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“Here’s some of the stories trending This
Week at NASA!”

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Vice President Mike Pence visited our Marshall

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Space Flight Center on Sept. 25 to thank employees
working on NASA’s human spaceflight programs.

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He also spoke to the three NASA astronauts
currently serving onboard the International

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Space Station.

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"Literally and figuratively we all look up

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to you and we are grateful for your courage
and your determination and your contribution

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that you make to American leadership in space."

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During a tour, the Vice President also saw
progress being made on our Space Launch System

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rocket, that will send astronauts in our Orion
spacecraft on missions around the Moon and

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ultimately to Mars.

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NASA used satellite data to create this “damage
proxy map” of locations in the San Juan,

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Puerto Rico area that are likely damaged as
a result of Hurricane Maria.

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The map was delivered to the Federal Emergency
Management Agency (FEMA), and other agencies

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to assist in disaster relief efforts.

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Meanwhile, a suitcase-sized radar instrument
capable of detecting human heartbeats under

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rubble, was used by disaster relief workers
following the recent 7.1-magnitude earthquake

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in Mexico City.

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The technology and the device, called FINDER,
which stands for Finding Individuals for Disaster

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and Emergency Response, was developed as a
collaboration between NASA and the Department

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of Homeland Security.

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On Sept. 28, NASA’s Associate Administrator
for Science, Thomas Zurbuchen discussed the

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impact of the August 21, 2017 total solar
eclipse across America, during a Congressional

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Hearing of the House Science Committee’s
Subcommittees on Research & Technology, and

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on Space.

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Our coverage of the solar eclipse was the
agency’s most watched and most followed

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event – with an estimated 50 million viewers
watching the rare event live on NASA TV, on

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the nasa.gov website, and on various social
media platforms.

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Hours after our OSIRIS REx spacecraft sped
past Earth to complete its Earth Gravity Assist

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maneuver on Sept. 22, the spacecraft’s MapCam
captured this color composite image of the

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planet, at a range of approximately 106,000
miles.

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The dark streaks at the top of the image are
caused by short exposure times of less than

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three milliseconds.

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Short exposure times are required to image
objects as bright as Earth – but are not

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anticipated for an object as dark as Bennu
– the asteroid OSIRIS REx will study, starting

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in late 2018.

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NASA researchers used high resolution maps
from the New Horizons spacecraft’s 2015

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flyby of Pluto, to identify large formations
of frozen methane on Pluto’s surface that

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have jagged spires and are as tall as skyscrapers.

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This “bladed terrain”, which occurs only
at high altitudes and in the region around

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the equator of Pluto, is thought to be created
by an erosion process as the methane ice sublimates

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into gas.

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And that’s what’s up this week @NASA …