Tag: freedom

Voyager signs SpaceX’s Starship to launch its Starlab space station

3:23 pm

Voyager Space, one of three commercial space stations being built in partnership with NASA, has awarded SpaceX the launch contract for putting its Starlab space station into orbit, using that company’s Superheavy/Starship rocket.

The companies did not disclose terms of the agreement or a projected launch date, although a spokesperson for Starlab Space said the company was confident that Starlab would be launched before the decommissioning of the International Space Station, currently scheduled for 2030.

Voyager is building Starlab in a joint partnership with Airbus and Northrop Grumman. The design is relatively simple though large (one main module and a service module), which makes Starship an excellent method for getting it into orbit.

SpaceX now has deals to launch two different space stations using Starship. The second is with the private company Vast, which is building its station completely independent from NASA. Starship also has won launch contracts from two different private citizens, as well as NASA.

It appears that Musk’s instincts were right on the money when he decided to build this rocket, even though when he proposed it there did not seem to be any customers for it.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.

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Pentagon in discussions with SpaceX about buying a Starship outright for military missions

9:49 am

The Pentagon is negotiating with SpaceX the idea that in certain cases where it deems it legally necessary it will buy outright full ownership of a SpaceX Starship/Superheavy launch rocket in order to fly some military missions.

The idea is similar to how the Air Force moves cargo. At times, the service contracts with private carriers to deliver cargo, but for certain critical missions it uses service “gray tail” aircraft. In this hypothetical case, the military could take a Starship off the line for a specific mission and return it to SpaceX after it is complete.

I suspect such situations involve very risky wartime missions that carry liabilities that a private company cannot accept. The military takes over ownership, relieving the company of risk, and then returns ownership afterward. Such a plan requires the company to agree to it, and the military to pay extra for these temporary rights. According to the article at the link, SpaceX is presently exploring its options.

That the Pentagon is discussing this with SpaceX at all tells us that it sees Starship/Superheavy as having a lot of value. It wants to buy its services, one way or the other.

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Private company in India aims to build its own manned capsule and astronaut training facility

9:27 am

A private company in India, Astroborne Aerospace, is now developing its own commercial manned capsule as well as a commercial astronaut training facility, targeting as customers Earth-based tourists as well as those hoping to fly in space.

The capsule, dubbed Airawat, will seat six, and will be designed for suborbital flights, similar to Blue Origin’s New Shepard capsule. The training facility will be on a four-acre site the company is presently negotiating either a lease or purchase from the local government.

The company says it has obtained investment capital, but also says that money will arrive next month.

Whether this deal is real or not is actually irrelevant. Its existence illustrates the underlying enthusiasm in India for private commercial space, now that the Modi government has ended the monopoly on all space activities by its space agency ISRO.

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Rocket Lab launches four commercial satellites

12:15 am

Electron 1st stage floating in the water

Rocket Lab today successuflly launched four satellites as part of a commercial constellation designed to track all objects in orbit, its Electron rocket lifting off from one of its two New Zealand launchpads.

The company also successfully recovered the first stage using a parachute system to slow it down for a soft splashdown in the Pacific where a ship picked it up. The image to the right is a screen capture shortly after the recovery ship reached the stage, which can be seen floating in the water on the left. As of posting the ship was in the process of pulling the stage from the water. Once completed, the stage will be returned to Rocket Lab’s rocket factory for refurbishment and tests to see if it can fly again.

The 2024 launch race:

10 SpaceX
6 China
2 Iran
1 India
1 ULA
1 Japan
1 Rocket Lab

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Spain awards rocket startup PLD $43.8 million grant

12:53 pm

Capitalism in space: The Spanish rocket startup PLD has won a $43.8 million grant from the Spanish government to develop its Miura-5 orbital launch rocket.

The company won the funding after completing the preliminary design review (PDR) its Miura 5 small launch vehicle, a review that was then examined by an independent committee. The award is technically a loan, which will be paid off over 10 years once Miura 5 begins commercial operations, currently scheduled for 2026.

The rocket will compete directly with Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket, with a bigger payload capacity. PLD also plans to recover and reuse its first stages after splashdown in the ocean, as Rocket Lab is now attempting to do with Electron.

The significance of this deal is multifold. It shows us that Spain is now a player in space, with its own rocket company, though still only a startup. It also provides further evidence that the nations of Europe are beginning to go their own way in space, rather than rely on their partnership in the European Space Agency and its rocket division, Arianespace. Arianespace has failed to do the job, so Spain like Germany is now looking to the private sector to get its satellite payloads in orbit.

Finally and most important, this deal illustrates the shift in Europe from being the designer and owner of rockets to being a mere customer. Rather than depend on a governnment-built and owned Arianespace rocket, Spain is buying the service from a private company, PLD. That company owns it entirely and can sell its services to others as well.

This trend away from government-owned rockets bodes well for the future of space exploration in Europe. It will produce a vibrant competitive industry with many different companies coming up with different ideas that will increase innovation while reducing cost.

It also signals the coming death of Arianespace, ESA’s commercial division which despite dominating the commercial launch market for almost two decades, was never able to make a profit ever. Instead, it produced rockets that were too expensive and required subsidies on a yearly basis. The nations of Europe are no longer willing to tolerate that bad performance, and have basically told Arianespace it either must compete with these new private companies, or die. I expect it to die. If it does survive, it will only do so if it changes radically.

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SpaceX launches Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus capsule to ISS

10:22 am

SpaceX today for the first time launched a Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo freighter to ISS, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its 10th flight, landing back at Cape Canaveral. Cygnus will rendezvous with ISS in two days, where it will be berthed to the station using a robot arm. It will then stay docked for six months as astronauts unload about 8,200 pounds of cargo.

SpaceX was used as a launch provider because Northrop Grumman’s own rocket Antares is presently unavailable because the engines for the first stage as well as the stage itself were previously built by Russia and the Ukraine respectively, both of which the company cannot no longer buy due to the Ukraine War. SpaceX has a contract for three flights, with today’s launch the first. Firefly has a contract from Northrop Grumman to built a new first stage for Antares, with a first launch targeting mid-2025.

The launch was SpaceX’s 10th in January. With a goal of 150 launches in 2024, this puts the company slightly behind the pace required to meet that goal.

The 2024 launch race:

10 SpaceX
6 China
2 Iran
1 India
1 ULA
1 Japan

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India and France sign deal to partner selling flights on their rockets

9:21 am

India and France have apparently signed a deal to not compete in selling flights on their biggest rockets, but instead work together to keep prices under their control.

Under the terms of the MoU [memorandum of understanding], NSIL’s [the commercial space division of India’s government] heavy-lift launch vehicle, LVM-3, and Arianespace’s Ariane-6 will be at the forefront of this joint endeavor.

The article at the link provides no information at all about the specifics of this deal. I am simply guessing that is it designed to control prices, especially because France by itself does not own the Ariane-6 and thus can not award launch contracts for it. All it can do is convince India to not charge less for its comparable LVM rocket (a variation of its GSLV rocket). If so, it is a bad deal for India, which can easily undercut any price that Arianespace can charge for the expensive Ariane-6. It will drive business from India, since other companies (such as SpaceX, ULA, and hopefully Blue Origin in the near future) will be under no obligation to match Ariane-6’s high cost.

It is also possible that the deal is simply an empty political gesture, timed during the visit to India by France’s President Emmanuel Macron. Its vague language suggests this. It gives Macron a photo op, but as an MOU it leaves India under no long term obligation.

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The Pentagon picks Northrop Grumman’s orbital refueling port as its standard

9:05 am

Having reviewed the designs of several orbital refueling ports, the Space Force has chosen Northrop Grumman’s port as the standard it wishes future military satellites to use.

In a move that could shape the in-orbit satellite servicing market, the U.S. Space Force’s Space Systems Command designated Northrop Grumman’s Passive Refueling Module (PRM) as a favored interface to enable future in-space refueling of military satellites. The PRM has a docking mechanism to allow a refueling vehicle in orbit to transfer propellant to another satellite to extend its useful life.

Northrop Grumman said the Space Systems Command, which oversees in-space logistics and services programs, also will support the company’s development of an orbital fuel tanker for geosynchronous orbit missions that would carry up to 1,000 kilograms of hydrazine fuel and deliver it to client satellites on demand.

Lauren Smith, program manager for in-space refueling at Northrop Grumman, said the selection of the PRM was based on the maturity and technical viability of the design, as well as the company’s experience servicing satellites in orbit. Northrop Grumman’s SpaceLogistics subsidiary remains the only commercial firm to have successfully serviced satellites in geostationary orbit, having docked twice with client Intelsat satellites some 22,000 miles above Earth to extend spacecraft life.

Note that even though Northrop Grumman’s MEV spacecraft has twice docked with defunct Intelsat satellites to return them to service, the spacecraft did no refueling. Instead, it brought its own fuel and engine, and used that to control the satellite.

Other companies developing refueling services with ports they had hoped would become the standard include Astroscale and Orbit Fab. Both have launched demo missions, but neither has yet completed a refueling mission as well. Though this Space Force decision is not exclusive, and leaves open the possibility of further awards to these other commercial refueling port designs, it will likely force everyone to move towards the Northrop Grumman design.

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The FBI must be wiped clean, or wiped out, on Day One of the next Repubican administration

1:05 pm

Christopher Wray, the world's most powerful mobster

Should Donald Trump become president in 2024 and the acts to make major changes within the federal executive bureaucracy, cleaning house from top to bottom with major firings and layoffs (something he should have done in his first administration and failed to do), without question the first agency he must attack mercilessly is the FBI.

There are numerous documented examples in the past decade where the FBI has been weaponized against conservatives and Republicans, investigating, harassing, and even arresting people because they held beliefs that opposed the agenda of the Democratic Party. In some cases the individuals attacked were simply religious Christians who opposed abortion. In other cases the victims were ordinary Americans who simply made public their support of Trump.

Nor were just everyday Americans attacked. The FBI has arrested Republican candidates for office. Its officials have altered evidence to justify illegal seach warrants against Republicans. Its management also targeted and framed Trump officials it did not like. Officials there also abused the FISA court, submitting error-filled applications that were used to get warrants to spy on Americans. It redacted information to hide its misbehavior, claiming dishonestly that the redactions were for national security reasons.

This list is only a very small selection of the many such stories reported in the past decade. Any one of these corrupt actions would justify firing everyone at the FBI and zeroing out its budget as quickly as possible. Last week however the Ninth U.S. Court of Appeals provided us another reason: It ruled that FBI agents literally committed theft in rummaging through hundreds of security deposit boxes at a bank in wealthy Beverly Hills, confiscating millions of dollars it had no right to grab, simply because the cash was there and the agents and the agency wanted that money for their own pockets.
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SpaceX completes two launches on Sunday

9:20 am

SpaceX yesterday successfully completed two Starlink satellite launches, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from opposite coasts.

First the company launched 23 Starlink satellites from Cape Canaveral in Florida, using a first stage flying its eighteenth time. That first stage landed successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

Next less than five hours later the company launched another 22 Starlink satellites from Vandenberg in California, using a first first stage flying its ninth time. That first stage landed successfully on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The 2024 launch race:

9 SpaceX
6 China
2 Iran
1 India
1 ULA
1 Japan

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Bi-partisan bill proposed giving space traffic management to Commerce, not FCC

3:07 pm

On January 25, 2024 a bill sponsored by a bi-partisan group of senators was introduced assigning the job of managing orbital traffic and the removal of defunct satellites to the Commerce Department, essentially telling both the FCC and NOAA that the attempt by those agencies to grab this power, outside of their statutory authority, will be opposed by elected officials.

The bill puts the responsibility of managing satellite and spacecraft traffic and the regulations regarding de-orbiting satellites to Office of Space Commerce (OSC) within Commerce. It is also supported by the comercial industry, which has not been happy especially with the FCC’s regulatory power grab. Unlike the regulations the FCC is creating, this bill relies heavily on industry advice and consensus, the very people who not only know best what needs to be done, but are the only ones qualified to do it.

Of course, the bill must pass both the Senate, House, and be signed by the President before it becomes law. Whether that can happen remains uncertain, especially since there appear to be a lot of factions inside DC who want to give federal agencies like the FCC legal carte blanche to regulate however they see fit, superseding Congress, the Constitution, and the law. And it seems that Congress now is so weak, those factions might just get what they want.

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Major donor to Cornell pulls funding, demands firing of university president

3:15 pm

These might be the worst colleges in the country
These are probably the worst colleges in the country,
and it includes Cornell.

Jon Lindseth, a major donor to Cornell for years, has published an open letter to the university’s board of trustees, condemning strongly its bigoted “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” (DEI) policies and demanding their shutdown along with the firing of university president Martha Pollak.

I am proud to count myself one of several generations of Lindseths who are Cornell alumni and invested donors, but I am alarmed by the diminished quality of education offered lately by my alma mater because of its disastrous involvement with DEI policies that have infiltrated every part of the university.

President Pollack’s shameful recent response to clear acts of terrorism and antisemitism compared with her swift and strong response to the George Floyd tragedy demonstrates that Cornell is no longer concerned with discovering and disseminating knowledge, but rather with adhering to DEI groupthink policies and racialization. … Today the instruction Cornell offers is in DEI groupthink applied to every field of study. The result is a moral decay, some call it “rot,” that falls in line with prevailing ideology and dishonors basic principles of justice and free speech. Under President Pollack’s leadership the university continues to put more value on DEI’s broad application rather than merit. This was not how Cornell became one of the country’s leading institutions and a proud member of the Ivy League.

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