November 5, 2021 Zimmerman/Batchelor podcast
Embedded below the fold in two parts.
To listen to all of John Batchelor’s podcasts, well worth your time, go here.
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Author: Robert Zimmerman
Mentour Pilot – SAS flight 751-the Gottröra Miracle
An evening pause: Hat tip Björn Larsson a.k.a. LocalFluff. who adds,
This stuff is more complicated than I thought. You could pick your favourite(!) airplane crash. The fantastic Hudson river landing for example. My favourite is this one, with a happy ending, because it crashed near to where I lived as a kid back then. The crash site, a potato field, was then locally called The Gottröra International Airport. Someone even put up a sign with that name at the bus stop nearby.
China launches Landsat-type satellite using Long March 6
China today successfully placed a Landsat-type satellite into a sun-synchronous orbit, using its Long March 6 rocket. From the link:
The Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center sits at an altitude of approximately 1,500 meters (4,920 feet) above sea level, its dry climate making it an ideal launch site for the Chinese space program. Unlike the Kennedy Space Center or the Guyana Space Centre, however, Taiyuan is located inland rather than on China’s eastern coast. This means spent rocket stages can crash-land near populated regions depending on the rocket’s flight trajectory.
Some recent flights of [Long March] rockets have featured parachutes and even grid fins mounted on the first stage boosters, presumably in an attempt to mitigate any collateral damage caused by falling debris. Friday’s launch did not see this type of hardware in place.
No word yet on where the first stage booster landed, or if it landed near habitable areas.
The leaders in the 2021 launch race:
40 China
23 SpaceX
18 Russia
4 Northrop Grumman
4 ULA
4 Europe (Arianespace)
China now leads the U.S. 40 to 36 in the national rankings. Its forty successful launches so far this year is the most by a single nation since Russia completed 49 in 1994.
This was also the 100th successful launch this year. Based on the number of planned launches presently scheduled,, that number could easily rise to more than 125, the most since the early 1980s.
The strange surface of Mars’ north pole icecap
Click for full image.
Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and annotated to post here, was taken on September 17, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows us a very small section of Mars’ north pole icecap.
What are we looking at? The picture was taken in summer, so by this point the thin mantle of dry ice that falls as snow in the winter and covers the north pole down to about 60 degrees latitude has sublimated away. This surface thus is water ice interspersed with Martian dust.
Yet, unlike the Antarctic icecap on Earth, the ice surface is not smooth and flat. Instead, this Martian ice has a surface that is a complex arrangement of hollows and ridges, all about the same size. Why?
And what are the two larger white spots? What caused them and why are they the only differently-sized objects in the picture?
The full resolution close-up, found at the image website, provides some answers to these questions.
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Today’s blacklisted American: Rutgers bars student from remote classes because he had not gotten COVID shots
Clowns in charge at Rutgers
They’re coming for you next: Logan Hollar, a student at Rutgers University, was blocked by the college from his university email account as well as attending remote classes because he refuses to get any of the COVID-19 shots that the school is now requiring.
Logan Hollar, 22, told NJ.com he largely ignored the school’s coronavirus mandate “because all my classes were remote” from his Sandyston home, a distance of some 70 miles from the university’s principle campus in New Brunswick.
But he was locked out of his Rutgers email and related accounts when he went to pay his tuition at the end of last month — and was told he needed to be vaccinated even though he has no plans to attend in person, according to the report. “I’ll probably have to transfer to a different university,” Hollar told NJ.com, revealing at least one other student to his knowledge is in the same position.
“I find it concerning for the vaccine to be pushed by the university rather than my doctor,” he told the outlet. [emphasis mine]
The highlighted sentence is the bottom line. » Read more
NASA runs out of money for building second SLS mobile launcher
NASA’s bloated SLS mobile launchers
NASA has had to halt construction of the second mobile launcher platform for its SLS rocket because the agency has run out of money.
Overall, NASA spent almost a billion dollars on the first launcher (to be used only three times), and now has budgeted almost a half billion dollars for the second.
That’s about $1.4 billion, and apparently it is not enough.
The second Mobile Launcher (ML-2) has a cost estimate of $450 million. However, like ML-1, that cost is likely to rise over time based on the challenges involving ML-1, which ranged from being overweight to suffering from a slight lean. Both of these issues have since been resolved via engineering solutions. [emphasis mine]
The highlighted words illustrate more NASA incompetence. The first platform was designed and built badly, being too heavy for its purposes while also improperly tilting sideways The agency had to spend a lot of money and time fixing these problems.
Meanwhile, SpaceX moves its Starship spaceship and Superheavy booster about in Boca Chica using simple truck movers that probably cost the company no more than a million dollars each, if that. And they became operational quickly, and are now in use.
SpaceX begins filling tanks at Starship orbital launchpad
Capitalism in space: SpaceX has begun the process of filling the many tanks at its Starship orbital launchpad in Boca Chica, requiring more than a hundred truck deliveries of nitrogen (for cleaning the interior of the tanks as well as cooling the propellants) and oxygen.
In mid-September, SpaceX began delivering cryogenic fluids to Starbase’s orbital tank farm for the first time ever. Instead of propellant, dozens of tanker trucks delivered liquid nitrogen to one or two of the farm’s tanks between mid-September and mid-October. Altogether, around 40-60 truckloads was delivered – only enough to partially fill one tank. That liquid nitrogen also appeared to be piped into two of the farm’s three liquid oxygen tanks, meaning that it may have only been used to clean and proof test them.
Combined, the farm’s seven main tanks should be able to store roughly 2400 tons (5.3M lb) of liquid methane (LCH4), 5400 tons (12M lb) of liquid oxygen (LOx), and 2600 tons (5.7M lb) of liquid nitrogen (LN2). LCH4 and LOx are Starship’s propellant, while LN2 is needed to ‘subcool’ that propellant below its boiling point, significantly increasing its density and the mass of propellant Starships can store.
It appears that while SpaceX has begun storing oxygen, it has not yet begun loading its methane tanks. When that fuel begins arriving we will know that an orbital launch of Starship is imminent.
History Unplugged – The Age of Discovery 2.0: Episode 2
Part two of the six part series, The Age of Discovery 2.0, from the podcast, History Unplugged, is now available here.
This episode is centered on an interview with law professor Glenn Reynolds, the creator of the aggregate news website Instapundit. As the series host and creator, Scott Rank, describes:
With private space companies launching rockets, satellites, and people at a record pace, and with the US and other governments committing to a future in space, Glenn Harlan Reynolds looks at how we got here, where we’re going, and why it matters for all of humanity.
Episode 3 (November 9) will feature Robert Zubrin, describing how building a space-faring society will invigorate the civilization on Earth. Episode 4 (November 11) will feature yours truly, discussing my new book, Conscious Choice, and how the history of the British colonies in North American can guide us in building just and prosperous colonies in space. Episode 5 (November 16) will feature Rand Simberg, describing how we must accept risk and failure if we wish to do great things in space.
The final episode (November 18) will look at the future of warfare in space, something that ideologues think they can outlaw even though that dream is utterly impossible.
Astra proposes its own 13,000 satellite internet constellation
Capitalism in space: Astra, the startup smallsat rocket company that has yet to successfully complete an orbital launch, has filed with the FCC a proposal to launch a 13,000 satellite constellation for providing internet services globally.
Astra said its satellites would be built in-house, and would be launched on Astra’s own rockets. The satellites would be sent into orbital altitudes ranging from 236 to 435 miles (380 to 700 kilometers), and would be equipped with propulsion systems to aid in collision avoidance and post-operational deorbiting.
Potential applications for Astra’s high-bandwidth connectivity would include communications services, environmental and natural resource applications and national security missions.
Though Astra could certainly launch many of these satellites itself, it is unlikely it launch them all with its small rocket. Thus, more launch business for other rocket companies!
Weather forces another delay for Endurance launch to ISS
Because of poor weather expected on November 7 evening NASA and SpaceX have once again delayed the launch of the manned Dragon capsule Endurance carrying four astronauts to ISS.
The U.S. space agency and SpaceX have pushed the launch of the Crew-3 mission, which will send four astronauts to the International Space Station, from Saturday (Nov. 6) to Monday (Nov. 8) at the earliest, because of anticipated bad weather over the coming days.
NASA and SpaceX are also now considering whether to bring the four astronauts of the previous mission, Crew-2, back down to Earth before sending Crew-3 skyward.
The reason they might bring the crew home first is because the capsule they will be using, Endeavour, is only rated to stay in space for seven months, and the end of that time period is approaching. If they wait much longer, the mediocre November weather could prevent a return before that end date is reached.
Lisa Hannigan – Undertow
An evening pause: Hat tip Dan Morris.
November 4, 2021 Zimmerman/Pratt podcast on blacklists
The forty-plus minute interview I did with Robert Pratt on his Pratt on Texas podcast is now available here. Pratt’s show summary is as follows:
The cases are more frequent, insidious, and perversely absurd.
In this update we discuss a surgeon and another doctor seemingly fired for simply speaking up about mask mandates and WuFlu treatments. We look at two teachers harmed and a formerly prestigious science body that denied giving awards because all nominees were white males and that’s not all.