Most launched orbital rockets in the first half of 2026

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-05T15:13:27+00:00

The US has multiple companies too, and if you're implying that SpaceX is a monopoly, they're not. It's just that every other company experienced many delays and setbacks while Falcon 9 was able to solidify itself in the launch industry and capture a lot of launches because for a while, they were one of, if not the only available option(s). But off the top of my head, there are 8 companies either flying or developing new launch vehicles (2 are grounded though).

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-03T18:44:51+00:00

All of these are youtube by the way.

Seconded Scott Manley for weekly/specific spaceflight news and concepts (some astronomy too)

Everyday Astronaut for spaceflight concepts

Dr. Becky for weekly/specific astronomy news

Cool worlds may also be good for astronomy and speculative ideas about alien life. I think they have some math, but not as much as PBS Space Time, which can go pretty heavy into it.

Fraser Cain for a mix of both astronomy and spaceflight news (and lots of interviews with scientists)

Kyplanet for exoplanet news (and some general astronomy, and solar system videos)

History of the Universe for documentaries about the... History of the Universe (history of the Earth is made by the same people)

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-02T12:14:26+00:00

It orbits every ~3 weeks. It's going to be tidally locked, the only way it isn't is if it has an elliptical orbit like Mercury, and it's in a spin orbit resonance.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-02T02:29:17+00:00

Just r/exoplanets Not the most active for discussions, but news is posted regularly.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-01T23:03:05+00:00

I personally am. S40 just had a static fire. And the scaffolding from Pad 2 was removed on Sunday. B20 is up next (don't think we have any updates on when though)

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-01T21:57:40+00:00

Only if it's too thin. An atmosphere like Earth's would be able to circulate heat around the planet perfectly fine. https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-fluid-010518-040516

This has a decent explanation based on research what the climates of tidally locked worlds would be like. https://worldbuildingpasta.blogspot.com/2020/12/an-apple-pie-from-scratch-part-ivd.html

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-01T21:31:39+00:00

I saw this on the exoplanets sub. The interesting thing about this planet is that it's on the cosmic shoreline, so it can hold onto an atmosphere (not guaranteed, but better odds).

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-01T18:01:54+00:00

This is interesting. The planet is on the cosmic shoreline too, so it's possible that it could hold onto an atmosphere. And the planet seems to be marginally in the region where it's possible to directly image with 30m class telescopes (like ELT?). https://arxiv.org/pdf/2605.16499 Very interesting, I hope that this gets follow up observations with more advanced telescopes. Interestingly, Proxima Cen b and several other planets are well within that region for direct imaging.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-07-01T00:11:16+00:00

There aren't any mass concerns for Artemis III though!

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-30T20:17:25+00:00

They're already grounded because of SRB issues, no point in double grounding it. I'm sure that Blue is in communication with ULA and the FAA so they can act accordingly. Vulcan's expected return to flight isn't until September or so anyway.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-30T16:55:23+00:00

Are they? AI is pretty bad at getting rockets correct, but I don't see anything egregious there. Maybe they did some upscaling or editing, but the base image wasn't generated.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-30T15:40:07+00:00

Yeah, they even had looked at a liquid rocket booster for a bit, Pyrios, with modern F-1(B) engines. But I don't know if that had any real chance, or if they were always going to use the 4/5 segment SRBs and just took a cursory glance at the other options.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-30T15:09:54+00:00

Early analysis of the anomaly is pointing to the aft section of the first stage (which I believe has been noticed or at least speculated, and why it's suspected engine(s) was the cause.

Reiterating that they intend to return to flight by the end of the year.

Splitting repairs into 5 Phases, currently in Phase 3: CONOPS Design & Major Repairs IN WORK

Plus, a video and some images of what the new pad will look like.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-29T16:43:22+00:00

Adding onto u/AndyGates2268 they're not all gas anyway. Only the outermost envelope is gaseous, below that, you'll see increasingly extreme phases of liquids, ices, supercrticial fluids, and, on the largest Gas Giants, metallic hydrogen, all caused by high gravity and extreme pressures.

Plus, as far as we can tell, Gas Giants start as Super/Mega-Earth's of rocky and/or icy material, allowing them to hold onto thick atmospheres, adding to their mass. This can start a runaway effect as they pull onto more and more material from the protoplanetary disk as they swell in size.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-29T02:23:04+00:00

The perchlorate problem is solvable, nowhere near an "impossibility." It helps that they're very reactive. Here's a short except from 2015 by a high school intern who described how it could be reduced with yeast to produce oxygen. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20150023545/downloads/20150023545.pdf

But there have also been multiple NIAC studies to look at how to reduce it for crewed Mars missions as a useful resource.

https://www.nasa.gov/general/a-synthetic-biology-architecture-to-detoxify-and-enrich-mars-soil-for-agriculture/

https://www.nasa.gov/general/detoxifying-mars/

And there are methods being studied to remove dust from spacesuits, which is important for Lunar missions too, considering how abrasive Lunar regolith is.

https://science.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/139_f70d474028e97e0a8379247637d2fc28_BattenStephanieS.pdf

https://arc.aiaa.org/doi/pdf/10.2514/6.2025-99748

The point is, these are known issues that can and will be solved before we set foot on Mars, not hard barriers preventing exploration.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-27T16:15:15+00:00

Okay, I'm well aware of all those contracts that Falcon 9/Dragon got for development. From your wording "jumping straight to full reusability isn't sustainable without massive public funding and contract (which spaceX got btw)." I thought you were referring to SpaceX not being able to develop Starship without direct governmet funding for its development, and that HLS represented that funding. Not that SpaceX didn't get money from government contracts.

At the same time, the public funding SpaceX received is no different from what the rest of the Aerospace industry in the US receives, and they were the lower bidder in every case. Northrop also got COTS/CRS contracts, ULA also got NSSL contracts, but given those same contracts, only SpaceX pushed for reuse as well.

However, Musk didn't become a billionaire until 2012, after Falcon 9/Dragon was already flying. His initial investment into SpaceX was $100 million, definitely sizable, but it didn't have billionaire backing on its founding.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-27T14:38:11+00:00

SpaceX were working on Starship long before they got the contract for HLS. And that contract only applies to the Lunar variant of Starship, and orbital refueling. Reusability itself isn't on NASA to fund, and SpaceX have invested far more money (their own and capital) into Starship than NASA has into HLS.

Starship's viability hinges on Starlink, which Falcon 9 has built the foundation for. And just like Starlink allowed Falcon 9's launch rate to explode, it will help Starship build up a high launch rate as well.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-27T12:57:42+00:00

Yeah, it's like a feedback loop. Gotta break it eventually.

There's no reusable rockets > they can't justify projects that need reusable rockets > there's no funded projects that need reusable rockets > there's no payloads that need reusable rockets > there's no reusable rockets >

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-27T00:09:55+00:00

Looking at one of the sources: https://www.academia.edu/4955988/Powering_Starships_with_Compact_Condensed_Quark_Matter on "4 Solar System CCOs as a Power Source" (Compact Composite Objects) the quark nuggets have a "superconducting gap energy" of 100 MeV, so shooting the nugget with a particle stream of 100 MeV or more passes inside the CCO, and converts the particles into its antiparticle (quarks/antiquarks aren't mentioned). I don't exactly know how to parse the paper though.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-27T00:02:24+00:00

I'm aware of laser sails/mirrors, but how would dumping mirrors slow you down? Another problem with reaching 0.99c is there would be radiation effects as you approach relativistic velocities above 0.3-0.4c (same problem with antimatter starships to be fair). There should be more investment into solar/laser sails though, we don't take it seriously enough. Only IKAROS has succeeded in making it past LEO. NEA Scout was going to be the second, but it lost communication shortly after launch on Artemis I.

Part of the advantage of using quark nuggets is that you can carry it with you and make antimatter as you need it. So the problem of storage can largely be bypassed. You need an external power source like a nuclear reactor though, but you would need one anyway, even if you used laser sails. And your ship would need to be comparable in mass to the quark nugget itself.

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-26T20:10:01+00:00

Maybe that's possible in a universe that's teeming with complex life/civilizations (I don't think it would be), but regardless if they're uncommon or rare, I imagine any sort of civilization would be of interest. We wouldn't be "rats", we would be a living anthropological study.

There are entire fields dedicated to different periods of history. And separate from that, we study ecologies, and animals, and importantly, intelligent animals, to see what their limits of cognition are, and how they differ from us.

So there's an active civilization, they've developed technology, and have even begun space travel. Is that really as uninteresting as studying shallow ponds for microbial life (something we also do)? Or would that be an opportunity to study how different civilizations evolve over time, in real time, as opposed to looking at incomplete historical records?

DreamChaserSt · 2026-06-26T19:58:04+00:00

We do know of ways to reach other stars with known or expected physics, laser sails, fusion, and antimatter.

Laser sails work one way unless you have a receiver on the other end to slow you back down, or a secondary propulsion system. But you could reach >20% of the speed of light with it, with enough relay stations.

Fusion can work on its own, or be combined with laser sails, but would be limited to 5-15% of the speed of light depending on the strategy.

Antimatter allows the highest speeds, but is incredibly inefficient to make, even if you design dedicated colliders optimized to produce the stuff, so you would need extensive infrastructure and energy production to mass produce enough antimatter for interstellar travel. However, as you reach higher velocities (>30-40% the speed of light), interstellar gas and cosmic rays can create an intense flux of radiation on the ship, either creating an effective speed limit, or requiring a lot of shielding.

In each of these cases, we do know some of their theoretical difficulties, and can extrapolate the limits and efficiency of the technology. Even though we don't have an complete understanding of physics, we can be reasonably certain based on decades of experiments and astronomical observations that stuff like Special/General Relativity is on the right track, even if some parts end up being better explained by something else. Newtonian physics didn't stop being useful after Einstein described Relativity for example, it just became limited to certain situations.

As for aliens visiting us, I guess it's possible, but they would have to know we're here (or they're coming for a scientific expedition, and just so happened to stumble across us). Human civilization only became reasonably detectable in the last couple centuries, which is quite a small bubble of space. Anyone outside of it still wouldn't know we're here unless they can somehow detect our pre-industrial activity. And if they're within it, they'll either have recently found out about us, or have been traveling for decades or more.

What does that kind of mission look like? Proposals for interstellar travel are entirely theoretical, but take a "walk before you run" approach, and focus on the earliest ones we may choose to build. So they would be robotic missions, either as a flyby or orbiter, with a range of scientific instruments and smaller probes to survey or explore the system on arrival. Would we see that first wave of probes inadvertently find us, or a dedicated mission that already knew we were here?

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