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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
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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.


Hubble still in safe mode

NASA released a new but relatively terse update on November 1st describing the status of the Hubble Space Telescope, which has been in safe mode since October 25th.

Hubble’s science instruments issued error codes at 1:46 a.m. EDT Oct. 23, indicating the loss of a specific synchronization message. This message provides timing information the instruments use to correctly respond to data requests and commands. The mission team reset the instruments, resuming science operations the following morning.

At 2:38 a.m. EDT, Oct. 25, the science instruments again issued error codes indicating multiple losses of synchronization messages. As a result, the science instruments autonomously entered safe mode states as programmed.

Mission team members are evaluating spacecraft data and system diagrams to better understand the synchronization issue and how to address it. They also are developing and testing procedures to collect additional data from the spacecraft. These activities are expected to take at least one week.

In other words, the engineers presently do not understand the problem, and are working at pinpointing its cause.

This is not a “glitch”. If used properly that word really refers to something that is akin to a short burp in operations. Hubble has been shut down now for ten days, and will remain so for at least one more week. This is a serious problem that remains unsolved.

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

  • concerned

    Bob– did you mean “If used properly,……” ?

  • concerned: Yes. My brain sometimes does not communicate with my fingers. Fixed. Thank you.

  • I’ve said that Hubble is well past its “Sell By” date. That machine is essentially, done. We’ve lost Arecibo, and are losing Hubble. Dark Ages are easier to implement, when you can’t see.

  • Lemuel Vargas

    We have the James Webb Telescope w/c is slated for launch on Dec. 18, 2021 at 7:20 EST. It has arrived now in Kourou French Guiana….

    Hopefully, the complicated unfurling of it will have no glitch…

  • Lemuel Vargas: Just in case you don’t know, Webb is NOT a replacement for Hubble. It is an infrared telescope, not optical, and was designed for deep space cosmology. It will do great work, but when Hubble goes, the U.S. will no longer have an orbital optical telescope.

    The Chinese plan to launch one comparable (or even better than Hubble) in just a few years, and keep it relatively close to their space station so they can maintain it.

  • Ray Van Dune

    Imagine a telescope of roughly the SOFIA specifications, but instead of riding in a 747 hull, riding in the cargo bay of a Starship. The development investment could be focused less on minimum mass and high redundancy, and more on timely deployment (not -10 years but -2 years), and repairability / upgradability.

    Instead of going to the Lagrange 4 or 5 points to reduce Earth’s interference, a lunar “halo” orbit might be a workable improvement to Hubble’s LEO orbit. The opportunity might exist to have human visits as required, or even periodic returns of the observatory to LEO for work.

    SOFIA stands for Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, but the conceptual design could be adapted for visual use too.

  • pzatchok

    It might be time for someone to reach out and fix it.
    Sort of like an abandoned ship at sea,

    Attach a propulsion system to it and start bringing it into a lower orbit of maintenance. A year later a ship could get close enough to fix it.

    If you fix it you own it.

    I bet a few private companies would go for this.
    Charge the world half a billion a year for its use.

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