The space flight thread

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https://www.yahoo.com/news/boeing-ceo-dennis-muilenburg-says-185354563.html

Boeing’s Dennis Muilenburg says he’ll beat SpaceX to Mars; Elon Musk says ‘Do it’

Alan Boyle
GeekWire
December 7, 2017

So what does SpaceX CEO Elon Musk think of Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg’s claim that the first people to set foot on Mars will arrive on a Boeing rocket? “Do it,” Musk tweeted, in one of many two-word comebacks that might have come to mind.

The latest round of media jousting started when CNBC’s Jim Cramer brought up Mars during an interview with Muilenburg. “Who’s going to get a man on Mars first, you or Elon Musk?” Cramer asked.

In response, Muilenburg touted the Space Launch System, the heavy-lift rocket that Boeing is helping NASA build for deep-space missions.

“We’re going to take a first test flight in 2019, and we’re going to do a slingshot mission around the moon,” he said. “Eventually, we’re going to go to Mars, and I firmly believe the first person that sets foot on Mars will get there on a Boeing rocket.”

Muilenburg said pretty much the same thing last year during an industry conference in Chicago, but since then, Musk has laid out a vision that calls for sending settlers to Mars on SpaceX’s yet-to-be-built monster spaceship starting in the 2020s.

If Musk and NASA stick to their current schedules, the first bootprints on the Martian surface would be left by folks arriving on a SpaceX rocket as much as a decade before the Space Launch System sends a spaceship there.

Is Musk’s response a dare? A space-race smackdown? Maybe. But the billionaire has always said his main goal in life is to help make humanity a multiplanet species by facilitating cities on Mars. Taken in that light, the “Do It” tweet may well be Musk’s way of saying that he’s glad for anyone else to be taking the move to Mars as seriously as he is.

That’s how John Gardi, an engineer and SpaceX fan who anticipated Musk’s hyperloop design in 2013, chooses to see the exchange. “You win either way, @elonmusk!” Gardi said in his tweeted response. “You can only lose if NOBODY goes to Mars!”

Meanwhile, Boeing and SpaceX are enmeshed in a shorter-term rivalry, to finish work on the space taxis that they’re building to transport NASA astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

The current schedules call for SpaceX to conduct a crewed demonstration flight with its Dragon capsule next August, while Boeing plans the first crewed flight of its Starliner space taxi in November 2018. But those schedules have been shifting to the right for years, so it’s too early to call the race.

The first to deliver astronauts to the space station will win a U.S. flag that was left aboard the outpost in 2011 by the last space shuttle crew. May the best team win? I prefer to look at it the way Gardi does: In this space race, may all teams win.
 
   #62  

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From today's Trump 1600 Daily email.....

Our long journey to the stars—and the Moon
Forty-five years ago today, NASA’s final Apollo mission landed on the surface of the Moon. No human has walked there since.

This afternoon, President Donald J. Trump will tell the country that it’s time to refocus our vision for American space exploration.

In signing Space Policy Directive 1 today—the first recommendation of the recently reconvened National Space Council—the President will shift NASA’s resources and attention toward the Moon and Mars. Given its relative closeness, the Moon in particular offers humans the best hope for long-term exploration and utilization.

President Ronald Reagan once eloquently captured the sweep of mankind as “his long climb from the swamp to the stars.” With President Trump’s order today, America commits itself once again to writing the next chapter of that story.

Watch the signing ceremony today at 3:00 p.m. EST.
 
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   #63  

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^^^ He should cancel the SLS and give a performance-based contract to Space-X.
 
   #64  

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http://www.popularmechanics.com/space/satellites/a14471796/luxury-hotel-iss/

Russia's Plan To Build a Luxury Hotel on the ISS
And you can go...if you have $40 million.

By Anatoly Zak
Dec 21, 2017

Space tourism isn't a new idea. SpaceX announced plans this year to send civilians skyward and Virgin Galactic is still working toward its goal of regular space flights. Just this week, Blue Origin released footage of its future space tourism ambitions. But all these plans aren't exactly a first-class experience. Even after paying millions, a few super-wealthy adventurers have to brave spartan accommodations in orbit alongside well-trained astronauts.

But in a few years, space tourism agents might be offering five-star orbital adventures, courtesy of the Russian space agency. The amenities will include a luxury orbital suite parked at the International Space Station (ISS) offering private cabins with big windows, personal hygiene facilities, exercise equipment and even Wi-Fi. In addition gazing at our tiny blue orb from a dizzying altitude of 250 miles, space tourists will have an opportunity for space walks accompanied by a professional cosmonaut.

The entire trip, lasting from one to two weeks will cost $40 million per person and going with the spacewalk option and an extended month-long stay will set the traveler back an additional $20 million.

This is the gist of Russia’s grand scheme to return into the space tourism business. This month, Roskosmos State Corporation had began reviewing a business plan for a high-comfort addition to the ISS. According to a detailed proposal seen by Popular Mechanics, the 20-ton, 15.5-meter-long module would provide 92 cubic meters of pressurized space. It would accommodate four sleeping quarters sized around two cubic meters each and two “hygiene and medical” stations of the same volume. Each private room would also have a porthole with a diameter of 228 millimeters (9 inches), while the lounge area of the module would have a giant 426-millimeter (16-inch) window.

The external structure of the tourist module looks like the Science and Power Module, NEM-1, which Russia is currently building for the International Space Station. The second NEM module had originally been on the books in the station’s assembly scenario, but the Russian government funded only one module. It will serve primarily as a science laboratory and a power-supply station for the ISS.

Now, Russia’s prime space station contractor, RKK Energia, came up with a scheme to pay for the second NEM module through a mix of private and state investments. To make profit, the NEM-2 would be customized for paid visitors.

RKK Energia pioneered space tourism in the 1990s, first renting the Mir space station to a private firm and then flying millionaires to the ISS. However in recent years, tourist flights have been on hold because Russia’s ISS partners booked all available seats on the Soyuz spacecraft, which remains the only way to reach the outpost after the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011. The Soyuz will become available again in a couple of years, as NASA’s private contractors, like SpaceX, are poised to introduce orbital taxis of their own.

The proposed Russian tourist module is estimated to cost from 16.4 to 26.2 billion rubles ($279-$446 million). In order to recoup this money as soon as possible, RKK Energia plans to fly two tourists on each Soyuz flight accompanied by one professional cosmonaut. With four Soyuz flights available throughout the year, it will be possible to carry up to six tourists on short visits to the station annually while keeping professional cosmonauts in orbit on year-long shifts. At that rate, RKK Energia hopes to recoup its the module's cost in about seven years.

To minimize the initial cost, RKK Energia wants to book at least 12 passengers who would agree to make payments of around $4 million up front so that the company could begin the development of the orbital hotel module. It's a similar method that Virgin Galactic used at the beginning of its space tourism ambitions. The same clients will then pay two 12.6 million bills in the two years leading up to the flight, then paying the final $10.8 million payment at the time of the flight.

This plan bets on the growing number of multi-millionaires around the world. By some estimates, by 2021 there will be more than 43,000 people globally, whose personal fortune exceeds $30 million. It means that if just 36 of these individuals (or 0.33 percent from the whole group) choose to visit the space hotel, the module would make money.

Despite these sci-fi ambitions, the authors of the proposal admit there are a few serious problems. The main potential stumbling block is the technical complexity involved in building the new module, even if the engineers can take advantage of existing blueprints and some available spare parts from its government-funded sibling. In the past two decades, the efforts to restart the assembly of the Russian part of the ISS have been chronically behind schedule.

Currently, the launch of the NEM-1 module is planned for 2021. In the meantime, the retirement of the ISS is looming in 2028.

RKK Energia estimates that it would take at least five years to build the tourist module, which means that if the work began right away, it would make it to the station in 2022 or later. Hence, the project might not have those seven years required to pay off the investments. Also the project will be vulnerable to currency exchange fluctuations and cost overruns, the authors of the study said.

In the near future, much will depend whether Roskosmos or private investors will pony up the cash for humanity's first luxury hotel in space.
 
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   #65  

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/28/russian-satellite-lost-wrong-spaceport-meteor-m

Russian satellite lost after being set to launch from wrong spaceport

Deputy prime minister admits programmers gave the $45m device coordinates for Baikonur rather than Vostochny cosmodrome

Wed 27 Dec ‘17 19.39 EST
Last modified on Thu 28 Dec ‘17 17.00 EST

Russian deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin said on Wednesday the loss of a 2.6bn-rouble ($45m) satellite launched last month was due to an embarrassing programming error.

Russian space agency Roscosmos said last month it had lost contact with the newly launched weather satellite – the Meteor-M – after it blasted off from Russia’s new Vostochny cosmodrome in the country’s far east.

Speaking to Rossiya 24 state TV channel, Rogozin said the failure had been caused by human error. The rocket carrying the satellites had been programmed with the wrong coordinates, he said, saying it had been given bearings for take-off from a different cosmodrome – Baikonur – which Moscow leases from Kazakhstan.

“The rocket was really programmed as if it was taking off from Baikonur,” said Rogozin. “They didn’t get the coordinates right.”

The rocket was carrying 18 smaller satellites belonging to scientific, research and commercial companies from Russia, Norway, Sweden, the US, Japan, Canada and Germany.

The Vostochny spaceport, laid out in the thick taiga forest of the Amur region, is the first civilian rocket launch site in Russia.

In April last year, after delays and massive costs overruns, Russia launched its first rocket from Vostochny, a day after a technical glitch forced an embarrassing postponement of the event in the presence of the president, Vladimir Putin.
 
   #66  

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RIP John Young. He piloted the first Gemini flight, was the first astronaut to fart on the moon, and was the commander on the first ever space shuttle launch..... :(

https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-remembers-agency-s-most-experienced-astronaut

b0a41f31b9bdf769b2f7376b2a436e93
 
   #68  

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NROL-47 is at T-4 minutes and holding. They apparently have a MIL for a temperature sensor that's out of range, and are looking for engineering approval to change the threshold.....

 
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Abort at T-26 seconds! Recycling countdown to T-4 minutes and holding, still no call to scrub for today.....
 
   #70  

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Just scrubbed, apparently a valve problem on the ground. Anomaly Team determining whether de-tanking procedure needs any changes in light of valve problem.

Trying again in 24 hours.....
 
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https://gbtimes.com/rocket-booster-drops-from-sky-and-explodes-near-town-after-chinese-space-launch

Rocket booster drops from sky and explodes near town after Chinese space launch

by Andrew Jones
Jan 12, 2018 12:59

A booster from a Chinese Long March 3B rocket launch dropped from the sky and exploded near buildings in Guangxi, southwest China on Friday, shocking locals and onlookers.

The Long March 3B lifted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre in Sichuan Province at 07:18 local time on Friday, carrying two Beidou-3 GNSS satellites.

Minutes after launch as the rocket flew downrange, four strap-on boosters separated from the core, with one dropping near the town of Xiangdu in Tiandeng Country, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, around 700 kilometres from the launch site.

With Tiandeng county being within the designated drop zones for debris for the launch, some locals were evidently ready to capture footage in the case that discarded rocket boosters fell from the sky.

The clip below shows just that happening, with an explosion occurring on impact behind buildings.

In the video itself, posted on Chinese social media platform Sina Weibo, a range of shouts and noises can be heard from onlookers.

The powerful Long March 3B rocket, used to carry satellites to medium and geosynchronous Earth orbits, is almost 55 metres long, with a diameter of 3.35 metres on the core stage. The launcher has a mass at liftoff of 458,970 kg, or just over 1 million pounds.

The four 2.25 m diameter, 15 m long strap-on boosters are filled with unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine (UDMH) and dinitrogen tetroxide (N2O4) hypergolic propellant, which is highly toxic.

The booster did not hit any people or buildings, but the still burning wreckage will have posed a serious health hazard to locals who approached to film the debris, as seen below.

long-march-3B-booster-burning-baise-guangxi-jan12-2018.gif

A burning booster which fell to Earth in Guangxi from the Long March 3B launch on January 12, 2018. Sina Weibo

The footage comes in stark contrast to United States launches, which send launch vehicles over the ocean, while private company SpaceX has mastered landing its Falcon 9 first stages back at launch sites and on drone ships off the coast.

China's first three launch sites were established during the Cold War, with Jiuquan and Taiyuan constructed deep inland for security reasons. These included tensions with the Soviet Union spilling over into border skirmishes and the United States considering preemptive strikes against China on sites linked to nuclear weapon launch capabilities.

This means that today's space launches pass over inhabited areas. Though drop zones for Long March rocket stages are carefully calculated and launch notices and procedures put in places, events like the above are all too common, especially with China's space activities expanding greatly in recent years.

yaogan-27-lm-4c-yf21-engine-roof-hongjun-village-ankang-shaanxi-1.png

An unidentified man stands next to what is likely an engine from a Long March 4C rocket from the launch of the Chinese Yaogan Weixing-27 satellite in August 2015. Internet photo

The newest site, the Wenchang Satellite Launch Centre on Hainan island, is a coastal site, bringing launches into a more open age. However it is only used for the Long March 5 and 7 rockets, which have only just debuted in the last two years.

The China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC), a subsidiary of the main contractor for the Chinese space programme, CASC, said it plans to launch 14 Long March 3A, B and C variant rockets this year, including 8 launches for the Beidou system.

Such events pose a greater threat than that of Tiangong-1, China's first space lab which is losing orbital altitude and expected to reenter the Earth's atmosphere around March this year.

Most of the 8.5 tonne space lab will burn up on reentry, with remaining debris capable of landing anywhere within 43 degrees North and South.

However, this and events like today are bad optics for a country with serious space ambitions, including its own modular space station and lunar exploration goals.

CASC subsidiaries, the Shanghai Academy of Space Technology (SAST) and China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT) are looking into reusability for its respective Long March rocket vehicles, while CASC itself has stated plans to make all its launch vehicles fully reusable, but not until around 2035.
 
   #72  

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^^^^
Ewww! Why would anyone use UDMH and N2O4 as fuel in a throw-away strap-on booster? :rolleyes:

Someone should inform the Chinese that it's not the 1950s anymore.
 
   #73  

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Someone should inform the Chinese that it's not the 1950s anymore.

Funny you mention that..... :D

https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/01/russia-now-looking-to-sell-its-prized-rocket-engines-to-china/

Russia now looking to sell its prized rocket engines to China
The RD-180 is 40 years old but remains one of the highest performing engines.

ERIC BERGER
JAN 18, 2018 2:30 PM UTC

Ever since the Crimean crisis in 2014—precipitated by Russia's annexation of the Ukrainian-held peninsula—Congress has increased pressure on the US aerospace industry to end its use of Russian-made rocket engines. In particular, legislators want United Launch Alliance to stop using the RD-180 engine in its Atlas V launch vehicle. This booster, with a 100-percent mission success rate, launches many of America's national security payloads.

As United Launch Alliance plans to transition to US-made engines early next decade, and with other US rockets already flying or soon coming online, the Russian RD-180 manufacturers are looking to other markets. In doing so, they've found willing buyers in China, although this has come with some concerns.

Even though the rocket engine technology behind the RD-180 is 40 years old, it remains one of the highest performing engines in the world, with a near-perfect service record. With 860,000 pounds of thrust (about 3.8MN), the RD-180 also happens to be three times more powerful than any Chinese rocket engine.

The Financial Times has a new report on negotiations for the engine technology between Russia's NPO Energomash and the China Great Wall Industry Corporation. These discussions have been closely tracked by both Western officials and those in Russia.

For the United States and its allies, there is the concern that China's use of the engine technology will extend beyond peaceful uses in space. It is believed that China wants the powerful and efficient engines for a new generation of ballistic missiles that could target US aircraft carriers.

In Russia, too, there is wariness because China doesn't just want to buy engines as a customer, as United Launch Alliance did with the RD-180 for its rockets. Rather, they want to eventually build the engines themselves. “The Russians understand that what the Chinese ultimately want to do is put them out of the rocket engine business,” Rick Fisher, a missile technology expert at the International Assessment and Strategy Center in Washington, told the publication.
 
   #75  

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OK, but the RD-180 uses RP1/LOX (just like Elon's engines) and neither of those is a nasty poison.

Exactly! China is upgrading its 1950's technology with 1980's technology. ;) Good for the environment...especially when they keep dropping spent boosters on their people.....
 
   #76  

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especially when they keep dropping spent boosters on their people.....
Yeah, that part is puzzling. It's not like China doesn't have any east-facing coast-line to launch from.
 
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I haven't been paying much attention to these in the past, but this Atlas-V variant has a weird configuration -- one strap-on solid rocket booster. Can you say, "asymmetrical thrust"? :eek:
 
   #79  

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China should just steam roll to the east coast and make it a launch pad....... :D
 
   #80  

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Speaking of lessons from the 1980's, I'm happy to see this happening.....

https://apnews.com/f3f2fc24b2494f5b8c89a08b08244205/Christa-McAuliffe's-lost-lessons-finally-taught-in-space

Christa McAuliffe's Lost Lessons Finally Getting Taught in Space

800.jpeg


CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Christa McAuliffe's lost lessons are finally getting taught in space.

Thirty-two years after the Challenger disaster, a pair of teachers turned astronauts will pay tribute to McAuliffe by carrying out her science classes on the International Space Station.

As NASA's first designated teacher in space, McAuliffe was going to experiment with fluids and demonstrate Newton's laws of motion for schoolchildren. She never made it to orbit: She and six crewmates were killed during liftoff of space shuttle Challenger on Jan. 28, 1986.

Astronauts Joe Acaba and Ricky Arnold will perform some of McAuliffe's lessons over the next several months. Acaba shared the news during a TV linkup Friday with students at her alma mater, Framingham State University near Boston.

"I can't think of a better time or a better place to make this announcement," Acaba said. He and Arnold "look forward to helping to inspire the next generation of explorers and educators."

Four lessons — on effervescence or bubbles, chromatography, liquids and Newton's laws — will be filmed by Acaba and Arnold, then posted online by the Challenger Center, a not-for-profit organization supporting science, technology, engineering and math education.

The center's president, Lance Bush, said he's thrilled "to bring Christa's lessons to life."

"We are honored to have the opportunity to complete Christa's lessons and share them with students and teachers around the world," Bush said in a statement.

On Friday, he thanked Acaba, who along with two station crewmates fielded questions from Framingham State students about life in space.

NASA's associate administrator for education, Mike Kincaid, said the lessons are "an incredible way to honor and remember" McAuliffe as well as the entire Challenger crew.

Four of the six lessons that McAuliffe planned to videotape during her space flight will be done. A few will be altered to take advantage of what's available aboard the space station.

The lessons should be available online beginning this spring.

Acaba returns to Earth at the end of February. Arnold flies up in March. NASA is billing their back-to-back missions as "A Year of Education on Station."

The two were teaching middle school math and science on opposite sides of the world — Acaba in Florida and Arnold in Romania — when NASA picked them as educator-astronauts in 2004.

McAuliffe was teaching history, law and economics at Concord High School in New Hampshire when she was selected as the primary candidate for NASA's teacher in space project in 1985.

Her backup, Barbara Morgan, is on the Challenger Center's board of directors. Morgan was NASA's first educator-astronaut, flying on shuttle Endeavour in 2007 and helping to build the space station.

McAuliffe planned to keep a journal during her space shuttle mission, and one college student asked if the astronauts were doing the same. Acaba said he's been making entries in a leather-bound journal during his 14 years as an astronaut. He writes in it every night before he goes to sleep on the space station.

"When I'm sitting on my porch sometime in the future, I'll look back on all these great times," Acaba said.

___

Online:

NASA: https://tinyurl.com/yearofeducation

Challenger Center: https://www.challenger.org/
 
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