Category Archives: Space

Space

Bill Haynes

6 Comments

Most of my readers don’t know him, or even who he is, but I just learned that he was killed in an auto accident yesterday, on his way to church. Ironically, as Bill Simon (Bill’s webmaster and our mutual friend) tells me, the picture of him at his blog is one that he took of Bill in his F-86 flight suit on the Miata he was driving when he apparently was head-oned by an SUV. He reportedly died instantly.

Services Saturday — I suspect that Buzz Aldrin will be there, if he’s in LA. I’ll have more thoughts, and personal remembrances later, but suffice it to say that while he lived a long and full life, it wasn’t as long as he wanted, and now he’ll never make it into space, though he’s been working hard to make that happen not just for himself, but for all of us, longer than anyone else I can think of.

[Update a couple minutes later]

Going through Bill’s blog, I just noticed that this blog post, on the need to reduce the cost to open up space, may have been his last one.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s the initial story from The Daily Breeze, with no identification.

[Update late evening EDT]

The Daily Breeze has now provided the identification. As Bill might have said, schade, and scheisse.

Business, Political Commentary, Space

The Chevy Small Block Of Space

17 Comments

Is that what the Merlin is? A little early to say, I’d say, but I think one could come up with some creative new vehicles using it in the lower stages and the R-10 up above. If I were in control of NASA R&T budgets, something I’d have done a long time ago was to pay Pratt to test them to destruction to determine how many restarts they could do and how many hours they could fire without refurbishment. If I were SpaceX, I’d be doing the same with Merlin. Perhaps they already are.

Speaking of rocket design, I see that the rocket scientists on the Hill have been sharpening their pencils. I guess that Bill Nelson not only flew into space once, but he must have stayed at a Holiday Inn Express, too.

Business, Space

Clarifying

17 Comments

I talked to Elon for half an hour or so last night, to make sure that I was getting the story straight on an article I’m writing for Popular Mechanics, but he didn’t really tell me anything that changed the relevant aspects of my story. It does, however, change the spin on the story that AvLeak did a few days ago, and they’ve provided a correction, based apparently on a similar conversation with him. It’s always possible to read too much into technical papers presented at professional conferences (not to mention retirement aspirations), and that seems to be what occurred here. SpaceX would like to build a heavy lifter, but they don’t see the market for it absent NASA interest, which sort of makes the point that I’ve always made — that it’s not affordable, or even necessarily the best way to do the exploration job. I am sure, though, that if NASA really needs a heavy lifter, funding SpaceX to build it is the most affordable option.

Science And Society, Space, Technology and Society

The Bermuda Triangle

19 Comments

Solved?

Oceanographic surveyors of the sea floor in the area of the Bermuda Triangle and the North Sea region between continental Europe and Great Britain have discovered significant quantities of methane hydrates and older eruption sites.

Because of the correlations and existing data, the two envisioned what would happen when gigantic methane bubbles explode from natural fissures on the seafloor.

Makes sense to me. There would be no warning, and nothing you could do. You might be able to set up a warning system for aircraft, though, perhaps with satellite monitoring. I don’t think that ships would have the ability to escape. Too slow and unmaneuverable. Better to avoid the area, or perhaps to better map the deposits, and put them on the charts like other hazards.

[Via Geekpress]

General, Space

Sean O’Keefe

3 Comments

This AP story doesn’t say who’s aboard, but I’m hearing other reports that he was aboard the plane that crashed in Alaska.

He’s a former administrator, so it will have no effect on policy, obviously, but condolences to his friends and family if he and/or his son didn’t survive.

[Update a while later]

More over at NASA Watch.