December 5, 2021

SpaceX to Bring Starship Launches to Cape Canaveral Spaceport (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
SpaceX has begun construction on an orbital launch pad for its next-generation Starship at Kennedy Space Center, bringing to the Space Coast the world’s most powerful spacecraft that CEO Elon Musk hopes will eventually take people to Mars. Musk made the announcement Friday on his Twitter account and confirmed the company will still be using Launch Complex 39A at KSC, where it currently launches Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

“Construction of Starship orbital launch pad at the Cape has begun,” Musk wrote. “39A is hallowed spaceflight ground – no place more deserving of a Starship launch pad!” It’s unclear how the company will juggle launch operations at KSC, although it also operates launches from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

The space center is the launching point for Falcon 9 missions with Crew Dragon for shuttling astronauts to the ISS, and to date, the only pad that has supported the massive Falcon Heavy launches. The company has envisioned building Starship launch pads offshore, but Musk in the past has said SpaceX will continue to consider KSC in addition to the launch pad at its Boca Chica, Texas, spaceport. Musk said KSC will get similar, but improved, ground systems and a tower to what the company has set up in Texas. (12/3)

In Defense of Space Billionaires (Source: Catalyst)
So-called ‘space billionaires’ have received a lot of attention, and a lot of public ire this year. But much of the commentary on the subject misses the real point of space exploration.

Some commentators view Elon Musk’s SpaceX, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic, and other private space escapades as nothing more than vanity projects, or wasteful escapism. Rather, these projects have two big upsides that are not always considered; the first is of a more practical nature, and the second is somewhat harder to pin down, though pivotal to the human experience.

The primary benefit of these private space missions is that every rocket launch generates an incredible amount of data that informs future space flight, and can also help improve technological capabilities here on earth. The more rockets that are launched, the better scientists understand how these technologies work, enabling them to recreate safe space transport more dependably in the future. Plus, many of these missions serve to launch important satellites into orbit, improving and maintaining the global positioning, information transmission, and security systems that we have come to rely on in everyday life, and at the highest levels of our government. (12/3)

Should Billionaires be Pursuing Space Tourism? (Source: Toronto Star)
The space tourism industry is expected to exceed $1 billion U.S. dollars in the next decade. While that sounds like lining already-deep pockets, it actually represents jobs across a number of sectors: you need more than rocket scientists and engineers for suborbital flights. There will be plenty of high-paying tech jobs to be sure, but also a number of white collar and blue collar jobs that will receive paychecks as a result of their supporting work. New space tourism companies provide stimulus in the same way that every new industry since the Industrial Revolution has expanded the economy.

Through space exploration, NASA has designed solutions to problems that we no longer have on Earth, through technology like ​​memory foam, insulin pumps and scratch-resistant eyeglass lenses. While there is plenty of skepticism about the probability that any single space tourism flight or company might develop a technology that changes life on Earth, it is clear that part of the moral imperative for these billionaire founders includes technology advancement.

Finally, there is something to be said for the possibility that even a few of the tourists who take the journey to the edge of space come back psychologically changed by their experience. The “Overview Effect” was a term first coined by writer ​​Frank White in 1987 when describing the constellation of thoughts and emotions some astronauts report experiencing during their time observing earth from space. (12/4)

This Pansexual Streamer is About to Become the First Furry in Space (Source: Xtra)
You’ve heard of “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”—now, one person is set to take one giant leap for furrykind. Cameron Bess will become the first openly pansexual person and the first furry to go to space when they join Blue Origin’s third space tourism flight on Dec. 9. Other passengers will include Good Morning America co-host Michael Strahan, and Laura Shepard Churchley, the eldest daughter of Alan Shepard. Bess’ father, venture capitalist and tech executive Lane Bess, will also be on the flight, making them the first parent-child duo to go to space together. (12/2)

Space Tourism? Most Americans Not Interested (Source: Rasmussen Reports)
Even if they could afford it, fewer than a third of Americans would take a space trip on a commercial flight, and most don’t think they’ll ever go to space. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 32% of American Adults would travel into space on a commercial flight, if they could afford it. That’s just slightly higher than the 28% who were interested in space tourism in 2018. Fifty-seven percent (57%) wouldn’t take a commercial space flight, while another 11% are not sure. (12/3)

Seizing the Space Debris Moment From Russia (Source: Breaking Defense)
Russia’s recent anti-satellite weapons test created two parallel, but seemingly contradictory policy opportunities for the United States Space Force: supporting the establishment of an international moratorium on peacetime debris-creating events, while simultaneously developing the capability to rapidly replace lost or damaged assets through diversified launch.

The Russian direct ascent anti-satellite (DA-ASAT) weapons test created upwards of 1,500 unique pieces of trackable debris, to say nothing of pieces too small to be tracked yet still dangerous to both the International Space Station and existing satellite constellations. The threat of this debris, as with other tests by China and India, will last for years, if not decades.

A simple truth: the last thing humanity needs is the creation of unnecessary space debris through events such as ASAT tests. It is here that leaders in the Pentagon should support efforts to create international norms of behavior in space, in particular by supporting a moratorium on peace-time debris-creating events such as ASAT tests. Indeed, based on the recent National Space Council meeting it appears that the Biden Administration is preparing to outline new global norms for military space. (12/3)

So Metal: Newly Discovered Exoplanet is Likely Over 80 Percent Iron (Source: Ars Technica)
Researchers have announced finding what appears to be an extremely iron-rich planet that, at least composition-wise, is very similar to Mercury. The difference is that it's nearly on top of its star and is probably hot enough that any iron on the surface could potentially be molten.

The new planet was found orbiting a red dwarf star named GJ 367 that's about 30 light years from Earth. Red dwarfs are small, dim stars, which makes identifying planets around them easier. A planet that orbits between a red dwarf and Earth will block out proportionally more of the star's light. And, because the star is low mass, a planet's gravity will cause it to shift further when it orbits, creating larger Doppler shifts in the light originating from the star. (12/3)