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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.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

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


Europe at last launches Ariane-6

Ariane-6 seconds after liftoff
Ariane-6 seconds after liftoff

Arianespace, the commercial rocket arm of the European Space Agency (ESA) today successfully completed the first launch of its new Ariane-6 rocket, lifting off from French Guiana in South America carrying nine cubesats plus two re-entry test capsules.

As of posting, the nine cubesats have been deployed. Of the remaining payloads, one is a smallscale version of the return cargo capsule being built by the French company The Exploration Company. It will test the re-entry technology for that capsule.

UPDATE: There was an issue restarting the upper stage later in the flight that prevented the last payloads from being released. The bigwigs at the press conference at this link repeatedly insisted the flight was a complete success, but this failure of the upper stage is not a good thing, but hardly a disaster. It is similar to problems Firefly had on some of its early flights, which the company was able to overcome.

If all goes as planned, Arianespace and Arianegroup (the private company that builds and owns the rocket) hope to ramp up launches over the next three years, doing one more in 2024, six in 2025, eight in 2026, and ten in 2027. It says the rocket has contracts for thirty launches, eighteen of which are for launching Amazon’s Kuiper internet constellation.

I expect Ariane-6 to face heavy competitive pressure over that time period, not only from SpaceX but from the new European rocket startups that should begin launching at far less cost. The pressure should make the future of Ariane-6 somewhat dim, unless the European Union steps in and mandates its use by European satellite companies. If the latter happens, expect Europe’s entire space industry to suffer badly.

This was Europe’s first launch in 2024, so the leader board in the 2024 launch race has not changed:

71 SpaceX
30 China
8 Russia
8 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise still leads the world combined in successful launches, 83 to 46, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world, including other American companies, 71 to 58.

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

4 comments

  • M. Murcek

    Another expendable rocket. They are chortling over at SpaceX…

  • Ray Van Dune

    My idiot Sister-in-Law keeps talking about how SpaceX is a “monopoly” because they charge less than what everyone else does, principally by reusing their rockets instead of throwing them in the ocean. Did I mention that she’s an environmentalist too? God help us.

  • pzatchok

    I can see why they finished and launched this craft. The old sunk finances problem. Pay to much already to stop now.

    But I will be surprised if they keep flying past next year. And I would love to see them announce a re-usable rocket soon.

  • Ray Van Dune:

    I did a BOTE analysis of launcher reusability by dry mass fraction recovered. Falcon 9 has an 87% reusability (1st stage and fairing), while Falcon Heavy has an astounding 97% reusability if all three boosters and the fairing are recovered. Even expending the center booster yields a 64% re-use. Starship/Super Heavy, of course, is designed for 100% re-use. I would think that an environmentalist would be a SpaceX fangirl, given that it is only one of two companies, Rocket Lab being the other, that recycles their equipment. That she is not, makes me think that her ‘environmentalism’ is a cover for her politics. Does she truly want more efficient, less impactful industry (engineering!), or is that only true if the ‘right’ people are in charge?

    “I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is
    southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.”

    Hamlet Act 2 Scene 2 Shakespeare 1603

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