(Source: British Interplanetary Society)

Speaker: Richard Godwin

Date: 1 December 2011, 7-8:30pm
Venue: BIS, 27/29 South Lambeth Road, Vauxhall, London, SW8 1SZ

This lecture will give an overview of the DragonLab spacecraft and will be given by Richard Godwin, a private consultant to SpaceX on their DragonLab project.

DragonLab (DL) is a free-flying, reusable orbital microgravity platform capable of hosting pressurized and unpressurized payloads to and from space. It will be launched to orbit aboard a Falcon 9 launch vehicle built by Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SpaceX). It will be useful for standard deployment of satellites or powered return payloads. It can be used as a microgravity research platform such as for materials, fluids, combustion physics, biotech or life science experiments. It can also be used as a technology demonstrator for instrument and sensor developers. DragonLab is expected to start flying from around 2014 onwards.

Rocketeer comments: Discussion of possible support for UK microgravity research by UKSA.

NASA's development cost models are fundamentally broken, astrophysics professor and Augustine Commission member Christopher Chyba has pointed out in testimony to the Senate Commerce Committee. The Falcon 9 launch vehicle cost SpaceX $300 million to develop, numbers independently verified by NASA. Using the NASA/USAF NAFCOM cost models, it would cost NASA $1.7 billion (optimistic "entrepreneurial" assumptions) or $4 billion (standard assumptions) to build exactly the same rocket.

As Chyba put it:

[He] repeated his 2009 warning that NASA has not been able to develop one vehicle and fly another at the same time, given historic budget constraints. But he said NASA may be able to learn from SpaceX as it develops the heavy-lift launch vehicle Congress has ordered it to build for missions beyond LEO.

“The other thing that I think one would want to understand in some detail would be why would it be between four and 10 times more expensive for NASA to do this, especially at a time when one of the issues facing NASA now is how to develop the heavy-lift launch vehicle within the budget profile that the committee has given it,” Chyba said.

Or, as Henry Vanderbilt more memorably said in comments on Transterrestrial Musings:-

"Or translated out of diplomat-speak, NASA in-house rocket development is BROKEN.

He failed, however, to leap over the witness table, grab Senator Nelson by the throat, throw him on the floor, slap him a few times, and shout in his face “It means that you need to get through your head that NASA in-house rocket development is FATALLY, TEN-TIMES-COSTLIER-EVEN-BEFORE-THE-INEVITABLE-OVERRUNS, *BROKEN*, Senator!”

Not that there’s any guarantee that would get the message accepted either. Between the belief that lack of a new government-developed giant flying flaming phallic symbol would be a fatal blow to national machismo, and the amount of ongoing hometown white-collar welfare jobs at stake, De Nile is running wide and deep on these committees."

Gotta admire their ambition ;-) The latest SpaceX promotional video shows a Dragon capsule doing a propulsive landing on Mars! It'll need significant additional reentry braking (large ballute? electromagnetic system?), but still, very, very cool...

(Source: RLV News)

An SSTL manager says they expect to launch some of their satellites on SpaceX Falcon-9:

• British satellites to ride SpaceX Falcon-9 -- Florida Today

A new SpaceX teaser video hints at a 'big' announcement on 5th April:

It looks to be regarding development of SpaceX's new heavy-lift vehicle, the Falcon Heavy (previously Falcon 9 Heavy or F9H).

SpaceX: Something Big Is Coming
Elon Musk to Hold Press Conference in Washington Tuesday

WASHINGTON – Elon Musk, CEO and Chief Technology Officer of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), will hold a press conference on Tuesday, April 5th at the National Press Club in Washington to discuss his company’s latest venture.

EVENT: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk to Talk About the Next Big Thing
TIME: 11:20 AM EDT (4:20 PM BST)
DATE: Tuesday, April 5th, 2011
LOCATION: National Press Club, Zenger Room

Can’t make it in person?
The press conference will be webcast live at: http://www.visualwebcaster.com/spacex

Working draft/work in progress: I thought it preferable to post this as-is, and then hopefully get back to it over Christmas

"I love the smell of rocket exhaust in the morning. It smells of victory!"

Like many other NewSpace advocates, I have to say that I watched the picture-perfect SpaceX COTS-1 flight with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. It's now timely to consider the wider implications of this mission, the first in which a privately-developed human-capable spacecraft was successfully launched, orbited and recovered fully intact. The total cost to the US taxpayer for the entire Falcon-9/Dragon development programme to date is in the region of $260 million, or approximately one quarter of the cost of one shuttle flight.

The developments in suborbital spaceflight to date have earned a foot in the door for NewSpace, with both NASA (under the auspices of the CRUSR programme) and ESA (under their recent RFI) looking to work with commercial spaceflight groups on unmanned and manned missions. With the successful execution of the COTS-1 Dragon orbital flight, SpaceX kicked the door off its hinges.

NewSpace is now rightfully front and centre in any analysis of international civil space policy, where it belongs. By rights there should now be an atmosphere of outright fear in the executive boardrooms of certain major aerospace companies. Uncomfortable comparisons will be made, and thoroughly awkward questions about competence and cost-effectiveness will be asked, including in the halls of Congress. If they can do this, why can't you?

Why Orion? The Lockheed-Martin Orion spacecraft is the manned capsule portion of Project Constellation, originally intended to return humans to the moon. Constellation is effectively cancelled, but "Block I" Orion survives, as an LEO spacecraft for ISS servicing, and a basis for future developments for deep space missions. To date, Block-I Orion development has cost $4.5 BILLION and has launched… nothing. The earliest that an unmanned prototype is likely to fly is 2013, if then. Why do we need Orion at all, when Dragon, or systems derived from it, can do pretty much everything that Orion could, at very much less cost?

In astounding comments that caused online observers to spit coffee into their keyboards, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk explicitly said as much in the post-flight NASA press conference, publicly questioning the need for Orion. He pointed out that Dragon is quite capable of deep-space missions, including surviving off-nominal re-entries from the Moon and Mars. Was it impolitic of him to say so? Quite possibly. Was it justified? Certainly.

Why ATV? The unmanned Automated Transfer Vehicle is the ESA contribution to ISS servicing. Development of the ATV cost 1.3 billion euro, in comparison to ~$200 million for the Dragon spacecraft. The ATV is a somewhat larger vehicle with capabilities such as fully automated docking and ISS reboost, but it is not at all clear that these capabilities justify the vastly greater cost. Also, ATV has no downmass capability, and each 600 million euro ATV spacecraft is used as a trash disposal unit and destroyed at the end of its nominal mission. This is insane. A rational way to deal with disposal of ISS trash would be an inexpensive folding crate plus a dragsail or electrodynamic tether -- perhaps using a fully-reusable prox-ops drone to give an initial orbital separation… not throwing away a fully functional 20-ton 600 million euro pressurised spacecraft in the process. If the argument is that the ATV is being discarded because it has reached the end of its design life at that point, then frankly, EADS has designed it wrong.

EADS Astrium has submitted proposals to modify the ATV into an Advanced Re-entry Vehicle (ARV) with cargo downmass capabilities, with the eventual intention of carrying crew. (Dragon effectively already has demonstrated crew capability). An 18-month ARV design study started in summer 2009. I would suggest that ESA look long and hard at the cost-effectiveness of those proposals in the context of the demonstrated success of the Dragon programme. If they don't, European legislators should.

Why Arianespace? The essentially perfect performance of the Falcon-9 launch vehicle on its second flight will doubtless have set abacuses clicking at launch insurance providers. Demonstrated reliability translates into lower payload insurance premiums, which make's SpaceX's offerings even more attractive for on the commercial market. Right now, at least half of SpaceX's launch manifest is commercial satellite payloads (including a half-billion dollar order from Iridium Next, the largest single commercial launch deal ever signed). Six months ago, ESA director general Jacques Dordain said Falcon 9 gave his organisation 'cause to reflect'. I wonder what he's thinking now?

It's true that Ariane 5 does have more payload capacity than the Falcon-9, but SpaceX has plans for a medium-heavy launcher (the F9 Heavy) which will compete directly against the Ariane 5 for heavier geosynchronous comsat payloads, providing SpaceX sees sufficient market demand to build it.
Arianespace clearly needs to learn some elementary lessons in free-market economics, and fast. If the market is worth having, SpaceX will take it from you. If they let you keep it, it's not worth having.

Congratulations to SpaceX and the NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services team for a flawless flight of the Falcon-9 launch vehicle and Dragon orbital spacecraft.

The Falcon-9 launched from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station at 1043EST this morning. Lift-off, first stage burn, staging, second stage burn and spacecraft separation were all nominal. There was a minor flash fire from one of the fuelling umbilicals on takeoff likely due to a failed check valve, but the rocket itself was undamaged. The flight to orbit was perfect, with none of the anomalous roll seen in the first F9 test flight.

Once on orbit, the unmanned Dragon spacecraft, massing almost 7 tonnes, performed an extended checkout procedure, including propulsion, navigation, communications and control systems. Communications was established with the NASA TDRSS satellite system. The spacecraft simulated maneuvers for approach to the ISS. After two orbits, the Draco thrusters were fired in a deorbit burn. The Dragon spacecraft re-entered the atmosphere, deployed drogue and then main parachutes, and splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean around 800km west of Mexico. According to the post-flight press conference, the spacecraft landed within 1 minute of the intended time, and around 800m (or less than half a mile) from its target aim point.

This represents the first successful re-entry from orbit by a privately-built spacecraft. The Dragon is a man-capable spacecraft, currently lacking only seats, minor upgrades to the life support, and a launch escape system. Previously, only the US, Soviet and Chinese governments have developed orbit-capable manned spacecraft to date.

UPDATE: Here's the post-launch press conference, courtesy of Spacevidcast.com:

(Source: London Evening Standard)

The London Evening Standard interviews actress Talulah Riley, 25, from Hertfordshire, the new bride of billionaire space entrepreneur Elon Musk.

Talulah expresses an ambition to retire with Elon to Mars 'if he has colonised it by then'. 'I'd love to get involved with designing habitat systems on Mars – like housekeeping on a grand scale,' she says.

• Talulah Riley: How to marry a billionaire -- London Evening Standard

Rocketeer comments: As Mrs. Merton would say: So, Ms. Riley... what attracted you to the billionaire Elon Musk?