Watch How The Dust Moves In The 1/6th Gravity

the fact elon mask genuinely might ruin the night sky for everyone makes me wanna sharpen my shovel and get to work

Antique map of the Moon by mapsandposters

Space shuttle concept art from Rockwell International, late 1970s.

NASA Astronaut Anna Fisher photographed by John Bryson for Life Magazine, May 1985.

View of Earth from NASA’s Parker Solar Probe

Jared Harris as Anderson Dawes in The Expanse s01e06

Crescent Earth seen from the Moon

Chesley Bonestell, 1975.

1989: ‘Shuttle Evolution “Block II”’

(sorry for low resolution, I cannot find a higher-res version anywhere)

1989: A concept drawing for a never-realised next-generation Space Shuttle, capable of carrying 8 astronauts and possibly over 30 tonnes to low-Earth orbit. The most noteworthy feature is the detachable cockpit with engines which could serve as a launch escape-system or a lifeboat during an incident in-orbit. It was to use its lifting body, wings, and body flap to glide to a runway and presumably land on skids. The escape system would enable a crew's escape at any point during launch or orbital flight.

Comments and observations

The inclusion of this escape-system in the orbiter would necessitate a gap in the heatshield at the nose, one of the hottest parts of the vehicle during re-entry. That's obviously a big problem. Further, a pad-abort would seem to be very impractical. 3 seconds at 8 Gs would only send the capsule about 2 km high, probably not high enough to glide towards the nearest runway, especially with those stubby wings. Perhaps an emergency parachute system and a splashdown of the capsule would have been more sensible?

Other changes to the orbiter seem to be in the interest of improving gliding performance, such as two wing-tip vertical stabilisers instead of one tail-mounted one (to eliminate wing-tip vortices), shrinkage of the orbital manœuvring system pods by relocation of the OMS's propellant-tanks into the wings, and the addition of canards which would probably yield greater pitch-authority during landing.

The system also proposes replacement of the solid rocket boosters with liquid-hydrogen–fuelled boosters. These could provide a greater payload capacity, as well as greater control of thrust during ascent, and the possibility of an emergency engine shutdown, improving the crew's safety. The biggest and most obvious downside would be increased cost. The drawing doesn't specify whether the LFBs are intended to recover themselves by deploying parachutes, but what's certain is that saltwater generally damages delicate chemical rocket engines, so they probably couldn't just plop into the ocean like the real Shuttle's SRBs did.

Space history

It’s a hobby of mine to listen to and watch archives from the Apollo era.

There’s many places where you can just browse transcripts and video archives, but I’d recommend https://apolloinrealtime.org/11/ and https://apollo17.org.

Watching some of the videos from that time is eerie, because these people are so distant and isolated on this dark surface, illuminated by an inclined sun.