To read this post please scroll down.

 

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.


Firefly’s Alpha rocket launches eight smallsats into orbit

Firefly tonight successfully launched eight smallsats for NASA and others, its Alpha rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California.

The payloads on this launch were not all built by NASA, but I think NASA paid the launch costs as part of a program to help startups. One payload, Catsat, is a test of a spherical inflatable antenna created by the startup Freefall. If successful, it will be make it possible for cubesats to transmit much more data than they can now. As of posting seven of the eight satellites had been deployed. Catsat’s deployment however had not been confirmed.

As this was Firefly’s first launch in 2024, the leader board of the launch race does not change:

70 SpaceX
29 China
8 Russia
8 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise however now leads the world combined in successful launches, 82 to 44, while SpaceX by itself still leads the entire world, including other American companies, 70 to 56.

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

8 comments

  • Col Beausabre

    The Luddites are at the gates

    Particles From Satellite Mega Constellations May Destroy the Ozone Layer

    https://youtu.be/TJE0z9L79TA

  • Just wanted to add that the Serenity satellite launched on the Firefly Alpha is healthy and sending beacon. The team at Quub built the satellite and since for some this is the first time they have sent something to space, they are in shock. It was a great way to start the Fourth of July.

  • Joe: Do you know if Catsat was deployed? It was very unclear whether it had been released during the live stream.

  • All satellites were deployed. CATSat was off camera for the broadcast. I am hoping the download all the deployment video.

  • mkent

    ”All satellites were deployed.”

    I don’t think so. Only eight objects in orbit were cataloged for the launch. Presumably those were the upper stage and seven payloads.

    The good news is that in addition to the successful launch, Firefly successfully restarted its upper stage after satellite deployment and performed a plane change maneuver. That should clear the way for using flight 6 as a dedicated launch for Lockheed Martin.

  • mkent: If you are right, then Catsat was not deployed and Firefly failed to deliver one of its payloads.

    I have contacted people I know at the company that built Catsat to get clarity, but have not gotten an answer.

    Failure to deploy is not a good thing for any rocket company, especially because it appears to be the one action that works all the time these days.

  • mkent

    ”Failure to deploy is not a good thing for any rocket company, especially because it appears to be the one action that works all the time these days.”

    This is most likely a failure of the cubesat deployer, not the launch vehicle. It happens fairly often. It’s not that unusual for even SpaceX’s Transporter missions to have a cubesat or two fail to deploy.

    I’ll wager that potential customers are far more interested in that second upper stage burn than they are in the cubesat deployer.

  • Edward

    Joe,
    Congratulations!

    Thank you for the report. If you can, please keep us updated.

    As someone said to me on my first: Something you have touched is now in space.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *