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Readers!

 

The time has come for my annual short pre-Thanksgiving/Christmas fund drive for Behind The Black. I must do this every year in order to make sure I have earned enough money to pay my bills.

 

For this two-week campaign, I am offering a special deal to encourage donations. Donations of $200 will get a free autographed copy of the new paperback edition of Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, while donations of $250 will get a free autographed copy of the new hardback edition. If you desire a copy, make sure you provide me your address with your donation.

 

As I noted in July, the support of my readers through the years has given 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.

 

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The Falcon has landed

SpaceX has produced a short video that recaps its last launch and the successful landing of its first stage. I have embedded it below, because it is worth seeing again as the company is preparing to do it again this weekend. It is also worth watching again to see the joyous celebration of everyone watching at the moment, all of whom know deep down that they have just witnessed a significant event in the history of the human race.

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

4 comments

  • Cotour

    Capitalism, incentive and the freedom to employ both in a market operating within the nurturing bosom of the Constitution, there is nothing more powerful on the planet!

    Yes Mr. president, they did do that!

  • pzatchok

    I have never noticed or just missed it but when the Falcon Heavy finally flies will all three of its first stages all try to make separate soft landings like the original Falcon9?

    Or will it be just one landing.

    I’m sure the goal is reuse but I have just not noticed anything mentioned about it.

  • Edward

    pzatchok,

    My understanding is that they will separate and land independently, as the two side rockets are supposed to separate before the center rocket reaches engine cutoff.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy#Reusable_technology_development

    “The reusable launch system technology … is particularly well suited to the Falcon Heavy where the two outer cores separate from the rocket much earlier in the flight profile, and are therefore both moving at a slower velocity at the initial separation event.”

  • pzatchok

    Once they work that out they stand a chance of being able toi make several different combinations out of the Falcon system.
    The single Falcon9
    The triple Falcon Heavy.
    4 around a disposable central core. Falcon Heavy+
    Add 2 more to the standard Falcon Heavy to make a Super Heavy.
    Or strap two Falcon Heavy’s together to make a Falcon Super+.

    All with reusable first stages and possibly reusable second stages by then.

Readers: the rules for commenting!

 

No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.

 

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