Tag: government

Today’s blacklisted American: Unvaccinated students at Penn State banned from remote classes

12:23 pm

Coming to your town in America soon!
Rounding up the unclean unvaccinated: It is coming.

They’re coming for you next: Unvaccinated students at Penn State who fail to get a COVID test for three weeks in a row are now banned from the school, including a ban from even attending remote classes.

At Penn State University, 117 students have been placed on interim suspension for failure to comply with the university’s weekly COVID-19 testing requirement.

Students at University Park who are subject to required weekly COVID-19 testing and who have missed at least three weeks of testing have been notified by Penn State that they are out of compliance with the university’s health and safety policies and have been placed on interim suspension through the Office of Student Conduct, a statement from Penn State said.

Students on interim suspension may not participate in classes, in-person or remotely; are not allowed on university property; and may not attend any Penn State-sponsored events, programs, and activities, including football games. On-campus students on interim suspension also are temporarily removed from their residence halls.

The highlighted word prove the insanity and irrationality of this policy. » Read more

23 comments

China launches Earth observation satellite

8:37 am

China today successfully launched an Earth observation satellite using its smallsat Kuaizhou-1A rocket, the first launch of this quick response rocket since a failure in November 2020.
The satellite is supposedly for commercial use, but little information has been released about it and its constellation.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

33 China
23 SpaceX
15 Russia
4 Northrop Grumman

The U.S. still leads China 34 to 33 in the national rankings, with these numbers changing in a few hours should ULA successfully launch Landsat 9 using its Atlas-5 rocket.

3 comments

Today’s blacklisted American: Garden hoes banned by Facebook!

12:11 pm

Garden hoes banned by Facebook!
According to Facebook, a garden hoe apparently represents evil
and the worst of white supremacy.

Today’s blacklisted American, garden hoes, is meant more to illustrate the utter brainlessness of the blacklist culture, and why every intelligent American should refuse to bow to it in any way.

It appears that Facebook has been repeatedly flagging and then blocking posts on a gardening group because those gardeners periodically make reference to the gardening tool called a “hoe.”

A group called WNY Gardeners has been repeatedly flagged by the social network for “violating community standards,” when its more than 7,500 members discussed the long-handled bladed implement, which is spelled with an “e,” unlike the offensive term.

When one member commented “Push pull hoe!” on a post about preferred weeding tools, Facebook sent a notification that read, “We reviewed this comment and found it goes against our standards for harassment and bullying,” a moderator said.

“And so I contacted Facebook, which was useless. How do you do that?,” Elizabeth Licata said. “You know, I said this is a gardening group, a hoe is gardening tool.”

Nor has this been Facebook’s only “hoe” error. It had also been routinely flagging posts that referred to the English seaside community of Plymouth Hoe.

Facebook of course never responded to gardening group when they complained, as is usual for these inhumane big tech companies. However, when this story began appearing in the press, it told the AP that it was sorry about it, had corrected the algorithms that had caused the problems, and had assigned a real human to monitor the gardening group to make sure it is not censored for ordinary gardening discussions.

Hah! That didn’t work. The gardeners soon found themselves censored for writing about the various techniques they use for battling the Japanese beetle, a destructive pest to “flowers, trees and shrubs, fruits and vegetables, field crops and turf.” When on commenter suggested that gardeners should “Kill them all. Drown them in soapy water,” and “Japanese beetles are jerks,” the posts were blocked by Facebook.

It seems Facebook employees really don’t know how to read. Instead, they work eagerly to silence anyone for any statement they think should be silenced, without thought.

Throwing away the Kerwood Derby

All this reminds me of the short clip below from the early 1960s cartoon show, Rocky & Bullwinkle.
» Read more

31 comments

News flash! Union lobbyists wants to influence Biden against non-union SpaceX

9:41 am

In the past two days probably a dozen of my readers have sent me a link to this story at the Washington Examiner,
The Anti-SpaceX lobbying campaign casts new light on Elon Musk’s Biden beef.

The story reveals some private emails between a union lobbyist and a vice president at ULA, outlining their mutual effort to discredit Elon Musk and SpaceX because of its long term success in preventing its workforce from unionizing.

Everyone who has sent me this story somehow thinks it reveals a major breaking story.

I think this story is a tempest in a teapot. It reveals nothing newsworthy. All it shows is that a union lobbyist is trying to influence the Biden administration against SpaceX, a decidedly non-union company. Why should these actions surprise anyone? Unions always go after non-union companies, and they often do it by exerting their political clout.

Nor should be we surprised that one of SpaceX’s biggest competitors is partnering with the union in this effort. There is nothing newsworthy about this. Competitors compete, and that competition can sometimes be quite cut throat.

Furthermore, nothing in these emails appears illegal. The lobbyist’s claims against SpaceX are spurious and shallow, but so what? Unions have the right to lobby politicians, and they have the freedom to make whatever arguments they want, even if those arguments are silly or false.

Finally, to think it is a news story that Biden might be receptive to union lobbyists is kind of silly. Biden is a modern Democrat. In almost all matters he is going to genuflect to the unions. I don’t need to read the private emails of a union lobbyist to find this out.

However, the evidence in the past ten months shows that this lobbying effort has so far been incredibly ineffective. While I certainly do not trust the Democrats running the Biden administration, and fully expect them to take actions eventually to squelch private enterprise, this White House’s actions regarding space has so far generally continued the capitalist policies begun during the Trump administration. Note too that these are the same policies first begun at the end of the Bush Jr. administration, and encouraged strongly throughout the Obama administration. It certainly appears that — in space at least — the Democrats are as much for capitalism as the Republicans.

And these emails have apparently done nothing to change that. Thus, there is no news here.

16 comments

Today’s blacklisted Americans: Republicans blacklisted 53 to 1 over Democrats on social media

12:05 pm

Silenced by Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Google
Republicans: Routinely silenced by Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.

Blacklists are back and the Democrats have got ’em: According to a review of the actions of the big social media companies against politicians, the Media Research Center has found that Republicans are censored at a rate 53 times more than Democrats on social media.

The attacks on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google, Instagram, and others have been against both standing Republican members of Congress as well as Republican candidates running for office, with further evidence showing that Facebook very specifically has been favoring Democratic incumbents.

Nor have the top managers and owners of these social media companies been able to counter this data.
» Read more

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Fired flight director accuses Virgin Galactic of lying about problems on July suborbital flight

9:19 am

A former Virgin Galactic flight director, who was relieved of his duties just before the company’s July suborbital flight that carried Richard Branson and then fired shortly thereafter, has accused Virgin Galactic of misleading the public in its statements about the problems that occurred during that flight.

Virgin Galactic has claimed that the high winds forced the spacecraft away from its planned flight path.

Mark Stucky, who Virgin Galactic fired eight days after Branson’s flight, said his former employer put out an inaccurate statement about why VSS Unity flew unauthorized into Class A airspace for 1 minute 41 seconds during its descent. Class A airspace is primarily used by airlines, cargo operators and higher performance aircraft.

“The most misleading statement today was @virgingalactic’s,” Stucky tweeted. “The facts are the pilots failed to trim to achieve the proper pitch rate, the winds were well within limits, they did nothing of substance to address the trajectory error, & entered Class A airspace without authorization.”

There is no way to know if Stucky’s accusation is correct. We might be seeing a bit of personal anger on his part considering his firing. At the same time, the FAA’s statement about this issue made no mention of winds, which suggests the Virgin Galactic statement might not be true.

Regardless, Virgin Galactic’s track record in matters of safety has not been stellar. The company needs to quickly resolve these issues or they will become a lingering sore that will damage sales for future suborbital flights.

4 comments

Wuhan panic continues to shut down India’s space agency

9:08 am

While most private companies and many nations, such as China and Russia, have been launching continuously since the advent of the coronavirus panic last year, India’s space agency ISRO continues to be shut down, completing few launches with a story today suggesting that the three remaining planned launches for 2021 will likely be delayed until next year.

There have only been two launches this year – the purely commercial PSLV C-51 launch in February carrying Brazil’s earth observation satellite Amazonia-1 and the GSLV-F10 mission in August carrying an Indian earth observation satellite EOS-03 that failed.

To be sure, the space agency has plans for three more missions before the end of the year, including the first development flight of the SSLV [Small Satellite Launch Vehicle]. The other two will use India’s workhorse PSLV to launch two earth observation satellites EOS-04 and EOS-06.

“The three planned missions appear unlikely this year,” a senior scientist at the agency said on condition of anonymity.

Worse, before the year began ISRO had reduced its targeted number of missions for ’21 from 16 to 5.

The article makes believe the epidemic has shut down other programs, such as Artemis, in the same way, but that is false. NASA’s Artemis program might have lost a few months in ’20 due to the agency’s panic over COVID, but since then it has been moving as fast as it can, considering the cumbersome nature of its engineering. Even Rocket Lab, which has been badly hampered by New Zealand draconian Wuhan rules, has managed to launch eleven times since January 2020, compared to the four launches attempted by India during that same time.

Whatever has caused the shut down at ISRO, it really hasn’t been the epidemic. Something about the agency’s management and its bureaucratic culture has prevented them from resuming flights. And as they remained stalled, the private commercial companies in the U.S. and China are grabbing their customers.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Weatherman fired after 33 years for not getting COVID vaccine

12:03 pm

Weatherman Karl Bohnak, now a non-person
Weatherman Karl Bohnak, now a non-person.

Persecution is now cool! Karl Bohnak, who had been a weatherman for the Michigan television station WLUC for 33 years, was fired last week because he refused to get the COVID vaccine shot as now mandated by the station.

Bohnak announced his firing in an essay on his Facebook page [requires Facebook login]. I have posted the full text at the end of this essay, also posted here, to illustrate the rational, thoughtful nature of his decision. You might disagree with him, and think he should get vaccinated, but he outlines in clear detail his valid reasons for not doing so.

His essay also raises the very valid constitutional and ethically reasons for resisting the mandate of this company.

The abrogation of our liberty and freedom under the guise of a pandemic is very disturbing to me. Hopefully, whether you lean right or left, you are concerned about what has occurred the last year-and-a-half. I just wanted to go about my business, “live and let live”, and keep my mouth shut. But this act by the federal government through corporate America has brought me to a crossroads. Our way of life, our freedom and liberty, is collapsing before our eyes.

Sadly, Bohnak is not alone in this. Thousands of people across America are willingly losing their jobs because they will not submit to this dictatorial and entirely unconstitutional vaccine mandate. As the left has loudly proclaimed for decades, these Americans are declaring, “Our bodies, our choice!”

From the beginning, the data said that the lethality of COVID would merely be a variation of the flu. » Read more

40 comments

NASA awards Aerojet Rocketdyne contract to build 20 Orion main engines

10:21 am

NASA announced yesterday that it has awarded Aerojet Rocketdyne the contract to build twenty Orion main engines for capsules on missions running through 2032, with the first to be used on the seventh Artemis launch..

This engine is the one that Orion will use to enter and leave lunar orbit.

Based on the pace that NASA expects to launch SLS, once per year, I expect the last engine in this contract will fly in 2048, not 2032, since it will take about 27 years to put that many Orions into space after SLS’s first launch, expected sometime in the next five months.

In other words, this is a contract to keep the jobs at Aerojet Rocketdyne in existence for the next three decades, even if that company’s engineers build little and accomplish less. Nice welfare work I must say.

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NASA reorganizes bureaucracy of manned programs

9:05 am

Moving those deck chairs! NASA yesterday announced that it is reorganizing the bureaucracy of its manned programs, splitting the Artemis program out from the commercial program.

The space agency announced today (Sept. 21) that it’s splitting the current Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate (HEOMD) into two new entities: the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate (ESDMD) and Space Operations Mission Directorate (SOMD).

…ESDMD will be responsible for the development of systems and technology critical for NASA’s Artemis program, which aims to land astronauts on the moon in the next few years and establish a sustainable human presence on and around Earth’s nearest neighbor by the end of the 2020s. ESDMD will also map out NASA’s broader “Moon to Mars” exploration strategy, of which Artemis is an integral part, agency officials said. (NASA aims to land humans on Mars in the 2030s, by leveraging the skills and techniques learned during the Artemis moon effort.)

SOMD, meanwhile, will be in charge of crewed launches and ongoing human spaceflight operations, including activities on the International Space Station and the commercialization of low Earth orbit, a NASA priority over the coming years. SOMD will also be responsible for crewed operations on and around the moon once they get up and running.

Kathy Lueders, who had been promoted from just running the commercial crew program to run all of manned space back in 2020, will once again run just the commercial side. The Artemis side will be run by another long time NASA administrator, Jim Free.

As I noted in 2020, these kinds of reorganizations at NASA happen periodically, and generally accomplish little except to allow NASA’s top managers to make believe they are doing something. In this case the split I think is intended to prevent Artemis from being completely taken over by commercial space, thus giving some bureaucratic clout to SLS and the factions at NASA that favor government control, with NASA designing and building everything rather than simply being a customer. If so, the decision is a bad one for Artemis. It means the Biden administration and those factions want to once again take over the design and construction of the entire Artemis program. Since NASA’s track record in this area has been abysmal for decades, it is unlikely this shift will change anything for the better.

This reorganization also suggests that the Biden administration has had second thoughts about the private and commercial approach as recommended in my policy paper, Capitalism in space and adopted by the Trump administration. If so, the consequences for the new emerging private space industry will not be good. They shall increasingly find the government more eager to micromanage their designs and concepts, rather than allowing the private sector the freedom to create things on its own.

The one silver lining to this change is that by creating these two divisions, NASA will be highlighting the competition between them. As commercial space increasingly succeeds, leaving the cumbersome Artemis program far behind, the split will illustrate clearly to the entire world that a government-built program is not the way to go.

0 comments

Today’s blacklisted American: Blackballed professor at NC State sues

12:06 pm

The Bill of Rights cancelled at North Carolina State University
Freedom of speech cancelled at
North Carolina State University.

Fighting back: Stephen Porter, a tenured professor at North Carolina State University, has just filed a lawsuit against the university and several of its faculty for blackballing him for simply disagreeing with them on issues of politics and policy.

The introduction of the legal filing [pdf] outlines clearly the actions of the university’s faculty, designed to destroy Porter’s academic career:

[I]n retaliation for Professor Stephen Porter’s protected expressions of opinion on important societal issues, Defendants have intentionally and systematically excluded him from departmental programs and activities that are necessary for him to fulfill his job requirements, effectively hollowing his job out from the inside. They have done this in a deliberate effort to set the stage for his eventual termination. … Defendants are gradually forcing Plaintiff into what is effectively a “rubber room” in retaliation for his criticisms of the so-called “social-justice” ideology that now prevails both in his department and in academia more broadly.

Read the whole complaint. It describes in ugly detail the efforts by his supervisors to isolate and ostracize him so it would be impossible for him to teach and maintain his job.

So, what exactly did Porter do to bring the wrath of these petty dictators down upon him? » Read more

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NASA reviewing a dozen commercial proposals for future government space stations

8:45 am

Capitalism in space: Rather than replace the aging International Space Station (ISS) with an entirely government-designed-and-built new station, NASA is now reviewing about a dozen commercial proposals from private companies.

NASA earlier this year unveiled the Commercial LEO Destinations project, with plans to award up to $400 million in total contracts to as many as four companies to begin development of private space stations. In response to NASA’s request, its director of commercial spaceflight, Phil McAlister, told CNBC that the agency “received roughly about a dozen proposals” from a variety of companies for contracts under the project.

…The ISS is more than 20 years old and costs NASA about $4 billion a year to operate. The space station is approved to operate through the end of 2024, with a likely lifespan extension to the end of 2028. But, moving forward, McAlister says NASA wants “to be just one of many users instead of the primary sponsor and infrastructure supporter” for stations in low Earth orbit.

Based on these initial proposals, NASA officials estimate that the agency’s cost for running this future privately-built station will be about $1 billion per year less than the cost for operating ISS.

The agency will also only pay a part of the development cost for the new station, expecting that since the private company or companies will be making money from it also they should front a significant portion of that development cost.

Essentially NASA is following precisely the recommendations I put forth in my 2017 policy paper, Capitalism in space. And as I also predicted, the result is more achievement faster for far less cost.

8 comments

Today’s blacklisted American: Gun stores in Boston suburb banned

12:04 pm

Browning Brothers gun shop, Ogden, Utah Territory, 1882. From left to right: Thomas Samuel Browning, George Emmett Browning, John Moses Browning, Matthew Sandefur Browning, Jonathan Edmund Browning, and Frank Rushton
Gun shops banned in Brookline, Massachusetts.

They’re coming for you next: The local government in Brookline, Massachusetts, a suburban community outside of Boston, is attempting to impose new zoning regulations that would essentially ban gun stores.

Under the new zoning proposal submitted by town board members Petra Bignami, Janice Kahn, Alexandra Metral, and Sharon Schoffman, gun stores would only be allowed to operate by special permit. It also states buffer zones will be around residential properties, private and public K-12 schools, and childcare facilities, which would block firearm businesses from operating within a certain distance.

The proposal came after the City of Newton, one town over, approved new zoning rules for gun stores in June that restricted them to three locations. This action was in response to a new gun store attempting to open.

Since this very leftist community is routinely hostile to the second amendment and the right to bear arms, it would astonish me if any special permit would ever be approved. And even if one was, the buffer rules are likely so restrictive that there is probably no location in town where a gun store would be legal.

The illogic of gun control advocates always amazes me. » Read more

18 comments

China launches unmanned Tianzhou freighter to its space station

9:05 am

The new colonial movement: In preparation for the arrival of its next three-person crew, China yesterday successfully used its Long March 7 rocket to launch an unmanned Tianzhou freighter to its new space station, docking there seven hours later.

The Long March 7 is a new rocket that launches from China’s Wenchang spaceport on the country’s southern coast. Thus, its expendable stages fall into the ocean, not within China. The rocket also does not use toxic hypergolic fuels, but kerosene and oxygen, so it is less environmental harmful.

The crew will launch to the station on October 13th and will likely spend six months at the station.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

32 China
23 SpaceX
15 Russia
4 Northrop Grumman

The U.S. still leads China 34 to 32 in the national rankings.

2 comments

FAA now taking public comments on the licensing of SpaceX to launch Starship/Superheavy from Boca Chica

10:59 am

Capitalism in space: The FAA today announced by email that it is now taking public comments on the “Draft Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA)” it requires from SpaceX before it can issue a launch license at Boca Chica, Texas for Starship/Superheavy orbital launches.

From the email:

The FAA invites interested agencies, organizations, Native American tribes, and members of the public to submit comments on all aspects of the Draft PEA. Public comments are due on Monday, October 18, 2021. Comments or questions on the Draft PEA can be addressed to Ms. Stacey Zee, SpaceX PEA, c/o ICF, 9300 Lee Highway, Fairfax, VA 22031. Comments may also be submitted by email to SpaceXBocaChica@icf.com. Before including your address, phone number, e-mail address, or other personal identifying information in your comment, be advised that your entire comment – including your personal identifying information – may be made publicly available at any time. While you can ask us in your comment to withhold from public review your personal identifying information, we cannot guarantee that we will be able to do so.

The FAA will also hold two public hearings on October 6th and 7th, though it provided no information yet on where those hearings will be held.

This announcement means that the Starship/Superheavy orbital test flight cannot occur any earlier than October 18, 2021, and will actually occur at least several weeks or months later, based on the schedule outlined on slide 32 of this FAA presentation [pdf]. Once the 30-day public comment period ends the FAA must then hold “an industry workshop” reviewing the comments and then issue an update of the PEA, or a rejection of it.

Though the chances of the FAA rejecting SpaceX’s permit are practically nil, I fully expect this process to be slow-walked by the FAA under orders of the Biden administration in order to do whatever it can to prevent this orbital flight occurring before SLS’s first launch, now expected in early ’22.

I hope I am wrong, and that the FAA surprises me. We can only wait and see.

Update: If you think I am crazy thinking that the politics of the Biden administration will cause a slowdown in the FAA’s process, just read this story about the FAA suddenly imposing flight restrictions at the southern border to block drone flights by media outlets that show the illegal immigrant crisis there.

“We’ve learned that the FAA just implemented a two week TFR (Temporary Flight Restrictions) over the international bridge in Del Rio, TX, meaning we can no longer fly our FOX drone over it to show images of the thousands of migrants,” Fox News reporter Bill Melugin tweeted. “FAA says ‘special security reason.’”

Fox’s report resulted in a quick lifting of this flight restriction on their drone, but the action by the Biden administration shows that it is quite willing to interfere with normal aviation regulations for its own political reasons.

14 comments

India signs deal with private rocket startup

9:57 am

Capitalism in space: India’s new Department of Space, dedicated to encouraging the growth of a private commercial and independent Indian space industry, has signed a deal with the private rocket startup, Agnikul Cosmos, to give it access to government space facilities as it develops its own smallsat rocket.

Indian startup Agnikul Cosmos signed a framework memorandum of understanding (MOU) with India’s Department of Space on Friday for access to ISRO facilities and expertise for the development of its two-stage small-satellite Agnibaan launch vehicle.

“The Framework MoU…will enable the company for undertaking multiple tests and access facilities at various ISRO centers for testing and qualification of their single piece 3D printed Semi Cryo engine and other systems. The MoU also enable Agnikul to avail technical expertise of ISRO for testing and qualifying their space launch vehicle systems and subsystems,” ISRO said in a press release.

The company has raised more than $14.1 million in investment capital, and hopes to complete the first launch of its Agnibaan rocket by ’22.

0 comments

China’s three astronauts land safely

9:33 am

The new colonial movement: China’s three astronauts safely returned to Earth today after spending 91 days in space and 90 days on China’s new space station.

During their stay they did two spacewalks preparing the station for additional modules and later missions.

China is expected to send the robotic Tianzhou 3 cargo spacecraft toward Tianhe around Sept. 20. And the next crewed mission to the module, the six-month-long Shenzhou 13, is apparently scheduled to launch in mid-October. (Exact target dates are hard to come by with Chinese missions, because the nation tends not to announce many details of its spaceflight plans in advance.)

China will also in the next year launch two more large modules to attach to the station, using its Long March 5B rocket. Assuming they have not redesigned that rocket, expect the very large upper stage on both launches to once again crash out-of-control somewhere on the Earth, possibly in habitable areas.

4 comments

Today’s blacklisted Americans: Any tenant not vaccinated in Florida apartment complex

1:38 pm

Coming to your town in America soon!
Rounding up the unclean unvaccinated: What the left nationwide wants.

They’re coming for you next: A Florida landlord is now demanding that any future tenant show proof of vaccination against COVID-19 or they will be turned away, and any present unvaccinated tenant move when their lease expires.

If you’re not vaccinated for COVID-19, you can forget about moving into any of eight apartment complexes in Broward and Miami-Dade counties owned by Santiago A. Alvarez and his family.

And if you’re still unvaccinated when it comes time to renew your lease, you’ll have to find someplace else to live.

Alvarez, who controls 1,200 units in the two counties, is the first large-scale landlord known to national housing experts to impose a vaccine requirement not only for employees, but also for tenants. They’ll be required to produce documentation that they’ve received at least an initial vaccine dose.

The policy, which took effect Aug. 15, could set Alvarez’s company on a collision course with Gov. Ron DeSantis’ vaccine passport ban, which prohibits businesses from requiring that customers be vaccinated.

The story reports that already two tenants have contacted attorneys with plans to challenge this discriminatory policy in court. Note too that since the largest percentage of unvaccinated individuals comes from the black community, Alvarez is essentially discriminating against blacks with this policy. It seems that, for the left, the mantra “Housing is a right!” now only applies to those who agree with them. All others should be homeless.
» Read more

34 comments

Chinese astronauts undock from space station in return to Earth

10:07 am

The new colonial movement: Three Chinese astronauts, having completed their 90 day mission on China’s new space station, early today boarded their Shenzhou capsule and undocked from the station, with the expectation that they will return to Earth sometime tomorrow.

The astronauts have already set China’s record for the most time spent in space. After launching on June 17, mission commander Nie and astronauts Liu and Tang went on two spacewalks, deployed a 10-meter (33-foot) mechanical arm, and had a video call with Communist Party leader Xi Jinping.

Following their safe return, China will launch another unmanned cargo freighter to the station, followed by the launch of three more astronauts for another 90 day mission, continuing the station’s assembly construction. In addition to several more manned flights, in the next two years two more large modules will added.

NOTE: The New York Times actually did some good [and increasingly rare] journalism today to point out that the number of people presently in space, 14, is a record, beating the 13 that were on ISS in 2009. The difference now is that those spacefarers are on three different and very independent projects, ISS, the Chinese space program, and the first entirely private space mission launched by SpaceX.

2 comments

NASA awards small design lunar lander contracts to five companies

9:58 am

In what appears to be an effort by NASA to placate the losers in the bidding for the manned lunar lander contract, won by SpaceX’s Starship, the agency this week awarded small design contracts related to future lunar lander construction to five different companies, totaling $ 146 million and with the large bulk of the cash going to those losers.

The contracts were as follows:

  • Dynetics (a Leidos company) of Huntsville, Alabama, $40.8 million.
  • Lockheed Martin of Littleton, Colorado, $35.2 million.
  • Northrop Grumman of Dulles, Virginia, $34.8 million.
  • Blue Origin Federation of Kent, Washington, $25.6 million.
  • SpaceX of Hawthorne, California, $9.4 million.

From the press release:

The selected companies will develop lander design concepts, evaluating their performance, design, construction standards, mission assurance requirements, interfaces, safety, crew health accommodations, and medical capabilities. The companies will also mitigate lunar lander risks by conducting critical component tests and advancing the maturity of key technologies.

While the distribution of the money suggests NASA wishes to provide the most support to the companies that lost the bid, it also gives us a hint of what the agency presently thinks of those losers. Of the losers, Blue Origin received the least, suggesting that NASA remains skeptical of that company’s effort. It also might be NASA’s signal to Blue Origin that endless lawsuits and protests — rather than actual construction — is not a good way to make friends and influence people. This conclusion is reinforced by the fact that Dynetics received the most cash, even though like Blue Origin it has yet to launch anything into orbit.

This distribution of money is also part of the typical pattern of DC crony capitalism, designed almost like pay offs to capture these companies and make them partners in the Washington swamp.

One big space company, Boeing, however received nothing. The company might not have submitted a proposal, but I suspect that if it did, NASA dismissed it outright based on the agency’s decision last year to eliminate Boeing from such contract considerations because of the incredible weakness of its recent bids. I think that Boeing will remain on the outs until it finally gets Starliner flying and operational.

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