Hook me up to one of those and watch it return a 404 error.

will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

Decay said:

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will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

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I think the main concern is that if he sprung a leak or something and they wouldn't have time to go get him.

aTmAg said:

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Decay said:

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will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

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I think the main concern is that if he sprung a leak or something and they wouldn't have time to go get him.

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True. If I'm ever in space I'd just assume I'm a few minutes from death the whole time regardless.

Ag_of_08 said:

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You want to really piss yourself off.... kerbal space program with realism overhaul and real solar system. Rendezvous and docking is a nightmare....

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I worked so hard to dock one time in vanilla KSP that I just started using mechjeb for every docking after that.

Decay said:

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aTmAg said:

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Decay said:

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will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

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I think the main concern is that if he sprung a leak or something and they wouldn't have time to go get him.

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True. If I'm ever in space I'd just assume I'm a few minutes from death the whole time regardless.

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It has to be safer than sky diving

Decay said:

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will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

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Why would you run back into your ship in one orbit? I get you're traveling are the same speed as your ship in the same direction, but what makes you meet back up such it in the direction you're moving away in?

ABATTBQ11 said:

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Decay said:

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will25u said:

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Perhaps the most-terrifying space photograph to date. Astronaut Bruce McCandless II floats completely untethered, away from the safety of the space shuttle, with nothing but his Manned Maneuvering Unit keeping him alive. The first person in history to do so.
Credit: NASA pic.twitter.com/uapVOFwS2u

— Curiosity (@Sciencenature14) June 20, 2022

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Things like that used to freak me out. But really a space suit is just a one-person spacecraft anyway right? So you're basically just flying one ship around another ship.

Besides, Scott Manley has taught me orbital mechanics - even if you floated off, you'd just have to wait one orbit around earth and you'd be right back bumping into your ship. Also since that particular spacewalk was done from the Shuttle orbiter, it could easily come get you.

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Why would you run back into your ship in one orbit? I get you're traveling are the same speed as your ship in the same direction, but what makes you meet back up such it in the direction you're moving away in?

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There was a whole video about it but long story short, your orbit is now slightly different than the ship you were in orbit with. Due to the mechanics of how speeding/slowing down up will raise/lower your orbit, things like speeding up will actually cause you to take more time to go around the planet once, aka speeding up slows you down.

It's whack and I don't totally get it, but Scott Manley has several videos that help explain:

increase speed in the prograde direction -> raises your orbit -> makes your orbit longer ->takes more time to complete one orbit because the distance increases by a greater amount than your speed ->end up back in the same spot except you traveled an ellipse rather than a circle...

unless you wait until you're at your perigee and speed up in the prograde direction again -> makes your orbit into a circle again except it's higher than it was before ->you're going faster, but traveling a longer path, so the orbit takes longer.

Everything about orbital mechanics especially rendezvous is 100% counter intuitive at first.

Just accept that it's completely bass ackwards and then you'll understand... sorta...

Kenneth_2003 said:

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Everything about orbital mechanics especially rendezvous is 100% counter intuitive at first.

Just accept that it's completely bass ackwards and then you'll understand... sorta...

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No it makes sense now. Just have to think of it like a cylinder since you're really just traveling in a straight line and falling. Take the falling out and that's what you have. You and the ship are travelling along the length of the cylinder. If you start moving 90* away from the ship, you maintain velocity along the length of the cylinder and just do a loop around at, arriving back at the ship.

Malachi Constant said:

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Ag_of_08 said:

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You want to really piss yourself off.... kerbal space program with realism overhaul and real solar system. Rendezvous and docking is a nightmare....

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I worked so hard to dock one time in vanilla KSP that I just started using mechjeb for every docking after that.

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I CAN manually dock in ksp, even in ro/rss..... I only do it when absolutely necessary( mech Jeb kinda slams things together when they're over 300 tons, I will fly the final approach by hand then)!

Ag_of_08 said:

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Malachi Constant said:

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Ag_of_08 said:

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You want to really piss yourself off.... kerbal space program with realism overhaul and real solar system. Rendezvous and docking is a nightmare....

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I worked so hard to dock one time in vanilla KSP that I just started using mechjeb for every docking after that.

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I CAN manually dock in ksp, even in ro/rss..... I only do it when absolutely necessary( mech Jeb kinda slams things together when they're over 300 tons, I will fly the final approach by hand then)!

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Yeah, I just want to make sure I can do it, but I think it would be natural to assume those Kerbals would develop the technology to provide a mechjeb

I've gotten to the point I play in science mode most of the time now, but I give myself a loan at the beginning to unlock mechjeb to at least have rendezvous/docking/ascent from the start, and pay it off by subtracting points once I have a station and lab up.

I've done the full career from the pad to the outer planets.... that grind is blah!

Ag_of_08 said:

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I've gotten to the point I play in science mode most of the time now, but I give myself a loan at the beginning to unlock mechjeb to at least have rendezvous/docking/ascent from the start, and pay it off by subtracting points once I have a station and lab up.

I've done the full career from the pad to the outer planets.... that grind is blah!

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At this point I'm looking forward to KSP 2. Hopefully it's as good as it seems to be so far.

I think Scott Manley was brought in as an advisor on KSP2, so I'm hopeful it will be great.

I forgot they were making a sequel. Just looked it up, they are looking at a release date of sometime in 2023.

japantiger said:

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My youngest is interviewing for an engineering job with Space X tomorrow...wish him luck!

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Second round of interviews now set for tomorrow afternoon....today was a great and challenging experience for him. Must have done OK...

When are they launching the big one?

japantiger said:

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japantiger said:

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My youngest is interviewing for an engineering job with Space X tomorrow...wish him luck!

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Second round of interviews now set for tomorrow afternoon....today was a great and challenging experience for him. Must have done OK...

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First screen is usually just HR / recruiter asking about your experience, interests, what you know about the company, etc. Second and third screen is more technical. Then on-site you have to present.

Somewhere between July and January if you're talking about SpaceX.

I'm not real optimistic that SLS will "launch". I'd take reasonable odds that it goes boom at or near the pad.

As long as the keep the freeplay options, and domt try to lock down modding, it will be amazing.

SLS wet dress rehearsal yesterday had more issues. They had a hydrogen leak in an umbilical at a quick disconnect. They couldn't fix the leak so "masked the data to continue". Well that's a one way to complete the test.

Score another point for SpaceX. No hydrogen means no hydrogen leaks.

Mathguy64 said:

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SLS wet dress rehearsal yesterday had more issues. They had a hydrogen leak in an umbilical at a quick disconnect. They couldn't fix the leak so "masked the data to continue". Well that's a one way to complete the test.

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Surprised they couldn't 'fix' the leak. Maybe they couldn't access it.

It used to be (may still be the case) that the techs would wrap hydrogen leaks in cheese cloth then pour water over it letting the ice formation seal the leak.

The James Webb Space Telescope is finally ready to do science — and it's seeing the universe more clearly than even its own engineers hoped for https://t.co/rpuNsj2ga8 pic.twitter.com/GXaXaqVNUt

— SPACE.com (@SPACEdotcom) June 21, 2022

Mars race to return samples is on.

https://www.space.com/china-return-mars-samples-earth-2031

Quote:

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. . .
China plans to haul Mars samples to Earth in 2031, two years before NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) aim to do so, according to media reports.

The target date was announced in a Monday (June 20) presentation(opens in new tab) by Sun Zezhou, chief designer of the Tianwen 1 Mars orbiter and rover mission that arrived at the Red Planet in February 2021, according to SpaceNews(opens in new tab).

Zezhou's presentation, reportedly given at a Nanjing University seminar, says China is targeting a two-launch mission with liftoff in late 2028 and a sample return to Earth in July 2031, the report said.
. . .
"The complex, multi-launch mission will have simpler architecture in comparison with the joint NASA-ESA project, with a single Mars landing and no rovers sampling different sites," SpaceNews wrote.

NASA recently asked for public input on its joint sample return plans, after the agency decided to develop a second Mars lander due to the mass requirements of the mission. Adding that second lander pushes the arrival of Mars samples on Earth back to 2033, from 2031.

The NASA-ESA campaign will haul home samples collected by the American space agency's Perseverance rover, which has been exploring the 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero Crater since February 2021. The project will employ a European-built "fetch" rover to grab the samples and place them aboard an American-made Mars ascent vehicle (MAV). The MAV will launch the sample container into Mars orbit, where it will be snagged by a European Earth return orbiter.
. . .
China's effort will be more streamlined, with dirt and rock collected from one small area via "surface sampling, drilling and mobile intelligent sampling, potentially using a four-legged robot," SpaceNews wrote.

China already has experience in delivering samples from the moon. The nation's Chang'e 5 mission touched down on the moon in December 2020 and shortly after delivered to Earth the first lunar samples since the Soviet Union's Luna 24 did so in 1976.

And China already has considerable Mars experience thanks to Tianwen 1, which launched in July 2020 and arrived at the Red Planet in February 2021. Tianwen 1 consists of an orbiter as well as a lander and a rover, called Zhurong; this latter duo touched down in May 2021.

The Tianwen 1 orbiter and Zhurong are both still going strong. The rover entered a planned hibernation in May of this year to attempt to outlast the bitterly cold Red Planet winter.
. . .

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The USSR had plans to get a Cosmonaut to the moon before us, too. Wake me up when they contract Musk to do it.

They missed beating us back with samples to a computer malfunction in fairness. With any real budget, and Valentin Glushko not partially sabotaging the situation because he wanted hypergolics, they might have made a real fight of it.

We also don't have the same level of drive and will we did during the run to Apollo. It's very clear the DNC has no interest in space, and several factions of the GOP stay hung up on the Alabama aero-mafia.

China gets a sample back first, but they have to grab a shovel and dig it out of a crash site in the middle of a remote village.

bmks270 said:

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japantiger said:

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japantiger said:

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My youngest is interviewing for an engineering job with Space X tomorrow...wish him luck!

---

Second round of interviews now set for tomorrow afternoon....today was a great and challenging experience for him. Must have done OK...

---

First screen is usually just HR / recruiter asking about your experience, interests, what you know about the company, etc. Second and third screen is more technical. Then on-site you have to present.

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The 1st interview was completely technical. It was a surprise. The next two are increasingly technical and include a presentation to a team of engineers....quite the process.

I've not interviewed with SpaceX but friends who have had to demonstrate their knowledge/skills during the interview. One friend interviewing for an astronaut training position was given a week to learn a random subject and teach it during the interview.

Good company. No wonder they are doing the things they are doing.

NASA will not conduct a fifth wet dress rehearsal of the SLS rocket, @StephenClark1 reports.https://t.co/KMj5XszPYY

— Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) June 23, 2022

will25u said:

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NASA will not conduct a fifth wet dress rehearsal of the SLS rocket, @StephenClark1 reports.https://t.co/KMj5XszPYY

— Eric Berger (@SciGuySpace) June 23, 2022

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So, 4 dress rehearsals and couldn't get to the desired countdown point (even with inhibiting trip conditions)...

How many "launch attempts" will it actually take to ignite an engine?