It can be very good to have multiple instruments that do similar things.

Also, the Chinese astronomers I've worked with are not confused about the scientific value of things. I don't think university or government PR says anything about the views of the scientists working in any organization.

Oh, and the reason I've worked with Chinese astronomers is because they do collaborate with colleagues outside of China.

Many Asian science organizations are already partners in lots of telescope projects you've already heard about.

The Russians flew a bunch of nuclear reactors in low earth orbit, for radar satellites. There were multiple accidents, one of which smeared radioactive debris all over northern Canada. One hopes someone has learned something.

> no exactly a secret that western news are biased to western achievements...

Thanks for explaining your motivation.

I suspect the Vega team (20 launches, 18 successful) shared data with the Vega-C team... same team, with a decade of flight experience.

Name checks out! Still a dream for a few years.

They can use the next regular crew rotation mission, just send it up empty. The only minus is that they'll have to keep the 3 crew up for a year instead of 6 months.

The wikipedia page is an introduction to that exact topic.

u/fabulousmarco answered your question.

Here's the wikipedia article on the overall topic.

u/fabulousmarco appears to have read what I actually meant. I did not say the thing you're having an issue with.

If you want to talk about Shuttle, the fact that the SRBs were recovered several times with eroded O-rings before the Challenger "accident" kind of blows any statistical analysis out of the water.

You're arguing about something I didn't say or mean. The entire sentence is what I meant. I'm not calling any rocket "reliable" in an absolute sense.

You mis-read what I meant with my comment. Another way of saying the same thing: They are so reliable that it's impossible to accurately say which one is most reliable.

These 3 rockets are reliable enough that you need a lot more launches to accurately measure their reliability. It's a statistics thing.

What a confusing article! The actual paper makes it clear that ALICE was used to measure the "inelastic interaction cross section" of helium antinuclei.

This isn't a good take on reliability. Ariane 5, Atlas 5, and Falcon 9 are reliable enough that it's impossible to accurately say which one is most reliable.

The Kuiper order is a huge opportunity and problem. A good problem, but a problem.

No other government space agency directly issues bonds, and there's a reason why.

https://www.reuters.com/article/space-exploration-roscosmos-satellites/russias-space-agency-to-issue-bonds-for-satellite-programme-idUSL8N33B0UK

Hey u/Soupjoe5 this is a Reuters story, how about posting Reuters links instead of a Chinese government website? Thanks.

There's a lot of competition!

This is a good example of why most people think "space" means "orbit".

Starliner and Dragon both had more than a year of delay while arguing with NASA about MMOD (micrometeoroid and orbital debris). Which is what we're talking about.

The ground camera says it lit. Remember 2 failures ago, when it burned through the top of the 2nd stage? This is a different stage (wider). But still.

Development is expensive, and no doubt NASA wants a lot of oversight for a new piece of hardware.

They do not, and it would be illegal if they did. NASA and Space Force require additional mission assurance paperwork, which SpaceX charges extra for. Sometimes they buy an extended fairing, which costs extra. But you can point to some cases, like Europa Clipper, where the contract amount is quite close to SpaceX's announced commercial price.

Halo+PPE was a lot more, but it it requires an extended fairing.

Also, check out IXPE.

JWST's budget overrun delayed the entire astronomy program. So here we are.

My guy, Space-x doesn't exist. SpaceX never claimed to be the first to think of it: Iridium and Globalstar are the pioneers who went bankrupt with a ton of arrows in their backs. SpaceX launched IridiumNEXT. Iridium was happy that they had the first satellite assembly line. Then OneWeb Airbus built a bigger one, now SpaceX has the biggest. In short, it's a history of rapid innovation.