Since it came out, I’ve been saying that the decadal needs to be completely redone, as it assumes business as usual. But there’s a new report out from academics on how to use Starship for Mars exploration, so people are finally starting to get it. Bob Zimmerman summarizes.
Category Archives: Space
Off The Air
Driving up to the Bay Area for the Foresight Vision Weekend. We’ll be driving back down Monday. I’ll have the laptop with me, but don’t know if I’ll have much time for blogging. So comments are open.
The Isaacman (Re)Hearing
Unusually, I’ll try to live blog it in the morning. It starts at 1000 EST, and I’ll update here.
[Morning update, just before scheduled start]
Here is the link to the live stream.
[Update a few minutes later]
Hearing has started, with an introduction from Chairman Cruz.
[Update a couple hours later]
NASA Administrator Nominee Jared Isaacman delivers a powerful and urgent opening message at his confirmation hearing:
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) December 3, 2025
“The last time I sat before you, I introduced myself, my qualifications, and the challenges and opportunities ahead. This time, I'm here with a message of… pic.twitter.com/DRsJFxt9ZY
Here is the second NASA confirmation hearing for Jared Isaacman.
— Robin (@xdNiBoR) December 3, 2025
I have removed questions directed to Steven Haines and long unnecessary pauses, shortening the hearing by about an hour.
Please repost and share 🙏🙏
07:53 – Opening remarks from Jared Isaacman pic.twitter.com/9lLh3zwzIQ
[Thursday-morning update]
Bob Zimmerman says that the hearing, along with NASA, is ultimately irrelevant.
Happy Thanksgiving
The turkey is brined and in the oven, the dressing is ready to go in, and friends are coming over. I’m thankful for my health at an age I always figured as a kid would be OLD, friends in the space community, and the fact that things I’ve been hoping for for decades in space may finally be on the verge of happening. I’m also thankful that Jared gets another shot at running NASA. Finally, I’m thankful for my faithful readers, some of whom have become old friends, in both senses of the word, and some of whom we’ve lost over the years, but I always welcome new ones.
I’m less thankful for the Lions, but they’re not completely out of it yet.
Disport yourselves cordially in comments.
Cornelius Vanderbilt
ICBMs
Yes. It’s time (long past time, IMO) to move them from the Air Force to the Army. They’re really just very long-range artillery. Get the USAF out of both the missile and space business and get it to focus on aviation.
Dave Cheuvront
This was unexpected. I saw him at the beginning of the month in Orlando at the NSS Space Settlement Summit. I quoted and referenced him in my Reason Foundation study, for his work in showing that multiple launches were actually lower mission risk than a single one. Lori Guisewhite (who I also saw there) remembers him as well.
RIP and Ad Astra.
Oopsie
The new version of the Starship booster had an issue on the pad.
Hopefully, they’ll figure it out quickly, and it won’t be too big a setback.
Another Space Bureaucracy
I don’t understand why this wouldn’t be in NASA’s charter. You can say they haven’t been doing a very good job of it, but the response to that should be to fix that, not create another agency.
Military Necessity
…and the right to repair.
It’s a complicated issue. I wonder how much this issue is going to bleed over into space hardware?