We're just gonna take a really brief. Look at the latest starship developments

Our main focus will be Commercial Crew and the other day's press conference that Elon Musk and Jim Bryden stein put on then we'll learn

a fascinating history lesson as to why an upcoming

Falcon 9 mission will launch to a polar orbit from the Cape instead of Vandenberg Air Force Base in California

Then we'll finish with today's honorable mention. Let's get into it

So again, not a whole lot to discuss today concerning starship updates

But that doesn't mean that nothing is happening at the Boca Chica and Koko sites the launch pad for the Marquand prototype is still receiving

major upgrades in preparation for the 20-kilometer

Flight that should take place within a month and pad 39a is undergoing its own upgrades for future starship launches

furthermore the mark 2 prototype that will utilize the launch pad has recently received external pipe egde the next starship update elan puts on will

Include more information concerning the plan for point-to-point transit on earth this week NASA Administrator, Jim brightenstein and SpaceX

CEO Elon Musk put on a press conference at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California

With the sole intent to promote the Commercial Crew program just prior to the event

Jim was given a tour of the facilities and NASA took some pretty nifty pics

Including an image of the crew Dragon capsule that will be the first to take American astronauts to space early next year those two

Astronauts Bob and Doug were in attendance as well and despite NASA's Flintstones qualitystream

CNBC managed to do us a solid with what they captured

so here's just a quick little run through of all the

Interesting moments from the media briefing first the status of crew dragon and was to come

We have a static fire that is going to be happening in short order.

We have a high altitude abort test that will be happening in short order.

We've talked, even today. That we could see as many as 10 drop tests between now and the end of the year.

We're hoping to have the first successful mark 3 drop test within a week or two.

There will be steady cadence of tests thereafter.

Second, Elon commented on the crew dragon demo one capsule that exploded last April

And to be totally frank, if there hasn't been some hardware that blew up on the test stand, I don't think you've tested it hard enough.

That's the reality. You've got to push the envelope. Find out where the outer issues are. Then address all the corner cases.

Jim said that the explosion of the demo one capsule gave him confidence in Elon Musk and SpaceX because the very cause of the explosion

The propellant was the very thing that Elon said he was worried about when Jim became administrator

Elon Musk said to me, he said that's the biggest concern, that's what we need to worry about.

And I will tell you, if we look at the catastrophic failure that happened back in April, he was right.

And that gives me confidence. And that is why we test.

Doug and Bob were appreciative of SpaceX's transparency concerning the explosion as we all are

Any of these failures as they go forward, giving us insight and sharing that understanding as we go forward

Has been a part of what makes me so comfortable with this team kind of going forward

And I just really appreciate how much insight we've been able to have and how quickly we've been able to have it

in each of these cases as these cases when something like this comes up

We all know I love parachutes so imagine my excitement when they started talking about the new Mark 3 design

The biggest difference between the mark 2 and mark 3 is going to much stronger lines in the parachute

So going from essentially nylon to zylon. The strength of the lines is about 3 times that of nylon.

And then there are some changes to the stitching pattern, where the lines connect to the canopy.

You've got a stress-concentration. So you wanna have exactly the right [inaudible] to spread the load and the stress-concentration where the lines meet the canopy.

Jim was asked about William Gerstenmaiers permanent replacement for associate administrator for human exploration and operations

We opened the aperture very wide initially and started to narrow it down, but we are not ready to announce who that person is

But I will tell you, that announcement is not months away, it's weeks away. And that's a day we're all looking forward to

And finally Jim wanted to clarify his position and NASA's position on starship

I want people to make no mistake. That NASA has an interest in seeing Starship be successful.

We have been a partner on Starship, a non-exchange of funds kind of partner, when it comes to aerodynamics. And when it comes to testing and test facilities.

Crew dragon is currently expected to launch ports demo to mission with Bob and Doug on board in the first quarter of

2020 NASA has been training a lot lately for this upcoming mission to the International Space

Station in a view from the demo one capsule during liftoff was recently shared as well the Falcon 9 rocket for the Argentinean Space Agency's

Sawa comm Earth observation satellite will no longer lift off from Vandenberg Air Force Base

But instead will move to the Cape for its launch

No earlier than February

2020 while I'm not sure why it could be due to California's known hostility towards Vandenberg's commercial launch manifest

But what makes this move so surprising is that this particular satellite will be placed into a polar orbit and polar

Trajectories haven't launched from Florida and decades see a 1960 tensions were peaking between the u.s. And Cuba during the Cold War

In fact, just a year later

the Bay of Pigs invasion would take place, but that

November a Thor able star launch vehicle attempted to place a military spy satellite in a polar orbit from Cape Canaveral

Unfortunately, the booster malfunctioned and caused a slight diversion in the flight path

The rocket was manually detonated as standard protocol dictates

But an unlucky Cuban cow was prematurely slaughtered when it caught a piece of falling debris

And you can imagine the following drama that in student between the two nations during such a delicate time in history

And so the u.s. Decided to end polar orbits from the Cape until now, but now it's time for today's honorable mention

All right, we're back with yet

another segment of Richard Branson's Virgin

Company only this time we'll be discussing virgin orbit and their mission to be the first private company to send cube SATs to Mars as

Early as 2022 despite the fact that these virgins haven't yet penetrated low Earth orbit formed in

2017 as a spin-off of Virgin Galactic virgin orbit uses the familiar method of launching a rocket

known as launcher one like a missile from the bottom of a Boeing 747

named cosmic girl

Virgin prides himself on launching Rockets differently than most other space agencies and this new Martian endeavour was reportedly inspired by NASA's insight mission

which if you remember successfully used cube SATs to relay the descent status of the insight Lander under the surface of Mars in

2018 virgin orbit will be tag-teaming this particular mission with Poland based satellite companies sat revolution

Well, that's all I have for you guys today

Thank you so much for tuning in and until the next one

Godspeed

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