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Articles

Perspective on a Failure

1 week ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

SpaceX has lost another Starship, Ship 36, to an accident during a static fire attempt. The vehicle burst, and the was engulfed in a fireball, during the propellant load operation. There have been a string of failures in the Starship program this year - mostly relating to the new V2 iteration of the ship.
A Draft Roadmap for European Colonisation of Space

2 weeks ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

European spaceflight has fallen behind; SpaceX have taken the commercial launch market which was a decade ago dominated by Ariane 5, have rapidly increased the rate of launch and satellite manufacture beyond our ability to keep up, and perfected first stage reusability which remains at the concept stage in Europe. We lack a human spaceflight program of our own, and our ability to explore other planets is largely tied to collaborations with others.
Jared Isaacman and the Fate of NASA

3 weeks ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

Jared Isaacman’s nomination for NASA Administrator has be abruptly withdrawn by the Trump administration. This has been widely viewed as a very negative development - Isaacman was both well liked across the space community and incredibly well qualified. He would have been the first NASA Administrator to have prior experience running a different space program (his own private Polaris program).
Mass Value Report for May 2025

3 weeks ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

Last week we saw the ninth test flight of Starship, and an update from Elon Musk on the SpaceX plan for colonising Mars. Neither part of the Flight 9 vehicle fully completed its flight, and thus were not able to collect all the data that was needed, but did demonstrate the second ascent of a previously flown Superheavy booster. A similar mission will have to be reflown in a few weeks, delaying fully orbital flights. This did not dampen the ambitions of the company regarding this program though.
Ink on a Page

1 month ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

On Wednesday, during an press conference for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, in answer to a question from an AFP journalist, a spokeswoman made her government’s objection to the proposed “Golden Dome” ballistic missile defence system plain. Golden Dome is, based on statements from the White House, a space-based boost phase interception system.
Visions of Progress

1 month ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson is the book I’ve been hoping someone on the left would produce for a while now. I have noticed with frustration that left-wing movements across the western world have taken the production of goods and services for granted, believing their job is only to redistribute the bottomless spoils of a capitalist economy - often whilst unfairly criticising that economy.
Mass Value Report for April 2025

1 month ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

During a recent static fire, the next Starship being prepared for a test flight suffered an anomaly. Its not been stated at this point if this is related to the event that destroyed flights 7 and 8. It is likely flight 9 will be delayed at this point, with a potential impact on the total flights that are possible this year.
The Underview Effect

2 months ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

On Monday, six women went on a suborbital space tourism flight on board Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft, including journalist Gayle King and pop star Katy Perry. The presence of the latter especially made this a media event that had reach substantially beyond the space community, and generated a huge amount of headlines and comment. To be clear, this was not a particularly important mission, either for spaceflight or the advancement of women.
Rethinking the Kardashev Scale

2 months ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

The Kardashev is a staple of discussions about the development and colonisation of space. Initially proposed as three discreet classifications of civilisations by Nikolai Kardashev in 1964, where a Type 1 civilisation would control the energy of a planet, a Type 2 civilisation would control the energy of a star, and a Type 3 civilisation would control the energy of a galaxy . It was later refined into a continuous scale by Carl Sagan using the following formula.
Polar Explorers

2 months ago | planetocracy.org | Peter Hague

SpaceX have continued to push the boundaries of human spaceflight, flying the first human mission to a polar orbit. Fram2 flew 90 degrees to the equator, giving astronauts the first view of the poles with their own eyes. The highest inclination missions that have been flown before this are the dual missions of Vostok 3 through 6 in 1962 and 1963.