In other words, NASA will have the resources to help private companies start to develop their own space stations. NASA commanded the scoop to start the process of freeing itself on Wednesday morning. Prior to leaving the spacecraft Steve must verify the deployment of the large litter scoop attached to the top of the spacecraft. He donned his space suit and briefly stepped outside of the spacecraft to help retract the barrier. Steve’s voice transmission as he stepped into history. At 10:45 a.m. Mountain Time, Steve left the Phoenix Lander and walked into history. Talk of “saving the world” is generally best left to comic book characters and prophets — unless you happen to work for any of several international organizations tasked with identifying and tracking near-Earth objects (NEOs). “The International Space Station is a test bed for a host of technologies that are helping us increase our knowledge of how we operate in space and enable us to explore even farther into the solar system,” said Sam Scimemi, the space station’s division director at NASA, in a statement. The Space Shuttle program occupied over 654 facilities, used over 1.2 million line items of equipment, and employed over 5,000 people.

Steve has enjoyed reading the entries in his guestbook, which are beamed to Mars daily via the Deep Space Network on Earth and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Odyssey in orbit around Mars. Steve the Cat has set foot upon the Planet Mars. Step 2: In the Sign in to set up Office window, select I don’t want to sign in or create an account (it’s a small link at the bottom of the window). Steve the Cat will step out onto the surface of Mars on Saturday morning at 10:45am Mountain Time. This will allow Steve to step out onto the Martian surface within the next day or two. Air pressure is denoted in all sorts of ways: pounds per square inch (or psi) for tire pressure, inches of mercury for surface atmospheric pressure and millibars for air pressure aloft. The AQI measures concentrations of five air pollutants: ozone, sulfur dioxide, particulate matter, carbon monoxide and nitrogen dioxide. When President Obama took office in 2009, the shuttle replacement program, known as Constellation, was experiencing significant technical problems; its initial cost estimates had tripled; and its schedule had slipped five years in its first four years of development.

His nomination signals an intention by the president to continue this focus. Confirmation of his successful egress will reach Earth 15 minutes later since the signals take that long to travel from Mars to Earth at the speed of light. As Steve placed his paws on the Martian soil he uttered, “It is the curiosity of cats that has led us to the northern polar region of Mars. Steve can be seen looking out of the cat porthole while analyzing the region surrounding the lander in preparation for his first steps onto the Martian surface. Steve likened the Martian Surface to a giant litter box, although he wasn’t sure if it was clumpable. If all goes well with the deployment of Phoenix’s litter scoop on Thursday, Steve should be taking his first steps onto the Martian surface early next week! NASA’s Phoenix lander has successfully completed the deployment of its robotic litter scoop, putting it on track to start scooping the Martian soil within the next few days.

The robotic arm on NASA’s Phoenix lander has captured an image of Steve inside the spacecraft. NASA’s Mars Exploration Program (Press release). The exact time of Steve’s return will be determined based on the length of the primary Phoenix mission, which is dependent on the weather on Mars. Like the experiments on the Phoenix Lander, Steve’s primary mission is to search for signs that life could exist on Mars. Has Steve found any life on Mars? If Steve actually finds life THAT would be the cat’s meow! Because Steve had just completed a 16 hour sleep period prior to his EVA (Extra Vehicular Activity), he had lots of energy available for his first Martian excursion. Steve wanted to wait until the Phoenix Lander collected its first soil sample for analysis as an extra precaution against any form of contamination. Steve wanted to make doubly sure that he would not contaminate the sample. Most of the warming occurred in the past 35 years, with 16 of the 17 warmest years on record occurring since 2001. Not only was 2016 the warmest year on record, but eight of the 12 months that make up the year – from January through September, with the exception of June – were the warmest on record for those respective months.