Capitalism in space: In an effort to save costs ULA is reducing its workforce at Vandenberg by 48.
The company has been aggressively trying to streamline its operations to better compete against SpaceX. This reduction was expected, and based upon what I saw when I toured Vandenberg a few years ago, entirely justified. While SpaceX’s operations then looked lean and simple, ULA’s set up appeared a bit inefficient.
Capitalism in space: A new commercial satellite company, Global-IP Kayman, has purchased a Falcon 9 rocket to launch its first Boeing-built satellite late in 2018.
No word on whether the launch will use a reused first stage.
Since flying past Pluto in July 2014 New Horizons has now flown halfway to its next target, Kuiper Belt Object 2014 MU69.
The fly-by will take place on January 1, 2019.
Posted from the South Rim after hiking out today from the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Since Saturday I did about 40 miles of hiking, both near and inside the Canyon. I hope to post some details in the coming days.
ULA has finally scheduled the much delayed Atlas 5 launch of Orbital ATK’s Cygnus ISS freighter for April 18.
Posted from Maswik Lodge on the south rim of the Grand Canyon.
Capitalism in space: ULA last week won three launch contracts, two from the Air Force and one from NASA.
Both rockets are part of the existing EELV Block Buy between the Air Force and United Launch Alliance. The mission assignments were announced Friday by the Pentagon. The missions exceed the lift performance of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets that has been certified by the Air Force for national security payloads, making ULA the only provider available to execute these heavy launches.
In other government-launch news, NASA said last month that the second satellite in the next-generation era of U.S. civilian weather observatories will be launched atop an Atlas 5-401 rocket. The Atlas 5 beat out the Falcon 9 in a competition to win the rights to launch the Joint Polar Satellite System spacecraft No. 2 in 2021 from Vandenberg Air Force Base.
For SpaceX to truly compete with ULA they need to get the Falcon Heavy flying.
An evening pause: The song has two parts, Your move, followed by All Good People. This performance was performed live in 2004, was entirely acoustic, and was filmed live before a studio audience and transmitted live to 25 theaters throughout the United States.
Hat tip Frank Kelly.
<An evening pause: Performed on Sha Na Na’s television show, that aired from 1977 to 1981.
Hat tip Jim Mallamace.
An evening pause: More evidence that a good future is possible. All it takes is freedom and a determination to fulfill a need.
Hat tip Gene Shipp.
A bunch of stories from Russia today appear to express that country’s political response to SpaceX’s success yesterday in launching a commercial satellite using a previously flown first stage.
It appears that these stories are quoting a variety of Russian officials who apparently did not get their stories straight. Also, it appears that much of what they are saying here is pure bluster. For example, in the third link the official makes the silly claim that the ability of their rocket engines to be started and then restarted repeatedly proves they are dedicated to re-usability. And the first two links don’t provide much back-up for the claims that they can complete with SpaceX, especially since SpaceX presently charges a third less than they do per launch, and that is using new boosters. With reused boosters SpaceX’s launch fees will be less than half what Russia has been charging for a Proton launch ($90 million vs $40 million).
Similarly, the claim that they will complete 30 launches this years is absurd. They won’t be able to launch Proton until May, at the soonest, because of the need to remove defective parts from all of their in-stock engines. Soyuz launches are similarly delayed while they check its engines also. To complete 30 launches in only seven months seems very unrealistic to me, especially since the best they have done in a full year this century is 34 launches, with an average slightly less than 30 per year.
Nonetheless, this spate of stories and statements by Russian officials shows that they are feeling the heat of competition, and also feel a need to respond. The first story has this significant statement:
Russia’s State Space Corporation Roscosmos is responding to the challenges with available possibilities, he added. “It has announced a considerable reduction in the cost of Proton rocket launches. The commercial price of this rocket’s launch is considerably higher than its prime cost and we have the potential for the price cut. But customers are giving up our services because the number of payloads [satellites] remains unchanged and does not grow. Correspondingly, a new player on the market snatches away a part of orders,” the expert noted.
Because of Russia’s low labor costs they have always had a large profit margin on their Proton launches. The $90 million they charged was set just below what Arianespace charged for its launches. It appears they are now planning to lower their prices further to match SpaceX.
Posted from the south rim of the Grand Canyon.
The competition heats up: SpaceX plans to use two already flown first stage boosters when it does its first demo flight of Falcon Heavy later this year.
Musk said the rocket cores for Falcon Heavy’s first flight are two to three months away from completion. He emphasized that the first launch will carry a lot of risk, and as such, SpaceX doesn’t plan to carry a valuable payload or payloads with it. “We will probably fly something really silly on Falcon Heavy because it is quite a high risk mission,” he said.
SpaceX will seek to recover all the boosters from the first Falcon Heavy flight, assuming all goes according to plan. Musk said the two side boosters would land back at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, followed by the center core returning to a drone ship in the Atlantic.
They will also try to recover the upper stage, but are not hopeful this will succeed. The article also notes that they hope to fly an additional four used boosters in 2017. SES is eager to use them on its three scheduled flights this year.
The company has also said that the booster that was successfully reused this week will not fly again, but will instead be put on display in Florida.
Posted from the south rim of the Grand Canyon.
An evening pause: For tomorrow. I think this is information every car owner should have. Make sure you watch to the very end.
I am off for my annual hike to the bottom of the Grand Canyon. While I might be able to post this coming weekend, once we head down on Monday morning I will be out of touch through Wednesday.
