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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.

 

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NASA finally makes available to the aerospace industry its new flight termination software

After what appears to be about a year and a half delay, NASA finally today made available its new flight termination software so that the aerospace industry can now test it.

“This is a major milestone that enables Rocket Lab and other U.S. launch companies to integrate the software now with their launch vehicle’s hardware and run performance simulations,” said David L. Pierce, Wallops Flight Facility director. “This is a key achievement toward enabling Rocket Lab launches from Wallops, in parallel with the NASA teams’ final safety certification steps, which are currently underway. Rocket Lab’s use of the NASA software will enable a high degree of confidence moving forward toward launch.”

Rocket Lab had hoped to launch from Wallops more than a year ago, but was blocked by NASA because the agency was apparently behind schedule in preparing this software. Now that it is finally available for testing, expect Rocket Lab to move swiftly, with a likely Wallops launch within months.

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

5 comments

  • From the article:

    “I am very proud of the entire NAFTU team for reaching these critical milestones of releasing the software to industry, as well as completing the test procedure official dry runs,”

    Considering the process is more than a year behind schedule, and has hampered at least one companies’ efforts in a very competitive segment, he’s proud of. . . mediocrity? I am sure there are a number of whys and wherefores, but, to paraphrase:

    ‘Are there no liquidated damages?’

    Where’s the accountability?

  • sippin_bourbon

    ’bout time.

  • Joe

    I hope Boeing didn’t help write this.

    Too soon?

  • pawn

    It still has to work in the real world. Good luck.

    Turning your rocket over to a “robot” to blow itself up if the robot thinks something is wrong.

    And somehow this makes things “safer”.

    “Gosh, it world have worked OK but you guys configured it wrong.”

    You won’t be seeing those things in manned spaceflight, ever.

  • Willi

    This news and the recent sharp selloff in their stock tempts me to double my holdings from 20 to 40 shares…

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