Year: 2025

Is China’s Yutu-2 lunar rover dead?

12:58 pm

According to monthly images taken by Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) of China’s Yutu-2 lunar rover on the far side of the Moon, it has not moved since March 2024, suggesting it is no longer functioning.

“Up to about February 2023 the rover was moving about 7 or 8 metres every drive and typically about 40 m per lunar day. Suddenly the drives dropped to about 3 or 4 m each and only about 8 or 10 m per lunar day,” Stooke said in an email.

“That lasted until about October 2023, and then drives dropped to only 1 or 2 m each. In March 2024 Yutu 2 was resting just southwest of a 10 m diameter crater, and it’s been there ever since, as revealed by LRO images,” Stooke added.

It is possible the rover is not entirely dead, but there is no way to be sure. China is not generally forthcoming when things fail. For example, it has never acknowledged the shut down of its Zhurong Mars rover, which it had hoped would survive its first Martian winter. When that winter ended however no reports from Zhurong were released by China, which suggested it was no longer functioning. China however did not report this. It simply made believe the rover no longer existed.

It could be China is now doing the same with Yutu-2.

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Launches galore!

12:44 pm

Map of lunar landing sites
Landing sites for both Firefly’s Blue Ghost and
Ispace’s Resilience

The next two days will be another example of the resurgent American launch industry, with a wide range of rocket launches running the gamut from the maiden flight of the New Glenn rocket, another dramatic test flight of SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy, and a launch by SpaceX of two (not one!) lunar landers.

We begin however now with another successful launch by SpaceX’s of its Transporter commercial program, designed to place in orbit as many smallsats as possible at once. The company’s Falcon 9 rocket lifted off today from Vandenberg in California, carrying 131 payloads, from cubesats to microsats to orbital tugs.

The first stage completed its second flight, landing on back at Vandenberg. The fairings completed their 18th and 19th flights respectively. As of posting the payloads have not been deployed.

The 2025 launch race:

7 SpaceX
2 China

SpaceX continues its relentless goal of completing in 2025 one launch almost every other day. For example, the launch above is only the first launch planned by SpaceX today. Tonight it will launch another Falcon 9 from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying both Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander as well as Ispace’s Resilience lunar lander. The map to the right shows the landing targets of both.

Tomorrow the launch pace will continue. First SpaceX will attempt the seventh orbital test launch of its Starship/Superheavy rocket, lifting off from Boca Chica, with a launch window beginning at 4 pm (Central).

Blue Origin will later that evening once again attempt the maiden launch of its New Glenn rocket. The three hour launch window opens at 1 am (Eastern).

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Mars geology at its strangest

11:22 am

Strange Martian geology
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on July 29, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows the northeast quadrant of a weirdly distorted unnamed 3-mile-wide crater in the northern lowland plains of Mars. The crater rim is the ridgeline that enters from picture’s left edge to curve down to exit at bottom right.

The geological feature of interest however is the strange mound to the left of that rim, inside the crater. It certainly appears, based on shadows, that the top of this mound popped off at some time in the past, leaving behind that sharp-edged hollow.

Note however that there is no eruption debris. When a volcano erupts, the debris covers the nearby mountainside. Here we see no evidence of anything that was flung out from this small eruption.
» Read more

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Boom about to go supersonic

9:29 am

The commercial supersonic airplane company Boom is on the verge of flying its XB-1 test vehicle faster than the speed of sound.

The company has been doing a regular test flight program, each time increasing the plane’s speed.

During the latest 44-minute flight at an altitude of 29,481 ft (8,986 m) with Chief Test Pilot Tristan “Geppetto” Brandenburg at the controls, the prototype aircraft reached transonic speed. That is, flight so close to Mach 1 that some areas of airflow over the airframe exceed the speed of sound.

It’s also the point where the XB-1 was subjected to a maximum dynamic pressure of 383 Knots Equivalent Air Speed (KEAS), which is a pressure on the fuselage and wings greater than what it would experience when flying supersonic at Mach 1.1.

In short, XB-1 pushed what was once called the Sound Barrier.

Next step: break the sound barrier.

At the completion of this testing the company will then begin manufacture of its full scale supersonic passenger plane, dubbed Overture, that will carry up to 80 passengers and will sell to airlines. It already has contracts and financial support from a number of major airlines, including United and Japan Airlines.

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Malinda Kat and Rachel Hardy – Into the West

6:01 pm

An evening pause: A cover of a song from the end credits of the 2003 The Lord of the Rings film, The Return of the King..

Hat tip Alton Blevins, whose gmail inbox is filled and thus cannot receive any emails from me, or anyone. Alton: Clean out your inbox!

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Ridges from fractures at the head of a 300+mile-long Martian drainage channel

2:28 pm

Ridges from fractures on Mars
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on October 4, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

The science team labels this “Exhumed Fracture Network,” referring to the criss-crossing ridges on the eroded mesa at the picture’s center. That mesa only rises about sixty feet from the east-west channel at the top of the picture, but the location is actually on the outside northern rim of an unnamed 70-mile-wide very eroded ancient crater. The rim itself rises another 500 feet to the south before descending 10,000 feet to the crater floor.

I am assuming by the title that the geologists believe this ridges were originally cracks that got filled with more resistant material, probably lava. The fracture network then got covered over. More recent erosion removed the material around the cracks, but the material in the cracks resisted that erosion.

The most intriguing feature in this picture however might actually be that nondescript channel.
» Read more

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After more than two years, Australian rocket startup thinks its launch approval is about to finally arrive

12:39 pm

Australian commercial spaceports
Australia’s commercial spaceports. Click for original map.

The Australian rocket startup Gilmour Space originally expected to complete its first test launch of its three-stage Eris rocket off the east coast of Australia in April 2022.

At that time it thought the approvals for the licenses for its rocket, its Bowen spaceport, and the launch were just weeks away.

Hah! It is now two years later, and the company is still awaiting that launch license. According to the company’s head Adam Gilmour he is now hopeful the license is only weeks away.

“There is a lot of goodwill at CASA [Civil Aviation Safety Authority], and we recognise that they have been working very hard to get it done,” Mr Gilmour said. “We know they have been working towards it. It’s just that this is the first time for everyone involved, and it is quite complex. To give you an idea, we have had Zoom calls with literally 30 people on the call.”

Based on wait periods, if the CASA permit is approved (which comes with regulatory input from Airservices Australia), the earliest Gilmour could conduct the Eris Testflight One mission would be the middle of February. It is possible the permit will be granted as early as this week.

Gilmour however has been making the same exact statements about CASA now for two years. They are great! They are working hard! They want to approve!

Yet nothing happens.

I suspect that approval is close, but this long delay suggests other rocket startups in Australia are going to face the same governmental head winds. The government there seems uninterested in allowing freedom and competition to function. Instead, it sees itself as god, deciding who can do what when, and heaven forbid you challenge it in any way. (Which by the way explains Gilmour’s kow-towing in all his statements.)

Hat tip BtB’s stringer Jay.

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China completes second launch in 2025

1:16 am

China on January 13, 2025 (Chinese time) completed its second launch in 2025, its Smart Dragon-3 (Jielong-3) solid-fueled rocket lifting off from a launch platform off the coast near the city of Haiyang.

Little information was released describing the payload, other than it was “the satellite group CentiSpace-01.”

The 2025 launch race:

5 SpaceX
2 China

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January 10, 2025 Zimmerman appearance on the UAP Crossfire podcast

9:49 pm

This week I was a guest on a podcast saved from the ashes of several years ago. Back then the podcast was called Task Force Gryphon, and was run by a military guy who went only by the name of Commander Cobra for a variety of reasons. When I appeared on the show in this original version the questions were always smart, the interview thoughtful, and the topics on the money.

After a few years off the air, Cobra decided to restart the show under a new name, UAP Crossfire. During my two hour appearance last week the three hosts, Commander Cobra, Dan “Padre” Carlson, and Chris DePerno, conducted what I consider one of the best interviews I have done for a while, forcing the discussion to go to places I don’t normally go on such appearances.

I strongly advise my readers to check it out. You can listen to it here. or here.

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Live stream of first launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket-Launch scrubbed!

9:12 pm

UPDATE: The company has scrubbed the launch for tonight.

Scheduled for launch at 1 am (Eastern) on January 13, 2025 (with a three hour window), I have embedded the live stream below. On the west coast the launch will occur at 10 pm (Pacific), January 12, 2025. According to Blue Origin, the live stream will go live one hour prior to launch. Based on the company’s past broadcasts, we will have to suffer through a lot of “Gosh! Gee whiz!” Isn’t this great?!” stuff that really ain’t necessary. Maybe Blue Origin will surprise me. If not, come back five minutes before launch to spare yourself this blather.

You see, there is no need for Blue Origin to blather like that. The rocket is spectacular, and it speaks for itself.

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New Glenn launched delayed one more day because of rough seas

5:10 pm

Blue Origin announced today that it is delaying its first launch of its orbital New Glenn rocket by one day to 1 am (Eastern) Monday morning.

The company’s tweet explained that “sea state conditions are still unfavorable for booster landing.”

Without question this will be a truly heart-stopping launch. Blue Origin needs to get New Glenn operational, and it trying to also achieve its first vertical landing of the first stage on the first launch.

Right now all you need to do is stay up a little late Sunday night to watch.

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