RIP, I guess. I never got what was such a big deal about him. “Space Oddity” is the only song of his that I liked, and I never listened to an album. But apparently, according to my Twitter timeline, this is some kind of huge culture loss.
Category Archives: Space
Martian Concrete
They should be using nuclear for power, though, not solar.
Homer Hickam
Just got back from a very pleasant lunch with him in Manhattan Beach. Huge surf today, because of the storm. Gave him a signed copy of the book (he’d already read the PDF, and reviewed on Amazon).
Eric Drexler
Haven’t heard from my old friend (in both senses of the word these days), but Ray Kurzweil has an interview.
Haven’t listened to the whole thing, but so far, he doesn’t seem to have mentioned that he got interested in the subject of nanotech via his interest in space.
Beyond SpaceX
Ten other space companies to watch this year.
I’m pretty sure that XCOR’s hangar isn’t over ten thousand feet long. I also think he overstates the difficulties with getting a payload on the ISS. Nanoracks has made that pretty painless. I wonder why he didn’t mention VG, which is rolling out the new SS2 next month?
#SciTech2016
I’ve been at the SciTech2016 conference in San Diego (drove down from LA this morning ahead of most of the rain). Posting will probably remain light until tomorrow afternoon or Thursday, when I get back to the office.
I should say, though, that Bill Anders was very politically incorrect in the plenary session this morning. He was basically singing from my hymnal, about the obsession with safety, and Apollo not being about space, and he had unkind words to say about Orion, with a poor young woman from the program sitting on the dais with him (it was pretty funny when Ann Sulkosky and another Lockmart guy came up to him afterwards to gently remonstrate with him). It was particularly hilarious, because they’re the primary sponsor of the conference; there was a big Lockmart logo above them.
I introduced myself, and gave him a copy of the book. He said he’d read it (future tense), and I hope he does. It’s nice to run into an Apollo astronaut who’s thinking in 21st-century terms. He said Elon was on his poop list (he used a different word) because he was one of the few Apollo guys who had stood up for him against Cunningham and Cernan, but Elon had stood him up for lunch. I don’t think Apollo astronauts are used to being stood up for lunch.
A Spaceship Has Landed
Over at The Space Review, Jeff Foust has the story of Spacex’s return to flight before Christmas, and Sam Dinkin looks into the economics of reusability.
Everyone Talks About Space Weather
…but no one does anything about it.
Well, OK, hardly anyone talks about it, either.
The Lifeboat Foundation
They’re having a year-end fundraiser, with a generous offer to triple donations. It’s a good cause, I think.
The Space Age
We’re still not there.
But we are (finally, no thanks to Congress) getting closer.