Tag: government

A detailed review of SLS’s present launch status

10:28 am

Link here. The article provides a detailed look at the engine controllers in the former shuttle engines that SLS is using on its core first stage, including some details about the failed unit and the issues involved in replacing it.

I found this historical data in the article most interesting:

The first attempt to launch Orbiter Atlantis and the STS-43 Shuttle vehicle was scrubbed before dawn on July 24, 1991, when the primary computer, DCU A, failed while propellants were being used loaded into the External Tank. … As a result, the launch was scrubbed to allow replacement of the controller, and the launch was rescheduled for August 1, 1991. The failure analysis of the controller revealed a broken blind lap solder joint connection of the bit jumper to the half stack, which is not a generic design problem.”

According to contemporaneous Shuttle Status Reports issued by NASA Public Affairs at KSC in late July, 1991, after the launch was scrubbed and the External Tank was drained and inerted, access to the engine area for maintenance was established on July 26. The broken engine controller was removed, and a new one was installed on July 27, followed by testing to verify the new controller on July 28; the three-day countdown was started over from the top on July 29 for the next launch attempt on the morning of August 1.

It took NASA less than a week to replace an engine controller in 1991. Now, it appears it might take NASA several months, including testing, to do the same thing on SLS. Moreover, the article suggests that there are other subcontractors and organizations (such as the range safety) that are also having trouble being ready for the presently scheduled mid-February launch.

All in all, this report suggests that SLS will not launch in February, will be delayed until April, with a strong chance that even that April date might not be met.

The report also illustrates the sluggish manner in which NASA operates today. Nothing is done with any speed. No task is done in one day if it can take a week. This is bad management, and also a very dangerous way to operate, as it actually encourages sloppiness because no one is under any pressure to work hard. The result has been endless niggling failures, each of which delays things interminably.

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Local judge blocks Camden spacesport

10:11 am

Capitalism in space? Almost immediately after the FAA last week issued a launch license for the proposed commercial spaceport in Camden, Georgia, a judge in the state courts issued an injunction blocking it.

The order and request for an interlocutory injunction was filed last week by Camden residents James Goodman and Paul Harris. Camden County Superior Court Judge Stephen G. Scarlett granted the restraining order on Tuesday and scheduled a hearing on the injunction for Jan. 5.

This order prevents the spaceport, being developed by the county itself, from purchasing any additional land for the project.

Meanwhile, a petition to force a referendum for or against the land purchase has obtained enough signatures. They needed 3,400 signatures — 10% of the registered voters of Camden county — and obtained 3,800. Those signatures are presently being verified by the county probate court, which has until mid-February to complete its work. If a special election is then called, it likely won’t occur before the middle of 2022.

It is perfectly legitimate for the citizens of the county to express their opposition to such a project. And if in a special election a majority disapprove, then it is perfectly correct for the county’s effort to be shut down.

This opposition however gives us a peek into the modern culture of America, hostile to innovation and new businesses, and willing to use the government aggressively to prevent it. Whether that hostility is felt by the majority in Camden County is at present unknown, though the success of the petition suggests it is. The special election will tell us.

I predict however that if the special election comes down in favor of the spaceport, the opposition will not accept that result, and will then move to find other legalities that they can enlist the government to use to block the project.

This project is beginning to remind me of Hawaii and the Thirty Meter Telescope, which has been effectively blocked from construction by what appears to be a very small number of radical protesters.

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FAA’s approval of SpaceX’s Starship operations delayed at least a month

9:45 am

The FAA has now had to delay the final approval of its environmental reassessment of SpaceX’s Starship facility and operations at Boca Chica for at least one month because NOAA has refused to approve the plan.

That puts NOAA’s generic review of Rocket Landing and Launches back to at least the end of January, with the much more complex and contentious USFWS [Fish and Wildlife] review also pending (this one is habitat and species review of impacts to bird and wildlife populations specific to Boca Chica).

The earliest approval by the FAA (which again, is far from a sure thing) should be projected into February. And the actual launch license process can’t be started until then. March is absolutely the earliest even the giddiest optimist could expect for Starship’s Maiden Orbital Flight.

It appears that the bureaucrats in NOAA are hostile to the launch site, and are looking for reasons, mostly environmental, to either block it or slow it down.

It also appears that a second Department of the Interior agency must sign off, and it is also hostile.

Based on this story, it looks like Starship’s first orbital flight will not happen until the latter half of ’22, if then. Nor can we expect any help from the Biden administration. Unlike Trump, the Democrats now running the executive branch of government do not like private enterprise and business, and generally look for excuses to regulate and even block it, especially if they think there is the slightest chance it might harm some formerly unknown species somewhere.

This is America today, no longer free. Rather than you making the decision freely, as an American citizen, un-elected federal government officials now decide whether you can do anything, or not.

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Japan’s H-2A rocket launches communications satellite

3:52 pm

Japan today successfully launched a commercial communications satellite using its Mitsubishi-built H-2A rocket.

This was Japan’s third and likely last launch in 2021. Since 2018 its numbers have been low, ranging from 2 to 4, so this total matches that pace. It is an embarrassment for Japan, however, when compared to China and SpaceX.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race remain unchanged:

48 China
31 SpaceX
22 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab

The U.S. and China remain tied at 48 in the national rankings. This was the 128th successful launch in 2021, making it the second most active year in the history of rocketry, exceeded only by 1975, when there were 132 successful launches, 98 of which were by the Soviet Union, with the bulk of these being short term low orbit spy satellites.

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Today’s blacklisted American: College football coach fired for putting up hand-written sign saying “All lives matter.”

12:27 pm

Opinions that are banned at Illinois State University
Opinions banned by Illinois State University’s football team.

They’re coming for you next: Kurt Beathard, an offensive coordinator coach for the Illinois State University football team, was fired because he replaced an official school poster that had been pinned to his office door that specifically endorsed the Black Lives Matter movement with a hand-written sign that said, “All lives matter to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

[Head coach Brock Spack] asked Beathard to remove the poster, which the offensive coordinator did. “Meanwhile, another coach who wanted to replace Beathard as offensive coordinator had taken a picture of Beathard’s poster and shared it with the football players,” the lawsuit alleges. Apparently, the picture upset some of the football players.”

“On 9/1/20, some of the football players boycotted practice,” the lawsuit said. “Spack came to Beathard’s office and informed him that it looked like Lyons [another coach he had gotten in trouble for making fun of Black Lives Matters] was going to keep his job but that Beathard was in trouble over the poster.”

The next day, he lost his job because Spack did not “like the direction of the offense.”

Beathard, who had worked for 25 years as a football coach, has filed a lawsuit [pdf] against both Spack and Lyons in the federal courts, claiming that they fired him “for one reason and one reason only: He did not toe the party line regarding the Black Lives Matter organization.” The lawsuit also notes that his firing violated the school’s own policy, which states:.
» Read more

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Pushback against blacklists: Boeing cancels mandate to fire workers who don’t get COVID shot

12:27 pm

When Boeing was a great company
The 747: built when Boeing was a great company.

Do not comply: Boeing announced late last week that it is canceling its requirement that its workers get the COVID shots or be faced with termination.

The aircraft manufacturer said in an internal memo that it made the decision after a federal appeals court last month upheld its stay on President Biden’s vaccine mandate for companies with at least 100 employees.

It also appears that the decision was not solely for legal reasons. According to Boeing’s statement, “over 92% of the company’s U.S.-based workforce having registered as being fully vaccinated or having received a religious or medical accommodation.” That sounds nice, but based on the number of employees Boeing has, it means the company would have lost more than 10,000 employees if it had gone through with the mandate. Losing that many workers in one blow is likely something Boeing management did not want to deal with, especially considering the company’s numerous quality control problems.
» Read more

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Oh no! 132 SpaceX employees in California come down with colds!

11:16 am

Chicken Little update: The California press today is in a panic of doom because 132 SpaceX employees in its Hawthorne facility have been diagnosed with some form of COVID.

From the KABC news division, a typical example:

In the largest recent Los Angeles County workplace outbreak, at least 132 workers at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne have been infected with COVID-19, according to new county data. The county’s latest compilation of outbreaks at workplaces that don’t include residential facilities puts the rocket company at the top of the list, far ahead of the 85 cases at the FedEx facility near Los Angeles International Airport. The list includes 37 workplaces with a total of 452 cases.

…The outbreak comes as COVID-19 cases are once again rising in California and throughout the country, amid increased holiday travel and gatherings, and the spread of the omicron variant. Los Angeles County recently reported its highest number of daily cases since August.

California this week is marking 75,000 deaths from COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic.

And health officials are concerned as omicron has now become the dominant strain of the coronavirus. Hospitals are reporting once again being strained to the limit of their resources as the holiday season gets underway, with increased transmission linked to family gatherings and air travel.

O no! We’re all gonna die!

NOT! As is usual for the mainstream press, working as operatives of the Democratic Party, they fail to mention that this new “outbreak” of COVID-19 appears to be mostly from the new omicron strain, which to this date has killed only about fourteen people worldwide, most of whom were in the UK and sick with other illnesses.

All the evidence shows that more than 99.9% of everyone else experiences very mild symptoms from Omicron, comparable to an ordinary cold, and is better in a few days. Since most of SpaceX’s employees are young and healthy, I predict they will all be back at work with the coming of the new year.

None of these facts matter however to the fear-driven and ignorant press and the political leadership in states controlled by the power-hungry Democratic Party. Instilling fear is their goal, and instill it they will.

Meanwhile, most ordinary people nationwide are increasingly realizing that COVID-19 was never the plague it has been touted as, and are going back to normal life. More important, they are finally realizing that the politicians, health officials, and the mainstream press are simply idiots crying wolf endlessly, and should be ignored.

SpaceX for example during this entire fake “pandemic” has not slowed its operations down in the slightest. It has not required vaccines, it hasn’t even asked its employees what their status is. The result is the company has experienced no harm at all, while it forged ahead of all of its competition.

The same will happen now. In two weeks these employees will be back at work, and SpaceX will continue operations as normal. And if the various state and local California governments try to force restrictions on it, Elon Musk will tell them to go to hell, and move even more of his company’s operations out of California.

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FAA approves license for launchpad in Camden, Georgia

9:58 am

Capitalism in space: After years of review, FAA yesterday finally approved a license for building a space launchpad in Camden, Georgia.

The approval however does not mean rockets will begin launching, even in the near future. First, there is the opposition to the spaceport, an opposition based on the simple fact that the rockets have to fly over seven miles over land before reaching the Atlantic Ocean.

About 3,800 people have signed a petition calling for a referendum that would let voters decide whether the county can buy the property. “Virtually from the start, the FAA’s review of Spaceport Camden has been fraught with factual mistakes and legal errors,” Brian Gist, senior attorney for the Southern Environmental Law Center, said in a statement Monday. “We will carefully review the FAA’s decision to ensure that it fully complies with all applicable laws.”

The National Park Service and its parent agency, the U.S. Department of the Interior, also have expressed concerns.

In a July 22 letter to the FAA, the Interior Department said a chance of rockets exploding — with fiery debris raining down on wilderness land on Cumberland Island — creates an “unacceptable risk.” Cumberland Island, with its wild horses and nesting sea turtles, is a popular tourist area off the Georgia coast.

The threat to wildlife by the rocket launches is certainly bogus, as we have more than a half century of evidence at Cape Canaveral that space launches not only do no harm to wildlife, they actually help because they stop development.

The environmental opposition however is actually being used as a weapon by many local residents who really fear the launches because the spaceport seems to them too close to residential areas. They also fear it will also likely interfere with tourism to the coastal beaches and parks that the rockets will fly over, causing them to be shut down during launches.

Because the fears about the nearness of residential areas and the harm to tourism are somewhat legitimate, they illustrate a second reason why this spaceport will likely fail. Why should any rocket company choose this launch site, so close to residential areas and so opposed by many locals, especially when there are now so many other less risky and controversial spaceports to choose from? I suspect very few will do so, and this project will eventually die, even if it finally gets full approval and is built.

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SpaceX launches cargo Dragon to ISS using new 1st stage

9:39 am

Capitalism in space: In what will likely be its last launch in 2021, SpaceX early this morning successfully launched a reused Dragon cargo capsule to ISS.

This was the company’s 31st launch in 2021, extending its record for the most launches in a single year by a private company. The launch’s big news however was that the company used a new first stage booster, only the second time in 2021 that it needed to do so (the first was in May). The first stage successfully landed on the drone ship in the Atlantic, completing SpaceX’s 100th successful recovery.

The first such vertical landing had occurred in December 2015, and now six years later and after a hundred vertical landings, SpaceX remains the only orbital rocket entity in the world with such a capability. A very small handful of companies have performed tests with smaller scale prototypes, but that so much time has passed and no one has pushed forward to meet SpaceX’s challenge with even some full scale preliminary test flights does not reflect well on the innovative culture of the world’s rocket industry.

As for SpaceX’s yearly record, 31 launches actually exceeds the number of launches the entire U.S. rocket industry generally managed each year from 1970 through 2017. During much of that time the launch industry was run by NASA in a Soviet-style top-down system that stifled competition and innovation. Beginning in 2008, when SpaceX won its first contract with NASA, that system was abandoned by NASA, switching instead to capitalism and competition, whereby NASA was merely a customer buying its launches from the open market. The positive results from that change have been breath-taking, proving once again that freedom, competition, and private enterprise will win every single time over government programs and communist/socialist ideology.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

48 China
31 SpaceX
22 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab

The U.S. and China are now tied 48 to 48 in the national rankings. This was the 127th launch in 2021, tying it with 1976 for the second most successful year in rocketry in the history of space exploration. With five more announced launches on the schedule, there is a chance that this year could tie the record year, 132 in 1975.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Denver elementary school brings back segregation

12:43 pm

Segregated playgrounds return in Colorado!
Segregated playgrounds return in Colorado!
Click for original image from Christopher Rufo.

“Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” Administrators at a Denver public elementary school eagerly and enthusiastically organized a monthly playground night in which whites were apparently banned. The photo to the right is of the school’s sign, announcing this public event.

The school administrators claimed the evening was organized at the request of the school’s black families so that they could get to know each other, but that families from all races were also welcome.

The sign says otherwise. It suggests that this playground event is intended only for “people of color”, which usually means everyone but whites. This conclusion is reinforced by looking at the “Equity” pages at the school’s website. On this webpage the school proudly announces that “many of our staff have participated in Creating Connections and a CRT and the Brain Study group.” Another Equity page touts their links to the Marxist and bigoted Black Lives Matter movement, and touted segregated programs for:
» Read more

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Japanese tourists return to Earth after 12 days in space

8:35 am

Capitalism in space: Japanese tourists billionaire Yusaku Maezawa and his assistant Yozo Hirano safely returned to Earth yesterday in their Russian Soyuz capsule after spending 12 days on the Russian half of ISS.

Maezawa’s and Hirano’s flight contracts were negotiated by Space Adventures, the only company to date to fly its clients to the International Space Station. Prior to Soyuz MS-20, Space Adventures organized eight flights for seven self-funded astronauts (one flew twice).

Maezawa, 46, is the CEO of Start Today and founder of ZOZO, an online retail clothing business, which he sold to Yahoo! Japan. In 2018, he paid an undisclosed but substantial amount to SpaceX for a circumlunar flight on the company’s still-in-development Starship spacecraft. Maezawa’s “dearMoon” mission, which will fly him and a crew of artists around the moon, is currently targeted for launch in 2023.

Hirano, 36, managed the photography team at ZOZO and is now a film producer at Start Today. In addition to filming Maezawa during the mission, Hirano also took part in human health and performance research on behalf of the Translational Research Institute for Space Health (TRISH) at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. The studies included collecting electrocardiogram readings and using a portable auto-refractor device to collect sight data.

The article also notes a minor record set during this tourist flight. On December 11th a total of 19 people were in space, the most ever, though only for a very short time. Ten were on ISS, three were on China’s space station, and then six were launched on a suborbital flight that day by Blue Origin.

The next commercial tourist flight on the schedule is February’s first Axiom flight to ISS, carrying three customers to ISS for eight days.

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SLS likely facing another launch delay

9:45 am

Engineers for NASA’s SLS rocket have determined that they need to replace the flight controller on one of the engines in the rocket’s core stage, an action that will likely force a delay from the presently scheduled February launch date.

After performing a series of inspections and troubleshooting, engineers determined the best course of action is to replace the engine controller, returning the rocket to full functionality and redundancy while continuing to investigate and identify a root cause. NASA is developing a plan and updated schedule to replace the engine controller while continuing integrated testing and reviewing launch opportunities in March and April.

It appears they hope to make this change-out quickly and only have to delay one or two months, though at the moment it is also unclear this will be possible.

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China’s Kuaizhou-1A rocket fails during launch

8:33 am

China’s Kuaizhou-1A rocket experienced its second launch failure on December 14th, though few details about what went wrong have been released.

The Kuaizhou-1A rocket is built by one of China’s pseudo-private companies, Expace.

Expace had been encouraged by three successful Kuaizhou-1A launches across September, October and November, which followed the Kuaizhou-1A being grounded for one year as a result of a failure in September 2020.

Since the rocket’s first three stages use solid rocket motors, it must have been derived from military missile technology. Thus, the company is not private, even if it has obtained Chinese private investment capital, but closely supervised by the Chinese government and its military.

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NASA approves Axiom’s second commercial flight to ISS

9:19 am

In a strangely worded NASA press release, the agency announced that it has “selected” Axiom for the second private commercial manned mission to ISS.

NASA has selected Axiom Space for the second private astronaut mission to the International Space Station. NASA will negotiate with Axiom on a mission order agreement for the Axiom Mission 2 (Ax-2) targeted to launch between fall 2022 and late spring 2023.

As at present there appears to be no other American company planning commercial manned flights to ISS, NASA wasn’t “selecting” Axiom at all. All NASA was doing was approving Axiom’s proposal to fly the mission to NASA’s space station, while confirming that Axiom will pay NASA’s greatly increased charges, raised about 700% more than the older price list.

The language of this announcement, combined with the exorbitant NASA charges, is only going to accelerate the effort of private companies, including Axiom, to build their own independent space stations. It isn’t NASA’s place to “select” any privately funded commercial flight into space, ever. That this government agency is making believe it has that right is only going to alienate the new private space industry, giving them reason to get away from NASA as fast as possible.

Meanwhile, Axiom is already scheduled to fly its first tourist flight to ISS in February 2022. The second flight that NASA “selected” today is to be followed by two more, for a total of four tourist flights. At that point, around 2024, Axiom will then launch its first module to ISS, beginning the process of relying less on NASA and leading to the undocking of Axiom’s station from ISS.

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China launches second communications satellite for its manned space station missions

8:39 am

The new colonial movement: China today launched the second Tianlian communications satellite for its manned space station missions, using its Long March 3B rocket.

No word on whether the rocket’s first stage used parachutes or grid fins to control its crash landing in the interior of China.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

48 China
28 SpaceX
22 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab

China now leads the U.S. 48 to 45 in the national rankings. This launch was the 124th in 2021, making the sixth most active year in rocketry since Sputnik in 1957.

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Russia’s Proton rocket launches two communications satellites

8:35 am

Russia early today successfully launched two Russian civilian communications satellites using its Proton rocket on its second launch in 2021.

This was Russia’s 22nd successful launch in 2021, matching its total from 2019 and the highest since 2015. In that year its launch totals dropped as its international commercial market share switched to SpaceX, partly because of the lower prices that American company offered and partly because of the many quality control problems in the Russian aerospace industry that were causing numerous launch failures.

With two more launches still on its manifest, ’21 looks like it will be a good year for Russia.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

47 China
28 SpaceX
22 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab

China still leads the U.S. 47 to 45 in the national rankings. With 123 launches this year, ’21 is now tied as the sixth most active year in the history of rocketry.

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Mexico signs Artemis Accords

12:33 pm

Mexico on December 9, 2021 became the fourteenth nation to sign the U.S.-led Artemis Accords, designed to bypass the Outer Space Treaty’s restrictions on private property in space.

[Marcelo Ebrard Casaubon, Mexico’s secretary of foreign relations,] announced Mexico’s accession to the accords at an event attended by several other Mexican government officials as well as U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Ken Salazar and José Hernández, a former NASA astronaut. Hernández said in the statement that Mexico’s decision to join the Artemis Accords was evidence that, for this return to the moon, “we are going to do it as a community.”

The full list of signatories at this moment: Australia, Brazil, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, South Korea, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, Ukraine, and the United States.

Russia and China have both said they oppose the accords. Both want control to be centralized to the government, and the accords act instead to strengthen the rights of the citizens and private companies in space.

France and Germany remain the two major Western space powers who have not signed the accords. Both undecided on what they will do. Both seem eager to partner with Russia and China, and to do so also seem willing to abandon in space concepts of private property and individual rights in order to make those partnerships happen. At the same time both — especially Germany — have been pushing private enterprise in space.

This policy conflict is making both countries appear very confused.

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FAA to discontinue program to issue wings to everyone who flies in space

10:20 am

The FAA has decided to end an on-again-off-again program, only started in 2005, that issue wings to everyone who makes their first flight into space on a private commercial spacecraft.

he Federal Aviation Administration will stop awarding commercial astronaut wings at the end of this year, five months after it revised the criteria for receiving the wings.

The FAA announced Dec. 10 that it will award wings to all non-government individuals that flew on FAA-licensed commercial vehicles to date in 2021, as well as those who fly on any remaining launches through the end of the year. However, it will not award wings to anyone, either crew members or spaceflight participants, that flies on FAA-licensed vehicles after this year.

The program was merely a public relations effort designed to give an honor to tourists and others who flew on non-governmental space missions. The FAA is now getting out of that business, leaving it to the commercial space companies themselves.

That part of the reasons is that the FAA was finding it difficult to come up with a good criteria for awarding the wings based on the increasing numbers of people now flying on private missions is actually wonderful. It means going into space is becoming more routine.

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Russia selects first astronaut to fly on Dragon

8:19 am

Russia, as part of the continuing barter deal with NASA for seats on the capsules of both countries, has selected rookie astronaut Anna Kikina to be the first Russian to fly on a Dragon capsule.

Kikina is the only woman currently active in the Russian cosmonaut corps. She was selected in 2012 but has yet to fly in space, although Rogozin and other Russian officials had previously said she would fly in the fall of 2022. She would likely be on the Crew-5 Crew Dragon mission, to which NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada and JAXA astronaut Koichi Wakata are currently assigned.

While according to the Russians the barter deal is finalized, according to NASA negotiations are still ongoing. This announcement by the Russians might actually be a negotiating tactic, since the tensions between the U.S. and Russia over Russian threats to the Ukraine could threaten the partnership at ISS. By making this announcement the Russians might be trying to make the barter deal an accomplished fact.

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China launches two satellites with Long March 4B

8:08 am

China today launched two satellites thought to be for military reconnaissance, using its Long March 4B rocket.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

47 China
27 SpaceX
21 Russia
6 Europe (Arianespace)
5 ULA
5 Rocket Lab

China now leads the U.S. 47 to 45 in the national rankings. There have now been 122 successful launches in 2021, making it the seventh most active year in the history of space exploratoin.

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