The Space Review

[Orionid]

The normalization of space tourism
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 18, 2021


The New Shepard crew capsule descends under parachutes near the end of the NS-18 flight last week in West Texas. (credit: Blue Origin)

For a brief moment last Wednesday, there were two professional actors in space at the same time.

On the International Space Station, Russian actress Yulia Peresild was filming scenes for a Russian movie called Vyzov, or Challenge, where she plays a doctor sent to the station to perform surgery on a cosmonaut too ill to return to Earth. Klim Shipenko accompanied her to the station, with actual Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy reportedly playing the role of the ailing cosmonaut (see “Five big questions about the International Space Station becoming a movie set”, The Space Review, October 4, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4266/1

[Orionid]

The Artemis Accords after one year of international progress
by Paul Stimers and Audrey Jammes Monday, October 18, 2021


Peter Crabtree, head of the New Zealand Space Agency, and Charge d’Affaires Kevin Cover of the US Embassy in New Zealand pose following an Artemis Accords signing ceremony in May. New Zealand was 11th country to join the Accords. (credit: NASA)

NASA’s Artemis program, which will send the first woman and the first person of color to the Moon, is being closely watched by the rest of the world. The program’s success or failure will answer important questions with strategic implications for US leadership here on Earth: can the United States still achieve great things? Can it still lead by developing international consensus? Can it maintain a long-term effort despite political changes? Can it be a more compelling partner for space exploration than China?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4267/1

[Orionid]

Review: Back to Earth
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 25, 2021



Back to Earth: What Life in Space Taught Me About Our Home Planet—And Our Mission to Protect It
by Nicole Stott Seal Press, 2021
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5416-7504-9
US$30
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1541675045/spaceviews

Most people in the space industry have heard of the Overview Effect, the change in perspective about the Earth that comes from seeing it from space. It got renewed attention earlier this month when William Shatner went on a Blue Origin suborbital spaceflight, and talked about the experience for what seemed like longer than the flight itself (see “Black ugliness and the covering of blue: William Shatner’s suborbital flight to ‘death’”, The Space Review, October 18, 2021). The topic is likely to come up among some of the astronaut panels at this week’s International Astronautical Congress in Dubai as well.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4268/1

[Orionid]

How space tourism could affect older people
by Nick Caplan and Christopher Newman
Monday, October 25, 2021


Is space really the final frontier? William Shatner has found out after boldly going where no 90-year-old has gone before. Some 55 years after Captain James T. Kirk hit our screens in the original Star Trek, Shatner recently launched to the edge of space aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard for a ten-minute suborbital flight (see “The normalization of space tourism”, The Space Review, October 18, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4269/1

[Orionid]

Is outer space a de jure common-pool resource?
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, October 25, 2021


The scarcity of lunar resources like volatiles illustrates the need to deconflict activities on the Moon in a way that is acceptable by all participants. (credit: NASA)

As 2021 comes to a close, humanity is facing a historical crisis, when just a slight change will lead to widely different futures. The closest parallel occurred five centuries ago, when countries with advanced technology sought to exploit the resources of “new” worlds. The resulting Age of Imperialism was marked by needless war, suffering, and neglect, whose effects are still being felt today. How close are we to repeating that pattern? What role can space law play in avoiding it?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4270/1

[Orionid]

The battle for Boca Chica
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 25, 2021


SpaceX is continuing preparations for orbital launches of its Starship/Super Heavy vehicle at Boca Chica, Texas, also called “Starbase”, as the FAA continues its environmental review. (credit: SpaceX)

Few companies in the space industry are as polarizing as SpaceX, and few projects are as polarizing as its Starship vehicle. To advocates, it is humanity’s best hope to become a multiplanetary species, to use the phase frequently invoked by both the company and its supporters. To others, Starship is a high-risk venture, not just for the company and the space industry but also to the people and environment in the corner of Texas where it is being built.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4271/1

[Orionid]

Engineering the arts for space: developing the concept of “mission laureates”
by Christopher Cokinos Monday, October 25, 2021


NASA’s best-known links to arts is through an arts program that included works by artists like Andy Warhol, but there’s an opportunity to expand the scope of that partnership. (credit: Andy Warhol)

The arts have long been engaged with the night sky, astronomy, and, more recently, with space programs. Consider, in the latter case, NASA’s famed fine arts program that placed painters and illustrators such as Norman Rockwell and Robert Rauschenberg in the middle of launch facilities, training centers and recovery zones. There is a long tradition of “space art,” first popularized by Chesley Bonestell. Fine arts photographers, such as Michael Light, have given their craft over to space imagery. Many writers have turned their attention to space; in the modern era, consider Oriana Fallaci or Margaret Lazarus Dean. As co-editor of Beyond Earth’s Edge: The Poetry of Spaceflight, I know that poets have responded vigorously—if not always enthusiastically—to the Space Age.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4272/1

[Adam.Przybyla]

.. jednym slowem, kazda misja powinna miec swojego ... Cacofonix-a Z powazaniem
                                                                                                                            Adam Przybyla

[Orionid]

Strategic geographical points in outer space
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, November 1, 2021


Spaceports like Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and the Kennedy Space Center could serve as choke points for space, given the relatively small number of such facilities and their vulnerability to a wider range of threats. (credit: NASA)

Geography has long been a critical factor influencing national strategy, playing a vital role in both international politics and military planning. Captured in history’s stories are countless examples of how geography shaped everything from economics and trade to military conflict. While space can appear both abstract and intimidating, traditional studies of strategy and geography can be successfully applied to the space domain. For example, Halford Mackinder’s heartland theory and Nicholas Spykman’s rimland theory claim that controlling the heartland or rimland, respectively, is the key to controlling the world. The central tenet—states that best understand how to exploit geography create decisive advantages—applies equally well to strategic geographical points in the space domain.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4273/1

[Orionid]

How a small, distant space telescope can solve astrophysical mysteries big ones can’t
by Michael Zemcov Monday, November 1, 2021


A small telescope could be incorporated on future missions to the outer solar system and beyond, such as the proposed Interstellar Probe. (credit: JHUAPL)

Dozens of space-based telescopes operate near Earth and provide incredible images of the universe. But imagine a telescope far away in the outer solar system, 10 or even 100 times farther from the Sun than Earth. The ability to look back at our solar system or peer into the darkness of the distant cosmos would make this a uniquely powerful scientific tool.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4274/1

[Orionid]

Will SpaceX follow Tesla to a $1 trillion market capitalization?
by Sam Dinkin Monday, November 1, 2021


Starship could enable new business opportunities for SpaceX that could cause its valuation of $100 billion today to grow to $1 trillion or more. (credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX is readying its first test of Starship and Super Heavy, where Starship will splash down about 90 minutes after takeoff 84% of the Earth’s circumference around the world to the east near Kauai. Like launching Elon Musk’s old Tesla roadster beyond Mars orbit, this may result in further proof that Starship may soon reduce the price of access to low Earth orbit substantially more than Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy already have. With its 100-tonne capacity in reusable mode according to its user guide, or 136 tonnes “when fully optimized” and 227 tonnes in expendable mode, according to Musk in a tweet, it has the potential to increase global launch capacity by a giant leap. That would be especially true if Elon Musk devotes his possibly soon-to-be trillion-plus net worth to building extra Starships to settle Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4275/1

[Orionid]

The commercial space station race
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 1, 2021


Nanoracks, Voyager Space, and Lockheed Martin are cooperating on a commercial space station called Starlab that could be operational as soon as 2027. (credit: Nanoracks)

The International Astronautical Congress (IAC) returned last week after the pandemic forced last year’s event to move online. An estimated 5,000 people traveled to Dubai for the usual panel discussions and technical sessions on a wide range of space topics.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4276/1

[Orionid]

Review: Holdout
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 8, 2021



Holdout: A Novel
by Jeffrey Kluger
Dutton, 2021
hardcover, 352 pp.
ISBN 978-0-593-18469-1
US$26.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0593184696/spaceviews

NASA astronauts have, by and large, been pretty well behaved on their missions over six decades of spaceflight. Only a few cases stand out, including the disagreements between Apollo 7 commander Wally Schirra and ground controllers on their mission and the so-called “strike” by the crew of the third and final Skylab mission in late 1973 (which, a NASA historical review noted last year, didn’t actually happen.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4277/1

[Orionid]

Witch-hunts, power, and privilege from Salem to the stars
by Layla Martin Monday, November 8, 2021


“Space Witch,” an NFT created by the author ©2021

And, stating that sounds absurd. Why don’t we apply that same notion of absurdity to the idea of witches here on Earth? Witches and witch-hunts are an accepted, even celebrated, phenomena below the Kármán line. Yet, in reality there are no witches here on Earth and never have been.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4278/1

[Orionid]

For private space travelers, questions of vistas and titles
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 8, 2021


Private astronaut Chris Boshuizen, Emirati astronaut Hazzaa AlMansoori, and NASA astronaut Jessica Meir during a panel of astronauts at the International Astronautical Congress in Dubai October 29. (credit: J. Foust)

One of the selling points of commercial human spaceflight has been the ability to see the Earth from space, including the prospect of the Overview Effect: the shift in perspective that many astronauts have reported experiencing. But would a brief suborbital flight, spending only minutes in space, be long enough to trigger that effect in people?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4279/1