What's Happening in Space Policy May 25-June 5, 2015

Here is our list of space policy events for the new TWO weeks, May 25-June 5, 2015 and any insight we can offer about them.  Congress is in recess this week for the Memorial Day holiday.  The Senate returns on Sunday, May 31; the House on Monday, June 1.

During the Weeks

At last, a relatively quiet week after all the recent busy-ness.  Monday (May 25) is the observance of Memorial Day and federal government offices are closed.  Congress is in recess for the week despite a fractious Senate session that lasted until the wee hours on Saturday over a non-space related topic — extension of government surveillance authorities under the Patriot Act — that came to no resolution.  Those authorities expire at midnight May 31, so the Senate will return for a rare Sunday session on May 31 to try and find a way forward.  The House returns on Monday, June 1. The Senate already has declined to take up a House-passed measure addressing the topic so it looks like the authorities will indeed expire.  It’s a matter of what bill (if any) the Senate can pass, what the House is willing to accept as a compromise, and how long the process takes.

But that debate is outside the scope of this space policy website.  Suffice it to say that the congressional schedule for when they return is difficult to predict.

NASA has two interesting events this week, though.  First is the announcement of the science instruments for the Europa mission.  NASA had not planned to execute a Europa mission just now, but Congress feels otherwise.  It added money for it the past two years (and appears likely to do so again this year), which led the White House to give NASA permission to include mission formulation in the FY2016 budget request. NASA is moving forward with choosing the science payload.   It will be announced on Tuesday (May 26) at 2:00 pm ET.   The next day, NASA TV will air coverage of the ISS crew moving a module (using Canadarm2) from one docking port to another as the ISS is reconfigured to enable the commercial crew vehicles to dock there beginning in 2017.

The schedule for the first week of June is still filling up, but the list below shows what we know about today (Sunday, May 25).

Tuesday, May 26

• Announcement of Science Instruments for Europa Mission, NASA TV Studio, NASA HQ, Washington, DC, 2:00 pm ET (watch on NASA TV)

Tuesday-Wednesday, May 26-27

• Global Space and Satellite Forum, Abu Dhabi

Wednesday, May 27

• NASA TV Coverage of Relocation of ISS Module, Earth orbit, 8:00 am ET (watch on NASA TV)

Monday, June 1

• NSF-NASA-DOE Astronomy and Astrophysics Advisory Committee (AAAC), virtual, 12:00-4:00 pm ET
• NASA Briefing on Second LDSD Test, Kauai, Hawaii, 8:00 am Hawaii Standard Time (2:00 pm ET)

Tuesday, June 2

• ISU-DC Space Cafe Featuring Doug Messier, The Science Club, Washington, DC, 7:00 pm ET

Thursday, June 4

• Aerospace Today and Tomorrow (AIAA), Williamsburg, VA, 8:00 am – 5:30 pm ET