Carnival of Space 650

1. Universe Today – CHEOPS Just Opened Its Eyes to Start Studying Known Exoplanets, We Should See the First Picture in a Few Weeks

The CHEOPS (CHaracterising ExOPlanets Satellite) spacecraft just opened the cover on its telescope. The spacecraft was launched on December 18th 2019 and has so far performed flawlessly. In one or two weeks we could get our first images from the instrument.

CHEOPS is an ESA mission in partnership with Switzerland’s University of Bern. Its mission is not to find exoplanets, but to look more closely at stars with known exoplanets, and to watch as those planets transit in front of their star. It will watch those transits with a keen eye, and will determine the size of those planets with greater accuracy and precision. That will lead to better measurements of their mass, density, and composition.

2. Universe Today – Astronomers See Space Twist Around A White Dwarf 12,000 Light Years Away

3. Universe Today – Destructive Super Solar Storms Hit Us Every 25 Years Or So

4. Universe Today – Voyager 2 Went Into Fault Protection Mode, But Engineers Brought it Back Online

5. Universe Today – This is the Spot Where ESA’s Schiaparelli Crashed Into Mars

6. Space writer- Hot Planets are out there!

7. The Hill – House panel proposes NASA bill that would scrap the lunar base — or maybe not

8. Pradx me – Podcast show notes from the beginnings of astrobiology in India from the NewSpace India podcast

9. Space Writer – Flammable Ice

10. Nextbigfuture – SpaceX Will IPO Starlink.

SpaceX COO Gwynn Shotwell says that SpaceX will likely spinoff the Starlink satellite network with an IPO.

SpaceX is launching 60 Starlink satellites with every Falcon 9 launch. They are four successful launches from minimum global coverage.

420 satellites are needed for minor broadband coverage of Earth and 780 of the first ~1600 for moderate coverage.

2 thoughts on “Carnival of Space 650”

  1. Thing about it friend,…

    When you are a supplier to an agency that has a Director of Diversity, and a Provist of Inclusiveness, an PC Investment divestment arm, 500 congressional districts wanting their unfair share of the pie, another 2,500 institutions having no conceivable authority to pitch their variance-of-design, yet who do, and a government that has NO AUTHORITY to “say no” to any and all crackpot considerations … 

    When you have those impositions AND the tertiary imposition of “we don’t have as much money as you need this year, ladies” approach at funding, well … 5 year projects take 15 years or more. 

    The mountains of paperwork must by law be imaged, boxed, duplicated, dispersed, mailed and posted to everyone. 

    Everything needs committees to check the committees that check the work, and the budgeting offices that budget for the overhead of providing budgeting guidance for the budget watchdogs of Congress and her special district needs.  

    Then there are the Holy of Holies mandates, the shibboleths, the sacred cows, the Oracles that Must Be Obeyed.  

    Obeisance, given. 
    Tithing, done. 

    Prostrating before the Altar of Congress’s Lobbies, with lobbyists aplenty, lunches served, deductions made, contributions siphoned, security bought, paid, rented, fired.  

    You have any wonder, really, why a 5 year project has now taken 13 years?

    Me, none. 

    ⋅-⋅-⋅ Just saying, ⋅-⋅-⋅
    ⋅-=≡ GoatGuy ✓ ≡=-⋅

  2. I am still very irritated at all the delays and cost overruns of the James Webb Space Telescope. In my opinion, Northrop Grumman should never be awarded another contract. Supposed to have been launched in 2007. What could possibly justify this absurd delay. Did not take that much time from Kennedy’s speech to the Moon landings…all of them.
    If they keep their current deadline, it will have been 25 years of design and construction.

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