Spaceflight news

— SpaceX Crew-1 mission delayed (spacenews.com) (spacenews.com)

— Tom Mueller explained the gas generator cycle, and the Merlin engine in particular (youtube.com)

— GPS III SV04 launch scrubbed earlier this month due to “unexpected pressure rise in the turbomachinery gas generator” (twitter.com/elonmusk)

Short & Sweet

— Chinese taikonauts selected for country’s space station (spacenews.com)

— The Autophage engine receives funding (space.com) (patents.google.com)

— SpaceX is deorbiting its original Starlink satellites (spacenews.com) (forum.nasaspaceflight.com)

Questions, comments, corrections

— Emory Stagmer: The LCROSS Flight Director's Blog (nasa.gov)

Interview -- Ella Atkins, Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering at the University of Michigan, and IEEE Senior Member.

— We previously spoke with Ella on Episode 223 (theorbitalmechanics.com)

— Autonomous done with a nailgun (youtube.com)

— Ella’s professional profile and CV (aero.engin.umich.edu)

— U of M’s robotics department (robotics.umich.edu)

— Thanks to IEEE for putting us in touch with Ella! (IEEE.org)

This week in SF history

— 16 Oct, 1976: Soyuz 23 becomes the first unintentional splash-down (en.wikipedia.org) (americaspace.com) (youtube.com) (books.google.com)

— Next week in 2006: a fresh pair of eyes