SpaceQ Space news and analysis.

“And there you have it, the Great Canadian Handshake,” then astronaut Steve MacLean said over a scratchy radio from space back in 2006 after using the Canadarm2 on the International Space Station (ISS) to grasp 16 tonnes of machinery handed to him by a second Canadarm on the space shuttle Atlantis.

On May 11th the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology will meet a delegation of astronauts led by former astronaut and current Canadian Space Agency (CSA) president Steve MacLean.

The Advanced Plant Experiments on Orbit (APEX-CSA2) white spruce seedlings have sprouted some new shoots! This time-lapse video shows a close-up of the trees in their incubator on board the International Space Station over a six-day period. The new growth appears as light-green and orange buds that unfurl into fresh needles towards the end of the video. The seedlings will continue to grow in space …

The Canadian Space Agency yesterday issued a request for proposals for a $6 million Mars Exploration Science Rover (MESR) prototype as part of their Exploration Surface Mobility (ESM) program. The due date for proposals is June 8 and work must be completed by the end of December 2012.

There’s no news this week in space for Canada, at least until we absorb and assess the comments and whispered gossip coming out of last weeks Canadian Space Agency Workshop on Suborbital Platforms and Nanosatellites, but there’s lots of stuff going on elsewhere and this week we’re going to inventory some of those stories.

Air Force One touched down at 1:24 p.m. (EDT) today at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) carrying President Barack Obama and dignitaries for a short visit to explain and push his vision of NASA’s transformation. At the same time he came to reassure KSC workers that there would be some jobs and retraining money available. After a brief visit around KSC including a guided tour …

This week in space for Canada is all about the contrast between the generally positive business and industry reaction to the changes underway within the American space program, the silence these very same changes seem to be eliciting from within the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and about what the CSA might need to do to stay on top of the situation.

A British National Space Centre (BNSC) feature on CryoSat-2. CryoSat-2 will determine variations in the thickness of floating sea-ice so that seasonal and inter-annual variations can be detected. The satellite will also survey the surface of continental ice sheets to detect small elevation changes. Information on precise variations in ice thickness will further our understanding of the relationship between ice and climate change. As a …

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) CryoSat-2 earth observation satellite was successfully launched yesterday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on a Russian Dnepr rocket. As a cooperating member of ESA, the Canadian Space Agency is contributing to ESA’s Earth Observation Envelope Programme and therefore is participating in the mission.