JNSQ: To the Mun!: Epilogue

[Angelo Kerman]

Chapter 31

With Das Wanderer days away from entering Duna’s sphere of influence- the first kerbal-made object to do so- the vonKermans did something unexpected. They offered to share their knowledge of Minmus in exchange for access to KSP’s Deep Space Network. KSC was not sure that their DSN could reach the probe, but the vonKermans wanted to lease bandwidth on their network for future missions as well.

The senior staff at KSC was torn; several felt that cooperation would lead to going farther and faster with space exploration than just one nation could handle. On the other hand, other senior staff were stuck on competition and sore about the vonKermans establishing the first semi-permanent outpost on Minmus. It was bad enough that Munflight 4 barely even got a mention on the evening news; if the vonKermans did all the relevant research on the Mint Mun, then why bother going? Ultimately the Kerman States’ Vice President made the decision to share KSC’s DSN bandwidth. With the latest post-Munflight budget proposal, KSC would not be able to afford the missions needed to gather the data themselves.

Five days later, Das Wanderer entered Duna’s SOI. Kontrol elatedly contacted the distant probe through KSC’s Deep Space Network and commanded it to immediately report its status. The probe was high above the Rusty Planet. Unsure if they would be able to maintain contact, Kontrol immediately directed the probe to take all the scientific readings that it could. Then a day later, Das Wanderer reached its periapsis with Duna, a whopping 51,598 km away. KSC got lucky and still had contact with the space probe, so Kontrol attempted to circularize its orbit.

Sadly, its transfer stage engines refused to fire. In a desperate move, the probe separated and fired its kick stage, but it was not enough. Das Wanderer would live up to its name and forever wander the solar system. The vonKermans were saddened but also glad that at least the first probe to another planet retrieved some science.

A day later, Pioneer returned from orbit, overshot KSC, and landed at Welcome Back Island. Hardly anybody noticed outside of the space center; the media was already focused on Munflight 5. Bill, Bob, and Jeb were slated to become the first astronauts ever to visit both of Kerbin’s moons.

Better yet, Kongress freed up additional Funds to fly the Munar Ground Module Rover along with Billstown, a makeshift outpost designed by Bill Kerman that was cobbled together from spare MOLE modules. KSP reasoned that if the vonKermans had an outpost on Minmus, KSC needed one on the Mun.

While KSC pulled together the Duna 1Bs to launch each vehicle and the Arrow Transfer Vehicles to shuttle them to the Mun, the vonKermans launched Sofia (PLT), Emma (ENG), and Leon (SCI) into orbit in Drakken 8. Their mission was to pick up where Drakken 7 left off and prove that ISRU refueling was possible. A malfunctioning fairing sheered off one of the orbital module’s solar arrays, but the mission was still a go.

Drakken 8 linked up with its tug and burned for Minmus, arriving 8 days later. After docking with and refueling the Libelle that was left in orbit and bolting on the new ore tank that they brought with them, Sofia and her crew set down next to Hause 1 and got to work. A lengthy EVA later, Emma finished making the modifications and repairs to the Drakken Driller. All they had to do next is wait for the results.

***

Meanwhile, Billstown successfully settled down in the Munar Lowlands near Lowlander 2. It barely had any propellant left in its tanks. The MGM Rover waited in Kerbin orbit for an additional ATV to help it get to the Mun. Five days later, its second ATV docked with the first to form a booster stage. The transfer vehicles conducted their burns and sent the rover on course to the Mun. It arrived in munar orbit after nearly a 4-day trip. After another 4-day wait for Billstown to enter sunlight, the rover began its descent. It didn’t go as planned; the ATV worked well as a crasher stage, and the landing stage engine set down softly, but its legs failed to retract properly and the rover released too early and rolled over as it dropped down from the lander. But KSC planned for that contingency and activated the roll jets. “Miss Piggy” promptly rolled back onto her feet, and a few minutes later, the rover safely arrived at Billstown. Now they just had to wait for Munflight 5, which had to wait for another set of ATVs to provide orbital fueling…

***

Seventeen days after landing and a total of thirty days into their mission, Drakken 8’s storage tanks were full of liquid fuel and oxidizer, their fresh air reserves kept climbing, and the ISRU tanks continued filling up as well. Clearly the repairs and additional ore tank worked, albeit slowly. Unfortunately, like Karl before her, Emma was stressed out and unable to work, and both Leon and Sofia were showing signs of stress as well. Unsure of what to do, Sofia told Emma to get some personal time in the Libelle- and quietly told her about the bottles of “spring water” tucked away in a cubbyhole. They also found some hidden in the outpost.  A few hours later, the crew was feeling better- albeit hung over. But at the same time, Kontrol was concerned that their crews weren’t handling the stresses of spaceflight very well.

***

Delayed for five days while the Ministry of Space prepositioned more ATV, Munflight 5 finally launched Viking into orbit with Bill, Bob, and Jeb aboard. They spent 4 days traveling to the Mun and another 3 waiting for Billstown to be in sunlight. Unlike pervious flights, where the mission scientist descended to the surface with the pilot, Bill and Jeb made the trip down to Billstown while Bob stayed aboard Viking to mind the spacecraft and make observations from orbit. Owl landed 267 meters away from Billstown with just 58 m/s of delta-v remaining in its descent stage tanks.

Before long, Bill and Jeb deployed their rover, and Bill scavenged everything he could from their descent stage. After arriving at Billstown, the engineer mounted the smallest of the tanks and the science boxes onto “Miss Piggy.” While Jeb hopped into Billstown to start its systems, Bill reconfigured the buggy for fuel transport and raided the MGM Rover’s landing stage and crashed ATV for parts and resources. Three trips later, he delivered enough liquid fuel and oxidizer to fill Billstown over halfway full and fitted “Miss Piggy” with enough gyros to help control rollovers.

Once Bill completed refitting the pressurized rover, he gave its geology lab a test; their landing spot had a concentration 0.84% Ore and a small lode of precious metals. As he tested the other science instruments, the seismic sensor was the only one that had something new to tell about the Lowlands. But Bill didn’t mind, the rover had the range to investigate other biomes. But first, he and Jeb had somewhere to go. 2.7 kilometers later, they arrived at Lowlander 2. The first probe to soft-land on the Mun had subsequently toppled over, but nonetheless, KSC was excited to see what had become of the probe. After taking pictures of the probe, the two left the site undisturbed any further and tested the rover’s scanning arm on a nearby rock formation.

Then Jeb set course for their next destination, and Bill took geology readings along the way, noting where unusual mass concentrations where. Fifty kilometers and an hour later, they reached their destination. Jeb got out and took surface samples and planted a flag to commemorate the longest distance traveled on another world by rover.

Then they broke their record when they doubled their mileage and entered the Midlands. Bill ran a quick analysis; the Midlands had an ore concentration of 2.30%. Since Munflight 4 already did research in the biome, they kept going. Finally, they found their next destination in the munar Highlands, nearly 100 km further than their first location. Schaffer 2, the first rover to successfully soft-land on another world, laid on its back on a hillside. Bill and Jeb got out a few meters away and planted a flag to commemorate the vonKermans’ achievement- and to warn others to not disturb the site.

After taking pictures from a respectful distance, the two explorers hopped back into the pressurized rover and conducted some experiments before going in search of rock formations to examine. They found a crater a few hundred meters away that looked interesting, but Bill and Jeb could not detect anything new about it. Still, Bob asked Bill to set up their ground science instruments since nobody had done so for the Highlands yet. Bob was disappointed with the projected science output as Bill set up the instruments, but he brightened a bit after Jeb ran the geology lab-with direction- and discovered a 4.08% ore concentration in the area.

With nothing more to do in the area and no other area within range, Bill and Jeb turned around and headed home- a 70 km trip back to Billstown, for a grand total of 169km traveled in a rover. Several hours later, they were back in orbit and docked with Viking, and four days after that, they returned to KSC.

Munflight 5 was a textbook mission. KSP established an outpost of their own on the Mun, tested a pressurized rover, and even visited the sites of previous missions. Bill and Jeb spent five days on Kerbin’s nearest natural satellite before returning home. The only blemish on the mission was at the end; Viking’s nose skid got stuck in the runway collapsed during landing.

***

Several days later, with Hause 1 again running low on supplies and the crew’s stress levels increasing, Kontrol ordered Drakken 8 to return home. At least they’d accomplished their mission; they were able to partially fill the grounded Drakken tanker tugs- enough to conduct aerobraking tests- and demonstrate the viability of In-situ resource utilization technologies. All they had to do was scale it up to improve propellant production rates. But they also had a problem; their crews were getting stressed out during missions. They needed to study the problem more and find a way to counteract it.

Drakken 8 and her crew returned safely to Kerbin, followed 2 days later by the Drakken tanker tugs that they refueled. As expected, their deployable solar arrays burned off. The first tanker entered tail first like the Kerman States’ K-20 missions did while the second entered nose first. Unlike the KSC vehicle, the tail-first tanker could not take the heat and broke up on reentry. The nose-first tanker had a similar fate; its docking port melted away rapidly, followed by the forward superstructure. Kontrol did not expect either spacecraft to survive reentry, but the data they gathered helped the vonKermans design their next generation of tanker.

[Angelo Kerman]

Chapter 32

Tensions between the vonKerman Republic and the Kerman States increased after Bill and Jeb visited the site of Schaffer 2 unannounced. After apologizing profusely and assuring the vonKermans that they had no intention of disturbing the rover or stealing its technology, KSP shared their ground science experiments tech and offered a joint mission with co-developed technologies as a peace offering. The VKR, seeing their own budgets shrinking, accepted their offer, and both space programs worked together to plan the mission and design the hardware.

As the Munflight Drakken Test Project progressed through its planning phase, the vonKermans launched their prototype Drakken Lab into orbit, followed a few days later by Drakken 9. Sofia (PLT), Emma (ENG), and Leon (SCI) volunteered for the Drakken 9 mission after being cleared for flight. Drakken 9’s mission was to test Snacks bug fixes the new lab’s systems and evaluate them for use on their Drakken Palast (“Drakken Palace” in Kerman) space station.

***

With their negotiations and compromises finally completed, Valentina Kerman (PLT), Gerrim Kerman (ENG), Santrey Kerman (SCI) posed for a publicity photo with Hanse vonKerman (PLT), Karl vonKerman (ENG), and Sara vonKerman (SCI) before watching the first launch of the Munflight Drakken Test Project. Valentina was the natural choice to command Munflight 6; she and her mom immigrated from the vonKerman Republic when she was a young child, and her mom made sure that Valentina could fluently speak vonKerman in addition to Kerman. Hanse and his flight crew were veterans of Minmus, so they were the VKR’s logical choice for Drakken 10.

The first launch of the joint mission went smoothly as the modified Fleigenross delivered the first Drakken Tanker Tug 2 into orbit. Kontrol hoped that its enhanced structure and systems would enable it to survive aerobraking and someday deliver propellants refined from Minmus. As part of the testing, Kontrol attempted to recover the boosters and first stage. One of the three boosters was able to deploy its chutes and it landed hard, but the first stage managed to land with 3 of its 4 main engines intact. The Fleigenross upper stage wasn’t recovered; it was going too fast to survive reentry.

Over the course of the next several weeks, the vonKermans launched and positioned the remaining hardware needed for them to reach and explore the Mint Mun. Then at last, Drakken 10 launched from Darude on a resuable Fleigenross and linked up with its transport while its first stage successfully soft-landed in Kerbin’s Arid Lowlands and its upper stage burned up on reentry.

Shortly after departing for Minmus, Munflight 6 launched into orbit. A day later, Sojourner and her crew refueled from the D1B Minmus Tanker and were on their way as well.

As planned, Drakken 10 arrived about a day and a half ahead of Sojourner and used the time to survey the landing site as well as assess the state of the Libelle lander. Munflight 6 entered low Minmus orbit 8 days later, and Valentina went on EVA to test-fly the Kerbal Maneuvering Unit (KMU). After briefly checking out its systems, she undocked the KMU and flew it around Sojourner while Gerrim released the Docking Extension Corridor. A few minutes later, Valentina had the corridor docked to the ventral port of Sojourner’s service module. Then after Gerrim released the Unity node and docked with the L5US, Valentina parked the node on the end of the corridor and deployed its solar arrays and docking ports. Unity Station was open for business.

Four hours later, Drakken 10 rendezvoued with Sojourner. After a brief exchange of greetings over the radio, Hanse undocked the tanker tug and remotely piloted it near unit Unity Station before bringing Drakken 10 in close and docking. It was the first time in history that the two rival space programs docked spacecraft together, and cheers rang out at KSC and Kontrol.

A short time later, Hanse vonKerman and Valentina Kerman meet in the Unity node and shake hands. Not long after, the two crews tour each other’s spacecraft while the Libelle and the supply ATV made their way to Unity Station. Once both spacecraft arrived, Gerrim and Karl refueled the Libelle and transferred the ground science experiments to the lander before Valentina, Hanse, Gerrim, and Sara all boarded it and headed to the surface. Meanwhile, Karl and Santrey stayed aboard Unity Station to jointly run a space adaption study experiment.

The Libelle touched down softly and after the away team posed for a publicity photo, the engineers and scientists got to work setting up the ground science and retrieving the Schaffer rover. Before long, Sara and Gerrim had the ground station set up and Gerrim mounted the gyro needed to safely detach the rover/probe from its transport. The pair ran several of the Schaffer’s experiments, took surface samples, made EVA reports, and found some rock formations to study as well. And according to their resource scanner, the Basins had a concentration of rock, ore, minerite, and nitronate- perfect for setting up sustainable life support systems. And with directions from Kontrol, Gerrim rolled the rover’s transfer stage over to Hause 2, dismantled its engine, and connected its fuel systems to the outpost.

Several days later, it was time to head back to Unity Station, where Sara and Karl had just finished up their experiments as well. Before launching back into orbit, Valentina and Hanse stepped outside to make a joint statement.

“The Minmus Basins,” Valentina said in vonKerman and Hanse repeated in Kerman, “in accordance with the Minmus Basins Treaty signed by the Kerman States, the mcKerman Kingdom, and the vonKerman Republic, is hereby declared a condominium. By international law, all signatories of the Treaty agree to share equal dominium of the Basins. Hence, all nations who sign the Treaty will share ownership, governance, and experimental research. All parties agree to minimize the environmental impact of kerbal habitation of the Basins. We welcome other nations to sign the Treaty as well and hope that it and the Munflight Drakken Test Project will signify the beginning of international cooperation and exploration of outer space.”

The Libelle lifted off Minmus without any issues. On the way up, Gerrim unbolted unneeded equipment; their impact would serve to calibrate the seismic sensor left behind. Three hours later, the away team returned to Unity Station with their science results. Again, Valentina and Hanse made a joint statement. This time, they declared Unity Station an international station where nations can come together and explore space.

The team had one more task to perform; after refueling the Libelle, the ATV departed Unity Station, rendezvoused with the Sparrow ascent stage, and reversed its orbit before undocking and slamming itself into the Mint Mun for science.

With resources replenished and goodbyes said, Valentina, Gerrim, and Santrey boarded Sojourner for the trip home and undocked from Unity Station. The Crew of Drakken 10 had to wait for a delivery from Darude before continuing their mission, so they stayed aboard the station. But the Munflight Drakken Test Project was officially concluded. It demonstrated that despite their differences, the two nations could work together for the common goal of exploring space and sharing the knowledge that they gained. The Project also laid the foundation for future cooperative missions- both in orbit of Minmus and on the ground. But as the two spacecraft parted ways, both crews wondered if their nations would unite again on future projects or continue going their separate ways. Only time would tell...

Eight days later, Sojourner reentered Kerbin’s atmosphere and landed safely back at KSC. With the conclusion of Munflight 6, Project Munflight was also done.

Stay tuned for the conclusion…

[KerballingSmasher]

9 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

condominium

I believe a condominium is a type of house... I think the word you're looking for is co-dominion... just a small little grammar note from me  

[zumadawg18]

Glad to see Sojourner free flying! 

[Misguided Kerbal]

11 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

Stay tuned for the conclusion…

It's done already ?! 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[Angelo Kerman]

3 hours ago, KerballingSmasher said:

I believe a condominium is a type of house... I think the word you're looking for is co-dominion... just a small little grammar note from me  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condominium_(international_law)

59 minutes ago, zumadawg18 said:

Glad to see Sojourner free flying! 

I've had a lot of fun flying the X-20 Moroz that @Well finished up and released. I had my own X-20 mod in the works and shelved it because Well's mod did everything I wanted (minus some X-37 parts as the X-37 is about the same size as the X-20). Having a shuttles career is something that I've wanted to do as well.

26 minutes ago, Misguided_Kerbal said:

It's done already ?! 

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

At this point, I've pretty much gathered up the science from Mun and Minmus, so it makes sense to end the Munflights. I have other ideas brewing though...

[KerballingSmasher]

...oh

[Angelo Kerman]

Here's a look at what the epilogue will focus on (contains spoilers):

Spoiler

 

Edited July 22, 2020 by Angel-125

[Clamp-o-Tron]

Spoiler

Cool- Skylab. Really looked like the first bit of a Duna transfer vehicle, tho. I hope that’s part of your future plans!

 

[JakGamingKSP]

On 7/15/2020 at 11:05 AM, Angel-125 said:

 

Meanwhile, Billstown successfully settled down in the Munar Lowlands near Lowlander 2. It barely had any propellant left in its tanks. The MGM Rover waited in Kerbin orbit for an additional ATV to help it get to the Mun. Five days later, its second ATV docked with the first to form a booster stage. The transfer vehicles conducted their burns and sent the rover on course to the Mun. It arrived in munar orbit after nearly a 4-day trip. After another 4-day wait for Billstown to enter sunlight, the rover began its descent. It didn’t go as planned; the ATV worked well as a crasher stage, and the landing stage engine set down softly, but its legs failed to retract properly and the rover released too early and rolled over as it dropped down from the lander. But KSC planned for that contingency and activated the roll jets. “Miss Piggy” promptly rolled back onto her feet, and a few minutes later, the rover safely arrived at Billstown. Now they just had to wait for Munflight 5, which had to wait for another set of ATVs to provide orbital fueling…

 

 

 

Did billstown's name come from For All Mankind?

Edited July 24, 2020 by JakGamingKSP

[Angelo Kerman]

4 hours ago, JakGamingKSP said:

Did billstown's name come from For All Mankind?

Definitely inspired by it. Also, please do me a favor and clip your quote so you’re not duplicating the whole chapter.

[Angelo Kerman]

This took longer than expected due to some needed fixes in Snacks and some KSC renovations but at last...

To The Mun: Epilogue

“Ok, APU start,” Gene Kerman said, running through his checklist. A veteran Air Force pilot during the Last War and KSP’s Flight Director for the entire Munflight program, Gene Kerman took a leave of absence, left Bobak in charge, and received astronaut training to fly this mission. Valentina, Chief of the Astronaut Corps, touted it as an opportunity to experience first-hand what space crews went through in order to give him a better perspective, but she also knew that the Brigadier General wanted to go to space himself at least once in his lifetime. Gene also knew that it would probably be his only mission into space, but that was ok, microgravity made him queasy.

With the checklist complete, Gene undocked Viking, nudged the K-20 forward, and spun the craft around to take one last look at what had been his home in space for the past five months.

For the last Lindor flight, KSC engineers were given a single goal: launch their first long-duration space station since the short-lived MOLE. They had free reign to figure out a design that met the space program’s requirements. With just the Lindor to work with, they converted the L5US fuel tanks into a combination laboratory and habitat and added an airlock and docking compartment where the MEM went. In place of the K-20, they added a solar observatory with solar arrays that swiveled into position after reaching orbit. Finally, the engineers removed the Skipper engine and put an experimental thermal radiator in its place. Dubbed SkyBase, the station looked like a space-age windmill.

Their Lindor modifications didn’t end with the L5US. For the Lindor second stage, engineers crammed as many fuel tanks as they could into the space once occupied by the upper stage’s Skipper in hopes that it would have enough propellant to finish orbiting the station and then de-orbit itself- which it did. The first stage didn’t escape their attention either. Engineers removed the need for side boosters by stretching the tank and redesigning the engine cluster to mount a whopping nine KR-1 Mastodon engines. Then they attached four enormous landing legs to the bottom- courtesy of some research by the vonKermans- and a set of grid fins and parachutes to the top. Technically no longer a Lindor 5, KSC dubbed it the Lindor 9. It was their first step into reusable rockets, and it worked perfectly, setting down softly on Welcome Back Island.

After putting some distance between the two craft, Viking ignited its service module engine at the right place and time to de-orbit and land back at KSC. Gene’s stomach churned as he found himself in freefall once again.

He distracted himself by remembering the rollout of Pathfinder- the first K-20 KerbalSoar- and its use during the approach and landing glide tests. He saw in his mind’s eye the in-flight abort test that quickly became very real.

He remembered the team creating recovery procedures using the Sea Goat (the K-20 transporter and recovery craft). He recalled the astronauts arguing over who would make the first suborbital flight and then the first orbital flight.

He cringed at his memory of Mariner breaking up on its way to land and Jeb’s brush with death. But he smiled as Pathfinder finally made it home after its munar test flight and then retired.

The four surviving K-20s: Pioneer (OV-102), Ranger (OV-104), Viking (OV-105), and Sojourner (OV-106), made several flights into low Kerbin orbit and collectively made 3 flights to each of Kerbin’s moons - Viking and Sojourner both went twice. But when Project Munflight concluded and Project SkyBase replaced it, Pioneer and Ranger each made one last flight on increasingly longer duration missions to the orbiting station before landing and retiring. Viking, the second-youngest K-20 in the fleet and the first kermanned spacecraft to orbit the Mun, flew the longest duration mission, but today it was her turn to retire. Gene also knew that Sojourner would soon follow.

Gene looked at the mission clock. They had another eleven minutes until atmospheric entry. He stargazed out the cockpit window and way out in the distance, he saw the Mun. It almost looked out of reach, but he knew better. “To the Mun” had been the mantra of the Kerbal Space Program for nearly a decade. It was a way to break the Kerman States out of a wave of wars, recessions, apathy, and a string of bad leaders. The nation rallied around the goal of reaching Kerbin’s natural satellites.

At first, progress was terribly slow as they did basic research, scouted sites for the Kerbal Space Center, and painstakingly built the VAB. Then they picked up the pace as the kerbals developed numerous technologies to reach their goal including the mighty Lindor 5, the Pulsar communications satellites, and the K-20 KerbalSoar.

But while the Munflight program gathered significant amounts of science- including preliminary evidence of global climate change- produced amazing technology that found its way into the public, and even found a way to cooperate with the vonKermans, the missions were tremendously expensive and almost broke the budget. The new Shuttle Launch System promised to make spaceflight cheap and routine, but Gene quietly had his reservations about that. With SLS-1 weeks away, they wouldn’t have to wait long to find out.

Viking jettisoned its service module shortly before atmospheric entry. As the module burned up, the K-20 glided back to the KSC runway as it had done many times before and made a perfect landing. As the crew exited the craft, they were given a warm welcome by the astronauts.

As the crowd made their way to the Astronaut Complex, Gene saw ground crews preparing the SeaGoat to pick up Viking and fly it over to the Boneyard to join Pathfinder, Pioneer, and Ranger in retirement. It was a bittersweet moment; it was the end of one era, but also the beginning of a new one…

End of JNSQ: To The Mun!

---------------------------------------------

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed reading what happened as much as I had fun building the rockets and flying them. My KSP career game will continue in: JNSQ: Shuttle Launch System.

Edited July 29, 2020 by Angel-125

[Misguided Kerbal]

2 hours ago, Angel-125 said:

JNSQ: Shuttle Launch System.

Let me guess... something with the Mk-33?

[Angelo Kerman]

31 minutes ago, Misguided_Kerbal said:

Let me guess... something with the Mk-33?

Mk-33 is later...

[Misguided Kerbal]

7 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

Mk-33 is later...

Makes perfect sense..

[Angelo Kerman]

2 hours ago, Misguided_Kerbal said:

Makes perfect sense..

Well, the Mk-33 mod also isn't quite done yet...

[CDSlice]

@Angel-125 this has been an awesome series, would mind making a post here when your new series starts so I and the other people following this topic know to check it out?

[Angelo Kerman]

2 hours ago, CDSlice said:

@Angel-125 this has been an awesome series, would mind making a post here when your new series starts so I and the other people following this topic know to check it out?

Absolutely! I've got some things to tidy up before I can start the new series, but here's a preview:

Freedom is named for the shuttle in my very old and defunct KSOS Mission Chronicles.

Edited July 30, 2020 by Angel-125

[Misguided Kerbal]

2 minutes ago, Angel-125 said:

Absolutely! I've got some things to tidy up before I can start the new series, but here's a preview:

Freedom is named for the shuttle in my very old and defunct KSOS Mission Chronicles.

yaya!

[Angelo Kerman]

JNSQ: Shuttle Launch System launches this weekend!

[Angelo Kerman]

Complete K-20 flight log:

Quote

KS ALT-1: Pathfinder – Jeb (PLT), maiden flight of Pathfinder

KS-1: Pathfinder – Unkermanned sub-orbital test flight, water landing

KS-2: Pathfinder – Unkermanned abort test that turned real very quickly, KSC landing

KS-3: Pathfinder – Valentina (PLT), sub-orbital test, water landing

KS-4: Pioneer – Jebediah (PLT), maiden flight of Pioneer, orbital test flight, first orbital rendezvous (unplanned), first KSC landing

KS-5: Pioneer – Valentina (PLT), first polar orbit, first satellite deployment from K-20 (SCANSat), water landing

KS-6: Pioneer – Jebediah (PLT), first docking, landed away from KSC

KS-7: Pioneer – Valentina (PLT), second orbital docking, KSC landing

KS-8: Mariner – Jebediah (PLT), maiden flight of Mariner, first communication satellite deployment, vehicle destroyed during reentry, first bailout from a K-20

KS-9: Pathfinder – Valentina (PLT), CommSat 2 deployed, KSC landing

KS-10: Pathfinder – Jebediah (PLT), CommSat 3 deployed, KSC landing

KS-11: Ranger – Jebediah (PLT), Bob (SCI), maiden flight of Ranger, fist Block 2 K-20, first Mark One Laboratory Extension mission, first EVA, first refueling from formation-flying tanker, MunShot 1 rendezvous, KSC landing

KS-12: Ranger – Jebediah (PLT), Bill (ENG), Bob (SCI), first 3-kerbal crew, MOLE 2, first K-20 resupply, record 18-day mission, KSC landing

KS-13: Ranger – Valentina (PLT), Jebman (ENG), Ferwin (SCI), MOLE-3, first nighttime landing at KSC

KS-14: Ranger – Tesen (PLT), Gerrim (ENG), Santrey (SCI), first docking to separately launched MOLE station prototype, KSC landing

KS-15: Pathfinder – Unkermanned flight to munar altitude, Pathfinder stuck in orbit until rescued, first unkermanned deorbit with landing at Welcome Back Island, first K-20 retired to The Boneyard

KS-16: Viking – Valentina (CDR), Jebediah (PLT), Ferwin (SCI), maiden flight of Viking, maiden flight of Duna launch vehicle, first Munar Excursion Module orbital test, first time 3 K-20s were in orbit at the same time (Viking, Ranger, Pathfinder), KSC landing

Munflight 1: Viking/Finch – Mun, Val (PLT), Gerrim (ENG), Santrey (SCI), first flight from a Lindor 5, KSC landing

Munflight 2: Sojourner/Sparrow – Minmus, Bill (ENG), Bob (SCI), Jeb (PLT), KSC landing

Munflight 3: Ranger/Parrot – Mun, Dudmon (PLT), Jebman (ENG), Ferwin, (SCI), KSC landing

Munflight 4: Pioneer/Songbird – Minmus, Tesen (PLT), Jofrey (ENG), Malus (SCI), KSC landing

Munflight 5: Viking/Owl – Mun, Bill (ENG), Bob (SCI), Jeb (PLT), KSC landing

Munflight 6: Sojourner – Minmus, Val (PLT), Gerrim (ENG), Santrey (SCI), Munflight Drakken Test Project, carried Unity Station instead of Munar Excursion Module, final flight

Skybase 1: Pioneer - Tesen (PLT), Jofrey (ENG), Malus (SCI), duration 30 days, final flight, retired to The Boneyard

Skybase 2: Ranger - Val (PLT), Gerrim (ENG), Santrey (SCI), duration 60 days, final flight, retired to The Boneyard

Skybase 3: Viking - Gene (PLT), Jebman (ENG), Ferwin, (SCI), duration 180 days, final flight, retired to The Boneyard

Skybase 4: Sojourner - cancelled, Sojourner retired to The Boneyard after SLS-3

 

[Delta dart]

On 7/14/2020 at 9:05 PM, Angel-125 said:

Viking’s nose skid got stuck in the runway collapsed during landing.

That always happens to me for some reason