48 years ago today, NASA awarded Rockwell with a $2.6 billion contract to construct the Space Shuttle Orbiter. The initial contract would cover two flight articles, a main propulsion test article (MPTA), and a static test article (STA). After a four-year-long design process which involved all the heavy hitters of the American military-industrial complex, NASA settled on Rockwell primarily because of their experience with the Apollo 13 accident. The addition of two more flight articles later on would ultimately double the size of the contract. As an aside, the initial avionics were handled by five IBM AP-101 computer systems, the same used by Skylab, updated B-52 bombers, and many contemporary aerospace products. Early updates would use early Intel PC microprocessors, beginning with the immensely popular Intel 8088, even later going to the Intel 386.
Vitali Sevastyanov was born on July 8, 1935, in Krasnouralsk, Russian SFSR, in the central portion of the state. At the time he was born, his town was being converted into a factory town. After the Great Patriotic War, his family moved to Sochi. After he graduated from high school, Vitali studied engineering at the Moscow Aviation Institute. During post-grad research, he apprenticed at OKB-1. He was hired when he graduated in 1959, and helped work on the Vostok spacecraft. In the mid-1960s, he taught cosmonauts about physics. In 1967, he was selected as a cosmonaut himself in the third civilian cosmonaut group. His first mission was as flight engineer aboard the long-duration Soyuz 9 mission in 1970. He would also fly to Salyut 4 aboard Soyuz 18 in the summer of 1975, and communicate with Apollo-Soyuz during the two-month mission. Following the second mission, Vitali would continue to train cosmonauts and do design work for NPO Energia, particularly on Buran. He would also serve on reserve crews for various missions. He retired from RKK Energia in 1993, and spent some time in the Duma. Outside his work at Energia, he was the head of the Soviet Union Chess Federation for much of the 1980s. I've noted previously that he played chess with TsUP during Soyuz 9. Given the timing, it's very likely he personally knew Garry Kasparov. He died in Moscow following a long illness on April 5, 2010, aged 74. He left one child. He was buried next to his wife at Ostankino Cemetery in Moscow.
Nikolai Kamanin, the head of cosmonaut training for the Soviet space program, thought 1966 would be the year that the Soviet Union re-took the lead in the Space Race. The original plan was for four Voskhod flights and four Soyuz flights which would further refine extravehicular activity, test rendezvous and docking, and take longer and longer spaceflights in general. Then Sergei Korolev died. Now, half-way through the year 54 years ago today, the already-nebulous Soviet space program was in the grips of a power struggle. Voskhod was frozen, and ultimately would never fly again. Not with humans, anyway. Soyuz was experiencing developmental issues, and growing impatience would sow the seeds of future tragedies. VVS accused OKB-1 of delaying the program by insisting on fully automated controls for the docking system. There were also concerns about Korolev's insistence during his lifetime of experimenting with artificial gravity, which further complicated things. Given this info, one has to wonder how some alternate history theoreticians think that simply having Sergei Korolev survive his hemorrhoid surgery that January might have given the Soviets a path to beat the Americans to landing people on the Moon.
The maiden launch of Ariane 6 has been delayed to the second half of 2021. When the first launch would happen has been in limbo since OneWeb went into bankruptcy, depriving Arianespace of their intended first payload. Now, they are blaming decreased productivity caused by the pandemic. It's now beginning to look like Vulcan could beat them to orbit. ******** Among the increasingly dense manifest for Falcon 9, it's scheduled to launch a new satellite for Sirius XM, SXM-7, just after midnight EDT on August 1. SXM-7 will be the first of a pair of satellites to replace the remaining dedicated XM satellites, XM-3 Rhythm and XM-4 Blues. Its twin, SXM-8, is penciled in for Q3 2020. XM used geostationary satellites for its service, while Sirius initially launched its satellites into tundra orbits. The tundra orbit is a super-high version of the Molniya orbit that completes an orbit once a day instead of twice; it's essentially a super-high inclination geosynchronous orbit. Sirius was the only commercial enterprise that ever used it. Japan uses it for a navigational satellite system, Quasi-Zenith, which augments GPS in their country. After the merger, the process of merging services began with Sirius launching its first post-merger satellite, Radiosat FM-5, into geostationary orbit. Once its twin, FM-6, was launched, all three originial Sirius satellites, FM-1 through FM-3, were retired. Radiosat FM-4 was a ground spare of the first three that was never launched, and is now on display at the Udvar-Hazy annex of the National Air and Space Museum. Sirius and XM channels remain functionally separate, although customers can use both these days. The only satellite currently on-orbit that can transmit both Sirius and XM channels is XM-5, which was launched in 2010 but is an on-orbit spare.
19 years ago today, Atlantis was launched on STS-104 from Pad 39B, Kennedy Space Center. The primary goal of the mission was installation of the Quest Joint Airlock on the International Space Station. It would become the main location for the beginning of extravehicular activities on the American side of the station. It was attached to the station at Unity starboard. The reason why it is referred to as the joint airlock is because Quest could theoretically support EVAs with either the NASA Extravehicular Mobility Unit or the Roscosmos Orlan spacesuit. Although it nominally only stows EMUs, and the equipment required to support Orlan has to this day not been installed. Another procedure this enabled was "camping out". Astronauts on the ISS could now use Quest to spend the night, pre-breathing a low-nitrogen atmosphere prior to EVA to minimize decompression sickness. I'm fairly sure the Russians were able to start doing this as well once the Pirs airlock arrived three months later. Three EVAs were conducted by Michael Gernhardt and James Reilly to install and outfit Quest. The third EVA was the first one conducted from Quest itself. This was the last Space Shuttle mission to launch with five astronauts.
Robert Overmyer was born on July 14, 1936, in Lorain, Ohio. After getting his physics degree from Baldwin Wallace College, he was commissioned as a Marine Corps Aviator. After completing a master's in aeronautical engineering at the Naval Postgraduate School in 1964, he spent some time with a maintenance squadron in Japan before being assigned to the Air Force Test Pilot School. He was chosen in the second Manned Orbiting Laboratory astronaut group in 1966, then transferred to NASA in 1969. Once at NASA, Bob joined engineering development with Skylab. He was also a NASA liaison to TsUP during Apollo-Soyuz. He was chosen to pilot the first operational Space Shuttle mission, STS-5, in 1982. He would later command STS-51-B, a Spacelab mission aboard Challenger, in 1985. He would be a lead investigator in the Rogers Commission investigating the Challenger disaster. After the investigation, he left NASA, and retired from the Marine Corps as a colonel. After retiring from NASA, Bob spent seven years on space station development at McDonnell Douglas, while also maintaining a consulting firm. After retiring from McDonnell Douglas in 1995, he expanded his consulting firm, and eventually affiliated with Cirrus as a general aviation test pilot. He was testing stall characteristics on the Cirrus VK-30 when he died in a plane crash near Duluth International Airport on March 22, 1996, aged 59. He left a wife and three children. He was interred at Arlington National Cemetery.
When STS-127 was launched 11 years ago today, part of the payload was a series of cubesats to be deployed from the International Space Station. A pair of them were a joint venture by the University of Texas and Texas A&M. Collectively, they were known as DragonSat. Who was on the crew? Doug Hurley, on his first mission. Seems like the timeline was trying to unify there, wasn't it? There will be more on that soon enough. Meanwhile, Chris Cassidy and Bob Behnken are preparing for the last two spacewalks to replace the remaining NiMH batteries with new Lithium ion batteries, permitting the ISS to continue to work though its current planned retirement in 2030. The current plan is for them to camp out tonight in the Quest airlock before conducting the first EVA tomorrow morning. They will also do some outfitting on Tranquility in preparation for the arrival of the NanoRacks Bishop Airlock Module.
This is a triumph I'm making a note here: Huge success It's hard to overstate my satisfaction There was supposed to be another spacewalk on Tuesday to complete the replacement of the International Space Station's batteries. But Chris Cassidy and Bob Behnken got so far ahead of schedule that they completed the work today. Now the question is, do they even have any work to do on Tuesday? ... Well, there was a tweet to go with that, but NASA deleted it. Apparently, one of the Li-ion batteries that was installed in 2019 shorted out. They don't have a replacement for that one at the station, so that will have to be dealt with at another time.
Something unique about the Solar Orbiter is that, unlike the Parker Solar Probe, it actually has a camera. The investigators for Parker decided to focus on remote sensing experiments. They probably figured it wasn't worth it trying to get a camera that could survive in a heat environment that otherwise would require a heat shield derived from the Space Shuttle. #SolarOrbiter has made its first close pass by the Sun, studying our star and space with a comprehensive suite of instruments — and the data is already revealing previously unseen details. This is #TheSunUpClose. https://t.co/rVMjz45DoY pic.twitter.com/YLKBXRNQZb— NASA Sun & Space (@NASASun) July 16, 2020 Solar Orbiter went through its first perihelion in June, and took the closest images yet taken of the Sun. They were at a distance of roughly 0.5 AU, between the orbits of Mercury and Venus. The probe will eventually be sent closer. It won't take its first fly-by of Venus until December 26, which will lower its perihelion to roughly 0.28 AU. As I mentioned before, future fly-bys of Venus will raise the probe's inclination relative to the Sun, permitting it to see the Sun's higher latitudes.
I've been under the weather over the past several days. (No, I don't have the 'rona.) So I figured it was entirely possible I could miss something I said recently that I wanted to cover. So I looked up the figure on Wikipedia, and it turns out that day just happens to be today. I cross-referenced it with Encyclopedia Astronautica. They have nothing on him. Like, at all. He's not even in their list of subjects. They should, and you'll definitely see why. ******** Eugene Shoemaker was born on April 28, 1928, in LA. His family moved around the U.S. during the Great Depression, but eventually settled on a conservation project in Wyoming. His family split time between there and Buffalo, where his mother was a professor teaching about education. They returned to LA in 1942, and the super-bright Gene enrolled in high school at age 13. He graduated in 1944, and went to Caltech, where he was at home with the World War II-accelerated curriculum. He had a bachelor's in geology before he turned 20, then went to Princeton for post-grad studies. Two major things happened in his life in 1950. While studying at Princeton, he was hired by the U.S. Geographical Survey. Also, he was called back to California to be the best man at the wedding of his best friend, Richard Spellman. It was there that he met Richard's sister, Carolyn. Carolyn Spellman was born on June 24, 1929, in Gallup, New Mexico. Her family quickly moved to Chico, California. While Richard went to Caltech, Carol went to Cal State-Chico, where she ultimately got a master's in history, seeking to become an educator. While she wasn't terribly into more technical scientific pursuits like geology, she still took quite a liking to Gene. They began to write each other. In the summer of 1951, Gene took Carol on a two-week camping expedition in the Tennessee Plateau. She fell in love with both geology, and him. They were married by the end of that summer. She tried to get a job as a teacher, but found it didn't suit her personality, so she decided to be a homemaker instead, and she and Gene ultimately had three children together. Meanwhile, Gene was making some groundbreaking discoveries. One of his earliest: determining that Meteor Crater in Arizona was actually made by a meteor. There were some theories that Meteor Crater, also known as Barringer Crater, was actually volcanic in nature, perhaps a collapsed steam vent. But Gene's studies in the early 1950s determined that it had characteristics similar to craters produced by the atomic bomb tests in New Mexico and Nevada. In 1960, he finally found the meteorite that created it. Or rather, pieces of it. Occasionally, Carol would travel with Gene on his geology expeditions, but eventually stopped to re-focus on their children. At this point, Gene was pioneering astrogeology. He and Gerard Kuiper were involved in the imaging portion of the Ranger lunar impact probes, and Gene was the principal investigator for the Surveyor lunar lander probes. He would be involved in studying for the first three Apollo lunar landings...though his need in Apollo 13 was cut short. By the time their children were grown, empty nest syndrome hit Carol hard, and she was looking for something to do. She began learning about astronomy at the Lowell Observatory, where Gene was getting involved in looking for near-Earth asteroids. The Shoemakers would discover scores of asteroids and comets together, including nine comets found with David Levy, and three comets with Henry Holt. Most notable of these was Shoemaker-Levy 9, which was captured in orbit around Jupiter, and its fragments eventually impacted the planet. They were in the Australian outback in the southern hemisphere winter of 1997 while doing the last observations for Comet Hale-Bopp, which was outbound. While returning to Alice Springs, they got into a car accident, colliding head-on with another vehicle. Gene Shoemaker died of his injuries, aged 69. Carol was also injured, but survived. Carolyn would continue to make astronomical observations actively for the next five years. She has been involved in the discovery of over 800 asteroids and 32 comets. Gene is credited with only 183. Some of Gene's ashes were sent into space aboard the Lunar Prospector spacecraft. With its impact on the Moon, his are the only human remains known to be on a celestial body other than Earth.
Astra Space is giving it another shot. The outfit that failed to do the DARPA Launch Challenge right as the pandemic was starting has hit a few bumps. They actually lost their original intended rocket, Rocket 3.0 1 of 3, on March 23 because they left a valve open while detanking following a wet dress rehearsal. They've done some revisions to the hardware, and as a result, there has been changes in names for their other two intended Rocket 3.0 carriers. The next one, 2 of 3, will now be called Rocket 3.1. They will have six days with launch opportunities out of Kodiak Spaceport starting on August 2. Each day, the window will be will be open from 3:30-7pm EDT.
Alan Shepard was born on November 18, 1923, in Derry, New Hampshire. Being the grandson of someone who went to World War I via the National Guard, he had an interest in flying from an early age, frequently biking to Manchester to do odd jobs at their airport and occasionally get flying lessons. He wanted to go to the Navy, but graduated from his prep school, Pinkerton Academy, too early to get into the U.S. Naval Academy, so he spent an extra year at Admiral Farragaut Academy before going into Navy in 1941. After graduating from Navy in 1944, he spent the rest of the year serving on the destroyer USS Cogswell. One of his first tasks was assisting the cruiser USS Reno, which was crippled by a Japanese torpedo. He also battled kamikaze pilots in the Invasion of Lingayen Gulf. When Cogswell returned for an overhaul in February 1945, Alan married a woman he met while at Navy, Louise Brewer, on March 3. They would have two children together, and would also raise the child of one of Louise's sisters, who had died young. After getting married, he rejoined Cogswell for the last push of World War II. He again fought off kamikazes at the Battle of Okinawa, and was on the flotilla for the Surrender of Japan. Having completed his sea duty requirement, Alan reported for aviator training at NAS Corpus Christi in the beginning of 1946. After earning his wings and doing carrier tours of the Caribbean and Mediterranean, he went to Naval Test Pilot School at NAS Patuxent River. One of his projects as a test pilot was certifying the McDonnell F-2 Banshee for carrier use. He got a master's degree from the Naval War College in 1957, and was an instructor throughout. In 1959, Alan would be selected among the Mercury Seven to be one of America's first astronauts. When they observed an Atlas launch in May 1959 that ended in an explosion, Alan turned to John Glenn and said, "Well, I'm glad they got that out of the way." Ultimately, Shepard was chosen to fly the first Mercury mission, Mercury-Redstone 3 Freedom 7. There were plans for him to be the first astronaut to fly a second time with Freedom 7-II, which would've been a three-day mission. But they decided to press on with Project Gemini instead. So he was to fly Gemini 3 with junior pilot Tom Stafford. Except that didn't happen, either. In late 1963, Alan began experiencing random dizziness. He was diagnosed with Muniere's disease, and was grounded from flight status. To make matters worse, he was also diagnosed with glaucoma, and they found a lump on his thyroid, for which they did surgery. To make up for his being grounded, Alan was named as Chief of the Astronaut Office. He was involved in developing astronaut training, and also aided the selection of the Original 19 group in 1966. In 1969, he underwent a successful surgery to fix his ear condition, and was restored to active duty. He was put on as commander for Apollo 13, then flipped over to Apollo 14 with his crew to buy him extra training time. He ultimately became the fifth astronaut to walk on the Moon in early 1971. After the mission, Alan resumed his role as Chief of the Astronaut Office. He was promoted to Rear Admiral in the Navy in October 1971. He retired from the Navy and NASA in July 1974. He was known for keeping down some affairs early in his astronaut career, but was also very dedicated to his children; frequently, his children would be the only ones among the astronauts at NASA events. He did re-dedicate himself to Louise after Apollo 14. After his astronaut career, Alan made well for himself in real estate. He also wrote a book about the race to the Moon, Moon Shot, in 1994. He was diagnosed with leukemia in 1996, and died of complications 22 years ago today, aged 74. Louise died five weeks later following a heart attack. They were cremated, and their ashes were scattered together outside their home in Pebble Beach, California.
20 years ago today, NASA announced the selection of Astronaut Group 18, "The Bugs". The pilots were Dominic Antonelli, Eric Boe, Kevin Ford, Ronald Garan, Doug Hurley, Terry Virts, and Barry Wilmore. The mission specialists were Michael Barratt, Bob Behnken, Stephen Bowen, Alvin Drew, Andrew Feustel, Michael Good, Timothy Kopra, Megan McArthur, Karen Nyberg, and Nicole Stott. It wasn't known at the time, but this would be the first group where no one on the pilot track would command a Space Shuttle mission, as this took place 2 1/2 years before the Columbia disaster. Indeed, one of the pilots, Ronald Garan, wouldn't pilot the Shuttle at all, though they would fly two missions to the ISS. Behnken and McArthur were the first NASA astronauts born in the 1970s, which McArthur being the youngest, about to turn 29. The only astronaut that has not flown to the ISS is Megan McArthur, who flew only on STS-125, the last Hubble servicing mission. And of course, two of the members of this particular group should be very familiar from recently.
Astronauts will continue to launch to space from U.S. soil!Today, we named crew members to @SpaceX's 2nd operational Crew Dragon flight:🚀 Megan McArthur of @NASA_Astronauts 🚀 @astro_kimbrough🚀 @Aki_Hoshide of @JAXA_en🚀 @Thom_astro of @ESAInfo: https://t.co/DsBanB0l0o pic.twitter.com/sVOd77ERoj— NASA (@NASA) July 28, 2020 NASA and SpaceX announced the finalized crew for USCV-2 today. With USCV-1 planned to launch in September, following the return of Endeavour currently planned for this Sunday, crew rotations from Florida will begin to crank out. Hopefully even more readily once Boeing starts getting its s*** together. Kjell Lindgren has been shuffled to USCV-3. The crew for USCV-2 will now be commanded by Shane Kimbrough, who will be flying his third spaceflight. The pilot seat will be held by Megan McArthur, who will be taking her first trip to the ISS. They will be joined by Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide and French astronaut Thomas Pesquet. The big thing about USCV-2 is that SpaceX plans on flying the mission with Endeavour on its first reflight. USCV-1 is being flown by a new Crew Dragon capsule. USCV-2 will indeed be a Crew Dragon reflight. I know some had previously said it would likely not be flown again. Probably part of the reason they chose to do so is because they will not go anywhere near the 110 day limit that had been set for Demonstration Mission 2. The mission instead is planned to only go 65 days.
This should have been tweeted in upper case https://t.co/W44sIgp2xW— Scott Manley (@DJSnM) July 30, 2020 Perseverance and Ingenuity were launched this morning at about 7:50am EDT. They immediately ran into a minor issue: Its signal was too strong to be received by the Deep Space Network. The initial signal was on the order of about 2-3 x 10^-16 kW. The average interplanetary probe has signals that have strengths closer to 10^-18 kW, with the furthest probes approaching 10^-24 kW. They eventually were able to turn the signal down some, and are now communicating bidirectionally with them through the Goldstone radio telescopes. If you're ever interested in observing what probes are utilizing the Deep Space Network, NASA has a website for that. Keep in mind, all the missions have 3-to-4-character codes. They'll be easy to figure out when you click on their receiving dishes.
We're going to be breaking some serious science this weekend. SpaceX Demonstration Mission 2 will be undocking from the International Space Station at around 7:30pm EDT tonight, aiming for a splashdown Sunday afternoon, approximately 2:45pm EDT. (If you're interested, NASA will be going live online and on NASA TV with a departure ceremony at 9:10am EDT.) But with Hurricane Isaias spinning up the Atlantic coast of Florida, SpaceX is now targeting a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. Their prime landing zone will be off the Florida panhandle near Panama City. All Atlantic splashdowns in the capsule era occurred roughly in the Bermuda Triangle region; in the area of the Atlantic to the north of Hispañola and Puerto Rico, and east of the Bahamas. That accounts for four Mercury missions, all but one Gemini mission, and Apollo 7 and 9. The DM-1 uncrewed flight splashed down off Cape Canaveral. This could be the first mission targeted to splashdown in the Gulf. The SpaceX recovery boats, GO Searcher and GO Navigator, are already in the Gulf. NASA has dispatched one of its Astronaut Office Gulfstream V jets to Pensacola International Airport to bring Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken back to Houston. Doug and Bob were already anticipating the possibility of seasickness, and will have barf bags ready just in case. ******** Meanwhile, Rocket Lab has been building a mystery. Today we can confirm that we're returning to flight in August! Our team has confidently identified the cause of the in-flight anomaly on our 13th mission & we’re implementing corrective measures. Stay tuned for mission updates soon! https://t.co/Zx9GWkqwjq pic.twitter.com/wVI1GHFufY— Rocket Lab (@RocketLab) July 31, 2020 They identified a loose electrical connector as the cause of the launch mishap last month. They are now saying they will be doing a Return to Flight this month. Hopefully they'll keep a closer eye on their build. Because a loose electrical connector seems like a rather piddly oversight to me.
Amazing sign off by Katie here. The emotions of all of us! pic.twitter.com/DtAOiYCZSK— Chris Bergin - NSF (@NASASpaceflight) August 2, 2020 Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken, the astronauts that SpaceX has affectionately coined the "Space Dads", are finally home. They had a picture perfect splashdown not far from the mouth of the Perdido River near Pensacola, Florida, at around 2:48pm EDT. True to Florida Man style, they were surrounded not only by the fastboats that began their recovery, but by about two dozen private vessels wanting to be part of a revelry. They were quickly told to back away, and they also left an opening for the recovery boat, GO Navigator, to slide in and get the capsule on-board. Opening was delayed a few minutes as they took a little extra time purging RCS residue from the vicinity of the spacecraft. The astronauts are likely already on a helicopter to NAS Pensacola, and will be flown to Johnson Space Center by the end of the day to reunite with their families. Meanwhile, NASA and SpaceX will begin parsing telemetry so they can close out DM-2 and begin work on their first official crew rotation in late September.
Boat could not be cleared in time for us to launch within the window (ends at 9pm PT), and we have to unfortunately scrub for today— Astra (@Astra) August 3, 2020 Astra was trying to launch their first rocket last night. Their window opened at 6pm AKDT (10pm EDT, 0200 UTC this morning). A wayward boat wandered into the range, and they couldn't clear it in time. They are currently exploring their next launch opportunity. The good news is that we have more launch opportunities: stay tuned for updates tomorrow— Astra (@Astra) August 3, 2020 Rocket 3.1, the former "2 of 3", is going to carry a dummy payload. After the test incident that destroyed "1 of 3", they decided not to carry someone else's stuff on the test flight. And they did have time to congratulate SpaceX and NASA on the successful conclusion of DM-2. Congratulations @NASA and @SpaceX on a safe and successful mission! Welcome home @AstroBehnken and @Astro_Doug! #LaunchAmerica— Astra (@Astra) August 2, 2020
Astra will attempt to launch Rocket 3.1 again tonight. The window is the same, a 2-hour window opening at 6pm AKDT (10pm EDT, 0200 UTC tomorrow morning). Hopefully they won't get another wayward boat, and the weather will remain good. ******** 36 years ago today, two comsats for Eutelsat and French Telecom were launched atop the first Ariane 3 rocket from Pad A-1, Guiana Space Centre. The Ariane 2 and Ariane 3 were upgrades to the original Ariane 1 rocket. The core rocket had a slightly weaker first stage, but stronger second and third stage engines. The difference between the two was that Ariane 3 also had two solid rocket motors. Ariane 3 was used 11 times, with one failure attributed to the third stage. It actually debuted two years before the Ariane 2; without SRMs, it was a more direct successor to Ariane 1, which wasn't retired until 1986. Both rockets were retired in 1989 with the advent of the versatile Ariane 4.
I originally posted this last year at the end of my thread on Apollo 11, but I decided it needs its own post. Neil Alden Armstrong was born on August 5, 1930, in Wapakoneta, Ohio, a town roughly half-way between Cincinnati and Toledo. His father took him to air races as a kid, getting him into aviation from an early age. As a high school student, he got a pilot's license, and was capable of solo flights. An Eagle Scout, he would carry the badge of the World Scout Movement to the Moon with him. Neil went to Purdue over acceptance at MIT, and took part in an interesting Navy arrangement. It wasn't quite Navy ROTC, but he did his first two years of study, then spent a total of three years in the Navy during which he trained to become an aviator, then returned to Purdue to finish a degree in aeronautical engineering. During his initial tour of duty, he served as a carrier pilot in Korea in 1952. After getting his degree, Neil went into the Navy Reserve as a Junior Lieutenant, and focused as a test pilot. He was selected to the NACA's Man in Space Soonest program in 1958, though that went nowhere as it was repurposed when NACA became NASA. Neil resigned his reserve commission in 1960, and became a NASA test pilot. He would complete seven powered flights of the X-15; his flights were more focused on speed, and he achieved the seventh-fasted X-15 flight. But in 1962, he got another shot at becoming an astronaut when he was selected in NASA Astronaut Group 2. In addition to Apollo 11, he was the pilot on the eventful Gemini 8 mission. After that, his ultimate destiny to become the first man to walk on the Moon came about due to several twists of fate, including the Apollo 1 fire which killed Gus Grissom, and the decision to add the C-prime mission to orbit the Moon in 1968, which put his crew rotation on what ultimately became the first moon landing. Then there was the little matter of having to eject from an LLRV. Like the rest of the crew, Neil wouldn't fly again after Apollo 11. He split time between NASA and DARPA for a while, then resigned from both in 1971. During that time, he was also part of the investigation into the Apollo 13 accident. He would later also be part of the Rogers Commission into the Challenger disaster, serving as its Vice Chairman on the request of President Reagan. Unlike other astronauts, Armstrong rebuffed efforts from both Democrats and Republicans to run for office, preferring to stay out of politics himself. His known positions were generally libertarian and isolationist. He considered himself a Deist, and at times in the 1970s had to fend off hoaxes that he had converted to Islam. (Part of that is because he settled in Lebanon, Ohio. Nevermind that Lebanon also had Christians and Jews.) Armstrong served as either a spokesperson or board member for many companies; most notably, he took a board position with Eaton in 1980, chairing its AIL subsidiary until he retired in 2002. Neil maintained a relatively low profile in his later years; his family described him as a "reluctant American hero". He kept his participation in an expedition to the North Pole with Sir Edmund Hillary and Steve Fossett in 1985 discrete. Neil died on August 25, 2012, from complications following coronary bypass surgery. He was 82. He was survived by his second wife, and three children from his first marriage. He chose to be cremated, and his ashes were spread in a military burial-at-sea in the Atlantic off the missile cruiser USS Philippine Sea.
Meanwhile, back in the present timeline... SpaceX continued its good run of fortune last night by completing their first test flight of the SN5 test article of their methane-fueled BFR, Starship. It lifted off around 7:30pm EDT last night, and flew for about a minute. It was planned to reach an apogee of 150 metres, and I don't see any reports that it was far off from that. It landed a few metres from its starting point. From what I've heard, the ignition damaged the test pad where it lifted off from. It didn't look like they had a flame trench. The flight was similar to the flight of Starhopper, a test article that completed a similar "hop" a year ago. The name was chosen to evoke Grasshopper, the test article that helped SpaceX figure out landing procedures for the first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket. For this hop, similar to the Starhopper flight, it was powered by a single Raptor engine, which has just over 500,000 lb-f of thrust. A completed Starship first stage will be powered by 31 Raptor engines, and will produce up to 16 million lb-f of thrust at launch. Can't wait to see how roughly that rocks the Vehicle Assembly Building. One of the major issues with Starship's test articles recently has been failures of their quick disconnect umbilicals, which is a system ubiquitous with most launch systems. They were finally able to figure it out with SN5. SpaceX plans on putting three Raptor engines on the SN8 test article for even higher test flights. ******** We will provide another update tomorrow as we have additional launch opportunities through Friday.— Astra (@Astra) August 5, 2020 As for Astra, they had some issues with propellant load last night. They will provide an update this morning on when they will make their next attempt. They have the Kodiak range to themselves through Friday. UPDATE: Whatever issue they had, it's resolved. But weather is unfavorable for tonight, so they will try again tomorrow night, same window as before.
I didn't see anything on the Chinese launch of a Mars probe. Landing planetary probes is hard. If the Chinese succeed on Mars they will be the first space agency other than NASA. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02187-7
It's less likely I'll remember to post current events about China. And Russia did succeed once. It just only lasted one second.
20 years ago today, Progress M1-3 was launched atop a Soyuz-U rocket from Site 1/5, Baikonur Cosmodrome. It was the first Progress resupply vehicle launched to the International Space Station. NASA classified it as Progress 1P; they format all Progress flights sequentially regardless of the model. It docked at Zvezda aft two days later. It would refuel Zvezda autonomously. Its pressurized supplies would be unloaded over the next two Shuttle missions, STS-106 and STS-92. It was split over two Shuttle missions as they had construction tasks and their own supplies to unload on each mission. It would undock on November 1, and deorbit that day. Expedition 1 would arrive on Soyuz TM-31 the next day.