September 14, 2023 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- NASA’s live stream tomorrow of Soyuz carrying three astronauts to ISS
The launch is scheduled for 11:44 am (Eastern) on September 15, 2023, with the Soyuz docking with ISS three hours later.
- Venezuela’s leader Nicolás Maduro makes space deal with China to someday send a person to China’s Moonbase
Meanwhile, Maduro’s communist policies has resulted in starvation, bankruptcy, and people fleeing his country. No matter, Maduro will have lots of photo ops during such a mission, demonstrating his heroic right to rule unopposed.
- China establishes new division to improve its missile early warning abilities as well as identify, track, and analyze orbiting objects
This is essentially what the U.S. military has been doing since the dawn of the space, a task that most other countries have relied on. China wants its own capability.
- NASA begins installing old space shuttle engines on the core stage of the SLS rocket that will launch Artemis-2
As Jay rightly notes, “What a way to waste those engines! SpaceX has spoiled us on reusablity.” The crime is magnified in that these engines have been reused multiple times on the shuttle, and will now be thrown away by NASA on their next flight.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the 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. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
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.
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.
- NASA’s live stream tomorrow of Soyuz carrying three astronauts to ISS
The launch is scheduled for 11:44 am (Eastern) on September 15, 2023, with the Soyuz docking with ISS three hours later.
- Venezuela’s leader Nicolás Maduro makes space deal with China to someday send a person to China’s Moonbase
Meanwhile, Maduro’s communist policies has resulted in starvation, bankruptcy, and people fleeing his country. No matter, Maduro will have lots of photo ops during such a mission, demonstrating his heroic right to rule unopposed.
- China establishes new division to improve its missile early warning abilities as well as identify, track, and analyze orbiting objects
This is essentially what the U.S. military has been doing since the dawn of the space, a task that most other countries have relied on. China wants its own capability.
- NASA begins installing old space shuttle engines on the core stage of the SLS rocket that will launch Artemis-2
As Jay rightly notes, “What a way to waste those engines! SpaceX has spoiled us on reusablity.” The crime is magnified in that these engines have been reused multiple times on the shuttle, and will now be thrown away by NASA on their next flight.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the 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. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
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.
But no one wants to re-use hydrogen engines.
Let them go out on a high note.