Viking's ocean fleet expands

NAMED after the prominent constellation and in honour of Dr. Fisher’s work on NASA’s Orion exploration vehicle project, the 930-guest 47,800-ton Viking Orion arrived in Livorno, Italy on June 16. The ship will continue her maiden season sailing itineraries in the Western and Eastern Mediterranean this summer before heading east to sail Viking’s newest itineraries in Asia, Australia and Alaska.

New ship features include a planetarium-like immersive theatre, an “Explorations in Space” collection conceived as a photographic journal through space, with a broad range of vintage photographs, including astronaut portraits and documents of complex mission activities, produced by NASA and captured by National Geographic photographers.

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This beach just got bigger!

ONE of Florida's most popular surfside towns – Cocoa Beach – has added 4.7 million cubic yards of beach sand as part of a $39 million restoration project, just in time for the spring and summer vacations seasons. 

Once a narrow, sandy strip lined with concrete seawalls, the iconic beach known for surfing and space exploration has expanded its shoreline by 160 feet.

‘Get ready to be impressed,’ said Florida's Space Coast executive director Eric Garvey. ‘Our beach improvement programme has dramatically enhanced the beach experience here, from surfing to sand-castle building to soaking in the sun.’

Beach restoration on Florida's Space Coast began as an effort to protect the 72-mile-long coastline from threats posed by erosion and storms. 

Today, the wider beach with natural sand dunes is not only successful at preventing storm damage to coastline development, but also creates healthy habitats for wildlife and tourist recreation. 

Seen,left, is a Great Blue Heron sunning itself in the Thousand Islands area of cocoa beach.

The project took a sustainable approach to restoring the beaches than what had been done on other Florida coasts. By using sand instead of seawalls, storm protection was improved for residents and businesses, and minimized the impacts on wildlife habitats. 

Florida's Space Coast is considered by biologists to be the most important nesting area for loggerhead sea turtles in the Western hemisphere. 

The newly restored, wide and sandy beaches provide ideal nesting habitats for these turtles.

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Picture Credit: "Surfing at Cocoa Beach, Florida" by Leonard J. DeFrancisci via Wikimedia Commons; "Great Blue Heron sunning" by Robwaterman (Own work) via Wikimedia Commons; "Baby turtle" by NASA/Troy Cryder via Wikimedia Commons

See the blast-off!

KENNEDY Space Centre Visitor Complex guests can experience the sights and sounds of the launch of an Atlas V rocket October 29. 

The rocket will blast off from the nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, with the launch scheduled for 1:21 p.m (local time). 


The rocket will carry GPS satellites for the US military.

Pictured left at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 41 is an Atlas V with NASA's Tracking and Data Relay Satellite back-dropped by the rising sun looking across the Banana River.
Space for the launch viewing is limited and available on a first come, first served basis. 

Visitor Complex admission tickets can be purchased at www.KennedySpaceCenter.com


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Picture Credit: From Top -  KSC-2014-1156 (01/23/2014) --- CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.; KSC-2014-1155 KSC-2014-1155 (01/22/2014) --- CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. via  http://mediaarchive.ksc.nasa.gov/