Hubble to resume science operations using three gyros

9:02 am

Engineers have apparently figured out the issues with one of the Hubble Space Telescope’s three gyroscopes, and plan to resume science operations today using all three gyros.

After analyzing the data, the team has determined science operations can resume under three-gyro control. Based on the performance observed during the tests, the team has decided to operate the gyros in a higher-precision mode during science observations. Hubble’s instruments and the observatory itself remain stable and in good health.

This is excellent news. If it had been determined that the funky gyro was no longer functional, the telescope would have shifted into what the engineers call “one-gyro mode.” By using only one of the two remaining gyros, Hubble’s life could be extended. However, while it would allow the telescope to point and continue observations, the images would no longer be as sharp.

9 comments

SpaceX launches 22 more Starlink satellites

1:17 am

SpaceX early in the morning on December 8th successfully launched another 22 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California.

The first stage successfully completed its twelfth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

91 SpaceX
56 China
16 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches, 103 to 56, and the entire world combined 103 to 90. SpaceX by itself has once again taken the lead over the rest of the world (excluding other American companies), now leading 91 to 90.

At this moment, based on the pace SpaceX is setting, the chances it will make its goal of 100 launches in 2023 seems very likely. Not that it matters should the company fall short by one or two launches. At this moment it already has achieved more launches in a year than the entire world managed per year for most of the history of the space age, since Sputnik in 1957. It has also established that it can do this, which means its goal of 144 launches next year is quite reasonable.

One comment

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

Rachell Ellen Wong & Coleman Itzkoff – Hanukkah Medley

6:01 pm

An evening pause: This piece seems appropriate for the first night of Hannukkah, which celebrates the miracle of the lights during the Maccabbean revolt against religious oppression, a revolt that led to the restoration of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, part of which still stands and is called by the Wailing Wall by many Jews. The medley includes two songs, “Oh Hanukkah,” and “Al Hanisim” (Thank You For the Miracles).

It also seems appropriate today, the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, as Israel itself responds in like kind to Hamas’s own infamous sneak attack and massacre on October 7th.

Hat tip Judd Clark.

Leave a comment

December 7, 2023 Quick space links

4:30 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

 

 

  • The ice that fills Korolev Crater on Mars

    • A very cool image from Europe’s Mars Express orbiter. As noted at the tweet, “This crater on Mars is 3 times the area of Greater London and its filled with ice almost 2 kilometers thick.” Korolev is located at 73 degrees north latitude, where the Martian surface appears covered by ice sheets.

4 comments

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 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.

The steep mountain slopes inside Valles Marineris

1:28 pm

Overview map

The steep mountain slopes inside Valles Marineris
Click for full image.

Time for another cool image showing the dramatically steep terrain of Valles Marineris on Mars, the largest known canyon in the solar system. The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and enhanced to post here, was taken on October 31, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).

The scientists rightly label this picture “Steep Slopes in West Melas Chasma”. The red dot marks the high point on this ridgeline. The green dot at the upper left marks the lowest point in the picture, about 4,800 feet below the peak. The blue dot on the right edge marks the low point on the ridge’s eastern flank, about 4,600 feet below the peak. The cliff to the east of the peak drops quickly about 1,300 feet in less than a mile.

On the overview map above, the white dot marks the location. The inset is an oblique view, created from a global mosaic of MRO’s context camera images, with the white rectangle indicating approximately the area covered by the picture above.

The immense scale of Valles Marineris must once again be noted. The elevations in this picture are comparable to the descent you make hiking down from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. They pale however when compared to Valles Marineris. In the inset I have indicated the rim and floor of Valles Marineris in this part of the canyon. The elevation distance between the two is 18,000 feet.

In other words, the canyon to the east of this ridge is quite comparable in size to the Earth’s Grand Canyon, and it is hardly noticeable within the larger canyon of Valles Marineris.

Leave a comment

Americans might finally be noticing the depravity in academia that has existed for more than two decades

12:21 pm

Rick, stating the truth in Casablanca
Has the bankrupt testimony of three college
presidents finally awakened ordinary Americans?

For more than two decades conservatives have been reporting the growing immoral and depraved culture on the campuses of America’s most prestigious colleges, all to no avail.

These colleges instituted bigoted and racist policies of hiring, admissions, and funding that favored some races over others, so much so that today there are so few conservatives on their campuses that debate is impossible. The right has documented this repeatedly. Nothing was done.

These colleges worked to censor and silence the few conservatives that remained or came to speak as a guest, sometimes even allowing riots by leftist students to make sure such speech was prevented. The right has documented this repeatedly. Nothing was done.

These colleges further acted to remove and fire anyone, whether they were conservatives or not, who dared criticize any of the above actions. Often the terminations were done with no due process, and in direct violation of law and the colleges’ own rules. The right has documented this repeatedly. Nothing was done.

These colleges have steadily reshaped their curriculums so as to indoctrinate students into Marxism, “safe spaces”, and close-mindedness, instead of teaching the values of Western Civilization, liberty, the rule of law, personal responsibility, and most important, the requirement that an educated adult must be able to think critically. Students now come out of these colleges hostile to any debate, their minds closed to thinking because such thinking makes them uncomfortable.

The right has documented this repeatedly. Nothing was done.

As was the case in the early years of World War II, before the attack of Pearl Harbor (which occurred 82 years ago today), Americans were asleep. Then, Americans didn’t want to face the evil that was growing in Europe and threatened to engulf the world in war, and inevitably did so. Now, Americans have done everything they could to avoid facing the evil that has been growing in their own backyard. The result is the chaos we see today, with a younger generation that ignorantly believes America is the root of all evil, and that the best policies for the future should be censorship, socialism, and racial discrimination.

The situation has gotten desperate, and threatens to engulf us in another world war, potentially far more deadly than World War II. Worse, that war will be fought here, in America, from the start, because the enemies of Western Civilization have been deeply impregnated in our society by these corrupt colleges.

And as happened on December 7, 1941 when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, it appears that something has finally happened that has at last maybe wakened Americans up. Our Pearl Harbor today might simply be the bankrupt clueless testimony of three college presidents in front of Congress on December 5, 2023.

First everyone must listen to the most revealing moments of that testimony. If you haven’t seen the video below, you need to watch it now. And if you have already seen it, watch it again. It is short, and quickly illustrates the moral depravity of the leadership at three of America’s most elite colleges, Harvard, MIT, and the University of Pennsylvania.
» Read more

46 comments

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

Musk touts SpaceX’s gigantic lead in sending mass to orbit in 2023

9:22 am

The mass sent to orbit in 2023
Click for original image.

In a tweet Elon Musk sent out yesterday, he noted that “SpaceX is tracking to launch over 80% of all Earth payload to orbit this year.”

The graphic to the right was included in Musk’s tweet. Despite the delays in developing its heavy-lift Starship/Superheavy rocket, mostly caused by government red tape since the arrival of Joe Biden in the White House, the company’s smaller Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets have still been able to launch more than fifteen times the mass into orbit that its nearest competitor, the nation of China.

I count launches by company or nation as a indicator of rocketry success. The mass-to-orbit metric is as important, if not more so, though the two are without doubt linked. Both measure the success of those trying to become major players in the launch market.

And in both metrics, SpaceX is wiping the floor with its competition.

3 comments

The big 25th anniversary of ISS is really still two years away

9:10 am

The first crew of ISS, from left to right, Yuri Gidzenko, Sergei Krikalev, Bill Shepherd
The first crew of ISS, from left to right,
Yuri Gidzenko, Sergei Krikalev, Bill Shepherd

In a press release today NASA touted the 25th anniversary of the mating in orbit of the first two modules of the International Space Station (ISS), Zarya (built by Russia but paid for by the U.S.) and Unity (built by Boeing for NASA).

25 years ago today, the first two modules of the International Space Station – Zarya and Unity – were mated during the STS-88 mission of space shuttle Endeavour. The shuttle’s Canadarm robotic arm reached out and grappled Zarya, which had been on orbit just over two weeks, and attached it to the Unity module stowed inside Endeavour’s payload bay. Endeavour would undock from the young dual-module station one week later beginning the space station assembly era.

Though this anniversary is nice, it really isn’t the most significant. The most significant ISS anniversary is still two years away, when we celebrate 25 years of continuous human presence in space. That record began on October 31, 2000, when a Soyuz-2 rocket lifted off from Baikonur in Kazahkstan, carrying American Bill Shepherd and Russians Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev on what was to be the first crew occupancy of the station. Since that launch humans have occupied ISS without break.

With the present operation of China’s space station, and about four American commercial stations under development as well as plans by India and Russia to build their own, it is very likely that October 30, 2000 will remain the last day in human history where no human was in space.

That is the significant date. That is the moment in history that should be noted and marked as significant.

One comment

SpaceX initiates new round to obtain from $500 to $750 million in additional private investment capital

8:45 am

SpaceX has opened another tender round to obtain from $500 to $750 million in additional private investment capital, with the company now valued at $175 billion, up from the previous valuation of $150 billion.

With this new capital, the company will have raised at a minimum around $12 billion from private sources, not including the undisclosed investment in October from Italy’s biggest bank.

Why are private investors willing to do commit so much cash to this company? This quote from the article says it all:

SpaceX is on track to book revenues of about $9 billion this year across its rocket launch and Starlink businesses, Bloomberg News reported last month, with sales projected to rise to around $15 billion in 2024. The company is also discussing an initial public offering for Starlink as soon as late 2024 — a bid to capitalize on robust demand for communications via space.

In other words, SpaceX is already earning enough to pay for the development of Starlink/Starship/Superheavy, with even bigger profits expected because it has such a lead on its competitors in the satellite broadband business.

These investors realize that SpaceX has captured the majority of this market share, and because of this it will be difficult for late arrivals like Amazon to enter the market. Amazon could charge less to gain market share, but SpaceX could then do the same. And SpaceX will already be in the black when it does so, while Amazon will instead be increasing its red ink.

This situation underlines the wisdom of Musk’s decision in 2018 to shake-up the management in SpaceX’s Starlink division because the management then was setting too slow a pace. As I wrote then:

Musk’s desire for speed here actually makes very good economic sense. There are other companies developing similar internet satellite constellations, and if SpaceX’s launches late they will likely lose a significant market share.

His concern about the slow pace seems to me also justified. This technology, while cutting edge, shouldn’t require as much testing and prototype work as it appears the fired managers wanted. Better to get something working and launched and making money, introducing upgrades as you go, as SpaceX has done so successfully with its Falcon 9 rocket.

Time has now proven Musk right.

3 comments

SpaceX launches more Starlink satellites

11:53 pm

SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.

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

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

90 SpaceX
56 China
16 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches, 102 to 56, and the entire world combined 102 to 90. SpaceX by itself is once again tied with the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 90 to 90. The fast pace in launches continues, however, with five launches scheduled in the next five days.

8 comments

Pentatonix – Mary, Did You Know?

6:01 pm

An evening pause: When I posted a different version of this song last year, I said this:

This song honoring Jesus I think really speaks of every child born on Earth, and how every parent should see them. As Wordsworth said, they come “trailing clouds of glory.”

Did you know that your baby boy has walked where angels trod?
When you kissed your little baby then you kissed the face of god.

Still applies, to my way of thinking. That there are people in the world that think it good to kill such things means only that those people need to be removed from human existence as quickly as possible, as they represent the worst evil anyone can conceive.

Hat tip Alton Blevins.

3 comments

December 6, 2023 Quick space links

3:26 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

 

 

Leave a comment

Another example of the inability of Democrats to condemn bigotry

2:49 pm

House vote condemning anti-Semitism
Final totals of House vote condemning anti-Semitism.
Click for source.

This column today might sound familiar, as I have reported similar examples numerous times before (See previous essays here, here, here, here, and here). Yet, it is important to document the inability of the modern Democratic Party to unequivocally condemn bigotry, because so much of its base and membership are actually are in favor of such things.

Yesterday the House passed a resolution condemning the horrible rise of anti-Semitism seen nationwide and globally, mostly expressed during pro-Hamas demonstrations that have often descended into violence and calls for the murder of all Jews in Israel.

The resolution [pdf] is quite clear. After listing numerous examples of harrassment and violence against Jews in the U.S., Australia, Israel, and globally, it condemned such behavior, and made it clear that the term “anti-Zionism” is simply a euphemism for anti-Semitism.

The final vote totals are shown in the screen capture to the right, taken from C-SPAN. As you can see, except for one nay vote and four not voting at all, the entire Republican caucus voted in favor of this resolution.

The Democrats however were not so unanimous. While a little less than half of the Democrats in the House voted in support of this amazingly simple resolution, half voted “present”, following the instructions of Congressemen Jerry Nadler (D-New York), Dan Goldman (D-New York), and Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland) (all members of the Democratic Party House leadership). These Congressmen opposed the resolution because it is…
» Read more

9 comments

Big Martian gullies partly filled with glacial material

1:15 pm

Overview map

Big Martian gullies partly filled with glacial material

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on August 18, 2023 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It shows what the scientists dub as “large gullies with infilled alcoves.”

Gullies on Mars were one of the first discoveries by orbiters of small-scalle potential water-caused features on the Red Planet. The favorite explanation for their formation today involves the seasonal freeze-thaw cycle, combined with the deposition of ice and dry ice frost in the winter. When that ice and dry ice sublimates away in the spring it causes collapse and erosion, widening the gullies.

These gullies also exhibit evidence that underground and glacial ice might contribute as well. The material in the largest gullies looks like a mixture of glacial material and dust and debris. It could also be that there is ice impregnated in the ground, which can cause large collapses when it sublimates away.

The white rectangle on the overview map and inset above marks the location of this picture, on the western rim of a 13-mile-wide unnamed crater inside the western portion of the 2,000-mile-long mid-latitude strip on Mars I dub glacier country, since every image from orbit shows evidence of glaciers.

This picture is no different, as the horizontal cracks at the base of the crater rim suggests the glacier that fills the crater floor is being pulled apart by gravity at its edges. The elevation drop from the top of the rim to the floor is about 3,200 feet, so any ice on that slope will definitely be stressed by gravity. Such cracks are therefore not surprising.

Leave a comment

Psyche takes its first pictures

9:49 am

The spacecraft Psyche — going to the metal asteroid Psyche — has successfully taken its first pictures, proving its camera and pointing system work as planned.

The pictures, taken on December 4, 2023 from about 16 million miles from Earth, are actually quite boring, merely showing a field of stars. However,

The imager instrument, which consists of a pair of identical cameras, captured a total of 68 images, all within a star field in the constellation Pisces. The imager team is using the data to verify proper commanding, telemetry analysis, and calibration of the images. …The imager takes pictures through multiple color filters, all of which were tested in these initial observations.

At this moment all looks good for Psyche’s eventual arrival at Psyche in 2029.

2 comments

NASA completes investigation into the failure of the OSIRIS-REx drogue parachute

9:43 am

When the sample return capsule brought OSIRIS-REx’s Bennu samples back to Earth on September 24, 2023, it appeared that the drogue parachute never released prior to the release of the capsule’s main parachutes. Fortunately, those main parachutes were able to do the job, putting the capsule down unharmed but a minute early.

NASA has now completed its investigation into the drogue chute failure. According to its press release:

After a thorough review of the descent video and the capsule’s extensive documentation, NASA found that inconsistent wiring label definitions in the design plans likely caused engineers to wire the parachutes’ release triggers such that signals meant to deploy the drogue chute fired out of order.

The drogue was expected to deploy at an altitude of about 100,000 feet. It was designed to slow and stabilize the capsule during a roughly five-minute descent prior to main parachute deployment at an altitude of about 10,000 feet. Instead, at 100,000 feet, the signal triggered the system to cut the drogue free while it was still packed in the capsule. When the capsule reached 9,000 feet, the drogue deployed. With its retention cord already cut, the drogue was immediately released from the capsule.

In other words, engineers wired the thing incorrectly so it cut its cords before it was released. To further confirm this conclusion engineers will inspect the system thoroughly once scientists have completed removing the Bennu samples from the capsule.

8 comments

Iran and China complete orbital launches

9:35 am

Iran's launch December 6, 2023
Iran’s Salman rocket lifting off today.
The launch site itself was not disclosed.

According to the official state-run press of each country, both Iran and China yesterday completed successfully launches, both of which appeared to test new capabilities of some note.

First Iran announced that it had used its Salman rocket to put a 500-kilogram capsule that it said was carrying biological samples, and was also “has the ability to carry a human,” though the mass of this capsule makes that highly unlikely. Little other information was provided. Nor has this orbital launch as yet been confirmed by the orbital monitoring services of the U.S. military. The image to the right is a screen capture from the launch video at the link, and appears to show that this rocket has only one stage, thus making an orbital launch impossible.

Assuming this orbital launch is confirmed, it was Iran’s second orbital launch in 2023 and will therefore not show up on the launch race leader board below. If further information is obtained I will update this post appropriately.

China in turn announced the successful launch today of a test satellite, using its new Smart Dragon-3 solid-fueled rocket lifting off from a barge in the South China Sea 1,300 nautical miles off the coast of Guangdong province, where Hong Kong is located. To arrive at this ocean launch location took five days. The launch thus tested the use of this mobile floating platform from remote ocean locations.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

89 SpaceX
56 China
16 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches, 101 to 56, and the entire world combined 101 to 90. SpaceX by itself now trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 89 to 90, though it has another launch planned for tonight, with the live stream here.

9 comments

December 5, 2023 Zimmerman/Batchelor/Livingston podcast about Apollo 8

9:14 pm

This podcast was specifically to talk about the Apollo 8 mission to the Moon in 1968, and my book, Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8. John Batchelor and David Livingston allowed me to tell a lot of stories, some from the book and some from my private conversations with the astronauts and their families.

Embedded below the fold in two parts.

Note that I will be doing a much longer interview with John Batchelor on the December 23-24, 2023 weekend about Apollo 8 and my book. John scheduled this preliminary short interview so that his weekday audience (different from his weekend audience) could hear about the book.
» Read more

4 comments

December 5, 2023 Quick space links

9:01 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. Sorry about posting this late.

 

 

 

 

 

 

8 comments

Jerry Granelli Trio – Linus and Lucy

6:01 pm

An evening pause: The music from the soundtrack of the Charlie Brown television specials, with sections from “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” The man playing the drums, Jerry Granelli, is the last surviving member of the original group that played Vince Guaraldi’s music for the television show itself.

Hat tip Wayne DeVette.

2 comments

Pushback: Macy’s sued for its illegal discriminatory hiring policies

3:35 pm

Banned at Macy's
Banned at Macy’s

Bring a gun to a knife fight: The pro-bono non-profit legal firm America’s First Legal (AFL) has filed a federal civil rights complaint against Macy’s for its blatantly illegal diversity and inclusion policies that required hiring quotas bases solely on race.

You can read the complaint here [pdf]. AFL’s letter to Macy’s announcing the complaint is here [pdf]. As noted in AFL’s press release:

In a 2019 press release entitled “Bold Vision To Advance Diversity and Inclusion and Ensure The Company Reflects The Diversity Of The Customers and Communities Served,” Macy’s details its five-point plan with specific directives focused on achieving greater diversity for all aspects of the company’s business model.

The plan explicitly instructs Macy’s management to “[a]chieve more ethnic diversity by 2025 at senior director level and above, with a goal of 30 percent,” as well as to initiate a “12-month program designed to strengthen leadership skills for a selected group of top-talent managers and directors of Black/African-American, Hispanic-Latinx, Native American and Asian descent.” Quotas such as these are patently illegal under the law.

The language of that release is quite appalling. » Read more

3 comments

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter takes another look at the non-face on Mars

12:51 pm

The non-face on Mars
Click for original image

In 2007, shortly after it began science operations in Mars orbit, the science team for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) pointed its high resolution camera at the so-called “Face on Mars”, taking a picture that confirmed (as had Mars Global Surveyor several years earlier) that this “face” was a non-face, simply a mesa whose features made it appear roughly facelike in low resolution imagery.

Now, more than sixteen years later, scientists have used MRO to take a new picture of the non-face mesa. That picture is to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here. Compared to the 2007 photo the new photo has far better lighting conditions, revealing many details on the mesa’s eastern half that were mostly obscured by shadows previously.

In fact, these new details strongly suggest that the depression on the mesa’s eastern slopes harbors a decaying glacier. At least, that is what the features there resemble.
» Read more

11 comments

Ingenuity completes its 67th flight on Mars

9:58 am

Overview map
Click for interactive map.

Almost immediately after communications were re-established with Mars after the monthlong solar conjunction — where the Sun stood between the Earth and Mars — the Ingenuity engineering team uploaded instructions for Ingenuity’s 67th flight, and on December 2, 2023, the helicopter successfully completed that flight, traveling 1,289 feet to the west at a height of 39 feet for 136 seconds, almost exactly what the flight planned dictated.

The overview map above shows with the green dot the helicopter’s new position after that flight. It has moved ahead of Perseverance into Neretva Vallis, the gap out of Jezero Crater through which the rover will eventually travel. At the moment however Perseverance sits much farther east, as indicated by the blue dot, where it has been studying the surface geology of the delta that once flowed through that gap into the crater.

Leave a comment

Stratolaunch completes first test captive carry flight with powered Talon hypersonic vehicle

9:34 am

Test engineering vehicle attached below Roc
Test engineering vehicle attached to Roc during
a flight in October 2022

Stratolaunch has successfully completed the first test captive carry flight with its prototype Talon hypersonic vehicle fueled and powered, carried by its giant Roc airplane.

The flight was the twelfth for the company’s launch platform Roc and the first in which the aircraft carried a Talon vehicle with live propellant as part of a buildup approach for Talon-A’s first powered flight.

The flight lasted a total of three hours and 22 minutes and represented a significant step forward in the company’s near-term goal of completing a powered flight with the Talon-A vehicle, TA-1. A primary objective was to evaluate Talon-A’s propulsion system and the Talon environments while carrying live propellant. A second objective was to verify Roc and TA-1’s telemetry systems, which provides the situational awareness to ensure all systems are ready for powered flight during the release sequence.

The company has two contracts to do hypersonic test flights using flightworthy Talon vehicles, one with the Air Force and the second with the Navy. It is not clear however when those flights will occur.

Leave a comment

China launches two satellites

9:22 am

The Chinese pseudo-company Galactic Energy today successfully launched two satellites, its Ceres-1 rocket lifting off from China’s Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China.

China’s own state-run press illustrates how pseudo this company is by not even mentioning its name in its reporting. It mentions the launch was “commercial,” but that’s as far as it goes. China’s press knows the government runs and owns this company, and only allows it the superficial appearance of a private company to enhance competition within its space industry.

No word on where the rocket’s lower solid-fueled stages crashed inside China.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

89 SpaceX
55 China
16 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches, 101 to 55, and the entire world combined 101 to 88. SpaceX by itself still maintains its lead over the entire world (excluding other American companies) 89 to 88.

Leave a comment

Melinda Kathleen Reese – O Come O Come Emmanuel

6:01 pm

An evening pause: This was first posted in February 2019. As I noted then,

The video replays her singing the same thing three times. There is a good reason, as she almost appears to have begun singing as a lark, and the acoustics of the church astonish her. The repeats help bring out this amazing quality.

I think I shall always want to open the Christmas-Hannukah holiday season with it, as it speaks to both religions. And it is one magnificent song, sung here magnificently.

5 comments

December 4, 2023 Quick space links

4:47 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay.

 

 

 

 

 

4 comments

Cowardice and fear from Western leaders; Courage and determination from Israel and its Arab allies

1:00 pm

The model presently used by all leaders in the free world
The model presently used by today’s leaders
in the free world

If you wish to understand why the Middle East in general has had relatively few pro-Hama demonstrations — even in the Arab territories controlled by the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank — while the western nations have been largely engulfed by them — some of which have been violent and bluntly anti-Semitic by actually advocating the genocide of all Jews — you need only listen to the leaders of these countries, because those leaders reflect their populations and their overall attitude to the murder, rape, and beheading of innocent civilians, including children, by Hamas on October 7th.

In Israel Benjamin Netayahu made it once again very clear his country’s determination to eliminate Hamas and its terrorist cell in Gaza in a speech to his nation on December 2nd.

I state clearly and unequivocally: We will continue the war until we achieve all of its goals and it is impossible to achieve these goals without continuing the ground incursion. The ground incursion was essential in order to bring about the results up to now, and it is necessary to bring about future results.

I tell our friends around the world, you share our goal of eliminating Hamas and releasing our hostages; therefore, I also emphasize to them that there is no way of achieving these goals except by victory, and there is no way to achieve victory except by continuing the ground incursion. The IDF and the security forces are doing this with determination, strength and while upholding international law.

The second paragraph above was very specifically but carefully aimed at the leaders of Israel’s allies in the west, who from day one of this conflict have repeatedly waffled in their support, constantly looking for a way to stop Israel’s effort, to appease Hamas, and to make believe that an early end to this fighting, with Hamas still intact and in control of Gaza, will somehow bring peace. French President Emmanuel Macron illustrated their weaselly cowardice quite well during a press conference that same day:
» Read more

16 comments

Italian subcontractor for Arianespace misplaces two rocket tanks

8:58 am

This story is hard to believe but true: The Italian company Avio, one of the subcontractors for Arianespace that builds its smaller rockets Vega and Vega-C, apparently misplaced two rocket tanks that were to be used on the Vega rocket’s last launch, thus preventing that launch entirely.

The two propellant tanks that went missing were housed in an Avio production department in Colleferro that had undergone renovation work. At some point following the completion of the renovations, the two tanks were found to be missing.

According to the initial source, the tanks had not been entered into a company-wide asset management system that tracked the location of all vital Avio components. This ensured that the teams tasked with investigating the disappearance had very little to go on when beginning their search for the missing tanks.

Despite the futility of the search, the tanks were eventually found. This was, however, not the good news Avio had hoped for. The tanks are, unfortunately, not in a usable state. They had been crushed and were found alongside metal scraps in a landfill.

The tanks power Vega’s fourth stage that deploys satellites in orbit. They were to be used on the final flight of Vega, which has been delayed repeatedly for unexplained reasons. We now know the reason.

Because this was the final flight, however, the tanks cannot be replaced because the Vega production line has been shut down. The company is considering using two of the four qualification tanks first built more than a decade ago when Vega was first being tested, but those were test tanks and have been sitting unused for as long. It will be difficult to determine their reliability.

Europe’s government-run rocket program thus at present has no rocket capable of launching. Its Ariane-5 is retired. Its Vega cannot launch. Its Vega-C, which replaces the Vega, remains grounded due to a launch failure in December 2022, with the next launch expected no earlier than late in 2024. And its new Ariane-6 rocket won’t do its first launch until the summer of 2024, at the earliest.

6 comments
1 … 73 74 75 76 77 … 1,062