June 18, 2024 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.
- Space Force awards contracts to Blue Origin, CACI International Inc., General Atomics, and Viasat to develop space laser terminals [pdf]
These are small contracts to begin design work on using lasers for satellite communications.
- ULA CEO touts photos of new Vulcan launchpad under construction at Vandenberg
The first launch at this pad is scheduled sometime next year.
- Local officials in Cameron County praise SpaceX for bring billions in economic growth to region
Who cares? Elon Musk is evil and all his efforts must be shut down! That’s the rule when someone famous won’t vote for Democrats!
- Russia hopes to revive its Molniya satellite constellation, this time using Chinese parts
The original Molniya communications satellites — first launched in the 1960s — used a clever very eccentric orbit to get the best coverage of Russia, which sits at a high latitude. Traditional geosynchronous communications satellites don’t see those high latitudes that well.
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in the past two weeks has the mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuses to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. 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.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. 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. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
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.
- Space Force awards contracts to Blue Origin, CACI International Inc., General Atomics, and Viasat to develop space laser terminals [pdf]
These are small contracts to begin design work on using lasers for satellite communications.
- ULA CEO touts photos of new Vulcan launchpad under construction at Vandenberg
The first launch at this pad is scheduled sometime next year.
- Local officials in Cameron County praise SpaceX for bring billions in economic growth to region
Who cares? Elon Musk is evil and all his efforts must be shut down! That’s the rule when someone famous won’t vote for Democrats!
- Russia hopes to revive its Molniya satellite constellation, this time using Chinese parts
The original Molniya communications satellites — first launched in the 1960s — used a clever very eccentric orbit to get the best coverage of Russia, which sits at a high latitude. Traditional geosynchronous communications satellites don’t see those high latitudes that well.
The support of my readers through the years has given 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. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in the past two weeks has the mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
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. Even today NASA and Congress refuses to 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.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. 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.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. 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. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
Weird, I heard of this commercial company, makes lasers for intersatellite communications, and is selling them as an off the shelf component to anyone who wants them. I even heard low pricing like 30,000 a terminal (Need to find a reference for that). Even heard they have several hundred of them active and in orbit working today.
Strange, yep, better to spend our tax dollars on re-invent the wheel. Speaking of that, can I get a grant to investigate round devices that facilate motion in a plane?
Molniya Satellites
“How The Soviet Union Solved Satellite Communications Their Own Way”
Scott Manley October 2023
https://youtu.be/Nmhf2VK3xBE
20:52
A radio host this morning was talking about Elon musk announcing that he’s had 2 People attempt assassination? on his life?
Another person “legally whistle blowing” on the hospital she works for doing transgender surgeries on children and billing Medicare against the law in Texas… Déjà vu with the doctor story a few days ago, only she had visitors from the FBI told her to shut up. At first the FBI denied it but then she showed everybody the door cam.
https://slaynews.com/news/fbi-visits-nurse-blew-whistle-texas-childrens-hospitals-gender-surgery-program/
Apparently the FBI is facilitating child abuse against the state law.
The same radio host reading the news also read a story that Russian troops capturing towns recently discovered trafficked children slated for Europe and the United States. With bags of refrigerated blood… Adrenalchrome supply?
85,000 children, that have come across the border are missing. (at last count year year ago) Agents checking on the children found the addresses they were signed too either didn’t exist, or no children there.
https://oversight.house.gov/release/hearing-wrap-up-orr-director-fails-to-answer-questions-about-85000-lost-unaccompanied-alien-children-flawed-vetting-of-sponsors-and-more%EF%BF%BC/
A year later from this congressional hearing has turned up nothing, was this just political theater?