Rybo

You can never be too excited for cool stuff being done in space! The really exciting part of the MAVEN aerobrake is that it was never intended to do it in the first place. It doesn't have a heat shield. It's original areocentric capture orbit and subsequent orbital adjustments were all accomplished with it's Aerojet thrusters.

Copy-pasta from the InsideLM article:

I love the "sounds" from space. Absolutely incredible.

The massive vortex at the center of Saturn's north pole hexagon.

Never hurts to apply when the reqs start dropping. The worst they can say is no

Ill have to ask around to be sure, but I believe Lucy funding is from FY2016 and is currently capped. I haven't seen the FY2018 NASA et al. allocations but it's unlikely that it will include any further funding for Lucy, although it probably covers Psyche.

First returned image!

Hello all! Most of you are probably unaware that Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company recently won the contract for the Lucy Spacecraft set to launch in 2021 to visit a handful of Jupiter Trojans. The Lucy team will be fairly small (relatively speaking) given the shrinking budgets of interplanetary missions lately, but LM WILL be hiring new talent in the near future so keep your eyes open for opportunities if you feel you are eligible: http://search.lockheedmartinjobs.com The initial hiring wave will be primarily experienced engineers to design and integrate the bus and payload systems, and a second wave a year or so later will be build and test technicians such as solderers, cable and harness fabricators, and ground test equipment fabrication and installation technicians. If you don't feel qualified but want to be qualified it may be worth obtaining an IPC or J-STD solder certificate through your local community college if it's offered, or getting any job in electronics fabrication, repair, or installation and gaining some professional experience. I must admit I'm not on the forums all that often but I'll do my best to answer any questions you may have. Cheers!

If there's anything you should know about this business in the real world it's that it is extremely dynamic. WorldView-4 is now slated for the 11th of this month. The launch date of the 9th exceeds the battery life of the batteries on the Atlas and they must be removed, conditioned, and recharged at the ULA battery lab in Denver. Normally this could induce up to several months delay but instead the WV-4 team has coordinated with the NROL-79 team and they will be removing the batteries from AV-068 which still have several months remaining in their lifespan. This may or may not further delay NROL-79 depending on how quickly the battery lab can get them turned around. The ripple effect of the fire is incredible.

WV-4 bumped to the 9th of this month. NROL-79 moved up a day to Jan. 26th.

WV-4 is launching on the 6th of this month. NROL-79 was delayed because WV-4 was delayed and the new tentative date is Jan/27. Hope that clarifies.

A new little birdie told me it's now moved up to Jan/27.

As I'm sure most of you are aware, Worldview is scheduled to go on 11/6. Furthermore, a little birdie told me that NROL-79 is tentatively scheduled for Feb/14.

Further update...probably the last for a while since I'm finally headed back to home base. VAFB is still a madhouse of contractors and people all trying to figure things out. SLC-3 is still on generator power and there is still no firm date for WV4 (which will almost certainly delay the NROL launch in December). At this point the pessimist in me suspects that WV4 will be lucky to launch before the end of the year and that NROL-79 will be early spring. I'll keep my ears open back home but I certainly won't have access to the information that I have here.

Today I was able to get some more info about a few things. Currently, WV-4 launch remains unscheduled but is likely to occur sometime between 10/10-10/15. The only thing currently preventing launch is that the SLC is still operating on generator power. The power lines themselves are down because the fire burned the poles to the ground. Launch can't proceed until they are repaired and they are back on the VAFB UPS system (uninterruptible power supply). If those repairs take longer than expected for some reason, launch date could slip later into October or November. If it were to slip even later there is talk about reorganizing the entire schedule to ensure that other ULA customer needs are met. ULA has 1 primary Atlas V launch team and they work both coasts. With 6 total Atlas V launches in the next 5 months (WV4, NROL-79, SBIRS, GOES, Echostar, and AEHF), you can see why they might need to change the scheduling to make their other customers (read: their customers with larger budgets) happy.

Didn't really get much info other than they (LM, ULA, 30th Space Wing) have been having meetings all day today that are expected to continue into tomorrow. It's still pretty smoky and you can still see what looks like active flames but it'll be easier to tell tonight when it's dark.

I got back from Sequoia NF today. I highly recommend it! It's probably the most surreal place I've ever been. I'll get some pics up after I get them off of my phone. I confirmed with my supervisor that base is mostly back to normal. Still a huge firefighting presence and movement on south base is limited in some areas. I'll try to get info on potential WV4 launch date and window if I can.

@Kryten Everything north of Ocean Ave is North Base and likewise everything south of Ocean is South Base. The prison is southeast of North Base right here: https://www.google.com/maps/@34.6794839,-120.5130258,14.99z I talked to my supervisor on the phone this morning (I'm still on vacation, just catching up) who said that they think the third fire was caused by the second fire. I don't fully understand how since the two locations are at least 3 miles apart. Regular news reports are saying it was also a downed power line which seems much more plausible to me. The Santa Lucia gate (what we all call "the prison gate") is closed to all traffic. Luckily I rarely use that gate...It's where all of the trucks come in and it gets really congested in the morning.

Haha I didn't even think of that.

DAMN! I was mostly working in 8337 today and never saw anything when I left around 3. This is the first I'm even hearing of it but I was at Chumash from like 4 to like 20 minutes ago. I'm also a bit intoxicated though so maybe that's it haha. Glad I took tomorrow off, hope it doesn't spread too much since I usually work southeast of there at the JSOC at the corner of California and 13th. @Kryten in my absence this weekend while I look at huge trees I pass the torch to you to keep this thread updated with any info you get.

Update as of 9/22 at 12PM local Despite the wind I hear that huge are being made. I haven't been able to attend any of the space wing or fire briefings today due to work commitments but I'm hoping to be able to attend the one this evening. People at the BX told me there has only been minor acreage growth and containment is at 75%. All the major lines held overnight and are still holding. The tempo certainly hasn't decreased and drops are still quite regular and base is still buzzing with emergency vehicles and helos. It's like a non-stop airshow. I'll try to get one more update tonight before the weekend and then I'm going to enjoy adult beverages and a trip to meet General Sherman!

Update as of 9/21 at 6PM local Containment continues to generally improve but some setbacks are expected tomorrow and/or Friday with high winds (25-30mph gusting to 40-50mph). Crews are prepping by doubling fire lines/breaks and the aviation component of the fight has been bolstered by an additional DC-10 that made several passes today. I'm not sure where they are flying from since, to my knowledge, none of the closest airports (Lompoc, Santa Maria, Santa Barbara, etc) have adequate runway length. Luckily there are still a slew of other aircraft and helos supporting and a water or retardant drop is happening at least every 10-15 minutes, sometimes back to back to back. It's actually really cool to watch them do their thing...the professionalism and sense of urgency is profound. Unfortunately the on-scene fire chief says 100% containment is not expected until at least the end of the month. Col Moss clarified that that DOES NOT mean that launch can't proceed on the 26th if the necessary people can take time to stand launch duty and weather, air quality, LV, and SC, etc. are GO. He declined to comment on when he expected launch would occur and said he stands by the initial projection of no earlier than the 26th. He further clarified that the launch conditions must be satisfactory to all parties, not just the wing.

I haven't been following their investigation too closely, but I'm certainly rooting for them. Despite not seeing the cause yet, they still have access to WAY more information than they would have had if the booster had launched. Transmitting data over a physical umbilical is much easier, faster, and more efficient than sending it UHF once those umbilical lines are pulled at launch. At least that's the case with an Atlas. I'm not familiar with their processes and sequences so perhaps they do something differently (but I don't know why they would). There isn't really anything out there to worry about. Lots of farmland mostly, although I'm not sure what the crops are. Best guess is soy or peanuts or some other small plant like that. There are a few structures around those fields but nothing noteworthy like a neighborhood. The biggest building I think is a large white barn that I think is used to store their field tractors. The hydrazine tanks are fine....you would know if they weren't Hydrazine makes big booms.

Super sad, but if you've ever driven through that roundabout it's easy to see how it could have happened. There are accidents there pretty frequently. https://www.google.com/maps/@34.664665,-120.4078546,233m/data=!3m1!1e3 As a side note, if you're ever visiting there is a kickass little strawberry stand that's usually set up 200-300 yards west of there. I'm not sure the guy even speaks English but I'm confident that they're the best strawberries on this planet. @Mitchz95 I wouldn't use that as a baseline to guess how long it will take. Generally speaking, in-flight failures are significantly harder to diagnose than a rocket sitting on the pad that is physically connected to a network. That said, I wouldn't be surprised if they don't launch again until early next year.

TBD.