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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. 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.

 

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Rocket Lab launches its first Electron rocket

Capitalism in space: Rocket Lab today successfully completed the first test flight of their Electron rocket.

The rocket did not reach orbit, though it did reach space altitude. More details here.

“It has been an incredible day and I’m immensely proud of our talented team,” said Peter Beck, CEO and founder of Rocket Lab. “We’re one of a few companies to ever develop a rocket from scratch and we did it in under four years. We’ve worked tirelessly to get to this point. We’ve developed everything in house, built the world’s first private orbital launch range, and we’ve done it with a small team.

“It was a great flight. We had a great first stage burn, stage separation, second stage ignition and fairing separation. We didn’t quite reach orbit and we’ll be investigating why, however reaching space in our first test puts us in an incredibly strong position to accelerate the commercial phase of our program, deliver our customers to orbit and make space open for business,” says Beck.

It appears they had a problem with the upper stage. Nonetheless, this is a great achievement. They were completely privately funded. They built their own launchpad. When they make orbit they will be the first company to have done such a thing.

I have embedded footage of the launch below the fold.

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 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

8 comments

  • Alex

    There was also a problem with first stage, which made a roll movement just from the start. I assume that this was not intented. However, second stage did not roll after first stage separation. Here some more informative videos:

    View from the rocket downwards during inital flight phase:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vE2AnwJ2Qs

    Here a view, later one, downwards the second stage (incl. stage separation), which fallen short of required velocity to reach orbit.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Omk24sfUuhY

  • Gealon

    Nice to see something new. There’s a refreshing quality seeing this fledgling launch, like watching the launch footage of the captured V2’s from the 50’s, taking those first tentative steps into space.

  • Alex

    @Rod: Do you think that the first stage’s roll movement, which was later compensated by the second stage control system, has caused LOX sloshing? YDo you remember to that special Falcon 1 test flight?

    Here is new superb video from Space Lab.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VA_8HPsua0c

    Mr. Beck stays same the rocket man, who can cheer as a boy. Here are videos, which shows his beginnings in 2009 and earlier. The man made huge progress and added in 8 years also some weight (:-):

    Yes, it is burning!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlMFit6nd6I

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y4BW1DeakOk

  • ” . . . we did it in under four years.”

    NASA take note.

  • Dick Eagleson

    Looks as though Rocket Lab equaled or bettered what it took SpaceX three tries to do with Falcon 1. That ain’t too shabby.

    I will eagerly await definitive word on what the defects were in this first test and what fixes are implemented.

  • Alex

    @Dick Eagleson: Yep, BTW, the Electron rocket is technologically even more advanced as Falcon 1 was. For example, its whole structure (incl. LOX tank) is made of carbon composite and it employs a new engine scheme, electrically driven propellant pumps.

  • Edward

    Dick Eagleson wrote: “Looks as though Rocket Lab equaled or bettered what it took SpaceX three tries to do with Falcon 1.

    There was a time when first launches always blew up. As recently as the 1990s, 10 of the 11 new rockets’ first launches failed in some way. Although this one also failed in some way, at least it didn’t blow up, and it seems that rocket scientists are getting better, learning from the past.

    This is what develops people into “steely eyed rocket men.”

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