…but there is a lot more of other useful elements.
I’m writing a review of Bob Zubrin’s latest book, which touches on many of the same themes. His claim is that Mars will be to the Belt as San Francisco was to the 49ers.
Category Archives: Space
Odysseus
Eric Berger paid a visit to Intuitive Machines.
I personally consider this a very successful mission for a first attempt.
NASA’s Space Solar Power Plan
NASA has lacked ambition since the late seventies.
About That Russian Nuclear Satellite Thingy
Stephen Clark runs it down.
We really need bases in ELEO to deal with threats like this.
More Terrible Trial Coverage
I may respond later, but I have to think about it. As usual, the comments are lunacy.
[mid-morning update]
Thoughts from Will Bates.
[Update a few minutes later]
Reflections from (trial witness for the defense) Roger Pielke, Jr.
[Update a few more minutes later]
More thoughts from “Sharon F.”
[Update a few more minutes later]
A good comment from Roger’s substack.
[Afternoon update]
Joe Bastardi weighs in on the hockey stick.
[Monday-morning update]
More from Clarice Feldman. Though I have not stated any plans to appeal. The only reason I’m unhappy about the verdict is that the jury mistakenly found that I acted with malice, despite no evidence of it.
The Latest SPS Study From NASA
…is worse than worthless.
Thirty Eight Years
On another anniversary of the Challenger loss, here‘s what I wrote in 2010.
Mike Griffin’s New (Old) Plan
Eric Berger is less than impressed.
Another Artemis Delay
I wish that every time some politician (and Bill Nelson is definitely one of those) says that “Safety is the highest priority,” someone would ask them, “What is safe enough? When are you going to fly? How safe will it be then? If safety is the highest priority, why would you ever fly? Not flying is the only way to make safety the highest priority.”
ULA
Can it get its mojo back?
I think that partially, even largely depends on whether it can get a better owner than the current ones.
[Update a while later]
I have more thoughts over at X.
[This is a good history from @SciGuySpace, but there’s a word missing in it: Starship. Tory’s problem is that he thinks that he’s competing against Falcon, but Elon is going to obsolesce Falcon ASAP. How will Vulcan or New Glenn compete against a fully reusable heavy lifter?
The thing about Elon is that he never faces the Innovator’s Dilemma. His first instinct is to obsolesce his own product line before a competitor can. Anyone who wants to seriously compete against SpaceX has to compete against his future plans, not his current business.
If space launch was just a business for Elon, he’d be as complacent as any other businessman in his position, but it’s not a business; it’s a passion, and he wants to get thousands of people to Mars. So he’s going to continue to out-innovate the competition.
Imagine a world in which SH/SS is flying daily (or more often) on regularly scheduled trips to ELEO at a cost of tens of dollars a pound. Propellant would be cheap enough to deliver a payload to anywhere in cislunar space for much less than the cost of a traditional launch. That is what ULA and BO are going to have to compete with if they want to stay in the launch business.
I know, “But there’s not enough demand for that level of launch activity!” Believe me, at those prices, we will finally see the kind of price-demand elasticity that will drive it through the roof. People will be doing things dreamt of for decades, held back only by launch costs.
So good luck to ULA (and BO) on their upcoming maiden flights this year, but I don’t predict a long future for them. Not to mention SLS…
I feel like I should write a book about this.
[Monday-morning update]
ULA had a successful maiden flight, but there’s an anomaly with Peregrine.
[Bumped]