Philae: first soft landing on a comet

Philae on Comet 67PLaunched in 2004, the European Space Agency’s Rosetta space probe, orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in the outer solar system, releases the Philae robotic lander to descend to 67P’s surface. The lander’s harpoon anchoring system doesn’t work entirely as expected, and Philae bounces off the surface and goes spaceborne again for two hours before coming to rest on the comet once more. Though Philae is able to gather scientific data and the first-ever pictures from a comet’s surface, the nearby geography prevents its solar panels from keeping its batteries at a full charge; ESA ground controllers are only able to intermittently contact Philae.

Glen A. Larson, Battlestar Galactica creator, dies

Glen A. LarsonA television producer with an improbably long list of mega-hit series, including the science fiction shows Battlestar Galactica, Buck Rogers In The 25th Century, The Six Million Dollar Man, Automan, and Knight Rider, Glen A. Larson dies of cancer at the age of 77. Larson’s long string of non-genre hits includes such series as Magnum P.I., Manimal, Quincy M.E., The Fall Guy, Alias Smith And Jones, and many others.

Star Wars: Rebels: Empire Day

Star Wars: RebelsCable channel Disney XD premieres the seventh episode of the series Star Wars: Rebels, a CGI animated storyline falling between the original and prequel trilogies of the Star Wars saga. Brent Spiner (Star Trek: The Next Generation) and Peter MacNicol (Ghostbusters II) guest star. Read more

Star Wars: Rebels: Gathering Forces

Star Wars: RebelsCable channel Disney XD premieres the eighth episode of the series Star Wars: Rebels, a CGI animated storyline falling between the original and prequel trilogies of the Star Wars saga. Peter MacNicol (Ghostbusters II) guest stars. Read more

Hayabusa 2: back to the asteroid belt

Hayabusa2The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launches the Hayabusa-2 unmanned space probe, intended to study and sample asteroid 162173 Ryugu in 2018. Mission plans call for the ion-engine-powered Hayabusa-2 to remain at Ryugu for a year before returning to Earth with its sample. Hayabusa-2 also carries a European-built lander and an explosive penetrator to expose the asteroid’s subsurface material (using the same principle as the Deep Impact mission to Comet Tempel 1 in 2005.

Orion EFT-1

Orion EFT-1NASA launches Exploration Flight Test 1, the maiden unmanned voyage of the next-generation Orion space vehicle which is intended to assume the Space Shuttle’s place as NASA’s primary manned spacecraft. Heavily instrumented, Orion is boosted to a high altitude of 3,600 miles during its second orbit, and returns to Earth at 20,000mph, the fastest return of a man-rated spacecraft since the Apollo lunar missions. The flight profile of the EFT-1 mission is similar to that of 1967’s Apollo 4 mission, though ongoing budget constraints force NASA to launch Orion atop a Delta IV Heavy booster rather than the Space Launch System booster for which Orion has been designed. This budget crunch also prevents the Orion program from moving forward at the pace of Apollo: the next Orion flight will not take place for several years. Orion EFT-1 is also the first American spacecraft to be recovered from sea after a splashdown since 1975’s Apollo-Soyuz mission.

Star Trek director Joseph Sargent dies

Star TrekFour-time Emmy winning film and TV director Joseph Sargent, who directed the influential Star Trek episode The Corbomite Maneuver (the first to be filmed after NBC picked up the series), dies at the age of 89. Having worked until he was 84, Sargant also directed episodes of Kojak, The Man From UNCLE, and the Fugitive, and movies and TV movies such as The Taking of Pelham One Two Three and the 1991 Leonard Nimoy drama Never Forget.

Star Wars: Rebels: Path Of The Jedi

Star Wars: RebelsCable channel Disney XD premieres the ninth episode of the series Star Wars: Rebels, a CGI animated storyline falling between the original and prequel trilogies of the Star Wars saga. Frank Oz (the voice of Yoda in the original Star Wars films) guest stars. Read more

Agent Carter: Now Is Not The End

Agent CarterThe first episode of the Marvel Cinematic Universe series Agent Carter, starring Hayley Attwell as Agent Peggy Carter (a character she established in 2011’s Marvel movie Captain America: The First Avenger), premieres on ABC. James Frain (Tron Legacy, Star Trek: Discovery) guest stars.

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Agent Carter: Bridge And Tunnel

Agent CarterThe second episode of the Marvel Cinematic Universe series Agent Carter, starring Hayley Attwell as Agent Peggy Carter (a character she established in 2011’s Marvel movie Captain America: The First Avenger), is broadcast on ABC. James Frain (Tron Legacy, Star Trek: Discovery) and Ray Wise (Twin Peaks) guest star in an episode directed by Joe Russo (Avengers: Infinity War, Avengers: Endgame).

More about Agent Carter in theLogBook.com Store
Agent Carter now streaming on Amazon Prime

AKATSUKI’s second shot at Venus

Akatsuki at VenusJAXA, the Japanese space agency, announces its plans to put the unmanned AKATSUKI space probe into orbit around Venus. Originally launched in 2010, AKATSUKI failed to orbit the planet in December of that year due to a critical engine malfunction and instead fell into an orbit around the sun, but mission planners have devised a strategy to use its attitude control engines to slow it enough to be captured around Venus when it intersects the planet’s orbit again. AKATSUKI, more formally known as the Venus Climate Orbiter, is intended to study the atmosphere and weather of Venus, a mission it will begin in December if it can successfully enter orbit.

Planet Of The Apes: The TV Series (expanded soundtrack)

Planet Of The Apes TV soundtrackLa-La Land Record releases an expanded 2-CD edition of the soundtrack from the 1974 Planet Of The Apes TV series, featuring music by Lalo Schifrin, Richard LaSalle and Earle Hagen. This release adds an additional CD of material to the previously released music from the previous decade’s single-CD edition. Read more

Star Wars: Rebels: Idiot’s Array

Star Wars: RebelsCable channel Disney XD premieres the tenth episode of the series Star Wars: Rebels, a CGI animated storyline falling between the original and prequel trilogies of the Star Wars saga. Billy Dee Williams guest stars as Lando Calrissian. Read more