And here’s the megafeed of everything I’ve been doing.
I said this at the time, but I expected this news alongside either the BE-4 or Air Force selection announcements. Burying bad news with good news is always a solid plan, and I can’t imagine something has changed drastically in the last few weeks on the Vulcan front.
Just a few weeks back they announced the selection of ULA for a ViaSat-3 launch, and now they’ve firmed up what was an existing option for a Falcon Heavy launch in the 2020–2022 timeframe—the same timeframe as the ULA mission.
Looks like this move is solidifying, and may have interesting implications for the geostationary satellite production and launch markets.
NASA is asking about 7.6 metric tons of cargo to lunar orbit. That’s an ATV-class vehicle—a huge undertaking, requiring a big launch vehicle.
Good news for SpaceX and Falcon Heavy, but I still haven’t figured this one out. How did a company that has yet to finalize procurement of a satellite decide that a direct-to-GEO mission was right for them and their payload?
Elizabeth Howell joins Jake and Anthony to talk about her trip to Baikonur, the recent Soyuz situations, the politics of the ISS, and Canadian space.
Elizabeth Howell joins Jake and Anthony to talk about her trip to Baikonur, the recent Soyuz situations, the politics of the ISS, and Canadian space.
Elizabeth Howell joins Jake and Anthony to talk about her trip to Baikonur, the recent Soyuz situations, the politics of the ISS, and Canadian space.
This was my prediction back in July, and everything I said then still holds true, so if you want my thoughts on their choice, go have a listen.
For all my skepticism of Stratolaunch, it’s a major bummer that Allen never got to see the giant plane fly.
I share some thoughts on the two rocket drama stories from last week: a brutal OIG report on Boeing’s work on SLS stages, and the Air Force selected three new launch vehicles to receive development funding.
It’s kind of amazing that this is the first we’re hearing of this. Is this a new issue, or related to whatever caused Dragon 2 to end up with four parachutes?
Speaking of Russia, this is a story I’ve been following closely, from Tyler Rogoway and Ivan Voukadinov at The Drive.
I mentioned this on the last episode of Off-Nominal, but it’s worth saying here, too: I’m totally fine with Russia sitting out for the Gateway. Considering the state of the Russian space industry, and specifically how Roscosmos has been handling the ISS drill hole situation, I would very much prefer them to not be involved in building any hardware that will be flying to the Moon.
Blue Origin and Harris announced an interesting partnership last week that’s worth discussing: Harris will be producing 5-meter fixed mesh reflector antennas that can only fit (for now) inside of New Glenn’s big fairing.
Very special thanks to the 222 of you out there supporting Main Engine Cut Off on Patreon for the month of August. Your support keeps this blog and podcast going, and most importantly, it keeps it independent.
Looks like all the rumblings about Moon Express folding entirely weren’t the whole story. But I do want to point out that they haven’t even started building the first flight vehicle.
This month, I take on questions about BE-4 and Vulcan, small launch, BFR, and human spaceflight.
I don’t really understand the decision to establish in Luxembourg. It makes sense for organizations focused on space resources, since Luxembourg has taken such a strong stance for private space property rights. But I can’t quite make sense of it for CubeRover.
It’s encouraging that they chose to develop a hydrolox engine for their architecture, and 200,000 pounds-force puts it right about what a Merlin 1D is pushing these days.