Category: Points of Information

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

• Astra to sell propulsion systems to satellite company

Though Astra needs to buy its main upper stage rocket engines from Ursa Minor, it has still developed its own smaller altitude systems which it can (and now has) marketed to others.

 

• Russia claims it will build a nuclear-powered space tug for use in connection with the Chinese lunar base

Based on Chinese news outlets, it doesn’t appear they are depending on Russia’s tug. According to Jay, “The Chinese were talking about nuclear propulsion a few days ago for their Kuiper probes, but nothing about a joint effort with Russia. If anything, the Chinese will buy the plans and that will be it.”

 

• Blue Origin celebrates opening of new office in Phoenix

My heart be still. More desk space for Blue Origin managers! That’ll certainly get New Glenn launched sooner.

 

• China publishes its own analysis of Superheavy/Starship launch

This is all part of China’s design research, whereby you don’t create anything but simply copy what others achieve. To do that well however you need to study what others do very aggressively.

 

• NASA’s pick to be first black astronaut on Moon decides to denigrate his own mission as well all whites

The astronaut, Victor Glover, invoked a 1970s racist song called “Whitey on the Moon” during an interview. The song strongly implies that the 1960s Apollo missions were simply another expression of the oppression of blacks by the white race.

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

• Interesting Twitter discussion about the Hakuto-R1 lunar landing failure

The most interesting comment, based on inconclusive and confusing data, is this: “From the Doppler profile, it looks like it descended, landed, then something went badly wrong and it accelerated back off the surface – just speculation based on radio obs.”

 

• ULA CEO Tory Bruno publishes paper outlining his thoughts on maintaining U.S. space assets agains attack

Bruno’s approach is very thoughtful and clearly presented. He concludes that the best approach is the one with the most variety, with both low and high orbit constellations providing communications and data. Why am I not surprised?

 

• The spacewalk plan to shift two solar panels on China’s Tiangong-3 space station to better locations

This effort is reminiscent of similar things the Russians did on both its Salyut and Mir stations.

 

• Rocket Lab says its preparations for two launches in New Zealand of NASA’s TROPICS satellites are on schedule

The first is scheduled for May 1, 2023 (New Zealand time), with the second on May 16th.

 

• Russia official extends its partnership on ISS until at least 2028

No surprise. What this really tells us is that Russia’s own space station is continuing to fall behind schedule, and will not be ready for launch by 2027, as previously predicted.

 

• Russia touts strength of Chinese-Russian space partnership by citing visit by official to China

Yeah, right. And I have a bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to sell you. The Chinese will make nice noises, but they know that they can expect nothing from Russia. If something shows up, great, but it would be dangerous to depend on it.

 

• For the first time since 2021, Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo (VSS Unity) completes a glide test flight

Their next goal is a powered flight with six crewmembers, targeting the second quarter of this year.

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

• A three second video of a proposed Chinese interstellar spacecraft

Pure sci-fi at this point.

 

• The next Tianzhou cargo freighter to China’s Tiangong-3 station being prepped for May 10th launch

 

• China touts its Long March 9 Starship/Superheavy copy, with reuse of second stage coming as soon as the 2040s!

China’s design of this rocket changes every time it realizes the American rocket it is copying has gotten changed, or won’t work well. First it was duplicating SLS. Then it switched to Starship/Superheavy, but keeps revising it as SpaceX’s designs evolve.

 

• The paper outlining the new InSight results about Mars’ core

It is worthwhile reading, as it reveals the level of uncertainty behind its conclusion that the inner core is liquid, and made up of lighter materials and not iron..

 

• NASA reveals it will not reuse the Orion capsule that flew around the Moon on the first SLS launch

The avionics inside the capsule will be reused, but the capsule will only be used as an “environmental test article for future Artemis missions.” The irony is that even Boeing with Starliner is now planning on reusing its capsules. NASA is not, despite spending more than $20 billion developing Orion.

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay, who sent them on time but are being posted late because the creator of this website dropped the ball.

• A detailed analysis of Amazon’s proposed Kuiper constellation

Lots of great potentialities, but as always with Bezos space-related companies, little actual achievement, as yet.

 

• Global map of Mars produced by Tianwen-1 orbiter images

More significant is the announcement that Zhurong remains in hibernation mode.

 

• China’s space agency makes three rocket engines available for its pseudo-companies to buy

It also claims it can produce 300 engines per year.

 

• Another outsider’s perspective on the Starship/Superheavy test launch

I agree with Jay, her analysis is very refreshing, with exactly the right outlook.

 

• NASA considering shifting New Horizons from Kuiper Belt observations to solar observations, sooner that expected

The article is written entirely against this change, which if approved would occur in October 2024 instead of 2025. Though the New Horizons team is doing good research, they have not yet found another Kuiper asteroid target that New Horizons can get close to, and NASA management might be thinking the spacecraft could be better used studying the Sun from these distances.

 

• Celebrating the anniversary of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope, 33 years ago today

The link shows video of the launch of Discovery, carrying Hubble.