Tag: Spaceflight

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No ordinary spacecraft

I’m not sure there is such a thing as an “ordinary spacecraft”, but there certainly has never been a spacecraft like SpaceX’s BFR. The sheer audacity of someone trying this is balanced by the earnestness of the effort, and the whole process is fascinating to watch unfold. This article investigates some of the challenges SpaceX is facing.

“To be able to launch, refuel in orbit, endure months of flying through space, land on Mars, leave that planet, and safely return to Earth — then do all that over again — the BFR can’t be an ordinary spacecraft.”

Elon Musk is building a spaceship that's so ambitious that some experts are calling it 'science fiction.' Here's what SpaceX and its engineers are up against.
Elon Musk is building a spaceship that's so ambitious that some experts are calling it 'science fiction.' Here's what SpaceX and its engineers are up against.

SpaceX plans to fly a tourist around the moon in a new launch system called Big Falcon Rocket, or BFR: a giant spaceship and rocket designed for Mars.
Business Insider Business Insider
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One small step

The Eagle landed 49 years ago today, and two humans walked on a celestial body for the first time.

I have a fleeting, four-year-old’s memory of my dad waking me up (I must have been napping, as we were in CDT) to watch the moon landing. I don’t remember anything about the landing itself, just my dad waking me to see it. But that’s special enough, I think.

Here’s a nifty 360 of the interior of the Command Module that carried Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins to the moon that day.

https://www.facebook.com/Smithsonian/photos/a.57737704573.63791.6193904573/10156728357319574/?type=3&theater

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Blue Origin Mission 9

Lest it seem Generation Mars is mired in nostalgia, with all the recent Apollo posts, here’s Blue Origin pushing to new heights earlier today.

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Apollo source code

This article is actually a couple years old. But if you haven’t seen it, it’s a fun read.

Keep in mind that this software was literally woven into the Apollo Guidance Computer’s (ACG’s) memory by hand. Wire by wire, the 0’s and 1’s were stitched together to get us to the Moon.

Programmers, at least the ones I like to hang out with, have always had a sense of humor in the commenting of their code. It’s nice to see the programming team for Apollo was no exception.


The code that took America to the moon was just published to GitHub, and it's like a 1960s time capsule

The code that took America to the moon was just published to GitHub, and it’s like a 1960s time capsule

“Burn, baby! BURN!”

Quartz Quartz
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Mariner 4

Mariner 4 was the first successful flyby of Mars. On this day in 1965, it made its closest approach and sent the first closeup images of the surface. These were also the first closeup images ever returned of another planet.