June 16, 2025 Quick space links
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Blacksky expanding the capabilities of its imaging and surveillance satellite constellation
This decision was apparently fueled by the recent successful launches of Blacksky satellites by Rocket Lab.
- NASA’s 96-minute long documentary on the building of the Webb Space Telescope
I haven’t watched it and likely won’t, because I can’t imagine NASA telling the real story of the budget overruns, endless delays, and chronic bad management that plagued Webb from day one.
- Japan’s space agency JAXA unveils its upgraded HTV-X unmanned cargo freighter for ISS
It will be launched on Japan’s new H3 rocket later this year, the first of five HTV-X supply missions to ISS.
- Chinese pseudo-company Interstellar Glory says the first flight of its Hyperbola-3 rocket will occur by the end of 2025
The rocket is essentially attempting to copy what the Falcon 9 does. Whether the company will recover the first stage on the first launch is definitely uncertain.
- ESA releases first images from its solar telescope Proba-3
It uses a separate “occulter” satellite to block the Sun’s light in order to study the Sun’s corona, its atmosphere.
- On this day in 1963, Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly in space
It would almost two decades before a second Russian woman would fly in space.
- Cockpit footage of Iranian ballistic missiles launching towards Israel, taken from a commercial flight over Dubai
Expect fewer and fewer of these launches in the coming days.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.
- Blacksky expanding the capabilities of its imaging and surveillance satellite constellation
This decision was apparently fueled by the recent successful launches of Blacksky satellites by Rocket Lab.
- NASA’s 96-minute long documentary on the building of the Webb Space Telescope
I haven’t watched it and likely won’t, because I can’t imagine NASA telling the real story of the budget overruns, endless delays, and chronic bad management that plagued Webb from day one.
- Japan’s space agency JAXA unveils its upgraded HTV-X unmanned cargo freighter for ISS
It will be launched on Japan’s new H3 rocket later this year, the first of five HTV-X supply missions to ISS.
- Chinese pseudo-company Interstellar Glory says the first flight of its Hyperbola-3 rocket will occur by the end of 2025
The rocket is essentially attempting to copy what the Falcon 9 does. Whether the company will recover the first stage on the first launch is definitely uncertain.
- ESA releases first images from its solar telescope Proba-3
It uses a separate “occulter” satellite to block the Sun’s light in order to study the Sun’s corona, its atmosphere.
- On this day in 1963, Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly in space
It would almost two decades before a second Russian woman would fly in space.
- Cockpit footage of Iranian ballistic missiles launching towards Israel, taken from a commercial flight over Dubai
Expect fewer and fewer of these launches in the coming days.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
If you thought the budget overruns, endless delays, and chronic bad management that plagued Webb were bad, they had even less of a clue how to make a documentary !
John,
Thank you for watching that so the rest of us don’t have to. 96 minutes+ of what I strongly suspect was non-stop cloying and sugary NASA self-congratulation wouldn’t be doing my A-1C any favors.
This was one of the most inevitable developments of 2025: The Planetary Society is mounting a full-court press against the Trump Administration’s budget request for NASA. I have heard that Jack Kiraly is burning the shoe leather and the electrons on Capitol Hill this month; but now they’re publishing critical pieces in every venue they can manage to wrangle.
“NASA’s 2026 budget in brief: Unprecedented, unstrategic, and wasteful.” Casey Dreier and Jack Kiraly, The Space Review, June 16, 2025 | https://www.thespacereview.com/article/5007/1
“The administration’s anti-consensus Mars plan will fail.” Casey Dreier, Space News, June 15, 2025 | https://spacenews.com/the-administrations-anti-consensus-mars-plan-will-fail/
“The dark age of NASA science? Analyzing the FY 2026 budget proposal.” Jack Kiraly, Bruce Betts, Sarah al Ahmed, Planetary Radio (podcast), June 4, 2025 | https://www.planetary.org/planetary-radio/2025-fy-2026-budget-proposal
“The Planetary Society’s NASA Budget Briefing.” Casey Dreier, Jack Kiraly, The Planetary Society (Youtube Channel), June 12, 2015 | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=brzs7lNqyYU
They also did a big webinar briefing last Thursday: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_sIrY1J9nSkK1Y0Hq9559Lw#/registration
And I have heard there is a lot more in the pipeline in the coming days…
As Mr Zimmerman has already well documented, of course, a lot of this effort will be pushing on an open door on the Hill: A lot of rice bowls are imperiled. Congressmen and senators have noticed. There are thoughtful criticisms to be made of the PBR, perhaps (our host has event noted as much), but of course that’s not what’s going on here.
What strikes me is not the blowback, but that the administration has made no visible effort to defend or explain or lobby for its budget proposal. I realize Russ Vought is a busy guy, but it seems that in the White House scrum over Elon’s political influence, no one ever thought to put any effort into defending the plan. But it may just be the case that on space policy, there really isn’t anyone in charge, just factions and people contending with each other, and a president with much bigger things on his plate.
>>It uses a chronograph to block the Sun’s light in order to study the Sun’s corona, its atmosphere.<<
Is 'chronograph' the correct word? I thought that meant some kind of fancy/expensive watch…
todthen: Though I have read papers that use the term “chronograph” to describe a method for blocking the Sun’s light, in this case my use is incorrect. Proba-3 uses a second satellite dubbed “the occulter” to provide that blockage, flying in formation with the main spacecraft.
Thanks for the correction.
I think even Trump was shocked by Vought’s aggressive moves.
I might have kept any potential cuts in my back pocket as bargaining chips. Trump just let Vought go free range…and will likely let him run unmolested if only to avoid any more “TACO” nonsense. Trump doesn’t care enough about space to either support it or kill it.
Vought, however, makes Savonarola look like a piker.
Richard M,
The Planetary Society, quite predictably, is running around with its hair on fire over the proposed NASA budget. Ho hum. To whatever extent they are successful in mau-mauing an intrinsically pork-loving Congress into keeping all of the NASA parking lots full it simply brings nearer the time when the whole operation vapor locks from terminal bloat and managerial incompetence.
I will read at least some of their stuff out of a sometimes masochistic sense of duty, but I think we are rapidly approaching a juncture after which a lot of the Planetary Society’s favored hobby horses/sacred cows will die of terminal irrelevance and be rendered for pet food and glue.
todthen & Robert Zimmerman,
A chronograph is a type of clock. The word you want to describe the astronomy being done is coronagraph. “Chron” has to do with time. “Corona” has to do with the Sun’s atmosphere.
[Learnin’ all sorts of Spectrum-y factoids today!]
todthen–
Apparently, the defining features making a chronograph: combination stopwatch & display watch, of high accuracy.
Dick-
thank you, coronagraph!
I had to look that up! (Losin’ my mind by degrees….)
I assume these are analog mechanical devices, can they accomplish the same thing via Software?
Dick Eagleson: Of course. I misread the word “coronagraph” in the article as “chronograph.” The former is the term I’ve seen previously.
Today’s phys articles of note:
“From asteroid mining to space rustling–”
“Nanofibers yield stronger, tougher carbon fiber composite” -this from Oak Ridge
“Robots learn welding skills from humans to address welder shortages” I thought that was the case already.
“Physicists use 3D printed spines to sculpt water surface through surface tension.”
“Thermodynamics revisited: Study solves 120 year old problem and corrects one of Einstein’s ideas.”
The best article today is this:
“Scientists finally synthesize stable neutral nitrogen allotrope.”
Neutral Hexanitogen has double the explosion power of RDX and can last as a cryogenic for 132 years.
An all-nitrogen rocket next?
Vast has released a new video giving a virtual tour of the interior of Haven-1, narrated by former NASA astronaut Drew Feustel.
https://www.vastspace.com/haven-1-vr
It is also on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2qFOJc8iZo
Very clean, very sleek. Quite the contrast with the ISS.
“Coronagraph and the Occulter, flew 150 metres apart in perfect formation for several hours without any control from the ground.”
That takes perfect timing, so I reasoned that was the purpose of the title chronograph. it works for me.
One thing in the article that always triggers me is the declaration of a mystery in which they are still claiming there trying to solve.
“The Sun’s fiery corona reaches temperatures above a million degrees Celsius, much hotter than the surface beneath it. This counterintuitive temperature difference has long been a topic in the Scientific community”
A violation of the second law of thermodynamics. The equivalent in layman‘s terms of putting a sheet of ice in an oven, turning the upper element and the lower up to maximum temperature, and the ice remaining frozen… Even after billions of years it’s unchanged. Not possible.
The photosphere is so much colder then the interior of the Sun, or the Corona sphere over a thousand miles from the sun.
Jupiters interior is nearly 4 times hotter then the photosphere! And Saturn, Uranus and Neptune also rival the suns photosphere in interior temperature.
Eugene Parker explained his theories on how the sun works, he coined the word “micro flair” (now nano flare) the Soho satellite proved his theories true. Shows and books were produced on the subject in the 90s, but the “science” did not change. Established tradition and reputations would have been on the line. Billions in grant money for fission research would have been canceled.
It is fortunate that our Sun doesn’t demonstrate fission, our world would be lifeless if it was. Thousand times more radiation minimum. We get more energetic radiation from cosmic rays originating from outside our solar system then we do from the sun.
Max wrote: “A violation of the second law of thermodynamics. The equivalent in layman‘s terms of putting a sheet of ice in an oven, turning the upper element and the lower up to maximum temperature, and the ice remaining frozen… Even after billions of years it’s unchanged. Not possible.”
The second law of thermodynamics is for a closed system. The heat of the corona, the heat of the Sun’s surface, and the heat of the Sun’s interior is not the entire system. The oven model is incomplete.
For a couple of decades, solar astrophysicists looked into the possibility that recombinations of the magnetic fields near the surface of the Sun produced enough energy to heat the corona above the temperature of the surface. They have since concluded that these do not provide enough energy to account for the difference. However, the oven model does not include events such as this.
This is one of the mysteries of the Sun. As we are seeing, it will take much more investigation and innovative probes and experimentation to solve these mysteries.