Author: Robert Zimmerman

A supernova overpowers a spiral galaxy

9:34 am

A supernova overwhelms a small galaxy

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken in early 2023 by the Hubble Space Telescope because a ground-based automated sky survey had detected a new supernovae in late 2022 in this galaxy. The spiral galaxy is dubbed LEDA 857074, and is interesting because of its bright central bar and dim and broken spiral arms.

That supernova is the bright spot inside the galaxy’s central bar. It is so bright that it almost looks like someone accidently pasted a white dot there using a graphics program. From the caption:

Astronomers have catalogued millions of galaxies, so while today tens of thousands of supernovae are detected annually, the chance that one is spotted in any particular galaxy is slim. We also do not know how actively LEDA 857074 is forming stars, and therefore how often it might host a supernova. This galaxy is therefore an unlikely and lucky target of Hubble, thanks to this supernova shining a spotlight on it! It now joins the ranks of many more famous celestial objects, with its own Hubble image.

The galaxy itself had been studied by almost no one until this supernova was discovered in it.

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Orbital tug startup Impulse Space increases the kinds of satellites it will offer rides to geosynchronous orbit

9:16 am

The orbital tug startup Impulse Space, founder by former SpaceX engineer Tom Mueller, has announced new plans to make it possible for its tugs to take more kinds of satellites to geosynchronous orbit.

First, the company is revising the design of its larger Helios tug, set to do its first commercial mission in 2027, to carry multiple satellites ranging in weight from 300 to 5000 kilograms. Second, it is upgrading its already-flown smaller Mira tug so that it can be attached to Helios and act as a secondary tug once Helios gets to geosynchronous orbit.

The first Mira demo mission, launched in November 2023, had some communications and software issues but was still considered an overall success. The next mission will fly later this year.

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European aerospace company Safran to open production facility in U.S.

9:06 am

The European aerospace company Safran, which presently partners with Airbus to build the Ariane-6 rocket, has announced that it will open a production facility in Colorado for manufacturing its electrical propulsion thrusters used by satellites.

The American facility will focus on U.S. government and commercial customers, with the French line focusing on customers in the rest of the world. “With this double manufacturing line, we are able to provide trust and confidence to both U.S. domestic, national programs as well as commercial programs,” he said.

The thrusters produced by the two lines will be identical other than the sourcing of components for its power processing unit. The units produced in the United States will use U.S. components while those made in France will use foreign components.

The thruster, called the EPS X00, or “X-hundred”, is a new design and is expected to launch on satellites beginning in 2026. This announcement lets American companies know it is available to them as well. Being built in the U.S. it avoids the strict State Department ITAR regulations that would make it difficult for Safran to sell its European-built thrusters to American satellite companies.

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Axiom changes its CEO

8:59 am

Axiom's space station assembly sequence
The assembly sequence for Axiom’s space station while attached to ISS.
Click for original image.

After founding and leading Axiom for the past eight years, CEO Mike Suffredini, has decided to transfer to the company’s board of directors and pass the company’s leadership to someone else.

“I have dedicated over 40 years to advancing humanity through human spaceflight, including the past eight-plus years alongside Dr. Kam Ghaffarian at Axiom Space,” said Suffredini. “For personal reasons, I have decided to step down as CEO, effective August 9th. I will remain as an advisor to ensure a smooth transition and continue my role as a board member.”

Dr. Ghaffarian, Axiom Space’s Executive Chairman and co-founder, will assume the role of interim CEO until a permanent successor is appointed. His extensive experience and deep industry knowledge make him well-suited to lead the company during this period.

Suffredini’s a long career at NASA before founding Axiom was crucial in establishing the company’s success. He knew how to avoid all the pitfalls of working with the government agency, and was able to negotiate the right deals to make the partnership with NASA proceed smoothly. That inside knowledge probably allowed his company to beat out Bigelow Aerospace, which had been the first to build commercial space station modules but has now faded from sight.

The result is that Axiom was to fly commercial passenger flights to ISS using Dragon capsules, and is going to likely be one of the first commercial stations to begin operations. (The race to be first is presently being led by Axiom and Vast, with Vast looking to be slightly ahead.)

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Lufthansa signs deal with Airbus to train its astronauts for the Starlab space station

8:46 am

the proposed Starlab space station
the proposed Starlab space station

Airbus has now signed an agreement with Lufthansa for it to train the astronauts Europe will fly to the Starlab space station, being built by a consortium of American, European, and Japanese companies.

US-based Voyager Space and Airbus signed an agreement in August 2023 to jointly pursue the development of the Starlab space station. The pair is currently targeting 2028 for the launch of the low Earth orbit destination, with commercial activities commencing in 2029. This timeline will allow for a small window of overlap with International Space Station operations before the orbiting laboratory is decommissioned in 2030.

In a 6 August announcement on Twitter, Airbus Defence and Space revealed the expanding team behind the development of Starlab. The list included Hilton Hotels for crew lodging design, Northrop Grumman for the development of an autonomous docking system for resupply spacecraft, and Lufthansa Aviation Training (LAT) for the training of future Starlab astronauts. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, MDA Space, Palantir, and Ohio State University round out the partnership.

Though Voyager Space is supposed to be leading the project and obtained the seed money from NASA to get it started, the nature of this announcement suggests that it is Airbus who is really in charge at this time. At a minimum, the partnership has definitely transferred much control from the U.S. to Europe.

This shift should not be a surprise, since it became clear shortly after the August 2023 deal was signed that Europe had decided to focus its investment energies on Starlab and make it the European space station for the future.

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Thank you to all who donated to Behind the Black in July

8:00 am

Scroll down for the most recent posts. See also this post about the new print edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8.

My July fund-raising campaign for Behind the Black, celebrating its 14th anniversary, is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. And that includes those who contributed $2 to those who contributed hundreds. I always find it impossible to find the words to express my gratitude for this support, especially since no one has to pay me anything to read my work.

Thank you again! I will leave this announcement at the top of the page through the end of this week.

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Next manned Dragon mission to ISS delayed until September 24, 2024

12:10 am

NASA tonight announced that the next manned Dragon mission to ISS has been delayed until September 24, 2024, a pushback of more than a month caused by the thruster issues on Boeing’s Starliner capsule presently docked to the station.

This adjustment allows more time for mission managers to finalize return planning for the agency’s Boeing Crew Flight Test currently docked to the orbiting laboratory. Starliner ground teams are taking their time to analyze the results of recent docked hot-fire testing, finalize flight rationale for the spacecraft’s integrated propulsion system, and confirm system reliability ahead of Starliner’s return to Earth. NASA and Boeing continue to evaluate the spacecraft’s readiness, and no decisions have been made regarding Starliner’s return.

Since both manned capsule use the same port, Starliner must undock before a Dragon can arrive.

The schedule change also eliminates scheduling conflicts with a Soyuz capsule bringing Russian astronauts to the station in mid-September, and will also allow the launch to switch launchpads so as to not conflict with the SpaceX launch of Europa Clipper, scheduled for October 10, 2024 (though that launch remains in doubt due to other problems with the spacecraft itself).

NASA will be holding a briefing on the status of Starliner at 12:30 pm (Eastern) on Wednesday, August 7, 2024.

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China launches first 18 satellites in a new Starlink-type internet constellation

11:52 pm

China today launched the first 18 satellites in a new Starlink-type internet constellation dubbed Spacesail, its Long March 6A rocket lifting off from the Taiyuan spaceport in north China.

No word on where the rocket’s lower stage and four strap-on boosters landed within China. Jay notes that this Chinese constellation is now ahead of Blue Origin’s Kuiper constellation, a pattern that sadly has been repeated over and over again.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

77 SpaceX
33 China
9 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise still leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 91 to 49, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 77 to 63.

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August 6, 2024 Quick space links

11:40 pm

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.

I am finally home. I had hoped to post this during the day, but life got in the way. Posting will resume tomorrow (with a little posting tonight), and I will likely write something up later this week explaining where I have been.

 

 

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August 5, 2024 Quick space links

1:51 pm

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.

Because posting is so difficult at the resort where I am staying, and I have many other things planned for the day, I am posting Jay’s links early.

 

 

 

  • Rumors suggest NASA to significantly delay the launch of next crewed Dragion to ISS due to Starliner issues

    • The reason is that Starliner needs its flight software updated and this will take four weeks. Until Starliner undocks, there is no port for the Dragon to arrive.

    I will leave it to my readers to comment on what this new stupidity tells us about Boeing. This flight software worked as planned on the second unmanned demo mission. Why should suddenly need an update while two humans are already in space and relying on it? Furthermore, Boeing had numerous flight software problems on the first unmanned demo mission, and supposedly fixed them for the second.

Posting will continue to be light until tomorrow night.

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Sunspot update: In July the Sun produced the most sunspots in almost a quarter century

9:13 am

Every month since this website began fourteen years ago, when NOAA posts its update of its monthly graph tracking the number of sunspots on the Sun’s Earth-facing hemisphere, I post my own analysis, adding some details to provide the larger context.

Of all those updates — numbering about 168 — this month’s is possibly the most significant. Since around 2008, the Sun began a long period where it was unusually quiet, with the solar maximum that occurred in 2014 possibly the weakest in two hundred years. Before that weak maximum begun, half the solar science community predicted it would be a very powerful maximum, while half predicted a weak maximum. Both got it wrong, though the weak prediction was closer though still too high.

When it came time to predict the next solar maximum, expected around 2025, that same solar science community was once again in disagreement. Most approved a NOAA science panel prediction in April 2020 calling for another weak minimum, similar to the one in 2014. A few dissented, however, and instead predicted in June 2020 that the maximum would be one of the strongest ever. In April 2023 however those dissenters chickened out, and revised their prediction downward, still forecasting a peak higher than the NOAA prediction but no longer anywhere as intense.

Based on what happened on the Sun in July, they should have had more faith in their earlier prediction.
» Read more

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SpaceX launches Cygnus cargo freighter to ISS

3:20 pm

SpaceX today successfully launched Northrup Grumman’s Cygnus capsule to ISS, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its tenth flight, landing back at Cape Canaveral.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

77 SpaceX
32 China
9 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 91 to 48, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 77 to 62.

I am out of town till late Tuesday. Though I will attempt to do some posting, and have scheduled at least one essay tomorrow, expect posting to be light.

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SpaceX launches 20 Starlink satellites

12:33 am

SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 20 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California.

The first stage completed its sixth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

76 SpaceX
32 China
9 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 90 to 48, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 76 to 62.

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Ferris Akel – Great Blue Heron

6:01 pm

An evening pause: The music is called “Surprise Attack” by James Horner, and was written for the 1982 film, Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan. The action is produced by a Great Blue Heron at Sapsucker Woods, Ithaca, New York on July 20, 2024.

May your weekend activities be as successful.

Hat tip Ferris Akel.

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August 2, 2024 Quick space links

3:19 pm

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.

 

 

 

 

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Charges against pro-Hamas rioters have routinely been dropped nationwide

1:23 pm

The instruction manual of the left
The instruction manual of the left

According to an excellent report today at the website Campus Reform, charges against more than 300 pro-Hamas rioters that illegally occupied and damaged campuses at eleven different universities nationwide have been dropped by prosecutors.

The list is discouraging, to put it mildly:

  • School of the Art Institute of Chicago: 80 criminal charges were dropped
  • University of Texas at Austin: 79 criminal charges were dropped
  • Indiana University: 56 criminal charges were dropped
  • Columbia University: 31 criminal charges have been dropped
  • California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt: 27 criminal charges have been dropped
  • University of Minnesota: 9 criminal charges have been dropped
  • University of New Hampshire: 8 criminal charges have been dropped
  • The City University of New York: 7 criminal charges have been dropped
  • Northwestern University: 4 criminal charges have been dropped

The reasons why prosecutors have dropped these charges are manifold. In some cases (such as in California, Illinois, and New York), the prosecutors were partisan Democrats who approved of the riots, and thus acted to protect the rioters by dropping the charges. In several cases however the prosecutors expressed extreme unhappiness with their own action, stating that they did so reluctantly because they did not think they could win in court.
» Read more

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A frozen bubbly caldron on Mars

11:24 am

A frozen bubbly caldron on Mars
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, rotated, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on April 11, 2024 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows a nice collection of what the scientists label “irregular ring structures,” interspersed with clusters of small mesas ranging in heights from 13 to 75 feet.

The location is at 27 degrees north latitude, so the presence of near surface ice, which might explain these strange rings, is less likely though not impossible. The stipled nature of the flat ground suggests that near surface ice might be here, resulting in sublimation of that ice and leaving behind a flat but rough surface.

The location however suggests another possibility, which though vastly different in some ways, is almost identical in others.
» Read more

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Rocket Lab successfully launches commercial Earth observation satellite

9:54 am

Rocket Lab today successfully launched a commercial Earth observation satellite from the Japanese company Synspective, its Electron rocket lifting off from New Zealand.

This is the fifth launch of a contract of sixteen launches by Rocket Lab for Synspective.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

75 SpaceX
32 China
9 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 89 to 48, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 75 to 62.

It is noteworthy that Rocket Lab now has more launches in 2024 than Russia, and is maintaining a pace of more than one launch-per-month. The company had predicted doing 20 launches this year, which seems unlikely at this point, but not completely impossible. It however has now tied its 2022 record for most launches in a year, and is thus almost certainly guaranteed to smash it.

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Chinese scientists discover thin-layered graphene in Chang’e-5 lunar samples

9:47 am

Chinese scientists analyzing one of the lunar samples brought back in 2021 by Chang’e-5 from the Moon’s near side have detected for the first time what they call “natural few-layered graphene.”

You can read the paper here. The samples from Chang’e-5 came from some of what are believed are some of the youngest lava on the Moon. This discovery confirms that conclusion. From the paper:

The identification of graphene in the core–shell structure suggests a bottom-up synthesis process rather than exfoliation, which generally involves a high-temperature catalytic reaction. Therefore, a formation mechanism of few-layer graphene and graphitic carbon is proposed here.

Volcanic eruption, a typical high-temperature process, occurred on the Moon. Lunar soil can be stirred up by solar wind and high-temperature plasma discharge can be generated on the Moon’s surface. … [T]he Fe-bearing mineral particles, such as olivine and pyroxene, in lunar soil might catalyse the conversion of carbon-containing gas molecules in the solar wind or polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons into graphitic carbon of different thicknesses and morphologies on their surfaces, including few-layer graphene flakes and carbon shells.

These graphene flakes are likely to disappear over time, so its existence reinforces the belief that this lava is young.

Unlike too many American planetary scientists recently — who have repeatedly implied that finding anything even remotely related to life processes suggests the possibility of life on Venus and Mars — the Chinese scientists don’t make the additional absurd claim that finding carbon on the Moon suggests the existence of life. It doesn’t. Kudos to them for being good scientists.

As a result, expect American mainstream media to pay no attention to this result, despite its intriguing and unprecedented nature.

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Treaty allowing U.S. rockets to launch from Australia goes into effect

9:30 am

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

On July 23, 2024 the Australian government finalized its October 2023 agreement with the United States to allow U.S. rockets to launch from Australia soil, as well as allow Australian rocket startups to launch American satellites.

The agreement is mostly a boost for the three spaceports presently vying for business in Australia. Not only will this widen their customer base — with many international rocket startups looking for alternatives because of regulatory burdens elsewhere — it will allow any Australian rocket startups to sell their rockets to American satellite companies. At the moment there is only one such company, Gilmour, but this treaty will encourage investment in others.

This deal will also add impetus to the negotiations presently going on between SpaceX and Australia.

The company is reportedly in discussions with US and Australian authorities to bring down one of its rockets off Australia’s northwest coast and tow it into a yet-to-be-determined port for repatriation to the US. The talks follow a SpaceX Starship rocket making a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean in June. There are also reportedly tentative discussions about launching rockets from Australia or bringing them back directly onto Australian soil.

Using Australia as a launch site will not do much to relieve SpaceX of the red tape it has been struggling with from the federal bureaucracy, but it will provide it additional options for increasing its launch rate as well as the testing of Starship. It clearly wants to recover Starships as soon as possible for study, and having them brought to Australia quickly after splashdown would facilitate that effort.

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Arianespace finally schedules last Vega launch

9:04 am

After improvising an upper stage fix because the rocket’s Italian manufacturer, Avio, literally lost the stage’s tanks, Arianespace on July 31, 2024 finally scheduled the last Vega rocket launch, targeting a September 3, 2024 lift off from French Guiana.

The change to the upper stage was required after the company managed to lose two of its four propellant tanks. As the production line for the AVUM upper stage tanks had been shut down in anticipation of the rocket’s retirement, Avio was forced to find a way to instead utilize the larger propellant tanks from the Vega C AVUM+ upper stage. With this process now complete, the company has a clear path toward the rocket’s swan song.

This rocket has been replaced by the more powerful Vega-C. Control and ownership on future launches has also been shifted from Arianespace back to Avio as part of Europe’s transition from using a government-run launch monopoly (Ariancespace) to relying on multiple competitive and independent private companies.

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NASA/Boeing push back final decision of Starliner return

8:58 am

Starliner docked to ISS
Starliner docked to ISS.

Someone at NASA getting cold feet? According to a NASA posting today, the review that was supposed to happen this week to determine a return date for Starliner and its two-astronaut crew has been postponed until next week as engineers continue analzying the results of the recent thruster hot fire tests, both on the ground and on ISS.

The wording of this posting is intriguing, to say the least:

Teams are taking their time to analyze the results of recent docked hot-fire testing, finalize flight rationale for the spacecraft’s integrated propulsion system, and confirm system reliability ahead of Starliner’s return to Earth from the International Space Station.

Forward work for the team also includes finalizing the spacecraft’s undocking procedures and operational mitigations that could be used in flight, if needed, to build further confidence in the system. Meanwhile, Starliner ground and mission support teams are continuing to prepare for undocking by participating in integrated simulations with space station operations teams.

Following the completion of Starliner’s return planning, which is expected to continue into next week, more information will be shared about the agency’s return readiness review preparations and subsequent media briefing. As always, astronaut safety remains the top priority for both NASA and Boeing. [emphasis mine]

Up until this posting, I have been confidently predicting the two astronauts would return on Starliner. Now I am not so sure. It seems the data from the hot fire tests, especially the most recent tests on the Starliner capsule docked to ISS, was not as encouraging or did not confirm the conclusions drawn from the previous ground-based tests, and have required further analysis. This might not in the end make a difference, but the wording of this NASA’s press release, including the highlighted emphasis on astronaut safety, suggests NASA is at least considering the idea of bringing the astronauts home on a Dragon capsule.

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China launches “high-orbit internet satellite”

8:45 am

China last night successfully launched what its state-run press merely labels as a “high-orbit internet satellite”, its Long March 3B rocket lifting off from its Xichange spaceport in southwest China.

No word on where the rocket’s lower stage and strap-on boosters, using very toxic hypergolic fuels, crashed inside China. Previous launches have had those booster crash near habitable area.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

75 SpaceX
32 China
8 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise still leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 88 to 48, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 75 to 61.

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SpaceX launches 23 Starlink satellites

10:12 pm

SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The first stage completed its twelfth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

75 SpaceX
31 China
8 Rocket Lab
8 Russia

American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 88 to 47, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world combined, including American companies, 75 to 60.

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Inspector General: Roman Space Telescope is meeting the budget overruns and schedule delays NASA predicted

4:57 pm

According to the twisted language in a new NASA inspector general report [pdf] describing the present status of the Roman Space Telescope, the project is on schedule and on budget because NASA decided to predict ahead of time how much it would behind schedule and over budget at this moment. From its executive summary:

[A]s of March 2024, Roman was meeting its cost obligations and schedule to launch by May 2027. Roman was on track to launch despite encountering contractor performance issues and cost overruns related to hardware anomalies, under scoping of work, and inadequate oversight of subcontractors. Roman remains on schedule because Science Mission Directorate officials conducted a replan in May 2021 to mitigate the expected cost and schedule growth caused by COVID-19, increasing the life-cycle cost estimate from $3.9 billion to $4.3 billion. This replan also included delaying the launch readiness date from October 2026 to May 2027. As of March 2024, Roman was tracking its project reserves and potential delays with L3Harris as its top risks. Roman has been using its project reserves to mitigate cost growth related to L3Harris’s performance challenges. Despite these contract value increases, Roman is still within its life-cycle cost estimate because the project’s reserves cover these extra costs.

The insulting nature of this inspector general report is astonishing. The administrative state really does think the American public is too stupid to notice this. I wonder if they are right.

The report further notes issues with the telescope’s two subcontractors, BAE Systems and L3Harris, as well as warning of insufficient ground-based antenna capacity for downloading the data that Roman will produce.

[A]s of April 2024, the NSN [Near Space Network] did not have adequate capacity to support Roman’s mission requirements without planned upgrades to the White Sands antenna and lacked the funding to implement the necessary upgrades by the mission’s launch readiness date.

In other words, more money will be needed to build more ground antennas, something that NASA conveniently forgot to mention when it first proposed Roman to Congress. How interesting, but completely par for the course.

Hat tip stringer Jay.

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August 1, 2024 Quick space links

4:42 pm

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.

 

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