Tag: spaceflight

SLS-backer Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama) to retire

11:27 am

Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), long time firm supporter of the very expensive and long-delayed Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, has announced that he will not run for office again when his term expires in ’22.

The 86-year-old Shelby was first elected to the Senate in 1986 after eight years in the House. Shelby served in the House, and the first eight years in the Senate, as a Democrat, switching to the Republican party in 1994.

Shelby is best known in the space community for his role shaping NASA programs as a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee. That has included stints as chairman of the commerce, justice and science subcommittee, whose jurisdiction includes NASA, as well as of the full committee. With Democrats in control of the Senate, he is currently the ranking member of the full committee.

“I have worked to enhance Alabama’s role in space exploration and the security of our nation,” Shelby said in the statement announcing his decision not to run for reelection. That’s included support for programs based at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, such as the Space Launch System. “As chairman of the appropriations committee, I have more than a passing interest in what NASA does. And I have a little parochial interest, too, in what they do in Huntsville, Alabama,” he said at a March 2019 industry event

As the article makes clear, Shelby used his clout unceasingly to keep SLS funded. When NASA simply hinted in 2019 that it might switch to another rocket to launch Orion he made his displeasure known, and NASA immediately backed down.

His resignation now, at the same time that other members of Congress as well as the Biden administration appear to be separating the Artemis lunar program from SLS, is a strong signal that the political winds are blowing badly against SLS. Shelby has probably realized that he no longer has the same support for SLS in the rest of Congress that he once had, and knows there is a good chance it will go away, along with much of the pork he has been funneling to Alabama with it. When that happens, his chances of getting reelected drop precipitously. He probably doesn’t have to inclination to fight what might be a losing battle, especially at the age of 86.

The second static fire test of SLS’s core stage is presently scheduled for the fourth week in February. All had better go well, as time is running out in getting the rocket’s first launch off in ’21. Right now that schedule is very iffy. Further problems will make it impossible.

And any major failures would probably lead to the entire program’s cancellation. It would take years for SLS to recover the loss of the core stage, time the program does not have.

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Fiftieth anniversary of Apollo 14 lunar landing

9:22 am

Apollo 14 as seen by LRO
Click for full image.

In honor of the fiftieth anniversary today of the landing of Apollo 14 on the Moon, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) science team has used images from the spacecraft to map out what the astronauts did on the surface, as shown in the reduced image to the right. The orange and teal lines indicate the routes followed during the two EVAs, with the pink triangles indicating stopping points along the way.

Unlike Apollo 11 and 12, which focused on engineering goals such as landing precisely on the Moon, Apollo 14 focused on addressing science goals. Antares (lunar module) landed in the Fra Mauro highlands, the original destination of the failed Apollo 13 mission, essentially taking on that mission’s objectives. This was the first crewed landing in the lunar highlands and not in the mare.

The Apollo 14 astronauts who landed on the Moon, Alan Shepard (Commander) and Edgar Mitchell (Lunar Module Pilot), completed two extra-vehicular activities (EVAs) while on the surface. They spent a total of 9 hours and 22 minutes setting up equipment, taking photographs, collecting samples, and exploring.

This was the last mission where the astronauts had to walk. The next three Apollo missions brought a rover with them, so that they could drive to their research sites.

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Musk: Starlink to go public once operational

8:48 am

Capitalism in space: According to a tweet by SpaceX founder Elon Musk, once the Starlink internet satellite constellation is operational and has a “reasonable well” cash flow it will issue and IPO and become a publicly traded stock.

“SpaceX needs to pass through a deep chasm of negative cash flow over the next year or so to make Starlink financially viable,” Musk wrote in another tweet. “Every new satellite constellation in history has gone bankrupt. We hope to be the first that does not.”

Based on the company’s pace of launching satellites and rolling out service, this moment could occur as early as late this year. More likely it will occur in mid-22.

I would also expect that stock to quickly rise in value, and based on the history of all of Musk’s companies, will continue to rise thereafter. Expect also that a significant portion of the investment capital that Starlink will raise will be used to finance the development of Starship and Super Heavy, because Starlink will need that larger rocket to maintain its satellite constellation.

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UAE’s Hope or Al-Amal Mars Orbiter orbital insertion

8:31 am

UPDATE: The probe has apparently achieved orbit.

The new colonial movement: The United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) Mars orbiter, Hope, or Al-Amal in Arabic, is about to insert itself into orbit around the red planet, with that insertion to be confirmed by 11:08 (Eastern).

If you want to watch, I have embedded the live stream below the fold. A warning: The insertion is a relatively interesting event to watch, as the orbiter works autonomously and the signal confirming it happened arrives after the event. Most of the stream is propaganda for the UAE.
» Read more

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OSIRIS-REx has begun its return to Bennu

2:17 pm

On January 14th the OSIRIS-REx team fired the spacecraft’s engines to halt its drift away from the asteroid Bennu and begin its return for one last reconnaissance before heading to Earth with its samples.

OSIRIS-REx executed the first maneuver on Jan. 14, which acted as a braking burn and put the spacecraft on a trajectory to rendezvous with the asteroid one last time. Since October’s sample collection event, the spacecraft has been slowly drifting away from the asteroid, and ended up approximately 1,635 miles (2,200 km) from Bennu. After the braking burn, the spacecraft is now slowly approaching the asteroid and will perform a second approach maneuver on Mar. 6, when it is approximately 155 miles (250 km) from Bennu. OSIRIS-REx will then execute three subsequent maneuvers, which are required to place the spacecraft on a precise trajectory for the final flyby on Apr. 7.

OSIRIS-REx is scheduled to depart Bennu on May 10 and begin its two-year journey back to Earth. The spacecraft will deliver the samples of Bennu to the Utah Test and Training Range on Sep. 24, 2023.

While they will gather images of the whole asteroid, their number one goal will be to get high resolution photos of the sample-grab site Nightingale to see how it was changed by that sample grab. The spacecraft pushed into the asteroid’s rubble pile about 1.6 feet, and that act certainly disturbed both the interior and surface. By comparing the before and after pictures scientists can garner a lot of information about the asteroid’s make-up, density, and structure. It will also teach future engineers what to expect when next they try to touch another rubble-pile asteroid.

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The Icy Surface of Mars

1:04 pm

The extent of ice on Mars

Two newly published science papers in the past few days have once again reinforced the growing evidence that much of Mars from 30 degrees latitude to its poles is very icy, with much of that ice found close to the surface.

The map above, adapted and annotated by me from figures 4 and 12 of one of those papers (“Widespread Exposures of Extensive Clean Shallow Ice in the Mid‐Latitudes of Mars”), show the areas on Mars where the evidence suggests ample and easily accessible ice, underground but close to the surface.

The red dots and diamonds indicate recent impact craters that temporarily exposed the underground ice layer that would normally not be visible. The white dots and diamonds indicate ice scarps with visible ice layers in their cliff faces. The size of these locations is greatly exaggerated.

The two hatched lines at 30 degrees latitude, north and south, indicate the closest to the equator that scientists have detected evidence of glacial ice. It is also the closest to the equator that the second new paper, “Water Ice Resources Identified in Martian Northern Hemisphere “, has found evidence of underground ice in the north. From the abstract of this second paper:
» Read more

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Lockheed Martin picks ABL’s rocket to make its first UK launch

9:21 am

Capitalism in space: Lockheed Martin has chosen the smallsat rocket company ABL Space Systems to launch its first UK satellite payload from Shetland.

Lockheed said Feb. 7 that ABL will perform a launch of its RS1 rocket from the Shetland Space Centre, a spaceport to be developed on the island of Unst in the Shetlands, in 2022. The rocket, on a mission called the UK Pathfinder launch, will place into orbit a tug developed by Moog in the UK that will then deploy six 6U cubesats.

The launch will fulfill an award made by the British government in 2018 to support development of a domestic launch capability. The $31 million contract to Lockheed Martin covered a launch, then planned for a spaceport at Sutherland in northern Scotland, as well as Moog’s orbital maneuvering vehicle.

Lockheed did not disclose at the time, though, which vehicle it would use for the launch. The company does not have a small launch vehicle of its own compatible with the spaceport, but has invested in companies working on such vehicles, including ABL Space Systems and Rocket Lab.

It appears Lockheed choose ABL over Rocket Lab because of its mobile launch capability. As designed, its RS1 rocket needs no permanent infrastructure at the launch site. All they need is a concrete pad.

This decision also heightens the competition between the two presently proposed UK spaceports in Sutherland, Scotland, and Unst, Shetland. While planning at Sutherland started earlier, local opposition appears to be slowing it down.

ABL is one of six smallsat rocket companies planning a first orbital launch in 2021. While it is unlikely all will do so, the likelihood is increasing that several will, which will make things very busy in the rocket industry.

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Starship update: Prototype #10 being readied for launch

9:08 am

Link here. Not only have the engines been installed on the tenth Starship prototype, the static fire test is set for this week, maybe as early as today. It appears they are trying to launch the next test flight before the end of February.

At landing they will now fire all three engines, in case one or more fail to light (as happened with prototype #9), and then shut down all but one immediately and let that do the landing burn. This adds redundancy and increases the odds of a successful landing.

The article also provides a detailed update on the status of future Starship and Super Heavy test articles. While #11 is being readied for launch, it appears that, based on what has been learned from #8 and #9, they are dismantling prototypes #12-14 and incorporating changes to #15, which will likely fly after #11.

One aspect of this development program struck me today. These prototypes are essentially expendable rockets. Like it did with its early expendable Falcon 9, SpaceX is using these throw-away prototypes to test ways to make them more reusable and reliable. Unlike the Falcon 9s, however, the company isn’t using these prototypes to launch payloads, at least not at this stage. It isn’t good enough that these prototypes can successfully launch. They must be able to land as well.

I suspect that once during this test program the full rocket begins to reach orbit SpaceX will add payloads, even as they continue to test re-entry and landing. The early flights might produce rockets that successfully bring satellites into space but end up getting destroyed upon return. Those loses will then be used to make later ships better and more likely to return intact.

Eventually, we will have a rocket entirely reusable and flying multiple times, just like the Falcon 9 first stage.

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Tianwen-1 takes first picture of Mars

12:48 pm

Mars as seen by Tianwen-1 for the first time
Click for full image.

The new colonial movement: China’s Tianwen-1Mars spacecraft has taken its first picture of Mars, cropped and reduced to post here to the right.

The photo shows Valles Marineris as the darker splotch in the center-right of the hemisphere, with the northern lowland plain that this canyon feeds into, Chryse Planitia, the triangular dark area to the north east. Both Viking-1 and Mars Pathfinder landed in this region. The whitish border area on the triangle’s eastern flank is the area that Europe’s Rosalind Franklin rover will hopefully land in ’23.

The whitish area that caps the north pole is likely the annual mantle of dry ice that covers the planet’s polar regions down to about 60 degrees latitude each winter. Right now it is early spring in the northern hemisphere, and that mantle has only begun to sublimate away. In another few months that mantle will disappear entirely, exposing the terrain below it.

Finally, the very bright edge on the planet’s eastern limb is either caused by a cloud layer, or is simply an over-exposure. Hard to say which.

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Hydrazine on the surface of Saturn’s moon Rhea?

12:27 pm

The uncertainty of science: Scientists using data from several Cassini flyby’s of the Saturn moon Rhea now think that hydrazine, a very toxic chemical routinely used by spacecraft as fuel, might exist on its surface.

Their effort was an attempt to identify an unknown spectroscopy absorption feature at a specific wavelength.

In comparison to chloromethane, the production of hydrazine monohydrate was easier to explain due to chemical reactions involving water-ice and ammonia or delivery from Titan’s nitrogen rich atmosphere. Elowitz et al. considered the possibility of contamination of the UVIS data by a hydrazine propellant from the Cassini spacecraft, although it was highly unlikely since the hydrazine thrusters were not used during icy satellite flybys.

The team confirmed the specific signature of a 184-nm feature on Rhea’s surface using the UV spectrometer observations made by the Cassini spacecraft. In addition to that, the irradiation of ammonia by charged particles from Saturn’s magnetosphere induced the dissociation of ammonia molecules to form diazene and hydrazine. The source of ammonia on Rhea could be primordial, incorporated into its interior during formation and brought to the surface within a period of endogenic activity, as evident in Cassini ISS imagery, although ammonia was unlikely to survive indefinitely on the surface. The team suggest further analysis to understand the potential for satellite-to-satellite transfer of materials across Titan’s atmosphere to explain the presence of hydrazine monohydrate on Rhea.

Though useful as a fuel, its poisonous nature will make any exploration of these moons very hazardous, and will also likely make its usefulness difficult initially in that exploration

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ULA’s CEO advocates old way of doing things

11:17 am

In a webinar yesterday the CEO of ULA, Tory Bruno, argued that there is too much money being invested in new rocket companies and the money would be better spent developing in-space activities instead.

To be attractive to investors, these new space activities should be dual-use with both commercial and national security applications, Bruno said.

The launch market is becoming dangerously “overheated” for a couple of reasons. One is simply that there are too many launch companies chasing a “more or less fixed size” pool of customers, Bruno said. In the large rocket market, he said, prices are falling and the demand for satellite launches “has remained stubbornly inelastic.”

“It’s down to a third or even a fourth of the cost of what access to space was just a handful of years ago,” Bruno said. “Yet we have seen no increase in the overall size of the launch market nor have we seen a corresponding tripling or quadrupling of space activity.”

While Bruno is correct when he says that there are likely too many new launch companies, he is so wrong about his belief that the customer base “has remained stubbornly inelastic” that he is practically in the wrong galaxy. The lower costs he complains about are exactly why there is so much investment capital being poured into the new launch companies, because those investors see those lower costs attracting many new customers, something that is demonstrated by the growth of the launch rate in the past few years (something that I expect will explode in the next two years).

Many of these new companies will fail, for any number of reasons. No matter. A large number will succeed, and attract more than enough customers to make a profit.

What Bruno really is complaining about are the new lower launch costs. ULA can’t match them, and for this reason faces a crisis in that it might not be able to attract any customers at all in the coming years, even with the introduction of its new Vulcan rocket. And though Bruno has done a good job trying to make ULA competitive in this new market, he appears to have generally failed to change the company significantly. For example, why hasn’t ULA tried to market its Atlas 5 and Vulcan rockets for multi-payload smallsat launches, as SpaceX did with the recent launch of 143 smallsats on one Falcon 9? I can’t think of any reason why ULA’s rockets couldn’t do the same. Yet the company has done nothing to try to market itself to this smallsat industry. Instead, they have let Rocket Lab, Virgin Orbit, and now SpaceX grab it, along with at least four or five new smallsat rocket companies about to do their first launches.

Instead, Bruno advocated during this webinar that the federal government get involved, acting to encourage investors to leave the launch market and instead focus on building companies that only do things in space.

What a deal! The government helps to limit the number of new rocket companies, thus protecting ULA’s market share. ULA in turn can continue to charge its high prices, because the new in-space companies the government subsidized will have few launch options. In fact, the high launch prices that would result from a smaller launch market would likely force the federal government to also subsidize the launch costs for the new in-space companies so they can even afford to get to orbit.

All for the benefit of old big space companies like ULA, who for decades did nothing to innovate or lower the cost to launch.

I think what Bruno is really signaling to us here is that he is not hopeful for the future of his company in today’s present competitive free market, and is thus advocating government intervention to save his company.

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The new invasion of Mars begins next week!

10:13 am

In the next two weeks three spacecraft will arrive at Mars, including two orbiters and two rovers. This post is simply a heads up so that my readers will know what to expect and when to expect it.

First, we have the arrival in Mars orbit of the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) Hope orbiter on February 9th at 10:30 am (Eastern). The spacecraft was built in a partnership with U.S. universities and the UAE. Once in orbit it will focus on studying the Martian atmosphere.

Next will arrive China’s Tianwen-1 orbiter on February 10th. The exact time it will do its engine burn to enter orbit has not been announced, as far as I can tell. Once in orbit it will begin a four month reconnaissance of the landing site for its presently unnamed rover, which will descend to the surface in May.

Finally, on February 18th at 12:55 am (Pacific) the American rover Perseverance will land in Jezero Crater on Mars. Essentially an upgraded copy of the Curiosity rover, it will land in the same way, lowered by cables from its re-entry sky crane rocket above it. It will then spend years studying the geology of Mars, while also storing samples that a later mission can recover and return to Earth.

All in all February is going to be an exciting month for the exploration of Mars. Stay tuned for some cool stuff!

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Starlink now has over 10,000 users

9:46 am

Capitalism in space: SpaceX revealed yesterday that its Starlink internet constellation now has over 10,000 users in both the U.S. and elsewhere.

The update on Starlink’s customer base came in a petition to the FCC, with SpaceX asking that Starlink be designated an “Eligible Telecommunications Carrier” or ETC. The company noted that receiving this designation is necessary for Starlink to provide service to regions in “Alabama, Connecticut, New Hampshire, New York, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.”

SpaceX was awarded access to those regions under the FCC’s Rural Digital Opportunities Fund, an auction to bring broadband services to rural areas. The FCC in December awarded SpaceX with nearly $900 million in federal subsidies in the first phase of the auction.

“Designating Starlink Services as an ETC is in the public interest because it will enable the company to receive support that will facilitate rapid deployment of broadband and voice service to the Service Areas at speeds and latency comparable to terrestrial systems in urban locations,” SpaceX wrote in the filing on Thursday.

One of my readers, Steve Golson, emailed me yesterday to tell me he is one of those rural customers, as he is located in Maine.

We are at latitude 43.2°N which was too far south for their early beta program, but they’ve just opened it up to us. I signed up back in June 2020, when the Starlink beta signup first went live. Yesterday I received this email:

“Starlink is now available in limited supply in your service area. … Availability is limited so orders must be completed within 15 minutes of landing on the order page. If you are not able to order at this time, the Starlink team will continue to send updates as more capacity becomes available.”

I ordered right away, and I was notified that the dish shipped today, with delivery late next week by FedEx Ground. Cost is $500 for the dish, WiFi router, power supply, cables, mounting tripod. Monthy cost is $99. That’s the beta cost, but I suspect their final costs will be similar.

Now I’m getting a roof mount ready. You *really* need an unobstructed view of the whole sky. The very cool Starlink app (iOS and Android) shows you how much of your sky needs to be unobstructed.

He promises to give further updates as his service rolls out.

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NASA awards Firefly lunar contract

9:29 am

Capitalism in space: NASA yesterday announced that it has awarded the new smallsat rocket company Firefly a $93 million contract to build a lunar lander for delivering scientific payloads to the Moon’s surface.

This is the first delivery awarded to Firefly Aerospace, which will provide the lunar delivery service using its Blue Ghost lander, which the company designed and developed at its Cedar Park facility. This facility also will house the integration of NASA and any non-NASA payloads, and also will serve as the company’s mission operations center for the 2023 delivery.

The lander is based on the design of Israel’s Beresheet lunar lander that failed in its landing attempt in 2019. After that failure a group of Israeli engineers from that project formed their own company, and partnered with Firefly to build a new lander, which is now dubbed Blue Ghost.

The NASA contract itself replaces OrbitBeyond, which had won a lunar landing contract initially but had backed out in 2019.

Finally, the timing of this announcement immediately after Firefly had revamped its board of directors to remove its main Ukrainian backer from an obvious management position is most telling. Suggests to me that they did that revamping in direct response to NASA’s concerns, and once done NASA could then move forward with the contract award.

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Biden administration endorses Artemis program

9:14 am

During a press conference yesterday Biden’s press secretary Jen Psaki stated that the Biden administration plans to continue the Artemis manned lunar program that was initiated by the Trump administration.

“Through the Artemis program, the United States government will work with industry and international partners to send astronauts to the surface of the moon — another man and a woman to the moon,” Psaki told reporters in a White House press briefing Thursday. “Certainly, we support this effort and endeavor,” she added.

The Biden administration was under pressure to endorse Artemis, coming from its own party. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress want the pork it represents to them. This statement now aligns Biden with Congress. The American effort to return to the Moon, established by Trump, is now practically engraved in stone.

What the statement that Psaki read did not detail is whether that support will include the SLS rocket or the Orion capsule. Nor did her statement indicate any time schedule for a landing, which adds weight to the supposition that they are going to abandon the Trump’s effort to push for a 2024 manned landing on the Moon.

Moreover, the letter sent to the White House on February 3rd by eleven Democrats endorsing Artemis (available here [pdf]), also said nothing about SLS or Orion. Instead, it was more intent on encouraging the White House to award contracts to the private sector to build the manned lunar lander. NASA had announced on February 1st that it was delaying its decision on who should build it, and those Democrats did not want that delay to result in the contracts getting killed.

Both statements tell us is that SLS itself is presently on very thin ice. Congress wants Artemis, but Artemis is no longer synonymous with SLS. For the past two years the Trump administration had been awarding contracts to numerous private companies to design and build many components of Artemis, rather than have NASA do the designing and building (as it had with SLS). Those contracts have created a cohort of new vested interests that rely on Artemis, all of which I am sure are screaming at their representatives in Congress to keep their work funded.

Furthermore, SpaceX’s development of Starship is clearly showing everyone that an alternative to SLS does exist, and could be operational for much less and much sooner.

To my mind, all this evidence suggests that the Washington political world is getting itself ready for the possibility of abandoning SLS. They don’t want to, but if alternatives to its pork are available that are also more productive, they are steeling themselves for making the difficult political decision of switching.

This evidence also suggests that the Biden administration will continue the policies I outlined in my 2017 policy paper Capitalism in Space (available as a free download here [pdf]) and adopted by the Trump administration. I had recommended that all design and construction should be taken from NASA and given to many different private companies, with that private sector also owning what they build while competing for those government dollars. NASA would outline the project’s goals and concept, and then act merely as a customer which would find others to execute those goals and concepts, as quickly and as cheaply as possible.

If the Biden administration is embracing these recommendations, this is very good news. While the motives of these corrupt politicians might be bad, the result could be very good for the U.S. Allowing the private sector to do the job means it might actually get done, rapidly and for much less. It will also help fuel the growth of a very robust American space industry, which once established will soon no longer depend solely on the government for its business. The lower cost required by the competition to get NASA business will encourage others to buy the products, and soon thereafter the government will become irrelevant to this industry’s success.

This is the model used in the early 20th century to jump start the airline industry. It worked. It now looks like NASA and the govenment will do it in space.

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China’s Long March 3B rocket launches military satellite

8:24 am

China yesterday used its Long March 3B rocket to place a military communications satellite into orbit.

No word on whether this first stage or strap-on boosters lander near any residential communities.

The 2021 launch race:

4 SpaceX
3 China
1 Rocket Lab
1 Virgin Orbit
1 Russia

The U.S. still leads China 6 to 3 in the national rankings. SpaceX’s had planned to do another Starlink launch this morning but has rescheduled it for the weekend.

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New theory to explain the Martian seasonal streaks

9:22 am

The uncertainty of science: Scientists have proposed a new explanation for explaining the Martian seasonal streaks called recurring slope lineae that appear each spring and then fade over time.

Lineae, while unique to Mars, are different than the other similar Martian feature called slope streaks, which are not seasonal and have a somewhat different appearance and morphology.

This new proposal refines some of the past ideas for the seasonal cause of lineae.

Previous ideas suggested that liquid debris flows or dry granular flows caused this movement. Neither model can completely account for the seasonal martian flow features known as Recurring Slope Lineae (RSL). The team alternatively hypothesizes that small-scale ice melting in the near-surface regolith is causing changes at the surface that make it vulnerable to dust storms and wind. As a result, the RSL features appear and/or expand on the surface of Mars today. Further, the team believes that the thin layers of melting ice result from interactions between underground water ice, chlorine salts, and sulfates, which create an unstable, liquid-like flowing slush instigating sinkholes, ground collapse, surface flows, and upheave.

…Previous studies have suggested RSL are related to chlorine salts and noted their occurrence in regions of high sulfate outcrops. The current study extends these observations with a near-surface cryosalt activity model based on field observations and lab experiments. However, the exact mechanism of RSL formation on Mars still remains a mystery. [emphasis mine]

The mainstream press will make a big deal about this, but it really does nothing but add some nuance to previous theories. We really still do not know what causes lineae, as the highlighted text above notes.

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Firefly shakes up board of directors

9:09 am

The smallsat rocket company Firefly, only a month or so from the first orbital test flight of its Alpha rocket, has drastically changed its board of directors, removing its main financial backer from the Ukraine and replacing him with Americans.

Among those no longer on the board is Firefly’s financial savior, Polyakov, who has dual Ukrainian-British citizenship and lives in Edinburgh. This is a substantial change, as it moves the company’s key financial backer from a role as a decision maker to that of a stockholder. Markusic said Polyakov has the rights of a stockholder but that Firefly’s board now directs the company. Polyakov remains Firefly’s largest shareholder.

“These changes are part of the logical growth and development of Firefly,” Polyakov told Ars. “I’m extremely proud of what we have accomplished to date. Moving forward, I have the utmost confidence in Tom, his team, and the new board members.”

Some concerns had previously been raised about Polyakov’s background. This move, however, is more due to having an all-American board of directors, which should bolster Firefly’s efforts to work with the defense community.

Essentially, the company and Polykov have moved Polykov out of a sensitive position so as to make the company seem more palatable to the federal government. His presence on the board would have likely made it difficult to win any government contracts. Making him in name just a stockholder will reduce that issue.

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SpaceX competitors lobbying to kill FCC subsidy for Starlink

9:00 am

A lobbying effort instigated by some of SpaceX competitors in the rural internet service business is now working to kill the $886 million subsidy the FCC had awarded the company for developing its Starlink internet constellation.

The losers in the awards process apparently are teaming up with the Democrats to challenge all the awards, with SpaceX their main target.

The [award to SpaceX was] made when Trump administration appointees still controlled the FCC and now the agency is led by Biden appointees who could cut off applicants it considers dubious. Last month, 160 House and Senate members urged the FCC to scrutinize recipients, in part because network construction takes time. “We fear that we will not know whether funds were improperly spent for years to come,” said the lawmakers.

There is a “a need for proper upfront assessment,” Representative Jim Clyburn, of South Carolina, the No. 3 House Democrat, said in an email. He said many applicants claim to be able to deliver faster service to new customers than they are delivering to current subscribers.

This is a fight for government hand-outs, period. The losers are now using political pressure to change the decision. And since the Democrats generally hate SpaceX (and Elon Musk) because it is so successful at actually achieving what it sets out to do, they are glad to help them. Not only will it bring these politicians campaign donations (called bribes if you are honest), it will destroy the one space company that is proving that capitalism and freedom works.

From my perspective, no one, including SpaceX, should get these funds. SpaceX is proving they aren’t necessary to get the job done (bringing fast internet service to rural communities). Moreover, the federal government really doesn’t have the cash, deep in debt as it is.

But then, my perspective is now considered quaint, even “raaaaaaacist”, in our modern corrupt Marxist society.

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SpaceX launches another 60 Starlink satellites

11:29 pm

Capitalism in space: SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 60 Starlink satellites using its Falcon 9 rocket.

The first stage completed its fifth flight, landing successfully on the drone ship in the Atlantic. Both fairings were also used.

The 2021 launch race:

4 SpaceX
2 China
1 Rocket Lab
1 Virgin Orbit
1 Russia

The U.S. now leads China 6 to 2 in the national rankings. SpaceX had planned another launch later this morning, but they have delayed that launch one day until tomorrow.

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Ten finalists in public Chinese contest to name Mars rover

3:15 pm

The new colonial movement: The Chinese public vote to pick the name of the Mars rover presently flying to Mars on its Tianwen-1 orbiter has now been narrowed to ten finalists.

The public can now vote for their favorites from a shortlist of 10 names for the Tianwen-1 mission rover.

The 10 names — Hongyi, Qilin, Nezha, Chitu, Zhurong, Qiusuo, Fenghuolun, Zhuimeng, Tianxing and Xinghuo — are taken from ideas including Chinese mythological figures, Confucian concepts and legendary animals.

Notably Hongyi, from the Confucian Analects, can be translated to “persistence” or perseverance, giving a similar meaning to the NASA Perseverance rover also heading for Mars. Others meanings include:

Zhurong: a god of fire
Qilin: a Chinese unicorn
Chitu: red rabbit
Qiusuo: to explore, referencing an ancient poem
Zhuimeng: to pursue a dream
Nezha: a mythological hero
Fenghuolun: Nezha’s weapons
Tianxing: referring to the motion of celestial bodies
Xinghuo: spark

Personally, I hope they pick Chitu (Red Rabbit), as that matches nicely with the name of China’s lunar rover, Yutu-2 (Jade Rabbit).

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Russia & China negotiating increased cooperation on the Moon

10:21 am

The new colonial movement: According to the state-run Russian news source TASS, Russia and China are in negotiations to increase Russia’s participation in China’s program to establish a manned base on the Moon.

Russia’s state-run space corporation Roscosmos is in talks with its Chinese colleagues to determine scientific tasks for a lunar base and to discuss technical aspects of the project’s implementation, Deputy Director General for International Cooperation at the Russian state space corporation Roscosmos Sergey Savelyev told TASS. “At present, work is under way to determine possible scientific tasks of mutual interest in the Moon research. Besides, possible technical implementation of the project is being analyzed,” he said.

The article is very vague about details. It does signal that Russia is strongly looking for alternatives to working with the U.S. on its Lunar Gateway project. If it teams up with China NASA will likely begin breaking off all cooperation with Russia because of the legal restrictions that prevent it from partnering in any way with China.

This article also illustrates Russia’s declining status as a space power. For years they have depending on the American program at ISS to have a place in space. Now they are looking to China. All in all, it appears they can’t get their own projects going, and need to attach themselves to others to have any part in the exploration of space.

As for China, that country wants to the good public relations that would come from making its space program international in scope. I expect therefore they want Russia to sign on. I also expect that China will dictate terms, as it doesn’t really need Russia in its effort.

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Hans Koenigsmann, 4th person hired by Musk at SpaceX, retiring

10:11 am

The fourth person Elon Musk ever hired when he was starting SpaceX, Hans Koenigsmann, has announced that he is retiring.

SpaceX vice president of build and flight reliability Hans Koenigsmann is retiring and has begun transitioning his role to former top NASA official William “Bill” Gerstenmaier, according to note to employees that was seen by CNBC.

Essentially, Koenigsmann and Gerstenmaier will be trading places. Gerstenmaier has been a consultant at SpaceX, will now move into Koenigsmann’s position, while Koenigsmann will become a technical advisor similar to what Gerstenmaier has been.

Without doubt Koenigsmann is one the the main reasons why SpaceX has become as successful as it has. I am sure Elon Musk will miss him.

While I have heard sources in the space community happy about the choice of Gersternmaier to replace him, I have reservations. Gersternmaier was in charge of NASA’s manned space program for almost the entire period it was trying to build SLS and Orion, and was the key planner behind its numerous delays and problems. While he started out well at NASA, those later years make me think of him as a typical Washington bureaucrat, spinning problems to defuse negative publicity rather than fixing them quickly. It was this spinning over the problems with SLS that I think finally got him fired by the Trump administration.

I hope I am wrong. I also know that if I am not, the odds are high that Gerstenmaier will not last long in this position. Musk does not tolerate spin.

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Russian launches military satellite

9:50 am

Russia this morning successfully launched a military intelligence satellite using its Soyuz-2 rocket.

This was Russia’s first launch in 2021. The 2021 launch race:

3 SpaceX
2 China
1 Rocket Lab
1 Virgin Orbit
1 Russia

The U.S. still leads China 5-2 in the national rankings, a lead that should widen by tomorrow as SpaceX has two Starlink satellite launches planned from Cape Canaveral four hours apart in the wee hours of the morning. If both are successful, that single American company will have as many launches as the entire world combined.

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Jeff Bezos to step down as Amazon CEO

4:01 pm

Capitalism in space: Jeff Bezos announced today that he is stepping down as Amazon CEO to focus his efforts more on his other political and space-related activities.

From the email he sent to Amazon employees:

As Exec Chair I will stay engaged in important Amazon initiatives but also have the time and energy I need to focus on the Day 1 Fund, the Bezos Earth Fund, Blue Origin, The Washington Post, and my other passions,” Bezos wrote. “I’ve never had more energy, and this isn’t about retiring. I’m super passionate about the impact I think these organizations can have

I think this quote from the story above however explains a great deal about Blue Origin in the past three years:

Bezos is said to devote one day a week to Blue Origin (reportedly, Wednesdays), plus at least $1 billion worth of the annual proceeds from his sales of Amazon shares. He’s presided over high-profile publicity events including the unveiling of the Blue Moon lunar lander. But when it comes to the day-to-day business, he handed that responsibility over to veteran aerospace executive Bob Smith, who became Blue Origin’s CEO in 2017.

It was around 2017 that the pace of Blue Origin’s effort seemed to slow to a crawl. It was also about that time that the company became dedicated to becoming a government contractor, doing whatever the government required even if it meant that development of their New Glenn rocket would slow (which it did).

Whether this action will increase Bezos’ participation with Blue Origin however is unclear. In the last year he has seemed more interested in leftist environmental causes and leftist politics. We shall have to wait and see.

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Smallsat rocket company Astra to go public

2:15 pm

Capitalism in space: A merger with a major investment capital company, bringing in $500 million, will result in the smallsat rocket company Astra going public.

Small launch vehicle developer Astra will go public by merging with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC), providing the company with nearly $500 million in cash and valuing it at more than $2 billion.

Astra announced Feb. 2 an agreement to merge with Holicity, a SPAC established last year by Craig McCaw. That merger, expected to close in the second quarter, will turn Astra into a publicly traded company on the Nasdaq exchange with the ticker symbol ASTR. McCaw, chairman and chief executive of Holicity, will join Astra’s board as part of the deal.

Astra expects to raise $489 million through the merger with Holicity, a total that includes a $200 million private investment in public equity (PIPE) led by BlackRock and $30 million from a concurrent Series C round, company executives said in an investor call. The deal will value Astra at $2.1 billion.

In the article Astra’s head claimed the company already has contracts for its first fifty flights, but did not provide any details. At this moment Astra has yet to complete a successful orbital launch, and has two attempted orbital tests which both failed.

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SpaceX live feed of Starship #9 flight

1:24 pm

Just before landing
Just before landing.

Just after landing.
Just after landing.

The test is over. All went perfectly until the landing, when the spacecraft once again crashed on the launchpad. They hit the target, but just too hard.

This time the problem occurred early in the landing maneuver. It appeared the spacecraft was unable to get completely vertical and hit the ground without firing its engines.

Right now we have no idea what the issue was, or what will be involved in fixing it. Starship #10 sits on its launchpad, ready to go. Assuming they do not have to make major changes or redesigns to correct the issue, I would expect it to launch within six weeks.

Of course, that assumes the Biden administration doesn’t ramp up its regulatory enforcement effort against SpaceX. And I have every expectation that will be the goal of the Democrats now in charge of the federal government.

Meanwhile, the FAA is now claiming the launch license approval delay last week was related to SpaceX violating it license approval during the December test flight of Starship prototype #8.

In a Feb. 2 statement, the FAA said that SpaceX had requested a waiver to its FAA license for suborbital test flights of its Starship vehicle before the Dec. 9 flight of the Starship SN8 vehicle. That waiver, the FAA said, would have allowed SpaceX to “exceed the maximum public risk allowed by federal safety regulations.”

The FAA denied the request, but SpaceX went ahead with the launch. SpaceX considered the flight successful, although the vehicle exploded upon landing. No injuries or third-party damage was reported during the flight, but the FAA determined that SpaceX violated the conditions of its license by proceeding without the waiver.

“As a result of this non-compliance, the FAA required SpaceX to conduct an investigation of the incident,” the agency stated. “All testing that could affect public safety at the Boca Chica, Texas, launch site was suspended until the investigation was completed and the FAA approved the company’s corrective actions to protect public safety.”

This could be true but personally, I don’t buy it. To me this sounds like government spin to justify their own incompetence in blocking last week’s flight. It also sounds like the kind of spin used by government bureaucrats when they want to enlarge their power. Today’s landing crash of prototype #9 now gives the FAA and Biden administration wonderful ammunition to clamp down hard on SpaceX.

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Virgin Galactic almost lost its 2nd SpaceShipTwo in 2019 flight

9:45 am

Capitalism in space: According to a book to be published in May, Virgin Galactic had serious previously unrevealed problems during its 2019 manned flight of VSS Unity, ist 2nd SpaceShipTwo suborbital spaceship, problems that could have killed all on board.

[W]hen the ground crew wheeled the suborbital spacecraft back into the hangar, company officials discovered that a seal running along a stabilizer on the wing designed to keep the space plane flying straight had come undone — a potentially serious safety hazard. “The structural integrity of the entire stabilizer was compromised,” Todd Ericson, a test pilot who also served as a vice president for safety and test, said, according to a soon-to-be-published book. “I don’t know how we didn’t lose the vehicle and kill three people.”

Much more at the link. It does appear that the company was not doing due diligence prior to the flight, signing off inspections without actually doing those inspections.

The issue caused the long delay since that flight. That it was kept secret as the company went public and offered its stock for sale likely breaks some SEC laws.

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Watching Starship #9’s flight, take 2

9:28 am

LabPadre's Starship 24/7 live feed, at 9:12 am (Central), February 2,, 2021
LabPadre’s Starship 24/7 live feed, 9:12 am (Central), February 2,, 2021.
Click to go to it.

Capitalism in space: It appears that SpaceX has finally gotten approval from our benevolent government to attempt today a flight of the ninth prototype of its Starship. to a height of approximately 33,000 feet. The screen capture to the right from this morning shows Starship’s #9 and #10, both on their own launchpads. I think #9 is the one on the right.

As the company’s Starship website still notes,

Similar to the high-altitude flight test of Starship serial number 8 (SN8), SN9 will be powered through ascent by three Raptor engines, each shutting down in sequence prior to the vehicle reaching apogee – approximately 10 km in altitude. SN9 will perform a propellant transition to the internal header tanks, which hold landing propellant, before reorienting itself for reentry and a controlled aerodynamic descent.

The Starship prototype will descend under active aerodynamic control, accomplished by independent movement of two forward and two aft flaps on the vehicle. All four flaps are actuated by an onboard flight computer to control Starship’s attitude during flight and enable precise landing at the intended location. SN9’s Raptor engines will then reignite as the vehicle attempts a landing flip maneuver immediately before touching down on the landing pad adjacent to the launch mount.

SpaceX will be providing a live stream, which I shall embed here at Behind the Black once it becomes available about ten minutes before launch. In addition, there are these live streams available:

The SpaceX live feed will provide the best visuals, but that will not go live until just before launch. Right now I think the Labpadre live feed is my preferred choice because it provides a quick checklist on the screen telling you the countdown status, which in turn gives you an idea how soon the launch might be. For example, when the sirens sound, it means they are approximately 10 minutes to launch.

While this flight will likely be as epic as the flight of Starship #8, there is no guarantee it will occur today. Until they actually lights the candle, much of the action today will be like watching paint dry.

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Rocket of Chinese pseudo-private company fails on 2nd launch

8:52 pm

The new colonial movement: Today’s second launch of the Chinese pseudo-private company iSpace’s Hyperbola-1 rocket ended in failure soon after launch.

No details yet on what went wrong.

The company had successfully completed its first orbital launch in July 2019. The smallsat rocket, using four solid-rocket stages, is almost certainly derived from China’s military technology, and thus the company could not exist without significant government supervision.

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