- Aug 28, 2014
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- 26,097
Time to catch up on the space race.
1) Commercial Crew Program: Mark May 27th on your calendar because that is the date of the historic first launch of Americans from American soil since a shuttle launch in 2011. Yay 'merica. SpaceX will launch the Crew Dragon Capsule aboard a Falcon 9 rocket for a 7 Day visit to the ISS. You may ask what happened to Boeing and their Starliner Capsule? Well, the people at Boeing are incompetent. During the last test launch they discovered a S/W problem that would have killed everybody on board (if it had crew) had it not been discovered during the flight (due to another fault BTW). The bothersome thing was that it was a basic part of the mission and not a special case. Boeing should have discovered the problem on the ground during test-integration. Because of the glaring error Boeing has been grounded until a thorough review of Boeing's process by NASA.
2) The Artemis Program: The goal to land humans on the moon got a bit of a boost recently. A key component of the Artemis program was to build the Lunar Gateway, a space station orbiting the moon, that would serve as a transfer station. A lunar lander would be parked at the station and crew would launch to the station and then transfer over the the lander. In order to speed up the goal of landing astronauts by 2024 NASA has decided to skip the need to stop at the station. The station will still be built but won't be used for the initial missions. As such they have awarded three contracts to develop a lander that can be launched without the need for the station. Those contracts have been awarded to Dynetics, Blue Origin, and... wait for it... SpaceX. Interestingly Boeing was left out most likely because they are idiots. The Blue Origin solution is most like the Apollo lander in that it leaves the lander on the moon. Dynetics has the most interesting in that the entire lander launches back so would be completely reusable. SpaceX plans to modify a StarShip to land on the moon and deliver cargo. SpaceX is would be able to deliver a helluva lot more cargo. It will be interesting to watch that development.
3) Starship: Speeking of SpaceX the Starship went through two static fire tests this week and we should be seeing a 150M hop soon. Keep in mind the Starship is only the top half (upper stage if you will) of the Starship rocket. I don't know when they'll start testing the booster section. Both will be needed for the lunar mission.
4) Speaking of the Lunar Gateway and SpaceX: SpaceX has been awarded a contract to build a cargo craft for supplying the Gateway. SpaceX will modify a Dragon capsule for the purpose and will be launchable on the SLS.
5) Starlink: SpaceX's Starlink program is going along well with Musk saying that he thinks that they will be able to start signing up subscribers later this year. Starlink, of course, puts 1000's of small satellites in LEO in order to supply internet anywhere. Musk is banking on the success of Starlink to fund the Mars mission.
6) SLS: The 70 metric ton elephant in the room. SLS is years late and bIllions over budget. Not surprising since Boeing is the prime on this cost-plus contract. The SLS was supposed to be ready in 2017 and now they are talking late 2021. Nobody likes the SLS except the senators who have managed to mandate the use of vendors in their districts. It is totally expendable with a nearly $4B cost per launch. Other vendors claim they can do it for 100's of millions per launch. In any case the SLS is suppose to be NASA's ride of the future to deliver crew and cargo to the Lunar Gateway. Hopefully they will cancel this boon dongle after the initial set of flights. Supposedly, most all the components have been fairly well tested and our ready to go together but we will see.
7) A AE A-12: I case you don't know Elon just had a son and that's his name. Apparently mom and dad disagree on how to pronounce it. I won't go in to what it means.
1) Commercial Crew Program: Mark May 27th on your calendar because that is the date of the historic first launch of Americans from American soil since a shuttle launch in 2011. Yay 'merica. SpaceX will launch the Crew Dragon Capsule aboard a Falcon 9 rocket for a 7 Day visit to the ISS. You may ask what happened to Boeing and their Starliner Capsule? Well, the people at Boeing are incompetent. During the last test launch they discovered a S/W problem that would have killed everybody on board (if it had crew) had it not been discovered during the flight (due to another fault BTW). The bothersome thing was that it was a basic part of the mission and not a special case. Boeing should have discovered the problem on the ground during test-integration. Because of the glaring error Boeing has been grounded until a thorough review of Boeing's process by NASA.
2) The Artemis Program: The goal to land humans on the moon got a bit of a boost recently. A key component of the Artemis program was to build the Lunar Gateway, a space station orbiting the moon, that would serve as a transfer station. A lunar lander would be parked at the station and crew would launch to the station and then transfer over the the lander. In order to speed up the goal of landing astronauts by 2024 NASA has decided to skip the need to stop at the station. The station will still be built but won't be used for the initial missions. As such they have awarded three contracts to develop a lander that can be launched without the need for the station. Those contracts have been awarded to Dynetics, Blue Origin, and... wait for it... SpaceX. Interestingly Boeing was left out most likely because they are idiots. The Blue Origin solution is most like the Apollo lander in that it leaves the lander on the moon. Dynetics has the most interesting in that the entire lander launches back so would be completely reusable. SpaceX plans to modify a StarShip to land on the moon and deliver cargo. SpaceX is would be able to deliver a helluva lot more cargo. It will be interesting to watch that development.
3) Starship: Speeking of SpaceX the Starship went through two static fire tests this week and we should be seeing a 150M hop soon. Keep in mind the Starship is only the top half (upper stage if you will) of the Starship rocket. I don't know when they'll start testing the booster section. Both will be needed for the lunar mission.
4) Speaking of the Lunar Gateway and SpaceX: SpaceX has been awarded a contract to build a cargo craft for supplying the Gateway. SpaceX will modify a Dragon capsule for the purpose and will be launchable on the SLS.
5) Starlink: SpaceX's Starlink program is going along well with Musk saying that he thinks that they will be able to start signing up subscribers later this year. Starlink, of course, puts 1000's of small satellites in LEO in order to supply internet anywhere. Musk is banking on the success of Starlink to fund the Mars mission.
6) SLS: The 70 metric ton elephant in the room. SLS is years late and bIllions over budget. Not surprising since Boeing is the prime on this cost-plus contract. The SLS was supposed to be ready in 2017 and now they are talking late 2021. Nobody likes the SLS except the senators who have managed to mandate the use of vendors in their districts. It is totally expendable with a nearly $4B cost per launch. Other vendors claim they can do it for 100's of millions per launch. In any case the SLS is suppose to be NASA's ride of the future to deliver crew and cargo to the Lunar Gateway. Hopefully they will cancel this boon dongle after the initial set of flights. Supposedly, most all the components have been fairly well tested and our ready to go together but we will see.
7) A AE A-12: I case you don't know Elon just had a son and that's his name. Apparently mom and dad disagree on how to pronounce it. I won't go in to what it means.
