Main Engine Cut Off

This story is so crazy that it nearly sounds like an entrapment scheme—not that something like that has happened before.

Jeff Foust wrote a great rundown of the space implications of the midterms that’s worth reading this morning, and I’ve got a few thoughts, as well.

Chris Gebhardt of NASASpaceflight wrote a great rundown of Orbital ATK’s Next Generation Launcher that included a great little nugget of info at the end.

There are two payloads on CRS-14 that caught my eye as very important to the future in space.

Plain and simple: missions to the Moon are hamstrung by Orion—specifically by the European Service Module and its pitifully-small delta-V budget.

The current pricing SpaceX uses makes no sense in the high-level, long-term view. It’s pretty obvious that the model grew out of an expendable-minded era, and that SpaceX is sticking to it because the market itself has not yet changed its thinking.

I’m very curious to see how the second life of Sea Launch will play out. Relatedly, I haven’t been too kind to Antares lately, but this is actually good news for Orbital ATK.

Marco Langbroek, SatTrackCam Leiden, on the curious proximity of USA 276 to ISS on the days surrounding the berthing of SpaceX CRS-11.

Our old friend u/Death_Cog_unit posted some photos over on r/spacex of the ITS composite tank back in port after its most recent test outing. This time, it came back in pieces.