tater Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 (edited) I set time stamp to start where they talk about SpaceX. Not much new here. Engines going on orbital SH/SS in the next few weeks. Expecting to make 1 set of ship/booster per month by end of year (vs 2 months now). SpaceX has ~12,000 employees. Edited April 19, 2022 by tater Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 We know what this probably means seeing that B7 is back in the high bay! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 (edited) Remember Zuma? It was a highly classified satellite of an unspecified US agency and not flying under any specific launch program (for us in the public at least), which despite a successful launch on a Falcon 9 in early 2018 supposedly didn't separate from the payload adapter that Northrop built for it and reentered in the atmosphere a few days later still attached to the second stage. This odd event, together with the extreme secrecy of the project (even its existance wasn't known until less than a month before its original launch date), naturally caused conspiracy theories to spread left and right on internet, with the most widespread one being that the satellite's purpose was testing a stealth system to satellites from being seen in any way from the ground and that it did complete its mission. I'm bringing this up today because a new piece of the puzzle has come out: NRO has in fact just recognised Zuma, intentionally or not, as a (present or past) satellite of their fleet This only increases the questions about the payload: NRO has its own launch program, NROL, of which Zuma wasn't recognised as being part of for more than four years; this is especially odd considering that NROL missions had started flying on Falcon 9s a year before Zuma. What was on the satellite that was so secret that couldn't even be declared to be part of your own launch program of secret satellites? Edited April 19, 2022 by Beccab Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 (edited) Also, there's a section in the Decadal Strategy for Planetary Science and Astrobiology (which came out today) about Starship, and which recommends NASA begins planning immediatly for science missions that take advantage of Starships test flights beyond LEO which "could be much different than those designed for traditional NASA flight opportunities with their stringent mass and volume constraints." There's also this bit here, many pages later: Am I wrong to think that "high energy launch capability, or its equivalent" refers to orbital refueling considering the mentions in the rest of the paragraph? Edited April 19, 2022 by Beccab Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 Sorry for triple posting, but there's another spacex related part of the decadal survey: the Uranus orbiter and probe, probably the most important and likely to be followed suggestion of the study, is baselined on Falcon Heavy Assuming the design is accepted and FH selected, I doubt NASA will accept switching vehicle with Starship for one of the most important flagship mission ever; this means that by 2032 it could be one of the last FH launches before retirement Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 1 hour ago, Beccab said: Sorry for triple posting, but there's another spacex related part of the decadal survey: the Uranus orbiter and probe, probably the most important and likely to be followed suggestion of the study, is baselined on Falcon Heavy That is an extremely Kerbal-looking space probe. Are those a couple of FL-T200s? Curious how they rise to the challenge of naming this thing without eliciting muted giggles from the back row... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikegarrison Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 3 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said: That is an extremely Kerbal-looking space probe. Are those a couple of FL-T200s? Curious how they rise to the challenge of naming this thing without eliciting muted giggles from the back row... What's so giggle-inducing about "Uranus Probe"? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 excuse me if i'm not getting the context right, i'm a little behind on space news. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeSchmuckatelli Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 12 minutes ago, Random-E said: excuse me if i'm not getting the context right, i'm a little behind on space news. I must have had a brain fart - because I don't have a clue what you guys are talking about Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minmus Taster Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 1 hour ago, Beccab said: Sorry for triple posting, but there's another spacex related part of the decadal survey: the Uranus orbiter and probe, probably the most important and likely to be followed suggestion of the study, is baselined on Falcon Heavy Assuming the design is accepted and FH selected, I doubt NASA will accept switching vehicle with Starship for one of the most important flagship mission ever; this means that by 2032 it could be one of the last FH launches before retirement A surprise to be sure but a (very) welcome one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mikegarrison Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 10 minutes ago, Minmus Taster said: A surprise to be sure but a (very) welcome one Uranus probes are often a surprise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrandedonEarth Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 (edited) 55 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said: Curious how they rise to the challenge of naming this thing witho By getting the giggles out of our systems now, of course… Sigh… Spoiler Edited April 19, 2022 by StrandedonEarth Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Minmus Taster Posted April 19, 2022 Share Posted April 19, 2022 (edited) 7 minutes ago, StrandedonEarth said: By getting the giggles out of our systems now, of course… Then get it out of our systems we will, so without further ado... URANUS ORBITER?!?!?! HAHAHAHA so funny & KINDA SUS DON'T YOU THINK?!?!?! Jokes aside, I'm already getting Cassini flashbacks & it was only just recommended lmao. Spoiler Here have a nice Cassini image from one of the final orbits, I wonder what a photo like this would be like at Uranus: Also PLEASE tell me this thing will get a better name if it comes to be, naming a rocket "Space Launch System" is pretty bad but the current name would just be plain disgusting Edited April 19, 2022 by Minmus Taster Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Geonovast Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 A great deal of content regarding lunar mining has been moved over here: Guys, we know that a thread like this will spur a lot of other conversation, but once it gets past a couple of posts, please move it over to another thread, especially after a nudge from a moderator. Please continue the mining conversation over there. Thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 10 hours ago, Minmus Taster said: Also PLEASE tell me this thing will get a better name if it comes to be, naming a rocket "Space Launch System" is pretty bad but the current name would just be plain disgusting Let's call it "Mega Uranus Probe", it worked for SLS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JoeSchmuckatelli Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 With all the SLS analogies - if applicable - Uranus won't get probed for a long time Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 Also: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 (edited) Interestingly, in a single launch Starship could theorically launch all the upmass of SpaceX during Q1 Edited April 20, 2022 by Beccab Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beccab Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CatastrophicFailure Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 6 hours ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said: With all the SLS analogies - if applicable - Uranus won't get probed for a long time Well, 20+ years is kinda the best case scenario right now anyway, so... Someone born this year could conceivably be an intern on the team when it actually gets there. But then again... say this gets switched to Starship... How fast could it conceivably get to Uranus with a 100-tonne braking stage lobbed by a fully-fueled Starship? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ultimate Steve Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 15 minutes ago, CatastrophicFailure said: Someone born this year could conceivably be an intern on the team when it actually gets there. You don't even need the timescales of an outer solar system mission to get this same effect! I was really disappointed when I had to face the reality that space stuff takes a long, long time. In elementary school I read a book talking about NASA's plans for a moon base by the year 2020. Back when I was first starting to get into space, I remeber back in high school I read about the SLS EM-1 launching in 2018 or something and I was so excited but bummed out because it was still a long time away! Same with Falcon Heavy, although it is up and running now. Even much later when I knew a decent amount of space but was still optimistic and naive, I may have actually believed those early Starship dates for a minute or two. And now here I am, halfway through an engineering degree, and assuming I make it through and can get a job in the space industry, I could be working on one of those things I was so excited for in high school, still frustrated that it's taking so long. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StrandedonEarth Posted April 20, 2022 Share Posted April 20, 2022 7 minutes ago, Ultimate Steve said: You don't even need the timescales of an outer solar system mission to get this same effect! I was really disappointed when I had to face the reality that space stuff takes a long, long time. In elementary school I read a book talking about NASA's plans for a moon base by the year 2020. Back when I was first starting to get into space, I remeber back in high school I read about the SLS EM-1 launching in 2018 or something and I was so excited but bummed out because it was still a long time away! Same with Falcon Heavy, although it is up and running now. Even much later when I knew a decent amount of space but was still optimistic and naive, I may have actually believed those early Starship dates for a minute or two. And now here I am, halfway through an engineering degree, and assuming I make it through and can get a job in the space industry, I could be working on one of those things I was so excited for in high school, still frustrated that it's taking so long. Yeah, someone needs to mod the Matrix to include a “Warp to…” button… Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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