January 8, 2025 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.
- Stoke Space honors the memory of John Glenn as it refurbishes the launchpad he used for his first American orbital flight
The company hopes to launch its Nova two-stage reusable rocket there, though no date as yet been announced.
- Rocket Lab touts its proposal to get Perseverance’s sample back
The company claims it can do the job for less than $4 billion, with samples returned as early as 2031. This is faster and cheaper than what was NASA is now considering, as described at the press conference yesterday.
- Scientists propose a gentle collusion between Pluto and Charon caused the double planet system
Very cute sales job with its description as “kiss-and-capture”, but the entire theory is very speculative based on such a tiny amount of knowledge we have both planets that it is absurd to take this too seriously.
- A tweet listing the ten new rockets China hopes to launch for the first time in 2025
Go here for a more detailed report.
- China touts its own Mars sample return mission, Tianwen-3, targeting 2028
The mission has been kept very simple by scaling up what China’s engineers learned in doing its two lunar sample return missions. Or to put it another way, they will almost certainly fly at least two of these missions before NASA even comes close to deciding how it get Perseverance’s samples back.
- ISRO once again delays the autonomous docking of its two Spadex orbiting spacecraft
Apparently during the maneuver to bring the chase satellite within 225 kilometers of the target satellite, engineers detected a “drift … more than expected.” Before attempting the docking they need to know exactly where the two spacecraft are, relatively to each other, and apparently this drift requires more analysis.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed 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.
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.
- Stoke Space honors the memory of John Glenn as it refurbishes the launchpad he used for his first American orbital flight
The company hopes to launch its Nova two-stage reusable rocket there, though no date as yet been announced.
- Rocket Lab touts its proposal to get Perseverance’s sample back
The company claims it can do the job for less than $4 billion, with samples returned as early as 2031. This is faster and cheaper than what was NASA is now considering, as described at the press conference yesterday.
- Scientists propose a gentle collusion between Pluto and Charon caused the double planet system
Very cute sales job with its description as “kiss-and-capture”, but the entire theory is very speculative based on such a tiny amount of knowledge we have both planets that it is absurd to take this too seriously.
- A tweet listing the ten new rockets China hopes to launch for the first time in 2025
Go here for a more detailed report.
- China touts its own Mars sample return mission, Tianwen-3, targeting 2028
The mission has been kept very simple by scaling up what China’s engineers learned in doing its two lunar sample return missions. Or to put it another way, they will almost certainly fly at least two of these missions before NASA even comes close to deciding how it get Perseverance’s samples back.
- ISRO once again delays the autonomous docking of its two Spadex orbiting spacecraft
Apparently during the maneuver to bring the chase satellite within 225 kilometers of the target satellite, engineers detected a “drift … more than expected.” Before attempting the docking they need to know exactly where the two spacecraft are, relatively to each other, and apparently this drift requires more analysis.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed 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.
Readers: the rules for commenting!
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