Cygnus completes mission to ISS
Cygnus has successfully completed its cargo mission to ISS, burning up upon re-entry on Sunday.
The story includes images of the re-entry taken by astronauts on ISS.
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Cygnus has successfully completed its cargo mission to ISS, burning up upon re-entry on Sunday.
The story includes images of the re-entry taken by astronauts on ISS.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID 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. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
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.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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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4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
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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.
It is noteworthy that Cygnus and Dragon are taking the role of the now discontinued European ATV (the current flight being the last). After several companies competed with each other during the COTS portion of the program, these two companies won the Commercial Resupply Services contracts.
The ATV program took about 55,000 lbs to the ISS and cost $5 billion. During their CRS contract periods, Cygnus can take about 16,000 lbs (2,000 lbs per flight) for a cost of $2 billion, and Dragon can take 84,000 lbs (7,000 lbs per flight) for a cost of $1.6 billion (or $2 billion, if you choose to include development costs).
It looks like the commercial companies, which are new to this type of business, are already performing about as well as the older government agencies. Ain’t competition a nice thing?