Rocket Lab successfully launches two more BlackSky Earth observation satellites
Capitalism in space: Rocket Lab today successfully launched from its launchpad in New Zealand two more satellite for the Earth observation company BlackSky, completing the launch only 21 days after their previous launch, tying the company’s fastest turnaround.
This was Rocket Lab’s fifth launch in 2021, which the company states will be its last this year. At the start of the year it had predicted it would complete this number, so the company has at least matched its expectations for 2021, despite governmental hold-ups in both New Zealand and Wallops Island that slowed the launch pace.
The leaders in the 2021 launch:
46 China
27 SpaceX
21 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab
China’s lead over the U.S. in the national rankings is now 46 to 44. SpaceX has a scheduled launch later tonight, so the race between the two countries should continue to tighten.
This was also the 120th successful launch in 2021, the most in a single year since 1984, and making it the ninth most active year in the history of space exploration.
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Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
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Capitalism in space: Rocket Lab today successfully launched from its launchpad in New Zealand two more satellite for the Earth observation company BlackSky, completing the launch only 21 days after their previous launch, tying the company’s fastest turnaround.
This was Rocket Lab’s fifth launch in 2021, which the company states will be its last this year. At the start of the year it had predicted it would complete this number, so the company has at least matched its expectations for 2021, despite governmental hold-ups in both New Zealand and Wallops Island that slowed the launch pace.
The leaders in the 2021 launch:
46 China
27 SpaceX
21 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab
China’s lead over the U.S. in the national rankings is now 46 to 44. SpaceX has a scheduled launch later tonight, so the race between the two countries should continue to tighten.
This was also the 120th successful launch in 2021, the most in a single year since 1984, and making it the ninth most active year in the history of space exploration.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Given what still remains on the manifests for December, it’s hard to see how 2021 won’t end up as a Top 5 year for orbital launches. Roscosmos and SpaceX each have three more launches, for starters.
Can a super smart, high IQ, BTB, space engineer / nerd, rocket scientist comment on this video?
https://twitter.com/ChillzTV/status/1468340361697402886?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1468340361697402886%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fdailycaller.com%2F2021%2F12%2F08%2Fpilot-captures-footage-ufo-fleet%2F
Please explain what these are, who’s technology it is, and where they went.
Cotour–
I rarely click on twitter links, (especially with “ufo fleet” in the title) and I’m not a photo-interpretation analyst, but I know you’re sincere (for the most part!)
–>I’d want to know a whole lot more about the setting and the equipment used.
There’s nothing to scale anything, how fast is the guy going who took the video, is this a digital camera or film, is this being shot through a glass or plastic window, what is this guy’s speed, direction, and elevation, where is the sun and/or the moon, etc., etc.
Looks like lense-flashing of some sort (and I’m no photographer), unless he has a recorded radar-track on all of “them.”
I hear you, Wayne.
(I am always sincere, whether Im being sarcastic or not :)
I am serious, what is / are they, and who’s technology is it?
Looks like its an airliner at 30K + feet? The lights are at 20K feet?
“Thats some weird ‘Stuff”.
Cotour-
10,000 feet is 2 miles—I’m no pilot either, so I would defer to somebody with experience looking toward apparently bright objects 2 miles away.
–I’d also like to see the RAW video file, the version I downloaded from twitter was 540×540 and encoded in .mp4 format
My attitude on this stuff– try to avoid interjecting presuppositions.
(Ya know, if they are light flashes, there is no tech and there is no purpose.)
I would bet next weeks paycheck that it is a light aberration. The regularity of the ‘formation’, and the fact the they are at altitude, would seem to argue in favor.
Some super high IQ space nerds have commented:
https://www.the-sun.com/news/4238103/aliens-may-have-visited-earth-nasa-report/
SPACE INVADERS Aliens may have already VISITED Earth, bombshell Nasa report reveals as Pentagon ramps up hunt for UFOs
Cotour–
Brian Keating: Into the Impossible
June, 2021
“Eric Weinstein & Michael Shermer: An honest dialogue about UFOs.”
https://youtu.be/vmgVy7-WCjc
1:49:25
NSF Live: Peter Beck talks Rocket Lab’s Neutron
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNx4tpiyUAM