the faa has now changed the definition of astronaut flight crews who now demonstrate activities during flight that were essential to public safety or contributed to human spaceflight safety , bransons craft had a flight crew (pilot and co pilot ?)so they should get wings
Welp, GAO Canned Blue Origins and the other's arguement, Space X decision Stands! FAA should create a new designation for "Space Passengers" A set of wings like the Flight Attendents, a Ceremonial version as it were. But I agree with them, if your not flying the ship or doing something constructive, why would you get a set of wings? Basically.. you can't BUY astronut wings!
Well.. That happened.. Seemingly overnight the elves attached 29 engines to booster #4.. Now are they just bolted on or fully plumbed? No idea. Good chance either way. Heard a rumour that Elon is shooting for an August 5th launch. Meteor sized grain of salt..
Firefly has some shiny new engines: http://www.parabolicarc.com/2021/08...mponents-for-the-emerging-new-space-industry/ funny https://pagesix.com/2022/08/28/john...6.1340933661.1661735469-1224442519.1661735469 Cry me a river blue http://www.parabolicarc.com/2021/08/05/blue-origin-says/ A short hop http://www.parabolicarc.com/2021/08/04/chinese-company-completes-hop-of-new-booster/ A big test: MT Aerospace in Germany has demonstrated a novel design of a small scale tank made of a unique carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP) that is not only leak-proof with liquid hydrogen, but also compatible with liquid oxygen, without the use of a metal liner. A tank made solely of CFRP is much lighter than metal, requires fewer parts and is therefore faster and cheaper to manufacture. http://www.parabolicarc.com/2021/08...bon-fiber-reinforced-plastic-proven-possible/ https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2019/05/Phoebus Three Falcons http://www.parabolicarc.com/2022/06/19/spacex-completes-hat-trick-3-launches-36-hours/
It seems all did not go according to plans for Virgin Galactic's flight of SpaceShipTwo back on 11 July 2021. The FAA has suspended future flights until approval of a final mishap investigation report or determined the issues related to the mishap. The mishap occurred on the return leg when the descent was too shallow and flew outside of allotted airspace for one minute, forty seconds. This put the spaceplane at risk of an emergency landing. It appears the pilots continued flying despite warning lights indicating something was wrong. The article in The New Yorker cites sources within the company that the pilots should have aborted the mission. How can they abort a mission on the return leg?
yeah I don't get that either. SpaceShipTwo lands dead-stick. I doubt it has the cross range to pick another landing strip. the pilot and copilot are experienced test pilots (I know I know.. but that was then) and they made it back ok
A shot at Blue https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/this-is-hilariously-funny.32775/page-23#post-468445 https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/this-is-hilariously-funny.32775/page-25#post-473528 Dynetics Musk's craft https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=47144.1280
The next Space X flight will be truly be civilian space travel. Four people will spend 3 days in space aboard a Dragon crew capsule and not one of them is a professional astronaunt and one will be the youngest to fly in space. https://www.abc.net.au/news/science...ex-tourist-flight-ready-for-takeoff/100459552
Are Branson and Bezos so far behind the curve now that they should just team up with Musk? I don't think that will happen as I expect most billionaires are not disposed to cooperate due to the narcissism and/or egotism that gets them where they are.
A lovely video of Musk's flights Bezos should fund space factory payloads for Musk to launch....that's what needs to happen--else the RLV market gets oversaturated with the same old comsat model. Branson is a joke. A scaled up Stratolaunch would be able to loft a more conventional Space Ship 3 with all liquids. A lot of seats for a short ride--a fuel filled spaceplane with 2 seats to fly higher? But he wanted no part of Stratolaunch. Just as well. The cause of winged spaceflight deserves better than him. This is one reason I wish we could have had an Energiya Buran type Shuttle II like this: https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19910018890/downloads/19910018890.pdf See figure 4 there and figure 21 here: https://www.aiaa.org/docs/default-s...ttlevariationsfinalaiaa.pdf?sfvrsn=b8875e90_0 An engineless orbiter developed from a “challenge” by an individual at NASA/MSFC regarding the ability of the orbiter to evolve into an unpowered vehicle, something like the Russian Buran. This worked out very nicely, as seen in Fig. 21, by adding a payload bay segment at the aft end of the bay (as noted above for the stretched orbiter) and moving as much equipment into a new faired aft body as possible to compensate for the removal of the engines and thrust structure. The subsonic L/D increased to an estimated 6.02 as a result. Some musings on Buran here: https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=636.1100 Other craft https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/us-space-shuttle-projects.1928/page-12 Now...with engines under the ET (SLS style) I'm thinking that you could have different winged planforms---within reason. A hypersonic waverider boilerplate---one orbiter could be a Faget straight-wing...another--a lifting body. This giant Navaho would thump winged craft of real size above the atmosphere for high speed testing...and the 747 orbiter ferry used for low speed testing. That's how you do winged spaceflight---test in large scale. The idea was that we need RLVs first....with space factories coming last. I'm not sure I agree with that. Thing is---what if a good winged RLV can be grown out of a single crystal in orbit? Single Stage FROM Orbit to Earth...and refuel there? The factories should come first. The system Wayne Ordway came up with above (Fred's son) would have an independent HLLV to launch 100 ton space factory pods at first--that a much simpler orbiter could service....20 tons of raw materials up...fly back with 20 tons of zero-g grown goods back. Enough spilling out of a hold that big pharma stands up and takes notice...so we have money coming into space besides squabbling billionaires and vanity projects. I'm not saying that a Buran type system is the cheapest winged RLV...but it would be the simplest. The point is to get winged research going and get some type of cargos back to increase the appetites of the business community at large. Once that is done---even sleepy Boeing might take notice and start work on Star Raker or something. At the very least---fly-back boosters! My guess is that---if I used the same engines on Falcon 9 on a fly-back booster----the engines will last longer. They only light ONCE...and then well over a flame trench and return in a much more benign thermal environment with the wider wing taking the abuse. No hoverslam. Kero-burning jets allow for moving the stage that doesn't involve moving a bloody lighthouse or landing a grain silo like SpaceX does. A winged RLV could be turned around faster---if you put the engines in a cassette that a huge forklift can drive up to on the tarmac and remove---replace with a newone--and have someone in back of the rocket plane attach the hoses too and cinch everything up. One one side of him the tankage....on the other, the engine block. He has a door he half hangs out of in case the forklift surges and he can jump. Musk is killing winged spaceflight. Maybe that's where Bezos can come in and help. He'd have the USAF at his back--and they have more pull than even Shelby.
Youngest American. Gherman Titov will still be the youngest ever in orbit, till someone under 25 goes.