The coming April 8, 2024 total eclipse

12:09 pm

The next eclipses to cross the U.S.
Map by Michael Zeiler (GreatAmericanEclipse.com). Click for original.

On April 8, 2024 a large swath of the United States, from Texas to Maine, will have the opportunity to witness personally a total eclipse of the Sun by the Moon.

If you have never experienced a total eclipse, then you must do whatever you can to see this event, since the next eclipse within the United States will not happen again until 2044. Diane and I made a special trip to Idaho Falls, Idaho in 2017 to see that eclipse, and without doubt it was an experience that is difficult to describe. As I wrote afterward:

Totality was amazing. I was amazed by two things. First, how quiet it became. There were about hundred people scattered about the hotel lawn, with dogs and kids playing around. The hotel manager’s husband set up speakers for music and to make announcements, but when totality arrived he played nothing. People stopped talking. A hush fell over everything. Moreover, I think we somehow imagine a subconscious roar from the full sun. Covered as it was, with its soft corona gleaming gently around it, it suddenly seemed still.

Secondly, the amazing unlikeliness of the Moon being at just the right distance and size to periodically cause this event seemed almost miraculous. Watching it happen drove this point home to me. And since eclipses themselves have been a critical event in the intellectual development of humanity, helping to drive learning and our understanding of the universe, it truly makes me wonder at the majesty of it. I do not believe in any particular religion or their rituals (though I consider the Bible, the Old Testament especially, to be a very good manual for creating a good life and society), but I do not deny the existence of a higher power. Something made this place, and set it up in this wonderous way. Today’s eclipse only served to demonstrate this fact to me again.

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NASA high altitude science balloon sets new endurance record

9:57 am

GUSTO's flight path
Click for continuous tracking of GUSTO’s flight path

NASA’s GUSTO high altitude science balloon has now set a new endurance record for the most days of flight of a NASA balloon, flying more than 57 days over the continent of Antarctica at the south pole.

The map to the right shows GUSTO’s entire journey. The blue line was its first phrase of travel, the green its second phase, and the red its present stage.

GUSTO was launched at 1:30 a.m. EST Dec. 31 from the Long Duration Balloon Camp near McMurdo Station, Antarctica. The balloon mission not only broke the flight record but continues its path circumnavigating the South Pole. The stadium-sized zero-pressure scientific balloon and observatory are currently reaching altitudes above 125,000 feet. “The health of the balloon and the stratospheric winds are both contributing to the success of the mission so far,” said Hamilton. “The balloon and balloon systems have been performing beautifully, and we’re seeing no degradation in the performance of the balloon. The winds in the stratosphere have been very favorable and have provided stable conditions for extended flight.”

The previous NASA record was a balloon that it flew in 2012. GUSTO itself is being used to map the Milky Way’s carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen that is found between the stars in gas clouds.

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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 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

China to attempt 100 launches in 2024

9:47 am

China’s state-run press today announced that the country will attempt 100 launches in 2024, a number that includes launches from official government space agencies as well as a number of pseudo-companies that are supervised closely by that government.

This prediction now gives us a reasonably complete list of predictions from all the major players in the international launch market. Adding them all together, that market is predicting it will complete 366 launches in 2024, a number that would be 58% higher than the record set last year of 213 successful launches in a single year.

Will it happen? Not likely. Every one of those players routinely overstates its goals from year to year. For example, Russia’s numbers are always vastly high, with this year predicting 40 launches, a number that country hasn’t achieved in almost three decades.

At the same time, both China and SpaceX, the biggest players in this market, have been very good in recent years of predicting their output, only slightly missing their stated goals.

Based on these facts, it remains distinctly possible that the world’s global rocket industry will complete more than 300 successful launches in 2024, a number that is more three times higher than the average number of launches per year from the dawn of the space age in 1957 through 2021.

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SLIM survives lunar night!

9:33 am

SLIM's view after surviving lunar night
Click for original image.

Japan’s space agency JAXA yesterday announced in a tweet that its SLIM lunar lander had survived the harsh lunar night, and that engineers had resumed communications.

The picture to the right was taken after communications were resumed. It shows SLIM’s view of 885-foot-wide Shioli Crater, the opposite rim the bright ridge in the upper right about a thousand feet away. From this news report:

The mission team received telemetry from SLIM around 5:00 a.m. Eastern (1000 UTC). The temperature of the communication equipment was extremely high, according to JAXA, due to the sun being high over the landing area. Communication was terminated after only a short period of time, JAXA stated.

The SLIM team is however now preparing to conduct observations with SLIM’s multiband spectroscopic camera (MBC) later in the lunar day. MBC is designed to ascertain the composition of the lunar surface and could provide insights into the moon’s history. Sunset over Shioli crater, on the rim of which SLIM landed, will occur Feb. 29.

Surviving the long lunar night is a major achievement. It means Japan’s technology here is capable of doing long missions on the Moon.

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Conscious Choice cover

Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!

From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.

 
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.  
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.

 

“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society.

 

All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. All editions can also be purchased direct from the ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from the author (hardback $29.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $6.00). Just send an email to zimmerman @ nasw dot org.

LRO locates and photographs Odysseus on lunar surface

9:21 am

Overview map
Click for original LRO image of Odysseus

Scientists using Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) this weekend located and photographed Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus Nova-C lunar lander at a height of 56 miles during its first orbit over the site.

The inset in the map to the right shows the lander, with the white dot marking its landing site, several miles to the south of the planned landing site, as indicated by the yellow dot.

Odysseus came to rest at 80.13 degrees south latitude, 1.44 degrees east longitude, 8,461 feet (2,579 meters) elevation, within a degraded one-kilometer diameter crater where the local terrain is sloped at 12 degrees.

That slope could by itself explain why the lander tipped over and ended up on its side. First, it landed faster than planned. Second, Intuitive Machines designed this Nova-C lander with a relatively tall configuration, which gives it a high center of gravity. Hitting the ground fast and on such a slope could easily have been enough for momentum to tilt it over after touchdown.

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SpaceX launches 24 Starlink satellites

10:13 pm

SpaceX today successfully launched another 24 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its thirteenth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

18 SpaceX
9 China
2 Iran
2 India
2 Rocket Lab
2 Japan
2 Russia

American private enterprise now leads the entire world combined 21 to 17 in successful launches, while SpaceX by itself now leads the the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 18 to 17.

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Leaving Earth cover

Leaving Earth: Space Stations, Rival Superpowers, and the Quest for Interplanetary Travel, can be purchased as an ebook everywhere for only $3.99 (before discount) at amazon, Barnes & Noble, all ebook vendors, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.

If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big oppressive tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.

 

Winner of the 2003 Eugene M. Emme Award of the American Astronautical Society.

 
"Leaving Earth is one of the best and certainly the most comprehensive summary of our drive into space that I have ever read. It will be invaluable to future scholars because it will tell them how the next chapter of human history opened." -- Arthur C. Clarke

Odysseus is on its side, some antennas blocked

11:30 pm

It appears the reason communications with Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus lunar lander has been so difficult since its landing yesterdary is that something caused it to fall over so that it is now lying on its side, blocking some of its antennas.

Intuitive Machines initially believed its six-footed lander, Odysseus, was upright after Thursday’s touchdown. But CEO Steve Altemus said Friday the craft “caught a foot in the surface,” falling onto its side and, quite possibly, leaning against a rock. He said it was coming in too fast and may have snapped a leg. “So far, we have quite a bit of operational capability even though we’re tipped over,” he told reporters.

But some antennas were pointed toward the surface, limiting flight controllers’ ability to get data down, Altemus said. The antennas were stationed high on the 14-foot (4.3-meter) lander to facilitate communications at the hilly, cratered and shadowed south polar region.

Its exact location also appears to be several miles from its intended landing site next to the crater Malapart A. Scientists who operate Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) hope orbital images this weekend will identify the spacecraft’s precise location.

The company also revealed that the reason its own laser guidance system would not function — requiring a quick software patch allowing the spacecraft to use a different NASA system — was because “a switch was not flipped before flight.”

Because of this switch in navigation equipment it was decided to cancel the release of the student-built camera probe dubbed Eaglecam that was supposed to be released when Odysseus was about 100 feet above the surface and take images of the landing. Instead, it is now hoped it can be released post landing and get far enough away to look back and capture photos of the lander.

All these problems however do not make this mission a failure. Like Japan’s SLIM lander, the primary goal of this mission was to demonstrate the technology for softlanding an unmanned spacecraft on the Moon. Intuitive Machines has succeeded in this goal. Though obviously some changes must be made to improve this engineering, the success with Odysseus strongly suggests the next mission later this year will do far better.

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Mars’ flaky rocks

12:14 pm

Mars' flaky rocks
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on February 21, 2024 by the high resolution camera on the Mars rover Curiosity. It once again shows us a very typical many layered rock that the rover has seen routinely in Gale Crater and in the foothills of Mount Sharp.

The long flake tells us many things. First, Mars’ one-third Earth gravity, thin atmosphere, and lack of life allows such flakes to survive. On Earth not only would wind and rain break such delicate forms, plant life would eat away at it as well.

Second, the many thin layers tell us again that Mars’ geological history comprises many cycles and geological events, each of which placed another layer down. The many layers here could actually be evidence of year-by-year events, much like tree-rings detail the drought conditions yearly on Earth.

It will take study on Mars however to find out. These image only tantalize. They cannot give answers.

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How park volunteers in Tucson illustrated the growing resentment to unjustified authority

11:23 am

Forest Service discovers it ain't our lord and master
Forest Service discovers it ain’t
our lord and master

Recently the National Forest Service suspended its agreement with a volunteer organization, the Santa Catalina Volunteer Patrol, which had unpaid volunteers wear a forest service uniform with a volunteer patch, rather than a badge, and patrol within Sabino Canyon and other Forest Service trails near Tucson, answering questions for the public.

The reasons why the volunteer patrol was suspended were not described initially, except for vague statements that the volunteers needed “retraining.”

This drastic action is needed because we have patrollers not following our Forest Service Agreement, and any additional violations will result in our charter being removed. All patrollers will be required to go through retraining.

This past weekend that suspension was lifted, with the announcement giving a better explanation as to the cause of the suspension.
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Vast to compete with Axiom for NASA’s limited slots for commercial manned missions to ISS

9:40 am

The private space station company Vast, the only one presently building its own space station without a NASA contract, has now announced that it intends to to compete with Axiom for the limited docking slots NASA has made available for commercial manned tourist missions to ISS.

During a panel discussion at the Federal Aviation Administration Commercial Space Transportation Conference Feb. 21, Max Haot, chief executive of Vast, said his company would bid on the fifth and sixth private astronaut missions, or PAMs, that NASA offers to companies seeking to flying commercial missions to the ISS. “From our point of view, it will make us a better space station builder, a better partner of NASA, and it will help us practice a lot of the disciplines we are building” for its future commercial stations, he said of Vast’s plan to bid on the missions.

Up until now, Axiom has had no competition for those limited docking opportunities, has flown two missions, with a third planned for this fall. All it needed to do is negotiate the rental fees with NASA for using ISS. Now NASA will need to open up bidding for those slots. Its job is not to play favorites, but to instead make its taxpayer-funded facilities available to as many private companies as possible. Whether it will do so is at present unclear.

Vast’s own space station, a single module to be launched on SpaceX’s Starship/Superheavy, dubbed Haven-1, is scheduled for launch next year according to Vast officials. If so (assuming SpaceX’s rocket is operational by then), Vast will be the first private space station in orbit, beating Axiom and the two consortiums building Orbital Reef and Starlab. And it will have done it without taxpayer money.

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