Well, here they go (hopefully):
UPDATE: the flight seemed to go entirely successfully, from launch to engine shutdown, capsule abort, trunk jettison, re-orientation, re-entry, drogue chutes, main chutes, splashdown. The videos cut off prior to the rescue boats getting to the capsule, but at this stage I image everything is hunky dory within the capsule. As expected, the booster tumbled and kerploded quite spectacualrly.
While I want this, there are two things I want more:
1: Enough money to actually *run* one of these things
2: A change in the ridiculous laws that prevent me from owning one of these things.
German MEP Gunnar Beck sounds German neither through his accent nor through accepted current ideology…
An update: the contract has been signed. I now have until July to turn in my book. Until the publisher starts advertising it, I’ll shut the frak up about the details except to say that it’s along the lines of USXP, but on a tighter than usual focus… and a hell of a lot bigger. Currently have just shy of 70 diagrams finished for it (which explains the dry spell of aerospace on the blogs… I’ve been up to my eyeballs in aerospace, I just haven’t been sharing), and the spreadsheet lists just short of *200* diagrams.
A little while back I was contacted by someone who had an old display model of a Boeing Controlled Configured Vehicle bomber and wondered if I was interested in buying it. Interested? Yes. Able? No. But I was able to put the seller in contact with someone else who was able to procure it, so this Boeing CCV-100-2 wound up in a good home. More on the CCV-100-2 is HERE. Still no confirmation of the scale of the vehicle, sadly.
It’s a mystery.
SpaceX is doing an abort test of their Dragon 2 capsule tomorrow. All goes according to schedule, the Falcon 9 will launch normally at 8 AM eastern time tomorrow and 84 seconds later the capsules abort motors will fire. The Falcon 9 first and second stages will be destroyed, but the capsule will – hopefully – be successfully recovered. With that success and a few more tests, SpaceX could be ready to send astronauts to the ISS in March.
The US hasn’t launched a human into space since 2011. A good argument can be made that the US ceased to be a superpower at the point, since it was now dependent upon another nation for vital functions. Falcon and Dragon sending crews to the ISS would be a good *start* at returning the US to superpower status, though to really deserve that title the US will need to resume the project of advancement into space. And that means doing something better than simply going in circles.
A local animal shelter will sell you an adult cat for five whole dollars. A lot of these critters are *really* hard to pass up. But I already have four, and that’s enough.
The feller below had a bit of an issue, with the result you can see if you look closely enough.
And this last one: I tried several times to get a good photo of it but it was pretty mobile. It looked a *lot* like Raedthinn reborn.
Here’s how it’s done…
In 1985, Rockwell International contemplated the idea of the Space Station turning a profit for the company. At this point the Space Station seemed a reasonably certain program, though it would take another decade, the fall of the USSR and several complete revamps before assembly would really begin .
Next: advanced manned military spacecraft.
