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Why, from "unspent agricultural subsidies", of course.
http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/3994

Have you ever wondered whether Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic were serious about this thing? Or how much that accident almost a year ago set back things? Well this is a data point that indicates some construction (or "bending of metal") is going on. Peeks like this help us understand the progress of another otherwise secretive business.

No-one's lost their life on a Soyuz vehicle since 1971, and they're still flying today.

Did you not read what I just wrote? "Sure, they haven't had any manned Soyuz losses recently, but that's demonstrably just luck; unmanned Soyuz keep blowing up (and killing ground crew, too)".

They should have a sign up outside Baikonur... "Safety is #1! [ 37 ] years since a fatal accident".

Try 5 1/2 years. Yes, he was on the ground and was killed by falling debris from an exploding Soyuz, but it was still an *exploding Soyuz*. Had there been people on it, they'd have been dead, too.

Regardless of what the FCC pronounces from on high, there will be only one satellite radio provider within a couple of years. Market forces currently dictate that both companies cannot continue to bleed money at the rate they are doing and have any hope of long-term survival.

Annual revenue at BOTH companies is doubling, tripling, and sometimes even quadrupling year-over-year. On top of that, operating expenses in the satellite biz are somewhat a sunk cost...your expenses don't really go up as your subscriber count does. There's plenty of room for two companies in satellite radio. Satellite radio is just BEGINNING its "well-known" phase...I think I've seen my first satellite radio tv commercials within the past few months actually. Not to mention all the intensive pushes at retail joints and car company packages.

I mean, both Sirius and XM just hit cash flow break even. I see no signs of the satellite radio market slowing down...do you?

Regardless of what the FCC pronounces from on high, there will be only one satellite radio provider within a couple of years. Market forces currently dictate that both companies cannot continue to bleed money at the rate they are doing and have any hope of long-term survival.

Annual revenue at BOTH companies is doubling, tripling, and sometimes even quadrupling year-over-year. On top of that, operating expenses in the satellite biz are somewhat a sunk cost...your expenses don't really go up as your subscriber count does. There's plenty of room for two companies in satellite radio. Satellite radio is just BEGINNING its "well-known" phase...I think I've seen my first satellite radio tv commercials within the past few months actually. Not to mention all the intensive pushes at retail joints and car company packages.

I mean, both Sirius and XM just hit cash flow break even. I see no signs of the satellite radio market slowing down...do you?

The reason for the NASA ESAS man-rating concerns was due to the 25mT CEV mass requirement, which ESAS maintained could not safely even be met by the massive Atlas V Heavy variant. According to a Lockheed Martin paper unveiled this week at the Space 2006 conference, the basic Atlas V 401 can meet FAA and NASA man-rating requirements with little modification with a much smaller capsule mass of 20,000 lbs.

At 20,000 lbs, there is enough margin in the Atlas V 401's flight envelope to allow the crew to safely abort at any time during launch, closing all unsafe 'black-zones'. Also, at 20,000 lbs structural loads on the vehicle are decreased enough so that a detailed Lockheed analysis indicates that all primary structures meet NASA 1.4 Factor of Safety margins.

It had more to do with the payload than the man-ratability. The design is "perfectly man-ratable" and has been discussed for **years**. Check out this article (which is what I cited) which states that with the reduction in mass full aborts from launch to orbit are attainable: here.

By the way let me be the first to say this is freaking cool. Between the quater billion LM has on the COTS and the design of the CEV they have the potential to drastically reduce the cost of space flight for tourists and eventually private research. The reason the Atlas is so darn expensive is there are only a few launches a year. The bigleow deal increases that five-fold. Increasing launches decreases cost due to limited manufacturing runs. And repeated reliability is a Good Thing for the new emerging commercial space market.

(IAARS)

This article is a little late wouldn't you say, the shuttle launches this morning baring any further delays. Also I believe they are choosing to fly with the damaged fuel cell as it is not a threat to the safety of the crew.
Good Update: http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/3484
Countdown ticker: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/ind ex.html

"Apparently, it had gotten sucked into a vent somewhere, and had been sitting in a duct."

And there's the answer right there; anything left loose on the space station WILL end up on or in an air vent.
So just put a mesh cover over the vent s so nothing gets sucked in, and check them first when something goes missing.

(Something loose in the ductwork might explain that mysterious noise http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/2049 they keep hearing. just a thought.)

The Solar System Exploration Strategic Roadmap lays out NASA's current plans/wishlist for robotic exploration in the next 20+ years. Basically, they foresee one Discovery class (NEAR, Mars Pathfinder, Deep Impact, etc) mission every two years or so; two or three more expensive New Frontiers missions per decade such as the Pluto New Horizons probe or the newly announced Juno Jupiter Polar Obiter; and one or possibly two $1 billion+ "Flagship" missions. The first flagship mission will be the much delayed Europa Geophysical Orbiter. The second Flagship mission, slated for 2013 or therabouts, will most likely be a Titan Explorer, an RTG-powered blimp to cruise around the surface for an extended period.

Keep in mind that this is obviously subject to political whim, but it shows that Titan is a really high priority for future exploration.

Mars is likely not frozen solid. Just because we don't see eruptions going on nonstop on a major scale doesn't mean that they don't occur in recent geologic history. If some alien started observing Earth a couple decades ago using that same logic, they would conclude that megatsunamis and supervolcanoes don't occur on Earth, that the Sahara has always been a desert, and that we've always had high carbon-13 concentrations in our atmosphere.

Over the summer and last semester I worked in a nano-satellite lab at ASU. The most recent satellite of ours that was launched was Three Corner Sat and one of its primary mission objective was sterio imaging.

http://threecornersat.jpl.nasa.gov/
http://nasa.asu.edu/
https://spacegrant.colorado.edu/tiki-index.php?pag e=3CS

Unfortunately, the two of our satellites that got launched were released at 50,000 km instead of 100,000 km so they burnt up before they could power up.

http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/2737

"We *know* the ISS is a predictable, stable environment, as opposed to a failed shuttle."

Yes. Rock solid and *very* predictable and stable, indeed.

Dolan pledges to keep Voom operating

Err... no. The program was cancelled because scramjets are useless for launching cargo into orbit.

Um... NO.

.

"The primary purpose of the vehicle was to test scramjet engine technologies; while engineers involved in the program said it would take months to analyze their data, it appears that the X-43's scramjet performed well. The flight was the last of three test flights in the X-43 program, and perhaps the last NASA-supporte hypersonic flight program for years to come. A follow-on program to the X-43A, the X-43C, was cancelled by NASA earlier this year as the agency refocuses its technology development efforts on the exploration vision."

What that means, in practical terms, is you lose too much energy to drag friction to make accelerating in the atmosphere worthwhile. You're better off just bringing the oxidizer with you.

Incorrect. Scramjets produce ample net thrust, as was demonstrated by the X43, which was still accelerating at Mach 7, despite being designed to simply be able to maintain speed. Full-scale simulations show benefits up to almost orbital velocity. And you seem not to be aware of how much of a propellant mass benefit you get; it's around a fourfold reduction in propellant if using hydrogen (ignoring drag), which gets multiplied many times over in terms of payload fraction. It's a *huge* increase, not just a small one. That's why the project was launched in the first place, and it met expectations. What, you think they were launching the X-43 for the fun of it? Scramjet simulations, across the board, provide wonderful numbers; I don't know what on earth gave you a different impression...

The first is all the extra complexity you need to get up to speed.

On the contrary, a scramjet allows you to save in complexity. Scramjet engines are quite simple in form and function, like ramjets (it's getting the right design that is difficult). They themselves don't add much complexity, but they allow you to use much simpler rocket engines, which is where real complexity (and cost) lies. Have you ever looked at what the SSME has to do to get its performance levels?

BTW, rockets separate in the atmosphere all the time; have you never watched a Shuttle launch, for example? Honestly, I don't know where you're getting your ideas from...

The second problem is materials. All that drag is gonna create a lot of heat, and your craft had better be able to deal with it.

It better be able to deal with it anyways, or you'll burn up on reentry. The only difference is that you need a different distribution - you need more on the leading edges.

Also, the intake configuration of your scramjet is heavily dependent on air density. So it only works in a very narrow range altitude range. Too high and you don't have enough oxygen for combustion, too low and you burn up from the air friction.

No - too low, and you don't accelerate up to speed. What, are you picturing the scramjet climbing up, and then suddenly dipping down 10km after it's gained speed higher up? It's a flight trajectory; this is nothing new. Conventional rockets have to follow proper flight trajectories as well.

And the point here is what? To build a smaller rocket. Why not just build a bigger rocket?

It's not about fuel - at all. It's about structural integrity. The larger you make your rocket, the harder it is for it to bear its own weight. As rockets are build larger, you have to add more and more structural supports, which are really bad for your payload fraction. It's the same sort of problems that you encounter when building a skyscraper: the larger you make it, after a point it starts to become more expensive per square foot.

Additionally, once parts get big enough, they start becoming very expensive to build as you have to retool and build larger production centers.

The DC-X project was our

Just to clarify, Deep Impact didn't have a launch window of only 1:47:08 PM EST, it also could have launched at 1:08:20 PM EST for 12 January 2004. It actually had until 28 January to launch.

Delta 4 Heavy: 13 tonnes to GTO

Arianne 5-ECA: 10 tonnes to GTO

Not a huge difference.

(Ok, so 5-ECA didn't work, but then again neither did 4-Heavy :-)).

Deep Impact will be launching a copper projectile onto the surface of Comet Tempel 1 and the flyby spacecraft will film the creation of a large crater. All data will be visual only and unfortunately the launch has been delayed.

In contrast the ESA Rosetta Mission is going to orbit Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and attempt to lower a small lander onto it.

The animation of comet rendevous shows expected time to reach it is another 10+ years, the mission ends in December 2015. The launch took place successfully in March of this year.

The purpose of both missions is to discern chemical composition of these very old objects.

The bit I read this morning wasn't as positive as the story posted above...

http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/2713

Delta 4 Heavy launch comes up short
Posted: Wed, Dec 22, 2004, 9:30 AM ET (1430 GMT)
The first Delta 4 Heavy launch vehicle lifted off Tuesday afternoon but a problem with the vehicle's first stage has apparently kept the vehicle from deploying its payload in the proper orbit. The vehicle lifted off from pad 37B at Cape Canaveral at 4:50 pm EST (2150 GMT), more than two hours into a three-hour launch window because of minor problems during pre-launch preparations, and initially the launch appeared to be normal. However, the Delta 4's first stage -- three identical core boosters -- shut down eight seconds earlier than expected. To compensate, the upper stage fired longer than planned during the second of three burns needed to place the primary payload, a demonstration satellite, into geosynchronous orbit, and as a result ran out of propellant during the final burn. Contact has also not been established with two nanosatellites that were deployed from the booster 16 minutes after launch. Despite the underperformance of the first stage, Boeing officials said they, as well as the Air Force, who paid for the flight, were pleased with the launch.

In 2007, the Soyuz spacecraft will be for old people.

We seem to forget that it was congress that cut NASA's budget by $1.1 billion dollars for FY 2005. So, although they may still have $15.1 billion, that's enough for the Mars Rover and the Shuttle program and that's probably it. The funds it would require to QA to the level of an upside down sensor may have been in that $1.1 bill that our friends on Capitol Hill so conveinetly directed towards other things, probably even the Reagan/Bush desire for the "Star Wars Ballistic Missile Defense System".

Yes, the human factor was there but without suffiencent funds to pay for the time it would require such in depth Q&A, can the failure be totally blamed on NASA?

If any nitwit could have seen the error, then instead of bashing them on their failures, apply for a job there. You seem to know what you're doing

From here:

The $54 million contract covers the costs to complete the preparations for the launches of four GPS satellites scheduled to occur during the 2005 fiscal year.

here :
http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/978

News briefs: June 15-16
Posted: Mon, Jun 17, 2002, 6:27 AM ET (1027 GMT)

A test model of the Buran space shuttle will be featured during a festival this summer in the Persian Gulf nation of Bahrain, RIA Novosti reported this weekend. The Buran will be the centerpiece of an exhibit on Russian achievements in space exploration. The Buran had previously been in Sydney, Australia for an exhibit that eventually closed because of a lack of visitors.

too bad, I was really looking foward to this, especially after delay upon delay. Guess they need to doublecheck their equipment next time.

You don't need to be a rocket scientist to see that when falcon V costs 12 million USD and has a payload of 4200kg while vega costs 20 million USD and has a payload of 1500kg, the vega project does not make any sense.

And everybody on sci.space.tech or sci.space.policy will agree that using solid propellant for a civilian launcher is just asking for trouble.

21 rocket scientists from brazil would definitely agree with this. Unfortunately they can't because they are all dead!

--

It already is cheap enough for tourists... just not cheap enough for tourists like you. Dennis Tito went into space with the Russians in 2001, and Mark Shuttleworth went in 2002. Of course, this cost them tens of millions of dollars, but they were tourists none the less. In addition, there's another tourist, an American, scheduled to fly later this year.

Now, admittedly these have all been based on national programs taking on a "charity" case now and again either for a few bucks, or for the attention that it gives them, but I'd say it's only a matter of time before a private company starts really marketing these trips to the extremely wealthy. If you can bring the price down to a million dollars a trip, you'll have your self a line of people out the door ready and willing to go. This is the ultimate in conspicuous consumption, Thorsten Veblen would be proud.

Yeah, you're right. Over at spacetoday.net they list it as being GPS 2R-11. (For the record, the IIR is 2370 pounds.)

Pluto has an atmosphere, so it's a planet. What about Sedna? Does anyone know, or must we wait until Monday?

1) SM4 was canceled due to cost, we believe SM4 can extend the useful life of Hubble 4 or 5 years. Not True! SM4 was canceled primarily due to safety reasons. Please remember this, SM4 was Not Canceled due to Cost!!

2) Hubble is in 100% working order. Not true! The gyros which point the telescope are slowly failing.

3) Adaptive Optics/Clever Image Processing/Ground based telescope are better than or equal to Hubble. Not completly true! AO can image single objects to better than hubble. But AO has poor field of view! For reference, the UDF images have a field of view of 180 arcseconds square. AO fails above, 30, and degrades quickly above a few. Worst, AO needs a bright star to work. There simply are not enough of these stars! I can't reference this, but experts in the field think that it will take 30 years to get to Hubble's level of performance with AO.

4) Finally, AO will never work in at UV or near/mid IR wavelengths.

I am an astronomer, and I feel it is my duty to inform the public about the benefits of Hubble. HST serves a unique roll to the community. We should all understand exactly what the risk will be to fly SM4 before we lose 4 years of Hubble!

what the hell are you talking about? The X-33 was disassembled and useful pieces of technology scavanged.

Am I the only one to recall that sound heard on ISS a while ago? Maybe whatever caused that noise is causing the leak?

Tom

According to the Houston Chronicle, among other sources, the incident took place at 1:59 am CST (0759 GMT) Wednesday.

NASA budget this year is $15.3 billion.

WORLDWIDE (not US only) satellite launch revenue for 2002: $86 billion.

This is sort of apples and oranges. America runs approximately half the worldwide satellite launch industry, so call it $40 odd billion in revenues. (not profits).

So, these are some real hand-wavy statistics I'm showing here. I believe that the launch industry is a tiny fraction of the overall business revenue attributable to satellites. (Think telecom and television)

Now, you could certainly argue "Well, obviously unmanned space flight is profitable! No reason not to keep that up!" I'd answer that argument by saying that we can not estimate the monetary benefits that will come from manned space exploration and exploitation. The cost of a manned space program is small relative to the revenues its research has generated, and there's no reason to suppose that that pattern will not continue.

Just so's you know, there are reputable scientists who think that a continuing series of Mars missions would take ten years and approximately $40 billion dollars (over ten years, mind you) to
start. Continuing launches would be pretty darn cheap. If you're not excited by the prospects of colonizing another planet, there's really nothing I can say that could possibly get your attention.

Does that help?

A quick check on Spacetoday.com points to several good articles ...

SpaceFlightNow article
Florida Today article and it has three video's of the test
Orlando Sentinel article
Washington Post article
Houston Chronicle article

• [...] Mars probe that crashed because of mismatched units. And that was just poor communication among the software guys.