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My July fund-raising campaign to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black is now over. I want to thank all those who so generously donated or subscribed, especially those who have become regular supporters. I can't do this without your help. I also find it increasingly hard to express how much your support means to me. God bless you all!

 

The donations during this year's campaign were sadly less than previous years, but for this I blame myself. I am tired of begging for money, and so I put up the campaign announcement at the start of the month but had no desire to update it weekly to encourage more donations, as I have done in past years. This lack of begging likely contributed to the drop in donations.

 

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It is now confirmed that the next Falcon 9 launch to ISS will have legs on its first stage and will attempt a controlled landing over water.

It is now confirmed that the next Falcon 9 launch to ISS will have legs on its first stage and will attempt a controlled landing over water.

Earlier reports were based on rumors and unofficial reports.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

5 comments

  • mivenho

    This is great! Let’s hope that SpaceX gets some good (IR) video of the water landing!

  • BSJ

    Has anyone got a pic of these legs deployed, while attached to the real rocket?

    That ram has got to turn almost 180° from stowed to deployed! Where does it all fit within such a small space?

  • BSJ

    Does anyone have pics of the legs on the ‘real’ rocket? Not on the grasshopper…

    That big ram looks like it’ll need to turn over almost 180° to support the legs. I wonder where it will all go, given such a small space on the outside of the booster’s body.

  • BSJ

    What the heck? I couldn’t see the post I did yesterday, until I posted again…

  • The mechanism appears straightforward. It appears that the leg attaches to the body at the ends of the ‘v’, and the piston is attached to the rocket body at the upper end. As the piston extends, I would think that the lower end slides along the leg trough, forcing the leg down, until it reaches the landing pad end and locks in place.

    My question is, who are those people behind the leg mock-up? They don’t look like techs or engineers. Does Space-X give factory tours? If so, I know where my next vacation will be.

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