Spectators take picture remembering historic moment

The spectators take picture remembering historic moment.

"It was so long in coming and so quickly gone," says Burnett. "Yet it remains burned into my memory like a slow-motion movie."

Apollo affiliate files for US$600 mln REIT IPO

Apollo Commercial Real Estate Inc has filed an application to raise up to $600 million in an initial public offering and plans to invest in commercial mortgage-backed securities with part of the proceeds, according to a regulatory filing.

Apollo Commercial Real Estate, which plans to qualify as a real estate investment trust by the end of the year, will be managed by a subsidiary of the private equity firm Apollo Global Management, it said in a prospectus it filed on Friday with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

In addition to buying CMBS, it plans to originate senior commercial real estate mortgage loans.

Apollo Commercial Real Estate said in its prospectus, "markets are likely to face a void of several hundred billion dollars over this period that must be filled by new mortgage lenders."

A REIT is a property company that in exchange for distributing at least 90 percent of its taxable income to its shareholders, pays no corporate taxes on most of its income.

The expected date of the IPO, to be managed by J.P. Morgan (JPM.N), and price estimate range were not disclosed.

The filing comes as a spate of other investment companies, including AllianceBernstein (AB.N) and Western Asset Management Co, have created REITs that have applied for IPOs in recent weeks. (Reporting by Phil Wahba; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

(Agencies)

Senate confirms ex-astronaut Bolden to head NASA

FILE -- In this July 8, 2009 file photo provided by NASA, retired astronaut Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden, then nominee as the administrator of NASA, testifies during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington. The Senate Wednesday confirmed Bolden as administrator of NASA. (AP Photo/Bill Ingalls, NASA, File)

The Senate confirmed on Wednesday retired astronaut Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden as administrator of NASA, just in time for the space agency's 40th anniversary celebrations of man's first steps on the moon.

His confirmation also came just hours after the launch of space shuttle Endeavour, which began a 16-day mission to the international space station.

The Senate confirmed Bolden to head the National Aeronautics and Space Administration without objection. Bolden, who has flown in space four times and was an assistant deputy administrator at one point, will be the agency's first black administrator.

Former NASA associate administrator Lori Garver was also confirmed as the agency's No. 2.

The confirmation allows Bolden to be sworn in by July 20, 1969, 40 years after the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Bolden told senators last week that if the U.S. chooses to lead in technology, it must commit to, among other measures, inspiring the rising generation of children to contribute in the fields of science and engineering as well as enhancing NASA's ability and expertise in understanding Earth's environment.

"Either we can invest in building upon our hard earned world technological leadership or we can abandon this commitment, ceding it to others who are working vigilantly to push the frontiers of space," he said during a confirmation hearing on July 8.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., another ex-astronaut, said Bolden will "bring back the magic from a time when we rode rockets to the moon."

Bolden would inherit a NASA that doesn't look much like the still-somewhat-fresh-from-the-moon agency he joined as an astronaut in 1980. NASA now "is faced with a lot of uncertainty," former Johnson Space Center Director George Abbey has said.

President George W. Bush set in motion a plan to retire the space shuttle fleet at the end of next year and return astronauts to the moon and then head out to Mars in a series of rockets and capsules that borrows heavily from the 1960s Apollo program. The shuttle's replacement won't be ready until at least 2015, so for five years the only way Americans will be able to get in space is by hitching a ride on a Russian space capsule. And some of NASA's biggest science programs are over budget.

Bolden, a native of Columbia, S.C., will be only the second astronaut to run NASA in its 50-year history. Vice Adm. Richard Truly was the first.

In 2002, Bush unsuccessfully tried to appoint Bolden as the space agency's deputy administrator. The Pentagon said it needed to keep Bolden, who was a Marine major general at the time and a pilot who flew more than 100 sorties in Vietnam.

Bolden was the pilot of the shuttle flight that launched the Hubble Space Telescope into Earth orbit in 1990.

(Agencies)

Apollo 11 40th anniversary celebration July 24th through July 26th

Apollo 11 40th anniversary celebration

Celebrate the 40th anniversary of man鈥檚 first steps on the moon by attending Splashdown 2009 on the USS Hornet.

Now located at Alameda Point on San Francisco Bay, the USS Hornet was the primary recovery ship for the Apollo 11 and Apollo 12 missions.

Scheduled events for Splashdown 2009

July 24 (Friday)

Evening opening of Splashdown 09 festival and a chance to meet Hornet crew members who were onboard for the Apollo 11 retrieval. There will also be musical performance.

July 25 (Saturday, Museum Hours)

During the normal museum hours, there will be special Apollo exhibits, and opportunities to experience Chabot Space Center interactive spacesuit demo, the W Foundation space artifact interactive table and more. There will also be a public presentation featuring Buzz Aldrin, Apollo 11 moonwalker

July 26 (Sunday, Museum Hours)

The special events of Saturday will also be available on Sunday. Plus, a presentation 鈥淲omen in Space鈥?(tentative theme) featuring various female astronauts, NASA personnel, and scientists.

Other Apollo 11 Events

Anniversary Events in Texas and Washington, DC

Events at Alamogordo

Neil Armstrong to skip Apollo 11 event

Forty years ago this Monday, Neil Armstrong took 鈥渙ne small step for man, one giant leap for mankind鈥?

The world's most famous moon walker is to skip a Nasa event next week commemorating the 40th anniversary of the moon landing. The notoriously shy Neil Armstrong, the first of only a dozen men to set foot on the Earth's nearest neighbour, is counting on Apollo 11 shipmate Buzz Aldrin to relive his "one small step" for a worldwide audience.

Armstrong is said to be deeply suspicious of fans and of the press. Instead, Aldrin will be joined on Monday at Nasa's Washington headquarters by Eugene Cernan, one of the last astronauts to visit the moon, and other Nasa astronauts.

Armstrong is due to appear on Sunday night at an event at Washington's Smithsonian Institution, where he is expected to give a 15-minute lecture. But he is unlikely to satisfy the world's desire to hear him speak about his brief jaunt across the lunar surface four decades ago.

"He will not be doing interviews or photos," said Isabel Lara, a spokeswoman for the Smithsonian. Nor will he be signing autographs, being reportedly suspicious of souvenir hunters since he discovered in 2005 that his Ohio barber had sold some of his hair to a collector for $3,000.

Armstrong's aversion to the spotlight could have played a part in his selection for the historic role.

According to his biographer James Hansen, Nasa threw out existing protocol that would have had Aldrin, the lunar lander pilot, as first out of the craft and on to the moon.

Nasa chiefs predicted that the first person on the moon would have to bear the burden of lifetime fame, and granted the privilege to the comparatively unassuming Armstrong. Michael Collins, meanwhile, remained in the stifling command module, hurtling around the moon and preparing at an instant's notice to initiate one of 18 rescue procedures, should something fail on the surface below.

Nasa has a number of events planned to mark the anniversary, which it hopes will bolster flagging public support for new investment in its space programme. Tomorrow, the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 launch, the US space agency is showing new broadcast-quality film of Aldrin and Armstrong's lunar excursion, including footage said to have been locked away in Nasa storage since the event.

A new website, wechoosethemoon.org, will recreate Armstrong's first steps and track the capsule's route from Earth to the moon.

The space shuttle programme, which has claimed the lives of 14 astronauts - 11 more than the Apollo programme - is slated for retirement next year.

Barack Obama has shown little enthusiasm in public for the shuttle's replacement, Constellation, which Nasa planners hope will return people to the moon by 2020.

Griffith Observatory to commemorate moon landing

As a worldwide television audience tuned in 40 years ago to watch Neil Armstrong take "one small step" on the lunar surface, 4-year-old Chris Butler kept his eye on the astronaut he knew as simply the nice guy from his dad's work.

The son of an aerospace engineer at North American Aviation, Butler had been an occasional visitor to the Downey facility where the Apollo 11 command and lunar modules were built. It was there that he met Armstrong, who on July 20, 1969, became the first man to set foot on the moon.

"He would take me to his work," Butler said of his father, Robert. "I thought everybody's dad built spaceships."

It's that memory that Butler will share during "One Small Step," a four-day series of exhibits and discussions hosted by Griffith Observatory to commemorate the historic achievement. A complete schedule is available at www.griffithobs.org.

From noon-7 p.m. daily today through Sunday, the observatory will host a static display about the Apollo 11 mission, with exhibits including training equipment and moon rocks.

Today's activities also include a lecture at 3 and 7:30 p.m., where experts will discuss the validity of the lunar missions.

Friday's lectures include a look at upcoming space missions, while Saturday's events feature a primer on the astronaut selection process.

Butler will emcee a panel discussion Sunday titled "California Goes to the Moon," with three engineers who worked to design and build the spacecraft recalling their role in helping America win the space race.

"All too often, we forget that having the dream and giving the order is a lot different than doing the job - and that's (where) these engineers, myself included, have a large heritage and history," said Jerry Blackburn, who also worked at North American Aviation.

"It is the ability of remembering and feeling what it was like to build these machines and use (them) for the benefit of mankind."

Senate confirms ex-astronaut Bolden to head NASA

In this July 8, 2009 file photo provided by NASA, retired astronaut Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden, then nominee as the administrator of NASA, testifies during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington. The Senate Wednesday confirmed Bolden as administrator of NASA. (AP Photo/Bill Ingalls, NASA, File)

The Senate confirmed on Wednesday retired astronaut Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden as administrator of NASA, just in time for the space agency's 40th anniversary celebrations of man's first steps on the moon.

His confirmation also came just hours after the launch of space shuttle Endeavour, which began a 16-day mission to the international space station.

The Senate confirmed Bolden to head the National Aeronautics and Space Administration without objection. Bolden, who has flown in space four times and was an assistant deputy administrator at one point, will be the agency's first black administrator.

Former NASA associate administrator Lori Garver was also confirmed as the agency's No. 2.

The confirmation allows Bolden to be sworn in by July 20, 1969, 40 years after the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Bolden told senators last week that if the U.S. chooses to lead in technology, it must commit to, among other measures, inspiring the rising generation of children to contribute in the fields of science and engineering as well as enhancing NASA's ability and expertise in understanding Earth's environment.

"Either we can invest in building upon our hard earned world technological leadership or we can abandon this commitment, ceding it to others who are working vigilantly to push the frontiers of space," he said during a confirmation hearing on July 8.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., another ex-astronaut, said Bolden will "bring back the magic from a time when we rode rockets to the moon."

Bolden would inherit a NASA that doesn't look much like the still-somewhat-fresh-from-the-moon agency he joined as an astronaut in 1980. NASA now "is faced with a lot of uncertainty," former Johnson Space Center Director George Abbey has said.

President George W. Bush set in motion a plan to retire the space shuttle fleet at the end of next year and return astronauts to the moon and then head out to Mars in a series of rockets and capsules that borrows heavily from the 1960s Apollo program. The shuttle's replacement won't be ready until at least 2015, so for five years the only way Americans will be able to get in space is by hitching a ride on a Russian space capsule. And some of NASA's biggest science programs are over budget.

Bolden, a native of Columbia, S.C., will be only the second astronaut to run NASA in its 50-year history. Vice Adm. Richard Truly was the first.

In 2002, Bush unsuccessfully tried to appoint Bolden as the space agency's deputy administrator. The Pentagon said it needed to keep Bolden, who was a Marine major general at the time and a pilot who flew more than 100 sorties in Vietnam.

Bolden was the pilot of the shuttle flight that launched the Hubble Space Telescope into Earth orbit in 1990.

(Agencies)