August 14, 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.
- Satellite builder Terran Orbital removes Rivada from its list of future revenue
This appears to be a bookeeping maneuver, but suggests that Rivada may be having problems, which is a big deal because its contract with Terran Orbital is for $2.4 billion to build 300 satellites.
- Proposed Nova Scotia spaceport Maritime Launch Services signs deal with unnamed rocket company
This is one of those press releases about nothing. Maritime’s spaceport is years behind schedule. The release includes really no information, and appears to have been issued merely to counter another proposed Canadian spaceport, Nordspace, that recently released its own press release about nothing.
- Chinese pseudo-company CAS Space touts 320 second static fire test of an engine for its Kinetic-2 Falcon 9 copycat rocket
The goal is to do the first test launch in 2025.
- On this day in 2007 the Hubble Space Telescope capture a rare edge on view of Uranus and its rings
“Astronomers on Earth can only see the rings’ edge every 42 years due to the planet’s 84 year orbit.”
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five 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.
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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.
- Satellite builder Terran Orbital removes Rivada from its list of future revenue
This appears to be a bookeeping maneuver, but suggests that Rivada may be having problems, which is a big deal because its contract with Terran Orbital is for $2.4 billion to build 300 satellites.
- Proposed Nova Scotia spaceport Maritime Launch Services signs deal with unnamed rocket company
This is one of those press releases about nothing. Maritime’s spaceport is years behind schedule. The release includes really no information, and appears to have been issued merely to counter another proposed Canadian spaceport, Nordspace, that recently released its own press release about nothing.
- Chinese pseudo-company CAS Space touts 320 second static fire test of an engine for its Kinetic-2 Falcon 9 copycat rocket
The goal is to do the first test launch in 2025.
- On this day in 2007 the Hubble Space Telescope capture a rare edge on view of Uranus and its rings
“Astronomers on Earth can only see the rings’ edge every 42 years due to the planet’s 84 year orbit.”
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five 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:
5. 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. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Following up on the TCEQ story, iyt looks like the lawfare activists *may* have finally scored a hit – there may be state enforcement action against SpaceX in the works now. From Tim Fernholz of Payload, quote tweeting SpaceX’s correction of CNBC’s latest “revision” of their story on Starbase wastewater discharges:
__________________
Here’s SpaceX’s response, which stresses the work they do on compliance but basically confirms they have been discharging wastewater without a permit.
3:42 PM · Aug 12, 2024
It’s always interesting when a company has a comprehensive response like this prepared at publication time but doesn’t share it with the journalist, who I would guess asked for comment days before publishing
3:44 PM · Aug 12, 2024
I asked TCEQ, the Texas environmental regulatory agency, whether it gave SpaceX permission to discharge wastewater without a permit.
The answer? “There is a pending enforcement action. Due to this, we cannot comment any further at this time.”
12:53 PM · Aug 14, 2024
One of the aforementioned activists then weighs in, but I’ll let interested parties go there to read it if they wanted.
https://x.com/TimFernholz/status/1823764945043165611
“On this day in 2007 the Hubble Space Telescope capture a rare edge on view of Uranus and its rings”
That’s a Cool Image. Lo-res, but still cool.
Blair Ivey: There is a link at the tweet to the original Hubble press release with a high resolution version.
Dropping this in here….
Gregg Kihn
[July 10, 1949 – August 13, 2024]
“The Breakup Song” (They Don’t Write ‘Em)
Live at Wolfgangs Vault (February 24, 2011)
https://youtu.be/vzQ07lataP4
4:24
“I’d like to do a song that put both my kids through College, and partial grandchildren as well…”