NASA refuse to carry out ET Life experiments.

Head of NASA media services dead at 42

CAPE CANAVERAL, Nov 27 (Reuters) - Brian Welch, the head of NASA's media operations and former Space Shuttle commentator, has died after suffering a heart attack at 42, the space agency said on Monday.
Welch, a native of Fulton, Kentucky, died on Friday. "All of us at NASA are stunned and saddened by this tragic loss," said NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin. "Brian's love and enthusiasm for space flight and exploration was infectious. He approached his job with a passion and a purpose and truly embodied the spirit of this agency."
As Director of Media Services, Welch was responsible for overall agency news operations, NASA Television and its Internet services. He began his NASA career in 1979 and became editor of the Space News Roundup at the Johnson Space Center in Houston in 1981. Later he was a mission commentator, providing real-time descriptions from the Mission Control Center during space shuttle flights.
Welch was appointed NASA's Chief of News and Information in 1994 and Director of Media Services four years later.
A graduate of Murray State University in Murray, Kentucky, he is survived by his mother, a brother and a sister.
(C) Reuters Limited 2000.

Extracts from an interview with Brian Welch are included in the book DARK MOON and the video What happened on the Moon?

Aulis.

NASA caught in blatant manipulation of Space Shuttle video feed

A videotape recently released by California researcher Jeff Challender suggests that NASA is continuing to be economical with the truth regarding its activities and programs.
A segment from this tape can be played back from the CSETI website under 'What's New' http://www.cseti.org Jeff has put together a compilation of space anomalies from NASA video material recorded directly from recent Space Shuttle missions via his Sacramento, CA cable station.

Of particular note is a six minute segment from the STS-99 mission that shows the Earth viewed from the Shuttle, with land disappearing, and the Shuttle moving over a large body of water (ocean). This footage was recorded on Feb 17, 2000. There is however, one major problem.According to the accompanying NASA-animated schematic of the Shuttle's orbit THE SHUTTLE SHOULD HAVE BEEN OVER AFRICA (i.e. land) FOR THE ENTIRE DURATION OF THE SHOT.

NASA, for reasons unknown, did not show a live feed, but substituted archive footage from a totally different mission.

At face value this tape would appear to be further evidence that NASA's space program, as fed to the public, is mere smoke and mirrors.The complete tape also contains many other anomalies, including moving pulsating lights etc. But whenever something interesting starts to happen, the feed cuts back to Mission Control, or substituted herky-jerky S-band transmissions.

This one hour tape can be obtained from Jefchall@worldnet.att.net
(Jeff Challender, 2768 Mendel Way, Sacramento, CA 95833-201 USA).

August USA: NASA says learned from mistakes for new mission.

WASHINGTON, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Still reeling from the spectacular failures of two Mars missions last year, NASA said on Thursday it had learned from its mistakes and would not repeat them in an ambitious new mission for 2003. Edward Weiler, associate administrator in NASA's Office of Space Science, said communications and software shortcomings, brought on in part staff cuts, had plagued the agency.

But he said NASA had learned important lessons that it would apply to missions in 2001 and 2003. The second mission, which NASA outlined on Thursday, will take two roving robots to the planet's surface to look for evidence of water.

NASA said the two golf cart-sized rovers will be catapulted by rockets to Mars and, protected by air bags, bounce to the surface. Last December, the Mars Polar Lander smashed to the surface after a false signal caused its engines shut off before it landed. Two associated probes supposedly designed to crash and burrow into the planet's surface simply disappeared.

Just months before, the Mars Climate Orbiter burned up in the planet's atmosphere after an embarrassing misunderstanding over English and metric measurements.

In March, an 18-member committee headed by former NASA official Thomas Young criticised NASA's "faster, cheaper, better" philosophy, saying it had caused programmes to be underfunded by about 30 percent and encouraged staffers to cut corners in vital areas.

The Young report also said there were not enough people to do the job right and not enough communication between NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California and NASA headquarters in Washington when problems loomed.

It found poor communication between the laboratory and Lockheed-Martin, the primary contractor for the Mars probes.

Weiler said the agency had responded by putting all the Mars projects under one official, the newly named Mars programme director, Scott Hubbard, who is now based in Washington, D.C.

"The bottom line is there are some very clear recommendations from the Thomas Young committee," he told reporters.

He said NASA was following a virtual checklist handed down by the group. "One of the consistent themes was a lack of communication," Weiler said. "Had higher-level managers known there was a problem about the software communication between Lockheed and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, we would have been all over it."

He said staffers had been afraid to report problems because they knew of budget and staffing restraints and did not want to add to the burden. Now, he said, clear lines of communication had been established and programmes would be funded more carefully.

"We are no longer going to do a Mars programme that is very challenging and very aggressive with 10 percent reserves," Weiler said. "Is this a step away from faster, better, cheaper?" he added. No, he said, adding that the 2003 mission will still cost about a quarter of what the Viking lander missions cost in the 1970s.

© Reuters Limited 2000.

Source: REUTERS NEWS SERVICE