Space and Science BS Thread

Earlier this morning:
https://twitter.com/launchphoto/status/1659549814416109568?s=46
Uncropped

 

OMG, it’s BO and partners for the second HLS….edit, this second lander program is known as SLD - Sustaining Lunar Development.
https://twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1659569490080702468?s=46
https://twitter.com/nasaspaceflight/status/1659573127494483968?s=46

NASA pays $3.5 Billion + “north of $3.4B contribution by BO”

Nice summary:
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/19/nasa-awards-blue-origin-sld-crew-lunar-lander-contract.html

“All components dependent on the New Glenn booster to get to the cislunar environment.”

The above info provided by this guy. Seems like quite a catch by BO. Also very generous for EB to throw this out there:
https://twitter.com/sciguyspace/status/1659576537857896448?s=46

 

Then there’s:
https://twitter.com/airandspace/status/1659580499680010240?s=46

 

Except they may not end up being the last people to touch Hubble...

 

The last people, to date, that touched the Hubble.

 

https://twitter.com/spacex/status/1659599720761950208?s=46

 

Almost like I just requested this.
Edit- what I actually asked for though was for a demonstration with something in the spray plume. In any case, one thing the first launch demonstrated was that consequences aren’t necessarily scalable. It will be exciting again no matter what.

 

Internal channel, copper alloy, bimetal combustion chambers in the years before 3-D printing.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H4YZxb2E5PA
Or, How they originally made the RS-25 engines.

 

RDE might not be that far off. It offers ~25% greater thrust from a given amount of fuel burned. Consider what that does to the rocket equation. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HdSjyTBPef4
I had originally posted ~ an order of magnitude but that was a mistaken inference on my part taken from a statement in the video. Still, JAXA recently used one and I think a company in Spain is producing them. While it doesn’t change the need for staging to eliminate dead weight, the ability to incorporate aerospike technology would allow Starship to only require 3 engines instead of 6 and they’d be smaller and lighter as well(no vacuum nozzle), and a higher payload ratio. For Super Heavy it would also mean no flare out prior to meco, full thrust would be available throughout the flight and the same Starship could be boosted to separation with a smaller SH(or more payload with the same). This is being worked on at many companies, universities, and countries as well as our own military and is being applied to air breathing as well as lox engines. It won’t replace current tech immediately but the shear amount of energy, resources, and intellects directed at it leads me to believe it won’t be long before the size and thrust start scaling up. Detonation has for so long been “a bad thing” that learning to harness it instead of prevent it represents a gap in understanding that needs to be filled(lots of math and empirical data).

 

Nice perspective on the foreground.

 

Agreed. Ben is always pushing the edge!

 

https://twitter.com/tylerg1998/status/1660057851547512832?s=46

 

https://twitter.com/spacex/status/1660240180211531777?s=46

 

A first for a Crewed Dragon mission:
https://twitter.com/spacex/status/1660401510969212929?s=46

 

Apparently they couldn’t turn off the onscreen captions- unfortunate translation from Arabic during the Welcome Ceremony..

 

https://twitter.com/INiallAnderson/status/1660391871900729345?s=20

 

Good article on SpX jumping into the FAA lawsuit as a co-defendant. The motion is included, too:
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/22/spacex-joining-faa-to-fight-environmental-lawsuit-over-starship.html

 

Pieces of the lunar lander that crashed last month have been found:
https://twitter.com/tylerg1998/status/1661025654077374464?s=46

 

Wow, could a Dreamchaser launch actually happen?!?!?
https://twitter.com/sierraspaceco/status/1661061868339838977?s=46

 

Damn, 50 years ago…
https://twitter.com/nasahistory/status/1661054392877957130?s=46