This is just nuts. I hope he’ll come back to Twitter.
[Update a few minutes later]
More PC stupidity: The sins of the father shall be visited on the child.
Category Archives: Space
Mike Pence’s Space Gospel
Marina Koren has a nice history of religious allusions in space speeches.
Pence’s Space Speech At JSC
Bob Zimmerman says that the swamp is winning, big league.
Stratolaunch
A history, as it approaches first air under the gear. As I noted in an email to the person who sent me the link:
“Stratolaunch has never made any sense to me as a business. Gary [Hudson]’s theory is that it’s the Glomar Explorer of space: a civilian cover for a black operation (in this case, perhaps as an X-37 launcher capable of single-orbit rendezvous). But it seems nutty to me to make your business dependent on a single carrier aircraft. Orbital got away with it with the Tri-Star but at least there they could have gone to the boneyard for another one if they’d lost it. Look how much time it’s taken to even do taxi tests with a single vehicle. And they only this week announced (again) their plans for the orbital launcher, now not to fly until 2022, over a decade after that press conference.”
I also think that Allen placed entirely too much faith in Burt, who is an aviation genius, but not necessarily a space guy.
Rogozin
He’s whining about SpaceX’s prices. Maybe he should get a trampoline.
And this is amusing:
Due to its geography, Russia is largely unable to make Falcon-style reusable boosters that would make vertical powered descent to a movable platform at sea, and so it has to follow an alternate path sticking to horizontal landings or relying on parachutes, he said.
Yes, because they couldn’t possibly land vertically down range, where they currently dump their expended first stages.
Closer To Commercial Crew
The Fate Of The ISS
Matt Fitzgibbons says it’s like the ancient Roman roads. I’m not sure the analogy works very well, but I do think that it would be wasteful to deorbit it. When he says it’s “only” three or four billion a year, I don’t think he appreciates how much more we’ll be able to do for much less in the near future, But I also think in the next decade we’ll have the ability to move it higher, and preserve it as a museum.
The Eighth Continent
An open letter to NASA from Homer Hickam.
Space Force And Space Corps
Since it’s been so much in the news lately, I thought it would be useful to link to Coyote’s case for it from a year ago. I disagree with his recommendations about withdrawing from the OST, but he explains why a separate service is necessary.
A Space Corps First
This is a year old, but a good description from Coyote Smith why we should establish a Space Corps prior to transitioning to a Space Force.