Forgetting about variations in total solar irradiance already? https://priuschat.com/threads/whats-the-biggest-threat-to-our-environment.149284/page-7#post-2123647
I was very busy then, and didn’t even have cable tv. But I know he was President twice and I voted for him. No one who lost made any claims they won with no evidence. I remember that too.
I've read that Nixon's loss to Kennedy had some rumors about shady Electoral College stuff. But the popular vote was also Kennedy's so Nixon didn't make a stink about it. But that was when I was 12 years old and hadn't studied civics yet. Bob Wilson
Curious that they still call it that..... Irradiance or radiance? (Sorry. inside joke.) People seem to forget that we're 'made from stars' and that this rock might really not be quite so rocky..... I've been tinkering with antennae theory and wave propagation lately - all quite beyond my grasp at present, but the idea that one can use a 200mW transmitter and some math to swap data with a station more than 1,000km distant is a little intriguing. I cannot help but notice that 'things' are somewhat different, as they always are than they were when I took a couple of tests and received a 'license to learn....." Teacher says that every time an election goes 'wrong' an 'election denier' is born..... Personally, I think Richard was well named, and we were not badly served by P35 - warts notwithstanding. HOWEVER (comma!) Elections.... Presidents are SUPPOSED look at least a LITTLE larger in the rearview mirror. P35 and P37 do if one is is at least a little honest.
The "SpaceX reports rocket anomaly" didn't pan out for me. One of the features of the Falcon 9 is that above a threshold altitude, loss of one engine does not abort the mission. It has enough thrust from the remaining rocket engines for the second stage to reach orbit. The defective booster won't be recovered. Bob Wilson
Ok, I found this quote at the bottom: “After today’s successful launch of Crew-9, Falcon 9’s second stage was disposed in the ocean as planned, but experienced an off-nominal deorbit burn,” the company shared in a post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. “As a result, the second stage safely landed in the ocean, but outside of the targeted area.” SpaceX indicated it would pause flights using Falcon 9 — the world’s most frequently launched rocket — as it explored the anomaly. “We will resume launching after we better understand root cause,” the company said in the X post. Bob Wilson
Falcon is having a moment with its second, second stage abnormality but this latest one is relatively minor and not really a safety threat.....well......unless you live near the IO. I was curious so I asked the Googles some questions. Soyuz is the most frequently used launch vehicle in the world with something like 1700 liftoffs since the late 60's - but they've had a few bumps along the way too. Falcons have been on the scene since something like 2010 and they are closing in on 400 launches. My takeaways: Space is hard. My favorite Navy Admiral (Hopper) once said that ships are safe in port - but that's not what ships are for. Also: SpaceX is in no way comparable to whoever is running Soyuz this decade. It's private. Expendable. Scalable. AND - its replacement is on the pad as I type this - allegedly awaiting permission to 'slip the surly bonds.' SpaceX will hit the pause button and investigate. They will do a 'hotwash' and write down what went right and what went wrong. THIS time, they will use ink instead of human blood. If past is prologue, THAT will not always be the case!
Raptor engine weights: Raptor 1: 2,080 kg (4,590 lb) Raptor 2: 1,630 kg (3,590 lb) Raptor 3: 1,525 kg (3,362 lb) I wonder how much debris remains after re-entry? Regardless, more details: SpaceX grounds its Falcon rocket fleet after upper stage misfire – Spaceflight Now Debris from the rocket stage should have fallen in a stretch of the Pacific Ocean that started east of New Zealand, but probably ended up falling further downrange, but still south of the Equator, according to Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist and tracker of space launches and satellites. “The most likely failure mode that still results in reentry is a slight underburn,” he said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. “So you expect the entry to be further along… but not by too much.” McDowell told Spaceflight Now he estimates the deorbit burn should have occurred around 1:55 p.m. EDT (1755 UTC) as the craft passed over Yemen. If everything had gone to plan, reentry would have happened about 35 minutes later. Bob Wilson
"The best part is no part....." X is going to pay for that over the long run by thwacking their foreheads into stuff that they do not see but eventually the juice will be worth the squeeze. Unlike a lot of "science" these days, SpaceX seems to attract lots of volunteers to be squishy cargo. Some people even PAY THEM for the privilege. In orbit?? Not much. That's the whole point of dynamic deorbiting. I was tempted to say something snarky about the track over Yemen - but I'll cosplay a more sensitive being at present.
mrs b and i were walking into disney tonight around 6:45, and right in front of us was a spacex rocket being launched. we had no idea what it was, just looked like a huge firework with a smoke trail from that distance.
