Episode 16 - Imaginated Soap Buckets
Jake and Anthony talk about New Horizons’ recent flyby, Chang’e 4, and take on a handful of questions from listeners.
My RSS Feeds, January 2019 Edition
I’ve had a lot of people ask how I stay up on space news, so figured it might be worth sharing this.
Episode T+108: Layoffs and Launch Sites
I wanted to spend some time breaking down a few news items from last week that may be leading indicators of trends for 2019: layoffs at Stratolaunch, Tethers Unlimited, and SpaceX, and Relativity signed a lease for Launch Complex 16 at Cape Canaveral.
Relativity to Operate Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 16
Good to see them secure a launch site, but they’re still on the hunt for a polar-capaable site. Maybe SLC-3W at Vandenberg?
Astranis Signs First Customer
Pacific Dataport, an Alaskan company looking to provide broadband access to the entire state, is Astranis’ first customer.
Rough Few Months at Maxar
Caleb Henry, for SpaceNews, on the past few months at Maxar, including the departure of their CEO, who was replaced by DigitalGlobe’s president.
Episode T+107: Chris Gebhardt
Chris Gebhardt of NASASpaceflight joins me to talk all things SpaceX: Starship and its upcoming hopper tests, DM-1 and the government shutdown, and more.
Layoffs at SpaceX and Tethers
Rough end to last week for space.
WorldView-4 Fails
Such a bummer to lose a satellite after just two years in space, especially one that generated $85 million in revenue last year.
Thanks to December Patrons
Very special thanks to the 245 of you out there supporting Main Engine Cut Off on Patreon for the month of December. MECO is entirely listener- and reader-supported, so your support keeps this blog and podcast going, growing, and improving, and most importantly, it keeps it independent.
Dream Chaser Launch Costs
Catching up on some reading, and there’s an interesting little tidbit on Dream Chaser’s launch costs in a SpaceNews article by Jeff Foust.
Pacific Spaceport Complex — Hawaii
They clearly would like to operate multiple Pacific Spaceport Complex locations, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see them explore other options in the Pacific, like Guam.
Episode T+106: Q&A
This month I tackle questions on future space architectures, companies working in space right now, and finish with a 2018 Top 10 ranking.
OneWeb Refutes Reuters’ Report
Props to Reuters for posting a full story with the update, rather than posting it as an update on the original story, or going full Bloomberg.
The Inter-nominal Podcast
Jamie and Matt of The Interplanetary Podcast had Jake and I on their show for a wrap-up of 2018. I could not possibly have had more fun doing this episode—give it a listen!
Episode T+105: Jonathan McDowell
Jonathan McDowell joins me to talk about his recent paper proposing 80 kilometers, rather than 100, as a more appropriate boundary of the edge of space.
OneWeb Offering Russia 12.5% Stake
As if there wasn’t enough mystery as to what’s up with OneWeb lately, Maria Kolomychenko has an exclusive over at Reuters.
Spaceflight Is Not Messing Around
After the Swarm incident, Spaceflight is not messing around with licensing issues.
Spaceflight to Launch Brazil’s Amazonia-1
Pretty cool to see Spaceflight sign a deal like this, where they book a full-size primary payload and will match secondary payloads with it on a dedicated launch. Seems like an attractive service for all parties, and I hope to see more of it in the future.
Episode 15 - +1 Space Dagger
Jake and Anthony discuss what 2018 will mean to future space historians, and announce the winner of The 2018 Off-Nominal Award.