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End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

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Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#11

Post by daniel_reetz »

dylan604 wrote: post #10
wffurr wrote: post #8

Missing the most important piece of info about any NRO launch, the mission patch! Meow! https://www.nro.gov/portals/135/assets/img/L-70_Snow-Leopard...

Is it just me, but I feel like this being an NRO patch that the placement of the stars isn't just a designer's choice but potentially some cryptic meaning. If not, how boring!

Look up Trevor Paglen's book "I could tell you but then you would have to be destroyed by me". It's a collection of mission patches along with some interpretation as to the meaning and placement of symbols. Fascinating stuff.

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#13

Post by zaphoyd »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #9
Rebelgecko wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Wiki is wrong, IIRC this was part of a block buy of three launches for $450 million

Yes, Wikipedia says $2.2 billion for 5 launches, but the reference says $1.18 billion for 5 launches, where NROL-70 was part of a three launch buy for $467.5 million. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Delta_IV_Heavy_launc...

the reference says $1.18 billion just for "launch operation costs" that doesn't include the hardware. Farther down the source cites the hardware + operations as $2.2B/5 launches

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#14

Post by sandworm101 »

wffurr wrote: post #8

Missing the most important piece of info about any NRO launch, the mission patch! Meow! https://www.nro.gov/portals/135/assets/img/L-70_Snow-Leopard...

That isn't a real patch, more of a mission logo. The details are too small. The pink nose, if actually in patch form, would stand out as a pink dot in the middle of a blurry cat.

Fyi, military patches look best when using lines with fixed-width. Anything pointy or jagged doesn't translate well into stitched thread. Avoid shadows too. Yes, there are some all-plastic patches that are carved into 3d shapes but those are evil. Real patches are thread over velcro.

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#15

Post by perihelions »

shreezus wrote: post #2

This article sounds like it was written by ChatGPT. That said, it's wild we were still using expendable rockets like Delta IV Heavy when SpaceX offerings are objectively better & cheaper. What SpaceX has done for the industry is nothing short of incredible.

The point of overpaying on the 2nd-best choice is that it maintains an independent backup if the 1st-best disappears suddenly. The client (DoD) is willing to pay for that insurance: they do not want a multi-year downtime interval they're unable to launch military hardware.

(This isn't an anti-SpaceX thing, really: the dual-provider system (Atlas/Delta) long predates them).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Space_Launch

(And besides, these satellites are orders of magnitude more expensive than their launch vehicle! The NRO's budget alone is around $10 billion per year).

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#16

Post by subatomicspace »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #5
martythemaniak wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wikipedia says NRO launches are $440m, so the price difference is really really big, which is the reason why this is the last launch - not even the US Government has that kinda cash for launches. The other reason is there's a lag of several years between when a capability is established (Falcon Heavy) and when large customers can take advantage of it. For example, we really shouldn't expect Starship to make a dent in…

Does that Wikipedia figure include the satellite?

The figure would be for just the launch itself (however accurate it may be). Satellite costs for these big missions would be in the "multi-hundreds of millions of dollars" range.

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#18

Post by walrus01 »

wffurr wrote: post #8

Missing the most important piece of info about any NRO launch, the mission patch! Meow! https://www.nro.gov/portals/135/assets/img/L-70_Snow-Leopard...

Nothing will ever top NROL-39 with the octopus

https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&sca_esv=841...

There's a lot of in-jokes and humor in the defense contractor community for team morale building and such. Same idea why challenge coins exist within the relationships between big defense contractors and the DoD agencies that buy services and equipment from them.

The "nothing is beyond our reach" and octopus seems like some sinister and scary thing for a military/intelligence agency to be putting out there in public, but it probably has a more specific meaning within the top secret capabilities of that specific program. I have no idea what it is, could be something like listening to all mobile phone traffic in Waziristan, whatever.

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#19

Post by walrus01 »

dang wrote: post #12

We changed the URL from https://www.spacedaily.com/reports/End_of_an_Era_Final_Delta... to an article that seems to have more background information. Is there a better article available? If so, we can change it again.

I don't think you'll get a whole lot more info other than "this is the mission patch, it's named NROL-70, and it was obviously big and heavy enough to launch on a Delta IV heavy". What the payload is will be totally unknown to people who don't have clearance so there isn't anything for tech journalists/websites/bloggers to write about, other than their own speculation.

Re: End of an era: Final Delta IV heavy rocket carries NROL-70 on historic mission

#20

Post by walrus01 »

perihelions wrote: post #15
shreezus wrote: post #2

This article sounds like it was written by ChatGPT. That said, it's wild we were still using expendable rockets like Delta IV Heavy when SpaceX offerings are objectively better & cheaper. What SpaceX has done for the industry is nothing short of incredible.

The point of overpaying on the 2nd-best choice is that it maintains an independent backup if the 1st-best disappears suddenly. The client (DoD) is willing to pay for that insurance: they do not want a multi-year downtime interval they're unable to launch military hardware. (This isn't an anti-SpaceX thing, really: the dual-provider system (Atlas/Delta) long predates them). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Secur…

If you stop building anything for long enough you lose the capability to do it. There's reasons why the DoD wants to maintain at least two contractors, so I agree with your point here.

As an example when the UK built the first Astute class submarine about ten years ago they ran into a huge number of delays and technical issues because everyone who had been involved in their previous nuclear submarine construction program in the early to mid 1980s had retired or moved on to new things.

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