Barlow Girl – Carol of the Bells
An evening pause: Performed simultaneously by Mrs. Rodriguez in American Sign Language.
Hat tip Wayne DeVette.
Tag: commercial
Ranking the four private space stations under construction
the proposed Starlab space station
Yesterday NASA posted an update on the development of Starlab, one of the four private space stations under development or construction, with three getting some development money from NASA. According to that report, the station had successfully completed “four key developmental milestones, marking substantial progress in the station’s design and operational readiness.”
As is usual for NASA press releases, the goal of this announcement was to tout the wonderful progress the Starlab consortium — led by Voyager Space, Airbus, and Northrop Grumman — is making in building the station.
“These milestone achievements are great indicators to reflect Starlab’s commitment to the continued efforts and advancements of their commercial destination,” said Angela Hart, program manager for NASA’s Commercial Low Earth Orbit Development Program. “As we look forward to the future of low Earth orbit, every successful milestone is one step closer to creating a dynamic and robust commercialized low Earth orbit.”
I read this release and came to a completely opposite conclusion. » Read more
Starlink revenue in 2025 now projected to be $11.8 billion
Capitalism in space: According to one industry market research firm, SpaceX is expected to earn $11.8 billion in revenue in 2025 from its Starlink satellite constellation, a gigantic increase from its estimate for 2024.
SpaceX’s satellite internet service Starlink is projected to reach $11.8 billion in revenue next year, driven by strong consumer demand and growing U.S. military contracts, according to a new market analysis. The forecast, released by the market research firm Quilty Space, represents a substantial increase from the estimated $7.7 billion in revenue for 2024, highlighting Starlink’s rapid growth trajectory in the satellite communications market.
The rise in revenue has been fueled by two factors, the growth in consumer subscribers to the system, and the addition of Space Force contracts that use SpaceX Starshield version of its Starlink satellites.
These numbers are quite spectacular. In the past seven years SpaceX had raised about $12 billion in private investment capital to build both its Starlink constellation and its Starship/Superheavy rocket. Starlink now produces that amount of money for the company each year.
In other words, SpaceX no longer needs NASA as a customer. It has the resources to complete development of Starship, in all its iterations, without any government help. If it wishes to funnel some of this income back into Starship and Superheavy to launch its own missions to Mars, it can.
T-Mobile initiates direct-cell-to-satellite texting using Starlink
As expected after the most recent Starlink launch, T-Mobile has now begun offering its customers beta registration for using Starlink satellites for texting in areas where no cell towers exist.
The free beta program is available to all T-Mobile customers with compatible devices and postpaid voice plans, the telco announced Dec. 16, although first responders will receive priority access due to limited initial capacity. The company declined to detail capacity and device restrictions but said the beta program would gradually expand to more devices via software updates. “Spots are limited but the service will be available in most areas and most of the time,” a T-Mobile spokesperson said.
The goal right now is to test the system and get user feedback.
China and SpaceX complete launches
Two launches today. First China launched four Earth observation radar satellites, its Long March 2D rocket lifting off from its Taiyuan spaceport in northeast China. No word where the rocket’s lower stages, using very toxic hypergolic fuels, crashed within China.
SpaceX then launched a GPS-type satellite for the Space Force, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral. Little was released about the payload and what information was released was not very informative. The first stage completed its fourth flight, landing softly on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
130 SpaceX
62 China
16 Russia
13 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise still leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 149 to 94, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 130 to 113.
Faith Hill – A Baby Changes Everything
An evening pause: The song is about one particular baby, appropriate for this Christmas season. But as I’ve said before on similar songs, it applies to every child born everywhere, for all time.
Hat tip James Street.
Another American rocket startup gets a multi-launch contract
The American rocket startup Vaya Space announced today that it has been awarded a multi-launch contract to use its proposed Dauntless rocket to place up to 250 small satellites in orbit for the satellite startup Space Telecommunications.
Vaya has been around since 2017, has won contracts with the Air Force in connection with developing its hybrid-solid-fueled rocket, and in 2022 completed a test suborbital launch. It hopes to launch Dauntless for the first time in 2026.
This contract is probably like most launch contracts awarded to rocket startups. It allows the company to claim progress, while giving the satellite company the right to go elsewhere at no cost should the rocket not launch on time.
Ispace awarded $5.83 million loan from Japanese government
The planetary lander startup Ispace today announced that it has been awarded a $5.83 million loan from the Japan Finance Corporation, a government corporation designed to issue loans to encourage Japanese businesses.
The money will be issued this month, and Ispace will have ten years to pay it back. Depending on whether the company is profitable or not, the interest rate will be either 0.5% or 4.15%.
Ispace’s one lunar landing attempt so far, Hakuto-R1, was a failure when its software thought it was close to the ground at three miles altitude and shut off its engines. The company however is going to try again, with the launch of its second lander, dubbed Resilience, scheduled for a January 2025 launch. It will also carry the company’s own Tenacious micro-rover, and will hopefully land as shown in the map to the right, in the north of the Moon’s near side.
Boeing to take more than a decade to refit two 747s for Air Force One
Utter incompetence: According to recent news reports, Boeing will not be able to deliver the two 747s it is refitting to be the president’s Air Force One fleet until 2029, even though it signed a $3.9 billion contract to do so in 2018.
The delay is startling given that Boeing isn’t building the planes from scratch. During Trump’s first term, Boeing started to overhaul two 747s that were built for a Russian airline that never took the jets.
This is more than absurd, it is obscene. Boeing is handed two flightworthy 747s and almost $4 billion, and it can’t refit the two planes in less than a decade? It seems one of the first things Trump should do once he returns to office next month is cancel this contract entirely, demand a refund from Boeing, and simply convert his present fleet of “Trump Force One” airplanes that he has been using since 2020 for use as president. Cheaper, faster, and certainly a wiser use of taxpayer money.
As for Boeing, this story illustrates once again how far this company has fallen. Remember, it was Boeing that conceived, designed, and built the 747. Moreover, its 747 has been used for decades for Air Force One. For its engineers now to be incapable to refitting another two 747s for this purpose seems inconceivable, and suggests those same engineers should not be trusted on any new planes they build.
SpaceX launches more Starlink satellites
SpaceX today successfully launched 22 Starlink satellites, 13 of which were for its direct-to-cell constellation. The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Vandenberg in California, its first stage completing its ninth flight by landing successfully on a drone ship in the Pacific.
According to a tweet by SpaceX at the end of October, only five more launches were necessary to complete the first version of its direct-to-cell Starlink constellation. Today’s launch meets that criteria. Since the FCC has approved the constellation’s license, this means T-Mobile can start offering the service to customers, filling in all dead spots worldwide.
What makes this launch even more unique is that for the first time in quite awhile there was a four-day-plus gap between SpaceX launches. The company has been launching so often that it has been rare for more than two days to pass this year without a launch.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
129 SpaceX
60 China
16 Russia
13 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 148 to 92, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 129 to 111.
Melinda Kathleen Reese – O Come O Come Emmanuel
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 always open the Christmas-Hannukah holiday season with this truly glorious piece of music, as it speaks to both religions. And it is one magnificent song, sung here magnificently.
May all my readers have a glorious weekend.
Rocket startup Stoke Space completes static fire test of first stage engine
Stoke’s Nova rocket
The rocket startup Stoke Space revealed yesterday that it has completed a static fire test of the first stage engine it will use on its Nova rocket, shown in the graphic to the right.
The test, which was not the first for this engine, proved out several new technologies.
Stoke Space called the test significant for several reasons. It’s the first hotfire of the company’s Block 2 (flight layout) stage 1 engine, and this engine architecture — called full-flow staged combustion (FFSC) — is considered particularly challenging. Only two entities in the world — Stoke and SpaceX — have successfully developed FFSC engines. … Stoke’s stage 1 engine is a liquified natural gas/liquid oxygen engine capable of producing 100,000 pounds of thrust. The duration of the test was not revealed.
It was the first time Stoke has tested on its new vertical test stand in Moses Lake. The company’s testing philosophy is that you must “test like you fly,” and it believes vertical testing is key to engine development.
Nor is the first stage engine the only technological innovation. Nova’s second stage uses a radical design whereby the engine releases its thrust through a ring of small nozzles on the outside perimeter of the stage, rather than a single central nozzle. This design is what the company hopes will allow it to return that upper stage intact for reuse.
The four year old company has raised $100 million in investment capital, but has also faced environmental red tape from the Space Force for its launch facility at Cape Canaveral. It had previously targeted 2025 for the first test flights of Nova, but that schedule appears unlikely because of this red tape.
SpaceX requests special election to make Starbase at Boca Chica a city
In a letter [pdf] sent yesterday to a local judge, SpaceX requested that a special election be held in Cameron County on whether its Starbase facilities in Boca Chica should be incorporated as a city.
To continue growing the workforce necessary to rapidly develop and manufacture Starship, we need the ability to grow Starbase as a community. That is why we are requesting that Cameron County call an election to enable the incorporation of Starbase as the newest city in the Rio Grande Valley.
Incorporating Starbase will streamline the processes required to build the amenities necessary to make the area a world class place to live—for the hundreds already calling it home, as well as for prospective workers eager to help build humanity’s future in space. As you know, through agreements with the County, SpaceX currently performs several civil functions around Starbase due to its remote location, including management of the roads, utilities, and the provision of schooling and medical care for the residents. Incorporation would move the management of some of these functions to a more appropriate public body.
The letter went on to list the many other things SpaceX is already doing to benefit the area, including many of the environmental requirements imposed on it by the FAA and Fish & Wildlife.
At this moment there has been no response from the judge or Cameron County. I suspect there will be no objection, and this vote will take place in the near future. I also expect it will pass, because SpaceX employees now make up almost the entire population of Boca Chica.
Grissini Project – Merry go round of Life
An evening pause: The music is by Joe Hisaishi, from Hayao Miyazaki’s 2004 animated film Howl’s Moving Castle.
Hat tip Judd Clark.
Ispace signs agreement with lunar mining startup
The Japanese lunar lander startup Ispace has now signed an agreement with a lunar mining startup dubbed Magna Petra to transport the latter company’s helium-3 mining equipment to the Moon.
In a memo of understanding, ispace and Magna Petra have agreed to collaborate to utilize the moon’s resources for economic benefits to life on Earth, the companies announced Tuesday, Dec. 10. Through “non-destructive, sustainable harvesting,” according to a joint statement, Magna Petra plans to one day extract “commercial quantities” of helium-3 isotopes from regolith on the lunar surface for delivery and distribution back on Earth, where the resource is facing an extreme supply shortage.
Ispace meanwhile still has to prove it can put a lander on the Moon. Its first attempt, Hakuto-R1, almost succeeded, but crashed in April 2023 when its software thought it was just above the ground and shut down its engines when it was still three miles high. The company’s second attempt, dubbed Resilience and carrying a rover dubbed Tenacious, is scheduled for launch in January 2025. The landing site is shown on the map to the right, within Mare Frigoris in the northern part of the Moon’s nearside hemisphere.
Daryl Hall – Can We Still Be Friends
An evening pause: With Todd Rundgren.
Hat tip Ferris Akel.
ADRAS-J gets within 50 feet of abandoned rocket stage
Image taken during ADRAS-J’s initial approach in April 2024.
Click for original image.
The demo maneuvering spacecraft ADRAS-J, built by the Japanese orbital tug startup Astroscale, has successfully maneuvered to within 50 feet of the abandoned rocket stage that the company hopes to grab and de-orbit on a later mission.
When ADRAS-J was 50 meters behind the upper stage the spacecraft reduced the gap in a straight-line approach then maneuvered to approximately 15 meters below the Payload Attach Fitting (PAF) — the planned capture point for the follow-on ADRAS-J2 mission — aligning the spacecraft’s relative speed, distance, and attitude. ADRAS-J successfully maintained this position until an autonomous abort was triggered by the onboard collision avoidance system due to an unexpected relative attitude anomaly with the upper stage. The spacecraft safely maneuvered away from the debris as designed before reaching the CIP. Astroscale Japan is currently investigating the cause of the abort.
Engineers will have to understand that the cause of that abort prior to launching ADRAS-J2, the mission that will grab the stage and de-orbit it.
Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.
Part 2 of 2: De-emphasize a fast Moon landing and build a real American space industry instead
In part one yesterday of this two-part essay, I described the likelihood that Jared Isaacman, Trump’s appointment to be NASA’s next administrator, will push to cancel NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and its Orion capsule, deeming them too expensive, too unsafe, and too cumbersome to use for any viable effort to colonize the solar system.
I then described how the Artemis lunar landings could still be done, more or less as planned, by replacing SLS with Starship/Superheavy, and Orion with Starship. Such a change would entail some delay, but it could be done.
This plan however I think is short-sighted. The Artemis lunar landings as proposed are really nothing more than another Apollo-like plant-the-flag-on-the-Moon stunt. As designed they do little to establish a permanent sustainable human presence on the Moon or elsewhere in the solar system.
Isaacman however has another option that can create a permanent sustainable American presence in space, and that option is staring us all in the face.
And now for something entire different
Capitalism in space: I think Isaacman should shift the gears of Artemis entirely, and put a manned Moon landing on the back burner. Let China do its one or two lunar landing stunts, comparable to Apollo but incapable of doing much else.
» Read more
SpaceX recovers parts of Starship from its last test launch on November 19th
Two teams of SpaceX employees have successfully recovered parts of the Starship that completed a soft vertical landing over the water in the Indian Ocean during the last test launch on November 19th.
The recovery included heat-resistant panelling and large bags of “miscellaneous metal pieces”. Images also showed large tanks being loaded off the ship, however it is unclear what they contained. Recovery of the rocket’s main section also proved too difficult, and it was left to sink to the bottom, with that part of the Indian Ocean about 6km deep. Mr Leal said allowing space material to sink after a splashdown was “pretty normal”.
It appears from this report that the Starship broke in two pieces when it fell over and hit the water. It sounds like the recovery teams focused mostly on recovering the flaps and heat shield, though getting them off the spaceship’s outer hull while it floated in the water and was sinking must have been quite an interesting experience. My guess is that salvage operations lifted out of the water for this purpose.
ABBA – Chiquitita
An evening pause: Performed live 1979.
Hat tip Doug Johnson.