March 31, 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.
- FAA confirms that it has closed its investigation into the seventh flight of Starship/Superheavy
The FAA also noted the flight’s failure posed no safety issues, something that was clear almost immedately.
- Cuba’s state-run press attacks the arrival of Starlink in Cuba, claiming it is a plot by Trump and Musk to “destabilze” the island
In other words, Cuba’s communist dictators don’t like it that its citizens might now have other options for getting information that those dictators don’t control.
- On this day in 1997 Pioneer-10’s mission ended, 25 years after launch
It continued to send signals back through 2003.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID 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. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
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.
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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.
- FAA confirms that it has closed its investigation into the seventh flight of Starship/Superheavy
The FAA also noted the flight’s failure posed no safety issues, something that was clear almost immedately.
- Cuba’s state-run press attacks the arrival of Starlink in Cuba, claiming it is a plot by Trump and Musk to “destabilze” the island
In other words, Cuba’s communist dictators don’t like it that its citizens might now have other options for getting information that those dictators don’t control.
- On this day in 1997 Pioneer-10’s mission ended, 25 years after launch
It continued to send signals back through 2003.
Readers!
My annual February birthday fund-raising drive for Behind the Black is now over. Thank you to everyone who donated or subscribed. While not a record-setter, the donations were more than sufficient and slightly above average.
As I have said many times before, I can’t express what it means to me to get such support, especially as no one is required to pay anything to read my work. Thank you all again!
For those readers who like my work here at Behind the Black and haven't contributed so far, please consider donating or subscribing. My analysis of space, politics, and culture, taken from the perspective of an historian, is almost always on the money and ahead of the game. For example, in 2020 I correctly predicted that the COVID 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. Every one of those 2020 conclusions has turned out right.
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.
“On this day in 1997 Pioneer-10’s mission ended, 25 years after launch…”
Well, almost ended. If the purpose of Pioneer was to teach us to pay attention, then it was revived.
Data started to be questioned as far back as 1980 on Pioneer’s location. A paper in 1999 (arXiv:gr-qc/9903024 v2 9 Mar 1999 – Turyshev) started a 14-year march to find why Pioneer was always closer to the sun than we thought. Measurements were off by 10^-9 m/s^2.
The journey spanned another 14 years to ‘solve this problem’. arXiv:1307.0537 13 Jun 2013 (ten Boom).
Still leaving us to solve the problem of data storage however – if data from 30 years prior was nearly impossible to retrieve, how will we get at original data even 1000 years from now? Need we go back to vellum and ink?
Eric Berger today has a pretty remarkable long form interview with Butch Wilmore about what it was like actually flying Starliner. And it turns out, it was a good deal hairier than we knew. To the point where he felt confident right from the start that he wasn’t coming back to Earth on the Starliner. And Suni Williams felt the same way.
And: Wilmore describes how there was a moment during the docking attempt where he was doubtful that they could either dock with the station, or have sufficient control to get back to Earth, either. Scary stuff.
https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/04/the-harrowing-story-of-what-flying-starliner-was-like-when-its-thrusters-failed/
Forget Starliner–I’d rather be in an F-104 as a self-driving car.
A Pinto at least has a steering wheel.