To be honest, it's getting hard to find interesting stories these days.
The AX 4 mission is still on the ISS but I think it's in its last couple of days. Things I can trace say they'll stay on the station 14 days, but they docked to the station on June 26, and 14 days is June 40th, uh, July 10th. I don't know if those missions ever get extended and I don't see any word about "our mission ends on July x-didy x-th."
On This Day in 2011, the last Space Shuttle mission launched. I remember writing about it in my early days of blogging. It was really a day of mixed emotions; sorry to see the program ending but knowing it simply had to end - and probably should have ended years earlier. It was a spacecraft designed in the 1970s and flying for 31 years by then. I knew the program was over-hyped and never achieved the costs to orbit, the launch frequency, or the operational safety it was sold with.
I ended the piece with this:
It's no secret - chances are everyone who visits here knows the Endarkenment approaches. I know as well as anyone that the economy is on the verge of collapse, and the social order on the verge of disintegration. Knowing it's coming doesn't make seeing it any easier, and like some of the other folks I read, it pains me. The end of American manned space flight just seems like another sign of the approaching darkness.
Image credit
I imagine that this anniversary isn't getting spoken about much is partly these mixed emotions along with the fact that this is a 14 years anniversary not a 15, 20 or 25 year anniversary. It's a "tweeny" milestone.
And remember, in 2011, the Falcon 1 had only done a couple of test flights. The Block 5 Falcon 9 was years in the future, along with the first manned flight (Bob and Doug) from the USA in May of 2020, and dozens of other everyday things we're completely used to.
If we built the shuttle that NASA designed, instead of the shuttle that the DoD wanted, it probably would have worked better.
ReplyDeleteThat said, would you like a world where ever airliner was flown by the .gov? Or does it make more sense for airplanes to be owned and operated privately, for the most part? Yes, I know the .gov still owns planes, but I have never flown on one owned by the US government.
Re: "would you like a world where ever airliner was flown by the .gov?"
DeleteI've been saying I'm fine with NASA getting cut back or zeroed out for as long as I've been here, and I think the only thing I've ever said they're good at is the unmanned side - and that's 100% contracted out. Plus, the other side of that is having worked in civil aviation for my last 20 years of work, I've seen how badly Big Gov screws that up, too.
Rebuilding the shuttle and the pad after every launch sucked any 'savings' the program was supposed to give.
ReplyDeleteAnd in the whole shuttle design, it was never supposed to be 'Shuttle Only.' The shuttle system was designed as a whole family of space flight vehicles. All the Mars Direct, ARES Program and such were originally supposed to be part of the active program. Heavy lift vehicles using 2-4 SRBs wrapped around an extended tank with cargo at top and some J2 engines on the bottom. Long single-stack launchers like ARES1 made of SRB components.
Sigh. One big money pit.
(the money shot) It's no secret - chances are everyone who visits here knows the Endarkenment approaches.
ReplyDeleteBut it's so much easier to complain about the Space shuttle.
Thank you for the Smith Link, I've stored it for later discussions about spending and "Job growth".
We've kicked the can for so many decades and the end of the road is near.
But let's sip our coffee and complain about the Space Shuttle or the non-existent Epstein files or the next distraction as the wolf comes up to our door for its meal.
The first panacea for a mismanaged nation is inflation of the currency; the second is war. Both bring a temporary prosperity; both bring a permanent ruin. But both are the refuge of political and economic opportunists.
Ernest Hemingway
We are doing the debasement to cheapen the debts owed, I fear the powers that Be NEED a little WAR to cover their robbing the treasury and the not-a-vaxx deaths showing up in too many actuaries.
https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2025/07/it-looks-like-covid-jabs-were-and-still.html
Well at least on the bright side Trump used a not a real bombing on Iran to give our "Best Ally Ever" an off ramp after Iran smashed their defenses.
Better than our "Best Ally Ever" using their nukes in the Sampson Option.
I fear for my grandchildrens future.
Inflation is so embedded in society that people expect their house to be more valuable every year and to make more money every year. Houses, like everything, deteriorate with age so they should be worth less not more over time. They could be worth more if where you live has more buyers than sellers (gotten more popular). Labor should (could?) be worth more with experience, so if you're good, you may well be worth more over time. Inflation is chosen deliberately by the central banks under the belief that if people don't expect prices to go up constantly, they'll buy today instead of putting it off for later. That keeps the economy growing.
DeleteAnother factor is the Golden Rule of manufacturing says if you double the quantity you make you drop your prices around 25 to 30% by the "quantity discount" you get on the raw materials you're buying. Combine those and things are going to be cheaper "next year" so why buy now?
Both of those combine to make people feel it makes more sense to buy what they want now, rather than save for next year. The Gen Pop's poor math abilities account for thinking paying more with finance charges make sense.
Vaxes - not much I can say. I was reluctant to try an mRNA vaccine because what I knew was that the technology had been tried and was never successful. Count me among those who never got the jab while family and friends did, and now I'm concerned about losing brother, child, grandkid or others. In the meantime, I've revised my ideas about getting annual flu shots and I'm reluctant about more things.