Events To Highlight Industry Collaboration For Reaching The Planet Mars

By Maxine Scheer

Leaders from the aerospace community held a press conference at EAA AirVenture on Monday to get the word out on Space-related events scheduled Tuesday for Space Day. "AirVenture represents an audience interested in the space program," said Charlie Precourt of ATK.  The presence of NASA and the ATK, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Aerojet Rocketdyne team is intended to build awareness of NASA's commitment to achieving the mission of human space flight to Mars.

AirVenture attendees will learn about upcoming milestones that are part of six major phases of incremental technology and capacity building to safely launch, land, and return space vehicles when a convergence of distance and conditions in space are calculated as optimal.

Events Tuesday include an overview of the Orion spacecraft's first test flight happening later this year, Exploration Flight Test -1 (EFT-1).  The forum will be held at 8:30am at the College Pavilion.  If Monday's standing room only crowd for the Deep Space panel is a predictor, attendees are encouraged to arrive early.

At 2:30, Charlie Precourt of ATK will be moderating a session at Honda Aircraft Forum 7, titled, "A Trip to Mars".  A panel that includes NASA and industry executives will discuss what it will take for the first manned mission to Mars to succeed, and the current status of this mission.

Space Day concludes with Space-related events with a screening at Theater in the Woods at 8:45 of a new film, "I want to be an Astronaut", moderated by David Hartman with panelists Charlie Precourt and Joe Engle.

The industry team is participating in the EAA Innovations Pavilion, located adjacent to College Park.  Visitors to AirVenture are encouraged to bring the kids and learn more about the mission. Throughout the week, there will be other forums as well.

FMI: www.nasa.gov, www.atk.com