Biden signs budget continuing resolution, preventing shutdown

9:00 am

At the very last second Congress and President Biden passed and signed another budget continuing resolution that will keep the federal government operating till December and thus preventing another shutdown.

From NASA’s narrow perspective, the action means that the asteroid mission Lucy will likely launch in October as planned. From the perspective of the nation, this last second action merely illustrates the overall failure of the federal government and the elected officials who have been tasked to run it. They are all incompetent, and wouldn’t last five seconds in a real job outside the government.

That the voters keep re-electing them also speaks poorly of America today. We all should be ashamed.

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Dennis Praeger asks: Do you know anyone whom you could trust to hide you from the Nazis?

9:24 pm

Link here. The essay begins with something that is always in the back of the mind of every Jew since the day the Romans kicked our ancestors out of Israel:

There is something about most Jews that few non-Jews know: We Jews often ask ourselves if a non-Jew in our lives would hide us in the event of a Nazi-like outbreak.

I don’t know if young Jews think about this, but nearly all Jews who grew up in the decades following the Holocaust often wondered: Would this non-Jew hide me?

If you are Jewish and have been educated at all about your people’s history, you can’t help thinking about this. It is a variation of an essay I wrote back in January, when it was clear the intolerant and power-hungry Democratic Party was going to take power. At that time I said that America was becoming like Soviet Russia, where you chose your friends very carefully because if you didn’t, you might find yourself betrayed and reported to the secret police.

My example was generic, applying to everyone under the thumb of a dictatorship. Praeger gives a more nuanced example, from the Jewish perspective where repeatedly the larger society decided all Jews must be killed. In both cases, you no longer can be at ease with everyone you meet. You need to look at each new acquaintance in very stark and cold terms. And as Praeger notes, you need to ask: Would this person turn me over to the Gestapo to save their own lives, or would they do the righteous thing, no matter the risk, and protect me?

These are questions Americans now unfortunately have to think about. More significantly, we are at a moment where we can not only think them, but we can ask them aloud, to people’s faces. We can say to people we know: Would you save me from the Nazis? Or would you hide in fear, or turn me in? By asking that bluntly we might finally get some of the “go-along-to-get-along” types to finally wake up.

Read Praeger’s essay. He goes into great detail describing the kind of people who are more likely to protect the innocent from evil, no matter the risk. You might be surprised by what he says.

The question you next have to ask: Does this describe myself?

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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

Today’s blacklisted American: Private school threatened with shut down by Colorado

1:05 pm

Rick, stating the truth in Casablanca
Still asleep, and tragically, too many refuse to wake up.

They’re coming for you next: A private Christian school in Loveland, Colorado, is planning to sue the local health department because it demanded their students wear masks or else the school would be shut down.

Parents at Resurrection Christian School in Loveland, Colorado, were told on Sept. 15 that all persons entering school buildings the next day must wear a mask, by order of the Larimer County Health Department, or their school would be closed. The order allowed for medical exemptions but made no distinction in regards to vaccination status or acquired immunity.

The same evening, school Superintendent Jerry Eshleman vowed in a video message to parents and staff to fight the health department’s edict in court. He urged parents to comply with the public health order for the time being, so that the students wouldn’t have their school year disrupted by a forced school closure while the case was being fought.

Based on the article, it appears that many parents are trying to get medical exemptions for their children, with some succeeding.

Regardless, forcing kids to put on masks is the height of stupidity. » Read more

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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.

Former Blue Origin employee blasts company for sexism and safety issues

12:04 pm

Food fight! While the past two days have been filled with silly back-and-forth barbs between Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, none of which really matters (which is why I haven’t posted anything about it here), today came the publication of a long scree by a former Blue Origin employee blasting the company for sexism and safety issues.

The rant by Alexandra Abrams, former head of Blue Origin Employee Communications, claims it is co-signed by twenty other present and former Blue Origin employees, but provides no information as who those individuals are. The accusations themselves are all hearsay, since Abrams simply recounts experiences of unnamed others, without any documentation.

Could there be management problems at Blue Origin? Certainly. The real evidence in the past five years suggests that CEO Bob Smith has not done well to get the company off the ground. Not only has Blue Origin accomplished little under his tenure, employees are apparently not happy there, with many fleeing the company.

Abrams’ rant however comes off more like she is a disgruntled former employee who was let go because she was pushing social justice issues rather than focusing on getting her job done. Her use of worn leftist phrases like “climate justice” and “gender gaps” suggests this strongly. The response from Blue Origin to her essay reinforces that impression, noting that she was fired for doing things that could have gotten Blue Origin shut down by the federal government:

Ms. Abrams was dismissed for cause two years ago after repeated warnings for issues involving federal export control regulations.

If so, and Blue Origin would not say this publicly if it wasn’t true, Abrams misconduct could have been very serious indeed. Moreover, as noted at this last link, she was the head of the company’s employee communications department, a division that shouldn’t really be involved in such issues anyway.

This whole kerfuffle reminds me of a similar affair at SpaceX several years ago. A disgruntled former employee made all sorts of similar charges, sued, and lost. I expect a similar result here.

Both companies are in the business of building rockets. Their goal is not “gender equality” or “climate justice”. If that becomes any employee’s first priority, as it appears might have been the case with Abrams, that employee has got to be culled from the company, as that person will only become a cancer that will destroy what everyone else there is trying to accomplish.

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FAA extends comment period for SpaceX Starship/Superheavy environmental reassessment

11:11 am

Capitalism in space: The FAA today announced that it has extended the comment period for its environmental reassessment of SpaceX’s operations at Boca Chica, Texas two weeks until November 1st.

From the email announcement:

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has received requests for an extension of the public comment period for the Draft Programmatic Environmental Assessment for the SpaceX Starship/Super Heavy Launch Vehicle Program at the SpaceX Boca Chica Launch Site in Cameron County, Texas (Draft PEA). In consideration of these requests, the FAA is extending the public comment period.

The agency has also changed the dates for the two public hearings it will hold to October 18 and October 20. It will announce more information on those hearings on October 15th.

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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

Orbit of biggest comet ever detected refined

10:59 am

Astronomers have now been able to better refine the orbit and size of Comet Bernardinelli-Bernstein, comet with the largest nucleus ever detected.

A new analysis, led by Bernardinelli and Bernstein themselves, found that the comet nucleus is around 150 km wide, based on its brightness. If so, that makes it the largest comet ever discovered, by quite a margin. Most are only a few kilometers to several dozen kilometers wide, while some particularly big ones, like Hale-Bopp, may be up to 80 km (50 miles) wide. The previous record-holder, Sarabat’s Comet of 1729, has been estimated at about 100 km wide.

The team was also able to calculate the orbit of Comet BB in more detail. This object is on an incredibly long round trip into and out of the solar system – at its most distant point, some 1.5 million years ago, it was about 40,400 AU away. Last time it swung through our neighborhood was about 3.5 million years ago, when it came within 18 AU of the Sun.

But its current inward journey will be its closest so far. Astronomers have already calculated that in 2031, Comet BB will peak at 10.9 AU, almost reaching the orbit of Saturn.

It is presently unclear how bright the comet will be when it reachest its closest point. It will be much farther from the Sun than most bright comets, but its large size may change what is normally expected.

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Yutu-2 and Chang’e-4 successfully complete another lunar day on the Moon

10:52 am

According to China’s state-run press, its lunar rover Yutu-2 and the lander Chang’e-4 have now successfully completed another lunar day on the far side of the Moon, with both still functioning well.

Yutu-2 has traveled a total of 839.37 meters, or about 2,753 feet. They are aiming for a location that is still about 3,400 feet away. Based on the rover’s travel pace, about 100 feet per lunar day, it will take them about another two or four years to get there.

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FAA clears Virgin Galactic to fly

10:35 am

Capitalism in space: FAA yesterday closed out its investigation into the flight path deviation during the July Virgin Galactic suborbital flight, clearing the company to resume flights.

To prevent future issues, the company will request that a larger zone be restricted on future flights. The FAA also criticized the company for not revealing the flight deviation to the FAA immediately, and demanded the company make sure it doesn’t happen again.

The article at the link also notes that the Virgin Galactic employee whose job it was to provide that information to the FAA resigned the day before this announcement. There is no evidence however that there is any link to the two events, though it is very likely that person was made the fall guy to satisfy the FAA and Virgin Galactic.

Whether flights will resume in mid-October as the company has stated earlier is not clear, as there is no word about whether the manufacturing defect in the flight control equipment revealed by a third-party supplier has been resolved.

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Ingenuity’s 14th flight scrubbed by helicopter

10:22 am

Though Ingenuity successfully completed a preflight high speed test of its rotors on September 15th, when it came time to do its fourteenth flight two days later, intended as a short airborne test of that high speed, the helicopter’s computer sensed an issue prior to take-off and scrubbed the flight.

The goal of the high speed test and short flight were to see if Ingenuity could fly during the winter months when the atmosphere of Mars is thinner, thus requiring a higher rotor speed. Initially it was not expected the helicopter would still be operational at this point, so this is another example of it pushing its expected capabilities. The scrub however might be signalling the end date for Ingenuity, related to servo motors that help control the helicpoter:

Ingenuity performs an automated check on the servos before every flight. This self-test drives the six servos through a sequence of steps over their range of motion and verifies that they reach their commanded positions after each step. We affectionately refer to the Ingenuity servo self-test as the “servo wiggle.”

The data from the anomalous pre-flight servo wiggle shows that two of the upper rotor swashplate servos – servos 1 and 2 – began to oscillate with an amplitude of approximately 1 degree about their commanded positions just after the second step of the sequence. Ingenuity’s software detected this oscillation and promptly canceled the self-test and flight.

Our team is still looking into the anomaly. To gather more data, we had Ingenuity execute additional servo wiggle tests during the past week, with one wiggle test on Sept. 21, 2021 (Sol 209) and one on Sept. 23, 2021 (Sol 211). Both of the wiggle tests ran successfully, so the issue isn’t entirely repeatable.

One theory for what’s happening is that moving parts in the servo gearboxes and swashplate linkages are beginning to show some wear now that Ingenuity has flown well over twice as many flights as originally planned (13 completed versus five planned). Wear in these moving parts would cause increased clearances and increased looseness, and could explain servo oscillation. Another theory is that the high-speed spin test left the upper rotor at a position that loads servos 1 and 2 in a unique, oscillation-inducing way that we haven’t encountered before.

Because communications with Mars are now paused for two weeks because the Sun is in the way, the engineering team is holding off further tests until communications resume.

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