Some thoughts and history from Doug Messier.
I didn’t try to wangle an invite, because I’m currently in Missouri, sort of on vacation (which is why the light blogging as well). But if I’d been in CA, I’d have probably driven up, just to see who else was in attendance.
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Here’s the official release from Virgin Galactic.
…in spaaaaaaaace.
I wrote about this a few months ago.
This is a huge day for Kip Thorne (and others). Nadia Drake has a comprehensive story up already.
[Update a few minutes later]
Here’s another write up by Matthew Francis at The Atlantic.
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Here‘s the paper itself.
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And one from Miri Kramer.
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And from Loren Grush.
Alan Boyle has the story. A cut to SLS/Orion, which the Senate can be relied upon to restore.
Can you imagine an astronaut reading Genesis from space today, as they did during Apollo 8?
Looks like lasermicrowave launch will be on hold for a while.
It’s too bad — it’s an interesting concept. This is the sort of thing that DARPA/NASA should be doing, but the latter has to waste money on a giant rocket.
Eric Berger reports on Wednesday’s House hearing.
If NASA is smart, they’ll be putting a plan together for a return to the moon, to present to the next administration, preferably with a lot of public/private partnership.
[Update a few minutes later]
Keith Cowing had a roundup related links yesterday. And here‘s Doug Messier’s summary and Jeff Foust’s story.
Nadia Drake rides the simulator.
I just hope they can get the real thing working.
Jeff Foust has the highlights of what Gwynne said at the conference yesterday (I flew back last night, got in about midnight).
Not covered: I asked her the status on crossfeeding Falcon Heavy. She said definitely not first flight — they want to get the thing flying first (which makes perfect sense), but want to get there, maybe in the next two years. She also said that they had no current customer for a “sixty-ton(ne) payload.” Parenthesis because I don’t know if she meant English or metric, but either way, that’s the first time I’ve heard that number. The original stated payload (with crossfeed) was fifty-three tonnes (I think, have to double check, might have been tons), but that was also in expendable mode. I can imagine with the improved performance of the new larger densified Falcon cores, it would go up, but it’s not clear what the flyback penalty is. I may follow up with her in email.
[Update a few minutes later]
30th Space Wing is planning for a Falcon landing at Vandenberg this year.
Loren Grush has a good summary. Everyone recognizes that this is going nowhere, but the monster rocket people don’t care.