Author Archives: Gray Rinehart

Space History Yesterday — Clementine

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A day late and a dollar short, as my Dad says, but I couldn’t leave out a launch I actually saw, could I?

Yesterday — January 25, 2009 — was the 15th anniversary of the launch of the Clementine mission from Vandenberg Air Force Base, CA. In 1994 I was stationed at Vandy as part of the Titan (launch vehicle) System Program Office, and we watched the Titan-II launch from the parking lot of our building. One of my office-mates — Deb Fort, with whom I was stationed years earlier at the Rocket Lab — worked facilities support for the mission.

Clementine, for those who don’t remember it, was also known as the Deep Space Program Science Experiment, and was “designed to test lightweight miniature sensors and advanced spacecraft components by exposing them, over a long period of time, to the difficult environment of outer space.” So says this Naval Research Lab page, and they should know since they built the thing.

The Clementine mission plays an important role in my novel, MARE NUBIUM, as it was the first mission to return data that indicated ice in craters at the lunar south pole. Even though subsequent data show the ice probably isn’t as plentiful as once thought, it still makes (in my opinion) a good prop for a story.

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What about an Islamic Reformation?

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Typing out loud on twitter* this morning before I got into the day’s work — which, I’m doing this before getting into the day’s work, too — I wondered: what is the possibility that Islam might experience a re-thinking of its doctrines equivalent to the Protestant Reformation?

What cleric might have the courage to be the Muslim version of Martin Luther?

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*Follow me at http://twitter.com/GrayRinehart

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Register Your Opinion on National Civil Space Policy

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I got this from my old college buddy David O’Nan, and am posting it everywhere in hopes that at least one or two more folks will participate. (I even cross-posted it on the Space Warfare Forum, and I’ll be putting it on Twitter later.)

The Space Studies Board and the Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board of the National Academies (of Sciences, Engineering, etc.) have requested public input on the “Rationale and Goals of the U.S. Civil Space Program.” The deadline for submitting your opinion is January 30th.

The “Statement of Task” for the joint study is on this page:

An ad hoc committee will prepare a report to advise the nation on key goals and critical issues in 21st century U.S. civil space policy. The committee will identify overarching goals that are important for our national interest…. Using its best objective judgment and recognizing other national priorities, the committee will explore a possible long term future for U.S. civil space activities that is built upon lessons learned and past successes; is based on realistic expectations of future resources; and is credible scientifically, technically, and politically.

Here’s the link to the actual questionnaire, which invites you to consider

– What should be the rationale and goals for the civil space program?

– How can the civil space program address key national issues?

Inputs are limited to 600 words (I’m still formulating mine). I hope every space enthusiast will take this opportunity to tell the study group what direction they think the civil space program should go.

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Status Report, and a Space History Tidbit

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For the few people who have offered to help me clean up the rough spots in my novel, it’ll be another week or so before I get it in your hands. I’m up to chapter 11 in my quick editing pass … editing which is not going as quickly as I hoped.

In space history, today is the 40th anniversary of the launch of Relay-2, a small communications and scientific spacecraft. It was launched on a Delta rocket out of Cape Canaveral, and mapped some of the radiation belt around the earth.

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For Those Overloaded on Inauguration Coverage …

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We all live through little slices of history every day, but not like today. More words will be spoken and written about today than we can ever count — especially with blogs and tweets and squirts and whatever-will-be-next-in-the-crazy-world-of-the-Internet — and certainly more than anyone will ever read. All the historians through all the years will never catch up with all the words written and to be written about today.

Because of that, I will only say: Congratulations, Mr. President, and good luck.

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Happy Civil Rights Day

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Here’s wishing you and yours a happy Civil Rights Day, with hope that your civil rights are intact. If you live in the U.S. and are a law-abiding citizen, I believe your civil rights are as secure as ever … despite the protestations of the fear-mongers in this and other media.

I cannot, of course, evaluate the condition of the civil rights of people from countries other than the U.S. If you do not enjoy the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, I hope soon you will. Remember: no matter what your tyrants tell you, we in the U.S. desire only your freedom and friendship.

For those wrongly accused, denied their civil rights for illegitimate reasons, I wish for you justice.

But for people living in the U.S. who are plotting violence against our country, its leaders, or its institutions — no matter your ideological bent — you have no civil rights in my eyes. You abrogated your civil rights the minute you donated money to the terror-supporting organization; the second you agreed to do the bidding of your brooding, bellicose bosses; the instant you decided that your vision of unrest and death was preferable to our vision of peace and freedom. I hope the full force of our domestic intelligence apparatus is working to ferret you out of the holes in which you live and work and plot our downfall.

So, again, happy Civil Rights Day.

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Free Fiction From My Friend

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My friend Alethea Kontis‘s story “Blood and Water” (in issue nine of Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show) is going to be available FREE on the IGMS web site through March, in honor of receiving a number of recommendations for the Horror Writer’s Association’s Stoker Award. Congratulations, Lee!

If you haven’t checked out IGMS, now is a great time to do so. It’s only $2.50 per issue — except for when certain stories like Lee’s are made available free — and my friend Edmund Schubert works very hard to make sure it’s packed with excellent science fiction and fantasy stories.

And now, for your linking convenience: Intergalactic Medicine Show.

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Space History, and Something of a Space Mystery

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Today is the 40th anniversary of the launch of Soyuz-5 by the Soviet Union, a mission that was more dramatic for its near-disastrous landing than for its liftoff and the in-space docking maneuver performed with Soyuz-4. This page has a wealth of details about the mission.

The “space mystery” is more contemporary, and political: i.e., why is the front-runner for the NASA Administrator post a retired Air Force Major General with almost no space experience? (See, e.g., this Washington Post story.) Maybe it’s not so mysterious after all, since he’s been a close advisor to the President-Elect. He’s an accomplished fighter pilot with deep experience in international affairs, and I have no doubt that running a large agency would come easily to him — I say this having never, to my knowledge, met him — but I wonder if the NASA science types might try to baffle him with bulls*** (technologically-speaking, of course). We’ll see if this pans out, or if one of the other candidates gets the nod.

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For a Secret Mission, They Sure Have a Lot of Details

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Over in the Space Warfare Forum, I posted about a story in Spaceflight Now that included far more detail than you would ever expect to be released about a classified space mission.

Scroll down the Spaceflight Now story to the part beginning, “Details emerging on how the inspection exercise is playing out,” and see if you’re as amazed as I am that anything supposedly “top secret” (or even “secret”) would be released in such detail. Where the heretofore unknown inspection satellites started in the GEO belt, the specific date on which the first one supposedly made its close approach to DSP-23, etc.?

Here’s a link to the full Space Warfare Forum post.

Let’s just say, I have my doubts.

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A Micro (Really Micro) Economic Observation

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In the anti-gravity category:*

Last year, when gas prices were moving up toward record highs, the company that operates the vending machines in our building raised its prices. My twelve-ounce can of diet liquid caffeine carbonation went up, as did the prices of all the anti-diet items in the snack machine one pace to the left. This was concurrent with prices of almost everything everywhere going up and being blamed on the high gas price.

But since gas prices have come down to the lowest seen in years, the prices of these other things are still at their elevated levels.

The main effect of the lowered gas prices, then, appears to be higher profit margins for the purveyors of consumer goods. If they were wise, they’d plow those increased profits back into their businesses to improve their products, distribution systems and other practices, so that when the next increase in their operating costs comes along they don’t have to pass it on to the consumer right away — using the fat years to store away surplus for the lean years.

Wishful thinking.

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*I.e., the what-goes-up-doesn’t-always-come-down category.

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