June 4, 2025 Quick space linksCourtesy 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.
- New paper speculates alternative to the Big Bang
Fun stuff only a tiny bit different than fantasy. The author does however provide a nice summary of some of the basic problems with the Big Bang theory itself, problems that until recently it was generally considered inappropriate for any cosmologist to mention.
- Video of the launch and recovery of Space Epoch’s XZY-1 grasshopper rocket during its test flight May 29, 2025
As usual for these kinds of promo pieces, the video includes epic music.
- X user notes that China has not released a single picture of its Tianwen-2 asteroid probe, now on its way
Makes me wonder if the spacecraft looks too much like someone else’s (such as Osiris-Rex or Hayabusa-2), thus indicating its design was stolen, and China wants to hide this fact.
- Firefly touts the successful full duration static fire test of the Miranda engine it is developing for the first stages of both the Antares and Eclipse rockets
The video is quite impressive. This engines does appear powerful. Seven will be mounted at the base of Eclipse.
- Arsonists on trial in the UK for setting fire to a business supplying Starlink terminals to the Ukraine
The accused apparently were hired by the military Wagner Group that Russia used to pay to fight in the Ukraine.
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.
- New paper speculates alternative to the Big Bang
Fun stuff only a tiny bit different than fantasy. The author does however provide a nice summary of some of the basic problems with the Big Bang theory itself, problems that until recently it was generally considered inappropriate for any cosmologist to mention.
- Video of the launch and recovery of Space Epoch’s XZY-1 grasshopper rocket during its test flight May 29, 2025
As usual for these kinds of promo pieces, the video includes epic music.
- X user notes that China has not released a single picture of its Tianwen-2 asteroid probe, now on its way
Makes me wonder if the spacecraft looks too much like someone else’s (such as Osiris-Rex or Hayabusa-2), thus indicating its design was stolen, and China wants to hide this fact.
- Firefly touts the successful full duration static fire test of the Miranda engine it is developing for the first stages of both the Antares and Eclipse rockets
The video is quite impressive. This engines does appear powerful. Seven will be mounted at the base of Eclipse.
- Arsonists on trial in the UK for setting fire to a business supplying Starlink terminals to the Ukraine
The accused apparently were hired by the military Wagner Group that Russia used to pay to fight in the Ukraine.
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
Either that, or, as one X user responding to that tweet suggested, “Most likely the spacecraft is based on a design used for military mission including the electrical propulsion system.”
Or, it could even be both!
The music over Space Epoch’s hop test video is epic alright. It’s Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries. Hard to get more epic than that.
Firefly’s Miranda engine is quite impressive. It’s supposed to generate 230,000 lbf of thrust, about 20% more than a Merlin 1-D. It taps combustion chamber gas to drive its turbopumps. The upper exhaust plume is the one coming from the combustion chamber out of the main nozzle while the lower plume is the tapped-off gas from the combustion chamber after it has finished driving the pumps.
Dick Eagleson
In the Firefly video, why is the plume non-symmetrical wrt the ground. I assume some sort of “ground effect “ but this makes me ask why isn’t the test fixture higher ( probably would cost much more to have a heavy structure that high) or the ground removed?
I would expect the non-symmetrical output to be an issue…?
Thanks in advance for your explanation
Chris,
Speculation on my part but I suspect any asymmetry in plumes is due to acoustic “bounceback” from the incompressible ground that is not balanced from above because there is much less bounceback from the quite compressible air.