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"That's no moon ! - that's a Belarus arse-cheek"
(At least judging from the size of the tractor seat).
 
Elon Musk used the first female pilot today in the latest Space X launch. ...

That would be "first female pilot of a SpaceX Dragon."

There were multiple female Space Shuttle pilots and / or mission commanders dating back to 1995, and if you count her spacecraft as "piloted" the first female pilot in space was Valentina Tereshkova (Vostok 6; 1963).
 
That would be "first female pilot of a SpaceX Dragon."

There were multiple female Space Shuttle pilots and / or mission commanders dating back to 1995, and if you count her spacecraft as "piloted" the first female pilot in space was Valentina Tereshkova (Vostok 6; 1963).
Im not sure anyone actually pilots the dragon, i think they are all pretty much passengers on Musks space Uber.
 
There was the old joke that an astronaut was sent up in a capsule with a monkey.
The monkey was doing all the work, pressing all the buttons, pulling the levers etc etc.
The astronaut asked 'Why am I here if the monkey is doing all the work'
The reply was 'You're there to feed the monkey'.
 
The Dragon was almost destroyed on it way to the ISS.

According to Space.Com an emergency was declared as everyone put on their space suits again and braced for impact.

NASA said probably space junk came close to the the Dragon but missed.

NASA did not explain what the space junk was.
 
The Dragon was almost destroyed on it way to the ISS.

According to Space.Com an emergency was declared as everyone put on their space suits again and braced for impact.

NASA said probably space junk came close to the the Dragon but missed.

NASA did not explain what the space junk was.

Elon Musk's car?
 
At this moment the ISS is crowded with 11 people.

There is not enough beds so some will have to Velcro to the walls.

I guess in space it does not matter, but how many bathrooms do they have ?

I understand they clean themselves with special liquid soap, water, and dry hair shampoo, but water is limited.

Part of being an astronaut is ignoring the “ locker room smell “.
 

Posting this because it is weird. Someone presents SpaceX... in Latin.
 
The SpaceX crew has the “ luck of the Irish “ twice.

Beside missing space junk 6 and 1/2 hours into their flight to the ISS, ABC TV nightly news showed that 12 minutes into their flight their video feed showed when the Dragon and Falcon-9 rocket first separated, something flew in between that narrow space between the Dragon and rocket.

Another collision barely missed by inches.
 
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Thanks EnolaGaia for putting on the video. !

You have to say that video shows a weird situation.
 
Yes, it does look weird. If you watch closely there are other similar bits floating around at the time, but this one is either much larger or much closer to the camera.

According to the ABC News voice-over it's been suggested the mystery object is a chunk of ice.
 
NASA stops the moon program for 100 days to give Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin time to object to the Moon Landing contract going to Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Jeff wants the contract.
 
NASA stops the moon program for 100 days to give Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin time to object to the Moon Landing contract going to Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Jeff wants the contract.
I say they should all work together. This is too big for egos and money-grabbing.
 
all work together....

I think the idea is that NASA deliberately seeded the idea of 'contracting out' a lot of stuff to private companies in order to drive competition between different possible suppliers so that the speed of advancement would be greater.
Making these competing companies 'work together' would most likely be counter-productive.
 
I think the idea is that NASA deliberately seeded the idea of 'contracting out' a lot of stuff to private companies in order to drive competition between different possible suppliers so that the speed of advancement would be greater.
Making these competing companies 'work together' would most likely be counter-productive.
There is that. Good point.
 
Humanity has been treading water for 40 years. Competition got us to the Moon. Competition is what will get us back there.
 
Speaking of treading water.
I see the latest Dragon capsule has returned to earth (or rather, returned to sea) with a night-time splashdown in the waters off the coast of Florida.
This is the first night-time splashdown in 53 years, the last time being when Apollo 8 returned.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-56962120

Apollo 8s 'landing' wasn't exactly 'plain sailing' (sorry)
The spacecraft splashdown position was officially reported as 8°8′N 165°1′W in the North Pacific Ocean, southwest of Hawaii at 15:51:42 UTC on December 27, 1968.
When the spacecraft hit the water, the parachutes dragged it over and left it upside down, in what was termed Stable 2 position. As they were buffeted by a 10-foot (3.0 m) swell, Borman was sick, waiting for the three flotation balloons to right the spacecraft.


So Frank Borman managed to travel to the moon by rocket, orbit it, and return, and then barfed due to seasickness, lol.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_8#Cruise_back_to_Earth_and_reentry
 
Elon Musk will launch an all civilian space crew aboard the Dragon this fall.

The crew at 300 miles up will circle the for earth 3 days.

The crew will consist of a cancer survivor, a billionaire, an engineer, and a science teacher.
 
Elon Musk will launch an all civilian space crew aboard the Dragon this fall.

The crew at 300 miles up will circle the for earth 3 days.

The crew will consist of a cancer survivor, a billionaire, an engineer, and a science teacher.
What could go wrong :oops:
I suppose it is only a taxi service to the ISS.
 
Yup the SN15 flight was excellent.

My only criticism is that, despite all the advanced technology on display, they can't seem to find a way of providing decent coverage.
There seems to be a number of issues including 'cameras that don't work properly or point in the wrong direction', 'signal failure/freezing', 'poor picture quality', etc etc.
Also the issue of 'many different live feeds', which means that when I'm watching on the PC I have to have several windows open with the pictures coming from different providers, as otherwise (like with one of the previous flights) I find that I miss the launch ascent as the camera stays focused on the launch pad.

But apart from that...all good.
I expect that the plan with SN15 now is to turn it around for a refuel and another flight ASAP?
 
Jeff Bezos has offered NASA billions of dollars if they take way the moon lander building contract from Elon Musk.

I thought this was against the U.S. law ?
 
Jeff Bezos has offered NASA billions of dollars if they take way the moon lander building contract from Elon Musk.

I thought this was against the U.S. law ?
It is and its just not - polite - the correctly courteous thing is to sue.
 
I think it's actually the case that Bezos has offered to continue developing his Lunar Lander plans with the partner companies throughout the next couple of years without receiving any payment from NASA.
Essentially giving NASA the option of 2 different suppliers, as per their original plan.
NASA were forced into putting 'all their bets on one horse' when they were advised that their funding would be cut significantly, and they opted for the SpaceX supply as they had already got proven orbital ships and repeated safe launches, and a higher level of technical and managerial abilities.
 
The U.S. government tells Bezos that Elon Musk will build the moon lander.
 
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