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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.

Blue Origin reveals its orbital rocket

9:15 am

The competition heats up: Blue Origin today unveiled the orbital rocket it plans to launch before 2020, dubbed New Glenn.

Named in honor of John Glenn, the first American to orbit Earth, New Glenn is based around two variants – a two stage and a three stage launch vehicle – and a reusable booster stage. No information has been released as to where the booster stage will land, although it is believed Blue Origin is evaluating the option of an “ocean-going platform,” per planning documentation associated with the launch site. “Building, flying, landing, and re-flying New Shepard has taught us so much about how to design for practical, operable reusability. And New Glenn incorporates all of those learnings,” Mr. Bezos added.

Mr. Bezos added that the two-stage New Glenn is 270 feet tall, and its second stage is powered by a single vacuum-optimized BE-4 engine (the BE-4U). The 3-stage New Glenn is 313 feet tall. A single vacuum-optimized BE-3 engine, burning liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, powers its third stage. The booster and the second stage are identical in both variants. The three-stage variant – with its high specific impulse hydrogen upper stage – is capable of flying demanding beyond-LEO missions.

The rocket will be quite large and comparable more to SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy than its Falcon 9, indicating that the competition is not only forcing companies to lower their prices, it is forcing new designs to be larger and have more capacity.

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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, 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 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

Do you have video of the Falcon 9 explosion? SpaceX needs it!

2:40 pm

In a series of tweets today Elon Musk put out a call for any videos anyone might have of last week’s Falcon 9 launchpad explosion.

“Still working on the Falcon fireball investigation. Turning out to be the most difficult and complex failure we have ever had in 14 years,” Musk wrote. “Important to note that this happened during a routine filling operation. Engines were not on, and there was no apparent heat source. Particularly trying to understand the quieter bang sound a few seconds before the fireball goes off. May come from rocket or something else,” he said.

Musk also answered questions and responded to comments from the public. When Twitter user @ashwin7002 tweeted at Musk that “there are some videos on YouTube claiming something hit the rocket. Any reality there?” Musk replied, “We have not ruled that out.”

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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.

Upcoming lecture in Illinois

11:20 am

For those of my readers who happen to live in Illinois, I will be giving a lecture on Tuesday, October 4, 2016 at 6:00 pm in Urbana, Illinois to the University of Illinois at Urbana student chapter of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

My topic: Predicting the future of space travel, based on the past.

Abstract:

What shall the future of space exploration be like? Will the United States continue to dominate? Or will other nations move to the forefront and eclipse the present generation of American and Russian pioneers? Moreover, will the next travelers to other worlds go to the Moon or the asteroids? Or will they head straight to Mars, as some passionately advocate?

Predicting the precise chronology of these future events, ALL of which are inevitable, is certainly impossible. However, human history does repeat itself, and a close and objective look at history can give us a fairly good idea of what will happen in the future. This is especially important in the context of the federal government’s present budget problems and how they will influence future events.

In his lecture, Robert Zimmerman will outline a few examples of past exploration — both famous as well as obscure — and use these stories to show that the path we are on today is actually heading in a direction that few expected or predicted only a few years ago.

The actual location will be in the Talbot Laboratory, 104 S Wright St, Urbana, IL 61801.

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The people directly hurt by Obamacare rises

10:17 am

Finding out what’s in it: A new poll shows that the number of people directly hurt by Obamacare has continued to rise.

Currently, 29% of Americans say Obamacare has hurt them and their family, up from 26% in May, and the highest Gallup has measured to date. Meanwhile, the percentage who say the ACA has helped their family dropped from 22% to 18%. The bulk of Americans, 51%, continue to say the law has “had no effect.” As more provisions of the law have taken effect over the years, the “no effect” percentage has dropped from the first reading of 70%, in early 2012.

Not surprisingly, support for Obamacare, always low, has shrunk as well. As the article at the link notes,

Wait until the next round of open enrollment starts in eight weeks. The number of people who feel the ObamaCare pain is likely to rise even further, especially in places like Tennessee, Minnesota, and other states where premiums will go up 40% or more over 2016.

The fact that in many regions there will be only one or fewer insurance options will help to underline why people increasingly hate Obamacare. Sadly, every one of these failures was predicted by conservatives back in 2010. The Democrats however were too wise and caring to listen. For them, caring is all that matters, even if it means instituting policies that destroy people’s lives.

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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

An attack on Israel coming?

10:01 am

Two stories this morning suggest that an attack soon on Israel from either Iran- or ISIS-backed forces, or both, may soon take place.

The first would be a large attack from the north, near the Golan Heights, planned with the hope of grabbing and holding territory from Israel. The second would be a small terrorist attack. meant only to distract and cause harm. Supposedly Iran and the Islamic State oppose each other, but here they would be working together. Good thing the Obama administration sent Iran $33 billion in cash to help them in this effort.

To get a feel for the hate held by Islamic leaders of all stripes for Jews, watch this excerpt from a Friday sermon by a Hamas MP. Their goal is simple: Kill all the Jews. I wonder how Israel is going to negotiate a two state solution faced with that.

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The flowing formations of Lethe Vallis

9:36 am

Cool image time! The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter science team yesterday released several new images. Below is just one, cropped and reduced in resolution to post here. It shows a large flow channel called Lethe Vallis, formed first by lava, then hit by an impact which created a walled crater in its middle. Flood waters then followed, creating the tear-shaped dune surrounding the crater. In addition, erosion exposed the dark lava basalt below the surface on the edge of that tear-shaped dune. Within the crater itself can be seen ripple dunes formed by wind. As the scientists note,

This single image thus contains features formed by periglacial, volcanic, fluvial, impact, aeolian and mass wasting processes, all in one place.

Be sure to check out the full image.

Lethe Vallis

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Rosetta’s final descent to Comet 67P/C-G

9:07 am

The Rosetta science team today posted two stories, describing details about the planned final descent of the spacecraft to the surface of Comet 67P/C-G on September 30, ending the mission.

The spacecraft will land in a region dubbed Ma’at that contains several active pits more than 300 feet across and 150 feet deep. This is also where several of the comets dust jets originate.

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Update on the Falcon 9 launchpad explosion investigation

9:42 pm

The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article today describing the investigation into last week’s Falcon 9 launchpad explosion, noting especially how — despite participation by the FAA, NASA, and the Air Force — SpaceX will be entirely in charge of the investigation, in accordance with present law.

The article is clearly lobbying for a change, whereby the government would have more power in these investigations. I personally think a change would be a mistake, that the law as it is now is how it should be. It was their rocket that exploded. Their business model depends on their rockets not exploding. Thus, they have the greatest self-interest in fixing the problem. The other outside players might be helpful, but their presence can only in the long run make things more difficult and slow things down, without making anything better.

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Arianespace offers to pick up SpaceX business

9:35 pm

The competition heats up: In an effort to gain more business, Arianespace is offering to add an additional launch to its 2017 schedule for any satellite companies whose payload launch is being delayed by both SpaceX’s Falcon 9 launchpad explosion as well as a delay in Russian Proton launches due to its own technical issues.

In his remarks it seemed to me that the CEO of Arianespace was almost gloating.

In a Sept. 7 interview with France Info radio, Israel reiterated his confidence in what he portrayed as Arianespace’s more plodding, deliberative — and higher-cost — approach to launches when compared to SpaceX.

Arianespace does not want a reusable rocket for the moment, he said, because it’s not certain that reusability can reduce costs and maintain reliability. The Ariane 6 rocket, to operate starting in 2020, will not be reusable. The company also is wary of the Silicon Valley ethos that champions constant iteration, which he said has been a feature of Hawthorne, California-based SpaceX as well. “We think that the more a launch resembles the preceding launch, the better we are for our customers because we remain in the ‘explored domain’ where everything is understood,” Israel said.

In the short run he and Arianespace might benefit by this situation, but in the long run they will face a shrinking market share if they cannot lower the price of their rockets.

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Blue Origin to do New Shepard launch abort test

9:27 pm

The competition heats up: For the next test flight of New Shepard, tentatively scheduled for early October, Blue Origin plans to test the capsule’s launch abort system, separating the capsule prematurely from its propulsion module during launch.

“We’ll be doing our in-flight escape test with the same reusable New Shepard booster that we’ve already flown four times,” Bezos wrote. “About 45 seconds after liftoff at about 16,000 feet, we’ll intentionally command escape. Redundant separation systems will sever the crew capsule from the booster at the same time we ignite the escape motor. The escape motor will vector thrust to steer the capsule to the side, out of the booster’s path. The high acceleration portion of the escape lasts less than two seconds, but by then the capsule will be hundreds of feet away and diverging quickly. It will traverse twice through transonic velocities—the most difficult control region—during the acceleration burn and subsequent deceleration. The capsule will then coast, stabilized by reaction control thrusters, until it starts descending.”

If all goes well, the capsule will make a normal descent under three drogue parachutes, and then its main parachutes, to the ground. And the booster? It may not fare so well. It was not designed to survive an in-flight escape, Bezos noted, as it will be slammed with 70,000 pounds of off-axis force and hot exhaust. At Max-Q it is not clear whether the propulsion module will survive—in some Monte Carlo simulations it does, but in others it does not.

I suspect they already have at least one new propulsion module ready to go, and plan to use it with the reused capsule in future tests.

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First test captive carry flight for Unity

9:21 pm

The competition heats up: Virgin Galactic today completed its first test flight of its new SpaceShipTwo, Unity, flying it mated to WhiteKnightTwo for almost four hours.

Congratulations to Virgin Galactic! Still, it remains to be seen whether they can get this ship tested and capable of commercial flights fast enough to beat their competition, competition that did not exist when they started their business more than a decade ago.

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Obama administration gave Iran as much as $33 billion in cash

4:02 pm

Whose side is he and the Democrats on? In the past three years the Obama administration could have secretly shipped as much as $33.6 billion (with a B) to Iran.

Between January 2014 and July 2015, when the Obama administration was hammering out the final details of the nuclear accord, Iran was paid $700 million every month from funds that had previously been frozen by U.S. sanctions. A total of $11.9 billion was ultimately paid to Iran, but the details surrounding these payments remain shrouded in mystery, according to Mark Dubowitz, executive director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. In total, “Iran may have received as much as $33.6 billion in cash or in gold and other precious metals,” Dubowitz disclosed.

This is in addition to the $1.7 billion in cash that was paid as ransom for the release of several U.S. hostage.

We of course all know that because of Barack Obama’s golden tongue and his ability to give speeches that this money will now only be used for humanitarian purposes. Of course we know this. Of course.

And of course we also know that Hillary Clinton will continue these policies, because she recognizes how successful they have been.

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Blue Origin to use two launchpads at Cape Canaveral

10:10 am

The competition heats up: Even though it is years away from flying its first orbital rocket, Blue Origin has expanded its plans at Cape Canaveral and now plans to remodel and use two different launchpads there for orbital flights.

The Kent, Wash.-based company filed a permit Sept. 6 to build and operate two orbital launch sites at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, taking up launch complexes 11 and 36. The company originally announced its plans to blast off its rockets at launch complex 36 last year at the same time revealing its decision to build a rocket manufacturing facility near Space Florida’s Exploration Park in Merritt Island. Taking up launch complex 11 (LC-11) is a new development.

This means that when the company starts testing its orbital rocket it will likely be doing it in public, from the Cape, rather than in the secretive manner in which it developed its suborbital New Shepard spacecraft out in Texas.

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India’s GSLV rocket successfully launches again

10:03 am

The competition heats up: India’s Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) successfully placed a commercial communications satellite in orbit today.

This is the third successful GSLV launch in a row, indicating that India’s space agency ISRO has finally worked out the kinks of their home-built upper stage and are ready to begin regular and more frequent commercial launches, in direct competition with the world’s big players in the launch industry.

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The technology of Star Trek

9:55 am

On this, the fiftieth anniversary of the first airing of the first Star Trek episode, here is a fascinating look at the fictional technology of the series.

I remember that Thursday evening fifty years ago very well. As a teenager I had been suffering for years watching very bad and stupid television science fiction, like Lost in Space, written as if its audiences were five year old children and thus insulting them. Still, as an avid reader of science fiction that knew the genre was sophisticated and intelligent, I held onto the hope that some new science fiction show might finally do something akin to this.

Star Trek did this and more. That first episode had all the best elements of good drama and great science fiction: a mystery, an alien, a tragic figure, and an ancient lost civilization. From that moment until the series was cancelled, I would be glued to my television set when it aired.

You can watch that first episode if you wish, though with commercials. Click on the first link above to do so. In watching it recently when Diane and I decided to rent the original series from Netflix and watch them again, I was surprised how well this episode, as well as the entire first series, has stood up over time. It is not dated. Its drama remains as good. And you know, the writing is sometimes quite stellar, to coin a phrase.

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Rosetta finds carbon molecules in comet dust

9:32 am

The Rosetta science team has announced that they have detected very complex carbon molecules in solid dust particles that were released from Comet 67P/C-G.

“Our analysis reveals carbon in a far more complex form than expected,” remarked Hervé Cottin, one of the authors of the paper reporting the result that is published in Nature today. “It is so complex, we can’t give it a proper formula or a name!” The organic signatures of seven particles are presented in the paper, which the COSIMA team say are representative of the two hundred plus grains analysed so far.

The carbon is found to be mixed with other previously reported elements such as sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon, calcium and iron. It is bound in very large macromolecular compounds similar to the insoluble organic matter found in carbonaceous chondrite meteorites that have fallen to Earth, but with a major difference: there is much more hydrogen found in the comet’s samples than in meteorites.

But as this kind of meteorite is associated with reasonably well-processed parent bodies such as asteroids, it is reasonable to assume that they lost their hydrogen due to heating. By contrast, comets must have avoided such significant heating to retain their hydrogen, and therefore must contain more primitive material.

Because of the use of the term organics here for these carbon-based molecules, expect a lot of news reports to misreport this discovery and incorrectly announce with great excitement that Rosetta has “discovered life” on Comet 67P/C-G! Among scientists, any carbon molecule is referred to as organic, even if it is entirely inanimate. In this case these molecules are not the result of life, but of carbon’s atomic structure, allowing it to form an infinite variety of molecules with almost any other element.

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Orion faces more budget and schedule delays

9:18 am

A new inspector general report of NASA’s Orion has found that the program still faces significant budget and technical problems in meeting the planned August 2021 launch date for its first manned mission.

The report makes it clear that this launch will almost certainly be delayed until 2023, meaning that from the date President George Bush proposed Orion in 2004, it will have taken NASA a full two decades to launch the first manned Orion capsule.

Let me repeat that: Two decades to build and launch a single manned mission. Does anyone see something wrong here?

As for what will happen after that first flight, the report itself [pdf] makes it pretty clear that not much is likely. From page 11:

For Orion missions after 2023, NASA has adopted an incremental development approach. According to the Program Plan, the approach is cost-driven and will provide a core vehicle the Agency can upgrade to provide additional capabilities for missions beyond cis-lunar space. Each incremental upgrade will build on flight experience to ensure the vehicle’s design is based on viable technology and capabilities. Consistent with this incremental approach, NASA has not committed to specific missions after 2023 and therefore has not developed detailed plans, requirements, or costs for such missions. According to NASA officials, the Agency will instead focus on building capabilities through defined roadmaps that identify technology development paths and capability requirements for deep space exploration missions. Officials explained the Agency will fund basic research, pursue development of the technologies that appear most viable, and build capabilities based on available funding. Missions will be selected based on the progress and maturity of the developed technology.

A translation of this gobbly-gook into plain English can be summed up as follows: Congress has given us no money for future missions, so we can’t plan anything.

Considering the cost and the ungodly amount of time it took NASA to get to this one flight, and considering how badly this record compares with the numerous flights that private commercial space will achieve prior to this single flight, don’t expect Congress to fork up more money after 2023. SLS and Orion are going to die. Unfortunately, their slow death will have cost the American taxpayer billions of wasted dollars that NASA could have been better spent on other things.

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