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Author Topic: Space Thread  (Read 509485 times)
calapine
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Reply #525 on: May 25, 2016, 11:04:53 AM

Nothing special, just thought it looks nice:



A timelapse from Mars Express, who is orbiting since 2003.

Quote
In this remarkable movie, the Visual Monitoring Camera (VMC) on Mars Express was used for the first time to image the limb of Mars during most of a complete orbit, showing in good detail the atmosphere seen ‘on edge’ at the apparent border between the planet’s surface and space.

The movie was stitched together from a series of 403 still images acquired by the camera during 13:45–19:09 GMT on 29 April 2016, during orbit 15624.

The spacecraft was commanded to turn as it orbited Mars, which kept the camera pointing at the brightest point on the horizon as Mars Express passed over the southern hemisphere.

Restoration is a perfectly valid school of magic!
Jeff Kelly
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Reply #526 on: May 27, 2016, 02:48:40 PM

landed it again. Damn it!
Mandella
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Reply #527 on: May 27, 2016, 03:22:51 PM

landed it again. Damn it!

It's starting to be a trend!
Surlyboi
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eat a bag of dicks


Reply #528 on: May 27, 2016, 04:41:25 PM

A 3D tour of pluto, sort of.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIxQXGTl_mo

You need chrome to view it.

Tuned in, immediately get to watch cringey Ubisoft talking head offering her deepest sympathies to the families impacted by the Orlando shooting while flanked by a man in a giraffe suit and some sort of "horrifically garish neon costumes through the ages" exhibit or something.  We need to stop this fucking planet right now and sort some shit out. -Kail
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Reply #529 on: May 27, 2016, 06:44:52 PM

Ran fine here on Firefox.

Hic sunt dracones.
calapine
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Reply #530 on: June 03, 2016, 02:17:06 AM

This is kind of place to find a derelict starship full of eggs:







It's 67P of course, taken by Rosetta two days ago. The Picture is an out-take of a wider image that has been rotated & cropped to produce the "I am standing on it" effect. Full view here

Restoration is a perfectly valid school of magic!
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Reply #531 on: June 16, 2016, 04:42:00 AM

LIGO found another blackhole merger event by observing the gravitational waves.

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calapine
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Reply #532 on: June 17, 2016, 12:00:35 PM

Something neat I saw when watching launch videos (yes...yes, I know...)

Soyuz boosters icing up progressively as they are being filled. Made a GIF:




Location of that is South Amercia btw, not Russia. Context:

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Observing_the_Earth/Copernicus/Sentinel-1/Introducing_Sentinel-1

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calapine
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Reply #533 on: June 19, 2016, 09:22:00 AM

Not content with shitting up the Funny Picture thread with Polandballs I am now taking over the Space thread too!  Oh ho ho ho. Reallllly?


(Don't mean to be spammy, but it's a beautiful image...)





Last nights Ariane 5 start - her (it's?) heaviest* so far - 10730 kg to GTO (Geostationary Transfer Orbit).

The video itself worth a watch too, rare day launch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5P_8PNKsrE


(*Heaviest to GTO, low earth orbit to ISS has been 21 tons)
« Last Edit: June 19, 2016, 09:27:06 AM by calapine »

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Mosesandstick
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Reply #534 on: July 03, 2016, 01:07:23 PM

That is a beautiful shot, I wish there was a higher res version!
calapine
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Reply #535 on: July 03, 2016, 02:43:55 PM

That is a beautiful shot, I wish there was a higher res version!

I wrote CNES and asked. No idea how they are about public outreach, but let's see.

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Morat20
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Reply #536 on: July 03, 2016, 02:55:29 PM

Hubble got re-upped for five years. Hopefully by the time that runs out, Space-X can get a manned vehicle high enough for a quick-and-dirty service. (Batteries and gryos are what it really needs, although I'm sure there's a ton of instrument packages they could swap out).

JWST is going to be fantastic, but it's not looking at the same wavelengths. If they can keep Hubble running, it's worth the rather small investment.
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Reply #537 on: July 03, 2016, 08:42:14 PM

2001 is on TCM right now if you want to get in the mood for Juno's arrival.

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Mosesandstick
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Reply #538 on: July 04, 2016, 12:42:55 PM

I wrote CNES and asked. No idea how they are about public outreach, but let's see.

Wow, thank you!
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Reply #539 on: August 24, 2016, 02:43:45 PM

Yep, it's now confirmed: a rocky planet orbits the binary star system of Proxima Centauri, our closest neighbor  Heart Heart

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/08/24/health/proxima-b-centauri-rocky-planet-habitable-zone-neighbor-star/index.html

Quote
Proxima b is a rocky, terrestrial planet with a surface -- unlike a gas giant, such as Jupiter -- that is 1.3 times the size of Earth and orbits its star every 11.2 days. It is in a close orbit of Proxima Centauri: only 5% of the distance between the Earth and the sun. They are even closer together than Mercury and the sun. But because its star is much cooler and fainter than our sun, Proxima b has a temperature that is suitable for liquid water to exist on the surface without evaporating.
Researchers estimate that if the planet has an atmosphere, which could be assumed but isn't known, it may be between 86 to 104 degrees Fahrenheit on the surface. Without an atmosphere, it could be -22 to -40 degrees Fahrenheit. To put that in perspective, Earth would be -4 degrees if it didn't have an atmosphere, Reiners said.

But, yeah, why it took so long to discover it, given the relatively small distance?

Quote
It comes down to an understanding of the star this planet orbits, as well as how data collection has evolved during the last 16 years.
Proxima Centauri is a low-mass red dwarf star, known as an M-class dwarf, that happens to be close to the bright binary star Alpha Centauri AB, which outshines its cool stepbrother, so to speak. All of these stars are within the faint Centaurus constellation, which can't be seen with the unaided eye. M-class dwarves are not well understood in comparison with other types of stars, Reiners said. Because of that, researchers don't know much about the history of these stars or their radiation in the early days.
"But within the field of exoplants, [researchers] have recently realized that looking for planets around M dwarves is what is going to be the most spectacular, because you can find these plants in the liquid water zone more easily than other stars," Reiners said.

Because it's an active star, Proxima Centauri can behave in varied ways that mimic the presence of a planet, according to the study. Researchers wanted to observe it for a long period of time, so for the first half of this year, telescopes around the world were pointed at Proxima Centauri. The researchers looked for a "Doppler wobble," or back and forth wobble of Proxima Centauri that would be caused by the gravitational pull of a planet in orbit.
This was combined with research, data and published studies of Proxima Centauri dating to 2000.
"The significance of the detection went sky high," Anglada-Escudé said. "Statistically, there was no doubt. We have found a planet around Proxima Centauri."

More stuff in the article linked above.

Excited  DRILLING AND MANLINESS DRILLING AND MANLINESS DRILLING AND MANLINESS  Can't wait for my next four or five incarnations or so: I want to embark on the inevitable "noah's ark" that is going to head there  Oh ho ho ho. Reallllly?

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Reply #540 on: August 28, 2016, 08:02:19 PM

What would the radiation and mag fields be like that close to the star??  Is it a linear degradation with temperature?

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Reply #541 on: August 28, 2016, 09:02:13 PM

Mag field decays really quick, and radiation is going to be significantly less than it is here on Earth because red dwarfs release orders of magnitude fewer of the higher energy particles to begin with. The big trouble is that solar flares on some red dwarfs are just as impressive as the ones on yellow dwarfs like our sun, and the smaller distance they have to travel they'd be considerably less diffuse... and that could be pretty devastating. Proxima is just such a creature, and produces occasional bursts of X-ray fun.

Also it would always be, to our eyes, darker on the planet since so much of the radiation is in the invisible infra-red.

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Reply #542 on: August 29, 2016, 03:04:18 AM

It might also be tidally locked with the star among other factors making the planet unfun to live on (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxima_Centauri_b#Habitability)
There may, however, be more Planets within the habitable zone of Proxima.

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Mandella
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Reply #543 on: September 01, 2016, 11:51:21 AM

Bad day for private spaceflight. SpaceX had a total lose in a preflight test fire. Not just the booster, but the payload and the pad, are total writeoffs.

No official announcement, but this probably means no more flights for months while the accident is being investigated.

http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/spacexs-falcon-9-rocket-apparently-blew-up-during-a-test-firing-thursday/
calapine
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Reply #544 on: September 01, 2016, 12:28:22 PM

I went through a video of the explosion with a Frame-By-Frame function.

The two images are ~ 16 milliseconds apart, source is a 60 FPS recording





Youtube

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Reply #545 on: September 01, 2016, 12:50:59 PM

While it sucks that this happened, I think an event like this was needed and long overdue.

Musk's (and by extension, SpaceX's) hubris needed to be reigned in a bit. There have been reports of shoddy QA/QC on their manufacturing processes for years and they have been given a pass by the nerdisphere because "Musk is a visionary!" and "SpaceX hasn't had a failure in forever!". I am not saying that this was due to a manufacturing defect, but the "build it faster and cheaper, we need to ramp up our schedule because MARS!" attitude is pervasive and has the potential to be dangerous.

It happening now where the only loss was a few hundred million in hardware and a slipped launch schedule is much better than if it happened during a manned flight. Treating everything in the world as sonething that should be done in a Silicon Valley dot.com startup fashion is a dangerous outlook to have.
« Last Edit: September 01, 2016, 12:52:38 PM by Chimpy »

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calapine
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Reply #546 on: September 01, 2016, 01:06:48 PM

While it sucks that this happened, I think an event like this was needed and long overdue.

Musk's (and by extension, SpaceX's) hubris needed to be reigned in a bit. There have been reports of shoddy QA/QC on their manufacturing processes for years and they have been given a pass by the nerdisphere because "Musk is a visionary!" and "SpaceX hasn't had a failure in forever!". I am not saying that this was due to a manufacturing defect, but the "build it faster and cheaper, we need to ramp up our schedule because MARS!" attitude is pervasive and has the potential to be dangerous.

It happening now where the only loss was a few hundred million in hardware and a slipped launch schedule is much better than if it happened during a manned flight. Treating everything in the world as sonething that should be done in a Silicon Valley dot.com startup fashion is a dangerous outlook to have.

Some months ago I went through Glassdoor reviews of SpaceX and complains about practices on the workshop floor (so workers, not the engineers) cropped up a lot. What I remember: "You don't get decent training from the supervisor, its figure it out yourself" "People work in sneakers, no safety shoes" "Higher ups are all ex-car managers and have no clue about work procedures in aerospace manufacture"

This seems to fit as well:



Putting the payload on the rocket before the hotfire test - to save one single day - just cost them (their customer) > $300 million.

(The satellite was insured, but only AFTER rocket ignition...ouch)
« Last Edit: September 01, 2016, 01:13:32 PM by calapine »

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Reply #547 on: September 01, 2016, 01:14:24 PM

Hacking rocket science and space travel -- what could possibly go wrong?
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Reply #548 on: September 01, 2016, 01:34:31 PM

Hacking rocket science and space travel -- what could possibly go wrong?


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Reply #549 on: September 01, 2016, 03:57:15 PM

Some would call that a disaster; I'd call it an adventure.  why so serious?

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Reply #550 on: September 01, 2016, 04:24:14 PM

Better to learn it now, than when people are on board. Echoes of the Challenger bullshit.

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Reply #551 on: September 01, 2016, 06:26:19 PM

Rosetta's Comet outburst.

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Rosetta/Rosetta_captures_comet_outburst

At first I thought this was the comet blowing into two and then rejoining, but not quite.
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Reply #552 on: September 01, 2016, 06:39:27 PM

Some would call that a disaster; I'd call it an adventure.  why so serious?

I call it justice.  DRILLING AND MANLINESS

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Reply #553 on: September 02, 2016, 07:39:23 AM

Wait, they put the payload on the rocket for the TEST? To save themselves a day?

HOLY FUCK. My first thought when I read about the explosion being on a test run and not the final flight was "well, at least they didn't blow up their probably very expensive payload."

... the fuck?

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Reply #554 on: September 02, 2016, 08:51:14 AM

(The satellite was insured, but only AFTER rocket ignition...ouch)

Not only that it looks like SpaceX didn't take any insurance out on the Falcon 9 either, so it's a total write off for them as well (http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2016/09/02/425358.htm)
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Reply #555 on: September 02, 2016, 09:35:24 AM

Wait, they put the payload on the rocket for the TEST? To save themselves a day?

HOLY FUCK. My first thought when I read about the explosion being on a test run and not the final flight was "well, at least they didn't blow up their probably very expensive payload."

... the fuck?


I'm not a rocket scientist either, just a guy who tries to keep up with this stuff, so take the following accordingly.

As I understand the process, the rocket has been static fired and pressurization tested already. This test was more accurately a pre-flight dress rehearsal,  where all systems were brought up to launch readiness together. Since the satellite connections and pre-flight programming are some of the things being tested, it doesn't make a lot of sense to not have the payload in place while doing it. At this point only small bugs should be remaining anyway -- the sort of things that could cause a short hold during actual launch, but might cause the launch window to be missed.

Clearly, something more than a small bug remained. But since the launch was going to be in less than two days whatever flaw caused the explosion now would have likely caused the explosion then.

I have no idea what de Selding is going on about. (He's with Spaceflight News isn't he? -- I couldn't find the article where he supported his tweet.) This is not Kerbal. You don't just snap the payload off the stack with a mouse. If you are going to do a pad test then you'll need to drop the rocket back horizontally, move it back to the assembly area, attach the payload, move it back and set back vertical. Then you'd need to test it again because moving it means things changed. Now what SpaceX *had* been considering was to skip this test altogether, since they figured they had the pre-flight pretty well nailed down by now.

Again, clearly not.

Insurance: Launch insurance does not kick in because there was no launch. (As an aside, if it had blown up on launch day it would still not kick in, since it blew pre-ignition.) However, standard accident and loss insurance does. There is a report that Musk does not insure his rockets, but the pre-launch payload insurance is actually (as far as I understand it) the responsibility of of the payload owner. I have no idea what their policy particulars are, but probably not as good as the launch failure payout, which normally includes time and service loss compensation.

Zuckerberg: Facebook had planned to lease some of the satellite's bandwidth for a few years, and thus Zuckerberg used the words "our satellite" in his own post on the matter. So some mainstream media has been reporting "SpaceX Blast Destroys Facebook Satellite." Yes, poor wording by Zuckerberg completely collapsed the media's factchecking ability. More News at Eleven (or not).

tl;dr version, IMHO the problem was not the test, but whatever screwup caused the blast, and that is where accusations of poor work practices have some validity. I don't know. I've got no inside view on SpaceX at all. Wish I did, even if it was just running the cafeteria. But personally I'm going to hold off joining the witchhunt until some more information comes out revealing just what exactly went wrong.

Oh, postscript I guess. If it had happened with actual crew onboard (assuming launch day, they would not have been onboard during the test), then the crew safety system would have lifted them and the capsule away from the blast. Assuming it worked right of course, but hey, at least they have one designed in, unlike the Shuttle where we flew it in deathtrap configuration for decades and just got used to the fact that if anything went wrong it was just going to be a full party wipe.
« Last Edit: September 02, 2016, 09:37:57 AM by Mandella »
calapine
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Reply #556 on: September 02, 2016, 10:15:41 AM

Wait, they put the payload on the rocket for the TEST? To save themselves a day?

HOLY FUCK. My first thought when I read about the explosion being on a test run and not the final flight was "well, at least they didn't blow up their probably very expensive payload."

... the fuck?
I have no idea what de Selding is going on about. (He's with Spaceflight News isn't he? -- I couldn't find the article where he supported his tweet.) This is not Kerbal. You don't just snap the payload off the stack with a mouse. If you are going to do a pad test then you'll need to drop the rocket back horizontally, move it back to the assembly area, attach the payload, move it back and set back vertical. Then you'd need to test it again because moving it means things changed. Now what SpaceX *had* been considering was to skip this test altogether, since they figured they had the pre-flight pretty well nailed down by now.

Yes, he is the Spacenews Paris Bureau chief.

SpaceX used to perform the final static fire tests without the payload attached, then - if successful - lower the rocket, wheel it to the integration building, attach the payload, and erect it again for final launch.

As seen below:



The image is from the static fire test for the SES-8 sat launch (3 days before scheduled launch), taken on the same launchpad (SLC-40) as yesterdays rocket. As can be seen there is no payload fairing on top.

Some time ago SpaceX started doing the tests with the satellites already on board, thus avoiding one work step. Which now backfired...
« Last Edit: September 02, 2016, 10:17:32 AM by calapine »

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Mandella
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Reply #557 on: September 02, 2016, 11:11:52 AM

Wait, they put the payload on the rocket for the TEST? To save themselves a day?

HOLY FUCK. My first thought when I read about the explosion being on a test run and not the final flight was "well, at least they didn't blow up their probably very expensive payload."

... the fuck?
I have no idea what de Selding is going on about. (He's with Spaceflight News isn't he? -- I couldn't find the article where he supported his tweet.) This is not Kerbal. You don't just snap the payload off the stack with a mouse. If you are going to do a pad test then you'll need to drop the rocket back horizontally, move it back to the assembly area, attach the payload, move it back and set back vertical. Then you'd need to test it again because moving it means things changed. Now what SpaceX *had* been considering was to skip this test altogether, since they figured they had the pre-flight pretty well nailed down by now.

Yes, he is the Spacenews Paris Bureau chief.

SpaceX used to perform the final static fire tests without the payload attached, then - if successful - lower the rocket, wheel it to the integration building, attach the payload, and erect it again for final launch.

As seen below:



The image is from the static fire test for the SES-8 sat launch (3 days before scheduled launch), taken on the same launchpad (SLC-40) as yesterdays rocket. As can be seen there is no payload fairing on top.

Some time ago SpaceX started doing the tests with the satellites already on board, thus avoiding one work step. Which now backfired...


Okay found it. Yeah they changed their procedure in 2014, although saying it was done solely to save money and time is arguable.

In any case, I imagine SpaceX is re-examining that decision now...
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Reply #558 on: September 02, 2016, 11:46:35 AM

The fact that they ever did vertical testing without the payload is the weird thing.

Pretty much all other horizontal integrators flip the rocket upright once when it reaches the pad and don't tilt it back down to avoid additional stress on the rocket. Also, it makes no sense to test the systems in a non integrated state and give it a green light for the launch as tilting it down and adding things changes the configuration/loading.

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calapine
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Reply #559 on: September 02, 2016, 12:22:55 PM

The fact that they ever did vertical testing without the payload is the weird thing.

Pretty much all other horizontal integrators flip the rocket upright once when it reaches the pad and don't tilt it back down to avoid additional stress on the rocket. Also, it makes no sense to test the systems in a non integrated state and give it a green light for the launch as tilting it down and adding things changes the configuration/loading.


The 'entire rocket hotfire test' is an SpaceX speciality. Neither ULA, Arianespace nor the Russians do it.

For Ariane5 I know the main engine will be fired twice as part of acceptance testing before delivery, but that's before it's part of the rocket stack.

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