Daily Archives: January 10, 2024

SpaceX still has a lot to prove. Starship Has Sailed

NASA's efforts to return humans to the lunar surface are facing some serious delays.

As Reuters reports, the space agency's first crewed lunar landing mission in over half a century, dubbed Artemis 3 will likely slip from its tentative late 2025 launch date, with insider sources saying that the issue is SpaceX is taking longer than expected to reach certain milestones with its massive Starship spacecraft (you know, the one that keeps exploding.)

Similarly, NASA's Artemis 2 mission, a crewed journey around the Moon and back, will also likely be pushed back due to recently uncovered issues with Lockheed Martin's Orion crew capsule, per the report.

Given the astronomical complexities involved, the news shouldn't come as too much of a surprise. SpaceX has been working at a fever pitch to get its 165-foot stainless steel rocket into orbit and carried out two orbital launch attempts last year both of which ended in,well, don't call them failures but the missions didn't survive.

The plan is to have a Starship Human Landing System spacecraft rendezvous with an Orion spacecraft and ferry NASA astronauts from the Moon's orbit down to the surface.

It's a complicated mission that involves several Starship spacecraft fueling a Moon landing variant in Earth's orbit, before meeting up with the crew hundreds of thousands of miles away.

SpaceX still has a lot to prove, including achieving a stable orbit, swapping fuel between spacecraft, and of course the ability to make a safe and soft approach to the lunar surface.

Despite the delays, NASA is still making progress toward its goal of returning the first astronauts to the lunar surface in over half a century. So far, NASA already has one successful Artemis mission under its belt, having launched an uncrewed Orion capsule around the Moon and back in 2022.

According to Reuters, NASA is expected to announce revised plans today, so stay tuned.

Updated to correctly identify the manufacturer of the Orion crew capsule.

More on Artemis: This Multi-Purpose Moon Habitat Looks Cool as Hell

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NASA Reportedly Forced to Push Back Moon Landing After SpaceX Fails to Deliver Starship - Futurism

SpaceX is set to launch yet another batch of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit.

A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 22 Starlink spacecraft is scheduled to lift off from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base on Thursday (Jan. 11) at 3:59 a.m. EST (0859 GMT; 12:59 a.m. local time in California).

You can watch the launch via SpaceX's account on X. Coverage will begin about five minutes before the launch.

Related: Starlink satellite train: How to see and track it in the night sky

If all goes according to plan, the Falcon 9's first stage will come back to Earth about 8.5 minutes after liftoff, touching down on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You, which will be stationed in the Pacific Ocean.

It will be the 18th launch and landing for this particular booster, according to a SpaceX mission description. That's just one shy of the SpaceX reuse record of 19 flights, which was set last month by a Falcon 9 first stage.

The Falcon 9's upper stage, meanwhile, will continue hauling the 22 Starlink satellites to low Earth orbit, where they will be deployed about 62.5 minutes after liftoff.

Starlink is SpaceX's broadband megaconstellation, which beams service to customers around the world. The network currently consists of more than 5,250 spacecraft, and the number will continue to grow far into the future.

Thursday's mission will be the fourth orbital flight of 2024 for SpaceX, which wants to launch 144 missions this year. The company's current record is 98 liftoffs, which which was set in 2023.

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SpaceX to launch 22 Starlink satellites from California early Jan. 11 - Space.com

The high-altitude chase started over Cape Canaveral on Feb. 17, 2023, when a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched. Thomas Parent, a NASA research pilot, was flying a WB-57 jet when the rocket ascended past the right wing leaving him mesmerized before he hit the throttle to accelerate.

For roughly an hour, Mr. Parent dove in and out of the plume in the rockets wake while Tony Casey, the sensor equipment operator aboard the jet, monitored its 17 scientific instruments. Researchers hoped to use the data to prove they could catch a rockets plume and eventually characterize the environmental effects of a space launch.

In the past few years, the number of rocket launches has spiked as commercial companies especially SpaceX, founded by Elon Musk and government agencies have lofted thousands of satellites into low-Earth orbit. And it is only the beginning. Satellites could eventually total one million, requiring an even greater number of space launches that could yield escalating levels of emissions.

SpaceX declined to comment about pollution from rockets and satellites. Representatives for Amazon and Eutelsat OneWeb, two other companies working toward satellite mega-constellations, said they are committed to sustainable operations. But scientists worry that more launches will scatter more pollutants in pristine layers of Earths atmosphere. And regulators across the globe, who assess some risks of space launches, do not set rules related to pollution.

Experts say they do not want to limit the booming space economy. But they fear that the steady march of science will move slower than the new space race meaning we may understand the consequences of pollution from rockets and spacecraft only when it is too late. Already, studies show that the higher reaches of the atmosphere are laced with metals from spacecraft that disintegrate as they fall back to Earth.

We are changing the system faster than we can understand those changes, said Aaron Boley, an astronomer at the University of British Columbia and co-director of the Outer Space Institute. We never really appreciate our ability to affect the environment. And we do this time and time again.

When a rocket like the Falcon 9 lifts off, it typically takes about 90 seconds to punch through the lower atmosphere, or troposphere, before reaching the middle atmosphere. It was at the top of the troposphere that Mr. Parent began his pursuit, ultimately flying as high as the middle atmosphere, where the airs density is so low that he and Mr. Casey had to wear pressure suits and heavyweight gloves, as well as helmets that provided them with oxygen.

The middle atmosphere has seldom seen so much excitement. Commercial airliners seldom fly at these heights. Nor is there much terrestrial weather or pollution from the ground. It is thus calm, unspoiled and empty except for the occasional rocket, which will pass through it for three to four minutes on its way to space. By the time a rocket curves into orbit, it will have dumped in the middle and upper layers of the atmosphere as much as two-thirds of its exhaust, which scientists predict will rain down and collect in the lower layer of the middle atmosphere, the stratosphere.

The stratosphere is home to the ozone layer, which shields us from the suns harmful radiation. But it is extremely sensitive: Even the smallest of changes can have enormous effects on it and the world below.

When Mount Pinatubo erupted in 1991, it belched enough sulfur dioxide gas into the stratosphere to trigger a multiyear cooling spell on Earth. That gas created sulfate aerosols, which warmed the stratosphere while blocking heat from hitting Earths surface. Some scientists worry that cumulative exhaust from more rockets may affect the climate in a similar manner.

Today, rocket exhaust pales in comparison to the exhaust emitted by aviation. But scientists are concerned that even small additions to the stratosphere will have a much bigger effect. Martin Ross, a scientist from The Aerospace Corporation, a federally funded research organization in Los Angeles, compared Earths atmosphere to a barrel of muddy water that has settled with muck at the bottom and a relatively clear top. If you add more dirt to the mucky bottom, it may go unnoticed. But if you add that dirt to the clear top, he said, it is likely to become cloudy or even mucky.

Just how rockets will affect that relatively clear top, the stratosphere, remains uncertain. But scientists are concerned that black carbon, or soot, that is released from current rockets will act like a continuous volcanic eruption, a change that could deplete the ozone layer and affect the Earth below.

In the 1990s, when NASAs space shuttle and other rockets consistently launched from U.S. soil, several studies predicted that the spacecraft would cause local ozone damage. One study even forecast a loss as high as 100 percent essentially creating a small ozone hole above Cape Canaveral that would allow more of the suns ultraviolet radiation to reach the ground, raising the risk of skin cancer, cataracts and immune disorders.

The studies relied on models and predictions alone, with no observational data. So Dr. Ross and his colleagues gathered data from high-altitude research flights, which did find local ozone holes in the shuttles wake. But they healed quickly and were not large enough to affect Cape Canaveral at least not at the frequency of launches then, roughly 25 per year.

The same may not be true going forward. In 2023, SpaceX launched nearly 100 rockets on its own, with most flights building its Starlink satellite constellation. It will soon be joined by Amazon, which is planning frequent launches for its Project Kuiper constellation, and other companies seeking substantial presences in orbit. These satellites offer a range of benefits, including broadband internet almost anywhere on Earth.

But once these companies complete their constellations of up to thousands of orbiters, the launches wont end. Many satellites have a lifetime of five to 15 years, requiring satellite companies to loft replacements.

It is the beginning of a new era.

I think we are at a stage in the space industry that we were at many decades ago in a number of our terrestrial environments, said Tim Maclay, the chief strategy officer for ClearSpace, a Swiss company seeking to build sustainable space operations. We see the prospect of development and we tend to race into it without a tremendous amount of forethought on the environmental consequences.

As space companies set records for launches and satellites deployed, scientists are starting to quantify the potential effects.

In a paper published in 2022, soot from rockets was shown to be nearly 500 times as efficient at heating the atmosphere as soot released from sources like airplanes closer to the surface. Its the muddy-barrel effect.

That means that as we start to grow the space industry and launch more rockets, were going to start to see that effect magnify very quickly, said Eloise Marais, an associate professor in physical geography at University College London and an author of the study.

A separate study also published in 2022 found that if the rate of rocket launches increased by a factor of 10, their emissions could cause temperatures in parts of the stratosphere to rise as much as 2 degrees Celsius. This could begin to degrade the ozone over most of North America, all of Europe and a chunk of Asia.

As a result, people at higher latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere may be exposed to more harmful ultraviolet radiation, said the studys lead author, Christopher Maloney of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder.

That said, Dr. Maloneys team did not quantify how much more radiation exposure could occur.

The exact amounts of soot emitted by different rocket engines used around the globe are also poorly understood. Most launched rockets currently use kerosene fuel, which some experts call dirty because it emits carbon dioxide, water vapor and soot directly into the atmosphere. But it might not be the predominant fuel of the future. SpaceXs future rocket Starship, for example, uses a mix of liquid methane and liquid oxygen propellants.

Still, any hydrocarbon fuel produces some amount of soot. And even green rockets, propelled by liquid hydrogen, produce water vapor, which is a greenhouse gas at these dry high altitudes.

You cant take whats green in the troposphere and necessarily think of it being green in the upper atmosphere, Dr. Boley said. There is no such thing as a totally neutral propellant. They all have different impacts.

What goes up must come down. Once satellites in low-Earth orbit reach the end of their operational lifetimes, they plunge through the atmosphere and disintegrate, leaving a stream of pollutants in their wake. Although scientists do not yet know how this will influence Earths environment, Dr. Ross thinks that it will be the most significant impact from spaceflight.

A study published in October found that the stratosphere is already littered with metals from re-entering spacecraft. It used the same NASA WB-57 jet that chased the SpaceX rocket plume last year, studying the stratosphere over Alaska and much of the continental U.S.

When the researchers began analyzing the data, they saw particles that didnt belong. Niobium and hafnium, for example, do not occur naturally but are used in rocket boosters. Yet these metals, along with other distinct elements from spacecraft, were embedded within roughly 10 percent of the most common particles in the stratosphere.

The findings validate earlier theoretical work, and Dr. Boley, who was not involved in the study, argues that the percentage will only increase given that humanity is at the beginning of the new satellite race.

Of course, researchers cannot yet say how these metals will affect the stratosphere.

Thats a big question that we have to answer moving forward, but we cant presume that it wont matter, Dr. Boley said.

While scientists are raising the alarm, they dont see themselves in opposition to rocket companies or satellite operators.

We dont want to stop the space industry, said Karen Rosenlof, a climate scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Chemical Sciences Laboratory, who says that satellites provide incredible services to people on the ground. But she and others are asking for a set of regulations that will consider the environmental implications.

Dr. Rosenlof argues that there are ways to reduce the impacts of the space industry without shutting it down. For example, if scientists find a threshold beyond which the space industry will start to harm the environment, it would make sense to simply limit the numbers of launches and satellites. Alternatively, the materials or fuels used by the space industry could be tweaked.

Dr. Boley agrees. There are a lot of possibilities that could help us protect the environment while still giving access to space, he said. We just need to look at the big picture.

But to do that, scientists argue, satellite operators and rocket companies need regulations. Few are currently in place.

Space launch falls into a gray area, said Gavin Schmidt, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, who has been involved in a working group on this research. It falls between the cracks of all the regulatory authorities.

The Montreal Protocol, for instance, is a treaty that successfully set limits on chemicals known to harm the ozone layer. But it does not address rocket emissions or satellites.

In the United States, the Environmental Protection Agency is not responsible for analyzing rocket launches. The Federal Communications Commission licenses large constellations of satellites but does not consider their potential harm to the environment. (The Government Accountability Office called for changes to that F.C.C. policy in 2022, but they have yet to occur.) And the Federal Aviation Administration assesses environmental impacts of rocket launches on the ground, but not in the atmosphere or space.

That could put the stratospheres future in the hands of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and other private space company executives which is particularly worrying to Dr. Boley, who says the space industry does not want to slow down.

Unless it immediately affects their bottom line, theyre simply not interested, he said. The environmental impact is an inconvenience.

A spokesperson for the telecommunications company OneWeb, which has launched more than 600 satellites, said it is committed to sustainability in satellite design, constellation plans and launch efforts.

We work closely with public and private partners to minimize the environmental impact of our fleet of satellites, said Katie Dowd, a senior director there.

Still, OneWeb plans to expand its constellation to roughly 7,000 satellites.

It remains to be seen how well were going to do this, Dr. Maclay said. We dont tend to be very good as a species at proactively taking responsible steps toward environmental stewardship. It often comes as an afterthought.

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The New Space Race Is Causing New Pollution Problems - The New York Times

SpaceX is targeting tonight at 9:06 p.m. for a Falcon 9 launch of 22 Starlink satellitesto low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base.

Backup opportunities are available until 11:28 p.m., and also on Wednesday, Jan. 10 starting at 9:08 p.m., the agency reported.

Following stage separation, the first stage will land on the Of Course I Still Love You autonomous droneship stationed in the Pacific Ocean.

This is the 18th flight for the first-stage booster supporting the mission, which previously launched Crew-1, Crew-2, SXM-8, CRS-23, IXPE, Transporter-4, Transporter-5, Globalstar FM15, ISI EROS C-3, Korea 425 and seven Starlink missions.

A live webcast of the mission will begin onwww.spacex.comapproximately five minutes prior to liftoff.

Lisa Andr covers lifestyle and local news for Santa Ynez Valley News and Lompoc Record, editions of the Santa Maria Times.

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SpaceX Falcon 9 launch targeting tonight from Vandenberg SFB - Lompoc Record

A strange light moved through the East Texas sky Sunday night. For some onlookers, it seemed to vanish into thin air.

It left them with more questions than answers. What was it? Where did it come from, and where did it go?

On social media pages for Longview-area folks, people posted videos and photos of the celestial glow that they captured around dusk. It didnt look like a plane, helicopter or drone, and some began to joke or question whether extraterrestrials were to blame.

In reality, East Texans were seeing the upper stage of a rocket that was launched to send new satellites into orbit around Earth. And when people here saw the rocket stage mostly clearly, it already had made a trip around the globe, hence its easterly direction over the Lone Star State, according to Chad File, a mechanical engineering professor at LeTourneau University.

File oversees a student rocketry program, the LeTourneau University Nexus for Amateur Rocketry.

In this screenshot of a video posted to Facebook Sunday night by his wife Desirea Salazar, Longview resident David Salazar captured footage of strange light in the East Texas sky Sunday night. It turned out to be that of a SpaceX rocket.

About 5:35 p.m. eastern time (4:35 p.m. central) Sunday, SpaceX a spacecraft manufacturer founded by entrepreneur Elon Musklaunched one of its Falcon 9 rockets from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The rocket had a mission: Deploy 23 Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit.

Photos and videos of the luminescence began appearing on East Texas social media pages around dusk Sunday, generating discussion. Like Hank Williams hit country song I Saw the Light, droves of social media users commented on those posts, testifying that theyd seen it, too.

On Sunday, Longview resident David Salazar took a video of the luminous object by using his phone, and his wife posted it to a Longview community Facebook page.

"I thought, 'Whoa, what's that?'" Salazar said. "Immediately after, I saw the 'boom.' It shot towards the right and then slingshot back to the left quickly. Then it faded into a poof of smoke."

Some quickly attributed the light to the SpaceX launch. Others had their doubts: Most videos showed the light moving from west to east which, at first, didn't seem possible for a rocket launched from Florida.

File explained that the Falcon 9 rocket loops around the globe or circumnavigates, scientifically speaking before its payload is deployed. By dusk, the rocket already had been all the way around the globe, which explains why it was moving from west to east over Texas, as shown in videos on social media, he said.

On its website, SpaceX posts videos that show the flight paths its rockets will take around the Earth.

The flight path shows from [Sundays] launch, in particular after its reached around the globe, it goes right over Texas, File said.

Of note is that SpaceX has a facility in far South Texas near Boca Chica Beach and has launched rockets from there.

So, which specific part of the rocket were East Texans likely seeing Sunday night?

The second stage, File said. To understand that, heres a quick rundown of the Falcon 9.

The Falcon 9 named after the famed Millennium Falcon from Star Wars is a two-stage rocket, according to SpaceX.

The first stage of the rocket gives it more than 1.7 million pounds of thrust for liftoff. That stage falls away from the rest of the rocket and lands at a specific location, where it can be captured and reused. The first stage used Sunday had powered 16 previous missions, according to SpaceX. It landed on a ship about 8.5 minutes after liftoff, news website http://www.space.com reported.

In between the first stage and the second stage is the interstage, which allows the two stages to separate during flight. It falls away from the second stage.

The second stage, or upper stage, gives the payload its final push into desired orbit, according to SpaceX. The payload in this case, a collection of satellites is stored above this section in the fairing, a shell that houses the satellites on their way into space and opens to release them.

Satellites were deployed about 65.5 minutes after liftoff, space.com reported. SpaceX works to recover some parts of the fairing that can be reused.

The same cant be said, though, for the second stage, which burns up as it reenters Earths atmosphere, according to reporting by news website http://www.cnet.com.

Depending upon the time at which some social media users captured their videos, they may have captured the payload stages deorbit burn on its way to Earth rather than one of its trips before sending its satellites into space, File said.

In one of the videos I saw, there was not like a flash around it, but almost like a halo, cloud-ish, around it, File said. And that could just be a remnant of it heating up as its reentering thicker atmosphere.

Re-entry burn-up may be one reason why some folks said they saw the object disappear, File said.

Another one could be just from the location of the sun relative to that object in the sky, File said. Once that object thats up in the air goes into the shadow of the Earth, then the sun will no longer reflect off of it, and it effectively disappears.

File gave this illustration: Anybody who goes out late in the evening after sunset before like midnight or something you can often see a satellite up in the sky that looks like a plane, but its not blinking. Itll look like a plane just moving, but youll only see it for a certain time, and then it just disappears. And thats simply you see the sunlight reflected off of that until a certain point at which you can no longer see the sun reflecting off of it.

The Sunday rocket mission launched the Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit, which is the area in Earth orbit near enough to Earth for convenient transportation, communication, observation, and resupply, according to NASA. This is the area where the International Space Station currently orbits and where many proposed future platforms will be located.

Starlink satellites are another one of Musks business ventures. Starlink is a satellite internet provider with a goal of making high-speed internet service, also called broadband, available almost anywhere on Earth, according to the companys website. Some people in East Texas are using the service, as broadband isnt available in some parts of the region.

Starlink satellites are known for emitting their own unique light that has caused social media stirs. Joined together, they comprise illuminated satellite constellations, appearing as if theyre a train of lights passing through the sky.

People can find out when a Starlink constellation will be passing over where they live by visiting the website http://www.findstarlink.com, which provides approximate time and location information for viewing.

The constellations are really impressive to see, File said.

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Glow-in-the-dark mystery: Understanding the SpaceX rocket's trip over East Texas - Longview News-Journal

Read more about the malfunctioning moon lander mission.

A brand-new rocket lifted off early Monday morning from Cape Canaveral, Fla., sending multiple payloads on journeys into space.

Hours after the debut of the Vulcan rocket, a moon lander it carried built by a private company faced malfunctions that imperiled its mission. That did not diminish the launch itself, which was flawless and set up future missions of the vehicle, which was built by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin.

Tory Bruno, the chief executive of U.L.A., summed it up tersely in a post on the social media site X.

Launched on the open of the window. Perfectly nominal mission. Dead on bullseye orbital insertion, he wrote.

For U.L.A., the successful launch of the Vulcan Centaur rocket was crucial. Vulcan is designed to replace two older rockets, and the United States Space Force is also counting on it to launch spy satellites and other spacecraft that are important for U.S. national security.

The Vulcan is also the first of several new rockets that could chip away at the current domination of the space launch market by Elon Musks company, SpaceX. SpaceX sent nearly 100 rockets into orbit last year. Other debut orbital launches in the coming months could include the Ariane 6 rocket from Arianespace, a European company, and New Glenn from Blue Origin, the company started by Jeff Bezos, the Amazon founder.

Through the night, the countdown for the Vulcan rocket proceeded smoothly, and the weather cooperated.

At 2:18 a.m. Eastern time, the rockets engines ignited and lifted off from the launchpad, heading up and east over the Atlantic Ocean.

Everything looking good, Rob Gannon, the launch commentator at United Launch Alliance, said repeatedly as the Vulcan headed to space.

Yee-haw, Mr. Bruno, said after the deployment of the lunar spacecraft. I am so thrilled. I cant tell you how much.

United Launch Alliance was formed in 2006, and for nine years it was the only company certified by the United States government to send national security payloads into orbit. Until now, it has used two vehicles: the Delta IV, developed by Boeing, which will complete its final flight later this year, and the Atlas V, developed by Lockheed Martin, which is also to retire in a few years.

Seventeen Atlas V launches remain, but the rocket uses Russian-built engines, which became more politically untenable with the rise of tensions between Russia and the United States. That led U.L.A. to begin development of the Vulcan, which replaces the capabilities of both rockets at a lower cost, United Launch Alliance officials said.

Whats unique about Vulcan, and what we originally set out to do, was to provide a rocket that has all the capabilities of Atlas and Delta in one single system, said Mark Peller, the U.L.A. vice president in charge of Vulcans development. Because we do have that adjustability, its configuration can be really tailored to the specific mission.

Vulcan can be configured in a variety of ways. Its core booster stage, the main body of the rocket, is powered by two BE-4 engines manufactured by Blue Origin. The engines, which emit deep blue flames from the burning of methane fuel, will also be used on Blue Origins New Glenn rocket.

Up to six solid rocket fuel boosters can be strapped to the cores side to increase the amount of mass it can lift into orbit. Its nose cone comes in two dimensions a standard size of 51 feet in length, and a longer one, 70 feet, for larger payloads.

The launch market is more robust than it has been in decades, said Carissa Christensen, the chief executive of Bryce Tech, a consulting company in Alexandria, Va. And anticipated demand is likely to be sufficient to support multiple launch providers, including Vulcan.

U.L.A. already has a backlog of more than 70 missions to fly on Vulcan. Amazon bought 38 launches for deployment for Project Kuiper, a constellation of communications satellites that will compete with SpaceXs Starlink network to provide high-speed satellite internet.

Many of the other launches will be for the Space Force. U.L.A. and SpaceX are currently the only companies that are approved for launching national security missions. Mondays launch is the first of two demonstration missions that the Space Force is requiring to gain confidence in Vulcan before it uses the launcher for military and surveillance payloads.

The second launch is to lift Dream Chaser, an uncrewed space plane built by Sierra Space of Louisville, Colo., on a cargo delivery mission to the International Space Station. That could then be followed by four additional Vulcan launches this year for the Space Force.

The main payload for the first launch of Vulcan was Peregrine, Astrobotics lunar lander. Astrobotic, founded in 2007, is one of several private companies aiming to provide a delivery service to the surface of the moon. Its primary customer for this trip is NASA, which paid Astrobotic $108 million to carry five experiments. No American spacecraft has made a soft landing on the moon since 1972.

That is part of the scientific work the space agency is conducting to prepare for the return of the astronauts to the moon under the Artemis program. Unlike in the past, when NASA built and operated its own spacecraft, this time it is relying on companies such as Astrobotic to provide the transportation.

That spacecraft likely will no longer be able to attempt a moon landing. But Vulcan also lifted a secondary payload for Celestis, a company that memorializes people by sending some of their ashes or DNA into space. Two toolbox-size containers attached to the Vulcans upper stage house 268 small cylindrical capsules.

Among the people whose remains are on this final journey are Gene Roddenberry, the creator of Star Trek; his wife, Majel Barrett, who played Nurse Chapel on the original television show; and three other actors on the show: DeForest Kelley, who played the medical officer Leonard Bones McCoy; Nichelle Nichols, who played Uhura, the communications officer; and James Doohan, who played Montgomery Scott, the chief engineer.

One of the capsules contains samples of hair from three American presidents: George Washington, Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy.

A final brief engine firing sent the second stage and the Celestis memorial into orbit around the sun.

While Vulcan has many payloads to launch over the next few years, its longer-term prospects are less clear. Other aerospace companies are looking to win some of the Space Force business, and Amazon could in the future shift many more of its Kuiper launches to Mr. Bezos Blue Origin.

Another factor affecting Vulcans future is that SpaceX lands and reuses its Falcon 9 boosters, which is likely to give it a sizable price advantage over U.L.A. By contrast, the whole Vulcan rocket is used just once. Blue Origin is also planning to reuse the New Glenn boosters.

U.L.A. is developing technology that could be used to recover the two engines in the booster, the most expensive part of the rocket, but that is years away.

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Vulcan Rocket Aces Its First Launch - The New York Times

SpaceX lawsuit overview:

SpaceX filed a lawsuit asking for injunctive relief against the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), claiming the board should not be allowed to investigate SpaceX because its structure is unconstitutional.

SpaceX is being investigated after terminating employees after the employees sent a SpaceX worker protest open letter on the companys network in June 2022 regarding employment complaints, along with a linked survey, to thousands of SpaceX employees.

Several employees filed charges against SpaceX with the NLRB in November 2022, SpaceX filed a position statement on the charges in April 2023, and the NLRB authorized a complaint on eight charges against SpaceX in December.

The structure of NLRB is unconstitutional because it does not allow the president to remove board members and the NLRBs authority is therefore unchecked, the National Labor Relations Board lawsuit says.

The existence of unconstitutional removal protections inflicts twofold harm, the SpaceX lawsuit says. It limits the presidents constitutional authority, of course. But it also produces an administrative bureaucracy that operates on regulated parties without the constitutionally required degree of electoral accountability.

The NLRBs proceeding structure is also unconstitutional because it does not allow for a trial by jury related to the SpaceX employee worker protest, the National Labor Relations Board lawsuit says.

The right to trial by jury is a fundamental component of the American legal system and remains one of our most vital barriers to governmental arbitrariness, the SpaceX lawsuit says.

SpaceX allegedly pays women and minorities less than their white male counterparts, according to a SpaceX lawsuit filed Oct. 3 in California Superior Court.

Do you believe SpaceX should be subject to an NLRB investigation? Let us know in the comments.

The plaintiff is represented by Catherine L. Eschbach, Harry I. Johnson III, Michael E. Kenneally, Amanda L. Salz of Morgan Lewis and Bockius LLP.

The SpaceX lawsuit is Space Exploration Technologies Corp. v. National Labor Relations Board, et al., Case No. 1:24-cv-00001, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas Brownsville Division.

Read About More Class Action Lawsuits & Class Action Settlements:

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SpaceX sues National Labor Relations Board following worker protest suit - Top Class Actions

Image: SpaceX

SpaceX is aiming for 144 launches in 2024, once again another increase over the 98 it completed the year before. This cadence would mean the company would have to launch once every two and a half days. Keep track below of all of SpaceXs 2024 launches.

So far, SpaceX has launched three rockets in 2024, three Falcon 9, no Falcon Heavies, and no Starships.

Starship not included in success and launch rates.

Number of launches: 3 (Falcon 9: 3, Falcon Heavy: 0, Starship 0)

Non-Starlink missions: 1

Resued boosters: 2

Launch success rate: 100%

Launch rate: 2.33 days (Needed for 144 launches: 2.53 days or lower)

East Coast launches: 2 (LC-39A: 0, SLC-41: 2)

Gulf Coast launches: 0 (Starbase)

West Coast launches: 1 (SLC-4E)

Total payload mass: ~37,000 kg (Not including classified and rideshare missions or crew)

Total crew: 0 (Government: 0, Commercial: 0)

Starship not included

Number of landings: 3

Landing success rate: 100%

Ground landings: 1 (LZ-1: 1, LZ-2: 0, LZ-4: 0)

Droneship landings: 2 (OCISLY: 1, JRTI: 0, ASOG: 1)

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In 2023 Starship finally made its long awaited debut, in its fully integrated form. For 2024, Starship launches will obviously play another big role in keeping SpaceX in the headlines (good and bad).

We dont know exactly how many test flights SpaceX will get off but if the company wants to have any chance of meeting NASAs Artemis timelines it should be in the double digits. By the end of they year NASA really needs to see some serious progress towards Starship being a viable rocket and in space refueling being perfected.

If SpaceX could get past regular and lengthy (in SpaceX standards) FAA investigations, we could see Starship launches happen weeks or less apart. That amount of flight data and experience could turn Starship into a much more viable commercial rocket and build confidence for Artemis 3s 2026 timeline.

At the beginning of 2023 it looked like SpaceX was going to also increase its record for most human spaceflight launches in one year. Sadly, delays to the Polaris Dawn mission meant that the company matched its current record at three.

Something that is, and should still be, an amazing accomplishment for SpaceX.

In 2024, if all schedules hold or dont delay too much, SpaceX could launch as many as five crewed missions to space. At least three have little to none scheduling concerns like the two Commercial Crew missions for NASA and Axiom-3.

Two other missions that are set to liftoff this year are Axiom-4 in the fall and the Polaris Dawn mission. The debut Polaris launch this year is the most exciting as it will feature the first private space walk. This sort of ability will be valuable if SpaceX and Polaris get the go ahead from NASA to service the Hubble Space Telescope.

Vandenberg, the spaceport that has been around for as long as missiles were being launch by the US, has been neglected in recent years with high launch rates. SpaceX has been changing that in recent months. Soon the West Coast will start to see as much action that Florida has been seeing for years.

SpaceX hopes to launch as much as once a week from Vandenberg in 2024. With the increased business from Florida, the ability to launch more Starlink missions from California will favor improvements in bandwidth. In future years, SpaceX could launch as much as it has in Florida, circa 2023.

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List of SpaceX launches 2024 - Space Explored