Model Train Journal

Just watched the Spacex rocket launch live and must say it's quite impressive. The two booster engine returned to a landing pad and landed (gently) exactly as was planned. Pretty incredible to see booster rockets return and be reusable instead of destroyed and useless like the NASA days. 2nd stage landed on a drone ship in the ocean and it reusable too. Mind boggling technology. NASA has to be embarrassed.

BH

With a Tesla red roadster, as the payload, possessed of a mannequin in the driver's seat.

I'm glad it worked out for them 'cause about a month or 6 weeks ago, didn't they have a rocket that exploded and destroyed a $1 billion dollar military satellite? I wonder if Lloyds of London or Farmers covered that one?

I viewed that launch and landing via Facebook. Marvelous!

Dan Weinhold

Before the launch, Elon Musk said he only felt the rocket had between a 1/3 and 1/2 chance of making it. This heavy Falcon is supposedly the first step to moving folks to Mars, they are trying to get a reusable rocket that will routinely lift the weight equivalent of a 737. I think that's pretty cool!

Yeah, this technology really leapfrogs beyond what we had previously. I understand this rocket is much more powerful than the Titans or Atlas rockets of old. I just hope no one in his organization decides to get rich and steal/sell the technology to China or worse yet, NK. Pretty monumental accomplishment.

I understand Spacex put up a satellite not long ago for Northrup/Grumman and the satellite failed after it was deployed and shot off into space.

BH

The Space X payload (Musk's personal Tesla roadster) is now in a solar orbit that will take it beyond Mars. Up to now this has been very difficult to achieve.

The two boosters landing tail first a few hundred feet apart was a thrilling sight. It reminded me of what I thought a spaceport would look when reading Heinlein back in the 50s.

Dan Gurney's company made parts of the landing gear for those boosters.

In the News today, March 17, 2018, it has been determined that the identical Kelly twins are now different in DNA , to the extent that the "gene expression" of Scott Joseph Kelly is now and forever 7o/o different from his twin . That's 10s of thousands of molecular changes due to Scott's time in space.

This makes one wonder how much a traveler will be changed who makes the proposed trip to Mars, and returns, IMHO .

MurphOnMillerAve wrote:In the News today, March 17, 2018, it has been determined that the identical Kelly twins are now different in DNA , to the extent that the "gene expression" of Scott Joseph Kelly is now and forever 7o/o different from his twin . That's 10s of thousands of molecular changes due to Scott's time in space.

I can understand how it might change; I cannot understand how anyone can know it it changed forever. Forever is a fairly long time. And, their DNA could not have been 100% identical as everything prompts changes over time; divergence is constant. And, the real question is whether it even matters.......and it seems that nothing immediately critical was changed.

This makes one wonder how much a traveler will be changed who makes the proposed trip to Mars, and returns, IMHO .

Let's find out.

I wonder where these guys went?:

Roy wrote:I wonder where these guys went?:

Residents of NJ.

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:

Roy wrote:I wonder where these guys went?:

Residents of NJ.

Yup. Some. Just down the road from me.

MurphOnMillerAve wrote:

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:

Roy wrote:I wonder where these guys went?:

Residents of NJ.

Yup. Some. Just down the road from me.

Confirmed.

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:

MurphOnMillerAve wrote:In the News today, March 17, 2018, it has been determined that the identical Kelly twins are now different in DNA , to the extent that the "gene expression" of Scott Joseph Kelly is now and forever 7o/o different from his twin . That's 10s of thousands of molecular changes due to Scott's time in space.

I can understand how it might change; I cannot understand how anyone can know it it changed forever. Forever is a fairly long time. And, their DNA could not have been 100% identical as everything prompts changes over time; divergence is constant. And, the real question is whether it even matters.......and it seems that nothing immediately critical was changed. ....

I wondered about that, too. My interpretation of their report was that the bent of what they were asserting indicated the change was irrevocable, that once altered, he wasn't going to change back to exactly the way he was before the space journey..

MurphOnMillerAve wrote:

Rufus T. Firefly wrote:

MurphOnMillerAve wrote:In the News today, March 17, 2018, it has been determined that the identical Kelly twins are now different in DNA , to the extent that the "gene expression" of Scott Joseph Kelly is now and forever 7o/o different from his twin . That's 10s of thousands of molecular changes due to Scott's time in space.

I can understand how it might change; I cannot understand how anyone can know it it changed forever. Forever is a fairly long time. And, their DNA could not have been 100% identical as everything prompts changes over time; divergence is constant. And, the real question is whether it even matters.......and it seems that nothing immediately critical was changed. ....

I wondered about that, too. My interpretation of their report was that the bent of what they were asserting indicated the change was irrevocable.

Well, everyone's DNA is changing and it's not a static process. Why this is a surprise is the only surprise to me......and gene expression is not the same thing as a change to the DNA.