Category Archives: Random Thoughts

Random Thoughts: A Joint International Debris Remediation Effort

Posted on October 22, 2021 by Jonathan Goff

As humanity’s ambitions in space increase, one of the biggest potential risks to to those ambitions is the dangers caused by the debris we’ve left on orbit over the first half century of space development. Since Sputnik’s launch in October … Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Commercial Space, International Space Collaboration, International Space Competition, Orbital Debris Remediation/Mitigation, Random Thoughts, Satellite Servicing | 3 Comments

Random Thoughts: Why Cameras Might be Critical to Venus Settlement

Posted on July 21, 2018 by Jonathan Goff

It’s been a while since I last posted on the idea of Venus settlement, but the idea came up again on Twitter recently, and it got me thinking about several of the challenges that still need to be resolved to … Continue reading →

Posted in Random Thoughts, Space Settlement, Venus | 18 Comments

Random Thoughts: A Now Rather Cold Take on BFR

Posted on February 5, 2018 by Jonathan Goff

When Elon gave his update on BFR at the IAC conference in Australia, I was originally going to post some thoughts right away. But with Falcon Heavy’s maiden launch attempt coming up tomorrow, I realized I still hadn’t collected my … Continue reading →

Posted in BFR, Blue Origin, Random Thoughts, SpaceX | 49 Comments

Random Thoughts/Rocket Legos: Masten Xephr as a Vulcan SRB Replacement?

Posted on May 5, 2017 by Jonathan Goff

I’m sick at home today, so had extra time to think about fun technical concepts, so here’s an interesting one to think about. Right now, ULA’s plans for Vulcan include using expendable Orbital ATK GEM 63XL sold strapon boosters to … Continue reading →

Posted in Launch Vehicles, MSS, Random Thoughts, Rocket Legos, ULA | 7 Comments

Random Thoughts: RLVs and Megaconstellations

Posted on April 14, 2017 by Jonathan Goff

Last month I was out in Washington DC for a satellite industry conference (the 2017 Satellite Show). My startup has been working on a cool satellite servicing related project that I need to blog about soon, and we were out … Continue reading →

Posted in Blue Origin, Business, Launch Vehicles, MSS, Random Thoughts, RLV Markets, Space Transportation, SpaceX | 12 Comments

Random Thoughts: First Pass Analysis of a White Dragon/Xeus Lunar Sortie Mission

Posted on February 28, 2017 by Jonathan Goff

After yesterday’s SpaceX announcement of having booked two customers for a Apollo-8 style mission around the Moon and back, using Falcon Heavy and Dragon V2, I got thinking about ways to take the next step in lunar tourism–surface missions. Now, … Continue reading →

Posted in Commercial Crew, Launch Vehicles, Lunar Exploration and Development, Propellant Depots, Random Thoughts, Space Exploration, Space Transportation, SpaceX, ULA, YHABFT | 51 Comments

Random Thoughts: Throwing the Moon a Bone

Posted on November 18, 2016 by Jonathan Goff

[Note: This blog post was originally planned to be something significantly longer, triggered by one of Eric Berger’s recent Ars Technica articles. But running a bootstrapped startup gave me the choice of waiting until this was totally irrelevant, or saying … Continue reading →

Posted in Commercial Crew, Commercial Space, COTS, Lunar Commerce, Lunar Exploration and Development, Random Thoughts | 9 Comments

Random Thoughts: ACES/EUS Public Private Partnership Idea

Posted on May 17, 2016 by Jonathan Goff

A few years ago, I did a “Random Thoughts” blog post about synergies between the proposed ACES stage and the proposed SLS upper stage. Now, I’m still not the world’s biggest SLS fan, and I’m still not a fan of … Continue reading →

Posted in Launch Vehicles, NASA, Random Thoughts, ULA | 10 Comments

Random Thoughts: New Shepard for Pop-Up TSTO NanoSat Launch

Posted on January 24, 2016 by Jonathan Goff

Blue Origin’s recent successful launch, recovery, and re-flight of their suborbital RLV New Shepard got me thinking about an idea that I came up with back in late November shortly after their first flight. In an article written shortly after … Continue reading →

Posted in Blue Origin, Launch Vehicles, Random Thoughts, Rocket Design Theory | 32 Comments

Random Thoughts: Space Debris Cleanup Funding Mechanism

Posted on December 9, 2015 by Jonathan Goff

Ever since that Kosmos spacecraft t-boned an Iridium spacecraft a few years back, more and more people have been paying attention to the space debris issue. We’ve been able to live with the nuisance caused by space debris for a … Continue reading →

Posted in Orbital Debris Remediation/Mitigation, Random Thoughts | 17 Comments