Agamemnon

the engine will have an engine cooling system as well - but it is known how to build one... this thing - the precooler - is a new system - nobody built anything like this before - and thus it need extensive testing - and that is what\'s going on right now... (and it is a crucial part of the engine, because without the aforementioned liquid oxygen, it won\'t be able to work)

no, i haven\'t... an engine cooling system cools down an engine - to prevent overheating, etc... this thing - the precooler - cools down the air entering the engine and liquefies it... the air has to be liquid because a rocket engine uses liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen and can\'t work without liquid oxygen...

actually, it is not an engine cooling system, what they are testing. they are testing cooling of air entering the engine when the vehicle is still in the atmosphere and the engine is working in the air-breathing mode (in a way similar to jet engines, but as it is a rocket engine, it needs liquid oxygen - hence the cooling of air - to liquefy it). the precooler needs to lower the temp of air to -140 deg of celsius, or so... in a fraction of second

if anyone is interested a little bit more in this vehicle, here are two links: the home page of reaction engines - the developer of the plane: http://www.reactionengines.co.uk/ a discussion thread in nasaspaceflight.com about skylon with one or two developers from reaction engines participating: http://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=24621.0

i was waiting if someone will post this thing here as it was on the bbc title page the most important thing is: skylon is planed to be rapidly reusable SSTO...

and the soyuz tma-22 with burbank, shkaplerov and ivanishin just landed successfully...

the next launches are chinese long march with two beidou navigation satellites on 28th and then atlas v with a comm sat for the us military (on 3rd of may)...

and another successful launch: india launched a radar imaging satellite (called RISAT-1) using their PSLV launcher

and the launch was successful

proton launch in about 50 min. - streams already up the spacex launch slipped by a week or so

the next launch is tomorrow (23.4.) at 2218gmt (proton with a commercial comm sat)

actually docking will be completed after leak checks, air quality check and some more checks and then hatch opening

and capture

on nasa tv as well (www.nasa.gov/ntv)

the next launch is russian proton (for ils) with communication satellite yahsat-1b (uae) on 23rd april (22:18:13 UTC) edit: based on previous ils launches the next launch will be livestreamed both on tsenki.com and ilslaunch.com

and the success... solar arrays and antenas confirmed... docking to iss in 2 days

on nasa.gov/ntv as well... btw - it is progress m-15m progress m-15 was launched in 1992...

for now, it is: no and mostly no

photos from rollout of the progress launcher flying on the 20th: http://www.energia.ru/en/iss/iss30/progress_m-15m/photo_04-18.html

- no, you can call one flight hardly a commonality - spacex is not the first company to develop and build a spacecraft/launcher with help from a national agency - there is already several private companies that make profit with launching payloads (and no, spacex is not one of them) to LEO (and beyond) for it to start booming the price for launching a payload to orbit has to go down a few orders... this will not happen with spacex launching cargo to iss (not for now, not until someone comes with new propellant or completely new tech for engines) iirc, in the us, the faa has the authority over the private launchers (spacex\'s falcon, orbital\'s antares) and this stays as such for several more years (just now the two nations able to launch humans are russia and china)... spacex or ula perhaps will change this status but only several years from now (lets say 2017 - that\'s the guestimation by nasa and/or nasa administrator gen. bolden - IF money for ccdev will NOT be cut - as the congress is suggesting) few my thoughts: - private launch providers are necessary, but i think they will not bring any big turnaround... - for a turnaround to happen you need new tech, new propellant (metalic hydrogen? or something else - currently unknown? very far in the future) or perhaps new philosophy (skylon?) - at the moment, spacex is not even the cheapest launch provider (both in absolute prices and in prices for kg)... this means the prices will not go down as some people hope/think (maybe reusability will help, but you need much higher flight rate than it is today) so, it is nice that spacex will fly to iss, but expect nothing special... just one more launch provider in what is quite a big pool already (worldwide), and not even the cheapest one... or the most techn. advanced...

progress (and all iss launches) are on nasa tv as well, with english commentary and translation of russian (french/japan) information... and then of course great live commentary and info one can find on nsf forum

well, the north korean attempt to launch a rocket failed... the next one is russian progress resupply spacecraft for the iss on the 20th

and delta nrol-25 launch moved once again, to tuesday 2312 GMT

atv docking was smooth and successful delta iv launch (originally planned for today - 29.3.) moved one day to the right (to friday - 30.3.)... meaning we will get (if everything goes as planned) 2 launches on friday - proton (0542utc) and delta iv (2238utc)

atv docking in 2 hrs