February 3, 2026 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.
- Vast touts its full-scale life support testing for its Haven-1 single module space station
It is my understanding that some of these life support functions will be handled by the Dragon capsule that brings up the crew.
- House NASA authorization bill demands numerous reports and paperwork
While it is good Congress wants to maintain oversight, this bill simply forces NASA to write seven reports (essentially paperwork) that will add little knowledge not already in public domain and that no one will read.
- On this day in 1956 the Soviet Union launched the world’s first ballistic missile carrying a nuclear warhead
The R-5M rocket flew 740 miles in 10.5 minutes, delivering a nuclear warhead to the Aral Karakum region with a yield of 300 tons of TNT.
- On this day in 1966 the Soviet Union’s Luna 9 became the world’s first spacecraft to land on the Moon and function thereafter
It returned data for three days. The landing was not soft, as the spacecraft used giant airbags to protect it as it hit the ground hard and bounced several times.
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
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.
- Vast touts its full-scale life support testing for its Haven-1 single module space station
It is my understanding that some of these life support functions will be handled by the Dragon capsule that brings up the crew.
- House NASA authorization bill demands numerous reports and paperwork
While it is good Congress wants to maintain oversight, this bill simply forces NASA to write seven reports (essentially paperwork) that will add little knowledge not already in public domain and that no one will read.
- On this day in 1956 the Soviet Union launched the world’s first ballistic missile carrying a nuclear warhead
The R-5M rocket flew 740 miles in 10.5 minutes, delivering a nuclear warhead to the Aral Karakum region with a yield of 300 tons of TNT.
- On this day in 1966 the Soviet Union’s Luna 9 became the world’s first spacecraft to land on the Moon and function thereafter
It returned data for three days. The landing was not soft, as the spacecraft used giant airbags to protect it as it hit the ground hard and bounced several times.
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
“It is my understanding that some of these life support functions will be handled by the Dragon capsule that brings up the crew.”
This is the most obvious aspect in which Haven-1 really is “minimum viable product.” Vast wanted to get a space station into orbit as fast as possible with the resources they had, and shifting a lot of the life support over to a Crew Dragon shaved significant development time off the station. You have to admire that aggressiveness.
And speaking of “minimum viable product,” I’m not sure you can find better examples than Luna 9. But hey, it worked.
There’s another company building hardware to support deep space comms: https://cascade.space/
Must be 300 kilotons, I’m guessing?
I’m Mr. Pedantic today.
Patrick,
Actually, the answer may be more complex than even the tweet suggests!
Here is what Astronautix’s entry on the R5-M says:
http://www.astronautix.com/r/r-5m.html
Ha! Thanks for that, Richard M! I give it to Mr. Zimmerman for the win.
I think it is well within Congress’ purview to wonder where Lunar Starship is.
Jeff,
For over 2 1/2 years I have been working for an aerospace company that is developing equipment that must interface with SpaceX’s Starship HLS (lunar lander). Their spacecraft is for real! People are really working on it. Interface documents exist for it. I have been part of meetings and email chains working with SpaceX.
Your continual skepticism is frankly ridiculous. Their design is probably not perfect (I only know a bit of it), but it is quite real.
Imagine how things would be if everything were reversed.
You would have worked on SLS, and assured us it is real, while Starship was on the pad.. about to launch astronauts moonward.
If I then said “oh dear! It has leaks–roll it back and scrap it,” how would you respond? Perhaps by saying “Starship already flew to the Moon…it had some heatshield issues –but those are not insurmountable.”
Jeff Wright: your counterfactual fails because the reasons we put forth for canceling the SLS are far more robust than mere leaks. If Starship cost as much per launch as the SLS, was fully expendable, and flew as rarely, it would be objectionable too.
The situation you posit will never arise, because Starship will fly many imes unmanned before humans set foot aboard. But if you view SLS and Starship as fundamentally the same, that would go a long way explaining why you write as you do.
Jeff Wright,
We see that your reaction to the inevitable death of SLS has now passed from your long-time state of denial to one of anger. That’s the second of Elizabeth Kubler-Ross’s five stages of confronting death. Later this year, in all likelihood, you will progress to the third stage – bargaining. Sometime in 2027 – when the axe finally falls on SLS – I expect you will enter the fourth stage – depression. There’s a fifth stage – acceptance – which I suspect you will never get to because it is not you who will be dying but your beloved rocket.
Some grief counseling might be in order here.