Passant Rabie's saved articles

The Planetary Society tweet with the link for their congressional petition is here:
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This turbojet phallic flying object is not yet a rocket, not without a proper rocket engine. Read more

Seriously, just copy the Spirit and Oppo design, but with an RTG like a dozen times and send a bunch all over; Mars, Titan, Europa, Ganymede, Io, Venus, etc.. Read more

Why send rovers, when you can send Elon Musk...? Read more

SRL isn’t planned to land until late-2020s and return in the early 2030s. That dovetails into a potential manned Mars mission in the late 2030s. Sending a series of lower cost missions (especially new orbiters) instead of a single big rover before a manned mission makes sense, because any manned mission will need a… Read more

6.65 million pounds?

This monstrous double tracked crane was the previous title holder:

Could someone please put this in measurements I can understand like Bananas or Giraffes?   Read more

In case anyone else thought it was the Bagger 293 strip miner like I initially did, I looked it up and while the Bagger is significantly heavier at 31.3 million pounds, and it is able to move, the actual movement is powered by secondary means. So it holds a few records of its own as the largest terrestrial vehicle,… Read more

if starship works it is gonna DRAMATICALLY cut the cost of these types of programs. not only will it make launching the thing way cheaper but the lower cost per pound means that they can use less expensive designs / materials which would otherwise be weight prohibitive. fingers crossed Read more

I hope Congress puts the funding back in.  That seriously sucks - Venus has gotten the shaft on exploration missions for years.
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Off the primary topic, but did anyone else look at the top photo and see an ‘80s pool lounge chair floating in space? Read more

so basically this?

Those sand dunes look like something drawn by M.C. Escher. Read more

an outside consultant...who specializes in spacecraft propellant estimation Read more

Big EEAAO fan. Read more

with the help of a staff that will likely be used for balance and exploring the lunar surface.

I doubt they look like these ones...

Surprisingly (to me at least) I feel a lot more confident about Starship being ready mostly on time, vs. the spacesuit.  Read more

Yes, under the USSR, there were multiple rocket design bureaus, spread across the republics. Yuzhnoye was one of them, worked on the side boosters for Energia and the related Zenit medium-size launchers, among other things. They continued their work after the Soviet breakup, and have found a bit of a niche… Read more