July 31, 2024 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, go here.
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Author: Robert Zimmerman
J.S. Bach – Concerto No. 1 in D minor BWV 1052
An evening pause: Like the past two evening pauses this week, this also centers on a piano solo, and also takes us to an entire different musical genre. It is a bit long for a pause, but I can’t resist continuing the piano theme. You might recognize the third movement.
The soloist is 18-year-old Ignas Maknickas (who is clearly having fun), playing with Lithuania’s Ciurlionis School of Arts Symphony Orchestra.
Hat tip Todd Jones.
July 31, 2024 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Astroforge updates status of second cubesat demo mission, intended to get close-up views of asteroid
After discovering that the cubesat intended for the mission had serious technical issues, they junked it and have been rushing to prepare the cubesat intended for the third mission. It is not clear yet whether it will be ready on time.
- Amateur astronomer snaps magnificent picture of ISS, with Starliner docked in the lower port
The image’s resolution is so good you can also see one of the station’s robot arms inspecting Starliner.
- New video of Tianlong-3 test first stage crashing after it launched by mistake during a static fire engine test
This Space News article claims the Chinese pseudo-company, Space Pioneer, is pushing forward anyway, but a close read suggests nothing about its future is certain.
- Anthony Zak graphs what I have documented now for several years, that the pace of Russian launches since its invasion of the Ukraine has plummeted
The main cause of the drop is the loss of Russia’s entire international commercial market due to its breakup with Arianespace.
- A new Canadian rocket startup, Nordspace, announces its intention to build its own spaceport in Canada
I wish them good luck but note that there is a lot of blarney here, revealed by the fact that it took me a lot of digging to discover they don’t yet have a location for this spaceport, a detail they very carefully fail to mention on their webpage or press materials.
- On this day in 2008 NASA announced that the Phoenix lander had confirmed the presence of water ice on the high latitude surface of Mars
The discovery was actually not a big surprise to the scientists. The press however thought it a very big deal, since it really knew nothing about the research that had already shown evidence of lots of near surface ice in the high latitudes.
Unlike the white community, a real politcal conversation is finally happening among blacks
Click for full video.
Earlier this week a short clip was posted on a lot of conservative media from a zoom podcast that I think was organized by black podcaster Anton Daniels. In that short clip, one of the participants, a black woman going by the label “Page” said that she planned to vote for Kamala Harris solely because “She is a black woman.” She felt it important to do so to finally have a black woman as president.
The image to the right captures the reaction of the other participants, almost all of whom immediately showed either disgust or contempt or amusement by her words. Their verbal response began with several noting repeatedly that Harris isn’t even black, but then Anton Daniels broke in to note that this is irrelevant and beside the point. He then gave a short but very educated lesson on the failures of identity politics, the Democratic Party, and Kamala Harris. I have transcribed the full exchange below, highlighting what I consider the most important thing said during the entire exchange, because it tells us something very very profound. And you will need to look close, because that thing is almost certainly not what you expect it to be.
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Boeing names new CEO, set to take over on August 8, 2024
Boeing today named a new CEO, Robert “Kelly” Ortberg, who among the candidates being considered appears to be the only one who did not have a long career at Boeing.
Ortberg emerged as a leading candidate only recently. Others who were reportedly considered for the job included Patrick Shanahan, a former Boeing executive and now CEO of its most important supplier, Spirit AeroSystems, and another longtime Boeing executive, Stephanie Pope, who recently took over the commercial airplanes division.
Ortberg led Rockwell Collins from 2013 to 2018, when it merged with United Technologies and wound up as part of RTX, the company formerly known as Raytheon. He retired from RTX in 2021.
He will take charge of the company as of August 8, 2024.
It remains to be seen if Ortberg can fix things. As the article notes, since 2019 Boeing has lost more than $25 billion, and has been saddled with numerous quality control failures in almost all its technical divisions, from building airplanes to providing maintenance to building space capsules. The failures in its airplane divisions resulted in several crashes that killed 346 people, and caused it to accept a deal with the Justice Department that included a fine of $243.6 million to avoid a criminal trial. That deal however has not yet been accepted by the judge in the case.
Ortberg will have to demonstrate somehow that the culture at Boeing itself has changed. The first thing he could do to indicate he is serious about doing so would be to shut down entirely Boeing’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) bureaucracy. Getting rid of that poisonous race-based anti-quality program would go a long way in convincing others that Ortberg means business, and wants to put talent, skills, experience first in everything Boeing does, something previous CEOs have clearly not done.
A review of Japan’s effort to create a commercial space industry
Link here. The article does a nice job outlining the efforts of the new startups in Japan that have been successful in flying missions, such as the orbital tug company Astroscale and the lunar lander company Ispace, as well as newer companies such as Shachu, which proposes building and selling modules for use on any one of the new commercial space stations under construction.
The article also talks at length about Japan’s newly created ten year $6.5 billion strategic fund, designed to be provide funding for many different commercial projects and inspired by NASA recent switch from being the designer, builder, and owner of everything to simply a customer buying products from the private sector.
The fund has been given to Japan’s space agency to administer, and it remains unclear whether that government agency is prepared to give up power to the private sector as NASA has. This quote illustrates this uncertainty:
Since the effort is just starting, both companies and JAXA are uncertain how well the fund will work. Yasuo Ishii, senior vice president of JAXA, said the agency has assigned 450 people to administer the fund, including researchers and other experts. “We used to be an R&D institution and now we’re a funder,” he said.
He said JAXA will closely monitor progress on the initial awards made through the fund. “If some don’t go well, we may terminate them.”
It seems JAXA is so far using this fund to establish a large bureaucracy for itself, rather than issuing contracts to the private sector to build things JAXA needs.
We shall see how this plays out. The Japanese aerospace industry appears to be similar to the American space industry around 2008, with lots of old established big companies working hand-in-glove with the government space agency and a lot of small startups trying to establish themselves as competitors. In the U.S. at that time NASA was very resistant to give contracts to the startups. It took strong political pressure from within the upper levels of government, first in the Obama administration and then in the Trump administration, to force a change at NASA. Whether this will happen in Japan remains unknown.
China scientists propose both a communications and GPS-type infrastructure on the Moon
In line with the remarkably rational and long term plans China has developed for exploring the solar system, Chinese scientists have proposed the country develop both a communications and GPS-type infrastructure on the Moon, with both including constellations of satellites in orbit as well as facilities on the ground.
A first phase would establish satellites in elliptical frozen orbits around the moon. A second phase would see further … satellites and spacecraft at Earth-moon Lagrange points 1, 2, 4 and 5, a near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO), and a spacecraft in geostationary orbit, termed a cislunar space station.
A third and final phase would add satellites in existing and new distant retrograde orbits (DRO), forming a near-moon space and extended space constellations. The system also includes comprehensive ground-based facilities.
While this plan is simply a proposal, it fits with China’s overall strategies for lunar exploration, all of which are designed carefully so that they can be scaled up for more complex operations there as well as elsewhere in the solar system. And based on China’s track record in space in the past decade, we should be entirely confident this program or some variation will be built.
That is, unless China undergoes a major economic collapse and a change in leadership that has different priorities.
John Anderson – Seminole Wind
An evening pause: Starts with a piano solo, like yesterday’s pause, but takes us to an entirely different kind of music.
Hat tip Sayomara.
July 30, 2024 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
Jay notes, as I do, that today has been a slow news day in the world of outer space.
- Video of fire at a Russian aerospace facility in Yekaterinburg
It is unclear the cause. The facility builds flight control systems for spacecraft and rocketry, including the Soyuz-2 rocket.
- Rocket Factory Augsburg touts the successful completion of the test campaign for its orbital rocket’s second stage
That stage is now on its way to Saxavord for stacking with the first stage and a hoped-for launch before the end of the year — assuming the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority will issue a launch permit.
- On this day in 1971 the Apollo 15 lunar module Falcon landed on the Moon
Astronauts David Scott and Jim Irwin landed at the base of the Apennine Mountains next to Hadley Rille, and produced some of the most spectacular imagery so far from the lunar surface.
- On this day in 1964 Ranger 7 crashed intentionally on the Moon, taking 4,309 photographs during its descent
Though the first six Ranger missions failed, the next two also succeeded, producing another 13,000 pictures before crashing on the surface as planned.
Secret Service agent reveals the edifice of incompetency and stupidity that permeates the entire federal government
You would have to live under a rock, or rely entirely on mainstream media news sources, to not know that in the past twenty years the work of most federal government agencies had almost always been incompetent and badly managed, resulting in failed projects and vast amounts of money spent to get nothing accomplished. Only two recent examples come to mind immediately:
- In 2021 Congress provided $7.5B to Biden for electric vehicle chargers. Built so far: Zero
- Biden $42 billion internet program headed for failure, Industry leaders warn
The second story is an even more egregious failure. After three years the program has so far failed to provide any American internet service. In that same time period SpaceX’s Starlink service, by itself, provided millions service worldwide, and did it for far less.
Letter of condemnation by secret service sniper. Click for original.
This reality of governmental failure was driven home even more harshly today when it was revealed that a Secret Service agent has sent out an agency-wide email [enhanced screen capture to the right], condemning the entire supervisor leadership at that agency, and insisting that he will continue to speak up publicly “… until 5 high-level supervisors (1 down) are either fired or removed from their current positions.” He went on to note that
I have conveyed these thoughts to not only supervisors (to include the current Captain of CS [Counter Snipers], but those responsible for training us (SOTS/CS). Only to be brushed off as those with less experience somehow knew more than me.”
ULA completes its 4th launch this year and last Atlas-5 launch for the Space Force
Though ULA’s Atlas-5 rocket still has a number of launches on its manifest before it is retired, early this morning the company successfully completed the last Atlas-5 launch for the Space Force, the rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
This was ULA’s fourth launch in 2024, the most in a year for the company since 2022. The leader board for this year’s launch race remains unchanged:
74 SpaceX
31 China
8 Rocket Lab
8 Russia
American private enterprise however now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 87 to 47, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 74 to 60.
Note: A Rocket Lab that had been scheduled for today has been delayed two days.
Emerson Lake & Palmer – Show Me the Way To Go Home
An evening pause: Hat tip James Street.
July 29, 2024 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Video of Falcon 9 first stage landing at Vandenberg
Though the tweet congratulates SpaceX for the 300th reuse of a Falcon 9 first stage this past weekend, the video (which is quite excellent) is of a landing earlier this year.
- On this day in 1958 President Eisenhower signed legislation that created NASA
The agency was created out of an older government agency, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). Eisenhower had not been enthused by this idea (seeing it as another example of the military-industrial complex teaming up with the federal bureaucracy for their own crony deals), but the politics of the Cold War forced it upon him.
Meandering Martian ridges flowing down from crater rim
Click for original image.
Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and enhanced to post here, was taken on February 9, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a good example of the typically rough region inside the southern cratered highlands of Mars.
Note the ripple dunes that fill the low areas. The volcanic ash from Mars’ past volcanic history has become trapped here, with those ripple dunes suggesting the direction of the prevailing winds to the southeast.
The bright areas also suggest there is interesting mineralogy just below the surface. The 100-foot-high mesa near the picture’s top suggests a lot of erosion has occurred here, with its top suggesting the elevation of the surface a long time ago.
The most interesting feature however is the meandering ridge that starts at the lower right and weaves to the upper left.
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Google monitors and censors Gmail and Googlegroup emails for political content it dislikes
Reason 2,458,210,539 to stop using Google: We now have solid evidence that Google monitors and censors emails sent out using either Gmail or to Googlegroup listservs, because it censored emails discussing Robert F. Kennedy’s independent candidacy for the presidency.
The story at the link describes how the author, Lori Wentz of the Brownstone Institute, on June 27, 2024 emailed to a Googlegroups listserv a link to an X livestream where Kennedy would give his own answers to the questions in the live debate between Trump and Biden on June 28, 2024. In doing so the author also included some of her own thoughts, which resulted in an exchange on the political listserv about the subject. She subsequently got the following notice from Googlegroups:
“We’re letting you know that we’ve permanently removed [your] content…An external report flagged the content for illegal or policy violations. As a result, our legal content and policy standards team removed the content for the following reason: unwanted content.”
Wentz had no way of finding out what that “unwanted content” was, as Googlegroups did not provide this essential information, instead informing her that she would simply have “to pursue your claims in court.”
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FAA releases proposed environmental assessment of Boca Chica permitting more Starship/Superheavy launches
Superheavy/Starship lifting off on March 14, 2024
In advance of several planned public meetings, the FAA today released [pdf] its proposed environmental assessment of SpaceX’s proposal to increase the number of orbital launches allowed per year from Boca Chica from 5 to 25.
The report makes for some fascinating reading. First and foremost it indicates the FAA’s general approval of this new launch cadence. That approval however must also be given by the public in comments at those meetings, as well as by the National Park Service (NPS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG), and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Expect serious objections from the NPS and USFSW, both of which have acted to slow or stop SpaceX in the past, when each was given the opportunity. Both have a new opportunity here.
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Senate gives NASA cash to stop its tantrum
Surprise, surprise! As expected after NASA proposed major cuts in several missions, such as the Chandra Space Telescope and the OSAM demo robotic refueling mission, the subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee has rejected those cuts and instead proposed that NASA not only get everything it asked for, it be forced to take more money than it requested.
I am certain that NASA is not going to complain, as this was its plan from day one. The cancellation of Chandra was intended as a toddler’s tantrum that our weak Congress was certain to bow to and come up with the cash. It has now done so.
The report directs NASA to spend at least $98.3 million on Hubble and up to $72.1 million on Chandra, similar to the budgets for those missions in recent years, emphasizing the ability of the telescopes to work in conjunction with the James Webb Space Telescope.
In this case the Senate action makes some sense, as these cuts would have been penny wise and pound foolish. But NASA knew that. If the Senate was really interested in controlling the budget (which it is not) it would have funded Chandra and Hubble as described, but demanded cuts from NASA elsewhere.
Instead the Senate committee not only demands that these telescopes be maintained, it doles out extra money the nation doesn’t have for other projects that NASA wanted to cut for entirely legitimate reasons. OSAM for example was conceived more than a decade ago as a mission designed to demonstrate robotic refueling in space. After spending a billion and a decade, it had still not flown, and during that time private companies had not only successfully demonstrated this capability several times for far less, they had done so in a far simpler and more profitable manner. The technical need for OSAM was gone. Why spend the additional billion we can’t afford for a project that will prove nothing?
Congress, especially the Senate, likes wasting money however, and so the appropriations committee in an entirely bi-partisan effort is pushing to revive OSAM, as well as several other projects that have either gone over budget or NASA had deemed correctly were unaffordable.
The dark age has already begun in many ways, but its official start will be marked by future historians by the date the United States undergoes a full financial collapse, due to its government’s unwillingness to rein in a national debt that is now in the many many trillions and growing uncontrollably each day.
Boeing completes full series of static hot fire engine burns on Starliner while docked to ISS
Boeing announced today that engineers have successfully completed a full series of static hot fire engine burns testing all of Starliner’s attitude thrusters while still dockecd to ISS.
The one-pulse firings were designed to confirm the performance of each thruster. Aft-facing thrusters were fired for 1.2 seconds and all others for .40 seconds. Between each firing, the team reviewed real-time data and all thrusters performed at peak thrust rating values, ranging from 97-102%. The helium system also remained stable. Additionally, an RCS oxidizer isolation valve that was not fully seated previously, was cycled several times during today’s testing and is now operating normally.
This is the second time the spacecraft has been hot fired successfully while docked, an integrated operation the station and Starliner teams will also conduct during future long-duration missions.
This result is not a surprise, based on the information provided during the most recent briefing. It confirms the data obtained during previous hot fire tests both on a Starliner on the ground and the Starliner docked to ISS. Not only does it appear that Boeing has enough information to fix this problem so it does not occur again, it has proven unequivocally that these thrusters as well as the helium leaks inside the thruster systems pose no unusual risk for a return in the capsule.
NASA and Boeing have a planned review of these results this coming week, when we should expect them to name a return date, likely sometime in the first two weeks of August.
SpaceX launches another 20 Starlink satellites
I had my days wrong last night. In the previous post I said that SpaceX had another launch scheduled for later tonight. In actuality that launch was today, but in the wee hours early this morning. Four hours after a Falcon 9 placed 23 Starlink satellites into orbit from Cape Canaveral, another Falcon 9 placed 20 Starlink satellites into orbit from Vandenberg in California. That’s three launches in just one day.
The first stage completed its seventeenth launch, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
74 SpaceX
31 China
8 Rocket Lab
8 Russia
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 86 to 47, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 74 to 59.
SpaceX launches another 23 Starlink satellites
SpaceX tonight completed its second launch in two nights since resuming launches after a two-week halt after the July 11th upper stage launch failure, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral and placing another 23 Starlink satellites in orbit.
The first stage completed its fourteenth launch, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
73 SpaceX
31 China
8 Rocket Lab
8 Russia
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 85 to 47, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 73 to 59.
SpaceX has another launch scheduled for tomorrow night.