MESSENGER

Today there was a great Netscape/CNN/AP article about one of the spacecraft I was working on immediately prior to coming over here.  It's called MESSENGER which stands for something that I'd have to look up.  It's MErcury Surface Something EN GEo-something and Ranging.  :)  You can find out more about it on the MESSENGER web-site.  Anyway, it'll be launching, in sha'allah, on August 2nd at 2:16AM EDT.  I plan on watching it online since that'll be just after 10AM here, but I also hear that it'll be on NASA Select for those of you with access to that channel.  (Btw, MESSENGER stands for MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging - I was close.)  If you want to know even more about it, there will also be live web-based Q&A sessions with "McRalph" (one of the project scientists (and hosted by my friend Cheryle)), and "Jimmy" (one of the mission systems engineers) on the 29th and 30th, respectively.  There are other people involved too, but those are the ones that I know.  On the NASA site, there's also a link for you to build your own MESSENGER.  Mine's printing as I type!  It's cool stuff!  Check it out!