# The Great Ongoing Space Exploration Thread **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Tags:** science-math\ **Created:** [November 16, 2020, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703 "2020-11-16T12:18:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 113
**Author:** ![Zoobi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/13edae/32.png) [@Zoobi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoobi)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2243 "2025-09-18T20:59:52Z")
Lol it’ll be on Friday the 13th too! ---
**Author:** ![Maserschmidt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maserschmidt/32/18829_2.png) [@Maserschmidt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maserschmidt)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2025, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2244 "2025-09-20T12:21:53Z")
> [@zimaane](#): > > We may get our best view of the interstellar object 3i/atlas… > > from Mars! I was unaware of all the excitement surrounding this object until I got a note from a relative (who watches a lot of edgy YouTube videos) telling me to keep an eye out for it. ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2025, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2245 "2025-09-20T12:35:37Z")
Guess this can go here-the original thread I would have sworn we had here doesn’t come up on search (tho a couple of tangential ones do)-I was hoping another media outlet would have the story (I also don’t want to link a video), but for now you’ll have to deal with the Scientific American paywall: [How a Billionaire’s Plan to Reach Another Star Fell Apart](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-quiet-demise-of-breakthrough-starshot-a-billionaires-interstellar/) Yes, Breakthrough Starshot, the idea of propelling a bunch of tiny probes via a superpowered laser to Alpha Centauri, is now moribund. The tl;dr is that while the basic idea may be sound in the long run, the current state of the art for the tech required isn’t going to get her done anytime soon, AND there were political concerns around building a possible superweapon. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2025, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2246 "2025-09-20T14:58:30Z")
I bet the thread you want is this one: > [@Do we have the technology, and the time, to send a probe to the interstellar object](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-we-have-the-technology-and-the-time-to-send-a-probe-to-the-interstellar-object/1022692): > > Suppose there was a nonzero chance, backed up by scientific evidence, that this 31/Atlas was an alien spacecraft. If so, would we have enough time, and technology, to get a probe to it to take pictures and gather other data? Or is it going to pass too far away and/or any mission to send a probe would take too long to plan and implement? ---
**Author:** ![smithsb](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smithsb/32/12107_2.png) [@smithsb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smithsb)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2025, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2247 "2025-09-22T22:05:28Z")
'the Cygnus supply ship was docked after a glitch prevented robot arm capture. No actual defect, just a software adjustment. > **[Northrop Grumman cargo ship reaches International Space Station after...](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/northrop-grumman-cargo-ship-international-space-station-software-fix/)** > > The capture by the International Space Station's robot arm came a day late because of an unexpected, but now resolved, software issue. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2025, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2248 "2025-09-30T00:34:07Z")
A not quite successful test of the booster stage for Firefly Aerospace’s next Alpha rocket: > **[Another setback for Firefly Aerospace’s beleaguered rocket program](https://arstechnica.com/space/2025/09/after-another-fiery-setback-it-seems-fireflys-alpha-rocket-is-still-in-beta/)** > > “We will share more information on the path forward at a later date.”… > **[BOOM! Firefly Alpha Rocket Explodes During Test](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AS-ScrGLooQ%2F)** > > UPDATE! During testing at Firefly’s facility in Briggs Texas, the first stage of Firefly’s Alpha Flight 7 rocket experienced an event that resulted in a loss... ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2249 "2025-10-06T00:15:20Z")
China is going to try to put up a space based solar power system. You, know beaming power back to Earth. Here’s an analysis of why it won’t work. > **[Endless Sunlight, Endless Costs: The Economic Reality of Space Solar Power -...](https://cleantechnica.com/2025/10/04/endless-sunlight-endless-costs-the-economic-reality-of-space-solar-power/)** > > From microwave beams to megaton rockets, China’s space solar project highlights the gap between imagination and economic gravity. It does say some stuff about SpaceX Starship, which some here may find interesting. > [@](#): > > SpaceX’s Starship program was meant to revolutionize access to orbit by achieving full reusability and slashing launch costs. It promised payloads of 150 tons to low Earth orbit for only a few hundred dollars per kilogram, a claim that drew comparisons to the early jet age in terms of transformative economics. Several test flights have failed to meet mission objectives, and the company has gradually backed away from its early mass-to-orbit and cost targets. The combination of engineering limits on heat shielding, high refurbishment demands, complex launch logistics, and upper-stage recovery challenges have made those projections unrealistic. Even if Starship eventually becomes operational and reliable, the cost per kilogram is unlikely to undercut Falcon Heavy by more than a modest margin. The hoped-for revolution in launch economics remains aspirational, not achieved. However, most of the article is on how any space-solar-power system will not be cost effective until launch costs drop by at least an order of magnitude. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2250 "2025-10-06T00:39:50Z")
So is the concept of Starship having an airliner standard of turnaround now officially dead? Or is that just pessimism on the part of the writer? ETA: I’m glad the author acknowledged that geosynchronous power was never considered viable without _in situ_ manufacturing in space like the famous O’Neill concept. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2251 "2025-10-06T01:11:20Z")
Another thing I meant to highlight in that article is this (emphasis mine): > [@](#): > > To stay within public health and aviation limits, the average power density must stay around 10 W per square meter, far below the intensity of direct sunlight at noon. At that level, a gigawatt-class space beam needs a rectenna covering tens to hundreds of square kilometers. The land under the mesh could be grazed or farmed, but it would still be tied up by restricted airspace, electromagnetic safety zones, and expensive grid interconnections. **The same footprint could host conventional photovoltaic panels that would quietly produce the same or greater power** without any orbital complexity. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2252 "2025-10-06T01:24:39Z")
Provided of course that some practical solution to the ground-based intermittency problem comes to pass. Which admittedly sounds less challenging than building an entire space-based industrial infrastructure. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2253 "2025-10-06T04:01:09Z")
Instead of beaming power down as microwaves, what about large orbiting reflectors that would beam plain old light down 24 hours a day to isolated locations where solar farms would be built? Simpler technology in space, no worries about frying birds and planes in flight, etc. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2254 "2025-10-06T04:12:29Z")
Might be tough on life forms that depend on a district day/night cycle for various reasons. ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2025, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2255 "2025-10-06T04:27:34Z")
Yeah, about 30 seconds after posting that, I thought of a bunch of objections, the most significant of which is that if you get sunlight in a given location eight hours a day on average, the space project has to cost less than three times the price of the ground-based solar farm, or it would be cheaper just to expand the farm by 200%. Getting light 24 hours a day, vs 8 to 12, just isn’t enough of an advantage to justify the enormous cost and complexity of a space-based system, even if it’s just reflecting sunlight. Unless you significantly increase the intensity over natural sunlight, in which case you would probably get a bunch of ecological problems such as you suggest, and add to global warming, as well. ---
**Author:** ![smithsb](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smithsb/32/12107_2.png) [@smithsb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smithsb)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2025, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2256 "2025-10-18T17:15:29Z")
Martian flight video from [Physics.org](http://Physics.org) [Take a flight over the Martian surface with the Mars Express orbiter](https://phys.org/news/2025-10-flight-martian-surface-mars-orbiter.html) ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2025, 12:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2257 "2025-10-20T00:46:47Z")
Thanks for this. I’ll show my kid. The narration is helpful, explaining the likely events that produced what we see (e.g., a flow of water 3 billion years ago). ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2025, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2258 "2025-10-26T00:51:57Z")
> [@dtilque](#): > > China is going to try to put up a space based solar power system. You, know beaming power back to Earth. Here’s an analysis of why it won’t work. If only there was a way to economically beam the power of the Sun to Earth. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2025, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2259 "2025-10-26T01:20:35Z")
Yeah, but that takes _eight minutes._ Too slow. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2025, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2260 "2025-10-26T02:29:10Z")
People have this strange idea that solar power is incredibly rich and just waiting to be harvested. In fact the energy density of sunlight is quite modest: on a clear day with the sun directly overhead, about one kilowatt per square meter, less under suboptimal conditions; then multiply by the percent efficiency of solar panels. One cited real world figure is 150-200 watts. Virtually any other alternative has higher energy densities. Gathering solar power is the equivalent of harvesting specks of coal by hand with a pair of tweezers. And of course it cannot provide a 24/7 base load like on-demand power generation can. It’s not _useless_, and there have been huge increases in cost-effectiveness since the technology was introduced in the 1960s for space applications. But the industry wouldn’t be viable if the solar panel factory itself had to run 100% on solar power. ---
**Author:** ![Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiendish_astronaut/32/3295_2.png) [@Fiendish\_Astronaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiendish_Astronaut)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2025, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2261 "2025-10-26T11:04:04Z")
Big news for Soundgarden fans if true. > **[Are Black Hole Stars real?](https://www.mpg.de/25316826/black-hole-stars)** > > Astronomer de Graaff from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy and her team reveal what could be behind the small red dots in the images from the James Webb Space Telescope: black hole stars, which are supermassive black holes at the center of... ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2025, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703/2262 "2025-10-26T12:37:36Z")
True. But assuming decent infrastructure to move large amounts of power transcontinental distances with reasonable losses, it becomes more plausible to build solar farms tens of miles on a side out in the arid parts of the US where land is cheap, clouds are rare, and people are few. For darn sure the lifecycle cost of a MW-level solar array laid out on the ground is a fraction of trying to orbit and maintain a much smaller array up there and somehow beam the power down here. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703.md?page=112) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-great-ongoing-space-exploration-thread/925703.md?page=114)