Right next door?
Maybe it’s more motivation to develop interstellar propulsion, but we’re still a long way from it, and thirteen light years is still a long way away.
Category Archives: Space
“Safety Is The Number One Priority”
Ray LaHood, who I won’t miss, is right on cue. As I note in comments, someone ought to write a book about that.
Asteroid Missions
Are they really harder than landing on Mars?
Sorry, but with all respect, that’s nuts. We know all we need to know about asteroids to plan a mission to them, including the space radiation environment. All you need to do is pick one. And landing on Mars is hard.
That’s not to say that I think that NASA should be doing an asteroid mission, of course. And especially it shouldn’t as long as it continues to spread the nonsense that it needs the SLS/Orion for it.
[Update a while later]
I think that this is mostly FUD from people who don’t want to do an asteroid mission.
Thoughts On Space Safety
From Brian Swiderski.
The main problem with his thesis, though I agree with much of it, is that no one said “failure is not an option” in the sixties. That happened with Gene Kranz’s book and the movie, in the nineties.
Planetary Science
…and sequestration. Which is looking more and more likely.
Obviously, if I were running the agency, and didn’t care what Congress thought, I’d just cancel SLS and Orion. Webb should go, too, but the sequestration goal can be met with those two alone. I’d cancel Webb if I could redirect the money elsewhere. But Charlie and Lori aren’t going to have that option as long as Dick Shelby and Barbara Mikulski are calling the shots. So we’ll continue to waste billions on unneeded rockets and capsules, and an overpriced telescope, while planetary science goes fallow.
The Zenit Launch Failure
Looks like a failed hydraulic pump, which took out its steering capability.
Ten Myths About Columbia
From Jim Oberg.
Ten (And Three) Years Later
Jeff Foust remembers two February-first space-related anniversaries, related to each other.
We Must Move On
Sea Launch
Had an expensive oopsie.
At least they didn’t wreck the launch platform this time. But it’s not helpful for coming out of bankruptcy. I wonder if this is another symptom of the problems that the Russians have been having (yeah, I know that Zenit is Ukrainian, but as Marcia Smith notes, Sea Launch is mostly owned by Energia RSC)? Speaking of which, if Congress was really worried about safety (not to mention non-proliferation), they’d be accelerating commercial crew, and getting us off our dependency on the Russians ASAP.