SpaceX has rolled out it’s new 7-crew Dragon V2 capsule with smoke and lights but apparently no mirrors. It looks like an old Apollo capsule but it’s designed to land upright on the ground instead of splash down into the ocean.
Then, if all goes well, Dragon V2 would be refueled, reloaded and launched back into near Earth orbit—the dream of cost-efficient, reusable space hardware realized, as it never was with the space shuttle.
Meanwhile, a Gulf of Mexico launch site near Brownsville on the southeastern tip of Texas has finished jumping through one of the critical federal regulatory hoops in the way of any commercial flight op. Especially one that (gadzooks) potentially harms already endangered plants and animals.
Still to be heard from, however: the almighty Environmental Protection Agency, boy toy of the anti-capitalist Greens. So there’s still time to bring all this science and engineering dreaming to a screeching and demoralizing halt.
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 