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Category: space – Page 890

What was it like to see, up close, the H-IIA rocket (that carried Diwata-2) leave the grounds of Japan’s Tanegashima Space Center last October 29? Here’s a firsthand account from BusinessMirror.

WHILE waiting for the launching of Diwata-2 at the view deck in Tanegashima Space Center in Kagoshima, Japan, with our cameras trained at the launch site, Dr. Joel Marciano, the head of Philippine Scientific Earth Observation Microsatellite Program (PHL-Microsat) whispered: “Don’t just look at the rising rocket [named H-IIA F40 that carries Diwata-2] through your camera. Look at the real event so you can feel it.”

I didn’t know and did not have the time to ask what he meant by “feel it.”

But as the countdown started and the rocket began rising into the sky with Diwata-2 on it, I began to understand what Dr. Marciano meant.

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Four is the point Max Faget and Paul Pursur were trying to make in their quest to prove that harnessing that many modified Sergeant engines would make a $200,000 vehicle that would perform as well and with more flexibility, and would less cost than a $2.5 million Atlas or $1 million Redstone rocket.

Faget and Purser were two NASA space pioneers, whose aim was testing some of the Mercury components that would evolve into Apollo, including the escape and parachute systems and recovery methods, plus the performance of the space capsule under pressure at altitude.

Little Joe got off to an ignominious start when it blew its top one day at Wallops Island.

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Over the past few months, I was part of a study funded by the United Launch Alliance and supported by a large group of technologists to determine if we can mine water on the Moon and turn it into rocket fuel, and to do it economically. The final report can be downloaded here.

Why Mine Water on the Moon?

The lunar water would be launched off the Moon and delivered to a “gas station” in Earth orbit. This propellant depot will use solar energy to turn the water into rocket fuel. Then, space tugs can refill their tanks so they can repeatedly boost spacecraft from Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) (where the launch rocket throws them) into Geosynchronous Orbit (GEO) where they can begin operating.

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