Mars Curiosity Rover $2.5 Billion Cost: "The Best Stimulus You Could Imagine!"

In the above video, NASA engineer Adam Steltzner discusses the awesomeness that is the Mars Curiosity rover.  My favorite part is when Stelzner addresses the critics of the program's $2.5 billion cost: 

"It's not 2 ½ billion dollars we stuffed in a trunk and blew into space. It’s thousands of high tech jobs spread over 37 states. It's honing and developing our skills in science, engineering, and math."

He notes that the U.S. has slipped to 14^th in science education and 18^th in math¹ – in a world where we're competing for economic prosperity with nations 1 through 13.

"This mission is an investment in high tech jobs, in inspiring the youth of our country, in stepping up rung by rung toward 1^st place.  It's the best stimulus you could imagine!"

If we ever want a chance to be a reputable country in science and math education, we need to spend on the programs that inspire the future.  I hope to see this country become tops in science and math education within my lifetime.

Endeavour Lands in Los Angeles!

Endeavour has finally landed in Los Angeles! It will remain at LAX until its final journey to the California Science Center. I also covered its stopover in Houston a few days ago.

Here are a collection of my favorite tweets from the day.

Space Shuttle Endeavour Lands in Houston

Flickr photo from Lucas A Worthen

The space shuttle Endeavour has completed part of its two leg journey from Kennedy Space Center in Florida to the California Science Center in Exposition Park, in the Los Angeles area. It's currently enjoying a stopover in Houston.  There is a fantastic Flickr group of photos, as well as the #SpotTheShuttle hashtag on Twitter.  

The rest of the journey is highlighted in this clip from the LA Times:

On Thursday, the 747 will refuel at El Paso's Biggs Army Airfield before heading to Edwards Air Force Base in California, where it will be housed overnight.

The shuttle will depart the Mojave Desert base about 7:15 a.m. Friday and will fly low over Palmdale, Lancaster, Rosamond and Mojave before heading north to Sacramento, NASA officials said.

There, Endeavour will fly over the Capitol and turn to San Francisco, where those hoping to catch a glimpse of the shuttle are advised to watch from one of several Bay Area museums, including the Chabot Space and Science Center, the Exploratorium, the Bay Area Discovery Museum, the Lawrence Hall of Science and the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Once the shuttle reaches the Los Angeles area about 10:30 a.m., the orbiter will be carried over landmarks including the Getty Center, the Griffith Observatory, Malibu and Disneyland before landing at Los Angeles International Airport. It will also fly over the California Science Center in Exposition Park, its new permanent home.

Check the livestream of the Houston landing below.

Live stream videos at Ustream

Celebrate Women in Science!

Photo via Mike Wall and Space.com shows Clara Ma, the originator of the Curiosity name

I came across a great article profiling some of the women involved with launching the Curiosity rover into space and landing on Mars. In particular, I love the following quote by Ann Devereaux, a flight systems engineer on the Curiosity team:

When she speaks about her job to young students, she tells them she hates math, according to a profile on NASA’s website. “Who ever said you have to like math to be an engineer?” she adds, understanding that a dislike of math keeps many kids from exploring STEM career. “What’s interesting are the cool applications you can do that need some math applied to them to make them work.”

It's not just about learning obscure, theoretical math - it's about applying math to real world solutions. This is something that I try to get across to the youth that I work with,  but especially young women that tend to be more easily deterred from math than young men.  Showing people the cool applications of math, instead of just problems and equations, is a much better way to get people excited about science.

NASA Landsat 40th Anniversary Photos

On July 23rd, I traveled to DC to attend a NASA event celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Landsat program. The Landsat satellites provide valuable images of the planet for analysis of forests, natural disasters, etc. I joined other NASA twitter followers via the #NASASocial program at the Newseum (Washington, DC) and Goddard Flight Center (Greenbelt, MD).

Check out my coverage of the event below. Follow me on Twitter at @ShareefJackson or search the hashtags #NASASocial and #Landsat for tweets from other attendees.