The Japanese space agency JAXA and the American space agency NASA both tested important pieces of hardware today. In JAXA’s case, the test was of an unmanned capsule known as the H-II Transport Vehicle, which aims to deliver goods to the International Space Station. The ISS is presently serviced by Progress vehicles (adapted Soyuz spacecraft from Roskosmos) and the Advanced Transport Vehicle, or ATV, from ESA. The launch is below:
Also being tested today was DM-1, the dummy Ares-1 rocket. The rocket is made up of different stages, for today’s test, all but the lowest stage were dummy capsules. The lowest stage itself is made up of five segments and for the test, only three of them were real. The intention was to see how the structure vibrates and rolls due to the firing (the rocket was tethered to the ground in what is known as a static test – ie it goes nowhere). Footage from the test is now on NASA’s Youtube Channel:
Where the Sun hits the sky 