Mitchz95

Maybe a dumb question, but when they do tests like these, how does the engine not go flying away? Especially since it doesn't have a payload on top. Do they just weigh it down as much as they can beforehand and hope it's enough?

And touchdown!

Having a similar issue in my (modded) Career game. The In/Out option doesn't appear when I try to transfer fuel: Possibly related: trying to transfer TAC Life Support resources doesn't work either -- the In/Out options are there, but nothing happens when I toggle them. EDIT: Reloading the game fixed the TAC problem, but not the fuel problem.

We often refer to stars as being red, yellow, blue, etc. But the sun, a "yellow" star, actually looks white when viewed from outside the atmosphere. So what color would the other star types be in unfiltered light?

How about Peregrine?

A moon the size of a car isn't much of a moon. Find one the size of Texas and then we'll talk.

Remember when Boeing was the reliable one and SpaceX the reckless underdog?

I don't doubt the orbit would be unstable, but it's for a soft science setting, so doesn't really matter. Anyway, going by mass, would it make more sense for this world to referred to as a planet or a moon?

Hypothetically, could a celestial body in the L2 point of a hot Jupiter be permanently shaded from its sun? If so, would this make more sense as a planet, or moon of said hot Jupiter? And what type of star would be optimal for this scenario?

Wait, what??

M-types are flare stars, aren't they?

I like it. Sleek, minimalistic, and reminiscent of Starfleet uniforms.

This was already posted in the SpaceX thread, but it's relevant here...

A spaceship without windows? What the hell is the point??

Sure, but where's the fun in that?

I assumed you were exaggerating but... yeah, the difference in apparent quality is striking.

Obligatory xkcd:

IIRC, Mark Watney had plenty of vitamins to take care of his nutritional needs, including protein. The potatoes were just for calories.

Those look like heat radiator panels to me. Could be wrong though.

The sheer scale of these impacts breaks my brain whenever I think about them.

With the advent of truly reusable launch vehicles, two things are very likely to happen over the next decade or two: 1) Launching stuff into space is going to be way cheaper than ever before. 2) There's going to be a LOT more stuff in orbit. We all saw the concerns about what effect Starlink would have on astronomy. Even if Starlink itself turns out to be not a big deal, we know Kuiper is coming soon and presumably lots of other mega-constellations will follow. With these in mind, it seems likely that we'll soon have both the desire and the ability to launch space telescopes more commonly, and to higher orbits as well. So does this mean ground-based telescopes, like the controversial one planned in Mauna Kea, obsolete in the near-term?

So there wasn't a livestream this time? Disappointing, I was waiting for one and missed it. But hey! Starhopper hopped!

Not sure if it counts as a trailer, but this is concept footage for the Three-Body Problem animated series being developed by YooZoo Entertainment. It looks very true to the spirit of the books, so I'm incredibly excited! Be warned, it pretty heavily spoils the first two books of the series.

The Dark Forest theory argues that any civilization with a sense of self-preservation must immediately exterminate any others they encounter, for fear that the other will do the same to them. Covert infiltration of a technologically-inferior civ might be a stopgap, but depending on how different their physiology is, understanding and befriending them may be impossible a lot of the time. And even if we pull it off, how can we be sure they won't change their mind and annihilatate us a century down the road, too suddenly for us to respond to?

How much faster could Dragonfly get to Titan if it launched on a Starship and refueled in orbit? Eight years is a long time to wait.