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Readers!

 

It is now July, time once again to celebrate the start of this webpage in 2010 with my annual July fund-raising campaign.

 

This year I celebrate the fifteenth anniversary since I began Behind the Black. During that time I have done more than 33,000 posts, mostly covering the global space industry and the related planetary and astronomical science that comes from it. Along the way I have also felt compelled as a free American citizen to regularly post my thoughts on the politics and culture of the time, partly because I think it is important for free Americans to do so, and partly because those politics and that culture have a direct impact on the future of our civilization and its on-going efforts to explore and eventually colonize the solar system.

 

You can’t understand one without understanding the other.

 

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NASA: Dragon crew will return to Earth August 2nd

Capitalism in space: Assuming that the weather cooperates, NASA has now set August 2nd as the date the manned Dragon capsule will return to Earth with its two man crew.

Assuming good weather and a smooth final few weeks on the International Space Station, astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken are scheduled to undock from the orbiting research outpost Aug. 1 and return to Earth the next day to wrap up a 64-day test flight of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spaceship.

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine confirmed the target dates for the Crew Dragon’s undocking and splashdown in a tweet Friday. A few hours after departing the space station, the Crew Dragon will fire its Draco thrusters for a braking burn and re-enter the atmosphere, targeting a parachute-assisted splashdown at sea. “Splashdown is targeted for Aug. 2,” he tweeted. “Weather will drive the actual date. Stay tuned.”

Note that the recovery operations, as has been the case with everything else on this flight, will be run entirely by SpaceX and its employees. NASA’s only real role is that of a customer and observer, though obviously agency officials are taking a hands-on part in determining the landing date.

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. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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

2 comments

  • Ray Van Dune

    I will feel a lot better when these boys are safe on land! They have a LOT of kinetic energy on orbit, and they are going to be sitting very close to where it all has to be dissipated! But it can’t be avoided.

    OTOH – let’s outgrow water landings!! Landing in the middle of the ocean is risky enough, but splashing just offshore is false security. You can drown in 50 feet of water just as well as 5000, and it raises the specter of an undershoot, a landing on land in a vehicle not designed for it!

    I hope Elon puts his foot down with NASA and says “Enough – why don’t you focus on managing Boeing if you can, and Spacex is going to do this right – propulsive landing with emergency parachute / airbag backup!”

  • A. Nonymous

    No need. Elon is moving directly to propulsive landings with no backup. Give it a few years.

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