Tag: competition

Astronaut touts space at Republican convention

9:07 am

American astronaut Eileen Collins spoke last night at the Republican convention, calling for a renewal of the American space effort.

Her remarks were very short, essentially calling for an end to the American reliance on the Russians to get our astronauts into space. Her speech also differed from her prepared remarks in that she left out the part where she specifically endorsed Donald Trump.

According to a transcript of her prepared remarks provided by the GOP Convention to Syracuse University (her alma mater) and posted on the university’s website, however, the ending was supposed to be “We need leadership that will make America first again. That leader is Donald Trump. Thank you and God bless the United States of America.” Thus, although she did not read the line endorsing Trump, she did use his slogan “make America great again” instead of “make America first again” as in the prepared remarks.

The press will make a big deal about this, but I suspect that when it came time to say the words, Collins’ decades of training at NASA, where astronauts as government workers are specifically forbidden by the Hatch Act from lobbying for specific political candidates, took over. She clearly was supporting Trump. Habits just made it hard for her to become political, even though she is now retired from NASA.

What is important is that both she and Ted Cruz in their convention remarks both invoked the need for a vibrant American space effort, but both were vague about how to do it. Combining that with Trump’s already noted position, that we need a space effort but we also have to find ways to do this efficiently because the government has bigger priorities, suggests to me once again that, should Trump win, SLS and Orion will die quickly while commercial space will get a boost.

On a personal note, I am hoping that my policy paper, Exploring Space in the 21st Century, due out in about a month and focused very much on this precise issue, will land on these politicians’ desks at exactly the right moment, and help convince them to make what I think are the right decisions.

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The Indian government considers privatization

8:46 am

The competition heats up: The Indian space agency, ISRO, is discussing with private companies ways in which it might privatize its smaller and successful rocket, the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).

In order to step up the launch capacity within the country, ISRO is in the process of exploring the possibility of involving Indian industry in a greater role to meet the increased national requirements and possible commercial demand for launch services. Discussions are being held with the Indian industry towards formulating a plan and strategy to enhance the capacity as well as capability of managing the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) programme on an end to end basis.

The sense I get from this ISRO announcement is that the government is taking the lead, trying to drag the private companies forward to take over. I also sense that both the private companies as well as ISRO are at the moment are somewhat uninterested in doing it. Neither impression is stated anywhere in this announcement and are merely my personal impressions, based literally on no inside information, which of course means I could be very wrong.

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New Shepard aced its landing test

8:36 pm

The competition heats up: According to an email sent out by Jeff Bezos, the recent New Shepard capsule landing test, with one parachute disabled, was a complete success.

Besides the three parachutes, New Shepard is slowed in its descent by a retrorocket that fires just before the capsule hits the ground. Bezos’ email also provided pictures of the “crushable ring” on the bottom of the capsule, which can help decelerate the craft if it hits the ground too fast (acting sort of like the bumper on a car). “Even with one chute out, the crushable barely crushed,” wrote Bezos, who is also founder and CEO of Amazon.com.

“When new, the crushable is about 5.5 inches [14 centimeters] high and can crush down to less than 1 inch [0.4 cm] high, providing a constant deceleration force as it crushes. After the mission, the crushable was still over 5 inches [12.7 cm] high along nearly the entire circumference of the ring,” Bezos wrote.

No word on when the next test flight will take place.

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No 6207 A Study in Steel

6:01 pm

An evening pause: A fascinating and well-filmed documentary from 1935 describing how a British company then built locomotives. Note the lack of construction helmets, gloves, or safety glasses. Note also the number of workers involved. Today most of this work is automated, making it more precise and efficient. Then, however, they did not yet have such technology, and instead found ways to build very sophisticated machines using the skills of ordinary humans.

Hat tip Edward Thelen.

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Satellite hit by space junk, still operational

2:00 pm

A private Earth-observation satellite, WorldView-2, was either hit by space junk or had some internal failure that produced “8 debris pieces” in its vicinity.

The Joint Space Operations Center, which is the Defense Department’s nerve center for space operations and tracks space objects from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, tweeted July 19 that it had identified a debris-causing event related DigitalGlobe’s WorldView-2 satellite.

The amazing thing about this is that the satellite is still functional, and to prove it the company has already released an image produced after the event.

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International space efforts to double in next decade

8:14 am

The new colonial movement: According to a new industry analysis, the number of countries with active space efforts will double to almost fifty in the next decade.

By 2025, we estimate that the number of emerging space programs will increase to 47 countries around the world. This includes 23 newcomers who will have committed their first investment in space between 2016 and 2025. Over 130 satellites are forecast to be launched in the next 10 years, nearly double that of the last decade. The total value of these satellites should more than double at nearly $12 billion, versus more than $5 billion during 2006-2015.

The new efforts are not confined to the traditional space programs, but also include nations that will be purchasing services from others to build satellites for them.

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Franky Zapata demonstrating his Flyboard Air

6:01 pm

An evening pause: Hat tip t-dub, who wrote that the Flyboard Air “is a real product developed by Franky Zapata. It’s a jet powered board that reminds me of what the Green Goblin used in Spiderman. This video was done in Monaco during the Formula 1 race this year. His company is called Zapata Racing and he has developed a jet pack, water hover board, and those fire hose things people use over water which is a hydraulic Flyboard I believe. If they only had this stuff back in the 70’s when I was growing up.” T-dub also added, “The Flyboard can go up to 10,000 feet, fly at 98 MPH, and has a duration of almost ten minutes depending on use. They have also set a Guinness record with the device.”

My thought: Once again, life imitates art.

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New rocket company raising investment capital

4:44 pm

The competition heats up: Two former employees of SpaceX and Blue Origin have teamed up to start their own rocket company, aimed at using 3D printing technology to build rockets “with zero human labor.”

The funding rounds are described in two documents filed in May and this month with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The first filing reports that $1.1 million in equity was sold to investors. The second filing serves as a new notice of $8.4 million in equity sold, out of a $9.6 million offering.

The filings indicate that Relativity Space is based in Seattle, but in response to an email inquiry, the company declined to say anything further about its location, its business plan or its investors. “We are entirely in stealth mode and will comment more when we are ready,” the company said.

New companies come and go, but the fact that the guys in charge of this come from these two companies, and have already raised significant investment capital, suggests attention should be paid.

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SpaceX seeks two more pads for returning 1st stages

3:58 pm

The competition heats up: SpaceX is asking for permission to establish two more landing pads so that it will have the capability of landing three first stages all within minutes of each other.

“SpaceX expects to fly Falcon Heavy for the first time later this year,” the company said in a statement responding to questions. “We are also seeking regulatory approval to build two additional landing pads at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. We hope to recover all three Falcon Heavy rockets, though initially we may attempt drone ship landings” at sea.

This news suggests two things: 1. The first Falcon Heavy launch is definitely coming soon. 2. They are going to try to return all three 1st stages during that first launch.

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