Space News thread

[Takeovers]

Wow...Can you imagine a trip like that?...Coming soon, to a theater near you, as they say...

Can you imagine to book an orbital or ballistic flight on a rocket for long distance plus a local connecting flight? The intercontinental orbital flight in the range of 30 minutes with the connecting flight much longer.

[BaitongBoy]

Indeed...And it's not far off...And yet, many years from now it will seem primitive...There will be some mind-blowing advances in the future that will change everything once more...

[Latindancer]

You won't get ME on an intercontinental orbital flight. Too many things to go wrong, and always will be.

After their crash record, I won't even get on a helicopter !

[Takeovers]

You won't get ME on an intercontinental orbital flight. Too many things to go wrong, and always will be.

After their crash record, I won't even get on a helicopter !

I guess if you don't want to fly helicopter then rockets will really not be your thing.

True, rockets will have to become a lot safer. Part of it will be reuse. They are learning from every landed rocket. Two days ago the third pre flown rocket booster made its second flight. Even SpaceX are surprised how quickly customers have accepted them. They do not even give a high disount presently.

[Luigi]

What's the insurance like?


Serious question. I know nothing of the legalities of the aeronautical industry, but I presume every commercial flight must legally be insured.

What insurance company is going to insure passenger-laden Intercontinental Ballistic Rockets?


At the same price that they insure an airbus A380. They have said that they plan to have a price point similar to conventional air travel.

[Takeovers]

What's the insurance like?


Serious question. I know nothing of the legalities of the aeronautical industry, but I presume every commercial flight must legally be insured.

What insurance company is going to insure passenger-laden Intercontinental Ballistic Rockets?


At the same price that they insure an airbus A380. They have said that they plan to have a price point similar to conventional air travel.

I have a really hard time seeing that happen. The regulatory hurdles are huge. For spaceflight they can have the passengers sign a waiver, declaring they are aware of the risks. The same would not apply to commercial passenger transport. I guess they would need some 20 years of flights without major accidents maybe. But even then there are requirements in aviation that can not possibly be met with a rocket. There is a requirement to be able to evacuate an airplane on the ground and it already becomes hard to meet that requirement on an A380. They did demonstrate it with volunteers and just barely made it. With a few broken bones, which is regarded acceptable in an emergency. Impossible to do the same with a rocket and passengers at 100 m above ground.

But imagine, they get to fly passengers. They would soon have 20-40 launch sites that earn their cost on earth. But they would be available to send off a few thousand vehicles to Mars in one launch window without needing major dedicated ground support on the cost side. A real enabler for Mars colonization. Everything Elon Musk does needs to be seen in the context of settling Mars.

[Takeovers]

I watched a reddit AMA by Elon Muskon BFR last night. Last year at the IAC conference in Mexico Elon Musk was trolled by abysmal questions from the audience. A woman who asked him if she can come up to the stage to kiss him was actually one of those with the better questions.

Yesterday Elon trolled the reddit users with some of his replies. On one question how they produce the needed hot gases he said they will use a Harry Potter spell for ignition - incindere.

But overall it was very, very interesting again. In the beginning he was concentrating much on airplane like operations on earth. He said safety standards on par with modern jets or better will be required and are the design goal. Still seems incredible to me.

[harrybarracuda]

Tiangong 1: Out of control Chinese space station about to fall to Earth, expert says
Engineers lost contact with the space laboratory last year, and has been gradually falling back to Earth ever since
Andrew Griffin @_andrew_griffin 20 hours ago


An out-of-control space laboratory is falling towards the Earth and will crash land soon, experts say.


The Chinese space station is accelerating its fall towards us and will reach the ground in the coming months, Harvard astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell told the Guardian. It is decaying quickly and he expects "expect it will come down a few months from now – late 2017 or early 2018", he told the paper.


The Tiangong 1 station was launched in 2011 as one of the great hopes of the Chinese ambitions in space, and as part of a plan to show itself off as a global superpower. The country's space agency referred to the station as the "Heavenly Palace" and conducted a range of missions, some of which included astronauts.


But last year scientists at Chinese's CNSA space agency said that they had lost control of the lab, and that it would now be heading towards Earth. That put an end to months of speculation, as experts watching the path of the station suggested that it had been behaving strangely.


And it also sparked immediate concerns that people on the ground could be at risk from the falling space debris.


It's unlikely that anyone will be harmed by the crash, or that anyone would see it at all, since it's most likely that the lab will drop into the sea. But it's still possible that it would crash somewhere near people.


It's very difficult to predict where it will fall because engineers have lost control of the capsule and it will be thrown around by the wind as it comes down. Even a slight push from the weather could send it from one continent to the next.


Much of the debris will burn up on its way into Earth's atmosphere. But chunks as big as 100kg will make their way through and fall from the skies, said McDowell.


In the past, space junk has fallen within sight of people, and there have even been reports of injuries.


Tiangong 1: Out of control Chinese space station about to fall to Earth, expert says | The Independent

[Latindancer]

The Tiangong 1 station was launched in 2011 as one of the great hopes of the Chinese ambitions in space, and as part of a plan to show itself off as a global superpower.

The country's space agency referred to the station as the "Heavenly Palace" .

Fantastic news !

The wankers deserve to lose face big-time due to what they are doing to the Tibetan people and their pushy actions in the South China Sea. And that's just for starters.

I hope their "Heavenly Palace" falls right on top of the Communist Party headquarters in Beijing. That would restore my faith in justice and the universe.

[uncle junior]

^It's lasted only a about year less than Skylab did. Not bad for a first effort.

[Maanaam]

Nasa admits the mysterious Planet Nine is real

Nasa admits the mysterious Planet Nine is real - NZ Herald

[Takeovers]

Nasa admits the mysterious Planet Nine is real


Nasa admits the mysterious Planet Nine is real - NZ Herald

The article is ok, the facts known for a while.

The headline is clickbait, lent from the range of conspiracy theories and Nibiru believers.

[misskit]

Russian Supply Ship Docks at International Space Station
FILE - A photo provided by NASA TV shows a cargo ship as it arrives at the International Space Station, Dec. 13, 2016.



MOSCOW —
An unmanned Russian cargo ship has docked successfully at the International Space Station, delivering supplies to its six-member crew.


The Progress MS-07 ship, carrying 2.5 metric tons (2.75 tons) of water, food and scientific equipment, moored at the space outpost in automatic mode Monday two days after its launch from the Russian-leased Baikonur launch complex in Kazakhstan.


Saturday's launch came after a two-day postponement and docking plan change.


Initially, the Progress cargo ship was to test a new regime for docking with the space station less than four hours after launch. But the Thursday launch was aborted after an unspecified glitch and space officials used the regular two-day regime.

https://www.voanews.com/a/internatio...p/4072117.html

[harrybarracuda]

Scientists just found a human habitat in space
Zoe Drewett for Metro.co.uk
Thursday 19 Oct 2017 12:45 pm

If tuning into the news every day for the past year has made you want to give up on Earth entirely, this might just be the thing for you. A study has confirmed the existence of a potential habitat located on our planet’s moon, meaning humans could be able to stay for long stretches of time.

Scientific Journal, the Geophysical Research Letters, discovered a large open lava tube in a particular section of the moon’s surface – the Marius Hills region – which could be used to protect astronauts during space walks. No one has ever been on the moon for longer than three days because space suits alone are not enough to shield astronauts from the elements. Extreme temperature variation, cosmic ray radiation and meteorite impacts all pose real threats to humans during space walks.

But according to researchers from Japan and the US, the intact lava tube could provide enough protection that astronauts would be able to seek shelter from the hazardous moon surface. Junichi Haruyama, a senior researcher at JAXA, Japan’s space agency, said: ‘It’s important to know where and how big lunar lava tubes are if we’re ever going to construct a lunar base. ‘But knowing these things is also important for basic science. We might get new types of rock samples, heat flow data and lunar quake observation data.’

Junichi and other scientists analysed radar data from Japan’s Selene spacecraft, which was used to bounce radar busts off the moon’s surface. It found a distinctive pattern suggesting the presence of a floor and a ceiling of a lava tube.

The scientists said that for a lava tube to be detectable, it would need to extend several kilometers in length and at least one kilometer in height and width. It means the lava tube they discovered near Marius Hills could be big enough to house an entire city.

Space scientists may have found a human habitat on the moon | Metro News

[BaitongBoy]

Lava tube...There's an interesting term...

[Takeovers]

Lava tube...There's an interesting term...

They are interesting structures. We have plenty of them on earth.





They are created when lava flows. On earth they are relatively small, but on low gravity worlds like the moon and Mars they can become huge. Big enough to house mega cities. If you find one that can be closed off and pressurized you have a habitat for millions of people. Similar as shown in Total Recall. But before living in one I would like geologists do a thorough evaluation for their long term stability. Breaks in their structure are possible.

Sometimes their ceilings break in and produce openings like this:



Thats a new opening discovered on Mars. You don't want this to happen when it is pressurized and you live in it.

[Takeovers]

Articles like this are always good for a frown, or a laugh, depending on your mood. A journalist tries to write an article from a press release without knowing even remotely what it is about.

The surface of the moon and to a smaller extent on Mars exposes you to harsh cosmic background radiation. Being inside a lava tube will protect you from radiation and from large temperature swings. But getting access is hard. If you want to build a large permanent presence it may be worth it, but only for very many people. For a research station it would be easier to just cover habitats with some regolith, that's the local soil, except soil is a term that implies an organic content like everywhere on earth, so they use regolith.

[BaitongBoy]

Thats a new opening discovered on Mars. You don't want this to happen when it is pressurized and you live in it.

Kinda like the "ceiling" of the infamous Olympic Stadium in Montreal...

[OhOh]

^It's lasted only a about year less than Skylab did. Not bad for a first effort.

Quietly, you'll wake up the Dragon haters here. The Japanese, UK, French, Australian, German and Israeli ones are where?

Thank god for the Russian engines otherwise the ISS would be dead and gone as well.

[Takeovers]

It was a test station only and has served its purpose. It was not planned to be used any more. They did lose control which means they now can not deorbit it in a controlled way into a predetermined area. Usually structures that are deorbited in a controlled way end up in the empty South Pacific. But the risk of any damage caused by the station is small. The Russians once lost a satellite with a nuclear reactor over Canada.

Work on a larger permanent station is ongoing. Underestimating the Chinese space effort would be a major mistake.

[Topper]

Haven't scientists been talking about using lava tubes on the moon for years now as a place to settle?

[Takeovers]

Haven't scientists been talking about using lava tubes on the moon for years now as a place to settle?

There was little talk about settling on the moon, but yes. The moon is more a destination for scientific research. Lava tubes are certainly one interesting structure to do research in. Recent speculation was that they may even find some water in there which would make them more attractive for a base or for mining local resources.

Much more talk was about Mars.

[Topper]

I think if I were Musk, I'd find me a lava tube on the Moon, set up a "base" and use it as a testing facility for the same such thing on Mars while selling research space in the base to finance the Mars colony.

[Takeovers]

I think if I were Musk, I'd find me a lava tube on the Moon, set up a "base" and use it as a testing facility for the same such thing on Mars while selling research space in the base to finance the Mars colony.

Too much of an investment. SpaceX will gladly offer transport for anyone who wants to go to the moon. Problem is that presently probably NASA is not willing to invest in SpaceX. NASA and Congress prefer the old NASA style mission profiles, which remind of Rube Goldberg machines in their complexity. They do have the advantage of costing at least 20 times as much as the SpaceX approach and distribute purchases and research contracts over many congressional districts. An advantage that SpaceX can not match.

We will see if that somehow changes once SpaceX has their architecture actually flying, but not before. There is one big hope for SpaceX to get government money help for their development. The Airforce wants a new generation of launch vehicles and is going to give financial support to up to 3 companies developing them.

[Takeovers]

Some info on the planned NASA Mars rover 2020.



The rover is based on the Curiosity rover. Same chassis but much changed science instruments. Cameras are much more capable.

The wheels are a new design after the Curiosity wheels failed much earlier than expected.



PIXL Planetary instrument for X-ray lithochemistry.

An X-ray fluorescence spectrometer that will also contain an imager with high resolution to determine the fine scale elemental composition of Martian surface materials. PIXL will provide capabilities that permit more detailed detection and analysis of chemical elements than ever before.

RIMFAX (Radar Imager For Mars' Subsurface Experiment)

A ground-penetrating radar that will provide centimeter-scale resolution of the geologic structure of the subsurface.

There is more here: https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/mission/instruments/