Astronomy / The Universe

[Unknown user]

20 minutes ago, Gizmo said:

We all benefited from many Gemini and Apollo developments, so I doubt that this will be true. The ISS has already provided benefits. 

 

As a by product though, imagine if we just focused all that money and effort directly into things that will benefit mankind.

 

I know NASA will never be replaced by a body that focuses on tech development purely for benevolent purposes of course, it's just frustration on my part.

[JFK-1]

When it comes to space I feel it's an imperative if we want to be around long term. Because even if we weren't strangling the planet ourselves, even if we weren't here at all, the planet will still be devastated sometime, could be anytime.

 

If we cannot live anywhere but on this planet we're on the way out.

[Unknown user]

27 minutes ago, JFK-1 said:

When it comes to space I feel it's an imperative if we want to be around long term. Because even if we weren't strangling the planet ourselves, even if we weren't here at all, the planet will still be devastated sometime, could be anytime.

 

If we cannot live anywhere but on this planet we're on the way out.

 

It won't be us, it won't be our descendents. No one's going to pay the many millions each seat will cost for us.

 

It'll be the mega rich and the mega powerful, plus their birds and probably some slaves. We probably won't even know it's happened.

 

We need to work on saving life on earth.

[JFK-1]

19 minutes ago, Smithee said:

 

It won't be us, it won't be our descendents. No one's going to pay the many millions each seat will cost for us.

 

It'll be the mega rich and the mega powerful, plus their birds and probably some slaves. We probably won't even know it's happened.

 

We need to work on saving life on earth.

 

I agree there are countless plausible scenarios where it would be wealthy who got off leaving the mass of the average Joes behind, the Matt Damon film Elysium was an excellent depiction of such a scenario involving a habitat orbiting the earth.

 

My thinking though is that from a survival of the species perspective we would survive, regardless of if it being only the rich if that were the case. Isn't that the objective as such?

 

As for our current long term woes I think they would still exist if all of the NASA budget were allotted to them and NASA didn't even exist.

 

To me corporations and their activities are by far our greatest issue, NASA isn't destroying the planet, it provides us useful data on our planet, and it's budget is a drop in the ocean in comparison to the money swilling around in these corporations. And the reluctance to stop earning so much to help save the planet.

 

The oil industry for decades has been denying any link between fossil fuels and climate, while everybody knew it clearly had an effect, and they knew it too. So, like Trump, went down a route of fueling conspiracy theories. That's criminal. 

Edited March 30, 2023 by JFK-1

[Cade]

Space exploration is expensive, but it pales in comparison to military budgets and especially when compared to what private companies hoard in their tax havens every year.

It's a drop in the ocean and leads to significant scientific advances that benefit everybody.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spinoff_technologies

[Unknown user]

6 minutes ago, Cade said:

Space exploration is expensive, but it pales in comparison to military budgets and especially when compared to what private companies hoard in their tax havens every year.

It's a drop in the ocean and leads to significant scientific advances that benefit everybody.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spinoff_technologies

 

And as I said, imagine if they just focused on significant scientific advances that benefit everybody.

 

I watched a thing about the solar shields on that space thing that went up. Years of testing, millions spent just on testing how best to fold it in gravity and unfold it in zero gravity.

 

[Gizmo]

12 hours ago, Smithee said:

 

As a by product though, imagine if we just focused all that money and effort directly into things that will benefit mankind.

 

I know NASA will never be replaced by a body that focuses on tech development purely for benevolent purposes of course, it's just frustration on my part.

I mean yeah as a spin-off, just as wars drive innovation out of desperate need but I'd never suggest we spark one up to move us forward.

But the drive for minutarisation of electronics, particularly the IC, was massively speeded up by Apollo - and that was defintely one of the roads that got us to where we are. Our modern communications rely on regular and routine launches too - so whilst I'd argue that space exploration is important solely from a scientific discovery pov, it's also vital to modern life. 

[Cade]

Football consumes far more money and resources than space exploration.

 

Perhaps we should cancel football until all the world's ills are solved?

[Unknown user]

Just now, Cade said:

Football consumes far more money and resources than space exploration.

 

Perhaps we should cancel football until all the world's ills are solved?

 

No one thinks football's the answer to the world's problems while people starve now though

 

[Unknown user]

Ah like I say as well though, it's frustrating talking.

 

I love the scientific side of it, which is how I know about the folding sun shield stuff, it's just that we have so many problems we're not addressing.

[Cade]

There are many things which consume funds and resources which could (and perhaps should) be spent elsewhere.

Space exploration, at least, does have real tangible benefits through the new technologies and alloys which it creates.

 

Space exploration is not a frivolous waste of money.

[Unknown user]

9 minutes ago, Cade said:

There are many things which consume funds and resources which could (and perhaps should) be spent elsewhere.

Space exploration, at least, does have real tangible benefits through the new technologies and alloys which it creates.

 

Space exploration is not a frivolous waste of money.

 

Not only is it a frivolous waste of money, it has a very negative effect in many people's minds. "Our future is in the stars!" also carries the subtext "the planet's ****ed beyond repair" and it's a comfort blanket that stops many from taking things seriously.

[Lone Striker]

I share  Smithee's views  on this - while accepting that there's lots of scientific spin-offs which have benefitted the world economy, all the way down to individual citizens with their fancy phones, cars and gadgets.   Telecoms in particular has been transformed by satellite technology, which in turn needs space launches and complex tracking. 

 

It looks very much as if governments in the "developed world" are fighting a losing battle against the effects of climate change - basically they seem to be  tacitly conceding  that the human and financial cost of the increasing number of devastation incidents around the world  is an inevitable  fact of life now.   For folk directly  affected by the worst of these around the world (losing their home and livelihood), there is no benefit from space exploration or technology.

 

 And while 7bn dollars per year is only a tiny proportion of the US military spend, that justification simply highlights the obscene amount of  military spending for a country which is not officially at war with anyone.

 

(For avoidance of doubt, I'm not singling out the US for this - there's probably loads of countries with similarly obscene amounts of military spend, including the UK).

 

The curiosity and appreciation of human ingenuity in me  loves the concept of space exploration - but I think at some point the world governments involved in it will have to talk openly about the long-term objectives.      Is it  to look for signs of life in distant galaxies ?    Is it to find another suitable planet for humans to colonise ?     If its the latter, a whole can of worms opens up - why ...... when..... how..... who pays for it ......how will the colonising humans organise themselves .....  who'll be in charge ....etc.  And as Smithee alludes to,  once that happens then  the future of  Earth as a habitable planet  becomes even more alarming  for every Earth citizen.   

 

Thankfully, I'll be dead by then.  

 

            

 

 

[JFK-1]

13 hours ago, Gizmo said:

Our modern communications rely on regular and routine launches too - so whilst I'd argue that space exploration is important solely from a scientific discovery pov, it's also vital to modern life. 

 

I think that factor is something that's sometimes forgotten, space isn't a luxury we can do without if we want our current lifestyle to continue. Oops there goes GPS, I'm lost. 

[Gizmo]

If we can generate energy off-planet or mine the regolith of the moon for 3He then we will be helping address climate change massively. We also know more about climate change thanks to the monitoring satellites we've deployed and continue to deploy.

If we settle and don't strive, we definitely be jeapordising our future. That's just the way it is - one extinction level event like a massive asteroid and it's all over. 

This argument against space exploration is just the same as we would have heard when people wanted to cross the oceans. I'm a member of the Planetary Society precisely because I believe we need to keep exploring and not stop at our earthly border. 

[Unknown user]

8 minutes ago, Gizmo said:

This argument against space exploration is just the same as we would have heard when people wanted to cross the oceans.

 

Is it though?

 

36 minutes ago, JFK-1 said:

 

I think that factor is something that's sometimes forgotten, space isn't a luxury we can do without if we want our current lifestyle to continue. Oops there goes GPS, I'm lost. 

 

Maintaining our orbital infrastructure and trying to colonise the stars aren't the same thing at all.

[ri Alban]

3 hours ago, Smithee said:

 

Is it though?

 

 

Maintaining our orbital infrastructure and trying to colonise the stars aren't the same thing at all.

We haven't even conquered the deep blue sea, we'll never conquer the galaxy. Ever! 

Colonies on Mars and The Moon. Build cities under the sea first. Naw, I didn't think so.

Edited April 1, 2023 by ri Alban

[Cade]

Virgin Orbit down the swanney

 

[Cade]

FAA grants SpaceX a 5-year licence to launch Starship.

 

It's happening!

 

[JFK-1]

Such reusable heavy lift rockets are going to be the key factor in US domination of moon exploration and exploitation. Whoever has the most heavy lift rockets carrying materials up there is going to be the dominant player.

 

And that's far and away the US. Who else has not only a national space agency which already has the largest space budget, but a private enterprise like SpaceX to compliment it. Who else is building a moon orbiting portal?

 

Nobody, it's almost like a one horse race. 

[Cade]

Chinese already have their own space station up and are planning manned missions in the near future.

Despite their laissez faire attitude to space junk and controlled de-orbits.
Messy feckers.
 

Russia will fall behind due to the sanctions.

They've been stagnating for donkey's years, long before the USSR fell apart.

Soyuz, although modified, is essentially the exact same spacecraft that's been used for 60 years.
Sure, it's reliable but it's a stagnant dead end.

 

With SLS and Starship up and running, the USA will hold a commanding lead and if Starship works as intended and is almost fully resuable, that will cut the launch cost significantly and they'll have a monopoly on heavy lift capability, especially on the open market.

[JFK-1]

11 minutes ago, Cade said:

Chinese already have their own space station up and are planning manned missions in the near future.

Despite their laissez faire attitude to space junk and controlled de-orbits.
Messy feckers.

 

The Chinese station is in low earth orbit, carrying humans all the way to the moon, landing them on the moon, and bringing them back safely is a challenge way greater than an earth orbiting space station.

 

I don't think they have even conducted much if anything in the way of spacewalks. The US already landed men on the moon multiple times decades ago, brought them safely back. And must have amassed hundreds if not thousands of hours on long and intricate spacewalks. Repairing Hubble as an example.

 

To me China is so far behind in every aspect they're not even a real runner as such. They can't match the decades of experience NASA has in a short time. Though they're not just messy feckers, they're technology thieving feckers who will be spying on both NASA and SpaceX.

[Cade]

Starship launch could happen as early as 7am CDT (1300 BST) tomorrow.

 

Pretty high chance of the attempts being scrubbed due to various factors, but maybe we'll get a launch of the world's largest ever rocket.

 

[JFK-1]

A couple of days or so ago ESA launched an exploratory satellite towards Jupiter. Big worry was the solar array, will all 98 square yards of it deploy? If not it's dead, but all went well, it's on its way.

 

The rocket didn't have the punch to send it all the way to Jupiter, or at least not in an acceptable time frame.

 

Instead they have actually sent it in the opposite direction, towards the sun. There it's going to spend some time whipping around the sun, back to Venus, whip around Venus and  back to the sun to repeat it.

 

Multiple times this will happen before it picks up sufficient speed to then head for Jupiter. Arrival date is around eight and a half years from now.

 

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-65273857

[Cade]

ESA's JUICE is going to take ten years to get into position around the moons of Jupiter.

That's the problem with launching from Earth.

You need so much energy to break free of Earth's gravity that you have very little energy left to go onwards from there without using gravitational slingshots and coasting.

That's why things like Lunar Gateway and other orbital platforms are so good.

You launch from Earth up to one of those, then transfer the cargo to a new rocket that's already in space then all the energy in the rocket is available for faster interplanetary travel.

 

There is a theoretical limit on how much energy that conventional chemical rockets can produce, and that limits how much weight can be lifted from Earth and we'll hit that limit eventually then we'll have to think of something else.

 

 

 

[Cade]

Here's the live feed of the SpaceX attempt to launch Starship, the world's most powerful heavy lift vehicle.

*other livestreams are available, I just like the NASA Spaceflight guys

 

[PortyJambo]

13 hours ago, Cade said:

Starship launch could happen as early as 7am CDT (1300 BST) tomorrow.

 

Pretty high chance of the attempts being scrubbed due to various factors, but maybe we'll get a launch of the world's largest ever rocket.

 

Elon Musk going up in this first launch?

[Cade]

10 minutes ago, PortyJambo said:

Elon Musk going up in this first launch?

Sooner he fecks off to Mars the better

[Cade]

Launch scrubbed due to a pressurisation problem.

Continuing with a full wet dress rehearsal.

[maroonlegions]

 

The Galileo Project;

 

Professor Avi Loeb, Harvard University, said he will be scouring the ocean floor near Papua New Guinea to find out whether the object that crashed into the ocean a decade ago was a rock or an extraterrestrial probe.

 

As part of the expedition, astrophysicist Avi Loeb, who “definitely” believes extraterrestrials exist, will scour the floor of the southwestern Pacific Ocean for what he believes may be an alien spacecraft.

“The material of it is tougher than iron, based on the data, so the question is whether it’s just an unusual rock or perhaps a spacecraft from another civilisation,” he told Channel Seven’s Sunrise on Monday.
 

 

“I received $1.5 million last month to go ahead with this expedition,” he said.

Loeb’s fascination with the topic was driven by the discovery of Oumuamua — Hawaiian for “messenger sent from the distant past” — a football-field-sized, cigar-shaped object that zipped through the solar system in 2017.

In a controversial 2019 paper, Loeb speculated that Oumuamua’s unusual trajectory and shape suggested it was neither a comet nor an asteroid, but possibly an alien probe.

“So that’s what brought me into this,” he said.

 

Loeb and his student wrote a paper about their discovery, but were instructed not to publish it because they used classified government data for their research.

But in April, the US government “confirmed our conclusion in an official letter and said that 99.999 per cent they agree with our assessment”.

“They also released the light curve of the explosion of this object, which revealed that it had material strength tougher than iron, and it was tougher than all the other space rocks that the US government identified over the past decade, about 272 of them,” he said.

 

 

Make way, SETI (aka the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence). There’s a new game in town, which might be called SETA (the Search for Extraterrestrial Artifacts), though it’s officially known as the Galileo Project.

 

SETI began in 1960 and has, in the intervening six decades, been almost exclusively limited to the search for radio and laser signals from potential alien civilizations.

 

The Galileo Project, which was launched this month with a July 26 press announcement, will instead embark on a systematic search of the skies above Earth and outer space for artificial objects of extraterrestrial origin — possible space probes, active sensors, or long-defunct “astro-archaeological artifacts.”

 

Serendipity played a role in the start of this venture, according to Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb, who heads the Galileo Project. In early July, Loeb told Discover, “an administrator in Harvard’s Astronomy Department told me they’d just received $200,000 for my research fund, which someone had donated without even telling me.”

 

A day or so later, Loeb was able to contact the generous individual (whom he didn’t know beforehand), and after their conversation he was given even more money. Since then, other individuals have sent money to support this research effort, no strings attached. In a couple of weeks, Loeb accumulated $1.75 million. “They basically told me: ‘Here is the money. Do with it whatever you think is right,’” he said. “In all my decades in academia, that kind of thing never happens.”

 

So we have outside sources funding or part funding such projects. Its not all about if a government can afford it.

 

For what its worth scientists have been working with the US Whitehouse for some time now.

Source;

President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology
 

 

Also….

Source: Avi Loeb nominated to presidential advisory council
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cade]

2nd launch attempt for Starship is tomorrow (Thursday 20th april 2023), aiming for around about 2pm UK BST.

 

 

[Cade]

Plenty of livestreams already up.

 

[JFK-1]

So do they haver an estimated launch time, they have been talking about bacon and chopsticks, nothing about the launch. 

[Cade]

Estimated T0 (launch) timer at top left of that particular stream.

But that's just an estimate based on what SpaceX have publicised.

Experience with their launch procedures allows them to notice when certain things have been done and how likely the launch time is and they'll move the clock accordingly.

[Cade]

Took off, went up, went into a spin, went boom.

Par for the course for a first-time SpaceX test flight.

They have more boosters in production, all of which are being built with new upgrades already.

 

 

[Footballfirst]

27 minutes ago, Cade said:

Took off, went up, went into a spin, went boom.

Par for the course for a first-time SpaceX test flight.

They have more boosters in production, all of which are being built with new upgrades already.

Video of the launch and ultimately the "boom"

 

 

[A_A wehatethehibs]

Just watched the whole stream. Have to say that launch is one of the more emotional launches I have ever felt. Quite possibly the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. 

 

That beast is twice the height of the Scott Monument.
 

Hats off to the hardworking engineers who’ve dedicated their lives to this,  that’s their voices you can hear takeover the countdown 🚀

[Arse 'Friends' Dyslexic?]

What was with all the welts who continued clapping and cheering AFTER it blew up?

Utterly bizarre.

[Maple Leaf]

Great effort.  Congrats to all involved.

 

But I smiled at the terminology of "rapid unscheduled disassembly."  That sounds better than "it broke up in mid-air."

[Cade]

Leading theory is that the hydraulic system blew up and without that, the engines couldn't gimble and the 2nd stage holding clamps couldn't disengage.

 

Next rocket on the production line has electrically operated systems and not hydraulic.

 

So, if the hydraulic system was the issue, that's already been solved.

 

 

[Cade]

 

 

[JFK-1]

6 hours ago, Maple Leaf said:

But I smiled at the terminology of "rapid unscheduled disassembly."  That sounds better than "it broke up in mid-air."

 

One I saw, "this does not appear to be a nominal situation"

 

I knew it was gone when it began to rotate. Definitely not nominal.

 

[Cade]

When it began to go off course it was around about max-Q which is the part of the launch when the vehicle is under the most amount of aerodynamic stress.

It's kind of impressive that it didn't just break up when spinning out at max-Q.

 

[ri Alban]

Elon is definitely on strong gear. A success

[Cade]

18 minutes ago, ri Alban said:

Elon is definitely on strong gear. A success

 

It cleared the pad and got past Max-Q.

More than many other test rockets have done on their first launch.

A lot of people were expecting a large crater to appear where the pad once was.

 

SpaceX themselves blew up tons of Falcon rockets in the test phase and now they're launching them almost every day.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Falcon_9_and_Falcon_Heavy_launches#2022

[A_A wehatethehibs]

17 hours ago, Arse 'Friends' Dyslexic? said:

What was with all the welts who continued clapping and cheering AFTER it blew up?

Utterly bizarre.

 

[Arse 'Friends' Dyslexic?]

34 minutes ago, A_A wehatethehibs said:

 

 

I agree that the test was an impressive first attempt. Far better than I thought it would be.

But, again, the reaction seemed completely over the top and stage managed.

Mind you, with Elon watching on and the cameras rolling, anyone not seen a whoopin and a hollerin would probably be looking for a new job...

[hughesie27]

21 hours ago, JFK-1 said:

 

One I saw, "this does not appear to be a nominal situation"

 

I knew it was gone when it began to rotate. Definitely not nominal.

 

I think the first rotation was intended to allow the separation.  The subsequent dozen less so.

21 hours ago, ri Alban said:

Elon is definitely on strong gear. A success

Reaching orbit was given about 20% chance. They knew it was destined to blow up, they just wanted it to clear the launch tower. The data they got from doing that, reaching max Q and even the fault resulting in it blowing up can all be considered a success. 

[Cade]

 

 

[ri Alban]

I jumped of my roof, to see if I could fly. It would have been a success, if I hadn't hit the ground. Aya!

Edited April 22, 2023 by ri Alban