Comments on: April 24, 2025 Quick space links

By: Jeff Wright

Jeff Wright — Sun, 27 Apr 2025 06:09:50 +0000

Sea level dip
https://thedebrief.org/radian-aerospace-reveals-next-generation-spacecraft-material-dur-e-therm-designed-to-withstand-single-stage-to-orbit-flight/

By: Patrick Underwood

Patrick Underwood — Sat, 26 Apr 2025 19:45:40 +0000

Ray, Elon has said he’s putting Optimus robots on the 2026 (or 2028, if you prefer) Mars flights, and that several Starship landers will make the journey. If I were writing a Heinlein D.D. Harriman knockoff, I might imagine Elon, er, D.D.:

-Putting some robots and a Tesla in the payload bay of a couple (for redundancy) Starships
-Putting a 2-stage Dragon-based hypergolic direct-ascent/return vehicle in the payload bay of a couple Starships
-Landing near the Perseverance samples but not close enough to set off NASA’s bio contamination alarms
-Road-tripping a couple highly sterilized Optimi in a Tesla to retrieve the samples
-Dividing the samples between the two return vehicles (if both survived), again for redundancy
-Launching the samples back to Earth

Of course I have no idea what I’m talking about engineering-wise, but it makes a good story.

By: Ray Van Dune

Ray Van Dune — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 13:57:12 +0000

Blair, I suspect Elon’s response to your question would be “Here, hold my beer a minute…”

By: Blair Ivey

Blair Ivey — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 06:12:40 +0000

Curious if it would be possible (or feasible) for a private Mars Sample Return. Ahead of the Chinese. That would be Capitalism spiking the football.

By: Mitch S.

Mitch S. — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 02:22:33 +0000

So Boeing is sticking with Starliner.
I don’t know the terms of the NASA deal but I guess Boeing figures if they can do a few crew missions to ISS they’ll get paid enough to cover the additional costs. Otherwise Starliner looks like a dead end.
ISS will be deorbited in the not distant future, unlikely to be replaced by another NASA station. Even if Starliner becomes safe and reliable it is still likely to be too costly to compete transporting people to private stations or doing space tourism. At least ULA’s Vulcan can line up some US military and spy agency launches to limp along.

By: Dick Eagleson

Dick Eagleson — Fri, 25 Apr 2025 00:49:48 +0000

Jared Isaacman’s nomination being reported favorably out of committee will be another big step, but won’t put him in the Administrator’s chair just yet. I hope the full Senate can vote on his nomination as early in May as possible. There’s stuff needs doin’ and time’s a-wastin.’

By: Skunk Bucket

Skunk Bucket — Thu, 24 Apr 2025 23:54:42 +0000

An “Election” rocket sounds cool, but I’m betting you meant Electron. Personally, I’m starting to get excited at the prospect of the Neutron.