Broomsticks!

[Suff]

What am I talking about?

The head of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, has been making an arse of himself again. Back when Russia annexed Crimea and the west sanctioned Russia, he said "If the west want to get to the ISS, they can use trampolines".

This time he suggested that the west might want to use their broomsticks to get to the ISS.

Of course times have changed. Boeing might be taking forever to get the valves sorted on their dreamliner, but SpaceX is sending supplies and people to the ISS regularly now. Musk, being, well, Elon Musk, fell on this stupidity and started calling every Falcon 9 launch an American broomstick.

This might, normally, be a slight irritant to Russia. But SpaceX launch cadence is higher than any other space launch facility and the SpaceX launch calendar for Q1 2022 is larger than the Roscosmos launch calendar for the whole or 2022.

Expect to hear a bit more about "broomsticks" as SpaceX has multiple launches planned every month for the rest of the year. 54 for the year if I recall, more than one a week.

To put this into perspective, SpaceX have, now, launched more weight into space than every other space launch provider combined; since the beginning of space launch.

[Workingman]

As you know I am not a fan of St Elon of Musk but I do like the way he deals with accusers and insulters. He doesn't go all wobbly, he often turns their insults back on them to make them look stupid.

SpaceX Broomsticks. Class.

[Suff]

I thought so too. The guy may be crass, overbearing and an ass way too often. But he has been the catalyst to change 2 major industries. Space he has turned completely upside down.

It turns out that if SpaceX were not competitors the UK government would have some seriously hard questions to ask. OneWeb paid Roscosmos, up front and non refundable, $600m for 6 launches. The Falcon9 lifts more than twice the mass and has significantly more volume. If you take a used booster, SpaceX charges $50m a launch.

We might be seeing a LOT More "Broomsticks" soon.