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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. 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. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

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4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it to
 
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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.


ESA delays Webb launch one day due to weather

The European Space Agency (ESA) announced late yesterday that, due to “adverse weather conditions” in French Guiana, it has delayed the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope on an Ariane 5 rocket one day to December 25th.

The announcement also stated that the final launch readiness review also approved the launch, though no update has yet been issued on the ground control communications problem that had caused a two day delay last week.

Meanwhile, this story and its headline encapsulates the terror I think many astronomers presently feel about this telescope:

Why Astronomers Are “Crying and Throwing Up Everywhere” Over the Upcoming Telescope Launch

The sense is one of helpless panic among astronomers who want to use Webb. They know it will do really cutting edge science, but they also know that many things can go wrong, and the history of the telescope (ten years late and 20x overbudget) will likely make replacing it impossible.

And many things can go wrong. Below is NASA’s video showing the telescope’s complex unfolding, step-by-step, after launch.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

7 comments

  • Col Beausabre

    Oh, man, it is so jimxed!

  • Col Beausabre

    sorry, meant “jinxed”

  • Mitch S.

    Not so much whether it’s jinxed, it’s a question of how much is it blessed.
    At the successful conclusion of a complex undertaking you’ll often hear “It went great – almost flawless”.
    Problem with JWST is “almost flawless” may be a complete failure.
    If 99% of the shield latches deploy perfectly the telescope may be crippled.

    I hope it’s very blessed!

  • Andi

    Who was the lead designer on this thing, Rube Goldberg?

  • “adverse weather conditions”

    Cover for “we don’t want to take a chance on hitting Santa” ???

  • Jeff Wright

    Christmas…hmm….we will see a miracle…or Krampus on the campus.

  • Edward

    From the second link, Planetary scientist Peter Gao wrote: “my entire career hinges on this bucket of single point failures I’m so nervous I’m crying and throwing up everywhere.

    Gao has reason to be worried sick (apparently, literally). According to the article, “that ‘bucket of single-point failures’ contains more than 300 individual things that could each fail and bring the whole $10 billion, 13,700 pound, 30-years-in-development mission down with them.” Considering the problems that have plagued Webb for the past decade, how many of us are completely confident of success? The mirror doesn’t have so many moving parts to fail to latch in place, but that sunshade is a nightmare.

    Add to this the recent problem that Lucy had with its solar power panels getting hung up, and that was an easy mechanism.

    My career does not hinge on Webb’s success or failure, so I am not this emotional nor this sick, but I have scores of dollars of tax money tied up in this thing, so if it fails I will be thinking of the six or so lunches that I could have bought or the few dozen space telescopes we all could have had for the money that we overspent on Webb. Even if Webb works perfectly for longer than its expected lifetime, will we get our money’s worth or would we have been better off with those other telescopes?

    Uh oh. Now I am crying, and now I am feeling nauseated.

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