Video: TMRO Orbit 10.33 – The History of SpaceX

The latest TMRO.tv live program is now available on line: The History of SpaceX – Orbit 10.33 – TMRO

Stewart Money author of, “Here be Dragons: The Rise of SpaceX & the Journey to Mars” joins us to talk about the history of SpaceX and some projects you may not have known of. Interview segment starts at 24:40

Space news topics discussed:

1:41 – Ariane V Launch Abort
4:53 – Falcon 9 Launch with X37-B
8:51 – Asteroid Florence Zips Past Earth
15:04 – Bridenstine nominated for NASA Admin, and why that could be bad
19:54 – Boron Found on Mars

TMRO is viewer supported:

TMRO:Space is a crowd funded show. If you like this episode consider contributing to help us to continue to improve. Head over to http://www.patreon.com/tmrofor information plus our all new goals and reward levels

Cassini nears journey’s end + The plume of Enceladous + The rings in hi-res

The Cassini mission to Saturn will end on September 15th when the spacecraft’s orbit will take it into the gas giant’s atmosphere. This video shows some of the spectacular imagery of the Saturn system sent back by the probe since it went into orbit there in 2004.

** Here is a video clip showing the plume of water vapor emitted at the pole of Saturn’s moon Enceladus: Cassini: The Grand Finale: Last Enceladus Plume Observation

This movie sequence of images is from the last dedicated observation of the Enceladus plume by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.

The images were obtained over approximately 14 hours as Cassini’s cameras stared at the active, icy moon. The view during the entire sequence is of the moon’s night side, but Cassini’s perspective Enceladus shifts during the sequence. The movie begins with a view of the part of the surface lit by reflected light from Saturn and transitions to completely unilluminated terrain. The exposure time of the images changes about halfway through the sequence, in order to make fainter details visible. (The change also makes background stars become visible.)

The images in this movie sequence were taken on Aug. 28, 2017, using Cassini’s narrow-angle camera. The images were acquired at a distance from Enceladus that changed from 684,000 to 539,000 (1.1 million to 868,000 kilometers). Image scale changes during the sequence, from 4 to 3 miles (7 to 5 kilometers) per pixel.

** Sharpest images yet of Saturn’s rings: Cassini: The Grand Finale: Colorful Structure at Fine Scales

These are the highest-resolution color images of any part of Saturn’s rings, to date, showing a portion of the inner-central part of the planet’s B Ring. The view is a mosaic of two images that show a region that lies between 61,300 and 65,600 miles (98,600 and 105,500 kilometers) from Saturn’s center.

The first image (Figure A, above) is a natural color composite, created using images taken with red, green and blue spectral filters. The pale tan color is generally not perceptible with the naked eye in telescope views, especially given that Saturn has a similar hue.

The material responsible for bestowing this color on the rings—which are mostly water ice and would otherwise appear white—is a matter of intense debate among ring scientists that will hopefully be settled by new in-situ observations before the end of Cassini’s mission.

Continue…

More about Cassini’s final days and its legacy:

Space Studies Institute giving away Kindle versions of Gerard K. O’Neill’s ‘2081’ and ‘The High Frontier’

The late Princeton physics professor Gerard K. O’Neill was a major influence on many space development activists and entrepreneurs. For example, as O’Neill advocated, Jeff Bezos sees millions of people living in large in-space colonies and heavy industries moved off earth and into space: Jeff Bezos blue origin calls for a dynamic entrepreneurial space – CNBC

“The Stanford Torus – This space habitat design resulted from a NASA-Ames/Stanford University summer study. It’s a wheel 1.1 miles in diameter.” More space colony artwork.

The Space Studies Institute was founded by O’Neill and this week is offering free Kindle versions of two of O’Neill’s books:

** Right Now 2081 and The High Frontier are FREE | Space Studies Institute:

We broke the news yesterday for SSI Associates to get their jump start and now it’s open for everyone:

For a limited time The Space Studies Institute is giving away the Kindle editions of Gerard K. O’Neill’s 2081 and The High Frontier for free!

2081, an amazing look at the future rising around us, and The High Frontierthe cornerstone book of the NewSpace generation, are both regularly priced at $6.99 USD but right now they are  online around the planet for free download from the Amazon.com websites and Kindle stores.

SSI President Gary C Hudson shows the evolution of reading… as predicted in the book 2081

For details on 2081, just jump down to the previous SSI Blog postand as for The High Frontier, well, if you haven’t heard of it then it’s time you laid the right foundation in your Space education.

Gerard K. O’Neill’s The High Frontier is a landmark book.  A stunning, readable treatise.

Space is the place where there are no limits  and where benefits to ALL of Humanity – everywhere – are free for the using with no need to harm anyone.

Sound far fetched? Sound naively Utopian and absolutely unachievable? Until a person actually reads The High Frontier for themselves, they should be careful about jumping to conclusions.

In The High Frontier, Princeton Nuclear Physicist Gerard K. O’Neill asks the famous question:

“Is a planetary surface, any planetary surface,
really the best place for an expanding technological civilization?”

And then he systematically looks at what it means for a civilization to expand, what such a civilization truly needs for real positive growth, and finds that all of those requirements and more are in no way out of reach.

Professor O’Neill makes this book of real science and real technology readable by most everyone by using fascinating “Letters From Space” followed by clear explanations of the hows and whys.  O’Neill was a world-renowned scientist but he had the gift to make even the most technical information completely understandable.

If you’ve never personally read 2081 and The High Frontier, you are in for a truly amazing experience. If you haven’t read them in a while then now is a great time to refresh your memories!

To get your free copies, log into your Amazon.com account using your web browser or start the Kindle Store in your Kindle app or device to search for the “O’Neill Kindle 2081″ and “O’Neill Kindle The High Frontier”

Read on your Android, iOS or Windows Phone while in line at the grocery then pick up where you left off while relaxing at home with your tablet then start right up again on your Kindle Fire, Voyager or DX and even steal a few minutes at work using the Kindle program on your full Mac or Windows PC.

Pass the word!

The Space Studies Institute is giving away the Kindle editions of Gerard K. O’Neill’s 2081 and The High Frontier.

Twitter the news, Blog it, Facebook it, email it, spread the word and do it today!

** Gerard K. O’Neill’s 2081 is now an SSI Kindle Book! | Space Studies Institute:

Gerard K. O’Neill’s hopeful book of the human future, 2081, is now an SSI Kindle release!

What is 2081?

Gerard K. O’Neill’s The High Frontier is a classic of the Space Industry. World famous, it has been called “the book that launched a thousand Space careers.” 2081 may be lesser known but, believe us, it is no less fascinating or important. Here is the description we have put on the Kindle edition Amazon page:

E Ink slate tablets instead of paper books, grocery stores that let you check out without stopping for a cashier, instant as-needed delivery of any item by intelligent systems, electric cars that go where you tell them without your having to pay attention, super-fast and silent underground public transportation that people actually enjoy riding, whole communities enjoying island climates in the middle of snowy winters, working from home with all of the human interaction of going to a job, carts that politely follow you carrying your loads and ready to guide you when you’ve lost your way, houses that listen and are always ready to answer any question or organize any part of your life, cheap energy to fuel every device without adding to the carbon, heat or disposal issues of fossil and nuclear fuels. This is your world in 2081.

Princeton Nuclear Physicist Gerard K. O’Neill, most famous for revolutionizing high energy physics labs and particle accelerators with his invention of Storage Ring technologies, and for his view of the potential for thousands of regular people to enjoy satisfying and productive jobs and lives in Space, looked back at the history of looking forward, looked at the realities of where we were in 1981 and envisioned, logically, how regular people would be living in the year 2081. Some of the gadgets and infrastructure that he thought would take a hundred years are with us already, others are in the news today as being right around the corner and some are just waiting for smart people to understand the need for them and make them real parts of our daily lives.

“This book is in four parts. In the first, ‘The Art of Prophecy,’ we’ll explore in a pragmatic way the lessons that can be learned from the colorful history of earlier attempts at predicting the future. In the second, ‘The Drivers of Change,’ I’ll describe five developments that I believe will determine, alone and in combination, the course of the next hundred years. In the third part, ‘Life in 2081,’ I invite you to join me in a tour through the world in which our great-grandchildren will just be at their prime. In the fourth part, ‘Wild Cards,’ we’ll explore the most exciting developments of a century from now that are just at the limits of possibility – and some that are, perhaps, well beyond those limits.”

“It’s an exciting future that I’m predicting, even more different from the late twentieth-century than our own time is from 1881. Some people may be frightened rather than attracted by the prospect of so much change still to come. But we need not be afraid if we approach the future armed with understanding.”

“We have a responsibility beyond mere curiosity to learn as much about the future as we can, because we must choose those actions that will insure not only the survival of humanity, but an improvement in its condition.”

Gerard K. O’Neill