** The Official Space Flight Thread - The Space Station and Beyond **

VaderDSL said:
Could it just be artifacts from the light? If you watch it back the trail seems to just disappear instantly in stages.

But then again I’m trying to view it on a phone, so might be clearer on my PC
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Could the camera refresh rate not be picking up all the detail & just be playing tricks?
 
Pixelpusher said:
Thank you so much, having checked there was a Helicopter flying at that time in the right direction. Why a helicopter would leave a trail & pulse is puzzling, unless like other's have said it's a camera artifact!
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The rotor blades will be doing weird things to the reflections of the lights which won’t help the camera!
 
www.livescience.com

Comet 3I/ATLAS has been transformed by billions of years of space radiation, James Webb Space Telescope observations reveal

The interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS has a thick irradiated crust that no longer resembles its home star system, simulations and James Webb Space Telescope observations have found.
www.livescience.com www.livescience.com

That's one old rock if the estimates are correct at 7billion years old :eek: It will technically be the oldest object in our solar system until it departs, it's also crazy to think that our solar system didn't even exist when it started its journey
 
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Colonel_Klinck said:
Incredible! Anyone with half a brain knew that plan was never going to work, yet they bought into Elon's hype (lies) and threw $3b of taxpayers money at it for zero results. And people still think Elon is getting humans to Mars this decade :cry:
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The funny thing is the Chinese are currently testing their own new rocket that's an exact copy of Starship. They too bought into Musk's BS and took him at face value as they tend to do (if something is popular in the west, China needs to copy it because it must be good lol), now they have wasted money on design that seems to go nowhere
 
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Grim5 said:
The funny thing is the Chinese are currently testing their own new rocket that's an exact copy of Starship. They too bought into Musk's BS and took him at face value as they tend to do (if something is popular in the west, China needs to copy it because it must be good lol), now they have wasted money on design that seems to go nowhere
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For LEO launches Starship could be a great success but for going to the Moon it makes zero sense atm. Maybe in 15-20 years when they've worked out all the problems with it and an actual Moon base is under consideration. At the moment the idea of a Starship launching again after a few hours is a pipe dream and it looks like they'll need 10s of Starships lined up to refuel just 1 in orbit. We know how Elon got this idea through, by his usual vague hype that it was just going to happen. I'm amazed NASA fell for it or maybe the boffins didn't but the politicians did.
 
Colonel_Klinck said:
For LEO launches Starship could be a great success but for going to the Moon it makes zero sense atm. Maybe in 15-20 years when they've worked out all the problems with it and an actual Moon base is under consideration. At the moment the idea of a Starship launching again after a few hours is a pipe dream and it looks like they'll need 10s of Starships lined up to refuel just 1 in orbit. We know how Elon got this idea through, by his usual vague hype that it was just going to happen. I'm amazed NASA fell for it or maybe the boffins didn't but the politicians did.
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But for HLS it doesn't need to launch every few hours, that is the ultimate goal not the immediate one. They are planning for methane oxygen in orbit propellant store, exactly the same as Blue Origin. Except that they are using methane which is easier to store than the hydrogen Blue Origin plan to use. Also BO have only done one flight with New Glenn and nothing toward a propellant depot whereas SpaceX are already building test articles and V3 StarShip with the appropriate ports. They won't need 10's of StarShip lined up unless they are not refurbishable, now given the damn thing soft touches down on aggresive flight profiles with heat resistant tiles removed from the most delicate areas, I think there is a reasonable chance of them being able to refurbish Starship in a couple of weeks. But they do have the actual manfuacturing capacity to build 5+ boosters and vehicles per year so having 10 isn't pie in the sky if that brute for method was required. Blue Origin have shown no sign that their contracted option could do likewise.

Blaming SpaceX and Nasa seems kind of odd given the situation was effectively created by the US Congress providing insufficient funding leaving SpaceX as the only affordable option. SpaceX haven spent far more of their own money on StarShip than they have Nasa's as they are paid only for th milestones they complete. Now there is no problem criticising HLS StarShip as a non-optimal solution, Dynetics Alpaca was a far more sensible option but SpaceX aren't to blame for others choices and if a Moon Base is ever going to be built it will be the immense capacity StarShip that makes it feasible.
 
Colonel_Klinck said:
For LEO launches Starship could be a great success but for going to the Moon it makes zero sense atm. Maybe in 15-20 years when they've worked out all the problems with it and an actual Moon base is under consideration. At the moment the idea of a Starship launching again after a few hours is a pipe dream and it looks like they'll need 10s of Starships lined up to refuel just 1 in orbit. We know how Elon got this idea through, by his usual vague hype that it was just going to happen. I'm amazed NASA fell for it or maybe the boffins didn't but the politicians did.
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NASA didn’t fall for it as such - the decision was made when there wasn’t a full time administrator in post, by one particular individual who then quit her job and started with SpaceX less than 2 years after that decision was made.


She actually left them earlier this year, after realising they weren’t going anywhere quickly…
 
starship totally can and probably will work

will it be ready for HLS by 2027 artemis iii?

i really doubt it at the current rate of development

i think on paper blue origins lander looks simpler, but its got a lot of development to do, could it overtake starship? maybe, will it be ready for 2027 - probably not
 
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