteorite

Garrett Tenney
Fox News
March 6, 2011

We are not alone in the universe — and alien life forms may have a lot more in common with life on Earth than we had previously thought.


That’s the stunning conclusion one NASA scientist has come to, releasing his groundbreaking revelations in a new study in the March edition of the Journal of Cosmology.

Dr. Richard B. Hoover, an astrobiologist with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, has traveled to remote areas in Antarctica, Siberia, and Alaska, amongst others, for over ten years now, collecting and studying meteorites. He gave FoxNews.com early access to the out-of-this-world research, published late Friday evening in the March edition of the Journal of Cosmology. In it, Hoover describes the latest findings in his study of an extremely rare class of meteorites, called CI1 carbonaceous chondrites — only nine such meteorites are known to exist on Earth.

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Military Wants More Global Partnerships In Space

WTOV9
February 20, 2011

WASHINGTON — The U.S. military needs to better protect its satellites and strengthen its ability to use them as weapons as the uncharted battlefield of space becomes increasingly crowded and dangerous, Pentagon leaders say.

A new military strategy for space calls for greater cooperation with other nations on space-based programs to improve America’s ability to deter enemies.

“It’s a domain, like air land and sea,” said Gen. Kevin Chilton, who headed U.S. Strategic Command until he retired recently.

The U.S., he said, needs to make sure that it protects and maintains the battlefield capabilities it gets from space-based assets, including global positioning data, missile warning system information, and communications with fighters or unmanned drones.

As the U.S. and other countries depend more on their satellites for critical data, those assets become greater targets for enemies.

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Huge solar flare said to jam China communications

AFP
Feb 17, 2011

The strongest solar flare in four years disrupted radio communications in southern China, according to the China Meteorological Administration.
The solar flare, a huge explosion on the sun’s surface caused by magnetic activity, affected transmissions in southern China on Tuesday, Xinhua news agency reported, quoting the CMA.

The US space administration NASA confirmed that Monday’s solar flare was the largest in four years, and the event sparked predictions of heightened activity on the northern hemisphere of the sun.

“X-class flares are the most powerful of all solar events that can trigger radio blackouts and long-lasting radiation storms,” disrupting telecommunications and electric grids, NASA said.

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Largest planet in the solar system could be about to be  discovered - and it's up to four times the size of Jupiter

By Daily Mail Reporter

Scientists believe they may have found a new planet in the far reaches of the solar system, up to four times the mass of Jupiter.

Its orbit would be thousands of times further from the Sun than the Earth's - which could explain why it has so far remained undiscovered.

Data which could prove the existence of Tyche, a gas giant in the outer Oort Cloud, is set to be released later this year - although some believe proof has already been garnered by Nasa with its pace telescope, Wise, and is waiting to be pored over.

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72 new images of comet Tempel 1 streaming in from Stardust-NExT flyby

Stardust-NExT sped to within 112 miles of the comet Monday at 11:39 p.m. EST. During the flyby, it snapped 72 new images of comet Tempel-1. Stand by for scientists' analysis of what they see.

By Pete Spotts, Staff writer
Christian Science Monitor

Images taken during the Stardust-NExT mission's flyby of comet Tempel 1 Monday night are trickling in to a happy but bleary-eyed science team eager to comb them for clues about the comet's history and changes the comet may have undergone since 2005, when another spacecraft took its measure.

After a trip of slightly more than 5.3 billion miles since its launch in February 1999, Stardust-NExT sped to within 112 miles of the comet, snapping 72 images during the flyby.

It's the first time researchers have gathered flyby data on the same comet twice.

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