Tag: competition
Orbital Sciences hopes to put its Antares rocket on the launchpad in five weeks.
Fingers crossed: Orbital Sciences expects to put its Antares rocket on the launchpad for initial checkout in about five weeks.
Europe’s new Vega rocket successfully put nine satellites into orbit this morning on its first flight.
Competition: Europe’s new Vega rocket successfully put nine satellites into orbit this morning on its first flight.
The Dragon/Falcon 9 test flight to ISS has been delayed again, until late April, in order to complete additional software tests.
The Dragon/Falcon 9 test flight to ISS has been delayed again, until late April, in order to complete additional software tests.
India moves ahead with the construction of its own reusable space plane
India moves ahead with the construction of its own reusable spaceship.
ArianeSpace will make a profit in 2011, the first time in three years
ArianeSpace will make a profit in 2011, the first time in three years.
Helped by the two Soyuz campaigns, which occurred in October and December, Arianespace in 2011 apparently averted a third consecutive year of losses. Its financial accounts are not finalized until June, but Le Gall said the company expects to report a slight profit on about 985 million euros in revenue.
In other words, it was the addition of the Russian low-cost Soyuz rocket to their fleet that helped avoid another year’s loss. This doesn’t reflect well on the profitability of the Ariane 5 rocket.
American Airlines files for bankruptcy
American Airlines files for bankruptcy. Note this as well:
American was the only major U.S. airline that didn’t file for bankruptcy protection in the aftermath of the 2001 terrorist attacks that triggered a deep slump in the airline industry. The last major airline to file for bankruptcy protection was Delta in 2005.
This list of bankrupt airlines does not include Southwest, however, which has seen its business boom in the past decade. I wonder, could these other airlines be driving customers away with their high baggage fees, complex ticket rules that end up costing customers money or convenience, and their willingness to go along with the abuses of the TSA?
Whenever I can, I fly Southwest, because they don’t charge for baggage and allow me to change or cancel flights without penalty. However, I also fly as little as possible these days, mostly to avoid being treated like a criminal by the TSA. And I know I am not alone in this.
Thus, all airlines have lost business due to TSA abuse. You’d think they’d wake up and start to fight this government intrusion into their operations.
How Richard Branson started Virgin Atlantic
How Richard Branson started Virgin Atlantic.
“In ’79, when Joan, my fiancee and I were on a holiday in the British Virgin Islands, we were trying to catch a flight to Puerto Rico; but the local Puerto Rican scheduled flight was cancelled. The airport terminal was full of stranded passengers. I made a few calls to charter companies and agreed to charter a plane for $2000 to Puerto Rico. Cheekily leaving out Joan’s and my name, I divided the price by the remaining number of passengers, borrowed a blackboard and wrote: VIRGIN AIRWAYS: $39 for a single flight to Puerto Rico. I walked around the airport terminal and soon filled every seat on the charter plane.
Memo to the Occupy protesters: Ten things we evil capitalists really think
Memo to the Occupy protesters: Ten things we evil capitalists really think.
I especially like #8:
8. Capitalism, with all its imperfections, is the fairest scheme yet tried. In a system based on property rights and free contract, people succeed by providing an honest service to others. Bill Gates became rich by enriching hundreds of millions of us: I am typing these words using one of his programmes. He gained from the exchange (adding fractionally to his net worth), and so did I (adding to my convenience). In a state-run system, by contrast, third parties get to hand out the goodies.
Another way to say this is to call it freedom.
Read the whole thing.
Training space tourists for their suborbital flight
Training space tourists for their suborbital flight.
In the NASTAR Center’s Observation Lounge, trainees can watch the centrifuge through a large window, as well as see a live video feed of its rider. Meanwhile, Henwood iterates the importance of the correct timing of breaths. “If you’re going to need it, you’re going to want to do it right.” Failing to begin the manoeuvre before the onset of the g’s can result in loss of consciousness.
“You’ll tell me when to breathe?” the first flier of the course says over the intercom to Greg Kennedy, NASTAR Center’s director of educational services and the monitor of participants’ in-flight safety.
“Yes,” Kennedy says. “Are you ready for your flight?”
The case against SpaceX
The case against SpaceX. From one of the company’s biggest supporters.
Trent Waddington raises many good points, all of which must be considered to have a clear, educated sense of where the future stands for American manned spaceflight. Two quotes:
The goal of SpaceX is human spaceflight, and the greatest repository of knowledge about human spaceflight is NASA. As such, it would appear obvious that getting NASA to help you to fly humans safely is a good idea. The way to do that is with Space Act Agreements. This is what SpaceX did under the COTS program, and later under the CCDev program.. and they got paid for the privilege. As a result, the Dragon spacecraft will soon be fully qualified as safe for human habitation on orbit as it will be berthed to the ISS and have astronauts inside it.
The problem is that NASA is a precocious customer. They know what they want, they think they know even better than you do how to make it, and they feel no guilt about changing their mind halfway through the project. As such, Space Act Agreements just totally grind NASA’s gears. They don’t have enough control. [emphasis in original]
NASA money is like heroin.. once they start taking it, most people find it very hard to stop. There’s a dependence that has grown between NASA and SpaceX, and although it is obviously a love-hate relationship, it’s going to be very hard for SpaceX to let go.. but, inevitably, they must. The current needs of NASA are very different to the long term goals of SpaceX.
And this:
Fundamentally, SpaceX has a shoddy business case which is best described as a house of cards.. that they’re still trying to play poker with.. and there’s dogs at the table, and they’re smoking cigars! Yeah, metaphor.
Read the whole thing. It’s quite good.
A Singaporean businessman, his wife and two children have paid $1 million to become the first Asian family to fly together on SpaceShipTwo
This is my idea of a family outing: A Singapore businessman, his wife, and two children have paid $1 million to become the first Asian family to fly together on SpaceShipTwo.
Scheduling the next Dragon flight, the first to dock with ISS
Scheduling the next Dragon flight, the first to hopefully berth with ISS.
Presently they are saying early January, though it appears that no one will be surprised if it gets delayed to February.
A millionaire has purchased two tickets on Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo and is looking for a woman to join him
Want a date? A millionaire has purchased two tickets on Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo and is looking for a woman to join him on the flight.
NASA moves first flight test of Orion capsule up three years to 2014
NASA has moved the scheduled first flight test of the Orion capsule up three years to 2014.
This action, while good, was almost certainly triggered by the competition from the private space companies. The managers at NASA are finally realizing that if they don’t speed up deployment of their own spacecraft, they will certainly lose in the competition for government dollars. That they will have to use another rocket other than their heavy-lift vehicle for this launch, however, will not help that particular project’s lobbying effort.
Either way, I think this action is only further proof that the more competition we have, the quicker we will get into space. And the journey will cost less too, not only because it will take less time and therefore less money, but the competition between companies (or NASA) will force everyone — including NASA — to lower costs to show they can do it better.
Robot obstacle course
An evening pause: The robot obstacle course at the 2006 ROBO-ONE competition in Kawasaki, Japan. Very impressive, for a machine, though this does illustrate how difficult it is to artificially duplicate what life does so naturally.
For the first time in a half-century, Cubans will be allowed to buy and sell real estate openly
Communism fails again: For the first time in a half-century, a new law will allow Cubans to buy and sell real estate.
Excalibur Almaz joins commercial crew program
Another commercial company vies for NASA’s business, this time using old surplus Russian space station modules.
Boeing leases shuttle hanger from NASA for its CST-100 manned ferry operations
Boeing has leased a now unused shuttle hanger from NASA for its CST-100 manned ferry.