Commander Kelly took this photo on September 23, 2015, on his 180th day in orbit – the halfway mark in his stay on Station as part of NASA’s A Year in Space program. Read about what it’s like for him at Air&Space Smithsonian. In the photograph below, north is to the right. To help you orient yourself, […]
Space Station Commander Scott Kelly Photographs the Nile River and Middle East from Space
Space Station Commander Scott Kelly on the International Space Station posted the following photo on his Twitter feed (@StationCDRKelly) just about an hour ago, at 7:24 pm ET September 22, 2015. To zoom in, first click on the photo to take you to Twitter, and then click on the photo again. At night the Nile […]
THE SOLUTION to the Mission 9 Student Challenge: Understanding Weightlessness – You Want Me to Take a Bathroom Scale Where?
To teachers starting Mission 9 to ISS, this challenge was posted a week ago on Monday, September 14, 2015. It is designed to help you get your students immersed in Mission 9 microgravity experiment design by first exploring the concept of microgravity (often referred to as the phenomenon of ‘weightlessness’). As promised, here is the solution to […]
For SSEP Mission 9 to ISS Student Researchers – A Challenge for the Start of Program: Understanding Weightlessness – You Want Me to Take a Bathroom Scale Where?
This post is for teachers in the 22 communities across the U.S. and Canada that just started SSEP Mission 9 to ISS. You are invited to use this Challenge with your students to get them thinking about the concept of microgravity (the technical name for the phenomenon of ‘weightlessness’). In the Challenge below, students are […]
The Tradition Continues – To the Students, Teachers, and Communities Starting SSEP Mission 9 to ISS, Welcome Aboard America’s and Canada’s Space Program, NASA Johnson Style, and One Direction
It’s now a space program tradition. Whenever we start a new SSEP flight opportunity, it’s time for NASA Johnson Style. It’s the video below that will get students and teachers in the frame of mind to start Mission 9 to ISS. We want everyone to recognize that what they are about to embark upon […]
Astronauts Eat Space-Grown Food for the First Time
‘Awesome’, ‘tastes good’, ‘kind of like Arugula’ and ‘that’s fresh’ are the responses of Astronauts Scott Kelly, Kjell Lindgren, and Kimiya Yui of Japan after taking their first bites of food grown on the International Space Station on Monday, August 10, 2015. The astronauts sampled fresh red romaine lettuce, the first food to be grown, […]
Loss of SpaceX CRS 7 and Mission 7 Odyssey
SpaceX CRS-7 suffered a critical failure and exploded about 1 minute after launch with complete loss of vehicle. We are expecting a post-event News Conference on NASA TV but currently the expectation is no earlier than 12:30 pm ET. A NASA TV portal is provided below. After the explosion all visitors at the Kennedy Space Center […]
WATCH LIVE: Launch of SSEP Mission 7 Odyssey, TODAY 10:21 am ET
Today, at 10:21 am ET, SpaceX CRS-7 is launching from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, adjacent to Kennedy Space Center. The vehicle carries the Student Spaceflight Experiments Program (SSEP) Mission 7 to ISS Odyssey payload of student experiments. The National Center for Earth and Space Science Education (NCESSE) invites you to watch the launch live, […]
Pretty Powerful Food for Thought: ISS and the Moon – A SSEP Teachable Moment
Sometimes a photo can speak volumes about scale. The photo of the Moon below was taken by Theirry Legault on December 20, 2010, when the International Space Station (ISS) just happened to pass in front of the Moon as seen from Theirry’s location on Earth. Look closely, do you see ISS? Now for the fun […]
LIVE VIDEO OF EARTH FROM ISS – A SSEP Teachable Moment
Last month, at the top of the SSEP Homepage, we added a new section titled “Multimedia”, which includes currently 3 multimedia resources, each accessible by opening up a ‘toggle’. The new multimedia section is meant to provide SSEP students, teachers, and their communities a real world connection to the International Space Station, its crew, and the […]