Year-long Mission in Space

Today, astronaut Scott Kelly and cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko will launch from Baikonur in the Ukraine to begin a year-long mission in space on board the International Space Station. The unique thing about Scott Kelly is the mission will allow us to look at how extended time in space can affect the human body as Scott Kelly has a twin brother, retired astronaut Mark Kelly.


The science we will learn from this is remarkable because it will give us an understanding of how the human body will react to extended time in space, and give us knowledge of how to alleviate problems on the body for longer duration flights, for example, to Mars.


Follow Scott Kelly on twitter here.
Follow Mark Kelly on twitter here.
Follow the International Space Station here.


Watch the launch live here.

NASA to Resume Launching Astronauts to Space

NASA announced yesterday that it will resume launching astronauts into space using two American companies, Boeing and SpaceX. This will be done to stop our reliance on the Russians to launch astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

Boeing will be using its CST-100 spacecraft and SpaceX will be using the Crew Dragon spacecraft. NASA is currently using SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft to send supplies to the ISS.

This is good news for NASA as it may be the first step to making space travel privatized in the US instead of making space travel exclusively for military and the government.

News of the announcement is here on the NASA website.