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Friday, January 5, 2024

Oops - Talked too Soon About Vulcan

In last night's piece where I bemoaned the lack of updates on the ULA's Vulcan Centaur Cert-1 mission, I was a bit early.  The vehicle was rolled out to the launch pad on SLC-41 today.  There's a video of the rollout that's just a bit under one hour, twenty minutes long - and the rollout is 0.3 miles from the hanger to the pad.  YouTube allows you to double the playback speed, but nothing faster than that 2x.  I recommend just moving the cursor manually and stopping when you like the view. 

This view of the vehicle was posted to X by Tory Bruno, CEO of ULA.  He simply captioned the photo "Now that is a beautiful sight. #VulcanRocket"

The launch will be streamed live early Monday morning by ULA - here.  At the moment, it says coverage will start at 1:30 AM EST with launch just over 45 minutes later.  I've not seen any mention of a launch window but I also haven't seen anything saying it's an instantaneous window.  

As those following this mission will know, the primary payload on this mission is the Peregrine lander from Astrobotic in a mission partially funded by NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program.  CLPS is intended to help pave the way for the agency's crewed return to the moon. NASA intends to establish a permanent, sustainable human presence on and around Earth's nearest neighbor by the end of the 2020s.  The other payload, human remains and DNA on a mission from Celestis and Elysium Space have created a stir in the last few weeks.  The Navajo Nation has complained to NASA about the mission, saying:

In a Dec. 21 letter to NASA and the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT), Nygren expressed his thoughts on the matter. "It is crucial to emphasize that the moon holds a sacred position in many Indigenous cultures, including ours," Nygren wrote. "We view it as a part of our spiritual heritage, an object of reverence and respect. The act of depositing human remains and other materials, which could be perceived as discards in any other location, on the moon is tantamount to desecration of this sacred space."

It seems like a fundamental miscommunication; I don't think people paying to place loved ones' remains on the moon thinks of it as discarding them; it's "an act of reverence and respect."  Still, there was supposedly an agreement between NASA and an organization representing the tribes that doesn't seem to have been followed.  A complication is that this isn't actually a NASA mission; it's the private company United Launch Alliance testing out a new vehicle and private companies Celestis and Elysium Space providing the interface to the vehicle so that the human remains and DNA samples can be handled in a way that doesn't damage the Peregrine lander or any part of the upper stage.  It's possible NASA has very little say over details like what's in the payload.



4 comments:

  1. No worries about jumping the gun on ULA, SiG - they are relatively closed-mouthed compared to SpaceX. Old-timey Space Guard, don'cha know.
    As far as the moon being sacred to the Navajo Nation, what a load of hooey. Everybody and his brother (and sister, don't forget them!) can make the same claim. It's meaningless.

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  2. Okay, I'm with the Navaho Nation on this one. The Moon is sacred to a lot of cultures, including the US' Cult of Apollo, a part of the great Church of NASA (who follow the precepts of science and math during their cultist gatherings (this was aimed at the anymouse that keeps saying the US never made it to the moon.)) Mow point out the part of the Moon that touches your reservation. I'd waiting... Waiting...

    The "I can see it therefore it belongs to me" argument is what is reprehensible about many 'indigenous' cultures (who often are where they are because of the piles of previous indigenous cultures' peoples the current indigs are standing on) and at least one major religion of pieces...

    (If anyone thinks I'm seriously in support of said Navahos, well, so glad that my tickets for next week's Blue Origins moon shuttle are on the counter...)

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    1. You can say the same about the people who complain when someone builds something on another property that "ruins" their view. As if the fact you can see someone's property gives you a say in what he builds on it.

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  3. And you thought the watermelons were only rough on SpaceX, eh?
    Their evil knows no limits.

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