Category: Behind The Black

Blue Origin’s BE-4 engine set for “commissioning” tests

1:29 pm

Capitalism in space: According to a tweet from Blue Origin on June 21, 2022, engineers have finally installed a flight-worthy engine on the test stand in Huntsville for static fire “commissioning” tests.

This is an engine that was supposed to be delivered to ULA for its new Vulcan rocket more than two years ago. With final engine tests only beginning now, it likely means the engine will not be delivered for at least several more months.

ULA will then have to install it in the rocket, and do its own fueling and static fire tests. All this suggests that a Vulcan launch before the end of this year is almost impossible.

When Blue Origin’s own New Glenn rocket will fly using the BE-4 is utterly unknown. ULA at least has built a full-scale test version of Vulcan and done launch countdown rehearsals in order to iron out issues with its launchpad and ground systems. Blue Origin has done none of this.

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Pushback: University of Houston forced to allow free speech to settle lawsuit by conservatives

12:12 pm

University of Houston: reluctantly forced to recognize the First Amendment

Bring a gun to a knife fight: When in December 2021, the University of Houston changed its anti-discrimination policy, broadening the definition so widely that almost anything anyone said could be defined as harassment, three conservative students obtained the help of the first amendment organization Speech First and sued. From their lawsuit [pdf]:

The Policy’s “[e]xamples of harassment” make clear that the Policy covers protected speech. Examples of harassment “include but are not limited to: epithets or slurs, negative stereotyping, threatening, intimidating, or hostile acts, denigrating jokes and display or circulation (including through email or virtual platforms) of written or graphic material in the learning, living, or working environment.”

Under the Policy, even “[m]inor verbal and nonverbal slights, snubs, annoyances, insults, or isolated incidents including, but not limited to microaggressions,” can constitute harassment if “such incidents keep happening over time and are targeting a Protected Class.” The Policy warns that “academic freedom and freedom of expression will not excuse behavior that constitutes a violation of the law or this Policy.” [emphasis mine]

In other words, according to the highlighted quote, the university’s anti-discrimination policy attempted to overide the First Amendment to the Constitution.
» Read more

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A major update from Curiosity’s science team

10:13 am

Panorama of Mars
Click for full image.

layered flaky rocks
Click for full image.

In a press release today, the Curiosity science team provided a major update on the rover’s recent travels in the mountain foothills of Gale Crater.

First and foremost was the new information about the rover’s wheels, which was buried near the bottom of the release:

The rover’s aluminum wheels are … showing signs of wear. On June 4, the engineering team commanded Curiosity to take new pictures of its wheels – something it had been doing every 3,281 feet (1,000 meters) to check their overall health. The team discovered that the left middle wheel had damaged one of its grousers, the zig-zagging treads along Curiosity’s wheels. This particular wheel already had four broken grousers, so now five of its 19 grousers are broken.

The previously damaged grousers attracted attention online recently because some of the metal “skin” between them appears to have fallen out of the wheel in the past few months, leaving a gap.

The team has decided to increase its wheel imaging to every 1,640 feet (500 meters) – a return to the original cadence. A traction control algorithm had slowed wheel wear enough to justify increasing the distance between imaging.

» Read more

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Blue Origin determines New Shepard ticket prices by who you are and what you can pay

9:08 am

From the first commercial launch of Blue Origin’s suborbital New Shepard spacecraft in 2021, the company has refused to reveal what its standard price is for a ticket.

Now, after five flights and fourteen passengers, one journalist has determined that the company does not appear to have a standard price, but instead determines its prices depending on who you are and what you can pay.

Blue Origin doesn’t advertise price information on its flight reservation page. Passengers say they have paid from zero to nearly $30 million. Industry insiders say Blue Origin’s ticket price is tailored to individual passengers based on a variety of factors.

“It’s not about money; it’s about who you are, your social capital, whether you align with their launch purposes. It’s kind of a package deal,” said Roman Chiporukha, cofounder of SpaceVIP, a platform that helps the wealthy book space trips, including Blue Origin’s. Blue Origin declined to discuss its pricing strategy. [emphasis mine]

How very socialist of Blue Origin, to treat people differently depending on such factors. Under this policy, people have paid from zero to $28 million per ticket.

The ticket policy itself is not illegal — as long as the price differences are not related to race, ethnicity, sex, or religion. It is just unseemly to consider a person’s wealth and status in determining a price.

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China and Europe complete launches

8:47 am

In the past 24 hours both Europe and China successfully completed launches.

First Arianespace’s Ariane-5 rocket yesterday launched two commercial communications satellites, for Malaysia and India. With this flight the Ariane-5 rocket has only four flights to go before it is retired and replaced with ArianeGroup’s not-yet flown Ariane-6 rocket.

Then, China today used its Long March 2D rocket to launch three remote-sensing satellites.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

26 SpaceX
20 China
8 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 ULA
2 Europe (Arianespace)

The U.S. still leads China 35 to 20 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 35 to 33.

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A snakelike Martian ridge

1:21 pm

A snakelike Martian ridge
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on November 22, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the science team labeled a sinuous ridge. Make sure you also look at the full image. The ridge goes on to the south, but then fades way as an almost perfect ramp, only to have another even more wiggly but thinner north-south ridge begin only a few feet to the west.

Sinuous ridges like this are found in many places on Mars. Almost always their origin is thought the result of a former river channel that became a ridge when the surrounding softer material eroded away.

That explanation however does not seem to work for this ridge. It has too many other inexplicable features. For example, note how the peak of the ridge smoothly transitions from sharp to flat-topped. It has a soft appearance that is strengthened by the gap near the top.

It is almost as if this ridge is a kind of elongated sand dune! And guess what: The overview map below gives that explanation some believability.
» Read more

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Today’s blacklisted American: School board threatens parent with lawsuit if she doesn’t shut up

12:16 pm

Alexandra Schweitzer: a true momma grizzly
Alexandra Schweitzer: a true momma grizzly

When parent Alexandra Schweitzer began challenging publicly the use of inappropriate sexual materials in the elementary schools in Oconomowoc Area School District (OASD) in Wisconsin, the school board made what appeared to be some minor superficial changes in its policy without really addressing her concerns.

Above all, school district officials would not confirm unequivocally that these materials — many of which advocated the queer agenda on gender — had been removed. Unsatisfied with this response, Schweitzer expanded her campaign.

After enrolling her children elsewhere, Alexandra continued to be an advocate and resource for local parents regarding their concerns. As President of No Left Turn in Education [NLTE]– Wisconsin, Schweitzer voiced her concerns, and those of district parents, in public forums and in testimony before the Wisconsin legislature.

Apparently, the school district did not like what she said in those public forums or in that testimony. It proceeded to hire an outside lawyer — using school funds — to send Schweitzer a cease-and-desist letter [pdf], threatening further legal action against her if she did not retract her statements and then shut up.
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A telescope using a liquid mirror about to become operational

10:02 am

Link here. The telescope, located in the Himalayas, is “an international collaboration between institutions in India, Belgium, Poland, Uzbekistan and Canada.”

The mirror works by rotating it so that its thin layer of liquid mercury forms a parabola.

The tradeoff is that the [telescope]is fixed in a single position, so it only observes one strip of the night sky as the Earth rotates below it. But since the telescope will be hyper-focused on just one area, it’s well-suited for spotting transient objects like supernovas and asteroids.

It appears the scientists will use it to study this same strip of sky over five years, hoping to detect changes in that time period.

This telescope is more a technology test than an actual observatory. Eventually the best place to put such a telescope — and much larger — will be on the Moon, and to do that requires some construction and testing beforehand.

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InSight team decides to shorten lander’s life to operate seismometer longer

9:49 am

The InSight science team has decided to continue to operate the lander’s seismometer through August rather than turning it off at the end of June, even though that longer use will drain InSight’s batteries sooner and kill the lander shortly thereafter.

The previous plan would have allowed the lander to survive through the end of the year, but would have meant no earthquake data would have been gathered after June.

To enable the seismometer to continue to run for as long as possible, the mission team is turning off InSight’s fault protection system. While this will enable the instrument to operate longer, it leaves the lander unprotected from sudden, unexpected events that ground controllers wouldn’t have time to respond to.

“The goal is to get scientific data all the way to the point where InSight can’t operate at all, rather than conserve energy and operate the lander with no science benefit,” said Chuck Scott, InSight’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California.

Apparently they have realized that it is now very unlikely that a dust devil will come by and clear the dust from InSight’s solar panels, so keeping the spacecraft alive longer — but getting no data — does not make sense.

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The battlelines and alliances shift over big satellite constellations in space

9:41 am

Two stories today show that the competition for frequency use and orbital territory in space are shifting, partly because of international politics and partly due to changes in technology.

First the harsh conflict between OneWeb and Starlink over the positioning and frequency use of their constellations in orbit now appears to have vanished.

The companies have written a joint letter to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), declaring harmony in low Earth orbit (LEO) for spectrum coordination between their respective current and next generation broadband constellations.

In the letter, which is dated June 13, SpaceX and OneWeb request that the FCC disregard previously filed dissenting comments regarding spectrum coordination in LEO. SpaceX and OneWeb both submitted proposals for their first-generation internet constellations to the FCC in 2016, followed by a second round of proposals in 2020 for each company’s next-generation broadband satellites. Simultaneously, both SpaceX and OneWeb submitted complaints with the FCC in an attempt to get a leg up on each other. Now, it seems the companies are operating on friendlier terms.

The article I think correctly speculates that this new-found cooperation probably resulted from OneWeb’s need to use SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets to get its satellites in orbit, caused by Russia’s confiscation of 36 OneWeb satellites in response to Europen sanctions over the Ukraine War. During the launch negotiations I am sure SpaceX demanded both iron out their differences relating to the satellite constellations. While SpaceX might have been able to gain some advantages in that negotiation due to its strong position, I also suspect that OneWeb has not been hurt in any major way.

In the second story, SpaceX ramped up its opposition to a Dish 5G system in a wavelength used by its Starlink satellties.
» Read more

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Psyche software issue could prevent launch this year

9:08 am

In a remarkably brief announcement on the Psyche website, the engineering team suggested that the flight software issue that forced a seven week delay in its launch might now prevent a launch this year.

This is the entire announcement:

NASA’s Psyche mission team continues to assess ongoing issues with the spacecraft’s flight software. The team is evaluating its ability to meet a schedule to launch in 2022 – the current launch period is Sept. 20 to Oct. 11. If it is determined that launch in 2022 is not possible, a full range of actions for how to proceed will be considered.

This year’s launch window would have gotten the spacecraft to the asteroid Psyche in 2026. Since this flight path required a fly-by of Mars, it is very unclear when another launch window will be available.

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China’s Kuaizhou-1A smallsat rocket launches technology test satellite

8:47 am

China today used its smallsat solid rocket Kuaizhou-1A to put a technology test satellite into orbit.

The Kuaizhou-1A rocket is not the same as the Kuaizhou-11 rocket, which some have speculated exploded during a static fire test in the fall of ’21. Both are part of a family of rockets designed for fast launch.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

26 SpaceX
19 China
8 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 ULA

The U.S. still leads China 35 to 19 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 35 to 31.

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Has work begun on a dedicated helicopter mission to Mars?

12:42 pm

Overview map

The easternmost point in the Mars Helicopter traverse
Click for full image.

In my routine searches through the image archive for the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, I recently came upon several images labeled “Candidate Mars Science Helicopter Traverse” that I at first thought referred to Ingenuity’s extended mission in Jezero Crater.

A closer look however revealed these photos have nothing to do with Ingenuity or Jezero Crater. Taken in November ’21, January ’22, and March ’22, the images instead cover parts of the south rim of Valles Marineris, the solar system’s largest canyon, and appear to be research for a future dedicated Mars helicopter mission. The overview map above shows the location of these photos by the black dots. Three locations have each been imaged twice to produce a stereoscopic view that can precisely measure the topography.

The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, shows the easternmost image, taken November 3, 2021. Not only does it show ample flat areas, the picture captures an impressive avalanche flow coming down from that southern interior canyon slope.

All the images were requested by planetary scientist Edwin Kite of the University of Chicago. Though I tried several times to contact Dr. Kite to get more information, he unfortunately did not respond. It could be this work is still too preliminary and thus he does not wish to comment.

Nonetheless, the extent of the three sets of images give us a fair idea of the kind of missions Kite and others might be considering. From east to west the distance between the images is about four hundred miles, and covers a traverse of the southern interior slopes of Valles Marineris along that entire length. The photos look mostly at the base of the canyon’s slope, each showing clearly that a helicopter flying there would have plenty of landing spots.

Obviously this first dedicated Mars helicopter mission might not cover this entire distance. Right now these images could simply be the first tentative research on choosing potential landing areas. Regardless, it appears that at least one scientist has already concluded that Ingenuity has proven such helicopter missions make sense, and is beginning to target one of Mars’s most spectacular locations, Valles Marineris, for that mission.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Student gov’t demands blacklisting of every club that does not endorse the queer agenda

11:38 am

Student government at North Texas opposes freedom of speech

They’re coming for you next: The student government at North Texas University has passed a resolution that demands the school blacklist of every club that expresses any dissenting opinion about the queer agenda.

From the resolution [pdf]:

THEREFORE, LET IT BE RESOLVED THAT, any UNT Student Organization that engages in harassment, discrimination, hate crimes, and/or violation of UNT policy through transphobic posts, statements, and actions be immediately suspended to protect the mental, emotional, and physical health of transgender students at UNT. [emphasis mine]

Note how this resolution isn’t condemning actual harassment. Instead, it considers mere disagreement to be “harassment, discrimination, and a hate crime”, and thus must be punished.

The resolution lists a bunch of incidents where so-called “trans” students (more accurately described as emotionally unstable individuals who want to make-believe they are of a different sex) were offended and felt “unsafe” when others expressed their opposition to this queer agenda. The key and most significant event however involved an appearance at the school of Jeff Younger, who was then running for the state legislature but more importantly had been involved in a very public and truly horrifying case where one of his two sons had been forced by a guardian to dress as a girl because that guardian had decided the boy was one. (To understand how horrifying, look at the images at the link.)

Younger had fought but failed to protect his son. He came to the campus to tell his story, which was then disrupted by leftist protests of chants and obscenities. Apparently, it is all right for Younger to feel “unsafe.” These leftist rules as always apply in only one direction.

The article at the link quotes Program Officer Graham Piro from the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression:
» Read more

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South Korea successfully launches its Nuri rocket

9:04 am

The new colonial movement: South Korea today successfully launched its home-built Nuri rocket, placing a test satellite, a dummy satellite, and four university cubesats into orbit.

The government program to build this rocket began in 2010 and cost $616 million, though not all of that money was devoted to the rocket. South Korea’s space agency has four more launches planned through 2027.

This was obviously South Korea’s first launch this year. The leaders in the 2022 launch race thus remain the same:

26 SpaceX
18 China
8 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 ULA

American private enterprise now leads China 35 to 18 in the national rankings, and leads the entire world combined 35 to 30.

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SLS dress rehearsal countdown ends at T-29 seconds

7:47 pm

NASA’s fourth attempt to complete a full dress rehearsal countdown of its giant SLS rocket today ended at T-29 seconds, just short of the complete countdown.

It appears the countdown had one issue — a hydrogen fuel leak at the point where the umbilical fuel line attaches to the rocket — that mission control decided to ignore (or “mask” to use their word) so that they could proceed into the count as far as possible. It was this decision however that caused the two-hour delay in the countdown. They then resumed the countdown at T-10 minutes, the beginning of terminal count.

During the terminal count, the teams performed several critical operations that must be accomplished for launch including switching control from the ground launch sequencer to the automated launch sequencer controlled by the rocket’s flight software, and important step that the team wanted to accomplish.

NASA will hold a press conference tomorrow at 11 am (Eastern) to discuss the results of this dress rehearsal. While the leak is concerning, I expect NASA to decide that this dress rehearsal was a success, that they will roll the rocket back to the vehicle assembly building where they will fix this problem, after which the agency will declare the rocket ready to launch by the end of August.

While risky, doing otherwise likely raises other risks. If they decide to do another dress rehearsal the launch faces more delays. And waiting much longer continues to increase the danger that the solid rocket side boosters will not function as intended because they have been stacked almost a year longer than their accepted use-by date.

If this turns out to be the plan, expect the actual launch countdown to be as plagued with issues and delays and scrubs. NASA has yet to demonstrate it can do this smoothly with no problems. Worse, this level of mediocre performance has been par for the course for this entire SLS program.

If that launch should go smoothly it will be a welcome and unprecedented event.

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David Bull – David’s Choice

6:01 pm

An evening pause: Hat tip Cotour, who admits “This is a bit different.” I agree, but it gives you a flavor from the past when a new technology first met art, to produce something beautiful but new. From the youtube webpage:

The next in our ‘David’s Choice’ series, where Tokyo-based woodblock printmaker David Bull introduces some of his favourite prints. This time, the print(s) being featured are from the old Doi Hanga Company, and are two different scenes of the Kagurazaka district of Tokyo. The designers were Tsuchiya Koitsu, and Noel Nouet, and the prints were originally published in the late 1930s.

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