Small Space News Story Roundup 68

It's Thursday, October 9 as I type, and around the space community big, flashy, loud things are moving, especially from a couple of big stories we've talked about.  

Big One First: Starship Flight 11 Booster Rolls to the Pad

On Wednesday, Oct. 8, SpaceX announced they had rolled the (already flown and flight tested) SuperHeavy booster for the next flight test.  They posted photos on X showing the giant booster, posed for photographs along the way and then being placed on the launch pad. 

SpaceX rolls the Starship Flight 11 Super Heavy booster to the launch pad at its Starbase site in South Texas. Photo posted on X, Oct. 8, 2025. (Image credit: SpaceX)

As has been covered before the launch is currently scheduled for Monday, Oct. 13 at 7:15 PM EDT.  The plan for Flight Test 11 is similar to August's FT-10, which was very successful.  This booster is a flight-proven vehicle, having flown on FT-8 last March.  On that flight, it was captured by the tower "chopstick arms," which is not planned for this flight.  It will fall into the Gulf of America near the launch site in Boca Chica.  

This is also expected to be the last flight of a Version 2 Starship and a short description of the mission is to test the "corner cases" of the ship and booster like FT-10 did, but more aggressively. 

Meanwhile in Florida, Blue Origin rolls their next New Glenn to the pad

As mentioned yesterday, Blue Origin is preparing for the November launch of their second New Glenn rocket to orbit, this time lifting NASA's two ESCAPADE satellites to an escape trajectory to head to Mars.  That's right, this isn't a test flight for Blue Origin to learn more about their vehicle, it's for paying customers. 

The two ESCAPADE ("Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers") orbiters will be sent to the Red Planet, where they will study the Martian atmosphere and how it's affected by the solar wind and space weather. 

Blue Origin rolls the first stage of its powerful New Glenn rocket to the pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Oct. 8, 2025. (Image credit: Blue Origin)

Comparatively, Blue Origin's story is lower priority because their earliest launch date is November 9, while Starship test flight is this coming Monday, just a few days away.

More Info for New Glenn flight two and ESCAPADE

Thanks to Eric Berger at Ars Technica, we have more information on the second (ever) launch of Blue Origin's New Glenn, a preliminary launch date and more information on the mission itself.   

The launch date is No Earlier Than Sunday, November 9th, no time given, but the range of dates given is only November 9-11, so they'd better be good and ready by the 9th. You may have seen the headlines that the booster for this mission was rolled to the launch pad today.

The rest of the article is largely about Blue being committed to successfully landing the ship, and the reality of the case being that their financial success depends on getting New Glenn reusable as quickly as possible.  The ship for this flight has been named "Never Tell Me The Odds," a line by Han Solo in one of the original Star Wars movies - The Empire Strikes Back originally in 1980.  It fits here because of how much Blue Origin wants to succeed but from observing the rest of the world, getting it on their second try doesn't seem very likely .  

Blue Origin, though, has something going for it that nobody else really had: some engineers that helped make the Falcon 9 the success that it is "jumped ship to" (or "were hired away by") Blue Origin.  This is in the same category as being "as predictable as the sunrise" or whatever your favorite phrase is.  There is exactly one company in the world that has made "reusability changes everything" a life motto and company mandate.  The question is how fast they can make it happen.  

Eric Berger says, in so many words, "I'll tell you the odds."  Blue is saying the chance they'll successfully land this booster is 75%.  Eric says, "not so fast." 

The only comparison available is SpaceX, with its Falcon 9 rocket. The company made its first attempt at a powered descent of the Falcon 9 into the ocean during its sixth launch in September 2013. On the vehicle's ninth flight, it successfully made a controlled ocean landing. SpaceX made its first drone ship landing attempt in January 2015, a failure. Finally, on the vehicle's 20th launch, SpaceX successfully put the Falcon 9 down on land, with the first successful drone ship landing following on the 23rd flight in April 2016.

SpaceX did not attempt to land every one of these 23 flights, but the company certainly experienced a number of failures as it worked to safely bring back an orbital rocket onto a small platform out at sea. Blue Origin's engineers, some of whom worked at SpaceX at the time, have the benefit of those learnings. But it is still a very, very difficult thing to do on the second flight of a new rocket. The odds aren't 3,720-to-1, but they're probably not 75 percent, either.

SpaceX pretty much immortalized that in this two minute video called, "How not to land an orbital rocket booster."

Unlike the development of Falcon 9, New Glenn is a heavier lift vehicle and they've talked about intending to re-use it for years before the first mission - which was lost while trying to land. Blue has said little about what happened, raising the question of whether they really know and just aren't talking or are working from educated guesses. It's clear that they didn't get to test every aspect of the hardware and software needed for the intricate dance the booster needs to go through in order to land safely and have a reusable booster to show for it.

While hardly anybody will actually talk about this truth, the Launch Industry in America, and the rest of the world to be completely honest, pretty much comes down to SpaceX and everybody else. Eric Berger looks at it from this optimistic perspective:

Nevertheless, we're not supposed to talk about the odds with this mission. So instead, we'll just note that the hustle and ambition from Blue Origin is a welcome addition to the space industry, which benefits from both. 

Strange timing leaves NASA's Juno probe to Jupiter in unknown state

This is one of those stories that you hear and just think the people running these things are too smart for something this stupid to show up.  There must be more to it, but much like the celebrated offspring from crossbreeding a rhinoceros and an elephant, it's an elephino.  

Space.com reports the setup this way

NASA's spinning spacecraft studying the satellites of the solar system's largest celestial body (aside from the sun), may already be switched off, but the space agency won't say.  

...

NASA has extended Juno's mission multiple times, most recently in 2021, guaranteeing operations through Sept. 30, 2025. That date has now passed, and with the U.S. government shut down, there is no word yet on whether Juno will come out alive on the other side.

Now I don't find that to be among the more clear things I've read (especially combined with the rest) but apparently the end of the operation extension was to coincide with the end of Fiscal Year, or September 30, 2025.  Since the government shutdown was on October 1st, it seems someone forgot to do something about Juno and now NASA isn't saying anything about whether Juno is still running.  Maybe someone intended to make sure they could extend the mission and just plain forgot.  Maybe the people running the satellite couldn't even think of some new science to do with the little probe and figured they wouldn't get approved for new money for Juno and just said, "good night, Juno."  I just figure if it was that last one, they'd have told someone and word would have gotten around.  

In an email shared with Space.com, NASA Planetary Science Division Media Lead Molly Wasser referenced Juno's 2021 extension saying the "mission was extended to September of 2025. This is the most recent update. Regarding the future of the mission, NASA will abide by the law."

Due to the government shutdown, NASA is currently unable to say whether Juno is still operating or already powered down. At the time of publication, responses from agency officials state that "NASA is currently closed due to a lapse in government funding … Please reach back out after an appropriation or continuing resolution is approved."

They go on to add that there are "excepted activities" that can go on during a shutdown, but those are activities required to protect life, property, or national security and I can't see how Juno could fall under those.  There's also an exception that says "presidential priorities" can be funded, but Juno doesn't appear to be one of those, either.  A clue is that Juno was zeroed out in the draft NASA budget that was submitted before the shutdown. 

This is the first government shutdown in a few years, so it's possible the people that knew how to keep probes alive during a shutdown are gone.  

Basically, until normal government operations resume, we won't even know if Juno's operational.  If they do an orderly shutdown, perhaps diving the spacecraft into one of the Jovian moons or Jupiter itself, that's about the best case.  The next big probe to Jupiter is Europa Clipper. That big probe is a bit under a year into its mission to the planetary system with arrival expected in 2030.  

A visualization of NASA's Juno probe orbiting Jupiter. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

It sure is hard to come up with anything

Talk about slow news days, I can find only one story that's worth mentioning.  Honestly that's pretty much only because it reminds me of one my all time most favorite headlines and that was just last May.  Remember this one:

Australia's first orbital launch scrubbed because the rocket's nose fell off

The story centers on Australian launch company Gilmour.  As the weeks went by after I first heard of them, I kept checking in to see if a date had been announced.  What was supposed to be in March of '25 it ended up being quite a bit later than that - May 15. Instead, the nose cone fell off the rocket hours before it was supposed to leave the launch pad Thursday. 

When they finally actually attempted a launch a few months later, (in July) it lifted off the launch pad, drifted a little, while gaining virtually zero altitude, then fell to the ground. 

The news is Space News says Gilmour says they're planning to launch again "next year" but I don't subscribe to their site so that's all I can read. 

The first Eris rocket from Gilmour Space Technologies lifts off July 29 (U.S. time) on a short-lived test flight. Credit: Gilmour Space Technologies

Hey, the next Falcon 9 launch is 12:13 AM Tuesday! 

China calls NASA to avoid a collision in space

It's a remarkable story because it's being reported as the first time this has ever happened.  

The Chinese space agency has reportedly contacted NASA for the first time to avoid a collision in orbit. 

 The CNSA message read:

“We would like to recommend you hold still and we’ll do the maneuver,” Alvin Drew, NASA Space Sustainability director and former astronaut, said Oct. 2 at a panel on space sustainability at the International Astronautical Congress here. “That’s the first time that has ever happened.” 

China is one of the most prolific launching states, and their beginning to share data like this is a major step in cooperation.  

“I know for a fact that OneWeb has been contacted by a Chinese constellation to talk about where they’re going,” Darren McKnight, senior technical fellow for LeoLabs, said during a Sept. 29 technical session on space sustainability. “SpaceX also has been contacted by a Chinese constellation.”

Recent action by CNSA and commercial satellite operators to discuss spacecraft maneuvers “tells me there is a coordinated signal coming from someone in China,” Drew said. “Somebody is saying, ‘Yes, you can talk to them. Yes, you can coordinate with them.’” 

Honestly, I think everyone involved has long thought all space programs should coordinate with each other to minimize the chances of bad things happening.  It just doesn't seem to have moved beyond that first impression level.  

The US Commerce Department is working on a system, dubbed Traffic Coordination System for Space (TraCSS), to track spacecraft in orbit and help deconflict potential conjunctions. 

However, it’s only as good as the data fed into the system. And missing self-reported information from one of the major operators in space—if China is unwilling to share information—is likely to leave those using the program with at least a few blind spots. 

Part of the reasoning could be that China is communicating more openly about what they're doing, from the 13,000-satellite Guowang internet-of-things constellation to the 15,000-satellite Qianfan or Thousand Sails broadband constellation.   They're going to be sharing the near-Earth orbit space with SpaceX's Starlink constellation which could include 42,000 satellites while even Amazon intends to send over 3,200 broadband satellites into Project Kuiper.

A Long March 8 lifts off from Hainan commercial spaceport March 11, 2025, carrying 18 Qianfan (Thousand Sails) satellites. Credit: CASC

“Although we’re making progress, for years our ability to communicate with the Chinese National Space Agency has been extremely crude,” Drew said. “When we had a conjunction, we would send a note to the Chinese saying that we think we’re going to run into you. Hold still, we’ll maneuver around you.”

Often there was no reply, Drew said. It was never even clear if the messages were received.

“Once we did maneuver both at the same time and fortunately we missed,” Drew said. “We’ve come a long way.”

It's interesting that in both messages, the first one from the Chinese in the second indented paragraph from the top and this last one here from the US sent the other side the same message.  “Hold still; we'll maneuver around you.”

As Space Force works with Vulcan more, the costs go up

One of the so-called Golden Rules of manufacturing is that the more of something you make the lower the unit price goes.  The usual way you see that stated is that when a company doubles the quantity of whatever they're making, the unit price drops by about 25 to 30%.  Yeah, it depends on the quantities and exactly what they're making but it basically comes down to the maker becoming more efficient at what they're doing, wasting less time per unit and the fact that they're generally buying parts from lower-level suppliers and the more parts they buy, the more their prices get "quantity discounts."  

Which is one of the reasons the headline at Ars Technica surprised me saying, “Pentagon contract figures show ULA’s Vulcan rocket is getting more expensive.” If they're building more and getting better at it, why should the price go up? 

The headline story gets buried because, like Lucy, they got some splainin' to do.  The meat of the story is that this time of year, the ending of the old fiscal year and before the start of the fiscal new year,  the US space Force convenes a Mission Assignment Board to dole out contracts to launch the nation's most critical national security satellites. The military announced this year's launch orders Friday, and SpaceX was the big winner. 

Space Systems Command, the unit responsible for awarding military launch contracts, selected SpaceX to launch five of the seven missions up for assignment this year. United Launch Alliance (ULA), a 50-50 joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, won contracts for the other two. These missions for the Space Force and the National Reconnaissance Office are still at least a couple of years away from flying. 

It's essentially meaningless to just say the contracts went to ULA and SpaceX because they're the only two companies with rockets certified by the Space Force to launch the Pentagon's big-ticket satellites. They had to award the contracts to those two.  

ULA's Vulcan rocket, which replaces the company's Atlas V, debuted nearly two years ago and successfully launched its first national security mission in August. SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets each have long track records of success. 

If you're saying "what about New Glenn?" The answer is they're not certified by Space Force yet, so they can't legally launch those payloads.  

That's the background.  Here's where it gets a little attention focus.  

The Space Force is paying SpaceX $714 million for the five launches awarded Friday, for an average of roughly $143 million per mission. ULA will receive $428 million for two missions, or $214 million for each launch. That's about 50 percent more expensive than SpaceX's price per mission.

While notable, these prices are close to the numbers from the last batch of contracts, when SpaceX charged $121 million per mission, and ULA's price was $214 million per launch, the same as this year. Part of this price difference could be explained by SpaceX's reuse of Falcon boosters, whereas ULA's Vulcan rocket is a disposable design.

But look back a little further and you'll find ULA's prices for Space Force launches have, for some reason, increased significantly over the last few years. In late 2023, the Space Force awarded a $1.3 billion deal to ULA for a batch of 11 launches at an average cost per mission of $119 million. A few months earlier, Space Systems Command assigned six launches to ULA for $672 million, or $112 million per mission. 

If you're trying to figure the cost per launch, you have to figure in that Space Force can change the contract during the course of the contract.

ULA and SpaceX competed for military launch orders from 2020 through 2024 as part of the Space Force's NSSL Phase 2 contract. The Space Force added more money to each company's Phase 2 contract—$1.1 billion for ULA and $661 million for SpaceX—in mid-2024 to help cover a higher number of launches than the military originally expected.

Accounting for this funding surge, ULA's total haul of 26 Phase 2 launches came in at an average of $173 million per mission, still significantly less than ULA's prices this year. SpaceX's average launch price was $182 million, far more than the company's prices in 2025. Part of SpaceX's Phase 2 contract money went toward upgrades of ground infrastructure and development of an extended payload fairing for the Falcon Heavy rocket.

I have to admit being rather fond of the Falcon Heavy, which directly comes from my study of the Space Launch System at the heart of the Artemis program.  As I've said many times, the SLS can launch more payload than the Falcon Heavy, but not that much more. It's like 30% more payload, so "all ya gotta do" is launch two Heavies.  One launch of an SLS costs over $4 Billion.  Two Falcon Heavies cost less than 10% of the one SLS launch.  So throw up TWO Heavies and save the $3.6 billion.  

A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket with NASA's Psyche spacecraft launches from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on October 13, 2023. Credit: Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images

Here's a breakdown of the seven new missions assigned to SpaceX and ULA:

• USSF-149: Classified payload on a SpaceX Falcon 9 from Florida

• USSF-63: Classified payload on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Florida

• USSF-155: Classified payload SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Florida

• USSF-205: WGS-12 communications satellite on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Florida

• NROL-86: Classified payload on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from Florida

• USSF-88: GPS IIIF-4 navigation satellite on a ULA Vulcan VC2S (two solid rocket boosters) from Florida

• NROL-88: Classified payload on a ULA Vulcan VC4S (four solid rocket boosters) from Florida

Not sure when we can expect these, other than "not soon" but four more Falcon Heavy launches sounds like fun. 

And now for something completely different

A little research project that got prompted by something a lot of us have seen over the last few years.  

The point of interest is the position of the north magnetic pole and its migration over the last hundred or so years.  This plot sums it up nicely. 

As the graphic itself says, it's from a graphics site called Dreamstime.com, and that's really just about all we know about it. 

The point of this plot is to show the movement of the magnetic pole in the solid, light blue line, with dates in red dots along the line.  The line is fairly neatly shown; it doesn't wander much, and the dates are easy to read.  At the bottom end, the distance between 1904 and 1831 is much smaller than between 1904 and 1948 and it's clearly quite a bit wonky from 1831 and the other dates on the left, but the overall impression is still a steady, relentless movement of the pole toward the top of the map - that middle circle with all the lines converging toward its center is the geographic north pole, so the magnetic pole has gone "over the pole" and is moving into Asiatic Russia at the top.  

There's a group of people who think this is evidence that the pole is about to flip from being the north here with the south somewhere down near Antarctica over to this being the south pole, swapping positions between north and south.  The essence of the argument is that this has happened before and there's evidence that it has happened many times.  Because of that, "we're due" for another flip. 

Because of that, I started trying to look for other examples of the north pole's movement and stumbled across a great example this week. I'd like to know what the "historical normal" looks like. This is the movement of the pole from 200 AD until 2007, which is pretty easy to spot on the previous map.  Sorry about the clip off on the right - this is from a file available on Research Gate.

 

The start of the curve is in the "upper left" and marked 200 AD.  The path, in red with some dates printed, wraps around the physical north pole several times, and in bottom-center area you'll see familiar dates from the previous map and the relatively straight, simple path tracked out with yellow dots until 2007, so it's only slightly smaller than the previous map.  It ends in 2007 instead of 2020. 

So why is this here?  First of all, I find it interesting.  Second, it shows that the movement of the north magnetic pole isn't unusual.  It moves all the time.  It becomes obvious when you look at distances between the spots that the speed the pole moves goes up and down over and over, too. Nobody knows why for sure. Since we don't have charts like this from the last N/S pole reversal we have no idea if looked like this, or if it had more or even less pole movement before the last swap.  The last pole flip was 780,000 years ago, but the average time is 450,000 years between pole swaps. 

No we don't know if this is leading to a magnetic pole swap. We don't know if disasters are coming or if it's just plain "life as usual." Like most other disasters in life.

European Space Agency signs contract for a Starship Clone

Low in the news this week were reports that the European Space Agency had signed a contract with one of their regular contractors, Italian rocket supplier Avio, to produce a reusable rocket upper stage. Avio is a contractor on other ESA launch vehicle contracts, like Vega 6 and the Ariane.  

The European Space Agency (ESA) and Avio signed a two-year contract worth 40 million euros (about $47 million U.S. at current exchange rates) on Monday (Sept. 29) at the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) here in Sydney, Australia, with the goal of preparing for in-flight demonstration of a reusable upper stage.  

In the bigger picture sense, the ESA has talked about reusability for some time, and we've covered it here over the years - like about three weeks ago. This contract will cover the preliminary design and the technologies for the ground and flight segments required for an upper stage demonstrator.

It's too soon to know what the test vehicle will look like, but ESA put out a possible signpost on Monday. The agency posted on X a rendering that looks a lot like SpaceX's Starship megarocket upper stage. 

"I am glad to sign this contract since its importance is two-fold: on one side it addresses technological criticalities in the short-term; on the other side, it paves the way for the preparation of Europe's long-term future in space," ESA's Director of Space Transportation Toni Tolker-Nielsen said in their statement.

ESA says the move capitalizes on progress made in advanced liquid propulsion, reentry, recoverability and reusability technologies. The upper stage could be used on future Vega rockets, also developed by Italian multinational Avio, or other European rockets.

The ESA started down this path almost exactly three years ago with an upper stage called Susie - or Smart Upper Stage for Innovative Exploration.  I can't find any records of a vehicle equipped with a Susie ever flying.  

EDIT 10/3/25 0820 EDT to add:  Link to the original source article

 

 

Artemis II has a date, a time, and a mission plan

Within the last week or so, there was a flareup of hype about the Artemis II mission.  Part of this is from the emphasis on the moon that has come with President Trump, Sean Duffy as NASA administrator and other changes, but it resulted in solid changes to the Schedule. 

Artemis II, if you're new to it, will be the next flight of an SLS and the Artemis program.  The mission's crew of four will be the first NASA crew to be launched to the moon since Apollo 17 in 1972. This won't be a mission that lands on the moon; it won't even orbit the moon, unlike Apollo 8  in 1968. It will just loop around the moon and return to Earth without going into orbit around our neighbor. 

Naturally it's early in the sequence of things that need to happen, but the launch is now set for No Earlier Than Thursday February 5, 2026 at 8:09 PM EST, from LC-39B at Kennedy Space Center.  Delays further down the calendar are always possible.  

Artemis II flight plan. Credit: NASA

The crew is Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, Canadian Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen, and Payload Specialist Christina Koch.  They come across as rather excited with the coming flight, yet trying to balance the things they're required to do by the mission with the things they need to do.  Like sleep. 

Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen put it this way:

"You know me, personally, I hope to take a very short nap on the pad," he said. "There's enough time built in there to have a nap. I’ve been practicing falling asleep. So if the loops are quiet enough, and I get a minute, I’ll try for a nap."
...
That Hansen is contemplating a nap on the launch pad of the Artemis II mission underscores just how frenetic the opening day of this mission will be as the astronauts test out the Orion spacecraft to ensure it is indeed ready to fly them to the Moon. It will be a super-busy, high-stress time, during which everything must go right or they'll have to come straight back to Earth. So yes, maybe the crew should grab some sleep when they can.

Hansen also has a different concern he's preparing for.  He's the only one of the four who hasn't been to space before, so he doesn't know if he'll be susceptible to problems getting up and to work.  

Nearly half of all astronauts experience "space adaptation syndrome" during their first flight to orbit, and there is really no way to predict who it will afflict beforehand. This is a real concern for Hansen, a first-time flier, who is expected to hop out of his seat and start working. 

Hansen: I'm definitely worried about that, just from a space motion sickness point of view. So I'll just be really intentional. I won't move my head around a lot. Obviously, I'm gonna have to get up and move. And I'll just be very intentional in those first few hours while I'm moving around. And the other thing that I'll do—it's very different from Space Station—is I just have everything memorized, so I don't have to read the procedure on those first few things. So I'm not constantly going down to the [tablet] and reading, and then up. And I'll just try to minimize what I do.

Hansen and Christina Koch will set up and test essential life support systems on the spacecraft. To put it bluntly, if the bathroom doesn't work, they're not going to the Moon. If the water supply doesn't work, they're not going to the moon. There are more systems we could mention, but you get the picture. 

The big, overriding issue, though, is they're the first people who will fly the Artemis system in space.  Nobody knows what it handles like, nobody knows what it feels like. The only flight of an Artemis craft was unmanned, flown by remote control.  For a few days, they're going to the center of attention for millions, perhaps billions, of people.  Concern about that seems like a pretty normal response. There are more details in the source article. 

Preliminary launch schedule for Flight Test 11

SpaceX has picked the launch date and time for the next Starship Flight Test, FT-11 is preparing to launch as soon as Monday, October 13. The launch window will open at 6:15 p.m. CT.  This mission is being talked about as the last Version 2 Starship that will fly, so it's a combination of things they want to get "one last look" at and things they'll need for what the next test flights will be like. 

The upcoming flight will build on the successful demonstrations from Starship’s tenth flight test with flight experiments gathering data for the next generation Super Heavy booster, stress-testing Starship’s heatshield, and demonstrating maneuvers that will mimic the upper stage’s final approach for a future return to launch site.

The booster on this flight will be reused, having flown on Flight 8.  Of its 33 Raptor engines, 24 have flown before.  Its primary test objective will be demonstrating a unique landing burn engine configuration planned to be used on the next generation Super Heavy.  The booster will not return to the launch site to be caught by the Mechazilla arms but will land in the Gulf of America, as some previous flights have done. 

Super Heavy will ignite 13 engines at the start of the landing burn and then transition to a new configuration with five engines running for the divert phase. Previously done with three engines, the planned baseline for V3 Super Heavy will use five engines during the section of the burn responsible for fine-tuning the booster’s path, adding additional redundancy for spontaneous engine shutdowns. The booster will then transition to its three center engines for the end of the landing burn, entering a full hover while still above the ocean surface, followed by shutdown and dropping into the Gulf of America. The primary goal on the flight test is to measure the real-world vehicle dynamics as engines shut down while transitioning between the different phases.

The Starship itself will be the last Version 2 ship to fly.  A highlight of flight 10 was finally getting the "Pez dispenser" to eject a handful of simulated Starlink satellites during the tests of the Ship itself.  The same things are planned for this mission.  They're also planning a relight of one Raptor engine, something that has been talked about many times but apparently never was achieved.

The flight test includes several experiments and operational changes focused on enabling Starship’s upper stage to return to the launch site on future flights. For reentry, tiles have been removed from Starship to intentionally stress-test vulnerable areas across the vehicle. Several of the missing tiles are in areas where tiles are bonded to the vehicle and do not have a backup ablative layer. To mimic the path a ship will take on future flights returning to Starbase, the final phase of Starship’s trajectory on Flight 11 includes a dynamic banking maneuver and will test subsonic guidance algorithms prior to a landing burn and splashdown in the Indian Ocean.

Again, October 13 at 7:30  PM EDT.  That's under two weeks away and, as always, best available guess. 

Now essentially a stock photo - Starship test in April of 2023. Image credit: SpaceX

Firefly Aerospace's next Alpha rocket explodes during testing

The booster (first) stage for Firefly Aerospace's next Alpha rocket was destroyed Monday Sept. 29 in a fiery accident on the company's vertical test stand in Central Texas. 

Engineers were testing the rocket before shipment to Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, to prepare for launch later this year with a small commercial satellite for Lockheed Martin. Activities at the vertical test stand in Briggs, Texas, include propellant loading and test-firings of the booster's four kerosene-fueled engines. The rocket was undergoing one of these test-firings on Monday when the accident occurred. 

Firefly released a statement saying the rocket "experienced an event that resulted in a loss of the stage." The company confirmed all personnel were safe and said ground teams followed "proper safety protocols."  They concluded with saying, "We will share more information on the path forward at a later date." 

It seemed to me that this story was more recently, but on Sept. 15, Firefly's investigation of losing the booster on their previous launch, Message in a Booster, was resolved enabling them to get closer to launching this mission for Lockheed Martin.  This mission was to be the Alpha's return to flight mission.  

Still image from a security camera video of a nearby business shows the explosion of Firefly's Alpha rocket on the test stand in Briggs, Texas. Credit: Harold's Auto Parts

Firefly's facility in Briggs is roughly 40 miles north of Austin.

The booster destroyed Monday was slated to fly on the seventh launch of Firefly's Alpha rocket, an expendable, two-stage launch vehicle capable of placing a payload of a little over 2,200 pounds, or a metric ton, into low-Earth orbit.  

The details of the previous mission's failure were covered in that previously linked story from Sept. 15th. The Alpha rocket already has a mixed and frankly not very impressive record heading into this year. Firefly has only achieved two fully successful missions in six launches of the Alpha rocket. Two missions put their payloads into off-target orbits, and two Alpha launches—the rocket's debut in 2021 and the flight in April—failed to reach orbit at all. 

The company's most notable success was its Blue Ghost lunar lander program, which achieved the first fully successful landing of a commercial spacecraft on the Moon in March. NASA has selected Firefly for three more commercial landings on the Moon, and Firefly reported last week that it has an agreement with an unnamed commercial customer for an additional dedicated lunar mission.

There's some demand for a rocket like Alpha, which is larger than micro-launchers like Rocket Lab's Electron and smaller than SpaceX's Falcon 9. Lockheed Martin announced last year that it signed an agreement to purchase up to 25 Alpha launches from Firefly. The US Space Force, NASA, and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are also booked to fly national security and weather satellites on future Alpha missions.

As mentioned above, Firefly didn't say much today but has begun their failure analysis efforts.  Seems a safe bet that to say that the mission which was the eventual goal of today's test is going to be delayed some amount.

And the Tropical Storm threat has ended

On Friday night, local time, I posted about the next tropical storm that looked to be developing and coming closer to threatening us than any this year.  A few of us had a bit of discussion to follow that post but here on Sunday night local, the bottom line is that the forecast tonight is radically different from the prediction I posted two nights ago, and I expect no issues from what is now Tropical Storm Imelda.   

Here's tonight's look at the next five days worth of positions.

The date and time on this graphic (lower left, under "Tropical Storm Imelda") work out to be Monday morning, September 29th at midnight UTC.  You'll note nowhere in Florida has the yellow Tropical Storm watch or blue TS warning color. 

As mentioned in comments to Friday night's post, I talked about looking at some models that just weren't available until the storm was officially named as a Potential Tropical Storm and said, “Everything I saw concluded it was going to turn hard right out to sea. The models mostly varied in how far north the storm gets before it turns right.”  Sure enough, every plot between the one I posted Friday until this one - all from the National Hurricane Center - showed the right turn and every successive plot had it turn out to sea sooner and farther south.

Since the first time I looked at the more detailed forecasts of our local conditions, the winds forecast for Monday have stayed the highest, but nothing beyond a slightly blustery day: winds say 18-20 steady, gusting to 30 mph.  

Can it damage something?  I wouldn't bet a lot that it's impossible, but these are the kinds of winds we get several times a week in our summer afternoon thunderstorms.  Sometimes stuff just breaks.

But, hey, it's not even the end of September. Hurricane season isn't over until the end of November! We're not out of the woods, yet.

NASA Dumps Dream Chaser

Is this the end of the line for Sierra Space's Dream Chaser? 

Word broke on Thursday that NASA modified its contract with Sierra Space for cargo missions to the ISS cancelling guaranteed cargo flights and replacing them with essentially a single test flight that won't dock with the ISS.  

What began as a hopeful contender in NASA’s Commercial Crew Program has now been relegated to a free-flying test mission targeted for no earlier than late 2026—likely slipping into 2027—leaving its role in space station operations uncertain.

Short (4:22) video from NASASpaceflight.com.

The history of the Dream Chaser goes back to the last years of the Space Shuttle era, and a space plane called the HL-20 lifting body developed in the 1990s.  

Image of the HL-20. Credit: NASA 

In 2008, Sierra Nevada Corporation (now Sierra Space) acquired the design and pitched it for NASA’s Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program, securing funding through phases 1 and 2, as well as the Commercial Crew integrated Capability (CCiCap) stage.

Despite these early investments, Dream Chaser was ultimately passed over in 2014 when NASA selected SpaceX’s Crew Dragon and Boeing’s Starliner for crewed missions to the ISS. Sierra Nevada protested the decision with the U.S. Government Accountability Office but lost the appeal.

This led to a change of emphasis for Sierra Space, shifting directions when the Commercial Resupply Services-2 (CRS-2) contract to carry cargo to the ISS was opened. This is the program both SpaceX’s Cargo Dragon and Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft are operating  under. Sierra Space was awarded a contract under CRS-2 for a minimum of seven ISS resupply flights with Dream Chaser and its companion cargo module, called Shooting Star. Nine years later, however, Dream Chaser has still not reached space and its cargo deal has just been changed.

"After a thorough evaluation, NASA and Sierra Space have mutually agreed to modify the contract, as the company determined Dream Chaser development is best served by a free flight demonstration, targeted in late 2026," agency officials said in an emailed statement on Thursday (Sept. 25).

"Sierra Space will continue providing insight to NASA into the development of Dream Chaser, including through the flight demonstration," they added. "NASA will provide minimal support through the remainder of the development and the flight demonstration. As part of the modification, NASA is no longer obligated for a specific number of resupply missions; however, the agency may order Dream Chaser resupply flights to the space station from Sierra Space following a successful free flight as part of its current contract."

The unavoidable consequence of being late is that the station itself is on its last legs, and while there is no firm, fixed date for taking it out of orbit, it looks to easily be NET (No Earlier Than) 2030, and the latest date I've seen is in 2031.  If the earliest possible launch of a test flight for Dream Chaser is 2026, with 2027 certainly looking possible, coordinating a test flight with the real cargo to be delivered to the ISS could be an issue.

On October 24, 2023, Sierra Space moved the Shooting Star cargo module into position behind the Dream Chaser spaceplane for checkouts before shipment to Ohio for environmental testing. Image credit: Shay Saldana/Sierra Space.  More details here. 

Sierra Space isn't saying they're giving up, but they're absolutely between the proverbial rock and a hard place.  

NASA’s statement emphasized that the shift prioritizes Sierra Space’s development needs, enabling data collection in a lower-risk environment. Potential underlying reasons for the modification, based on industry insights, include:

Ongoing development challenges at Sierra Space are hindering readiness for flight. Concerns over the timely certification processes required for ISS operations. NASA’s reluctance to allow an unproven vehicle near the station, especially given the need for rigorous safety standards in proximity to crewed habitats.

While Sierra Space has not publicly detailed the issues, the company’s determination to fly Dream Chaser for learning purposes may have clashed with NASA’s risk-averse approach to ISS missions.

NASA has been noncommittal about Dream Chaser, saying, ”we might potentially order resupply missions if needed” which doesn't offer much encouragement.  In fairness, it could be that SpaceX and Northrop Grumman have done such a good job getting cargo to the ISS they're not really concerned about Dream Chaser as a last option.  They've been doing it flawlessly since the shuttle fleet was grounded in 2011, (with some contribution from the Russians until the last few years).  Perhaps Sierra is just so late they don't matter any more. 

It's getting to be that time of year

We've had a fairly quiet hurricane season so far this  year.  A few low pressure systems went over Florida north of us, there have been a few storms that went north into the North Atlantic missing Bermuda by large distances, and basically nothing around on September 10th, the peak of the season.  

It looks like we're going to have one get closer than anything this year in the next few days.  Meet Potential Tropical Cyclone Nine. The winds as of this 8PM map were 35 mph; it shows tropical storm status in six hours at 2AM Sunday, when it will be given the name Imelda.

Thankfully, it looks like nothing but a rain event here south of the Cape.  The center of the storm doesn't even look to be a Category I hurricane until it's north of us.  Not that a very rainy, stormy day is idyllically wonderful, but it beats stronger storms. 

One of the moderators (or founders or both) of the Central Florida Hurricane site I use regularly, who calls himself cieldumort (ciel du mort is French for sky of death), posted this graphic of expected IR brightness temperature on Monday at 1500 UTC (11:00 AM).  It's the second to last post on that linked page.

You'll note he says, "parts of the east coast may get some gross weather."  We're in the second highest reflectivity colors on the map.  As of Friday evening, our detailed forecast from our local NOAA service shows our maximum winds to be 20 mph on Monday afternoon.  I'd be less than surprised if that goes up, but it doesn't look like winds to take down the antennas and put up the shutters. 

Something about the plot above it worth noting is how the last spot is 24 hours after the second to last, it has barely moved from the previous position and it drops from hurricane to tropical storm.  Stalling offshore for practically 24 hours is a sign of perfectly balanced forces and at five days out I have a hard time believing the prediction can be that accurate.  

The Other Other Space Race

Pretty much everybody is talking about what's looking to be a replay of the 1960s US vs. USSR race to be the first to land on the moon.  This time, of course, it's looking to be the US vs. the People's Republic of China and a group of others seemingly positioning themselves to get favorable trade deals with or better treatment from China. 

There seems to be a second race developing that is less tied to geopolitics, a race to become the preferred replacement space station for the ISS, now considered to be essentially in its last five years of life.  

We've covered Axiom Space, Vast, Blue Origin, and probably others I'm missing.  

Today, I found references to one I hadn't heard of yet on Payload, a site I subscribe to.  In fact three companies are mentioned in the headline "Voyager Selects Vivace to Manufacture Starlab".

Voyager Technologies ($VOYG), the majority shareholder of Starlab Space, has tapped Vivace Corp. to manufacture the primary structure of Starlab’s commercial space station.

The announcement places Starlab one step closer to launching the potential ISS replacement to orbit in 2029, and Voyager expects Vivace to complete the initial test structures by the end of the year.

An important aspect of this group of companies chasing the next Big Thing is that they all approach the problem differently.  Vast is on the small side of the plans, with the Haven-1 big enough for a crew of four for up to 30 days, and crews would fly up and back on SpaceX Crew Dragons.  Their early descriptions of the Haven -1 said they aim to operate a "100-meter-long [330 feet] multi-module spinning artificial gravity space station launched by SpaceX's Starship transportation system."  That never seemed to appear, and they later showed a test vehicle that fits in a Falcon 9 payload fairing.  The current planning date for the launch of the smaller Haven-1 is "NET June, 2026" on NextSpaceflight.  The most recent photo I've seen of the prototype Haven-1 appears to be the one that fits in a Falcon 9 fairing.  

Voyager is taking the opposite approach, along the lines of "how much payload can we put up on Starship?"  Which immediately brings up the question of "where can we build something big enough to fill a Starship?"  How about where they build the SLS? 

To complete the project, Vivace intends to use NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans—which manufactured the core stage of the Space Launch System rocket for the Artemis II mission.

“We’re building a really big structure. And what place has the lock on building a space-rated, human-rated structure of that size? Well, if you look at MAF, the Michoud Assembly Facility, you’ll see that that capability exists there,” Starlab CEO Marshall Smith told Payload.

Starlab’s primary structure is planned to be about 8 m in diameter, just smaller than the core stage of the 8.4 m diameter SLS rocket. At this size, Starlab will offer about 40% of the pressurized volume of the ISS.

Go back to the Haven-1 for a minute.  Haven-1 has a diameter of 4.4 m. As a precursor to a larger station Vast is planning, Haven-1 will spend a significant amount of its time on-orbit uncrewed.

Smith told Payload that committing to a larger station will give Starlab the capacity for continuous crewed habitation from the get-go, and the ability to perform most of its maintenance from the inside of the vehicle—lessening the need for spacewalks.

“We have tremendous capability to support research—all of NASA’s desires, as well as industry and commercial,” Smith said. “We’re not going to build stuff and let it go to waste. We’re going to build the systems that we’re building, and then make sure it’s permanently crewed right from the beginning.”

So far, NASA has awarded Starlab $217.5 million on their contract. Voyager has said that the program is designed to generate decades of free cash flow by offering governments and commercial customers lots of space to develop advanced materials, test their new technologies in-space, and conduct scientific research.

“I think in the short term there will be winners and losers,” Smith said. “[With] lower pricing you’re going to see this whole [sector] grow dramatically, but again, the initial take, my guess is probably two or maybe three stations’ worth, depending upon their size and what they’re capable of doing.”

Smith maintained that there’s room for more than one station to succeed, a statement which seems unquestionable to me. As we learn to "spread our wings" in space, I can imagine a space-based economy where resources acquired in space are used in space as well as being dropped back to the surface.  The tough question there is how long it takes to establish that. 

Starlab rendering of their first station. Image credit: Starlab Space LLC

Small Space News Story Roundup 67

With the emphasis on small space news stories 

Russia's "Noah's Ark" mission returns to Earth

Do you remember the mid-August story about a mission Russia which was ready to launch to carry mice and fruit flies into orbit to determine their susceptibility to radiation?   

The Bion-M No. 2 biosatellite is being readied for its planned Aug. 20 launch atop a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Onboard are 75 mice and other specimens to be exposed to 30 days of radiation before a parachute-aided return to Russia.

Bion-M No. 2 is being dubbed a "Noah's Ark," because it's loaded with the mice, more than 1,000 fruit flies, cell cultures, microorganisms and plant seeds.

The satellite carrying 75 mice, over 1,500 flies, cell cultures, microorganisms, plant seeds and more returned to Earth on Sept. 19 in the steppes of the Orenburg region after spending 30 days in Earth orbit.

After launch, the craft was placed into a polar orbit roughly 230 to 236 miles (370 to 380 kilometers) in altitude at an inclination of roughly 97 degrees. Bion-M No. 2's payload of select biological specimens were thereafter exposed to a high level of cosmic radiation. 

There were reports that the Bion-M No. 2 biosatellite started a small fire where it landed but teams of specialists were on scene to make preliminary examinations of the mice, flies and all.  They were all expected to have been delivered to the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IBMP) by the evening of Sept. 20. 

Russia’s Bion-M No. 2 descent module, on the steppes of the Orenburg region. (Image credit: Roscosmos/Ivan Timoshenko)

NASA's tests of lasers for deep space to Earth communications wrap up

NASA's Psyche Spacecraft is on its long journey to the asteroid bearing that name (it's actually 16 Psyche).  It launched in October of 2023 and is expected to arrive at the asteroid in 2029.  A side mission to keep the spacecraft and the ground support crew from forgetting everything they need to know, has been to test replacing the radio links used to download data from Psyche to Earth.  Replacing them with what?  Space Lasers. 

NASA's Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) experiment, a technology demonstration carried aboard the Psyche mission, has completed its 65th and final test, successfully exchanging laser signals across 218 million miles (351 million kilometers), surpassing all technical goals after two years of operations, according to a statement from the space agency. 
...
During its run, DSOC achieved 65 successful passes between Earth and Psyche as the spacecraft journeyed toward its asteroid target. The system encodes data into pulses of laser light, transforming digital information into streams of photons...

Use of laser data links over terrestrial or LEO data links isn't remotely new, but using them for deep space is new.  The information in the article is low, especially in regard to the questions and concerns I have (I used to design radio communications systems, so it's sort of my home turf).  I'm sure they wouldn't engage in tests like this without calculations to show expectations for just about everything and I'd like to know if there were any unexpected results - good or bad.  In that last quote, I threw out a sentence the author wrote because it's in that never-never land of either worded horribly or just plain wrong. 

Artist's conception of the satellite Psyche in close approach to metal-rich asteroid 16 Psyche.  Image Credit:  NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU

Next launch up: NASA's IMAP probe and two ridesharing missions

Currently set for No Earlier Than 7:30 AM EDT tomorrow (9/24), IMAP is the next SpaceX launch from LC-39A on the Kennedy Space Center portion of Cape Canaveral Space.  Bound for the Earth-Sun L1 Lagrange point, there are three payloads on this launch. The trajectory will be due east.

IMAP, or the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe, is a NASA heliophysics mission that will map the boundaries of the heliosphere: the large bubble created by the solar wind that encapsulates our entire solar system. IMAP will study how the heliosphere interacts with the local galactic neighborhood beyond and will support real-time observations of the solar wind and energetic particles, which can produce hazardous conditions near Earth. Falcon 9 will launch IMAP into a transfer orbit that will take it to the Earth-Sun L1 Lagrange Point – a gravitationally stable region 1.5 million kilometers from Earth (directly between Earth and the Sun) where the Sun and the Earth's gravity essentially balance each other. Also on board the mission is NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory and NOAA’s Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1, which will also head to the Earth-Sun L1 point. 

SpaceX tells us this is the second flight for this booster, B1096. This photo of the booster being delivered to 39A for tomorrow's launch was taken this past Sunday, Sept. 21, 2025. Image credit: SpaceX

NASA has produced an introductory trailer about the mission that strikes me as rather well done.  It's at the IMAP program site linked to in that quoted (indented) paragraph above and presented here.

Overview

The Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe, or IMAP, will explore and map the very boundaries of our heliosphere — a huge bubble created by the Sun's wind that encapsulates our entire solar system — and study how the heliosphere interacts with the local galactic neighborhood beyond.

As a modern-day celestial cartographer, IMAP will also explore and chart the vast range of particles in interplanetary space, helping to investigate two of the most important overarching issues in heliophysics — the energization of charged particles from the Sun, and the interaction of the solar wind at its boundary with interstellar space. Additionally, IMAP will support real-time observations of the solar wind and energetic particles, which can produce hazardous conditions in the space environment near Earth. 

There are 10 instruments onboard the IMAP satellite, and more onboard its two rideshares, NASA’s Carruthers Geocorona Observatory, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Space Weather Follow-On Lagrange 1 (SWFO-L1) spacecraft.  

NASA names next astronaut class

NASA today named the 24th class of astronauts since the Mercury 7 in 1959, including the first person to have been to Earth orbit before becoming an astronaut.  The class was chosen out of a pool of more than 8,000 applicants after an extended recruitment process that began in March 2024.

The space agency on Monday introduced the four men and six women who comprise its 2025 trainee class during a ceremony held at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Following two years of basic training, the new candidates will be eligible for mission assignments in low-Earth orbit and on the Moon, as NASA's Artemis program works toward sending the first humans to Mars.

"We picked the best and the brightest, the most skilled, the best looking, the best personalities to take these 10 spots," said Sean Duffy, acting NASA administrator and secretary of transportation. "You are America's best and brightest, and we're going to need America's best and brightest because we have a bold exploration plans for the future."

In addition to Sean Duffy, NASA Associate Administrator Amit Kshatriya and Vanessa Wyche, director of the Johnson Space Center, also spoke at the event. 

NASA's 24th class of astronaut candidates ("ascans") at Johnson Space Center in Houston at their announcement ceremony on Monday, September 22, 2025. Credit: collectSPACE.com

They will next undergo lessons in orbital mechanics, basic spacecraft systems, spacewalking skills, robotics control, and other disciplines needed for spaceflight. Upon their graduation in 2028, they will become members of NASA's astronaut corps, which has 41 active members as of Monday.
...
Given plans to retire the International Space Station in 2030, the new ascans may be too late to visit that complex, but they could launch to commercial orbital platforms that are under early development today. They could also be sent on missions to land at the Moon's south pole, with the first Artemis lunar landing targeted for mid-2027 at the earliest.

I personally don't see any problems using a term like Senator Ted Cruz talks about here but a few things come to mind. First and foremost, I'm an old guy, while this class is six women and four men, all of whom are not just at the "best of the best" levels, but all of them are closer to 40 years old than 22-ish, just out of college. Based on having worked with some really good women engineers, I assume that like those women I worked with, they're not without a sense of humor.

"Now I recognize that these guys are capable of pulling out a can of whoop ass, but I would humbly suggest next time, maybe we go with a different name than 'ascan' [pronounced 'ass-can,' short for astronaut candidate], like the collective branding can come up with something suitable to the occasion," Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said at the event.

NASA's 2025 astronaut class portraits: Ben Bailey, Lauren Edgar, Adam Fuhrmann, Cameron Jones, Yuri Kubo, Rebecca Lawler, Anna Menon, Imelda Muller, Erin Overcash, and Katherine Spies. Credit: NASA/Josh Valcarcel  (Note: short biographies of all of them here) 

In case she isn't immediately familiar to you, the one "ascan" who has actually flown in orbit before is Anna Menon, bottom row, second from the left.  Anna was one of the four to fly on the Polaris Dawn mission, the private, crewed mission to do the first space walks ever by "civilians" and flew the farthest from Earth than any mission since the end of the Apollo program.  That mission was in a Crew Dragon, commanded by Jared Isaacman, and while Anna was the medical officer on that mission, she was listed as being a SpaceX Engineer. 

Congratulations to all 10 of the class.  I have to say that at this point, it looks like they're not likely to fly to the International Space Station; at least, not all of them.  There are other alternatives possible, and Artemis, of course, is really the emphasis of what was talked about. 

What's the word for a rerun of a rerun?

Despite the major changes to the Federal Budget that have gone by since President Trump took office, I'm getting the feeling that it's all just "the same old bullshit" we've been going through for decades.  Yes, I'm reading of government shutdowns coming.  As usual, it's going to shutdown "if they can't agree to a budget."  Ars Technica (who are apparently 100% in the crowd that says, "yes cut the budget, but don't you DARE cut what I want!) summarized it this way: "In a win for science, NASA told to use House budget as shutdown looms."

The White House proposed a budget earlier this year with significant cuts for a number of agencies, including NASA. In the months since then, through the appropriations process, both the House and Senate have proposed their own budget templates. However, Congress has not passed a final budget, and the new fiscal year begins on October 1.

As a result of political wrangling over whether to pass a "continuing resolution" to fund the government before a final budget is passed, a government shutdown appears to be increasingly likely. 

While we haven't had an actual government shutdown in a few years, it's just the same old routine used all the time.  As for passing a budget, one of the actual duties assigned to the legislative branch, it still seems to be that the most recent Federal budget to be passed and signed was in 1997.  That's actually a polite and kind way of summing up the situation.  I say it's kind because it implies that congress has only been so bad in doing their jobs since 1997.  A better picture is conveyed by a quote attributed to South Carolina's Nikki Haley (governor at the time), "in the past 40 years, Congress has passed a pathetic four budgets on time."  

What they do that allows them to keep spending at nearly infinite levels is to pass those "continuing resolutions" mentioned in the first quote to legalize the spending.  

My guess is that if the media wasn't so tied up with the story about Charlie Kirk, they'd be blabbering about a looming government shut down, with the usual Gloom and Doom talk.  

Things like this recurring story are one of the reasons I've drastically cut back on the amount of politics and economics writing I used to do.  I'm so bored with writing about this, I'll just get to the essence of why I'm here.  If you want the long story, go to this 2023 post. 

So why do we go through this crap every time the subject comes up?  Political theater.  Kabuki (overly dramatic) theater.  They drag it out to the last minute so they can look like heroes.  If they shut down the Fed.gov, so what?  Those workers get their time off and their pay, so it's "no harm? no foul."  Feel sorry for them?  I think if one works for fed.gov, one should have a savings buffer of a few weeks to ensure you can buy your groceries in the event of a shutdown.  It's not like nobody knows a shutdown is coming. 

There's a cartoon I've been running for years, almost every reference to the debt ceiling since 2013, that I really think sums up the whole story.  In a way, a Star Wars parody reference.

Yup. They drag it out as long as they want, make it sound as dire as possible, all so that they can look like heroes, as in the last panel.  I went to the website referred to in the lower left of the cartoon and the web site appears to be gone, with a Vietnamese language site there.