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Astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli is pictured tethered to the space station during a spacewalk to replace solar array hardware.

The Expedition 70 crew participated in standard post-spacewalk activities today including health checks, spacesuit work, and a team conference. Meanwhile, science remained on Thursdays schedule as the International Space Station residents studied future piloting techniques and space manufacturing.

NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral OHara had their first post-spacewalk medical exams on Thursday. The duo spent a few moments measuring each others vital signs including temperature, blood pressure, and pulse. Afterward, the pair began cleaning up the Quest airlock and deactivating their spacesuits.

Moghbeli also downlinked imagery captured using spacewalk cameras on Wednesday. She then photographed the spacesuit gloves for inspection and analysis by mission controllers on the ground. OHara logged into a computer and participated in a cognitive assessment.

After lunchtime, the two astronauts joined Commander Andreas Mogensen and Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa for a conference with ground specialists and discussed the previous days spacewalk activities. Mogensen from ESA (European Space Agency) also spent an hour-and-a-half servicing the spacesuits the spacewalkers wore the day before. Satoshi from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) joined the trio at the end of the day for eye scans using the Ultrasound 2 device.

The orbiting labs three cosmonauts spent Thursday focused on space research and lab maintenance in the orbital outposts Roscosmos segment. Cosmonaut Nikolai Chub split his day on a pair of different experiments. During the morning, he explored spacecraft and robotic piloting techniques crews may use on future planetary missions. He then spent the afternoon testing a 3D printer that could help crews become less dependent on supply missions launched from Earth. Cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Konstantin Borisov worked throughout the day maintaining a variety of life support and electronics hardware.

NASA and SpaceX now are targeting 8:28 p.m. EST, Nov. 9, for launch of the companys 29th commercial resupply services (CRS-29) mission to the International Space Station. The additional time allows for completion of final prelaunch closeout ahead of liftoff of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon cargo spacecraft from Launch Complex 39A at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Prior to every Dragon mission, SpaceX conducts extensive prelaunch checkouts at every stage of refurbishment and final integration to ensure the spacecraft is ready to safely fly its next mission. During the initial propellant load in preparation for the CRS-29 mission, teams identified a leak of NTO (nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer) in a Draco thruster valve, which per standard procedure required a pause to the operation to troubleshoot. The team inspected the valve and respective data, and decided to replace the thruster.

SpaceX continues to keep NASA informed throughout the process and the joint team collectively decided to shift launch to account for the initial part replacement and subsequent system checkouts and data reviews.

With a Nov. 9 launch, the spacecraft will arrive at the space station about 5:20 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 11.

Learn more about station activities by following thespace station blog,@space_stationand@ISS_Researchon X, as well as theISS FacebookandISS Instagramaccounts.

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Health Checks and Science on Station, SpaceX Adjusts Launch Date - NASA Blogs

By Nathan Vardi

The billionaire investor has beaten the market by betting on Elon Musk. He lands on the MarketWatch 50 list and, in this interview, remains as bullish as ever.

When Ron Baron was starting an investment business, he got some advice from Steve Wynn. The casino magnate told Baron to name his investment company after himself as a way to show clients and customers that he promised to stand behind it. Some four decades later, Baron Capital has made its most important investment in Elon Musk, Inc.

Baron invested $570 million in Tesla (TSLA), mostly between 2014 and 2016, which was about 2% of his assets under management at the time. Today, after selling some shares, Tesla represents about 10.9% of Baron Capital's $41 billion under management, and the winning position has helped Baron's main mutual fund become the only mutual fund to beat the Nasdaq COMP over the last 5, 10 and 15 years, according to a recent Bloomberg analysis, during which time it returned 17% annualized.

"You get rich by being long-term and by being focused, by owning a small amount of companies," Baron said in an interview.

Baron epitomizes a bullish buy-and-hold investing style that has worked in the current environment, where a few big tech stocks, like Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet (GOOGL), have accounted for a disproportionate share of the stock market's gains. Baron runs a concentrated portfolio and owns one of the best performing big tech companies, Tesla, and has benefitted from the electric-car maker's remarkable stock-market run. As a result, he lands on The MarketWatch 50 list of the most influential people in markets.

Musk himself may have just thrown cold water on Tesla's long-anticipated cybertruck and expressed concern about the ability of consumers to buy his expensive cars in the face of high interest rates. But Baron says Tesla's stock will keep rising over time and its market capitalization can grow from its current $630 billion to as much as $4 trillion in 10 years.

"In the case of Tesla, we are convinced that people cannot do what they're doing and that, ultimately, it's not just going to be a car company and it's not just going to be a battery company," said Baron. "All the other car companies, which 50 years ago, elected to become much more profitable and outsource supplies and compute to other people. We're going to be like Intel was inside of computers. This is going to be Tesla inside of cars. All the cars are going to be using Tesla autonomous driving. No one else can possibly compete."

But Baron is even more bullish on Space Exploration Technologies Corp., better known as SpaceX. The world's busiest rocket-launching company and its large satellite-Internet subsidiary remain private, but Baron said he expects SpaceX will go public and list on a stock exchange within the next three years.

Baron invested about $700 million in SpaceX several years ago and a recent secondary share sale in the private market implied a nearly $150 billion valuation recently for the entire company.

"We think that by 2030 it likely will be worth somewhere around $500 or $600 billion," Baron said. "And then in the 2030s, that's when I expect to make another 10 times our money. So we can make over the next 15 or 20 years, we can make 30 to 50 times our money in SpaceX."

Baron added, "I think SpaceX has a chance to be even bigger than Tesla in the 2030s."

Baron called SpaceX's satellite-Internet business as "Internet for the planet" and said that it will be much lower cost in many places than what any competitor could hope to provide.

"In the case of SpaceX, what they're going to be doing there, the innovation that other people can't possibly do, is the fact that they are able to launch rockets and re-use them over and over and over again," said Baron. "So as a result of that, it costs other people to get to space $100 million, $200 million. It costs us a fraction of that amount ... Basically, we can get our satellites to space for a very low cost."

What is the risk of betting so big on one man? Baron said the risk was greater when Tesla and SpaceX were smaller companies with fewer people, a period when he thinks the two companies were even more dependent on Musk. But now, Baron said, those companies are teeming with excellent engineers and talented professionals. He added that 3.5 million people applied for jobs at Tesla and SpaceX last year.

"It's harder to get a job at Tesla and SpaceX than to get into Harvard," said Baron. "He has the most brilliant people working there, and that isn't going to change."

At the same time, Baron said, Musk is a unique and irreplaceable force.

"I'm betting he's going to stay alive for at least 5 or 10 years," said Baron. "I think that's a good bet."

-Nathan Vardi

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

11-04-23 1316ET

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Ron Baron says Tesla's valuation can hit $4 trillion, but 'SpaceX has ... - Morningstar

Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk said in a social media post on on Nov. 3 that his various companies will never issue a cryptocurrency token.

Musk stated:

To be super clear, none of my companies will ever create a crypto token.

Musk made that comment in response to news about a token that is attempting to capitalize on a new product from his AI firm, xAI, called Grok. Though that company and project are legitimate, any crypto tokens that use those names are not legitimate.

Musks statement indicates that the other companies that he owns or leads including his rebranded Twitter app X, his automotive company Tesla, and his spacecraft and launch company SpaceX will not issue a cryptocurrency of their own.

Despite that warning, there appear to be numerous tokens in circulation that intend to capitalize on Musks companies and their popularity in the crypto sphere. On the Ethereum blockchain alone, there are 260 tokens that mention SpaceX, 497 tokens that mention Tesla, and countless others that mention Twitter or X.

Though few of those tokens have any market value, some have become high-profile scams. In January 2023, Forbes listed 25 notable Elon Musk-themed scams, including a number of cryptocurrency scams and fake coin offerings.

Though Musks firms will not issue new crypto tokens, those companies do make use of existing cryptocurrencies. Tesla holds about $184 million of cryptocurrency, largely or entirely Bitcoin, and accepts Dogecoin for some merchandise transactions.

Elsewhere, X supports Bitcoin tipping. The firm is also planning to introduce extensive payment features that may or may not include support for crypto transactions.

SpaceX, finally, held an unspecified amount of Bitcoin as recently as 2021. One of the companys customers has also funded a SpaceX mission, called DOGE-1, with Dogecoin; that mission is currently expected to launch in January 2024.

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Elon Musk denies that X, Tesla, or SpaceX will ever issue crypto ... - CryptoSlate

The moon seen from the International Space Station on July 9, 2018.

Alexander Gerst | NASA

WASHINGTON Jeff Bezos has his NASA moon ticket.

The billionaire's space company, Blue Origin, won a key contract from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration on Friday to develop a crewed lunar lander for delivering astronauts to the moon's surface later this decade under the agency's Artemis program.

The effort is effectively a more than $7 billion project. NASA's contract award is worth just over $3.4 billion, officials said Friday, and Blue Origin Vice President John Couluris said the company will contribute "well north" of the contract's value as well.

"We're making an additional investment in the infrastructure that will pave the way to land the first humans on Mars," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in announcing the Blue Origin award. "Our shared ambitions now are no less lofty than when President [John F.] Kennedy dared a generation of dreamers to journey to the moon."

An artist's rendering of the lunar lander.

Blue Origin

Bezos said in a tweet Friday he's "honored to be on this journey with @NASA to land astronauts on the Moon this time to stay."

The Blue Origin-led team which includes Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Draper, Astrobotic and Honeybee Robotics topped the proposal of a team led by Leidos-owned Dynetics.

Leidos, in a statement to CNBC, said that "helping NASA with the inspiring efforts to return to the Moon will remain a priority." The company highlighted its existing and ongoing work on NASA systems and said the team is "committed to continuing to assist on these critical missions."

NASA received two additional proposals for the SLD contract but neither was considered "fully compliant with solicitation requirements" and so were quickly discounted, Jim Free, NASA associate administrator for the agency's exploration division, wrote in documents released Friday.

Known as the Sustaining Lunar Development, or SLD, program, the competition was essentially a second-chance contest that NASA organized after Elon Musk's SpaceX was the sole winner of the first crew lander contract in 2021.

That first program, called the Human Landing System, or HLS, gave SpaceX a contract to develop a variation of its Starship rocket for Artemis missions. Prior to the HLS award, NASA was expected to choose two winners, but the agency's budget at the time and SpaceX's more-affordable bid resulted in there being a single winner.

Both HLS and SLD are part of NASA's Artemis program to land astronauts on the moon, with the agency hoping to start flying crews to the lunar surface within the next few years. In December, NASA completed the first Artemis mission, which had no people on board, flying its Space Launch System, or SLS, rocket and Orion spacecraft around the moon for the first time.

Free, in explaining NASA's selection, wrote that Blue Origin's plan featured "compelling" strengths such as two uncrewed pathfinder missions in 2024 and 2025, early-stage technology maturation, excess capabilities of the lander itself, and a "reasonable and balance" price. He mentioned just two weaknesses in Blue Origin's bid, noting an issue with its plan for communications during flights as well as "numerous conflicts and omissions" in the company's schedule.

Regarding Dynetics, the strengths highlighted by Free were not enough to outweigh parts of its plan that were "uncertain" and "unclear," he said. The company's price point, which NASA did not disclose, was also "substantially higher in amount" than Blue Origin, Free wrote.

Elon Musk, founder of SpaceX, left, and Amazon and Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos.

Getty Images

Last year, Nelson explained the reasoning behind a second bidding process to add another privately built lunar lander, saying, "Competition is critical to our success."

"We can leverage that money by working with a commercial industry and, through competition, bring those costs down to NASA," Nelson said during Senate testimony in 2022.

SpaceX has continued to develop its nearly 400-foot-tall Starship rocket in the meantime. The company in April attempted to reach space with the vehicle for the first time but it exploded in midflight. Recently, Musk estimated that SpaceX will spend about $2 billion on Starship development this year and said he expects the company to reach orbit around the Earth with its next launch.

Last year, NASA gave SpaceX an additional $1.15 billion award under the HLS contract, exercising an option to buy a second crewed demonstration landing from the company. That brought the total value of SpaceX's HLS contract up to $4.2 billion through 2027.

To date, NASA has paid out about $1.8 billion to SpaceX under HLS, according to federal records.

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Bezos' Blue Origin wins NASA astronaut moon lander contract to compete with SpaceXs Starship - CNBC

Watch a replay of our live coverage of the countdown and launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on the Starlink 6-3 mission at 2:19 a.m. EDT (0619 UTC) on May 19 from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida. Follow us onTwitter.

Another Falcon 9 rocket lifted off early Friday from Cape Canaveral with a batch of 22 upgraded, new-generation Starlink internet satellites.

The Starlink 6-3 mission launched at 2:19:30 a.m. EDT (0619:30 UTC) from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. SpaceX delayed the liftoff from the mornings first two launch opportunities at 12:41 a.m. at 1:31 a.m. EDT to wait for weather to improve.

Like all Starlink launches, the Falcon 9 rocket released the new batch of internet satellites into an orbit below their final operating altitude. The satellites will then use on-board propulsion to raise their orbits to an altitude of more than 300 miles (500 kilometers).

SpaceXs launch team across the country in California was readying a different Falcon 9 rocket for liftoff at 9:19 a.m. EDT (6:19 a.m. PDT; 1319 UTC) from Vandenberg Space Force Base, but the chance for a launch doubleheader was thwarted by a last-minute abort in the countdown. The launch was rescheduled for Saturday to loft spare satellites for the telecom and data relay networks operated by OneWeb and Iridium.

The Starlink 6-3 mission continued launching SpaceXs new Starlink V2 Mini satellite platform fitted with improved phased array antennas with four times the communications capacity of earlier generations of Starlink satellites, known as Version 1.5, to beam internet signals to consumers around the world. Despite their name, the Starlink V2 Mini satellites are nearly times as massive and more than four times larger than the older Starlink V1.5 satellites.

The Mini moniker refers to SpaceXs plans to launch an even larger full-size Starlink V2 satellite design on the companys huge new Starship rocket. The Starship has nearly 10 times the payload lift capability of a Falcon 9 rocket, with greater volume for satellites, too.

The full-size Starlink V2s will be capable of transmitting signals directly to cell phones.But with the Starship rocket not yet operational following its first full-scale test flight in April, SpaceX began launching second-generation satellites on Falcon 9 rockets and developed the V2 Minis to fit on the companys existing launch vehicles.

The first group of 21 Starlink V2 Mini satellites launched Feb. 27 on a Falcon 9 rocket, but some of those spacecraft were decommissioned and intentionally steered back into the atmosphere due to technical problems. Elon Musk, SpaceXs founder and CEO, said the first batch of Starlink V2 Mini satellites were experiencing some issues, as expected. SpaceX planned to thoroughly test the satellites before boosting them above the altitude of the International Space Station to their final operating orbit.

Elon Musk, SpaceXs founder and CEO, tweeted the first group of Starlink V2 Mini satellites were experiencing some issues, as expected.

SpaceX continued launching older-model Starlink V1.5 satellites on a series of missions in March and April, before resuming deployment of the bigger, more capable Starlink V2 Mini satellites with a Falcon 9 launch April 19. Since then, SpaceX has launched four missions with the older Starlink V1.5 satellites before switching back to the larger V2 Minis with Friday mornings launch.

In addition to improved communications capability, the Starlink V2 Mini satellites have more efficient, higher-thrust argon-fueled propulsion systems. Argon is cheaper than the krypton gas SpaceX used to fuel ion engines on the older-generation Starlink V1.5 satellites.

This means Starlink can provide more bandwidth with increased reliability and connect millions of more people around the world with high-speed internet, SpaceX said before the first launch of Starlink V2 Mini satellites in February.

Each Starlink V2 Mini satellite weighs about 1,760 pounds (800 kilograms) at launch, nearly three times heavier than the older Starlink satellites. The are also bigger in size, with a spacecraft body more than 13 feet (4.1 meters) wide, filling more of the Falcon 9 rockets payload fairing during launch, according to regulatory filings with the Federal Communications Commission.

The larger, heavier satellite platform means a Falcon 9 rocket can only launch around 22 Starlink V2 Mini payloads at a time, compared to more than 50 Starlink V1.5s on a single Falcon 9 launch. The first two Falcon 9 launches with Starlink V2 Mini satellites carried 21 spacecraft, while Fridays Starlink 6-3 mission will deploy 22 spacecraft, matching or slightly exceeding the record for the heaviest payload SpaceX has ever launched into space.

The two deployable solar panels on each Starlink V2 Mini satellite span about 100 feet (30 meters) tip-to-tip.The previous generation of Starlink V1.5 satellites have a single solar array wing, with each spacecraft measuring about 36 feet (11 meters) end-to-end once the solar panel is extended.

The enhancements give the Starlink V2 Mini satellites a total surface area of 1,248 square feet, or 116 square meters, more than four times that of a Starlink V1.5 satellite.

The Federal Communications granted SpaceX approval Dec. 1 to launch up to 7,500 of its planned 29,988-spacecraft Starlink Gen2 constellation, which will spread out into slightly different orbits than the original Starlink fleet. The regulatory agency deferred a decision on the remaining satellites SpaceX proposed for Gen2.

Specifically, the FCC granted SpaceX authority to launch the initial block of 7,500 Starlink Gen2 satellites into orbits at 525, 530, and 535 kilometers, with inclinations of 53, 43, and 33 degrees, respectively, using Ku-band and Ka-band frequencies. SpaceX started launching older-design Starlink V1.5 satellites into the orbits approved for the Gen2 constellation in December.

The FCC previously authorized SpaceX to launch and operate roughly 4,400 first-generation Ka-band and Ku-band Starlink spacecraft that SpaceX has been launching since 2019. SpaceX is nearing completion with launches to populate the first-generation Starlink network.

With the launch Friday, SpaceX has sent 464 Starlink Gen2 satellites into orbit, including Starlink V1.5 and Starlink V2 Mini spacecraft. After this mission, SpaceX has deployed 4,469 Starlinks satellites in all, including test units no longer in service. More than 4,100 Starlink satellites are currently in orbit, according to McDowell.

The Gen2 satellites could improve Starlink coverage over lower latitude regions, and help alleviate pressure on the network from growing consumer uptake. SpaceX says the network has more than 1 million active subscribers, mostly households in areas where conventional fiber connectivity is unavailable, unreliable, or expensive.

During the overnight countdown beginning late Thursday night,SpaceXs launch team was stationed inside a launch control center just south of Cape Canaveral Space Force Station to monitor key systems on the Falcon 9 rocket and at the launch pad. SpaceX began loading super-chilled, densified kerosene and liquid oxygen propellants into the Falcon 9 vehicle at T-minus 35 minutes.

Helium pressurant also flowed into the rocket in the last half-hour of the countdown. In the final seven minutes before liftoff, the Falcon 9s Merlin main engines were thermally conditioned for flight through a procedure known as chilldown.The Falcon 9s guidance and range safety systems were also configured for launch.

After liftoff, the Falcon 9 rocket vectored its 1.7 million pounds of thrust produced by nine Merlin engines to steer southeast over the Atlantic Ocean.The Falcon 9 rocket exceeded the speed of sound in about one minute, then shut down its nine main engines two-and-a-half minutes after liftoff. The booster stage separated from the Falcon 9s upper stage, then fired pulses from cold gas control thrusters and extended titanium grid fins to help steer the vehicle back into the atmosphere.

Two braking burns slowed the rocket for landing on the drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas around 400 miles (640 kilometers) downrange approximately eight-and-a-half minutes after liftoff. The reusable booster, designated B1076 in SpaceXs inventory, flew on its fifth trip to space Friday.

The Falcon 9s reusable payload fairing jettisoned during the second stage burn. A recovery ship was also on station in the Atlantic to retrieve the two halves of the nose cone after they splash down under parachutes.

Landing of the first stage on Fridays mission occurred just as the Falcon 9s second stage engine cut off to deliver the Starlink satellites into a preliminary parking orbit. Another upper stage burn 54 minutes into the mission reshaped the orbit ahead of payload separation.

Separation of the 22 Starlink spacecraft, built by SpaceX in Redmond, Washington, from the Falcon 9 rocket was confirmed about 65 minutes after liftoff.

The Falcon 9s guidance computer aimed to deploy the satellites into an orbit at an inclination of 43 degrees to the equator, with an altitude ranging between 195 miles and 200 miles (314-by-323 kilometers). After separating from the rocket, the 22 Starlink spacecraft will unfurl solar arrays and run through automated activation steps, then use their argon-fueled ion engines to maneuver into their operational orbit.

ROCKET:Falcon 9 (B1076.5)

PAYLOAD: 22 Starlink V2 Mini satellites (Starlink 6-3)

LAUNCH SITE: SLC-40, Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida

LAUNCH DATE:May 19, 2023

LAUNCH TIME:2:19:30 a.m. EDT (0619:30 UTC)

WEATHER FORECAST:40-60% chanceof acceptable weather; Low risk of upper level winds; Low risk of unfavorable conditions for booster recovery

BOOSTER RECOVERY: A Shortfall of Gravitas drone ship northeast of the Bahamas

LAUNCH AZIMUTH:Southeast

TARGET ORBIT: 195miles by 200 miles (314 kilometers by 323 kilometers), 43.0 degrees inclination

LAUNCH TIMELINE:

MISSION STATS:

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SpaceX launches 22 new-generation Starlink satellites Spaceflight Now - Spaceflight Now