SunlitZelkova

To expand upon at @DDE's reply, Mars Direct actually does have such a feature. It would look like this, but with the TMI booster tethered in place of the Apollo CSM variant- Source of the image- http://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2019/01/apollo-to-mars-venus-north-american.html I think he means crewed expedition, neither robotic exploration nor full scale permanent habitation.

I have a couple of issues with the comments of this researcher, and to a certain extent, with the way this study concluded itself, at least with the information I have on it via this article. The comment about evolution in these new communities feels a tad silly, although I may be mistaken about the context he is making it within. "Real" evolution ("actual" changes in the species, and not just things like the fact that humans are, on average, taller now than a few centuries before) takes millions of years. And the plastic these communities rely on will decompose (well, not really decompose, but be reduced to such a state in which these creatures can no longer live on them) within 500 years. For evolution to actually occur we would have to keep dumping plastic into the ocean in perpetuity, assuming humanity/or at least humans capable of producing plastic are still even around in 500 years (humans probably will be, not so sure personally about the latter). Second, it does not appear that the researchers actually examined the health of the organisms- just whether they were there or not. Humans "live" in places like Cubatão, Brazil (I suggest looking it up if you have not heard of it already), but that doesn't mean it is a good or healthy (or sustainable) thing. Living entirely on plastic can not be good for plants, nor the animals. Even if these communities were to survive for the entire length of the existence of their "base" (the plastic), whether they would suffer reproductive or other issues that threaten the entire population of a species prior to the base's disintegration could be a potential threat to their existence. On a separate note, while I think "life" as a whole can be said to be tenacious, I don't think this is an example of that, because species aren't that tenacious. If you look at history, over hundreds of millions of years, there are impressive examples of evolution and survival of species throughout the ages. That's probably what most people think of when they say things like "life is tenacious", and then they put it into the context of the current crisis on Earth. But it doesn't really work to cram that into the space of two or three centuries. So while even if a worst case outcome of ocean acidification and climate change were to occur, "life" (just life, even if that is limited to simple organisms) could indeed survive, the survival of extant species (including humans) is much more questionable and unlikely. ------------- By the way, thanks for sharing these articles in general. It's cool that a thread about Moon wobble has spawned so many different interesting discussions, and turned into a running news thread of sorts.

I don't think currently proposed NASA operated space telescopes are enough. There are about a thousand professional observatories (radio and optical) around the world right now, with 600 of them in the US. In contrast, for the US, there are just three radio space telescopes and three optical ones (soon to be four). The balance is presumably worse in other countries. Even if there is "a eye" a lot will still be lost if the others are unable to search and observe or are hampered in doing so. To use an analogy to better convey what I am thinking, in a naval operation, if you have one reconnaissance plane, you "have eyes", and that's fine, but you are certainly disadvantaged as opposed to having 16 of them. There is a lot that is going to be missed and you won't know as much. So for me at least, government space telescopes alone won't eliminate the issue. Depending on how much Starship actually brings down the total cost of spacecraft, it could be possible to "replace" terrestrial telescopes with an orbital counterpart. But operating costs don't change, so I'm not sure whether that would actually be feasible, especially given the likely (I haven't actually looked) lower budgets private organizations operating observatories (like universities) have.

$396,000,530?

It also reminds me of the monster from Stranger Things.

"Retro" is really "in" these days.

I can't answer exactly (quick internet search did not reveal when EENT is), but here are some personal experiences that may help in answering it. Between 12:15 AM and 1:30 AM PST is often when I would use my telescope during the most recent summer. I often take breaks, and during this time I can still see satellites/space objects regularly, both high and low inclination. And then on other days I would just go out for a short while to see the stars, at between 3:00 AM and 4:15 AM PST, and satellites would still be very clearly visible. This is while living reasonably close to a large city with the associated light pollution, while gazing at the stars only a dozen meters away from an LED street lamp (albeit facing away from it)!

In English and other European languages, that name was the creation of seventeenth and eighteenth century European sailors using it to sail primarily to China for trade. Presumably due to traditionalism in European and American institutions/governments, the name has stuck. In Japanese *we* call it "South China Sea" (南シナ海). I couldn't find the exact reason with a quick internet search, but I don't think Japan really had a presence there until it opened up in the late 1800s, and as a result of the campaign to modernize (and thus Westernize to a certain extent) they presumably just used the Western name for the sea. In recent history in China it is called the "South Sea", Vietnam calls it the "East Sea", while presumably also due to historical trade reasons, it is traditionally called the South China Sea in Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia, however, in the Philippines, the parts the are inside the Philippine EEZ are called the West Philippine Sea. However, also in Indonesia in 2017, the government renamed the portions inside the Indonesian EEZ to "North Natuna Sea" (after the Natuna Islands). Just as the Baltic Sea is called the East Sea in German, and the West Sea in Estonia, countries that actually border the South China Sea will continue to call it what they want to. So what European language speakers wish to call it casually is kind of up to them I suppose. IIRC, legally however, everyone is required to refer to it (in court proceedings and what not) as the South China Sea a la various international agreements.

Well, yes. But to put it into perspective, for them, it is the equivalent of if China decided to regularly sail its own warships between the mainland and Hawaii, or if Russia decided to sail guided missile destroyers into the Caribbean or Gulf of Mexico. Legal, but spooky. This metaphor ignores the disputed nature of the South China Sea, which makes the situation a little different.

I actually deleted the craft file, but this is roughly what it looked like. I used a very steep reentry and almost made it through, but at the last moment the fairing exploded. The probe core inside did survive, but that just wasn't as satisfying. The probe core is the root part. My reentry angle was very steep (close to vertical) by accident. As mentioned above, it almost made it through, but exploded right before passing below 25km. In any case however, thanks for the design tips!

This is just the way relationships between great powers work. On Earth, the US regularly sails into the Baltic and Black Seas, as well as into the South China Sea. China and Russia have recently reciprocated with their big joint cruise through and around Japan, and simultaneously a small Chinese surface group sailed right up to the edge of US territorial waters near the Aleutian islands. Russia conducts long range training flights of Tu-95s relatively often into NORAD airspace (or at least ADIZ), and the tactical aircraft of China and Russia often fly into the ADIZs of their neighboring nations. Likewise, the US flies B-52s and other aircraft into China's ADIZ from time to time. Russia doesn't have an ADIZ but I have seen claims B-52s have flown near Russian airspace, although it should be noted their accuracy is dubious. During the Cold War, Tu-16s or Tu-95s flying into NATO ADIZs or airspace was common. During the Nixon years, B-52s would fly straight towards the Soviet Union, not turning around until the last moment- as diplomatic maneuvers to establish detente were going on! Space warfare has become vital to modern military operations since the Gulf War. So it is natural we will begin to see combat in that arena, just as armies possessing small numbers of early planes to use for reconnaissance evolved into the massive air arms of WWI. The things mentioned in the report are just the space equivalents of the above mentioned operations. In regards to blinding/jamming satellites however, this is not abnormal either. During the Cold War when Tu-16 reconnaissance planes would try to fly over (directly over) US carrier groups to photograph them, American naval interceptors would often fly dangerously close under the Tu-16 to try and block their cameras. This is just the space version of that, and I don't think it is particularly shocking or destabilizing. ---------------- Personal opinion comments with a little rant sprinkled in- complaints about space warfare from the Space Force come off like if signals officers during WWI had complained about their reconnaissance planes being shot down. If you put *a* military asset, combat or support, somewhere, you can expect a counter of some kind.

Is the standard SM-3 capable of targeting satellites?

I want to build an R-7 replica, but the last time I tried to build an ICBM, the reentry vehicle, which used a fairing with a probe core inside, burned up. Do I need to use nose cone parts? Does launching ICBMs require a very delicate trajectory to prevent the RV from burning up?

Well, it is hard to say for sure, but aircraft that were historically produced only in small numbers and then cancelled because of the end of the war would become frontline aircraft. For prop aircraft, this would namely be the P-51H. For jets, you would have the P-80, with the P-59 still cancelled in order to increase P-80 production. The P-80 was developed with little to no British support, so it could be expected to look the same despite the change in the timeline. Assuming Germany produces aircraft like the Messerschmitt P.1101 as a successor or supplement to the Me 262, America would probably build its own "next gen" replacement for the P-80. Without data from the Me 262, development might have taken a little longer, but a sort of pseudo-F-86 might have come to fruition, less sleek, but superficially similar.

I would say yes. In the land domain, its basically just "another Russia", and there are few places where the US Army might actually meet the PLAGF on the battlefield anyways. For the USMC, prior to the PLA's modernization, they (China) already had things like shore based AShMs anyways, so I don't think there any particularly "shocking" new problems at hand for them to solve. But for air and sea, it is something the Air Force and Navy never expected to happen. The USSR and Russia had/have, to a certain extent, very defensively oriented militaries, aside from Western Europe, they didn't really have the ability to "go" anywhere else in a meaningful manner. With China on the other hand, they are basically constructing a military designed to conduct missions more akin to the US- power projection. This is exacerbated by the geography of the region and the nature of how American force deployment worked there until now. From the 1950s until now, forces in the Pacific seem to have been structured around halting Soviet forays into the area and responding to regional crises (the ones that still have not been resolved at present), but it was assumed that the enemy would have relatively inferior equipment and tactics (traditional Soviet client state level), that is, it would be the Korean War in terms of the power balance but with better bullets. Now, its more like fighting against the Empire of Japan in WWII (technologically on par with the US, broad power projection capabilities), something that is very expensive and that US naval and air forces in the Pacific have not been structured to do, and, in fact, post-WWII naval technology has not been focused towards. Likewise, most post-WWII aircraft seem to have been designed around the tactical frontlines of Western Europe, not the enormous distances of the Pacific, and this too presents a major issue.

Blessed! Obviously this my personal opinion, and you are entitled to yours. That’s not to say that I don’t like rockets that taper up to the top fully, but new shapes once in awhile are cool too.

This version still uses a rocket engine in the second phase of flight. So for an ICBM at least, this wouldn’t work, and in any case, it is just going to get detected by radar and maybe ESM equipment, which will allow for early warning and interception. But for short ranges, it should. The only downside is that it is very unwieldy- I don’t think you can plop it down on a TEL-chassis and drive it around. But, there are short range BMD radars too, so it will still get detected and intercepted anyways.

Within this context, Apollo CM and LM are then products of North American Aviation (eventually became part of Boeing) and Grumman (now Northrop Grumman). However, the CM and LM were both built specifically for NASA and utilized government operated testing facilities, and of course could not be launched without using government operated support facilities. So this might be where “government stuff” would be correct. SLS and Orion, at least, would then also be government stuff. They cannot be launched without using government operated support facilities, like the VAB. So at the very least, a Lego SLS set in time for Artemis II should be feasible. On the other hand, a Lego Lunar Starship would be more difficult due to licensing issues, as it is a truly privately built spacecraft.

I have not seen any evidence that Star Wars, Disney, or anyone for that matter have asked Lego to make sets for them. In the 2000s at least, it was Lego approaching them, but not the other way around. If Lego was able to make a Lunar Module on time to release with the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11, certainly they can make an SLS on time to release with Artemis II and a Lunar Starship for Artemis III. I recall that there are some aviation-tank-ship military related video games that actually do include things like aircraft built by Bell, Boeing, Lockheed, etc., without licensing. I'm not sure how that works for physical products though.

In the United States, there were a number of proposals for robotic missions to explore asteroids or comets in the 1970s or 1980s, such as the following- http://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2015/03/missions-to-comet-darrest-asteroid-eros.html https://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2015/08/exploring-asteroids-multiple-asteroid.html http://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2015/03/preparing-for-halley-cometary-explorer.html http://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2015/03/earth-approaching-asteroids-as-targets.html Vega 1 and 2 flew to Halley's Comet, but were there any proposals before this? Have there been any since? Also, have there been any asteroid defence studies made in the USSR or Russia? I am particularly curious if there was any analog to this, perhaps involving either the N-1 or Energia. http://spaceflighthistory.blogspot.com/2015/06/mit-saves-world-project-icarus-1967.html

They have three, possibly four years though. They seem to be capable of moving decently fast, the sets released in time for Star Wars: The Force Awakens were not nightmarish in quality*, nor have the Mandalorian and Bad Batch themed set(s)*, which were more or less released alongside those two shows (within 6 months of the show's premiere at least (although it could have been faster), I don't recall the exact dates). I would be more worried about getting licensing from SpaceX. It could also require Boeing and Lockheed Martin's approval, depending on if the SLS were to have an Orion inside or not. *It should be noted that this is based on just a few reviews and the opinions of Lego Star Wars fans could vary.

What do you think the possible names might be for the Next Generation Crewed Spacecraft and the crewed lunar lander? My KSP replica of the NGCS is currently called "神箭" (Shenjian), which is just pulled from what Wikipedia claims the Long March series was renamed to in the 90s (but I have never heard that btw, so I can only assume it is false info lol). Once I build it, I am planning to name the lunar lander "天箭" ("Tianjian", "Heavenly Arrow(?)") (based on the Shenzhou-Tianzhou dynamic) although that might be nonsensical. I am not familiar enough with the Chinese language(s)/space history/mythology/spacecraft naming conventions to come up with a good one.

I think the reason there is no Lego SLS so far is because Artemis I is uncrewed, which public interest-wise is a little lame. We might be able to expect one when Artemis II happens though. Artemis II will, to a certain extent, be like the 21st century's Apollo 8 in terms of PR effect (humans to the vicinity of the Moon for the first time in over half a century!), and also, if they sell a Lego SLS around when Artemis II happens, they can sell a Lego Lunar Starship when Artemis III happens, without having to make people simultaneously buy two 120-150 $ sets. Assuming they are going to eventually make a Lunar Starship set (we have an Apollo Lunar Module after all) hopefully they would give you pieces to convert it into a Starship tanker too to complete the mission profile. Kind of like the 3-in-1 Creator sets.

Would it be possible to launch a modified Crew Dragon on a modified Starship too? This would eliminate the very bad possibilities of failing to perform a propulsive landing with crew during normal EDL, and of course Crew Starship will need to/should have some abort modes anyways during the early part of launch. This Starship will do propulsive landing anyways as it is still recoverable, so an abort mode is retained despite the normal Crew Dragon LES not being there. And then afterwards, if there is going to be some potential failure with the Starship upper stage during the latter part of launch, wouldn't that just doom the crew on a normal Crew Starship anyways? And therefore there is no loss in losing the LES with this hypothetical new Crew Dragon variant. IIRC, there are some ESA and Roscosmos studies stating that the amount of volume a single human needs in a spacecraft makes cramming 100 people in a Starship unfeasible anyways, and people in this forum then went on to calculate something like a 17-25 possible max crew for Starship. However, apart from SpaceX's Mars City, no one is going to require this many crew on a single flight (unless Starship has the potential to act as a "space bus" travelling between multiple, perhaps co-orbited, commercial space stations) and thus SpaceX will lose money on many launches. Thus using Crew Dragon might be more economical/efficient for commercial space demands in the near future (2030-2040, when Starship would be safe enough to carry crew). Launching Crew Dragon would eliminate consumer concerns over propulsive landing and save money for SpaceX, both by not needing to develop a new life support system inherent* to Starship and reusing Crew Dragon technology. This could also open up the serious possibility of launching Orion on Starship. NASA keeps their "traditional and safe" capsule, with no propulsive landing, and maintains billion dollar contracts through it, but without the need for SLS. Launch escape situation is the same as described above. *17-25 crew would be desirable for SpaceX's Mars City, however, it would probably be better to develop that as a sort of "plug-in" module that could be carried by a Cargo Starship with minimal modifications, rather than integrated into a new Starship variant. Apologies if this ends up coming off like a D.C. NASA manager in the early 70s spit-balling crazy money saving design parameter ideas to potential Space Shuttle contractors Actually, re-reading this, my thoughts regarding abort in the latter stage of flight really do sound like the justification for no LES on the Space Shuttle. There are major differences between Shuttle and Starship however, so I think the risk is far lower and thus although my ideas sound eerily familiar, they are reasonable.

https://spacenews.com/chinese-crewed-moon-landing-possible-by-2030-says-senior-space-figure/ This doesn't qualify as true development news, but it is interesting nonetheless. Some of the presentations given in the past year have also proposed a crewed lunar flyby (Artemis II equivalent) with the Next-Generation Crewed Spacecraft in 2025. However, it is not known how much development work has been done on the Long March 5DY rocket to launch it. It is known that work is progressing at a decent rate on the engines for the Long March 9, but that is unlikely to launch crew. -------- https://www.cbsnews.com/news/china-hypersonic-weapons-test-details-united-states-military/ I did not see this before. So we have confirmation from the US military that there was indeed some sort of hypersonic test at some point in the summer. Important news appeared however on Wednesday from the 7th China (International) Commercial Aerospace Forum. The ramjet engine of the first stage of the Tengyun spaceplane- has made its first flight. It is possible that the "HGV" was actually a sub-scale demonstrator for the Tengyun, akin in purpose to the BOR-4 prototype for the Soviet Spiral spaceplane (but powered), and that the "projectile released" was the first stage/carrier aircraft completing its mission while the "HGV" was a sub-scale, presumably non-powered (and thus just intended to impact) model of the Tengyun upper stage/main spacecraft (the X-37B looking thing). This would also explain why it was launched on a Long March rocket, and not a DF series missile. I think we have our culprit . Apologies for no links on the news from convention, it was just yesterday and the link to the image of the slide/presentation from my source is broken. It will hopefully appear soon. @steve9728, have you heard anything about the Tengyun test?