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Space Launches, Landings & Destinations v4


SpaceChampion

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Latest on the HLS contract:  Current version of the NASA Authorization bill is incorporated into the "United States Innovation and Competition Act" in the Senate, but includes a new provision extending the review of the HLS award to choose a 2nd winner, from 30 to 60 days, but also moved to protect SpaceX by ordering NASA not to modify or rescind the decision already made regarding the 1st choice -- SpaceX.

Edited to add:

On the robotic lander missions to the moon side of Artemis, all but one launch vehicle is provided by SpaceX. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Lunar_Payload_Services#List_of_missions_contracted_under_CLPS

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Name Launch Contractor Lander Launch Vehicle Notes Outcome
Peregrine Mission One Q4 2021 Astrobotic Technology Peregrine Vulcan Awarded in May 2019. Will carry 28 payloads, including 14 NASA payloads contracted under CLPS to Lacus Mortis on the Moon, landing is scheduled for Q4 2021. NASA awarded $79.5 M.[38] Peregrine mass 1,283 kg, payload mass up to 256 kg. Planned
Intuitive Machines Mission 1 (IM-1) Q1 2022 Intuitive Machines Nova-C Falcon 9 Awarded in May 2019.[20] Will carry up to five NASA contracted payloads as well as payloads from other customers to a landing site between Mare Serenitatis and Mare Crisium on the Moon. The spacecraft will operate for up to 14 days after landing.[39][40] Planned
Masten Mission One December 2022 Masten Space XL-1 Falcon 9[41] Awarded in April 2020.[42] Intended to deliver several hundred kg of payloads to the Lunar south pole, more information is expected once the mission draws closer.[43][44] Planned
Intuitive Machines Mission 2 (IM-2) December 2022 Intuitive Machines Nova-C Falcon 9 Awarded in October 2020.[45] Will land a drill (PRIME-1) combined with a mass spectrometer to the Lunar south pole, to attempt harvesting ice from below the surface. Planned
Blue Ghost Mid 2023 Firefly Aerospace Blue Ghost Falcon 9 [46] Awarded in February 2021.[47] Will land ten payloads at Mare Crisium.[48] Planned
VIPER November 2023 Astrobotic Technology Griffin Falcon Heavy Awarded in June 2020. First flight of Astrobotic's larger Griffin lander, Will deliver NASA's VIPER resource prospecting lunar rover to the Lunar south pole.[20] Griffin is 450 kg, the award is for $199.5 M[20] (that has to cover Griffin lander and launch costs too). Planned

Orbit Beyond returned their task order (cancelling their mission) two months after award.[20]

 

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Latest Starlink launch completes the first shell of the constellation, with 1,737 sats in orbit after 29 launches.

Edit:  Wow!  I thought these launches would get boring by now but right at @16.55 in the video you can see the sonic boom in the exhaust plume as the rocket goes supersonic -- never seen that before!  Seconds later a vapour trail suddenly appears precisely at Max-Q, which i don't recall coinciding before.

 

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https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2019/10/20/omg-space-is-full-of-radiation-and-why-im-not-worried/

Great article covering what the risk of radiation exposure on Mars is, which is comparable to the exposure in Ramsar, Iran.

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One house has a total background level of 200 mS/year, equivalent to the unshielded exposure on Mars. So people in Ramsar should be keeling over left and right from radiation? To quote Andy Weir, surely their cancer has cancer? In short, not only do people in Ramsar live apparently long and normal lives, there is no local increased rate of cancer attributable to radiation exposure!

It can be challenging to conduct long term longitudinal studies on people and to extract meaningful information. In particular, Ramsar is not a huge place, so there aren’t that many people to begin with. Additionally, many of them are already of advanced age, so a greater incidence of cancers and other health problems is expected. But most importantly, nearly everyone there smokes and it’s hard to separate cancers caused from inhaling smoke compared to cancers caused by inhaling radon.

 

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1 hour ago, SpaceChampion said:

https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2019/10/20/omg-space-is-full-of-radiation-and-why-im-not-worried/

Great article covering what the risk of radiation exposure on Mars is, which is comparable to the exposure in Ramsar, Iran.

 

First- thanks for maintaining this thread!  I've enjoyed the articles you found.

For this one, as much as I would love to lighten the risks from radiation on Mars, I think the author of the article is leaning too much on the Sievert unit to carry the point.  Not all radiation is the same when it comes to carcinogenic risks (which is mostly what we are worried about with the kinds of doses we are talking about regardless of source).  On checking, the Ramsar case is based on Radon gas which is an Alpha emitter, which is not particularly dangerous unless you are inhaling it in concentration (the particles dont normally penetrate the skin.) Its also why you likely have a perfectly safe Americium source in your smoke detector.  Unfortunately the bulk of radiation you are getting on Mars is in the form of high energy ionizing radiation such as X-rays and Gamma rays- which has no challenge making it through your skin to living tissue.  

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Still....can't take any chances. Find out what the Ramsar folk are smoking and then send a crow to Elon to amend Mars Starship's manifest to include a bushel or three of the stuff.  

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The U.S. Air Force (collaborating with Space Force) will be soliciting bids for space-delivery of 30 to 100 tons of cargo to anywhere in the world in 90-minutes.  Obviously SpaceX's Starship is the only one capable for doing that assuming it'll work as expected when it is flying, but USAF insist the potential for other aerospace companies is there to provide several options....   

I think the biggest obstacle to that is traditional aerospace culture (which Blue Origin also tapped when Bezos put together that company) is not up to the task.  SpaceX's challenge is the marginal cost of Starship will be in the millions, not billions.

https://spacenews.com/air-force-using-commercial-rockets-to-deliver-supplies-not-as-far-fetched-as-it-sounds/

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35 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Headlines are saying Bezos will be a passenger on his companies first manned space launch.

I mean really why wouldn't you if you had that option? I would totally do the same if I were in his position.

Yep, him and his brother, and the passenger whoever wins the auction for the remaining seat.


Meanwhile, SpaceX launches the SXM-8 mission

 

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So it appears SpaceX has scrapped or abandoned plans for SN16 through SN19, meaning there will be no more suborbital flights in the test program. 

The next flight will be the orbital launch of SN20 Starship and BN2* Super Heavy. 

However the orbital launch tower and pad seems to be still in construction and might not finish until August, but I don't know how reliable that info is.  They're even having to extend the large Frankencrane they've been using to stack sections of the tower.  The legs of the launch mount is said to go 60 meters deep into the ground.

*The original BN2 has become BN2.1 test tank, while BN3 has been renamed BN2, though parts of the now-BN2.1 are being used in its construction.

 

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On 6/5/2021 at 3:27 AM, SpaceChampion said:

The U.S. Air Force (collaborating with Space Force) will be soliciting bids for space-delivery of 30 to 100 tons of cargo to anywhere in the world in 90-minutes.  Obviously SpaceX's Starship is the only one capable for doing that assuming it'll work as expected when it is flying, but USAF insist the potential for other aerospace companies is there to provide several options....  

Putting an open bid is normal and probably mandatory by law even if there is only one feasible candidate. The USAF probably want to learn of other ideas nevertheless.

But what is actually the idea? It is hard to imagine any kind of cargo that requires that urgency given the network of well supplied bases around the World.

A possibility is they want to use it for special forces insertion. The idea has been around for decades and there were even projects of using ICBMs to insert small teams. The problem was always how to retrieve them after the mission. Using the Starship alone will have the same problem, not enough fuel to flight back. Putting it on top of the Super Heavy might send the Starship in ballistic course and save enough fuel to get the Starship back to nearest base.

I would imagine there is a range of military project ideas of how to use the Starship. I wonder if we'll see something like Prompt Strike using the Starship. This might be destabilizing.

EDIT: I was reading some material associated at this project and evidently the current allocated funding ($48 millions) won't allow the full development of a concept although of course it helps SpaceX both economically and politically. It seems that the USAF wants to have possible scenarios and then decide what they want to do.

 

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Relativity Space is rocket company using 3D printing technology to print rocket bodies and engines.  It's Terran 1 rocket (only 1.2 ton payload capacity, and fully expendable) will fly for the first time later this year, but today they've announced a medium lift rocket that is fully reusable, the Terran R.

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The company’s second launch vehicle.... will have more payload capacity than the partially reusable SpaceX Falcon 9, and is only the second fully reusable commercial launch vehicle to be revealed publicly after SpaceX’s Starship.

The two stage Terran R rocket will be 216 feet (65.8 meters) tall and 16 feet (4.9 meters) in diameter. The second stage features aerodynamic surfaces which will enable recovery and reuse, in addition to a reusable 5 meter diameter payload fairing. Terran R will be capable of delivering over 20,000 kilograms to Low Earth Orbit in its reusable configuration, beating Falcon 9’s 15,600 kilograms with drone ship recovery.

Both Terran 1 and Terran R are use methane-oxygen engines.

If it fly and lands as planned, it should be the first real competition for SpaceX's F9 rocket.  Unsurprising, like many of the newer rocket companies, Relativity Space is founded by former SpaceX engineers.  Their goal is also about helping expand human presence to Mars. 
 

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“Relativity was founded with the mission to 3D print entire rockets and build humanity’s industrial base on Mars. We were inspired to make this vision a reality, and believe there needs to be dozens to hundreds of companies working to build humanity’s multiplanetary future on Mars.”


They have about $650 million in investment to put towards bringing the Terran R to market.  Not a lot by traditional aerospace standards, but with 3D printing to reduce costs perhaps enough to get in the game.
 

 

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Looks like a mini BFR! Interesting, but not the first one after Starship. The japanese are also working in something similar.

But with a far less ambitious timetable.

It might well be that China is also working in something similar.

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/04/chinas-state-rocket-company-unveils-rendering-of-a-starship-look-alike/

Europe has also a concept for the Ariane Ultimate, a SSTO decades away.

 

 

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On 6/8/2021 at 3:29 PM, SpaceChampion said:

Relativity Space is rocket company using 3D printing technology to print rocket bodies and engines.  It's Terran 1 rocket (only 1.2 ton payload capacity, and fully expendable) will fly for the first time later this year, but today they've announced a medium lift rocket that is fully reusable, the Terran R.

Finally. I wonder if they got inspired by this (amateurish) proposal.

The SFR, the Small Falcon Rocket

http://toughsf.blogspot.com/2017/10/spacex-sfr-small-falcon-rocket.html

 

 

 

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I do a weekly space news update on my channel so I thought I would share the summary here:

○ Jeff Bezos + bro spacebound on Blue Origin, 3rd seat auction IP (https://www.instagram.com/p/CP0MSOqnYEo/)
○ U.S. Innovation and Competitiveness Act (including NASA authorization) passed Senate (https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-administrator-statement-on-us-innovation-and-competitiveness-act)
○ China's Shenzou-12 on the launchpad (https://apnews.com/article/china-rocket-first-crew-space-station-7fa5ef676c9c4725579cf91443bd4564, http://www.spacefacts.de/mission/english/shenzhou_12.htm)
○ ESA selected Venus orbiter mission EnVision (https://sites.lesia.obspm.fr/envision/2021/06/10/june-10-2021-envision-selected/)
○ new CHIME data contains 535 FRBs (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01560-4)

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Good they're admitting to major systemic problems, but this really ought to highlight why their efforts to get the second contract for lunar landing demonstration for Artemis is a bad idea for NASA.  I don't know if the Dynetics bid would be a better option though.

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