James Kerman

Welcome to the forum, @<Joseph kerman>. I used to be a believer in colonizing Mars until I realized the difficulties involved - even if you could terraform Mars (no small feat) you would still have the problem of solar wind and cosmic radiation bombardment because of the lack of a magnetosphere. I have read of a proposal of placing a solar shade at one of the LaGrange points (it would need to be many kilometers in diameter) to mitigate this problem but you are still left with a colony that requires just about everything to be delivered from Earth, at constant peril of disaster. Other issues are that we just don't know if animal reproduction is viable at low G's and such an endeavor would require huge amounts of cash and resources. The discussions here on the subject have led me to believe orbital outposts are more viable until we discover better propulsion and energy production methods and we know more about long term space habitation.

Personally I think we need to thoroughly search our own system, in particular deep sample drilling on Mars, Europa, Ganymede, the ice giants and Enceladus, before looking further afield. Our tree of life requires liquid water and until there is evidence of it on Tau Ceti e there are far better targets for research in our own backyard. Life on other worlds will remain a mystery until we have a data set greater than 1.

On reflection a role I can envisage for transport P2P is in bulky cargo, if it has the ability to land and be serviced at mostly unprepared locations. The dimensions of the cargo space in an aircraft precludes some goods that are too heavy or can't be broken down into smaller pieces and it is fairly common in the industry for some companies (generally mining or shipping) to pay if the effect of downed machinery or loss of productivity will cost more than the cost of the flight. Bulky/heavy goods are also prone to being bumped from flights because airlines usually prefer to upset 1 customer than 100.

I worked in international airfreight logistics for years and even though the actual flight might be 4 hours for P2P the paperwork and cargo preparation takes a lot longer than that (days). Also the infrastructure to refuel, service and load would need to be established at the major international cargo hubs before SpaceX could be a viable alternative to the current system.

I'm not sure if it's a mistranslation - do Russian missions have a "warranty period"?

Welcome to the forum, @jnbspace. I agree with Starhawk, the full version is fantastic, cheap and with continued development keeps getting better. I don't justify my KSP addiction to my family, I just wake up 3 hours before they do.

In career mode I usually build a mothership/lander with ISRU for Duna. There was a challenge a few years ago to visit Duna and Ike - you might find inspiration there. Some tips: You will need about 6600dv to land on Duna from the surface of kerbin. This assumes you follow standard procedures: 1. Get to low Kerbin orbit. 2. Depart low Kerbin orbit at the correct phase angle - this means leaving at a time when it is most efficient for a Hoffman maneuver to your destination. 3. Once you have an intercepting course, warp time to the half way point between Kerbin and Duna. Perform a course adjustment: Create a maneuver node 10 or 20 minutes ahead of your vessel - just place it without changing anything. Then click on Duna and select focus view - this will change your view to the destination and should show your plotted course in the sphere of influence of your destination. Rotate your view until you can see both the path through the SOI and the node you just created and you can now use that node to plan and execute a burn that will bring you close to your intended orbit or even into an atmosphere for aerobraking. The course adjustment is usually very cheap on Dv and you get savings by doing your capture burn nearer your destination planet/moon (benefiting from the Oberth effect). You will need about 1700dv to return to Kerbin from Duna (900dv to low Duna orbit, 800dv for return flight) follow steps 1,2,3 again) if you aero brake and capture at Kerbin. If you don't need a pinpoint landing then aero braking and aero capture will save you a lot of fuel. The thin atmosphere means parachutes are not as effective so I use a combination of chutes (set to open higher in the VAB) with a little bit of throttle for the last 100m of descent. You don't need a heat shield or ladders to land on Duna.

Welcome to the forum, @Lankspace. I love the game too and it is responsible for my interest in science and spaceflight. The forum is host to some great amateur astronomers, lots of STEM members and If you enjoy coding, the game has a vibrant modding community. I'm sure you'll fit right in.

Both MarCO cubesats (EVE and WALL-E) have ceased communicating with NASA.

My understanding of the outer space treaty means that host nations are responsible for approving rocket launches. I'd imagine this means NASA would still be the responsible body to approve or deny launches and I can't really see them allowing a crewed mission to fly without robust failure modes, even if they are not a customer.

Insight has now made adjustments to its seismic sensor and has deployed its wind and thermal shield. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

I think the majority of players are using windows/Linux because of the ability to add mods and the speed of updates.

The Statospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) , a modified 747SP carrying 2.7-meter (106-inch) reflecting telescope will attempt to image Titans atmosphere as it flies through the moons shadow, cast on earth this evening. Image Credit: NASA The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has posted an article explaining the mission here: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-01/sofia-flying-telescope-occultation-chasing-shadow-titan/10635802 Update: The mission was successful and the results will be compared with Cassini data to see if Titans atmosphere has changed over time.

Sorry, posted in the wrong thread.

Sorry about that - maybe @bewing has more insight into the problem.

“There is a distinct difference between having an open mind and having a hole in your head from which your brain leaks out.” James Randi

Further research by Professor Jan Kramers, Dr Georgy Belyanin, PhD candidate Tebogo Makhubela and their team of the University of Johannesburg suggests the Hypatia stone may have a pre solar origin.

Welcome to the forum, @RoyCreditor.

Another great video, Mate, Subscribed. Understanding the source of these signals, even if they prove not to be communications but cosmic events, will improve our knowledge of the Universe.

Welcome to our 'collective' @RockKrawler. I'd love to see an IVA created by a pilot.

Welcome @Moostic. I'm glad you have found your path in life and I hope you go on to make great discoveries (and also post about them in the science and spaceflight subforum ).

Welcome @MrSystems. Your spreadsheet surely beats my "Slap it on in the VAB and see" technique. Can't wait to try it.

As at December 2017, there are around 2400 observed trans Neptunian objects. Modeling predicts billions to trillions of these objects so, as per the GB mantra, I think we need moar data. Core region (38–49 AU): inclination (left) and eccentricity (right) vs. semi-major axis (a) Full region on a logarithmic scale from 30 to 1000 AU: inclination (left) and eccentricity (right). Images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Rfassbind

Researchers at the University of Cambridge and the American University of Beirut have proposed an alternate theory for the orbital anomalies that do not require a massive trans-Neptunian object.