Space and Science BS Thread

As if there was any doubt…

https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/status/1458168868527030275?s=21

 

shoulda called it YeetLaunch

https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/status/1458138238036557824

 

During the Media Q&A today, Administrator Nelson said they signed the HLS contract w SpaceX soon after the court ruling last week

 

Iirc one of the chutes is redundant. Though its possible it could change their telemetry only partially inflated, or interfere with the other chutes/ropes. Doubt it will put a hold on them for long, definitely not long enough for starliner to catch up.

 

I don’t think Dragon will ever be dependent on Russian seats….

 

It’s gonna get really interesting with HLS going full steam ahead means Starship overall will be too.

Elon’s said Starship will eventually replace F9 and Dragon so all that could make Starliner and Orion obsolete too.

At the media event Asst Admin Melroy talked about bringing SLS costs down to $1B per launch which is outrageous when compared to what Starship costs are projected to be when operational.

 

https://twitter.com/nasastennis/status/1458201450396495874?s=21

https://twitter.com/airandspace/status/1458213784611434500?s=21

 

What's the projected Starship cost?

 

Planned missions
In November 2019, Musk estimated that a Starship launch might cost $2 million, including $900,000 of propellant. Starship could carry up to four hundred Starlink satellites into orbit, far more than the Falcon 9's sixty.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org › wiki
SpaceX Starship - Wikipedia

 

According to one of the youtubers (cant remember which), suborbital it is "theoretically" possible for Starship to match or beat some of Boeing's largest jets in cost of operation if they see the same amount of performance improvements on Starship that they saw on Falcon. That's just theoretical though. I've seen a falcon 9 set off car alarms several miles from the launch site, and Starship is going to utterly dwarf that. That's one of the big reasons they're going with the oil rigs as launch pads, but it still means a 3-10 mile boat or helicopter ride for every launch. And that's going to add time and expense. So coast to coast I don't see it competing, but international flights have potential to save 8-12 hours each way and actually be comparable in price to a first class ticket.

And if this ever becomes a reality, despite the likelihood that you'll most likely be locking in like a rollercoaster for the entire thing, I'll still probably do it if it goes higher than Bozos did. I'll be first in line to get to REAL space before him!! Well, that and the fact that it's a rocket.

 

If they can incoorporate submersed tunnels from the platforms into land based hyper loops that could resolve some connection issues.

 

The plane of the ecliptic on display…

https://twitter.com/space_station/status/1458346771697086464?s=21

 

If you’re on the fence or didn’t know about it- 5 more days to sign up

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/the-official-2021-tw-secret-santa-thread.739640/#post-26328899

A good time had by most

 

I just read about part of NASA's current manifest.

Artemis I, unmanned, flying around the moon and back, is scheduled for February 2022.

Artemis II - ?

Artemis III, manned, landing on the moon via HLS, is scheduled for 2025.

I assume A-II will launch HLS to lunar orbit - but only a guess on my part.

This works out to less than 1 flight a year.

I really want to get back to the moon - and am very disappointed in NASA's performance. (Not getting into the "why", just venting.)

However, I plan to be in Florida for the launch of Artemis I. Anyone else planning to be there?

 

I have asked my wife about this, and she has no desire to go to space. I, otoh, definitely do want to go to space and would be first in line to be the GM of the first Fastenal on the moon!

 

https://twitter.com/nasakennedy/status/1458454263609413632?s=21

https://twitter.com/spacex/status/1458476859310559234?s=21

 

See above in bold

 

So Artemis II will not be carrying Gateway? Just astronauts? Then the elliptical orbit will be similar to the orbit A-I will fly? Last I heard, Gateway is planned to be in a polar orbit.

Costs are insane, and I doubt the contractor is interested in cutting them. Sole source provider and all...

 

Reminds me of The Moon is a Harsh Mistress but seems difficult to achieve since max V is when the atmosphere is most dense and requires the projectile to survive much more than orbital velocity since it decelerates all the way up but still has to arrive with orbital velocity. Heinlein at least put his catapults on the highest peaks available both to shorten the trip and avoid the densest part of the atmosphere. Linear acceleration is also amenable to humans where that circular one is not.

 

The main advantage it seems to me of projectile launches is none of the fuel needs to be accelerated, only the payload itself. So right off the bat you eliminate the fuel be payload trade off.