…will be Bob Lightfoot. I assume he’s just a placeholder until a winner emerges among the factional fighting over business-as-usual versus more commercial.
Category Archives: Space
SpaceX’s Finances
The Wall Street Journal has gotten hold of them. Eric Berger analyzes.
They’ve said that they’ve been profitable all along, and apparently were until that launch failure in 2015.
The Latest Progress Failure
The report has been released:
Members of the commission established that the most probable cause of the accident had been the disintegration of the oxidizer tank of the third stage as a result of the failure of the 11D55 engine, following the fire and disintegration of its oxidizer pump, Roskosmos said. The fire in the pump and its disintegration could be triggered by a possible injection of the foreign particles into the pump’s cavity or by violations during the assembly of the 11D55 engine, such as a wrong clearance between the pump’s shaft and its attachment sleeve, floating rings and impellers, leading to a possible loss of balance and vibration of the rotor.
Sounds like they still have serious QA issues, either in manufacture or processing. And it’s the same third stage that crew uses.
[Update a few minutes later]
Related: Bob Zimmerman writes (among other things, in a general analysis of the world launch industry) that 2016 was the worst year for the Russian launch industry in decades.
The Cislunar Verticals
Part 3 of Carlos Entrena Utrilla’s series on cislunar space is up now.
Geoengineering, Space Tech, And Societal Risk
Some interesting thoughts from Oliver Morton (who I unfortunately missed having lunch with in London last week, maybe next time):
AI worries people more, but geoengineering seems pretty well placed in second place. (Incidentally, what’s up with space as the top societal risk enhancer? If AI takes the laurels in terms of economy, geopolitics and tech, how come space outdoes it in the exacerbation of societal risks? A mystery for another time…)
Indeed. I have some ideas, and that some it arises from ignorance and too much bad SF in television and movies, but I’ll let the commenters have at it.
An Asteroid Just Missed Earth
Aleta’s Memorial
A reminder, for those who (unlike me) are in or can make it to western Texas this weekend. I hope that perhaps something can be done in the LA area as well at some point.
End Of An Era
Henry Vanderbilt is retiring from putting on the annual Space Access Conference. The good news is that it accomplished a lot of its goals, as we enter a new era of lower-cost launch, and likely destined to continue to see prices fall. I hope that someone else can take up the torch.
Moon Or Mars?
The latest on the issue.
It’s a pointless discussion, because it presumes it’s going to be a government program: Apollo back tot the moon again, or Apollo to Mars. We need to be developing capabilities to go wherever we want, affordably. Then let the people paying for it decide.
Related: Howard Bloom says that NASA needs to get out of the rocket business, and start working on an actual superhighway in space. I’m not sure I want Marshall in charge of that, though. To put it mildly.
The 2017 Launch Market
Bob Zimmerman has some prognostications.
I agree that it’s likely to be a banner year, with an even brighter future.