Free Republic

[snip] I just had to pull my video that I made last night about the leaks being solved. No more hydrogen leaks with Artemis and the launch being no earlier than March 6th. I literally just woke up and the information is now completely changed and it's not good. Jared Isaacman shared on X that after overnight data showed an interruption in helium flow in the SLS interim cryogenic propulsion stage, teams are troubleshooting and preparing for a likely roll back of Artemis 2 to the vehicle assembly building at NASA Kennedy. This will almost assuredly impact the March launch...

Ellie in Space interviews Christian Davenport, author of Rocket Dreams. Moon vs Mars, SpaceX IPO & The China Question w/ Christian Davenport | 45:11 Ellie in Space | 217K subscribers | 4,809 views | February 16, 2026

https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/2022898940035899849 Wall Street Apes@WallStreetApesIt’s all coming out. Linkedin Billionaire Reid Hoffman’s name appears 2,600 times in the new Jeffrey Epstein FilesElon Musk was rightThe Biden Admin was letting top Democrat donors and Jeffrey Epstein clients sponsor DOJ investigationsElon Musk reveals “The SpaceX lawsuit was funded by Reid Hoffman, who is a major Dem donor and also a Jeffrey Epstein Client”Think about that, Democrats let their donors use our law enforcement to target their enemiesElon Musk explains the SpaceX DOJ investigation went on for YEARS, he explains in details the Weaponization of law enforcementAnd it was sponsored by a top Democrat...

Elon didn’t reverse that through inspiration. He reversed it by building companies that required understanding manufacturing or failing completely. SpaceX and Tesla forced engineers to learn how metal fractures, how tolerances cascade through systems, how physical iteration costs months and millions per failure. No debugging. No patches. Just physics that doesn’t negotiate. Boyle: “Training two generations of engineers.” The product isn’t the cars. It’s the people. Look at who’s founding America’s critical hard-tech companies now. The common thread isn’t Stanford or MIT. It’s time on factory floors at SpaceX or Tesla. They learned welding. They learned that “impossible” just means...

James Cobban Space Nerd since 19569h Why is liquid hydrogen so challenging to handle when fueling rockets, and what special techniques are used to prevent leaks? The most effective way to avoid the challenges of using liquid hydrogen is to not use liquid hydrogen. There is no galactic police officer holding a phaser forcing NASA to use liquid hydrogen. There is no law of physics which says rockets must use liquid hydrogen. What.there are is a bunch of collosally ignorant politicians being bribed to insist that NASA piss away billions of tax dollars on technology which killed fourteen American heroes....

[live in about ten minutes] NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev will spend the next several months in low Earth orbit on NASA's SpaceX Crew-12 mission. While there, they will conduct various science experiments and technology demonstrations to benefit life on Earth and in orbit, furthering our journey back to the Moon, to Mars, and beyond. NASA's SpaceX Crew-12 Arrival & Welcome Remarks | less than 10 minutes NASA | 12.7M subscribers | 1,576 waiting | Scheduled for February 14, 2026

SpaceX opened February 13 with a dual milestone at Cape Canaveral, featuring a successful Crew-12 astronaut launch to the International Space Station (ISS) and the first Falcon 9 booster landing at the company’s newly designated Landing Zone 40 (LZ-40). A SpaceX Falcon 9 lifted off at 5:15 a.m. Eastern from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, placing the Crew Dragon Freedom into orbit on the Crew-12 mission. The spacecraft is carrying NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, as noted in a report from Space News....

Elon Musk just became the first person ever worth $800 billion or more after his rocket maker SpaceX acquired his artificial intelligence and social media company xAI. Forbes estimates that the deal, which values the combined company at $1.25 trillion, boosted Musk’s fortune by $84 billion, to a record $852 billion. Before the deal, Musk owned an estimated 42% stake in SpaceX worth $336 billion, based on a tender offer launched in December that valued the privately-held rocket maker at $800 billion. He also owned an estimated 49% stake in xAI worth $122 billion, based on a private fundraising round...

As Elon Musk tries to sweep his Mars ambitions under the rug like an embarrassing teenage phase, he’s now shifting focus to the Moon — with no less eye-brow raising ideas. According to new reporting from the New York Times, Musk told employees at xAI — his AI company recently acquired by SpaceX — that it needs to construct a factory on the Moon to churn out AI satellites. And to launch the satellites into space, he says, it needs to build an enormous electromagnetic catapult. Sci-fi readers already know where this is going: Musk is thinking about building a...

Dive into the latest SpaceX Starship developments in this week's update, where Booster 19 aces its cryogenic proof tests at Massey's, paving the way for Flight 12 amid ongoing Raptor 3 engine testing at McGregor. We explore massive expansions at Starbase's launch site, including new tank farms, deluge systems, and Pad 2 upgrades, plus aerial views of the rising Gigabay and hardware stacking for future vehicles like Ship 40 and Booster 20. From test tank progress and Sanchez lot innovations to McGregor's high-output engine testing - now sufficient for three full Starship stacks - we cover it all, including Elon...

In the last week SpaceX has acquired XAI and presumably related to that they submitted plans to the FCC exploring the construction of a compute cluster in Earth orbit with one million spacecraft. So, I try to use Universe Sandbox to visualize this.... and it's not easy. For technical reasons this is a limited version visualizing the kind of orbits we expect, but you can play with it yourself if you own Universe Sandbox. What Would SpaceX's Space Datacenter Plans Look Like? | 11:31 Scott Manley | 1.83M subscribers | 50,409 views | February 10, 2026

As the International Space Station approaches retirement, commercial space stations are preparing to take its place. Max Space is developing expandable habitats that launch compactly and expand in orbit, offering a new way to build space infrastructure after the ISS. Happening! Private Space Station Being Assembled for Launch | 10:47 NASA Space News | 597K subscribers | 1,506 | February 9, 2026 YouTube transcript reformatted at textformatter.ai follows.

SummarySpaceX shifts focus to lunar city, Mars project delayed Musk cites civilization's future, Moon is faster than Mars SpaceX plans uncrewed lunar landing by March 2027 Feb 8 (Reuters) - Elon Musk said on Sunday that SpaceX has shifted its focus to building a "self‑growing city" on the moon, which could be achieved in less than 10 years. SpaceX still intends to start on Musk's long-held ambition of a city on Mars within five to seven years, he wrote on his X social media platform, "but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization and the Moon is faster."...

For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years. The mission of SpaceX remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars. It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (2 day trip time). This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city....

The Russian invasion force is in disarray following the deactivation of its Starlink satellite communications. Meanwhile Ukrainians are rushing to get their terminals whitelisted to maintain the service. Both sides have made extensive use of the commercial Starlink service, which provides long-range, jam-resistant communication. Now the service operated by SpaceX is being denied to the Russians, and only terminals officially registered in Ukraine will work. “The Starlink terminals added to the ‘whitelist’ are working. The Russians’ terminals have already been blocked,” Ukrainian Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov said in a statement on Thursday, The effect on the Russians has been catastrophic,...

As the hype builds for the reported $1.5 trillion IPO of Elon Musk’s SpaceX later this year, there will be plenty of critics who argue the company’s marketing has more hot air than one of its rockets. It has been claimed by some that the IPO will be worth more than the top seven companies currently listed on the London Stock Exchange – including century-old giants such as Shell, HSBC and AstraZeneca – combined. And yes, sure, there is probably an element of wishful thinking in these reports, as there often is with Musk. But SpaceX also has the potential...

Blue Origin pauses New Shepard flights for no less than 2 years!? | 2:01 Ellie in Space | 216K subscribers | 15,046 views | January 30, 2026YouTube transcript reformatted at textformatter.ai follows.

Artemis II Wet Dress Rehearsal Delayed, SpaceX to Merge with xAI!? | 4:42 Ellie in Space | 216K subscribers | 4,773 views | January 30, 2026

BREAKING: SpaceX wants to turn Space into the World’s Biggest AI Data Center. • SpaceX is seeking approval to launch and operate up to one million satellites designed to function as orbital data centers. • These satellites would provide massive computing power to support advanced artificial intelligence and data processing. • The system would rely on near constant solar energy in space, reducing operating costs and environmental impact compared to Earth based data centers. • Satellites would operate between 500 km and 2,000 km in altitude, across multiple orbital shells, to handle global demand. • High speed laser links would...

SpaceX is considering a potential merger with either Tesla or xAI, according to people familiar with the matter. Bloomberg's Loren Grush and Kiel Porter break down what this possible consolidation of Elon Musk's empire could mean with Caroline Hyde and Ed Ludlow on "Bloomberg Tech." SpaceX Said to Consider Merger With Tesla or xAI | 4:57 Bloomberg Technology | 715K subscribers | 10,262 views | January 30, 2026