Americans on Mars By 2029?

I would say it's doubtful, but betting against Elon Musk has proven to be a pretty foolish thing to do.  The thing is, it doesn't seem to be Musk's idea, it seems to be President Trump's.  

Let me back up a little. 

Like every other government agency, NASA is in the throws of changes from President Trump's first weeks in office, along with Musk's department, DOGE.  The NASA folks are a bit rattled by it all.  Jared Isaacman, Trump's pick to lead the organization, hasn't been confirmed yet, and hearings are currently anticipated to be in the second half of February.  In the meantime, an interim administrator named Janet Petro was appointed, and like every other agency, has passed on the Executive Orders to remove diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility contracts and to "report" on anyone who did not carry out this order.  As I'd expect, there are people in NASA upset by that like every other agency we read about.

Isaacman's approval taking until nearly March seems to be more an issue of the large numbers that congress is having to approve and not a sign of likely disapproval.  In his last five years of funding orbital missions, Isaacman seemed to have come to be regarded as an earnest individual, genuinely interested in spaceflight and in advancing exploration for all.  He is seen as the kind of young, dynamic, pro-space leader with the potential to usher NASA into the 21st century and out of the Apollo era it has been stuck in for decades.  Most importantly, the idea of reaching Mars by 2029 is not his idea.  

January of '29 also happens to be the last days of Trump's term and many speculate that's why he talks of "men on Mars by the end of this decade." At this point, I find it hard to imagine the Artemis program will be successful in getting astronauts to the moon by 2030 and putting people on Mars is orders of magnitude harder.  

Artemis still depends on the horrific SLS, the Gateway station in a Near Rectilinear Halo Orbit near the moon and more.  It also depends a lot on Starship, and the setback of losing the Starship on Flight Test 7 impacts this schedule when the required numbers of Starship flights are seen.

Going to Mars puts enormous demands on Starship.  There's going to be a need to launch numbers of Starships unlike anything ever launched before.  In a posting on X, Musk said, "Mass to orbit is the key metric, thereafter mass to Mars surface. The former needs to be in the megaton to orbit per year range to build a self-sustaining colony on Mars."  A megaton to orbit?  The current Starship is the highest capacity ever built and the largest Version 3 Starship proposed carries 200 tons to LEO.  Musk calculates that he would have to achieve 5,000 Starships launches of this size per year to support a Mars colony. That's on the order of 14 Starship launches per day.  You think near Earth orbit is crowded now?

All that Musk has said that I can find is that he plans to start launching unmanned Starships to Mars in the next launch window (optimum planetary alignment) in 2026, and, if that goes well, perhaps manned flights by 2028/29.

As hard as 5000 Starship launches a year sounds, there are still many problems out there.  Many of them are related to the "couple of months every two years" launch windows and the problems of being in space that long for a crew.  Crews will be exposed to more radiation from the sun and deep space than any other crew ever has been, and it doesn't get much better than that once they're on Mars.  The planet's lack of a protective atmosphere and magnetic field creates that.  A nuclear engine that could get them to Mars in a very short order and reduced the dependence on those tiny launch windows would help exposure during flight but not on the planet.

Final words to the summary on Space.com

Generally, as laid out by Bob Zubrin in the last century, a Mars Direct approach would begin with successfully landing many uncrewed cargo ships in the same location on Mars with supplies including construction materials, consumables, mining & drilling equipment, electrochemical reactors for production of methane and oxygen, tankage, and the components of a nuclear power plant. Much of this would have to be done 2 years before the first humans were launched.

Actually, in theory, all of this could be done over decades, but 2029 is wildly unlikely, even for a one way, one astronaut suicide mission to plant a flag.

SpaceX first released this artist's conception of a settlement on Mars some years ago.  It shows a domed city surrounded by photovoltaic farms and four Starships. Image credit: SpaceX  I'd love to live long enough to see it, but seriously doubt that's possible.

Japan Launches Navigation Satellite on H3 Rocket

The Mitsubishi Heavy Industries H3 is Japan's flagship rocket, and available in several configurations.  This morning at 3:30 AM EST or 0830 UTC, an H3 was launched from Tanegashima Space Center. 

Aboard was the 1,900-kilogram Michibiki 6 satellite, also known as the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZS-6), for Japan’s navigation satellite system. The system aims to provide Japan with positioning, navigation and timing services, while increasing the accuracy and reliability of GPS services in the region. 

The first Michibiki spacecraft for a four-satellite system was launched in 2010.  Since that time, an 11-satellite system, to provide redundancy, is being considered, according to a 2024 policy document from the Cabinet Office of the Government of Japan. 

You might recall that the H3 had a failure on its first flight in March of 2023 - due to a failure in the upper stage; leading ground controllers to issue a destruct command to destroy the stage and its ALOS-3 payload. It was over a year, July of '24, before they had a successful H3 launch, and they've had two more successes since then. This is vehicle number five.

The 63-meter-long H3 comes in configurations with no solid rocket boosters, two SRBs or four SRBs for higher payload needs. The latter pair of configurations can also utilize an elongated payload fairing. 
...
The expendable rocket was designed to be more cost-effective and therefore competitive on the international commercial launch market.

The H3 received a boost last year with the announcements that the H3 will launch an asteroid mission for the United Arab Emirates, currently scheduled for 2028, while Eutelsat signed a contract to use multiple H3 rockets from 2027.

This morning's launch from Tanegashima Space Center. Photo from The Mainichi (Image credit: Kyodo)  Studying the vehicle as best as I can, it looks like an SRB is facing the camera and in line with the booster's body, which makes this the two SRB version.  Watching the Japanese launch video confirms that.

This was Japan's first launch of the year.  The moon-bound lunar lander Resilience from Japanese company ispace is still said to be in excellent health and en route to the moon, after taking a ride on a Falcon 9 back on Jan. 15. 

Small Space News Story Roundup 52

Largely from this week's Rocket Report from Ars Technica, but not only from there.

Space Force Has Big Dreams For 2025

The main emphasis in this section was launches on ULA's Vulcan, but it's not just Vulcan. The US Space Force is projecting 11 national security launches aboard the Vulcan rocket in 2025.  That's an aggressive schedule considering that Vulcan isn't certified for national security payloads yet.  

While ULA aims to ramp up Vulcan flights for military missions, SpaceX has maintained its dominance in the commercial launch market and even absorbed additional national security launches in 2024 that were originally slated for Vulcan, highlighting the Space Force’s growing reliance on SpaceX’s proven Falcon rockets to maintain critical military space access.

Add New Glenn to the mix.  The first mission of the New Glenn in January was deemed a success by the Space Force and it seems Blue Origin is going to do a second qualifying launch by the spring.  Space Force doesn't appear to be concerned about Blue's inability to land the booster for recycling and re-use.  Brigadier General Kristin Panzenhagen emphasized that booster recovery isn't a criterion for NSSL eligibility.  

“For our national security space launch missions, the primary measure of success is delivering the payload to its destination,” she said. 
 
The flight positions New Glenn to compete for Lane 1 of the NSSL Phase 3 program, which covers less complex missions. A second successful flight will likely be required for the rocket to qualify for the more demanding Lane 2 missions.

Blue Origin’s path to certification remains proprietary, with the company given the option to balance demonstration launches and detailed data reviews to meet Space Force requirements. ULA publicly disclosed that its plan to certify Vulcan would require two successful flights.

Vulcan is still under pressure with certification expected in late February.  If Space Force gets 11 NSSL launches out of the 10 months left in the year ULA is going to have operate at a pace we haven't seen them meet in years - if ever. 

Sorry, but this story makes me laugh

It's actually a headline in the Rocket Report that SpaceX expended a Falcon 9 this past Wednesday, Jan. 29.  You know, like virtually every other launch by every other launch service in the world, they used up every pound of payload to orbit they could get out of this system before letting it crash into the Atlantic ocean. That included taking steps like removing the landing legs and grid fins to add those few pounds to the payload it could put in orbit.  

The payload was the SpainSat NG-1 satellite launched from Kennedy Space Center's Pad 39A. 

The gigantic difference between SpaceX expending booster B1073 and every other example you can think of is that this was the 21st flight of B1073.  I'm unaware of any other launch provider that currently is able to recover and re-fly boosters over 20 times.

The Airbus-built satellite, known as SpainSat NG-1 (New Generation), is the first of two satellites for Hisdesat. It was developed under a partnership with the European Space Agency, making its launch on a Falcon 9 somewhat notable.

Apparently, the FAA is still being the FAA

Apparently enough people think that the FAA is just going to let SpaceX operate without doing their usual process on Starship's Flight Test 7 that it's news the FAA is going to follow FAA policies.

Within hours of the Starship's RUD, people were reporting finding debris, although there were no reports of any serious damages. 

The good news is there were no injuries or reports of significant damage from the wreckage that fell over the Turks and Caicos. "The FAA confirmed one report of minor damage to a vehicle located in South Caicos," an FAA spokesperson told Ars on Friday. "To date, there are no other reports of damage."

It's not clear if the vehicle owner in South Caicos will file a claim against SpaceX for the damage. It would the first time someone makes such a claim related to an accident with a commercial rocket overseen by the FAA. Last year, a Florida homeowner submitted a claim to NASA for damage to his house from a piece of debris that fell from the International Space Station.

A piece of what appears to be heat shield tile recovered in the Caicos, as shown on X. 

Several Interesting Space Missions Coming in February -

I stumbled across an interesting article on Space.com that contains more than the headline hints at.

The main part of the story is about NASA's new SPHEREx Infrared Space Telescope.  The James Webb telescope (JWST) is an IR telescope so that leads to asking “what's the difference?”  There are several, so let's start at the beginning:

It's an eggshell white, conical probe named SPHEREx, which (get ready for a mouthful) stands for Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of Reionization and Ices Explorer. And, because it works with infrared light, SPHEREx is meant to reveal things even the trailblazing James Webb Space Telescope cannot.

The main difference optically is that the JWST is a multi-segment, large aperture mirror (best picture of the system here) that's what photographers think of as a telephoto lens.  SPHEREx, by contrast is a wider angle lens, which many users refer to as a panorama lens.  

To be fair, SPHEREx won't rival the JWST's ability to observe highly localized regions of the universe that are confined to the infrared section of the electromagnetic spectrum. However, unlike the JWST, it is an all-sky survey. Whereas the $10 billion JWST is great at observing things like specific nebulas and relatively narrow but tremendously dimensional deep fields, SPHEREx is intended to image the entire sky as seen from Earth.

"We are literally mapping the entire celestial sky in 102 infrared colors for the first time in humanity's history, and we will see that every six months," said Nicky Fox, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. "This has not been done before on this level of color resolution for our old sky maps."

NASA's web page on the mission adds important content. SPHEREx will map the entire celestial sky illuminating the origins of our universe, galaxies within it, and life’s key ingredients in our own galaxy. 

 Launch is presently scheduled for no earlier than Feb. 27 aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket — and SPHEREx won't be the only payload. As part of NASA's Launch Services Program, which connects space missions with appropriate commercial launch vehicles, SPHEREx will share its ride with the agency's PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission, a constellation of four little satellites meant to study the sun. The duo will lift off from Launch Complex 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base in Central California.

NASA’s SPHEREx space observatory was photographed at BAE Systems in Boulder, Colorado, in November 2024 after completing environmental testing. The spacecraft’s three concentric cones help direct heat and light away from the telescope and other components, keeping them cool. Credit: BAE Systems

But wait!  There's more! (...as the commercials say)

The next moon lander from Intuitive Machines, the IM-2 or Athena moon lander arrived "just up the road" at Cape Canaveral, this past Tuesday (Jan. 28).  

Athena — which is Intuitive Machines' second lander — aims to validate resource prospecting, mobility, and communications infrastructure in the Mons Mouton region, a tall mountain near the moon's south pole. The region is a potential landing site for NASA's Artemis 3 crewed mission.

Athena's four-day launch window opens on February 26, or the day before SPHEREx's launch, and will also ride a Falcon 9 to its route to the moon.  The difference is that Athena is launching from Kennedy Space Center, LC-39A. 

Intuitive Machines' second moon lander, named Athena, arrived on Florida's Space Coast on Jan. 28, 2025. (Image credit: Intuitive Machines)

Payloads aboard Athena include a drill (The Regolith and Ice Drill for Exploring New Terrain, or TRIDENT) and the Mass Spectrometer observing lunar operations (MSolo). It also carries a Micro Nova Hopper, which will target a permanently shadowed crater and seek to detect hydrogen, and the Mobile Autonomous Prospecting Platform (MAPP) rover.

Once Athena touches down, the Micro Nova Hopper and MAPP rover will deploy to explore the lunar terrain. They will establish a connection using Nokia's Lunar Surface Communication System (LSCS), the first-ever 4G/LTE network on the moon. This is a move away from radio frequency communication and will enable real-time command and control, telemetry transmission, and even high-definition video streaming, in what could be a big step toward establishing sustainable lunar infrastructure.

Two interesting science missions scheduled for two successive days at the end of February.  Now that's a fun story!

A Couple of Space Station Stories

NASA to President Trump and Elon Musk: "nope"

The big story that I think everyone has heard about is that (paraphrasing) President Trump told Elon Musk to go get the two astronauts stranded on the ISS - whom we've all come to be on a first name basis with: Suni Williams and Butch Wilcox.  

This was surprising to those of us who follow this stuff because we know they're now part of the Crew-9 mission after that mission was changed to two new ISS crew members instead of four, and were set to come back down around the end of February or start of March.  That was the story until about one month ago (last story at that link) when some issues with the (new) Crew-10 Crew Dragon capsule caused NASA to delay that February mission until late March.  The usual "week or two" overlap between the arriving and leaving crews is pushing that toward early April. 

At this point, I don't know that SpaceX could ready another Crew Dragon and go get them much sooner than that early April date.  A day or a week sooner out of a 10 month extended mission just doesn't mean much.

Later yesterday, NASA issued a reply sending essentially that statement to the President. 

In a statement to reporters Jan. 29, NASA stated it was proceeding with plans to return the Crew-9 astronauts “as soon as practical” and after the arrival of new astronauts on the upcoming Crew-10 mission.

“NASA and SpaceX are expeditiously working to safely return the agency’s SpaceX Crew-9 astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore as soon as practical, while also preparing for the launch of Crew-10 to complete a handover between expeditions,” the agency stated.

As of late today, neither Musk nor Trump have further elaborated on their earlier comments, or responded to NASA’s statement. 

Meanwhile, Butch and Suni are Having Fun

The two Starliner-turned-Crew-9 astronauts took a long spacewalk today to resolve a longstanding problem on the ISS.  As part of that 5-hour and 26-minute spacewalk, Suni Williams surpassed the record for the most time spent in spacewalks by a woman. The previous total of 60 hours and 21 minutes was set by now-former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson in 2017. Whitson still holds the record for the most spacewalks by a woman at 10. 

The extended spacewalk was needed to free the radio frequency group (RFG) a key component of the station's primary command and data antenna assembly, that has been down for nearly two years.  The first attempt to remove the RFG from its mount was in April 2023, when a central latching bolt refused to release. NASA astronaut Stephen Bowen, who was on that earlier spacewalk, was in Mission Control on Thursday to advise Williams and Wilmore on the renewed attempt.

A second spacewalk in October 2023 was also tasked with trying to retrieve the RFG, but only had enough time to inspect it. Two more attempts in June 2024 were cut short before the EVAs could even get underway due to spacesuit equipment issues.

“There it goes, it’s free,” radioed Williams as the RFG finally came free. “Holy moly!”

The RFG was "good and stuck" as we say.  The two needed to try several different approaches and “a little bit of brute force” to remove the unit, exceeding the three hours that Mission Control had originally allocated for the task. They two spent the rest of their time outside carefully moving the RFG back into the Quest airlock so it can be returned to Earth for refurbishment.

After that main goal was achieved, an interesting little experiment was carried out.  In a prior mission, the Russians had swabbed the outside of their side of the space station but the rest has never been tested. 

Since 2014, cosmonauts have gathered similar samples from the Russian side of the station, which scientists have later claimed included microorganisms capable of surviving in the vacuum of space. This was the first time NASA has conducted its own such study. 

The Russians said that the tests revealed bacteria that were absent during the launch of the ISS module.  "That is, they have come from outer space and settled along the external surface. They are being studied so far, and it seems that they pose no danger."

I think I saw that movie. Or one like it.

As seen from his helmet-mounted camera, NASA astronaut Butch Wilmore prepares to swab the outside of the International Space Station to collect potential microbe samples during the spacewalk on Thursday, Jan. 30, 2025. (Image credit: NASA)

NASA Unveils Bennu Asteroid Sample Results

Today, Jan. 29, NASA released more details on the analysis of the samples of asteroid Bennu, returned in September 2023.  Bottom line up front: of the 20 amino acids known to create the proteins required for life on our planet, Bennu scientists have now found 14 of them. 

Bennu was the target of the mission called OSIRIS-REx that launched in 2016.  The ambitious mission was to get to the asteroid, get close enough to retrieve some samples of its surface by slapping into it and capturing the dust and pebbles that crash kicked up, then return that debris to Earth. 

In other words, OSIRIS-REx was meant to deliver untouched asteroid chunks home to be analyzed in a lab. This brilliant plan worked. The samples landed in the Utah desert in 2023, and scientists have been wringing those priceless pieces of Bennu for data ever since.

When the first results of looking at the 250 grams of returned pebbles and dust were released in October of '23, Mission Scientist Dante Lauretta, principal investigator from the University of Arizona, said scientists hit the jackpot with a sample that is nearly 5 percent carbon by mass and has abundant water in the form of hydrated clay minerals.

However, that was more or less expected (or at least actively hoped for as corroborative evidence of scientists' Bennu theories). The team's latest discoveries, which NASA unveiled on Wednesday (Jan. 29), come as a bit of a surprise, and pose many exciting questions. The most notable parts are probably that researchers found those aforementioned 14 amino acids, a high concentration of ammonia, and the five nucleobases life on Earth uses to transmit genetic instructions within DNA and RNA.

"Their findings do not show evidence of life itself, but they do suggest that the conditions necessary for the emergence of life were likely widespread across the early solar system," Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters, Washington, told reporters during a Jan. 29 press conference. "This, of course, increases the odds that life could have formed on other planets."

Nicky Fox later added: "For me, the question is: Why didn't life form on Bennu?" A question that needs more work - probably more space missions to come close to answering.  Not that there's anything wrong with that. 

There's a lot interesting content in that Space.com article, including a great example of science as it should be done, but doesn't seem to be done anymore.  It's a little long to copy in its entirety, six paragraphs, but it concerns the chirality of the chemicals found on Bennu - a bit on the Chemistry geek side. Chirality is also known as optical isomers - most all of these compounds will rotate polarized light in a left or right handed direction: levo- or dextro- rotary in that order.  To drag in one quote:

A molecule is considered "chiral" if it can't be superimposed on a mirror image of itself no matter what you try to do. This means that there must be two versions of that molecule, a left-handed version and a right-handed version. (Think about your own left and right hands. If your palms are facing upward, they follow this principle, too).

One of the puzzles that biochemists face is that all life on Earth seems to be based on left handed molecules, and nobody has a good explanation for why that is. Furthermore, when pieces of meteors that have made it to the surface are examined, they're also left handed molecules.  One of the Bennu scientists has been working on the theory that the early solar system was biased to left handed isomers.  The results from Bennu completely invalidated his work.  

"I have to admit, I was a little disillusioned or disappointed," Glavin said. "I felt like this had invalidated 20 years of research in our lab and my career. But I mean, here's the thing: This is exactly why we explore. This is why we do these missions, right? If we knew everything in advance, we wouldn't need to do an OSIRIS REx to bring these samples back."

I'd like to think that's the way all science is, but I've seen enough to convince me he's more like an exception to the rule.   

OSIRIS-REx touching down on asteroid Bennu. (Image credit: NASA)

From the No News is Good News Department

We can say it that way or say that a little news is also good news.  Whichever you prefer we got an update on Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lunar lander that was launched two weeks ago this morning (if you're reading this on Jan. 29).  A read of the mission profile graphic in that post will show you it's silly to be expecting big news when the lander is at day 14 of its 25 day Earth orbit, primarily spent raising the apogee of its orbit.  In other words, if we got big news, it would probably be a Bad Thing.

Instead we get this picture as a data point on how well the mission is going.  That bright circle just above the centerline of the picture is the moon as seen from the lander. 

Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lunar lander snapped this selfie with the moon in the background from Earth orbit. Firefly posted the image on X on Jan. 27, 2025. (Image credit: Firefly Aerospace)

"While Blue Ghost is in Earth orbit, we'll continue to keep an eye on our final destination! To the moon!" Firefly said in a Monday X post that shared the two images.
...
Everything seems to be going well for Blue Ghost so far. The lander remains healthy in orbit and has completed two engine burns on schedule, according to Firefly. In about 10 days, the spacecraft will conduct its most important engine firing yet — a translunar injection burn, which will set it on course for the moon.

The trip to the moon will take about four days, after which the Blue Ghost will spend 16 days in lunar orbit calibrating itself and lowering its orbit gradually.  Once pronounced ready, they will attempt to land the probe in Mare Crisium (the "Sea of Crises") on the eastern limb of the Earth-facing side of the moon. That shows up as 45 days after launch, or around the end of February. The New Moon is February 27 and the exact landing time is probably to be around sunrise at the Mare Crisium landing site - to maximize the lander's time.  That sounds like the landing will be in the first days of March.

Firefly has released other pictures from the probe in the last week.  There's a video from when the lander witnessed a solar eclipse and has captured beautiful "blue marble" views of Earth.

The other probe, launched on the same Falcon 9 as Blue Ghost was Resilience from ispace in Japan, and Resilience is also doing well, according to the company. ispace is gearing up for a lunar flyby that will take place around Feb. 15, but that's almost a tease.

Resilience is taking a longer, more circuitous route to the moon than Blue Ghost is; the Japanese lander won't reach lunar orbit until about four months after launch. It will attempt a touchdown about two weeks after that.

Four months after launch will be around May 15 and two weeks after that implies the new moon in May is the targeted landing time.

Things May Be Looking Up for Blue Origin

In the aftermath of the first successful orbital flight of the New Glenn, Blue Origin has finally become a real space company.  After all, a widely accepted standard in the space industry is that a rocket company isn't a real rocket company until it reaches orbit.  Now the company which was founded before SpaceX has finally achieved orbit and they feel like a new company.  

That Blue Origin has been far behind the company's goals isn't news, nor is the apparent real reason.  I recall writing about this years ago, wondering if it was too late for Jeff Bezos to save his company.  Blue's CEO at the time, and for most of the company's life by that date in 2021 was Bob Smith, an experienced industry executive who came from Honeywell.  The problem is Smith was too much of an "Old Space" or "Space 1.0" executive and brought much of that arguably obsolete mindset to Blue.  Smith was thought of poorly by his employees. and under his leadership, Blue was litigious, slow, and unproductive.  

In September of '23, Bezos finally took the proper step and brought in a manager from his Amazon days, Dave Limp.  It's worth mentioning that people were concerned he might not be a good choice either, because of little to no experience in aerospace.  I think time has shown he was a fine choice.

Back in May of '19, I did a story on Jeff Bezos' vision for Blue Origin's role in space.  Instead of settling on and colonizing Mars like Musk advocates, Bezos is an advocate of colonies in space.  Not International Space Station style; not even rotating wheel-in-space from the movie 2001-style.  Those are thousands of times too small.  Instead, he envisions "O'Neill Cylinders;" colonies of millions of people living in permanent colonies in space.  About a million people per colony.  This is as much a multi-generational commitment as colonizing Mars and establishing it as the "second home planet" of humanity. 

Apparently, Bezos and Limp have a very realistic view of how to move forward into the future.  The next steps are clear: get better at building engines and rockets while flying New Glenn regularly. 

At times during his remarks, Bezos sounded a lot like SpaceX founder Elon Musk, who has spoken about "building the machine that builds the machine" over the last decade with respect to both Tesla vehicles and SpaceX rockets.

Asked about Blue's current priorities, Bezos responded, "Rate manufacturing and driving urgency around the machine that makes the machine."

You've probably seen Musk's commitment in the way he refers to the launch towers at Starbase in Texas as being "Stage Zero" of the SuperHeavy.  Not just a launch tower but a properly designed part of the system; that is, anything that can be moved off the Starship to the tower to make the vehicle perform better or to improve its reliability is a target to be moved.  Remember his laws of engineering, like that the best part is no part. A very common mistake during designing a new product is to spend time and money to optimize a part or procedure that could be eliminated. 

It's just kind of rough to compare Blue and their track record to SpaceX.  Blue was founded in September of 2000, before SpaceX in March of 2002.  SpaceX has launched over 450 rockets into orbit; Blue Origin has launched one (in fact, SpaceX's launch number moves so fast, that 450 might not even be right)

It might be an insight to the Blue Origin mindset or approach to doing things is in this organizational motto.  The Latin phrase gradatim ferociter translates as gradually, fiercely.  They say Blue Origin prefers that as step by step, fiercely. 

The long-running joke in the space industry is that we'd all like to see a little less "gradatim" and a little more "ferociter" from Blue Origin. The company's coat of arms—yes, it has one—prominently features two turtles. A turtle logo is also stamped onto a New Shepard spacecraft after every mission. This is a reference to one of Aesop's Fables, "The Tortoise and the Hare," in which the slow and steady tortoise wins the race.

Bezos clearly believes Blue Origin is the tortoise that will win the space race.

Final words to Eric Berger at Ars Technica (which he translates from Latin as "the Art of Technology")

Days after New Glenn's first launch, Bezos attended the inauguration of Donald Trump, standing near Musk. The founder of SpaceX played a major role in getting Trump elected and has been advising him on space policy.

Bezos and Musk, the tortoise and the hare, appeared chatty and friendly in a way that has not been the norm for the rivals. More commonly, they have sniped at one another rather than chummed it up. Perhaps now, they'll team up to help America spread among the stars.

We'll see. Musk is interested in Mars, and Bezos is more fixated on the Moon. Ultimately, Trump may tell them both to follow their hearts, with the US government coming along for the ride.

Wandering Weekend

Yesterday got away from me but not in the usual way, which is that I'm here working on various things including finding something that I think is worth posting but can't really find anything.  Sometimes I start down a path and either mess it up or can't find a piece of information I want.  Sometimes I get distracted by a different project or something to play with. 

The big difference was that yesterday was entirely family-centered and hours away from home.  Mrs. Graybeard and I don't have much family left to interact with, so the events of the last year have changed that in a remarkable way.  I've mentioned son, DDL (Dear Daughter in Law) and PGD (Precious Grand Daughter), and long time readers might even remember those acronyms.  Unfortunately, they live over a thousand miles away so they're difficult to visit with.

The changes have come from my older brother's son and daughter.  Nephew got married well over a year ago, and had their first baby around a year ago.  They were living out of state until summer of '23, and we met niece-in-law on last Thanksgiving.  I have no idea what to call my relationship with the baby.  Not to be outdone, my niece got married in mid-'23, and while she lost one pregnancy, she delivered her first back in December.  I neglected to mention that niece-in-law is expecting their second in March. 

All of which sets up where we were all day yesterday.  Actual niece decided to throw a baby shower for niece-in-law at nephew and niece-in-law's house over on the west side of the state.  They're in location that's just hard to get to from here. As the crow flies, it's around 65 miles, but any route the map programs give me are in the vicinity of 120 miles. So two hours driving instead of one, each way. 

That's awfully long; I just don't see much of a way of shortening it.  The setup is part of the story because it illustrates that both of these women, 30-ish year old millennials, are playing the role that seems to be called "trad-wife" - a disparaging term to the screaming liberal girls that we see on the 'net in a never-ending series of memes.  

It was great visiting with the two couples, along with the rest of the family. 

And for something completely different...

To begin with, Mike Myles at 90 Miles from Tyranny has a clip from a Tucker Carlson video that is a good intro to this.  

The topic isn't RFK Jr. or autism that he's talking about, but it kind of leads to what I'm thinking of.  

I certainly don't agree with everything I've heard him talking about but if the numbers he throws around have truth behind them something is seriously messed up in our health care, especially with the dramatically higher rates of many conditions.  Another line of evidence shows up in this video, also from 90 Miles. 

The fundamental issue is that in virtually every instance the science behind public health questions is poor quality - and that's because higher quality studies are inherently difficult and expensive to conduct.  The study run by the doctor in that second video may be about as good as the studies get.  Until the Covid era, I was one who pretty much swallowed all the crap on vaccines.  Then I started learning more about how little they test things like the recommended series of vaccines for children, and I'm really unsettled about that now.  The tests I'd like to see are in the category of “inherently difficult and expensive.”

Let me add two buzzwords I keep seeing and I have no idea how important they are in terms of health. They’re clearly important to get people talking and selling newspapers, online reading or something, but what little “science” I can find is even lower quality than usual for this sort of the stuff.

The buzzwords are “microplastics” and “forever chemicals”.

When I first heard of microplastics it sounded like a good thing. Everyone was worrying about plastics in the ocean and talking about the great Pacific Garbage patch when all of a sudden (that link is dated '17) it turned out that the plastics were being partially dissolved or even digested by some sort of bacteria or maybe a critter. That meant the big pieces of plastic were becoming small pieces of plastic, and if it’s a surface area phenomenon, smaller pieces have a higher surface area to mass ratio (very little mass) so they disappear faster.

In the last year or two, it has turned into people saying we have microplastics everywhere, and it’s getting talked about as something to be alarmed about.  I have yet to see any explanation of why we should be alarmed.

The second term, “forever chemicals,” seems almost self-contradictory. I’ll borrow a quote from a news article that came out recently.  

PFAS are aptly named “forever chemicals” because of their nearly indestructible chemical structure, which prevents them from breaking down in the environment. These chemicals build up in soil, water, and even the human body over time.

Exposure to PFAS has been linked to various health issues, including cancer, hormonal disruptions, developmental delays in children, and weakened immune systems.

My issues here are both different than usual and the same as usual. The different thing is that a “nearly indestructible chemical structure, which prevents them from breaking down in the environment” means these chemicals don’t react strongly with other chemicals (and everything, is a chemical).  I read that as saying if they don’t react with other chemicals, or only react very weakly, they'll react the same way with the chemicals in our bodies.  So how can they be "linked to various health issues, including cancer, hormonal disruptions, developmental delays in children, and weakened immune systems?"  It has to be another “correlation versus causation” trap that so many of these studies fall into.  It sorta works like this: a researcher notices an increase in these “various health issues” and compares the rate of increase with various things until they get something with a similar rate (yeah, that's the same as usual part).

The same article states “Among the most troubling effects is the potential for hormonal disruption, particularly in men, where PFAS exposure has been associated with plummeting testosterone levels.”  Again: chemicals that don’t react much if at all with other chemicals are breaking down a select group of chemical pathways?  If they’re not reacting, how are they doing that? 

An editorial cartoon from Rubbernews - found by web search for "forever chemicals."  

America's Worst Week in Spaceflight - An Annual Remembrance

NASA had their annual day of Remembrance on Thursday, Jan 23. I usually run my annual remembrance post during the actual week, but I'll follow their example rather than my own tradition.

It's an oddity of US Space travel that every mission which ended in loss of crew and vehicle occurred in less than one calendar week, although those accidents span 36 years. That week is January 27th through February 1st; while the years run from 1967 through 2003.  

January 27, 1967 was the hellish demise of Apollo 1 and her crew, Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffee and Ed White, during a pad test, not a flight.  In that article, Ars Technica interviews key men associated with the mission.  In the intervening years, I've heard speculation that we never would have made it to the moon without something to shake out a bit of the NASA management idiocy, but that may just be people logically justifying their opinions.  Like this quote from Chris Kraft, one of the giants of NASA in the '60s. 

There was plenty of blame to go around—for North American [built the Apollo capsule - SiG], for flight control in Houston, for technicians at Cape Canaveral, for Washington DC and its political pressure on the schedule and its increasingly bureaucratic approach to spaceflight. The reality is that the spacecraft was not flyable. It had too many faults. Had the Apollo 1 fire not occurred, it’s likely that additional problems would have delayed the launch.

“Unless the fire had happened, I think it’s very doubtful that we would have ever landed on the Moon,” Kraft said. “And I know damned well we wouldn’t have gotten there during the 1960s. There were just too many things wrong. Too many management problems, too many people problems, and too many hardware problems across the whole program.” 

The next big disaster was January 28, - the next day on the calendar, but in 1986, 19 years later.  Space Shuttle Challenger was lost a mere 73 seconds into mission 51-L as a flaw in the starboard solid rocket booster allowed a secondary flame to burn through supports and cause the external tank to explode.  It was the kind of cold day that we haven't had here in some years.  It has been reported that it was between 20 and 26 around the area on the morning of the launch and ice had been reported on the launch tower as well as the external tank.  O-rings that were used to seal the segments of the stackable solid rocket boosters were too cold to seal.  Launch wasn't until nearly noon and it had warmed somewhat, but the shuttle had never been launched at temperatures below 40 before that mission.  Richard Feynman famously demonstrated that cold was likely the cause during the televised Rogers Commission meetings, dropping a section of O ring compressed by a C-clamp into his iced water to demonstrate that it had lost its resilience at that temperature.  The vehicle would have been colder than that iced water.    

As important and memorable as that moment was, engineers such as Roger Boisjoly of Morton Thiokol, the makers of the boosters, fought managers for at least the full day before the launch, with managers eventually overruling the engineers.  Feynman had been told about the cold temperature issues with the O-rings by several people, and local rumors were that he would go to some of the bars just outside the gates of the Kennedy Space Center and talk with workers about what they saw.  The simple example with the O-ring and glass of iced water was vivid and brought the issue home to millions. 

There's plenty of evidence that the crew of Challenger survived the explosion.  The crew cabin was specifically designed to be used as an escape pod, but after most of the design work, NASA decided to drop the other requirements to save weight.  The recovered cabin had clear evidence of activity: oxygen bottles being turned on, switches that require a few steps to activate being flipped.  It's doubtful they survived the impact with the ocean and some believe they passed out due to hypoxia before that.  We'll honestly never know.

Finally, at the end of this worst week, Shuttle Columbia, the oldest surviving shuttle flying as mission STS-107, broke up on re-entry 17 years later on February 1, 2003 scattering wreckage over the central southern tier of the country with most debris along the Texas/Louisiana line.  As details emerged about the flight, it turns out that Columbia and everyone on board had been sentenced to death at launch - they just didn't know it.  A chunk of foam had broken off the external tank during liftoff and hit the left wing's carbon composite leading edge, punching a hole in it.  There was no way a shuttle could reenter without exposing that wing to conditions that would destroy it.  They were either going to die on reentry or sit up there and run out of food, water and air.  During reentry, hot plasma worked its way into that hole, through the structure of the wing, burning through piece after piece, sensor after sensor, until the wing tore off the shuttle and tore the vehicle apart.  Local lore on this one is that the original foam recipe was changed due to environmental regulations, causing them to switch to a foam that didn't adhere to the tank or stand up to abuse as well.  

In 2014, Ars Technica did a deep dive article on possible ways that Columbia's crew could have been saved.  They republished that on February 1, 2023, the anniversary of the disaster.  It's interesting speculation, very detailed, compiled by a man who claims to have been a junior system administrator for Boeing in Houston, working in Mission Control that day.  

Like many of you, I remember them all.  I was a 13 year-old kid midway through 7th grade in Miami when Apollo 1 burned.  By the time of Challenger, I was a 32 year old working on commercial satellite TV receivers here near the KSC and watched Challenger live via the satellite TV, instead of going outside to watch it as I always did.  Mrs. Graybeard had just begun working on the unmanned side on the Cape, next door to the facility that refurbished the Shuttles SRBs between flights, and was outside watching the launch.  Columbia happened when it was feeling routine again.  Mom had fallen and was in the hospital; we were preparing to go down to South Florida to visit and I was watching the TV waiting to hear the double sonic booms shake the house as they always did. They never came.

The failure reports and investigations of all three of these disasters center on the same things: the problems with NASA's way of doing things.  They tended to rely on "well, it worked last time" when dealing with dangerous situations, or leaned too much toward, "schedule is king" all as a way of gambling that someone else would be the one blamed for delaying a mission.  Spaceflight is inherently very risky, so some risk taking is inevitable, but NASA had taken stupid risks too often.  People playing Russian Roulette can say, "well, it worked last time," but having worked doesn't change the odds of losing.

 

Edit 01/26/25 08:40 ET to add:  Casey Handmer's blog has an interesting post about this topic in the broadest sense, Called Dittemore's Law (link is to the post on his site). 

If the name is vaguely familiar, Ron Dittemore is the retired former Space Shuttle program manager who was ultimately responsible for the series of decisions that resulted in the Columbia disaster, which killed seven of the lost 25 astronauts.  Here's Handmer's money quote: 

Dittemore’s Law states that “A team composed of sufficiently competent, motivated, well-resourced individuals will tend to produce a collective outcome that is diametrically opposed to the intended, individually desired outcome.”

Worth a read. 

Small Space News Story Roundup 51

Because all of the news seems fixated on reporting things like NASA closing their DEI Office.

SpaceX Notches Another Milestone

It's another all-time world record because nobody is even close to really competing with them.  On Tuesday, Jan 21, the Starlink launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base crossed the next milestone, the 400th successful booster recovery.  Every successful recovery is a new record number, so only the Big Round Numbers get press.  The number of landings (400) is for Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy boosters only.  Starship's SuperHeavy boosters aren't counted here. 

This was the 10th flight for the first stage booster in this mission, which previously launched Oneweb 4, USSF-62, and now eight Starlink missions.  That time in the X screen capture, BTW, is shifted to EST; it was 7:54 AM PST.  The recovery drone ship was Of Course I Still Love You, the only one of the drone ships operating in California. 

Boeing to take additional Starliner losses in the 4th quarter

In a Jan. 23 press release, Boeing provided preliminary results for the fourth quarter of 2024. That included a projection of $1.7 billion in charges against earnings for five programs in its Defense, Space and Security business unit.

While they didn't provide more detail of how much losses will go against Starliner (I suspect "can't" is a more accurate word than "didn't"), by looking at the third quarter report it's probably reasonable to estimate the losses due to Starliner are on the order of $100 to 150 million. 

In a Jan. 23 press release, Boeing provided preliminary results for the fourth quarter of 2024. That included a projection of $1.7 billion in charges against earnings for five programs in its Defense, Space and Security business unit.

Most of those charges will go towards two programs: $800 million for the KC-46A tanker and $500 million for the T-7A trainer aircraft, totaling $1.3 billion. That leaves $400 million split between charges for Starliner and another couple of programs.

Both Boeing and NASA have offered few updates on the status of Starliner since the end of its mission back in September, but it seems NASA doesn't have much faith in Starliner.  Around the time of a similar story to this one back in October the statement was that NASA said it didn't know when it would buy more Starliner missions and Boeing said they didn't know when they'd be ready - with an implication they may not be willing to spend the money. There was talk about Boeing selling its space business segment off, keeping their commercial and military aircraft-related sectors.  That talk is still out there.  In fact, in a report released today, Jan. 23, venture firm Space Capital predicted that both Boeing and Airbus would divest their space divisions this year.

India's SPADEX Docking Experiment Succeeds

Back at the end of December, we covered the launch of a mission from India's Space Research Organization (ISRO) of a pair of satellites that would separate, then rendezvous and dock in orbit.  Called SPADEX by the ISRO, news suddenly showed up this morning from Payload (the email newsletter) that the docking had happened successfully.  Payload was the only one of my regular sources that had that story, and some quick searching around the ISRO website showed that the docking occurred early on January 16th, their time.  In achieving this, India becomes only the fourth country to successfully complete rendezvous and docking of two independent satellites.

Screen capture of a frame from the video at that prior link.  The specific frame I grabbed is a computer animation of the two satellites docked; there are some photographs but I find it pretty much impossible to tell what's going on from the two black and white images. 

Rendezvous and docking are essential for India's Gaganyaan program with a first crewed flight currently planned for 2026.  Uncrewed test flights are scheduled for 2025. Then there are other ambitious goals.

The mission is a significant step towards India’s pursuit of its aggressive space goals, including servicing satellites, transferring Moon samples between spacecraft for return to Earth, and assembling its space station in orbit.

The two satellites chased each other for over a week in their 290 mile high orbits.  ISRO postponed the attempt twice: first for extra simulation work on abort scenarios, and later because the satellites drifted too much while maneuvering for docking.  Now that they are docked, ISRO is controlling the duo as a single satellite for a few days, after which they will undock and operate their respective payloads for at least two years.  Since the docking was six days to a week ago, I wouldn't be surprised to read they've already entered that separated phase of the missions.

Satellite Startup Aiming for the Big End of the Market

It's an interesting thought experiment to look a few years into the future and decide what aspects of the space industry will be worth aiming for. Can a startup design and implement the needs of the market ahead of the rest of the industry?

Meet the California-based startup satellite company K2, a company with a novel and interesting view of the future.  Instead of expecting fleets of small satellites because of the current trends in that direction, Karan Kunjur the co-founder and chief executive of K2 looks at the emergence of Starship and the other very large capacity launch vehicles being talked about and has the opposite idea.

"We think we're about to go from an era of mass constraints to an era of mass abundance."

Look at the argument that we're going to be able to put much more mass into orbit this way: the cost per kg for the cheapest way to space now, a ride sharing mission on a Falcon 9, has been quoted (2022) as $1M (million) per 200-kilogram (440 lb) ‘slot’ which works out to $5,000/kg (more mass goes at the same price per kg).  Other vehicles currently on the market cost more.  Rocket Lab’s more accessible Electron rocket that only lifts smaller payloads than the Falcon 9 costs at least $7.5M for ~200 kg to sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) – or $37,500/kg.  The cost to orbit for Starship and SuperHeavy has been calculated to be $35 per kg.  That's 0.7% of the Falcon 9 cost of $5,000/kg.

"When we looked at the market, we saw a massive amount of small satellites," Kunjur said. "The small-satellite boom figured out how to go cheaper and faster, but it hasn't figured out how to do that without sacrificing capability." 

We're now back at one of the universal truths of engineering: Engineering is the Art of Compromise.  There are no ideal solutions that are best in every situation so everything is tradeoffs.  When you go to "smaller, cheaper, faster," the tradeoffs are going to take something from you.  

The industry has turned to satellite buses for bigger satellites - a satellite bus is the main structural component of a satellite, which payloads "plug into."  The standard sat bus is made by Lockheed Martin and called the AM2100 spacecraft.  It's a proven vehicle with a payload capacity of more than 1 ton and 20 kW of peak power, used for the military's Global Positioning Satellites and other government applications.  Satellites built on the AM2100 have operating in geostationary orbit for 15 years or longer. 

Although the price of this satellite bus is proprietary, various estimates place the cost at between $100 million and $150 million. One reason for the expense is that Lockheed Martin buys most of the satellite's elements, such as its reaction wheels, from suppliers.

"Lockheed is amazing at doing those missions with really complex requirements," Kunjur said. "But they just have not changed the way they build these larger, more complex spacecraft in the last 15 or 20 years."

K2 figured that there were probably newer ways to do this, since Lock-Mart hasn't changed them in so long.  Last week, SpaceX launched a test version of K2's satellite bus last week on a Falcon 9 Transporter ride share mission. Like the cost of the AM2100 bus itself, the cost of the reaction wheels it depends on is proprietary, but K2 guesstimates the cost at 1/2 to $1M each.  Their in-house developed reaction wheels cost $35,000. 

The company is now building its first "Mega Class" satellite bus, intended to have similar capabilities to Lockheed's LM2100: 20 kW of power, 1,000 kg of payload capacity, and propulsion to move between orbits. But it's also stackable: Ten will fit within a Falcon 9 payload fairing and about 50 within Starship's fairing. The biggest difference is cost. K2 aims to sell its satellite bus for $15 million.

The US Government is quite interested in this.

About a month ago, K2 announced that it had signed a contract with the US Space Force to launch its first Mega Class satellite in early 2026. The $60 million contract for the "Gravitas" mission will demonstrate the ability of K2's satellite bus to host several experiments and successfully maneuver from low-Earth orbit to middle-Earth orbit (several thousand km above the surface of Earth).

Naturally, this is early in the process, but they come across as doing well for where they are in the development process.

A look inside the K2 Space factory.   Image credit: K2

Both of Thursday's Launch Vehicles Grounded by FAA

The two big vehicles launched Thursday, Blue Origin's New Glenn and SpaceX's Starship SuperHeavy flight test have both been grounded pending completion of FAA mishap investigations.  

I think most of you are familiar with both missions and know that New Glenn lost the first stage while Starship lost the upper stage.  The need for a mishap investigation of New Glenn apparently wasn't known until late Friday the 17th and wasn't published there on SpaceNews until Saturday the 18th.  The story was then updated on Sunday. 

Blue Origin was originally quite pleased with the maiden flight of the New Glenn, at least in public.  

“Our Blue Ring Pathfinder hit all our mission objectives within the planned six-hour journey after being inserted into the desired orbit by New Glenn with an apogee of 19,300 km and a perigee of 2,400 km at a 30-degree inclination,” Dave Limp, Blue Origin’s chief executive, said in a social media post Jan. 17.

Limp added that the upper stage “nailed insertion with a less than 1% deviation from our exact orbital injection target.” Data from the U.S. Space Force’s Space-Track.org service show the upper stage in an orbit of 2,426 by 19,251 kilometers at an inclination of 29.99 degrees.

What Dave Limp didn't mention was what happened to the first stage.  In a scenario similar to SpaceX's loss of the upper stage, telemetry from the first stage, displayed on the launch webcast like SpaceX, froze at about T+7:55, around the scheduled end of a three-engine reentry burn. The last data point was at an altitude of 84,225 feet (25,672 m) so higher than most commercial aviation but far from being considered in space and was traveling at 4285 miles per hour, much faster than commercial aviation. 

As with other investigations I know of, it's being led by the ones who would know the most about the vehicle and the mission; in this case, Blue Origin. 

“We’re working closely with the FAA and submitted our initial findings within 24 hours. Our goal is to fly New Glenn again this spring,” the company said in a Jan. 19 statement to SpaceNews. The company added that it considered the launch a success because reaching orbit was the “lone objective” and that landing the booster would have been a “bonus.”

The only objections I've seen to the flight was some saying they put the Blue Ring Pathfinder into an orbit that's too high and therefore doesn't comply with orbital debris mitigation guidelines. They say that while the orbit avoids highly populated regions of low and medium Earth orbit, a breakup could create debris that migrates into those orbits.  Blue Origin said,  “Our second stage is in a compliant disposal orbit and meets the requirements for inerting and safing the stage so it doesn’t become a debris risk.”

The FAA mishap investigation for Starship was pretty much initiated immediately and was talked  about on Friday.  Many of you have seen the videos or photos of the debris reentering the atmosphere taken from the Turks and Caicos Islands at the eastern end of the string of islands containing the Bahamas and north of Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico.  There have been reports of air traffic controllers re-routing aircraft to reduce the chances of hitting debris and some aircraft being routed to other destinations if they said they were low on fuel. 

"During the event, the FAA activated a Debris Response Area and briefly slowed aircraft outside the area where space vehicle debris was falling or stopped aircraft at their departure location," the agency added. "Several aircraft requested to divert due to low fuel levels while holding outside impacted areas."

In both cases, the FAA must review and approve the companies responses to their mishap investigations.  

Blue Origin's New Glenn lifts off on its first flight Jan. 16. Credit: Blue Origin

The World's Largest Telescope Has a Problem

The Very Large Telescope or VLT is a project of the European Southern Observatory or ESO, and has  been in service since the 1990s.  It’s one of the world's most sensitive sky-watching instruments, capable of observing the most intriguing objects in the universe.  The ESO, knowing they were putting together the world's largest optical telescope, chose a remote, ultra-dark-sky location,  Mount Paranal, an 8,740-foot-high (2635m) peak in the Chilean Atacama desert. The VLT is built from four large aperture (27-foot or 8.2 meter diameter) telescopes that can act as one.   

While I could personally geek out on the optical design details and watch the hours of video I'm sure I could find, that's really not the story here.  

The story is that astronomers have started sounding alarms because an American energy company called AES Energy wants to build a large renewable hydrogen manufacturing complex only a few kilometers from the VLT.  The astronomers are concerned that light pollution from this plant will ruin their images. Xavier Barcons, ESO's Director General, told Space.com that the observing potential of this astronomical powerhouse will be significantly curtailed if the hydrogen project, called INNA, goes ahead.

"The brightness of the sky is going to increase by up to 10% from this project," Barcons said. "And that is enough to make a difference between the best observatory in the world and an average observing place."

Thanks to the unique geography of the area in the North Chilean Andes mountains, the night sky above Mt. Paranal is perfectly clear more than 11 months per year, providing perfect conditions for the most challenging astronomical research.  Barcons added, "It's the darkest place where we have ever set an observatory in the world, by a large margin." 

A survey published in 2023 found that among the world's 28 most powerful astronomical observatories, telescopes on Mount Paranal suffered from the lowest levels of artificial light pollution.  

A complication here is that the ESO is planning the successor to the Very Large Telescope, called (brace yourself) the 1.5 billion dollar Extremely Large Telescope or ELT.  Construction has begun on the ELT, and reports are it's more than halfway built; it's also in the Chilean Andes, just on a different peak, called Cerro Armazones.  The ELT website says it's "in the central part of Chile's Atacama Desert, some 130 kilometres south of the town of Antofagasta and about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Cerro Paranal, home of ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT)."   

If the VLT is going to be compromised by this hydrogen project, it's reasonable to think the ELT will be compromised as well.  

My first take on this is that we know why the big telescopes are in this area of Chile: the dark and transparent skies are the best in the world.  The question then is why the AES Energy complex can't be somewhere else.  My bet is it's probably the cost of the land for the project and getting it done in Chile compared to doing it elsewhere, like in Ivanpah, California, home to one of the biggest bird incinerators in the world.  It's not clear what the ESO is looking for in doing this "press release" (that might not be the best word).  Are they trying to get a groundswell of public opposition to the INNA project, or are they trying to convince Chile to deny approval to build it?

I know humanity isn't ready for this option just yet, but I think the far side of the moon is the best place for the VLT, ELT, or the "Oh My God You Won't Believe How Large Telescope" that they'll build for the next generation.  God willing, I'll live to see that.

A photo of one of the VLT optical telescopes at work.  The four bright lines are the most powerful lasers ever put on a telescope and are used to provide a "synthetic star" that can be used to correct atmospheric distortion in the telescopic image - a technique called adaptive optics.  Image credit: ESO/S. Lowery.