December 12, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- India’s Air Force to become the “Air and Space Force,” with plans to launch 100 military satellites in the next 7-8 years
It also says it will complete those launches using India’s private space industry, which is at this moment barely established.
- This week marks the 51st anniversary of Apollo 17, the last manned mission to the Moon
If you had told the astronauts then that they’d all be dead before we returned, they would have been outraged. Nonetheless, it looks like they will all be dead before humans once again step forth on the Moon, and worse, the odds of those next steps being taken by Americans is getting lower all the time.
- Satellite imagery suggests Blue Origin did an engine test of its BE-4 engine in early December
The real question is this: How many engines are they mass producing at this point? By next year they will need to produce a lot to meet the demands of both ULA’s Vulcan rocket and Blue Origin’s own New Glenn rocket, both of which have contracts to get a lot of Amazon Kuiper satellites into orbit quickly.
- China is apparently about to launch its own X-37B copy
The images suggest 1) that it is a copy of Boeing’s X-37B and 2) they will be reusing the rocket shroud on this launch. #2 however is unconfirmed.
I apologize to my readers for my lack of any essays so far this week. For maybe the first time in my life I have a kind of writer’s block. I find the news here in the U.S. so distressing I have trouble writing about it. This break might help me regain my writing juices.
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.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- India’s Air Force to become the “Air and Space Force,” with plans to launch 100 military satellites in the next 7-8 years
It also says it will complete those launches using India’s private space industry, which is at this moment barely established.
- This week marks the 51st anniversary of Apollo 17, the last manned mission to the Moon
If you had told the astronauts then that they’d all be dead before we returned, they would have been outraged. Nonetheless, it looks like they will all be dead before humans once again step forth on the Moon, and worse, the odds of those next steps being taken by Americans is getting lower all the time.
- Satellite imagery suggests Blue Origin did an engine test of its BE-4 engine in early December
The real question is this: How many engines are they mass producing at this point? By next year they will need to produce a lot to meet the demands of both ULA’s Vulcan rocket and Blue Origin’s own New Glenn rocket, both of which have contracts to get a lot of Amazon Kuiper satellites into orbit quickly.
- China is apparently about to launch its own X-37B copy
The images suggest 1) that it is a copy of Boeing’s X-37B and 2) they will be reusing the rocket shroud on this launch. #2 however is unconfirmed.
I apologize to my readers for my lack of any essays so far this week. For maybe the first time in my life I have a kind of writer’s block. I find the news here in the U.S. so distressing I have trouble writing about it. This break might help me regain my writing juices.
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.
Some good news for your file
https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/12/12/exclusive-florida-school-punished-allowing-boy-girls-sports/
: A Florida high school has been fined and placed on administrative probation for violating the state’s bylaws by allowing a biologically male student to participate on a female sports team
——-
A well thought out article on the feasibility of flooding the Gaza tunnels
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2023/11/01/flood_the_gaza_tunnels_989879.html
It has already been done
“Egypt flooded thirty-seven cross-border tunnels in southern Gaza back in 2015 in what stands as a practical proof of concept in this location. Seawater from the Mediterranean would be pumped directly into the tunnel openings through short pipelines.”
The left’s excuse of damaging the local water table does not hold water so to speak
“As with the Egyptian tunnel operations, the impact of flooding on groundwater salinization would no doubt be raised. The extent of saltwater leakage through the tunnels into local groundwater would depend on the depth and construction of the tunnels and the configuration of the local aquifer. Gaza’s shallow aquifer is already over-depleted, however, and ninety-five percent of its groundwater was considered unfit for public consumption as far back as 2017. The reason is that it’s extensively contaminated with chemicals and sewage, as well as saltwater intrusion from the Mediterranean due to a long history of over pumping. Because of that, Gaza relies heavily on desalinization for potable water.”
I am reading “When the Heavens went on sale”
You should read it and do a book review.
I have writer’s block too, but I don’t write so it doesn’t matter.
Here’s the Artemis 1 Orion re-entry real time. It’s neat, you can see they maneuver it to vary the lift vector to control the descent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U88DzZcsubs
A song operators on our side listen to for inspiration when they’re about to go into harm’s way
The Last of the Mohicans – Promentory (Main Theme)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tjdswqGGVg
(6 minutes)
Maybe we shouldn’t have left the keys in the ignition of those lunar rovers after all…