Category Archives: Space Travel

Anybody who fancies watching a new science fiction film this month can count their lucky stars. A Netflix drama, Stowaway, features Anna Kendrick, Toni Collette and Daniel Dae Kim as a trio of astronauts who are on their way to Mars when they discover that an unfortunate launch-plan engineer, Shamier Anderson, is still onboard. The trouble is, there is only enough oxygen for three of them. American viewers can also see Voyagers (due for release in Britain in July), in which 30 hormonal starship passengers are preparing to colonise another world. The trouble is, something goes wrong on their mission, too, and the trip turns into an interplanetary Lord of the Flies. The moral of both stories is that you should probably push astronaut a few slots down your list of dream jobs. But if youve caught any other science fiction films recently, its bound to be quite far down the list, anyway.

Again and again over the past decade, cinema has warned us that venturing beyond the Earths atmosphere is uncomfortable, dangerous, exhaustingly difficult, frequently tedious, and almost certain to involve interplanetary angst and asphyxiation. George Clooneys morose The Midnight Sky rounded off 2020 with a fatal spacewalk. Aniara and Passengers posited that existence on a colony ship was a lot grimmer than Wall-E had led us to believe. The sad dads in space sub-genre coalesced with Brad Pitts Freudian moping in Ad Astra, and Robert Pattinsons in High Life. No wonder todays youngsters would rather be YouTubers or influencers than astronauts. The overriding thesis of current science fiction films is this: space travel is rubbish.

The films in question are usually hard sci-fi. They unfold in the near future, as opposed to the 25th century, or a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. The characters dont have snazzy Lycra uniforms, they have bulky spacesuits and fish-bowl helmets. They dont use warp drives or teleporters to zip around the cosmos, theyre stuck with industrial-looking vehicles that trundle through the void for months or years. Instead of fighting acid-blood xenomorphs, they have to fend off dogs (High Life) or baboons (Ad Astra) or, more often, each other. Orgies and/or murders are inevitable. Life-support systems are unreliable. And even the sturdiest spacecraft is just one asteroid shower away from being scrap metal. Dont imagine that astronauts have a cheerier time on Earth, either. Judging by the characters played by Eva Green in Proxima and Natalie Portman in Lucy in the Sky, the only thing more upsetting than going to space is preparing to go, or coming back afterwards.

The space travel is rubbish (STIR) trope had been touched on before, of course, in such classics as 2001: A Space Odyssey, Solaris and Silent Running. But a new fleet of STIR films blasted off the launchpad when Alfonso Cuarns Gravity came out in 2013, and screenwriters everywhere scribbled debris cloud and tether snaps during spacewalk in their notebooks. The other big trendsetter was a similarly well-researched and painstakingly realised survival drama: in 2015, Ridley Scotts The Martian argued that an astronauts life wasnt about boldly going where no man has gone before, but about growing potatoes in your own poo. After that, there were two tributes to Neil Armstrong, Damien Chazelles First Man in 2018 and the Apollo 11 documentary in 2019; neither of them science fiction, but both of them key to reminding us that science fact can be traumatising enough in itself. And since then, countless films have pinched their bleak plots and melancholy moods from David Bowies Space Oddity: Here am I sitting in a tin can ... Your circuits dead, theres something wrong ...

Dr Keith M Johnston, the author of Science Fiction Film: A Critical Introduction, sees the STIR wave as a reaction to two things. The first of these is the Marvel, DC and Star Wars blockbusters that have cornered the market in monsters and ray guns. That side of sci-fi is fairly well catered for, he says, so elsewhere the genre has turned away from glossy big-budget fun and back to something serious. Even the more far-fetched of the last decades science fiction films, such as Interstellar, have dwelled on the emotional toll and technological hassle of flying across the universe. Meanwhile, the alien invasions in Arrival, Annihilation and Color Out of Space have invited us to gaze into the abyss, and not Will Smith-style to punch the abyss in its bug-eyed face.

Another thing these films are responding to, says Johnston, is the contemporary reality of space exploration and communication. We get regular updates from the International Space Station, we see people talking to us, singing to us, doing experiments, so we get used to the idea that being an astronaut is a job with large stretches of mundanity. Nasas television channel, Nasa TV, is the same. With the Mars rovers, youve got the launch, and youve got the big event, which is the landing, and in between there are months where nothing is happening. Whats even more disillusioning, says Johnston, is the ego-driven work of the billionaire build-a-rocket boys, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson. Theyre taking the excitement out of space travel.

But what about the sheer gloominess of these STIR films? Considering that so many of their characters are searching for somewhere new to live, because our own planet is in such a mess, its fair to assume that climate change is a factor. They tackle the terrestrial environment from three directions, says Dr Mark Bould, author of The Anthropocene Unconscious: Climate Catastrophe Culture. Gravity, for instance, points out that space is really inhospitable, and our only hope for survival as a species is Earth. Aniara shows that space is really big, so dont waste time planning on there being a Planet B any time soon. And the miserable-astronauts-back-on-Earth movies suggest that the planet we have fashioned through our economic, social and political systems might be biologically habitable, but is a pretty miserable world even for the absurdly privileged white folks of the global north. So ... dont come to science fiction for escapism. The message is that theres no escape.

One curious aspect of these films, with their isolation and anxiety, is that they seem to be tailor-made for lockdown viewing, despite being products of the pre-Covid-19 era. If they had come out in the next 10 years, rather than the last 10, I would have said that they were all about being cooped up at home with the same people for weeks on end. As it is, they can claim to be what so few science fiction films ever are: genuinely ahead of their time.

Stowaway is released on Netflix on 22 April.

Excerpt from:

Sitting in a tin can: why sci-fi films are finally telling astronaut life like it is - The Guardian

Everetts Christopher Sembroski always loved looking up. He grew up stargazing, learned to launch model rockets, but couldnt fathom ever becoming a space traveler.

In all of history, fewer than 600 people have gone into space. I had a better shot at getting into the NBA, the 41-year-old data engineer and father of two girls said Friday.

Yet if all goes according to the plans of a tech billionaire, Sembroski is just months away from three days in space. On a mission called Inspiration4, he is to be launched, in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule atop a Falcon 9 rocket at Floridas Kennedy Space Center, along with three others. The hope is to launch sometime after mid-September.

Jared Isaacman, the CEO of Shift4 Payments, is commander of the philanthropic mission aimed at raising millions of dollars for St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital in Memphis. The high-flying Isaacman, who has piloted military jets in airshows, is paying for whats billed as the first all-civilian mission to space.

If you watched Super Bowl commercials Feb. 7, you may vaguely remember one that started with an angelic voice singing Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. It ended with an invitation to visit Inspiration4.com for your chance to go to space.

Although he considers himself a space geek, Sembroski hadnt heard of Inspiration4 before seeing the ad.

I had no clue about any of this, said Sembroski, a reliability engineer with Lockheed Martin who works from home. Hes also an Air Force veteran, once stationed in Montana with the 341st Missile Maintenance Squadron. His wife, Erin Duncan-Sembroski, teaches sixth-grade English at Explorer Middle School in the Mukilteo district. Their daughters are 3 and 9.

Life has taken an out-of-this-world turn for Sembroski, who enjoys hiking and other outdoor fun.

Seeing the Super Bowl ad, he donated not a fortune, but he didnt share how much to the St. Jude cause. That put his name in the running. But it was a friend whod attended Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida with Sembroski who actually won the chance for the low-earth-orbit mission.

That friend, whos keeping a low profile, decided against going.

By early March, Sembroski was on a dizzying journey toward space flight. He learned in a Zoom meeting with his college pal and Isaacman that hed be filling the seat his friend had declined. Within days, Sembroski traveled to the SpaceX facility in Hawthorne, California, founded by Tesla billionaire Elon Musk, and to UCLA Medical Center for physical tests.

Along with Isaacman and Sembroski, the Dragon crew includes pilot Sian Proctor and Hayley Arceneaux. A survivor of childhood bone cancer, Arceneaux works at St. Jude Childrens Research Hospital as a physician assistant.

At the National Aerospace Training and Research Center in Pennsylvania, the crew experienced centrifuge training. The NASTAR Center specializes in training for commercial spaceflight. In what almost seems like a wild carnival ride, the trainee is seated in a capsule at the end of a long arm and the thing rotates rapidly.

Its so exhilarating and a lot of fun, Sembroski said of the high G-force training. The gravitational pull helps prepare a person for the rigors of a launch, he said.

Another heady experience the publicity came March 30. Thats when the world learned that Sembroski and Proctor, an Arizona community college instructor and space enthusiast, would join Isaacman and Arceneaux on the mission. The New York Times, NBCs Today show and other news outlets prominently featured the crew.

The crew members seats are labeled, with Sembroski representing Generosity, Arceneaux standing for Hope and Proctor for Prosperity. One message of the mission, Sembroski said, is that you dont need to have deep pockets to show generosity.

It is my hope that this flight will inspire others to pay that generosity forward by pledging their support for St. Jude and encouraging kids to dream the impossible, ushering in a new era of space exploration open to all, he said in a statement.

Sembroski grew up in Kannapolis, North Carolina, outside Charlotte. As a teenager, he took to late-night stargazing from the roof of his high school. By college, he had moved on to launching high-powered model rockets. And he volunteered with ProSpace, a lobbying effort that promoted legislation to help foster space travel and clear the way for companies such as SpaceX.

About 20 years ago, Sembroski was helping inspire kids as a Space Camp counselor. The camp, part of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama, once had a Florida location. It was there that Sembroski helped conduct simulated Space Shuttle missions and encouraged kids to concentrate on STEM subjects.

Many of our children who come to Space Camp want to be astronauts, said Pat Ammons, Space Camps senior communications director. As commercial space develops, this is sort of a hope to all those who carry that dream.

NASA astronaut Kate Rubins, who was scheduled to return from the International Space Station this weekend, is a Space Camp alumna, Ammons said.

Along with maintaining Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles, Sembroski was deployed to Iraq while in the Air Force. He and his family moved here in 2007 after he left active duty. He said they moved from Great Falls, Montana, because they love this area and all the things people do in the Pacific Northwest.

During those three days in orbit at an altitude of about 335 miles, more than 100 miles higher than the space station Sembroski said hes most excited about looking back at earth. Hell be taking an iPad and plans to keep a journal. Splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean will await the space travelers.

To become a civilian astronaut, Sembroski is working with a physical trainer to build strength. Hell spend time with the Inspiration4 crew, and do some mountaineering. Hell keep his Lockheed Martin job, and of course the duties and joys of fatherhood. The 9-year-old knows whats up, he said, but not so much her little sister.

Sembroski recently spent an evening making smores with his family around their fire pit. Its a regimen far different than what those early astronauts, chronicled in Tom Wolfes The Right Stuff, endured. Its a side gig Ill do on weekends, Sembroski said.

He didnt see it coming, but at 41 hes about to be a spaceman.

Its surreal, he said.

Julie Muhlstein: jmuhlstein@heraldnet.com

Learn more

Information about the Inspiration4 mission: inspiration4.com

Gallery

Everetts Christopher Sembroski during centrifuge training at the NASTAR Center in Pennsylvania. (John Kraus/Inspiration4 photo)

The crew of the Inspiration4 mission planned for later this year, from left, Jared Isaacman, Sian Proctor, Hayley Arceneaux, and Everetts Christopher Sembroski. (John Kraus/Inspiration4 photo)

Go here to see the original:

Everett's own spaceman thrilled to join all-civilian mission | HeraldNet.com - The Daily Herald

In 1994, physicist Miguel Alcubierre proposed a radical technology that would allow faster than light travel: the warp drive, a hypothetical way to skirt around the universes ultimate speed limit by bending the fabric of reality.

It was an intriguing idea even NASA has been researching it at the Eagleworks laboratory but Alcubierres proposal contained problems that seemed insurmountable. Now, a recent paper by US-based physicists Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire has resolved many of those issues and generated a lot of buzz.

But while Bobrick and Martire have managed to substantially demystify warp technology, their work actually suggests that faster-than-light travel will remain out of reach for beings like us, at least for the time being.

There is, however, a silver lining: warp technology may have radical applications beyond space travel.

The story of warp drives starts with Einsteins crowning achievement: general relativity. The equations of general relativity capture the way in which spacetime the very fabric of reality bends in response to the presence of matter and energy which, in turn, explains how matter and energy move.

General relativity places two constraints on interstellar travel. First, nothing can be accelerated past the speed of light (around 300,000 km per second). Even travelling at this dizzying speed it would still take us four years to arrive at Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to our Sun.

Second, the clock on a spaceship travelling close to the speed of light would slow down relative to a clock on Earth (this is known as time dilation). Assuming a constant state of acceleration, this makes it possible to travel the stars. One can reach a distant star that is 150 lightyears away within ones lifetime. The catch, however, is that upon ones return more than 300 years will have passed on Earth.

This is where Alcubierre came in. He argued that the mathematics of general relativity allowed for warp bubbles regions where matter and energy were arranged in such a way as to bend spacetime in front of the bubble and expand it to the rear in a way that allowed a flat area inside the bubble to travel faster than light.

Read more: Don't stop me now! Superluminal travel in Einstein's universe

To get a sense of what flat means in this context, note that spacetime is sort of like a rubber mat. The mat curves in the presence of matter and energy (think of putting a bowling ball on the mat). Gravity is nothing more than the tendency objects have to roll into the the dents created by things like stars and planets. A flat region is like a part of the mat with nothing on it.

Such a drive would also avoid the uncomfortable consequences of time dilation. One could potentially make a round trip into deep space and still be greeted by ones nearest and dearest at home.

How does Alcubierres device work? Here discussion often relies on analogies, because the maths is so complex.

Imagine a rug with a cup on it. Youre on the rug and you want to get to the cup. You could move across the rug, or tug the rug toward you. The warp drive is like tugging on spacetime to bring your destination closer.

But analogies have their limits: a warp drive doesnt really drag your destination toward you. It contracts spacetime to make your path shorter. Theres just less rug between you and the cup when you switch the drive on.

Alcubierres suggestion, while mathematically rigorous, is difficult to understand at an intuitive level. Bobrick and Martires work is set to change all that.

Bobrick and Martire show that any warp drive must be a shell of material in a constant state of motion, enclosing a flat region of spacetime. The energy of the shell modifies the properties of the spacetime region inside it.

This might not sound like much of a discovery, but until now it was unclear what warp drives might be, physically speaking. Their work tells us that a warp drive is, somewhat surprisingly, like a car. A car is also a shell of energy (in the form of matter) that encloses a flat region of spacetime. The difference is that getting inside a car does not make you age faster. That, however, is the kind of thing a warp drive might do.

Using their simple description, Bobrick and Martire demonstrate a method for using Einsteins general relativity equations to find spacetimes that allow for arrangements of matter and energy that would act as warp bubbles. This gives us a mathematical key for finding and classifying warp technologies.

Their work manages to address one of the core problems for warp drives. To make the equations balance, Alcubierres device runs on negative energy but we are yet to discover any viable sources of negative energy in the real world.

Worse, the negative energy requirements of Alcubierres device are immense. By some estimates, the entire energy in the known universe would be needed (though later work brings the number down a bit).

Bobrick and Martire show a warp drive could be made from positive energy (i.e. normal energy) or from a mixture of negative and positive energy. That said, the energy requirements would still be immense.

If Bobrick and Martire are right, then a warp drive is just like any other object in motion. It would be subject to the universal speed limit enforced by general relativity after all, and it would need some kind of conventional propulsion system to make it accelerate.

The news gets worse. Many kinds of warp drive can only modify the spacetime inside in a certain way: by slowing down the clock of the passenger in exactly the way that makes a trip into deep space a problem.

Bobrick and Martire do show that some warp drives could travel faster than light, but only if they are created already travelling at that speed which is no help for any ordinary human hoping for a bit of interstellar tourism.

Remember that a warp drive can modify the region of flat spacetime it encloses. It can, in particular, speed up or slow down a clock inside the drive.

Consider what it would mean to have such an object available. Want to put someone with a terminal illness on ice? Stick them in a warp drive and slow their clock down. From their perspective, a few years will pass, while a hundred years will pass on Earth time enough to find a cure.

Read more: The art and beauty of general relativity

Want to grow your crops overnight? Stick them in a warp drive and speed the clock up. A few days will pass for you, and a few weeks will pass for your seedlings.

There are even more exotic possibilities: by rotating the spacetime inside a drive one may be able to produce a battery capable of holding huge amounts of energy.

Faster-than-light travel remains a distant dream. But warp technology would be revolutionary in its own right.

Read more from the original source:

New warp drive research dashes faster than light travel dreams but reveals stranger possibilities - The Conversation AU

In 1994, physicist Miguel Alcubierre proposed a radical technology that would allow faster-than-light travel: the warp drive, a hypothetical way to skirt around the universes ultimate speed limit by bending the fabric of reality.

It was an intriguing ideaeven NASA has been researching it at the Eagleworks laboratorybut Alcubierres proposal contained problems that seemed insurmountable. Now, a recent paper by US-based physicists Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire has resolved many of those issues and generated a lot of buzz.

But while Bobrick and Martire have managed to substantially demystify warp technology, their work actually suggests that faster-than-light travel will remain out of reach for beings like us, at least for the time being.

There is, however, a silver lining: warp technology may have radical applications beyond space travel.

The story of warp drives starts with Einsteins crowning achievement: general relativity. The equations of general relativity capture the way in which spacetimethe very fabric of realitybends in response to the presence of matter and energy which, in turn, explains how matter and energy move.

General relativity places two constraints on interstellar travel. First, nothing can be accelerated past the speed of light (around 300,000 kilometers per second). Even traveling at this dizzying speed it would still take us four years to arrive at Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to our Sun.

Second, the clock on a spaceship traveling close to the speed of light would slow down relative to a clock on Earth (this is known as time dilation). Assuming a constant state of acceleration, this makes it possible to travel to the stars. One can reach a distant star that is 150 lightyears away within ones lifetime. The catch, however, is that upon ones return more than 300 years will have passed on Earth.

This is where Alcubierre came in. He argued that the mathematics of general relativity allowed for warp bubblesregions where matter and energy were arranged in such a way as to bend spacetime in front of the bubble and expand it to the rear in a way that allowed a flat area inside the bubble to travel faster than light.

To get a sense of what flat means in this context, note that spacetime is sort of like a rubber mat. The mat curves in the presence of matter and energy (think of putting a bowling ball on the mat). Gravity is nothing more than the tendency objects have to roll into the the dents created by things like stars and planets. A flat region is like a part of the mat with nothing on it.

Such a drive would also avoid the uncomfortable consequences of time dilation. One could potentially make a round trip into deep space and still be greeted by ones nearest and dearest at home.

How does Alcubierres device work? Here, discussion often relies on analogies, because the math is so complex.

Imagine a rug with a cup on it. Youre on the rug and you want to get to the cup. You could move across the rug, or tug the rug toward you. The warp drive is like tugging on spacetime to bring your destination closer.

But analogies have their limits: a warp drive doesnt really drag your destination toward you. It contracts spacetime to make your path shorter. Theres just less rug between you and the cup when you switch the drive on.

Alcubierres suggestion, while mathematically rigorous, is difficult to understand at an intuitive level. Bobrick and Martires work is set to change all that.

Bobrick and Martire show that any warp drive must be a shell of material in a constant state of motion, enclosing a flat region of spacetime. The energy of the shell modifies the properties of the spacetime region inside it.

This might not sound like much of a discovery, but until now it was unclear what warp drives might be, physically speaking. Their work tells us that a warp drive is, somewhat surprisingly, like a car. A car is also a shell of energy (in the form of matter) that encloses a flat region of spacetime. The difference is that getting inside a car does not make you age faster. That, however, is the kind of thing a warp drive might do.

Using their simple description, Bobrick and Martire demonstrate a method for using Einsteins general relativity equations to find spacetimes that allow for arrangements of matter and energy that would act as warp bubbles. This gives us a mathematical key for finding and classifying warp technologies.

Their work manages to address one of the core problems for warp drives. To make the equations balance, Alcubierres device runs on negative energybut we are yet to discover any viable sources of negative energy in the real world.

A two-dimensional visualization of an Alcubierre drive. Expanding and contracting regions of spacetime on opposite sides of the central flat region cause it to move. Image Credit: Applied Physics

Worse, the negative energy requirements of Alcubierres device are immense. By some estimates, the entire energy in the known universe would be needed (though later work brings the number down a bit).

Bobrick and Martire show a warp drive could be made from positive energy (i.e., normal energy) or from a mixture of negative and positive energy. That said, the energy requirements would still be immense.

If Bobrick and Martire are right, then a warp drive is just like any other object in motion. It would be subject to the universal speed limit enforced by general relativity after all, and it would need some kind of conventional propulsion system to make it accelerate.

The news gets worse. Many kinds of warp drive can only modify the spacetime inside in a certain way: by slowing down the clock of the passenger in exactly the way that makes a trip into deep space a problem.

Bobrick and Martire do show that some warp drives could travel faster than light, but only if they are created already traveling at that speedwhich is no help for any ordinary human hoping for a bit of interstellar tourism.

Remember that a warp drive can modify the region of flat spacetime it encloses. It can, in particular, speed up or slow down a clock inside the drive.

Consider what it would mean to have such an object available. Want to put someone with a terminal illness on ice? Stick them in a warp drive and slow their clock down. From their perspective, a few years will pass, while a hundred years will pass on Earthtime enough to find a cure.

Want to grow your crops overnight? Stick them in a warp drive and speed the clock up. A few days will pass for you, and a few weeks will pass for your seedlings.

There are even more exotic possibilities: by rotating the spacetime inside a drive one may be able to produce a battery capable of holding huge amounts of energy.

Faster-than-light travel remains a distant dream. But warp technology would be revolutionary in its own right.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Image Credit: Mathew Schwartz / Unsplash

Read more here:

New Warp Drive Research Dashes Faster-Than-Light Travel Dreamsbut Reveals Stranger Possibilities - Singularity Hub

The Soyuz MS-17 mission took off 185 days ago, and after six months of research on the ISS, NASA astronaut Kate Rubins andRussian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov returned to Earth safe and sound on Saturday, April 17th.

On March 19th, the trio boarded the Soyuz MS-17 "for a port relocation maneuver, moving the spacecraft from the Rassvet module to the space-facing port of the Poisk module. The relocation allowed the Soyuz MS-18 spacecraft and its crew to dock to the Rassvet module upon their arrival on April 9th."

This weekend, the capsule landed in the southeast part of the Dzhezkazgan city in Kazakhstan. It was Kate Rubins' and Sergey Ryzhikov's second spaceflight and the first flight for Sergey Kud-Sverchkov.

Kate Rubins was selected in 2009 as one of nine members of the 20th NASA astronaut class. She received a thorough training in "scientific and technical briefings, intensive instruction in International Space Station systems, spacewalks, robotics, physiology, T 38 flight and water and wilderness survival".

In the past six months,the astronaut has spent her time working on theISS conducting experiments, researching, and studying the space station's microbiome. She continued her research on DNA sequencing based on experiments she conducted during her first mission in 2016. Her work represents a crucial step in identifying potential risks for astronauts that adventure in space travel.

On Wednesday, April 21st, a meeting will take place in which Kate Rubins will talk in detail about her mission on ISS. The news conference will be broadcasted on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agency's social accounts.

Excerpt from:

NASA Astronaut Kate Rubins and Crewmates Return From ISS After 185 Days in Space - autoevolution

It has been 40 years since I saw the first space shuttle thunder into the blue Cape Canaveral sky on Apr. 12, 1981. I covered the spaceships premier launch as a columnist for the Athens Observer newspaper. The first flight of the mighty machine was a must-see, so I flew down to Florida to view the launch of Columbia and write my impressions of the historic event.

I have been a long-time space buff ever since my childhood days watching Flash Gordon and Captain Video on early 1950s black-and-white television and reading the science fiction tales of Ray Bradbury and Arthur C. Clark. I was captivated by Walt Disneys 1955 television series about space travel narrated by Wernher von Braun, the World War II Nazi rocket scientist who was brought to America after the war to lead the postwar U.S. space program. I was amazed at the age of 10 in 1957 when Russias Sputnik became the first satellite to orbit Earth, and I have for decades followed the space programs of both the Soviets and the Americans that culminated in footsteps on the moon and space stations orbiting Earth. As an Athens writer, I have covered such events as protest marches, political conventions and presidential inaugurations for many years, but being on the scene for the first space shuttle launch was an event that is indelibly etched into my mind.

As the day of the spaceships launch neared, towns like Titusville and Cocoa Beach near the launch site bustled with excitement. The ambiance of the area that calls itself the Space Coast was like a high-tech version of Dodge City during a cattle drive. Flags festooned town roads, and businesses posted signs and banners voicing messages like Good luck, astronauts and Hail Columbia. Newspapers published special editions to commemorate the upcoming launch. The Orlando Sentinel Stars special edition featured a large color photo of the shuttle on the launch pad and a huge headline blaring Space Odyssey: 1981. Hotels, motels, bars and restaurants on the Space Coast were packed with tourists and reporters, and local people were thrilled that the area would be back in the space business after a long lull in manned launches since the Apollo and Skylab programs ended in the mid-1970s. Titusville resident R.H. Scobie beamed with pride over the space shuttle as he said to me, Its like Buck Rogers! Who would ever think wed have it? Its beautiful, partner. Its beautiful.

Columbia indeed was beautiful as it stood on the far horizon in the predawn hours before launch, bathed in spotlights and clutched in the steel embrace of its service tower. Hundreds of thousands of people from all over America and around the world were camped out in viewing areas along the Indian River, at Jetty Park, and in the nearby towns of Cocoa Beach and Titusville, all waiting with Zen-like patience for the countdown to come to its dramatic denouement. Car stereos blared Elton Johns Rocket Man and David Bowies Space Oddity. A computer glitch had caused the cancelation of the launch two days before, but the crowd was confident on the morning of Apr. 12, 1981, as astronauts John Young and Bob Crippen boarded their spacecraft.

When the countdown dropped to zero, the crowd was on its feet. An instant orange glow erupted from the faraway launch site, and Columbia fairly vaulted into the early morning sky, trailing billowing smoke and flames hundreds of feet in length as it roared its way into orbit. All around me people shouted, cried, screamed and prayed as the spaceship disappeared from view in just two heart-stopping minutes. Along with many others, I wiped tears from my eyes after the launch. We had seen the future, and it worked.

It was exactly 20 years to the day after Russias Yuri Gagarin became the first human to travel in space on Apr. 12, 1961. Later, I would cover other space shuttle launches, including the first night flight in 1983 and legendary astronaut John Glenns return to space aboard a shuttle in 1998, but the first space shuttle flight 40 years ago was history that I will always remember seeing.

Like what you just read? Support Flagpole by making a donation today. Every dollar you give helps fund our ongoing mission to provide Athens with quality, independent journalism.

Continued here:

I Watched the First Space Shuttle Flight 40 Years Ago | Flagpole - Flagpole Magazine

Vin Diesel in Fast & Furious 9.

Screengrab: YouTube/The Fast Saga

Sony has just released a new trailer for Fast 9, and it includes planes, magnet bombs, space travel, a cameo from Paul Walker, Helen Mirren behind the wheel, and Han's official return.

The 3-minute clip gives fans of the franchise an extensive look into what they can expect from the upcoming movie.

Following the events of The Fate of the Furious, Dominic Torreto (Vin Diesel) and the family must face his younger brother, Jakob (John Cena), who has teamed up with their old enemy, Cipher (Charlize Theron).

WATCH IT HERE:

One of the most notable reveals is Han Lue's return (Sung Kang), whose character presumably died in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, director Justin Lin said about Han's return: "When I left [after Fast 6], I came in with Han, I'm leaving with Han. So, if there was no justice for Han and I came back, I probably wouldn't have brought him back."

Speaking about the character's return, Vin Diesel told the publication that there's something very special and magical about the Han character.

"When you see the movie, you'll feel it, but I believe at the core it's another testament to, not only don't turn your back on family, but don't give up on family," said Vin.

View post:

The new trailer for Fast 9 teases space travel, a cameo from Paul Walker, and more! - News24

UKRAINE - 2021/02/21: In this photo illustration a Spacex logo is seen on a smartphone and a pc ... [+] screen. (Photo Illustration by Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Elon Musks privately held rocket company SpaceX raised around $1.16 billion via equity funding over the last two months per SEC filings, with the company now reportedly being valued at $74 billion. This compares to a previous valuation of $46 billion based on a $2 billion fundraise last August. So what has really changed for SpaceX to command a 60% jump in valuation?

See our dashboard analysis detailing SpaceXs Revenues and Valuation for the underlying numbers on launches, revenues per launch, and valuation multiples.

There is an increasing shift from government-driven space programs toward enterprise-backed programs and SpaceX has a nice track record of winning contracts from government agencies, particularly from NASA and the U.S Department of Defense. Starlink, the companys satellite-based Internet service - which we see as a big driver of SpaceXs long-term potential - went into beta testing a few months ago and should start generating revenues this year. (related Starlink Valuation: What Could SpaceXs Starlink Service Be Worth) We also expect SpaceXs total number of launches to grow this year, with total revenue expanding to about $1.6 billion. Moreover, new areas such as space travel and point-to-point transport around the earth are also on SpaceXs radar and could help revenues in the medium to long term.

There are likely some market-related factors driving SpaceXs valuation as well. With interest rates still remaining low compared to historical levels, investors have a greater appetite to bet on futuristic companies working on the cutting-edge and moonshot projects. This is likely helping SpaceX. Moreover, investors likely view SpaceX as a solid play on the emerging space economy. Although there are other publicly listed plays on Space, SpaceX has a strong record of innovation and execution, having the distinction of carrying out the first commercial manned launch, while raising the bar for reusable rocket technology.

[2/2/2021] How Is SpaceXs Starlink Service Shaping Up?

SpaceXs satellite-based Internet business, Starlink, is seen as the biggest driver of the space exploration companys valuation, given its large addressable market. (Related: SpaceXs Revenues and Valuation) So how is the service shaping up? Starlink went into beta testing about four months ago, providing services in the northern United States, Canada, and some parts of Europe and the company says that it now has over 10,000 users globally. SpaceX charges beta customers $99 per month, and theres also an upfront charge of about $500 that goes towards the satellite dish and related kit. The company is reporting speeds of between 50 to 150 Mega bits per second on the service. While this makes Starlinks service pricier and slower than some mainstream broadband offerings, both metrics are likely to improve as the company builds scale (more satellites and ground stations) and signs on more users. The company has already launched over 1,000 working satellites for Starlink and intends to have a total of around 42k satellites once the project is complete. SpaceX was recently awarded close to $900 million in subsidies by the FCC, under the Rural Digital Opportunities Fund which aims to bring high-speed Internet across the U.S., particularly in rural areas. This could also help the economics of the service, to a certain extent. That said, competition is also mounting. Wireless carriers have been betting big on 5G technology which can offer gigabit-speed internet over wide areas, competing head-on with the fixed-line internet services. It remains to be seen if SpaceXs service can offer customers an attractive value proposition as competition increases.

View our interactive dashboard analysis, Starlink Valuation: What Could SpaceXs Starlink Service Be Worth? to modify our key assumptions to arrive at your own estimate for Starlinks valuation as it heads toward an IPO.

[Updated 2/12/2020] How Much Value Could SpaceX Unlock From Starlinks Proposed IPO?

SpaceX recently indicated that it could spin off and pursue an IPO for its satellite-based Internet business, Starlink. The Starlink service, which is likely to see operations begin later this year, aims to provide high-speed Internet globally in a cost-effective manner by leveraging a constellation of several thousand satellites. While SpaceX has not given a definitive timeline for an IPO, it has indicated that it could occur within the next few years. According to our analysis, we estimate that Starlink could be worth about $30 billion by 2025, assuming it generates revenues of about $10.4 billion then and is valued using a P/S multiple of about 3x. Below, we provide a breakdown of the opportunity Starlink provides to SpaceX and the potential risks.

View our interactive dashboard analysis, Starlink Valuation: What Could SpaceXs Starlink Service Be Worth? to modify our key assumptions to arrive at your own estimate for Starlinks valuation as it heads towards an IPO.

Why Starlink is Crucial To SpaceX

Estimating Starlinks Valuation

We project that Starlinks first full year of service will be 2021, with coverage spanning a large portion of the global population by 2025. We also expect that Starlink will primarily compete with fixed-line broadband services, as its receivers are expected to be somewhat large for truly portable use (likely pizza-box sized).

2.1 Estimating Starlinks Total User Base

2.2 Estimating Starlinks Revenues

Monthly ARPU

2.3 Estimating Starlinks Valuation using a P/S Multiple

What Are The Key Risks Associated With Starlink?

2020 has created many pricing discontinuities that can offer attractive trading opportunities. For example, youll be surprised how counter-intuitive the stock valuation is for General Motors vs Comcast.

See allTrefis Price EstimatesandDownloadTrefis Datahere

Whats behind Trefis? See How Its Powering New Collaboration and What-Ifs ForCFOs and Finance Teams |Product, R&D, and Marketing Teams

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Is SpaceX Really Worth $74 Billion? Forbes - Forbes

The Natural History Museum is presenting its 2021 Lecture Series: Trailblazing Women in Science.

The series spotlights trailblazing women who are exploring the unknown, offering unimagined ideas, and paving the way for future generations.

You still have time to hear the last two women speak virtually, broadcast live on the web.

Dr. Nalini NadkarniBranching Out: Exploring the Tapestry of the Forest CanopyThursday, April 15, 2021 at 6:30pm.

Dr. Nadkarni is known as the "Queen of the Forest Canopy". Nadkarni will talk about her pioneering research on the biota that live in the treetops of tropical rainforests that play critical roles in ecosystem processes.

Mae JemisonKeynote speakerApril 22, 2021 - 6:30pm

Mae was the first-ever woman of color in space and she is the keynote speaker. She will discuss the 100 Year Starship Initiative she leads which seeks to ensure the capabilities for human interstellar travel beyond our solar system within the next 100 years.

To register for the lectures, please visit nhmu.utah.edu.

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Travel deep into the forest with the "Queen of the Forest Canopy" and out into space with the first woman of color in space - fox13now.com

Neptune, photographed by Voyager 2 in 1989.NASA / JPL image

According to Wu Weiren, one of the leaders of the Chinese lunar research program, the two devices should be 15 billion kilometers from Earth by 2049. This is 100 times the distance from Earth to the sun. The centenary of the founding of the Peoples Republic of China will be celebrated in 2049.

Initial plans for the Chinese Interstellar Express have already been submitted, but in an interview with China Space News this week, Wu said the mission is now officially part of the new five-year plan for Chinese space travel.

This is just going to happen, says Mark Klein Wolt, an astronomer from Nijmegen, who previously conducted a Dutch radio experiment on a Chinese satellite. If China says it will do something, it will. It is completely in line with their ambitious policy.

Space race

China is participating in a geopolitical space race with the United States. After a successful moon landing, plans are now underway to establish a manned lunar base with Russia. A Chinese robotic car is due to land on Mars next month, and its space station is under preparation.

The two identical probes on the Interstellar Express will close close to the solar system in opposite directions. Theyll basically measure the interaction of the solar wind the electrically charged particles that the sun blows into space with the extremely thin matter of interstellar space.

Just like the American Voyager space probes 40 years ago, Chinese aircraft first fly over Jupiter or Saturn, where they are accelerated by the giant planets gravity. One is also to fly through the distant planet Neptune in the year 2038. It was examined closely only once before, in 1989 by Voyager 2.

In Chinese Space News, Wu described the project as Chinas contribution to the world and to humanity. Kline and Walt interested anyway. Who knows, we might also be able to turn a radio antenna on this.

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