Posts by Mike Richards 4397 posts • joined 28 Feb 2007
Back in the 1970s, Boeing - sniffing the air for delicious pork - came up with a plan to use the 747 to launch cruise missiles:
https://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.com/why-boeings-design-for-a-747-full-of-cruise-missiles-ma-1605150371
And here's a photo of a 747 ferrying a spare turbine - as you say, it looks strange:
https://www.flightradar24.com/blog/how-qantas-ferried-an-engine-on-the-wing-of-a-747/
Which may be a bit of a problem.
They have already stacked the two SRBs at the Cape and they can only be left like that for about a year. Apparently if the Senate Launch System was going to fly this year, the core had to leave the test stand by February so it can be spruced up for flight. Unless the problem is something small (and the word 'Major' was used) that can be resolved by simply removing the faulty engine and plugging in another, I suspect it won't fly this year and yet more money will be poured down the SLS's throat as the SRBs are mothballed.
Not many of them still in passenger service. No US airline flies them, Qantas has got rid of the 747, and even BA - the biggest recent user - has sent them off to the boneyard or breakers. Lufthansa and Korean are your best bet for a Jumbo flight these days as they both bought the 747-8 Intercontinental in relatively large numbers.
By the time the pandemic abates (which won't be any time soon given this government's performance), the datastore will escape deletion simply by having been relabelled for another purpose - flu vaccinations, dog fouling, Conservative-leaning voter engagement, post-Brexit dissident tracking...
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When this is all settled and Boeing adds up the redesigns needed, the delayed and lost sales and the moneys paid to the victims of their criminal behaviour; let alone the colossal damage to their reputation - I wonder if the MAX will have actually turned out to have been cheaper and quicker to deliver than a clean sheet design such as their abandoned Yellowstone Y1 proposal.
If it's not Ticketmaster scalping the punter, it will be ATG and their endless charges that are only mentioned after you've queued and secured a ticket. Dreadful companies - and that's before you ever have to request a refund when they show their even less customer-friendly side.
Boeing very nearly got their hands on Embraer, but the deal fell apart earlier this year in good part because of Boeing's deteriorating finances. At least part of the Brasilian government is talking about linking up with China instead - which would put the cat amongst the metaphorical business jets.
The Japanese plane you are thinking about is the Mitsubishi MRJ SpaceJet which is currently awaiting certification.
Most Earth observation and LEO satellites go into highly-inclined orbits that don't benefit from the extra kick you get from equatorial launch sites; so lugging everything to Ascension Island would just be an unnecessary expense. For instance many US national security payloads fly out of Vandenburg in California and Russian military satellites are launched out of Plesetsk in the Arctic.
Wow! As a Mac user who runs Adobe software I thought I'd read the ultimate in the psychotic bollocks from Silicon Valley's finest marketers, but phrasing the introduction of compulsory charges as something to 'enjoy' takes things to a whole new level.
'So there is certainly data back almost that far. As to where it's from, I imagine bog-oaks and other preserved timbers provide a lot of the data.'
The older radio-carbon dates are calibrated against corals and foraminifera shells; as well as speleothems (limestone deposits formed in caves such as stalagmites) which can also be independently-dated using U-Th -> Pb.
This would be a useful technique to go alongside Be-10 anomalies which are associated with supernovae explosions. These are found in deep ocean sediment cores and ice cores. What's really nice about Be-10 is that it has a 1.4 million year half-life which pushes things far beyond C-14 dating.
The one time pad is unbreakable provided you can secure the pad and never reuse it; but you still hit on the key distribution problem of getting the pad to the other user.
Fortunately, GCHQ discovered the solution to that issue back in the 1970s with public key encryption which - oh bugger - kind of gets in the way of authoritarians everywhere.
Around 2009, Boeing announced they were working on the Y1 clean sheet design for a twin engined narrow body airliner to replace the 737. Planned entry into service was around 2020. Instead, they went for the cheap option of the MAX which has nearly destroyed the company’s reputation, cost billions and killed several hundred people.
‘Yeah, I'm not just anti-Brexit, I'm actually European but I'm still amazed that after deciding to leave there wasn't some master plan on what to do next’
My goodness, the likes of Bernard Jenkin and Iain Duncan Smith have only had thirty years of railing against the EU - can you honestly expect them to come up with an alternative in so little time?
It’d be nice to not hand the US control of all major processor architectures. We’re already seeing with China that they are prepared to use their influence to strangle foreign rivals.
But this is the country that gave up its space programme on the strength of an American promise that we could launch payloads on their rockets - which was promptly withdrawn after Black Arrow as sent to the knacker’s yard, so I doubt anything will be done.
‘...Boeing selected as the prime contractor back in 1958. Full operational capability of the Minuteman III was declared in 1975,’
17 years of development cheques from the Pentagon that probably had to be printed on extra-wide paper to hold all the zeroes. Surely not even the masters at BAE have been able to take so long in delivering something.
The Moon isn't exempt - it falls under COSPAR (COmmittee on SPAce Research) planetary protection guidelines which are linked to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. COSPAR guidelines go from zero (essentially missions to the Sun) which require no special biological contamination protections through to Category V which is reserved for sample return missions to bodies where there is a serious risk of contamination by Earth microorganisms.
Since the Moon is blasted by UV, the Solar Wind, has a massive temperature range and no atmosphere, it is highly unlikely that any organisms or complex organic molecules will be found there. Under COSPAR, missions to the Moon are considered Category II - destinations which might contain information about the origin of life but where terrestrial contamination is unlikely to interfere with data.
As for the COSPAR II requirements - basically fill out a form saying what you plan to do and any potential risk of contamination; then another form if you should do anything bad when you were there. The probes themselves don't need any particular sterilisation before launch.
TLDR - crap on the Moon if you want, but fill out the paperwork afterwards.
The Soviet Union included a couple of balloon probes in their two Vega landers. These explored the upper Venusian atmosphere for a couple of days before their batteries died. The two balloons were made of PTFE-coated plastic to protect them from sulfuric acid (and the hydrofluoric acid they discovered) and floated at just about the altitude you suggested, not just because it is a good pressure, but because it has the strongest winds. More info here:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2019/06/dear-vega-forgotten-soviet-mission-that-flew-around-venus/
https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraft/display.action?id=1984-128F
A shame there haven't been any further missions along these lines; if only to try and pin down whether Venus has lightning and perhaps to listen for infrasound from any volcanoes that might be grumbling away down there.
The Falcon 9 doesn’t have that big a payload fairing which limits its ability to throw telescopes into space. This is one reason why NASA is going to use an Ariane 5 to fire the James Webb into orbit - if and when it is ever finished. If you want an all-American rocket for your telescope either the Delta IV Heavy or the Atlas 5 are the ones for putting mirrors into space.
A real problem with flying wings as passenger aircraft is that people sitting some distance from the central access will experience relatively large vertical accelerations and decelerations as the plane banks. Apparently those sorts of motion are linked to serious barfage - so I'm guessing we'll see them round about 'never' - unless the airlines take the next step in making air travel more 'efficient' by anaesthetising people at check-in and stacking them like cordwood.
'For example, the Foreign Secretary has responsibility for the National Cyber Security Centre, which is responsible for incident response, while the Home Secretary leads on the response to major cyber incidents. To add to the confusion, the Defence Secretary has overall responsibility for cyber techniques as "warfighting tools" and for the National Offensive Cyber Programme, while the Secretary of State for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) leads on digital matters'
So that would be:
Foreign Secretary - Dominic Raab
Home Secretary - Priti Patel
Minister of Fun - Oliver Dowden
You'd be hard-pressed to find three less suitable people to oversee intelligence matters. Though Gavin Williamson probably comes close.
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