>a huge amount of time, money, and effort has been spent ensuring that it will fold out correctly (which is still not certain by any means).
what are the chances that portions of this have been already tested in one form or another on some NRO bird
Those fucking baguettes lost one
Matthew Garcia
Tyler Ortiz
the chance is roughly equal to the probability that a snowball does not melt when immersed in molten silicate lava. If the NRO launched something that had folding mirrors that big it'd have fucking negative apparent magnitude. And if it's not using mirrors then that's not the same tech.
John Clark
Giant space telescopes are LITERALLY worthless though
Dylan Lee
"The launcher’s liftoff took place on January 25, 2018 at 7:20 pm. A few seconds after ignition of the upper stage, the second tracking station located in Natal, Brazil, did not acquire the launcher telemetry. This lack of telemetry lasted throughout the rest of powered flight. Subsequently, both satellites were confirmed separated, acquired and they are on orbit. SES-14 and Al Yah 3 are communicating with their respective control centers. Both missions are continuing."
Michael Lee
user, you can't put a price on fundamental science and answer to big questions. Making new telescopes has helped us develop new technology that can be used for things besides telescopes.
Aiden Barnes
Reminder that the French and USA paid off and conspired to force the UK to abandon one of the cheapest and most efficient rockets in human history.
Cameron Flores
>the Atlas V cannot possibly be described as providing assured access to space for our nation when supply of its main engine depends on President Putin's permission
-Elon Musk
Thomas Thompson
this
JWST is heavily constrained by its launch vehicle, both in mass and in size. Also the cost is so high partially because cost of space access is so high.
If BFR succeeds to radically lower launch costs and increase payload capabilities then JWST will be an obsolete design. Not just JWST but many other spacecraft, both scientific and other.
Lincoln Jones
For every minute we waited for TM, everyone became more quiet.
As Ariane confirmed the anomaly it felt as if the air in the room have been completely sucked out. I looked around and I started seeing everything in black and white.
It was a pure fucking nightmare.
Nolan Williams
what a humongous faggot