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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.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation. Takes about a 10% cut.
 

3. A Paypal Donation or subscription, which takes about a 15% cut:

 

4. Donate by check. I get whatever you donate. Make the check payable to Robert Zimmerman and mail it 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.


Saturday launch of Falcon 9 uncertain

With a delay of the static fire test from today to tomorrow, launch of the next Falcon 9 is now questionable for Saturday.

The company has not said one way of the other, so Saturday’s launch is still possible, assuming Thursday’s static fire test comes off successfully.

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

2 comments

  • Ann Wilson

    What did you think about the recent radio show Jimmy Church did on Coast to Coast with the guy who claims Stanley Kubrick filmed and orchestrated the Moon “landing” in 1969? I always believed we went to the moon until this guy mentioned
    the “Van Allen radiation belt” way out past the ISS. He said it would require lead shielding on the moon capsule to be
    6 feet thick in order to prevent frying the astronauts. Then he said the Russians have said it will take them until 2030
    to put together the technology and rocket power to land on the moon.

    Also, that famous earth rise photograph–wasn’t that shown in the film 2001- A Space Odyssey?

  • Edward

    Ann Wilson wrote: “Also, that famous earth rise photograph–wasn’t that shown in the film 2001- A Space Odyssey?”

    You are probably thinking of the “reborn” astronaut, Dave Bowman, as he watches over the Earth. Or maybe the sun rising and its rays touching the obelisk to set off the signal.

    Ann wrote: “He said it would require lead shielding on the moon capsule to be 6 feet thick in order to prevent frying the astronauts.”

    The Van Allen belts are strong, but not *that* strong. Otherwise there would have to be similar shielding on the ISS. Whenever the ISS flies (sails?) through the South Atlantic Anomaly, it (and other satellites in similar orbits) receives a dose of radiation similar to the bulk of the Van Allen belt.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Atlantic_Anomaly

    The Van Allen belt does have higher radiation than the surface of the Earth, but it will not fry astronauts that pass through as they escape Earth orbit or come back to Earth. The higher radiation dose to the astronauts is accounted for when planning a mission, there is a radiation-exposure budget, and there are dosimeters to verify that the astronauts did not exceed exposure limits.

    There were concerns that a large coronal mass ejection (back then I think they were called ion storms) could cause very high doses, but that did not happen on any of the missions.

    This also applies to satellites headed for geostationary orbit (GEO) or are escaping Earth orbit. The Van Allen belts do not fry the electronics, but a satellite stuck in a transfer orbit will get a high exposure over the course of several months (several scores of passes through the belt), as was the concern with the Air Force’s Advanced EHF 1 satellite (it was raised out of the belts before much or any damage occurred).

    Go back to believing that we went to the moon. If we hadn’t, the Soviet Union would have immediately and vigorously called us on it.

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