Jumping the Timestream: A Note from 2013

Greetings! This is a note specifically relating to my son, Grayson. Basically, after a swim lesson this morning (July 22, 2013), we had such a fun day that I was wondering what (if any) of its focus might linger into the future. With that in mind, I thought I’d send this forward to a time […]

Historic Dragon Caught: Dawn of Commercial Space

Quite literally, the sun dawned across from the International Space Station minutes ago to reveal history in the making. During a flawless night-time “grab,” Astronaut Don Pettit used the station’s robotic Canada arm to successfully secure SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft. This makes SpaceX the first private company to launch a spacecraft into orbit and rendezvous with […]

SpaceX chasing rocketry’s Holy Grail

As many who follow and support spaceflight are well aware, a Holy Grail of modern space transportation is the concept of the fully reusable rocket, or Reusable Launch System/Vehicle (RLV). Now, NewSpace orbital spacecraft provider SpaceX might just have this elusive target squarely in its sights. Many solutions have been suggested to achieve the true […]

What happened to Zero-G Football?

Back in late 2005, a company called IPX Entertainment, (headed by Haughton-Mars Project veteran Rocky Persaud,) began promoting microgravity sports. With an interview with Leonard David, another on Ajax Developers Journal, and a piece written by Rocky himself on The Space Review, he championed the promise of repeat customers for viewing and participating in zero-g […]

Russia announces new Nuclear Rockets for manned Mars trip

For the first time in possibly four decades, two electrifying space technology phrases have managed to show up in the same sentence in earnest. Quietly nestled in the murky details of a somewhat thrilling AP news story about a potential new Russian spacecraft to be produced in the next few years are the words: “manned […]

Following Lockheed Martin’s “Stepping Stones” to Mars

The wake of the cancellation of NASA’s Constellation Program has been devastating to Lockheed Martin’s Orion spacecraft plans. They had been counting on the subsequently-canceled Ares series of rockets to loft Orion to the International Space Station (ISS) as a replacement for the retiring Space Shuttle, with eventual plans as the command module for future […]

Exploring Test Cell C with ArcGIS Online

The future is now. GIS forerunner company ESRI has recently published much of their geospatial analysis capability online… for free. Implementing the philosophy that knowledge is power and that all peoples and nations should be empowered to make smart and responsible decisions, ESRI is seeking to change the world by making powerful GIS tools available […]

Tales from a nuclear rocket station

One of the great pleasures of my research into the ’60s development of nuclear rockets for space exploration are moments like the following, which I pieced together from archival records and oral history… (If I find enough of these to write, I might collect them into a book sometime. Feedback welcome.) Richard Nutley, a supply […]

Liberating Ares in commercial rocket fray

The NewSpace rocket environment is growing from a band of determined forerunners to a healthy platoon. Salvaging what they could from NASA’s cancelled Ares I rocket, industry giant ATK (responsible for building Space Shuttle’s solid rocket boosters, a critical component in the Ares rocket design,) has teamed up with Eurpoean company Astrium (of Ariane 5 fame) […]

Yanks and Brits join forces to design private interstellar spacecraft

That whole American Revolution thing is water under the bridge for two forward-looking spacefaring organizations. In a joint venture between the Tau Zero Foundation, a private American advanced space propulsion charity, and the British Interplanetary Society, a spacecraft known as Project Icarus has taken shape. So, what exactly is Project Icarus? To put it simply, […]