Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight/Archive 9

Astra (spaceflight company)
I have boldly created the Astra (spaceflight company) article. Feel free to contribute on this article. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 14:55, 26 February 2020 (UTC)


 * That's fine, but there a few things I'd like to add. They used to have a very quiet corporate presence, to the extent of answering the the phone by saying "stealth space". Also, their facilities in Alameda were inherited from the old Navy base and air station, and provide some ability to do indoor testing of rockets. I think that's notable, and if I have a chance to dig up the references, I'll add it. Fcrary (talk) 22:18, 26 February 2020 (UTC)
 * As far as I understand the company is not called Astra Space, so we should move the article to something else. Astra (spaceflight company) sounds like a good target. --mfb (talk) 01:46, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

I have pulled a requested move to rename the article to Astra, Inc. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 11:34, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Orbiter listed at articles for deletion
Discuss at Articles for deletion/Orbiter (2nd nomination). --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 08:02, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

NASA Astronaut Group articles common format proposal
The articles for individual NASA Astronaut Groups seem to be all using a different format when presenting the data, i.e. groups from 1 to 5 use a table with pictures of individual astronauts with their names, dates of flights, mission highlights, etc. The articles from group 6 onward use some variation of the text based format "Mission, Spacecraft — Date — Function — Mission highlights", but each article is a bit different. I understand the difference in format between groups until g5 and post g5, since this is when the shuttle started flying and the latter format is more useful, so for groups 6 and latter I suggest using a common format, the one found in the group 6 article. What do you guys think? Galopujacyjez (talk) 14:04, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * expanded and formatted the first astronaut group articles. Not sure if he had specific plans or thoughts on formatting of the articles beyond group 5?  Kees08  (Talk)   19:10, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Originally they were all more or less like Group 6 before I expanded them. The material gathered for groups 1 through 5 would enable me to expand groups 6, 7 and 8. I may expand groups 6 and 7 in line with the earlier groups. Interest goes down with each successive group. Although members of earlier groups flew the space shuttle, and groups 6 and 7 only flew the Shuttle, they were involved in earlier programs. Whereas group 8 were chosen to fly the shuttle. The big problem I have with this group is that there were 35 of them, so upgrading them in the manner of groups 1 through 5 would be an enormous amount of work unless someone else wanted to pitch in. Beyond Group 8 I have no sources, so I have no plans.   Hawkeye7   (discuss)  01:37, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Notification of requested move
Discuss at Talk:Blue_Origin_landing_platform_ship. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 06:51, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Private spaceflight sidebar
I have created a sidebar about private spaceflight (Private spaceflight) to navigate among the articles related to private spaceflight. Feel free to contribute on the template. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 07:32, 13 March 2020 (UTC)

Notification of two merge proposals
Hey there, WikiProject Spaceflight! Just wanted to let you guys know that I've made two different merge proposals today; the first one to merge Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander into Mars Surveyor 2001 (Discussion), and the second one to merge an assortment of Mars Exploration Program-related articles into Mars Exploration Program (Discussion). Feel free to express your opinions on these proposals at the discussions linked! –  PhilipTerryGraham (talk &middot;&#32;articles &middot;&#32;reviews) 22:22, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Apollo In Real Time
You're guys think that the site Apollo in Real Time is a good source for the Apollo 11, 13 and 17 articles? This site/project is also notable enough for an article? Erick Soares3 (talk) 18:16, 18 March 2020 (UTC)
 * No – the site fails WP:GNG. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 08:07, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Requests for United Launch Alliance article
Hello, I'm Megan, a member of ULA's communications team. I've taken over responsibilities as the company's Wikipedia representative, following User:ULA christa. I have two outstanding requests which have received some feedback but no movement. This request seeks to update the Activities section with mention of the Spaceflight Processing Operations Center (SPOC), and this request seeks to create the navigation template Template:United Launch Alliance from User:ULA Megan/Navigation template. I know Christa has reached out to WikiProject Spaceflight for feedback and assistance before, so I thought I'd try here again. I know there's a lot happening in the world right now, but are any editors willing to help with these requests? ULA Megan (talk) 17:54, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Mobile_launcher_platform
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Mobile_launcher_platform. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 14:31, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
 * It's usual to notify a project before you close the request. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:54, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Soumya left a message on this talk page when he first opened the discussion. It is in the archives now, specifically WT:WikiProject Spaceflight/Archive 8.--Cincotta1 (talk) 16:17, 26 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Indeed, the first discussions were around the merger, and this one is about the redirects.  Kees08  (Talk)   16:48, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Book availability
Does anyone have Dubbs, Chris and Burgess, Colin. Animals In Space: From Research Rockets to the Space Shuttle, 2007.? It could be used for the FA Laika, either if whoever has the book is interested, or otherwise if they can scan (or take photos) of certain pages for me.

Semi side note, I have been planning to make a library page for myself on what books I own; would a page like that hosted in this project which combines all of our book collections be helpful to others?  Kees08  (Talk)   16:06, 27 March 2020 (UTC)


 * I have a copy. Send me an email.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  17:59, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Aarghh. Sorry. My copy is not here. My apologies.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  07:53, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Solid-propellant_rocket
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Solid-propellant_rocket. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 18:06, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Possible page moves
Each of these articles: List of Ariane launches, List of Atlas launches, List of Thor and Delta launches, List of R-7 launches, and List of Proton launches are split by decade. However there seems to be an inconsistency in their article titles.

For the articles split under: List of Ariane launches, List of Atlas launches, and List of R-7 launches in the year range, the end year is given in full. i.e: However for List of Thor and Delta launches and List of Proton launches, the year range has two-digit ending years. i.e. The cited reason for not having the full ending years listed on the Thor/Delta and Proton pages was MOS:YEAR (see move edit history and see move edit history, both in 2013). The editors who moved those pages may be referring to MOS:DATERANGE in particular which originally favored the two digit method. However, in 2016 this this RFC changed the policy to be in favor of having the full ending year.
 * List of Ariane launches (1979–1989)
 * List of Atlas launches (1957–1959)
 * List of R-7 launches (1957–1959)
 * List of Thor and Delta launches (1957–59)
 * List of Proton launches (1965–69)

Therefore, would it make sense to move pages having the two-digit ending years to having the full ending years? (also citing WP:CONSISTENT - although that could work either way, hence why I brought it up here, and a strong local consensus could be in favor of having two-digit ending years). There might be other launch list articles that are split by decade but I didn't find any. OkayKenji (talk page) 03:47, 15 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Pinging and  who originally moved the pages. OkayKenji (talk page) 03:52, 15 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Support the two-digit ending year. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 07:28, 15 March 2020 (UTC)
 * How come? Schierbecker (talk) 03:16, 17 March 2020 (UTC)


 * I Support whatever policy says now. Schierbecker (talk) 03:14, 17 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Support full ending years, per MOS:DATERANGE cited above. The policy suggests that the two-digit notation is allowed for "any of the following cases: (1) two consecutive years; (2) infoboxes and tables where space is limited (using a single format consistently in any given table column); and (3) in certain topic areas if there is a very good reason, such as matching the established convention of reliable sources", which to me suggests that full ending years is preferable unless there is a frequent use of two-digit endings in reliable sources. — Sasuke Sarutobi (push to talk) 18:51, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Support full years per the RFC cited above. In particular Tazerdadogs summary at the top of the RFC states "Firstly, when space is at a premium, such as in tables or infoboxes, two year date styles may be used. Secondly, applications such as sports seasons, fiscal years, and consecutive years use the two-year date range convention without problems." We see that neither case is relevant to the titles of these list articles.--Cincotta1 (talk) 13:56, 21 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment I should note that another editor moved those pages to full years after I opened the discussion here; none the less the most of the local consensus seems to support full years so far. OkayKenji (talk page) 19:27, 24 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment – There is a similar discussion on 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic. According to the discussion, the two-digit ending year is preferred. --Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 05:48, 30 March 2020 (UTC)
 * The difference between this discussion and that one is that the latter involves consecutive years whereas the former involves a half-decade. Consecutive years is one of the exemptions listed in MOS and in the RfC and I am not sure the latter discussion is relevant here as a result.--Cincotta1 (talk) 12:11, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Infobox choice
Think Template:Infobox spaceflight is probably the wrong choice for NOAAS Okeanos Explorer Gulf of Mexico 2018 Expedition and NOAAS Okeanos Explorer Gulf of Mexico 2017 Expedition. Anyone know what it should be?  Kees08  (Talk)   06:58, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree that the current usage of Infobox spaceflight is inappropriate, but it does not seem that an appropriate infobox exists. I looked at various maritime expeditions. Those with standalone articles, like the Challenger expedition and Second voyage of HMS Beagle, lacked an infobox. Other were subsumed in the article about the main ship or submersible, which generally used the modular infoboxes about the ship, see Template:infobox ship begin. There isn't that much information in the NOAAS boxes right now and infobox ship does not seem appropriate to expand it, so maybe just convert the contents to prose and delete the infobox.--Cincotta1 (talk) 13:20, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Done, thanks. When I am in the zone of fixing the easy ones it is difficult to exit and do the work that you did and then get back into it. Thanks for looking into it. I have almost all the invalid parameters fixed used in infobox spaceflight! I have to add TemplateData to get them to work for our other infoboxes, but I will get around to that at some point.  Kees08  (Talk)   21:26, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Merger discussion for Inmarsat-4 F1, Inmarsat-4 F3, and Inmarsat-4A F4
Articles which may be of interest to members of this project&mdash;Inmarsat-4 F1, Inmarsat-4 F3, and Inmarsat-4A F4&mdash;have been proposed for merging with I-4 satellite. If you are interested, please participate in the merger discussion. Thank you.  Kees08  (Talk)   17:22, 27 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi! I now see this attempt at discussion here; sorry I missed it before jumping in to the discussion on the article talk page. I intend to leave my comments there intact, but here I will encourage you to be WP:BOLD, but not reckless! Best regards and thanks for your efforts! (sdsds - talk) 07:40, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Orbit
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Orbit. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 12:39, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Planetary science mission costs
The Planetary Science Institute has recently released detailed costs for all NASA planetary science missions (all numbers are in millions of US dollars). There are headline totals for each mission, and comparisons by year, celestial object and funding stream. Detailed annual budgets for each mission are given, before and after inflation adjustment. This could be a valuable source for dozens of articles. Modest Genius talk 11:19, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 19 March 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: No consensus — Wug·a·po·des​ 22:23, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

– According to the article itself, "Ptichka" is also called "Buria". Therefore, rename this and other articles à la OK-GLI. Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 12:55, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Ptichka → OK-1K2
 * 2.01 (Buran-class spacecraft) → OK-2K1
 * 2.02 (Buran-class spacecraft) → OK-2K2
 * 2.03 (Buran-class spacecraft) → OK-2K3
 * It is not some "Shuttle", but Buran-class spacecraft. Jirka.h23 (talk) 14:01, 19 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Oppose, this at most looks to make it way more confusing to me, for sure in the current proposed form. "Shuttle 2.xx" does not tell me anything about what it is and If I was looking for a Buran-class spacecraft that would certainly not make me think that it would be that. "Shuttle 2.xx"... does someone mean badminton shuttle version 2.01, Shuttle bus route 202 or could it be a redirect for the American space shuttle? I don't think anyone would know. --Redalert2fan (talk) 14:23, 19 March 2020 (UTC)


 * Oppose, Renaming the article "Shuttle 1.02" is IMHO confusing for two reasons. One, "Shuttle" is a word typically associated with the American NASA Space Shuttle System, therefore is not suitable for the Soviet Buran program. Two, Shuttle may in some cases bring the reader to think that the Buran Programme was just a simple "copycat" or "version" of the American Shuttle, while the Soviet proposal is different in many ways. If you really want to keep the series of articles consistent, either "OK-1K2 Ptichka" or "Ptichka (Buran-class spacecraft)" could be more appropriate Stormtrooper (talk) 14:47, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment – I have changed the nomination à la OK-GLI. --Soumyabrata (talk • subpages) 16:42, 19 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Strong support - Ptichka means "little birdie", I am surprised the article as it is now is not called something like "Ptichka (reusable spaceplane)". Anyway, this machine has an official name, so use it. Mikus (talk) 19:34, 6 April 2020 (UTC)


 * I think, that current move proposal (à la OK-GLI) is a little incorrect. For orbital vehicles there are two known naming systems: by hull (1.01, 1.02, 2.01, 2.02, 2.03), and by GRAU index serial number (1K, 2K, 3K, 4K, 5K). Designation like 2K1 is the flight configuration (2K is the designation of the orbiter, 1 is the flight number of this orbital vehicle), it was probably intended to be used similarly to the designations of STS flights in the US. As for me, continuing referring to those vehicles as "Buran-class spacecraft/orbiters", with a hull number is the best option. For Ptichka (the name is not official, as far as i concerned), the name itself sounds a bit informal, and sources i found do not clarify the origin of this name. The name "Burya" would most likely have been approved if the program had not been closed. Qydm (talk) 16:43, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Since the requested move on Talk:Lunar Gateway, I prefer natural disambiguation over the parenthetical disambiguation. Another suggested title is "Orbiter n", which is more appropriate. --Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 06:32, 9 April 2020 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Discussion at Talk:Ptichka
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Ptichka. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 16:52, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Request for comment at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Frontier Radio
Draft:Frontier Radio is a draft that has been bouncing around for a couple of years now with very nominal improvements. The subject doesn't seem to have much independent coverage, but does seem to be an intergal component in a few space probes. Requesting comment from this group at the MfD that has now been put up for it at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:Frontier Radio. Cheers Sulfurboy (talk) 20:43, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Spliting discussion for Reusable launch system
An article that the project has been involved with ( Reusable launch system ) has content that is proposed to be removed and move to another article ( Reusable spacecraft ). If you are interested, please visit the discussion at Talk:Reusable launch system. Thank you. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 07:34, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Buran (spacecraft)
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Buran (spacecraft). Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 08:40, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Template:Shenzhou program
While reading the article Shenzhou program I noticed after expanding it, that at the bottom of Template:Shenzhou program it says the previous mission is "Shenzhou 9" and next mission "Shenzhou 10" However Shenzhou 11 has already flown in space (in 2016). When I viewed the template to see if I could fix that, the intricate features of wiki-template syntax stumbled me, and are above my editing capabilities. So instead of screwing around with it, I thought it best to leave the info here. --Dutchy45 (talk) 08:19, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 * It looks like the before and after parameters are arguments given to the navbox when you call it. As I read it, if you were adding this box to Shenzhou 5, for example, the template markup would look like . Rather than capturing the program as a whole, the before and after arguments show the events relative to specific article.--Cincotta1 (talk) 12:16, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Removal of missing citations template for List of commanders of the ISS
References mentioned in the template have been added to the article. I nominate for removal of the template. If there are no objections, we can remove it after the talk. Any other suggestions to improve the article is greatly appreciated. Thanks!-Crazydaemon1 (talk) 04:02, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅. If there is no objections, you can do this yourself. --Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 05:38, 20 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you! -Crazydaemon1 (talk) 23:30, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Spliting discussion for Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39
An article that been involved with (Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39) has content that is proposed to be removed and moved to another article (Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A). If you are interested, please visit the discussion. Thank you. – Jadebenn (talk ·&#32;contribs ·&#32;subpages) 19:32, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Rocket
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Rocket. Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 17:57, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Recent changes and Controversy heading at United Launch Alliance
Hello, Megan with ULA here again. I'm disappointed to see some of the recent changes to the United Launch Alliance article, which reintroduce a "Controversy" heading and unfair text the community removed last summer. I've submitted a request here to remove the header, per Criticism. So far no editors have replied to the request. Editors here have been very helpful in the past, so I'm hoping members of WikiProject Spaceflight might be willing to undo recent changes or merging content into the History section appropriately? Thanks! ULA Megan (talk) 19:29, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Proposed rename of Cape Canaveral Space Force Station articles

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: I see consensus to move all of the pages. (closed by non-admin page mover) DannyS712 (talk) 00:54, 29 April 2020 (UTC)

– With the official renaming of CCAFS to CCSFS (confirmation is in body text of linked article), I'd like to once again propose to group all Cape Canaveral launchpad articles by geographic location. Many of these launch sites have been inactive since the 60s, so renaming them to "Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Launch Complex #" would be incorrect, as they never had that name during active use, and renaming only the pages of active launch sites would violate Wikipedia guidelines on title consistency. – Jadebenn (talk ·&#32;contribs ·&#32;subpages) 08:19, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station → Cape Canaveral Space Force Station
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 1 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 1
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 2 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 2
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 3 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 3
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 4 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 4
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 5 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 5
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 6 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 6
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 9 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 9
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 11 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 11
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 12 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 12
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 13 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 13
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 14 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 14
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 15 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 15
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 16 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 16
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 17 → Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 17
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 18 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 18
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 19 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 19
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 20 → Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 20
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 21 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 21
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 22 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 22
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 25 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 25
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 26 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 26
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 29 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 29
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 30 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 30
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 31 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 31
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 32 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 32
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 34 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 34
 * Spaceport Florida Launch Complex 36 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 36
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 37 → Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 37
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 40 → Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 40
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41 → Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 41
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 43 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 43
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 45 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 45
 * Spaceport Florida Launch Complex 46 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 46
 * Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Launch Complex 47 → Cape Canaveral Launch Complex 47

Survey

 * Feel free to state your position on the renaming proposal by beginning a new line in this subsection with  or  , then sign your comment with  . Since polling is not a substitute for discussion, please explain your reasons, taking into account Wikipedia's policy on article titles.


 * Rename per nom. No objections. --Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 10:56, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Support per nom.--Ortizesp (talk) 18:14, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. -Crazydaemon1 (talk) 18:44, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Support Makes sense to me. ~ HAL  333  04:26, 23 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Support once renaming is officially done. Garuda28 (talk) 20:29, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Comment We may want to confer to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight/Archive 8 where this was proposed before and rejected--Cincotta1 (talk) 12:13, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
 * There is a difference between no consensus and rejected. No consensus does not always mean the discussion is rejected. --Soumyabrata stay at home wash your hands to protect from coronavirus 12:27, 21 April 2020 (UTC)
 * In addition, the situation has changed since then. I am proposing a different rationale: That this is the best way to reconcile the article titles with the newly-renamed Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. – Jadebenn (talk &middot;&#32;contribs &middot;&#32;subpages) 18:26, 21 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Comment The article in question is slightly incorrect. Renaming bases has not yet occurred, but will occur after the Cornoavirus crisis dies down. That being said, I think all of these make sense to execute now, except for rennaming from AFS to SFS. Garuda28 (talk) 20:32, 27 April 2020 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Piece at the American Space Museum
I took this photo about 12 years ago at the American Space Museum in Titusville. To me it looks like the hatch from a Mercury spacecraft. Is it from Mercury-Atlas 1? (I don't remember.) Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 03:24, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Based on the museum's web page, I would say Liberty bell 7 from Mercury-Redstone 4. They do not provide a picture, but this is the only hatch explicitly named in the article and this makes sense with the narrative of the ballistic re-entry and splashdown provided in our article on the subject.--Cincotta1 (talk) 04:06, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Addendum: Maybe not that much sense, since that happened on the water and the craft was not recovered until later. Maybe Sigma 7 from Mercury-Atlas 8 which had its hatch detonated manually after recovery in response to the M-R4 incident?--Cincotta1 (talk) 04:22, 29 April 2020 (UTC)


 * I believe that the Liberty Bell hatch was never found. For one to have this much damage, it might be from MA-1 File:MA-1 Capsule Reassembled After Explosion - GPN-2002-000043.jpg.  I've seen film of a Mercury hatch being blown on the recovery ship, and it wasn't damaged this much. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 05:34, 29 April 2020 (UTC)


 * That makes sense. I emailed the museum, so hopefully soon we can verify this.--Cincotta1 (talk) 13:58, 29 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The museum sent me a link to a video on their facebook page. About 11:30 into the video, the host begins discussing the hatch; it is from Mercury-Atlas 1! They also forwarded my email to the collection manager so I may hear more, but I think the question is answered--Cincotta1 (talk) 17:43, 29 April 2020 (UTC)


 * Great. I thought it must be MA-1 because (1) it looked like a Mercury hatch, and (2) MA-1 is the only one that I could think of that was damaged that heavily.  Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 03:55, 30 April 2020 (UTC)

Stub articles duplicating parts of Megastructures
I've noticed a bunch of low grade/stub articles all trying to cover the subject of giant-scale speculative space structures, from space elevators to Dyson spheres and larger. For example: Megascale engineering, Macro-engineering, Astronomical engineering, Planetary engineering, Stellar engineering, etc. The only article that is well-written is Megastructures (and the tangential subject Exploratory engineering), so I suggest redirecting all the others either to Megastructures or to a suitable sub-section within that article. (Keeping an eye out for anything unique in the stubs which should be kept and moved to Megastructures.) Secondly, if anyone has spare time, a snipe-hunt for all the articles that link to the above list and, a) relink them to Megastructures or an appropriate sub-section, and b) try to create a more consistent nomenclature in those articles to reflect the language in Megastructures. -- PaulxSA (talk) 09:04, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Additional launches for the ULA article
Hello! Megan with ULA here again. Recently the United Launch Alliance article was expanded to include information about the company's launches during the 2000s, based on this request, which was added mostly as proposed by User:Seddon. I posted a similar request for ULA's 2010-2015 launches roughly two weeks ago, but so far no editors have responded. I see User:Seddon has not edited since May 20, so I am wondering if any other WikiProject Spaceflight members might be willing to review and update the article appropriately. Thanks! ULA Megan (talk) 16:35, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:JAXA
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:JAXA. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:33, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The discussion is now moot. There are no clear WP:TIES, and the article has been started with British English. Like it or not, WP policy is not to change the variant once selected, absent national ties. JustinTime55 (talk) 22:04, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Articles for deletion/USCV-4 and Talk:USCV-1
There is a discussion on whether the page, USCV-4 should be deleted. Also a dissuasion on if USCV-1 should be moved to SpaceX Crew-1. OkayKenji (talk page) 16:57, 2 June 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 24 May 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: moved. --Mdaniels5757 (talk) 19:17, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

– Proposing to rename the "Vandenberg Air Force Base foo #" facility articles to "Vandenberg foo #". Many of these facilities have been inactive as of 2020, so renaming them to "Vandenberg Space Force Station foo #" after the COVID-19 pandemic would be incorrect, as they never had that name during active use, and renaming only the pages of active facilities would violate Wikipedia guidelines on title consistency. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:59, 24 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Emplacement 8 → Vandenberg Launch Emplacement 8
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Probe Launch Complex C → Vandenberg Probe Launch Complex C
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 3 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 3
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 5 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 5
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 02 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 2
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 03 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 3
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 04 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 4
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 05 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 5
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 06 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 6
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 07 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 7
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 08 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 8
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 09 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 9
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 10 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 10
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Facility 21 → Vandenberg Launch Facility 21
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 2 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 2
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 6 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 6
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 1 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 1
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 4 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 4
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 8 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 8
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Space Launch Complex 10 → Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 10
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Complex 576 → Vandenberg Launch Complex 576
 * Vandenberg Air Force Base Launch Complex 576A → Vandenberg Launch Complex 576A


 * Support - as mentioned some of these have been re-officially-named and others not, so using the shortened name (which, I suspect, would also conform with WP:COMMONNAME, which while it has to be applied with WP:COMMONSENSE should at least be nodded to. As long as the redirects stay in place per standard, and all the various navboxen are updated (if they contain redirects they don't display correctly on the page) then this is indeed common sense. - The Bushranger One ping only 07:05, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Comment: I would be quite happy to close this and do the moves, but it sounds like there will be quite a lot of cleanup required and I might need some help with the navboxes at least... ping me or leave a message on my talk page if I can help. Andrewa (talk) 09:30, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Planetary flyby
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Planetary flyby. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:51, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:Infobox space shuttle
You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:Infobox space shuttle. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 14:22, 10 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion on Commons category names for individual spacecraft
Hey there! I've started a discussion over at Wikimedia Commons in an attempt to form some sort of agreement on how the names of categories for individual spacecraft should be formatted, as the status quo is inconsistent and messy. Be sure to come along and share your opinion on the matter! –  PhilipTerryGraham (talk &middot;&#32;articles &middot;&#32;reviews) 17:43, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Template talk:SpaceX rocket launches
There is a move discussion to move Template:SpaceX rocket launches → Template:SpaceX missions and payloads. OkayKenji (talk page) 01:34, 15 June 2020 (UTC)

Renaming Dragon 2
Interested editors are invited to comment at Talk:Dragon 2. — JFG talk 07:43, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Canadarm
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Canadarm. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 14:15, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

Requested move
There is a requested move at Talk:Blue Origin landing platform ship that would benefit from your opinion. Please come and help!  P.I. Ellsworth   ed.  put'r there 23:41, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

Edit request on the Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft) page
Hello WikiProject Spaceflight! I put up an edit request on the Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft) page. Wondering if anyone here could take a look at my suggestions and help implement them or provide feedback on what I can do to make the edits more acceptable. Thanks! Morgensteorra (talk) 20:32, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:NASA
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:NASA. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 05:31, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Boca Chica Village, Texas
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Boca Chica Village, Texas. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:27, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at commons:Commons:Deletion requests/File:Atlantis docked to MIR - GPN-2000-001315.jpg
You are invited to join the discussion at. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 06:03, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

RfC for SLS Launch Cost
An RfC this WikiProject may be interested in has been started. – Jadebenn (talk ·&#32;contribs ·&#32;subpages) 06:17, 7 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:List of crewed lunar lander designs
You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:List of crewed lunar lander designs. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 07:31, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at commons:Commons:Deletion requests/File:Starship 2019.png
You are invited to join the discussion at. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:47, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

viking 1
This is a direct quote from the viking 1 article, section 1.1 orbiter: "On August 7, 1980, Viking 1 Orbiter was running low on attitude control gas and its orbit was raised from 357 × 33943 km to 320 × 56000 km to prevent impact with Mars and possible contamination until the year 2019." Now, if these numbers are correct, obviously the apoapsis was raised but the periapsis was lowered. And since periapsis is what matters when considering aerobraking and impact, it seems to me the manouvre speeded up that time estimate, instead of "prevent"ing it! I feel my knowledge about these things falls just short of making an edit here myself. Maybe somebody involved with this portal can do that, or reply here with some details so that I can? Dutchy45 (talk) 16:00, 10 July 2020 (UTC)


 * I did some detective work, I think the number is incorrect and could be changed but am leery to do so because the article mentions additional adjustments between 1978 and 1979 which I cannot account for in the sources in the article.


 * The nearest citation, a conference paper titled 'An Investigation of the Orbital Status of Viking-1', does not mention final periapsis altitude after the manuever but confirms the apoapsis was raised from 34,000 to 56,000 km. The previous citation in the paragraph, a google book titled Robotic Exploration of the Solar System: Part I: The Golden Age 1957-1982 for which only page 251 is free for viewing, mentions a maneuver in 1977 which lowered the periapsis to 300km, but not any subsequent maneuvers. The NSSDCA catalog has 300 km listed as the periapsis for the epoch 1977-07-01 00:00:00 to 1978-12-02 00:00:00. The next epoch listed is the July 1980 maneuver with a 320 km periapsis. This seems evidence seems to suggest that the 357 km periapsis quoted is incorrect. The 357 km periapsis dates back to the first version of the article in 2002, all citations in that paragraph were added over a decade later. It is difficult to say where the current, weirdly precise numbers came from originally.--Cincotta1 (talk) 16:42, 10 July 2020 (UTC)


 * Addendum: I found the reported altitude and maneuvers in Gunter's Space Page. In fact almost the entire paragraph, verbatim, is in Gunter's. Searching for the url in archive.org shows that this paragraph dates back to at least 2005. So now two issues are present. Typically Gunter's space page is allowed as a source in our articles, but here we question the reliability of the claim because it goes against common sense to lower the periapsis, and Gunter Krebs cites only the NSSDCA catalog, which does not mention the 1979 maneuvers he claims. Further, we now have to worry about a possible copyright violation; Earwig's tool suggest a 75% confidence that one of these two articles is copied from the other. Right now, we have access to our version of the language from 2002 and Gunter's version from 2005. Which came first?, and is either one correct in reporting 357km periapsis lowered to 320km to prevent decay?--Cincotta1 (talk) 17:11, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

should we make a discord for this porject for better co ordination? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Spaceman1234 (talk • contribs) 02:46, 12 July 2020 (UTC)
 * You don't have to. We already have an unofficial Discord server. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 05:26, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Talk:Secondary payload
You are invited to join the discussion of a requested move of the page Secondary payload to Rideshare (spaceflight). OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 22:43, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 July 28 § SpaceX In-Flight Abort Test
You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 July 28 § SpaceX In-Flight Abort Test. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 06:05, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Request for additional editors to help out with the Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft) edit request
Hello again, WikiProject Spaceflight members! I posted an edit request back on June 21, 2020 on Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft). I've had one editor respond so far but most of the request has not been implemented since it looks like the editor needs some help going through all my suggested changes. Would any of you fine folks be able to come over to VERITAS_(spacecraft) to help out? Thanks! Morgensteorra (talk) 15:46, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 24 July 2020

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Pages moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) Jerm (talk) 04:16, 9 August 2020 (UTC)

– More appropriate and unambiguous title, since the letter B in "B####" means "Booster" and expanding the current article title results "Falcon 9 booster Booster ####"! What's the point? Besides, the proposed title is WP:CONCISE enough, since SpaceX do not label individual fairings and upper stages like this. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 05:38, 24 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Falcon 9 booster B1046 → Falcon 9 B1046
 * Falcon 9 booster B1048 → Falcon 9 B1048
 * Falcon 9 booster B1056 → Falcon 9 B1056
 * Support makes sense. I don't see any reason to object to the new names. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 03:39, 6 August 2020 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Chaotic usage of infoboxes on spaceflight articles
I see a chaotic usage of infoboxes on spaceflight articles. Such usage is listed below: In order to mitigate these and similar problems, I composed an essay at User:Soumya-8974/What infobox should be used on spaceflight articles. Any thoughts? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:17, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Once upon a time, both Johnson Space Center and Kennedy Space Center used Infobox government agency, even though they aren't government agencies (now replaced with Infobox organization. Now, several NASA facilities articles use Infobox government agency.
 * Once upon a time, both Crew Dragon Endeavour and Boeing Starliner Calypso used Infobox space shuttle, even though they aren't Space Shuttle orbiters (now replaced with Infobox aircraft career. I think other crewed space vehicles will probably use Infobox space shuttle.
 * Thanks for creating this, I feel that consistency is important - makes it easier for readers to read and editors to edit. So perhaps we could include that essay at WikiProject Spaceflight page. I have been working on creating a infobox for Endeavour/Calypso for a while now - might finish it this month or something so we don't have to use Infobox aircraft career. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 03:47, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
 * It's a good idea. Could use a little work, though. For one thing, you don't address what the facilities should use. JustinTime55 (talk) 14:03, 6 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Look at the "general facility" row of the table of my essay. :-) Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 10:52, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * Look at the "general facility" row of the table of my essay. :-) Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 10:52, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Prose at SpaceX Merlin
Good day all. I'd like to request some additional eyeballs at SpaceX Merlin and the corresponding talk page entry at Talk:SpaceX Merlin. While I believe the anon which added all the material about pollutants generated by the gas generator is acting in good faith, the amount and detail of material plus over-citing reads as WP:UNDUE and almost hit-piece-y, and this is definitely not in my area of knowledge. trimmed some prose and citations, but some of this has since been re-added. I'm unsure if this material is warranted here, should be moved to the generic gas generator article, or something else done. Thanks all! — Huntster (t @ c) 05:35, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

Revival of space stations working group
There are only two active members in the space stations working group: me and. I have a growing interest in space stations, hence joining the working group. The working group is currently in the brink of being inactive. In order to revive the working group, I have to recruit new members from this WikiProject. Any members with an interest in space stations should join the working group. Thanks. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 06:55, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

Discussion on a new parenthetical disambiguator
Should "(spacecraft class)" be used to distinguish between individual spacecraft and a class of spacecraft? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 05:48, 29 August 2020 (UTC)

List of ... launches articles

 * Hey Soumya. I'm not so sure that was a good move of the discussion.  You moved it to a nearly inactive "working group" that has had only one contributor in the past year.  It's not that the topic might not concern the scope of that "group", if that group were both active and composed.


 * But it is emphatically true that the audience that comment was for was this larger group of WikiProject Spaceflight participants; many of whom will never see the discussion now. (still, I'll just lodge this comment here; and leave it to some other disinterested editor to decide if the discussion invitation ought to, also, be left in full on this larger and more well-attended Talk page.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 02:15, 31 August 2020 (UTC)
 * This is why I have added the moved discussion to template here, therefore SPFLT participants will see the discussion. The TLS working group will be marked semi-active, but any discussions related to its scope should be there (according to WP:TASKFORCE), with optional notifying to the parent project. This is one of many ways to revitalize a working group. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 07:59, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

New "featured topics" subpage
A new subpage called "featured topics" is formed to improve articles towards the GA and/or FA status. See WikiProject Spaceflight/Featured topics. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:56, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at commons:Commons:WikiProject Council/Proposals
You are invited to join the discussion at commons:Commons:WikiProject Council/Proposals. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:11, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rocketry § Requested move 4 September 2020
You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Rocketry § Requested move 4 September 2020. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 06:58, 4 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Canceled and focusing on revitalizing this project since there are no parents of the rocketry project. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 05:51, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Perigee Aerospace needs updating
Perigee Aerospace planned a rocket launch on July 2020, but since then, the article is not updated. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:56, 5 September 2020 (UTC)

Rocket and launch vehicle ground support equipment
Was surprised today to find that the article Ground support equipment was 100% restricted to the scope of GSE for aircraft at airports. No mention whatsoever of "launch vehicle" or "rocket" etc., and of course no explication of rocket/LV GSE.

I've not found any other Wikipedia article on GSE for spaceflight-related purposes. (e.g., Ground support equipment (spaceflight), Ground support equipment (launch vehicle) or Ground support equipment (rocket) to disambiguate the multiple uses of GSE; it's not all airports and aircraft.) Searching didn't help either.

Do we have any article on this important aspect of spaceflight operational equipment? If not, should we? N2e (talk) 09:12, 7 September 2020 (UTC)


 * We definitely need to cover this (and GSE for spacecraft, not just rockets and launch vehicles). I think it might be better to add this to the existing Ground support equipment article rather than creating something like Ground support equipment (spaceflight). But I'm not in a position to do it myself, at least not in the next few months. Fcrary (talk) 19:48, 7 September 2020 (UTC)


 * Not that I've found, but just noting this article Launch vehicle system tests, that is not GSE but is related to it. Also GSE my be under the scope of Ground segment, this article could be expanded maybe? (though that article seems to be mostly about communication) OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 22:53, 7 September 2020 (UTC)


 * There are articles about some individual pieces of equipment which could be in the scope of GSE for spaceflight, for example crawler-transporter and service structure, and some things which cover a broader scope that might subsume GSE to a degree, like spaceport, but nothing that covers the entire scope of GSE for spaceflight. I am not sure how much information is available about GSE for spaceflight. At present, I think expanding the existing GSE article to cover spaceflight would be sufficient. We can always spin off a new article if it gets too unwieldy.--Cincotta1 (talk) 17:07, 10 September 2020 (UTC)

Payload tonnage to orbit by launch service provider by year
Jonathan McDowell, astrophysicist at the Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, has been tracking launches, spacecraft and derelict rocket body orbits, and such for years. He recently provided a cool dataset (with a pretty basic and not-great-looking graph, here) of payload tonnage by provider by year.

I really think this sort of data would be great in Wikipedia, especially is one of our more graphics-talented editors like User:JFG, User:Soumya-8974, or other interested editor might consider making some graphic that is beautiful and explanatory for the wikipedias of the world, and place it on Wikimedia in both English and unlabeled formats, so that other language Wikipedias might use it as well. I would think Jonathan's data set based on his sourcing of the data adequately verifiable (the table, not his graphic) to be used in a citation. Thoughts? N2e (talk) 02:00, 14 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Too crowded I think. SpaceX vs. others could be added to the SpaceX page, reaching half of the global payload rate is an achievement. And what is "old" and why did it deliver so much payload? There were Space Shuttle flights in these years but they didn't deliver /that/ much payload. Will be interesting to see an update for the active satellites after 2020. --mfb (talk) 20:50, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Tom Cruise and Doug Liman on Axiom Space-1
The tweet from Space Shuttle Almanac sad that Tom Cruise and Doug Liman will be part of SpaceX Axiom Space-1. Is this correct and can I add this add the articles? --Malo95 (talk) 13:08, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Space program of the United States
Draft:Space program of the United States was rejected for being non-notable. Therefore, I decided to form a list version of it and name it List of space programs of the United States. What do you think of this list? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:18, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
 * The space program of the US is not notable? This has large overlap with other articles, such as History of spaceflight, and the overlap should be addressed, but the topic is clearly notable and can be a stand-alone article in one way or another. --mfb (talk) 02:33, 4 October 2020 (UTC)

Amur launch vehicle: methalox, partially-reusable, low launch cost
The Russian space industry has formally joined the ranks of entities building methalox launch vehicles. Amur was publically announced today, with a contract signed for preliminary design. They are aiming for low-coast launch operations (US$22 million per launch) and a reusable first stage, after the Russian industry lost the commercial satellite market share they held in circa 2010-2013 with the Proton rocket, as SpaceX Falcon 9 came online in a big way. I've created an article stub for the new launch vehicle, but would appreciate more eyes on it and other editors who might improve this beyond stub level. Cheers. N2e (talk) 05:03, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * The Russians have announced a couple of new rockets in the last years that never went beyond announcements. We'll see if this one is different. --mfb (talk) 05:08, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, sure, that's always true of these design concepts. But for Wikipedia purposes, we want to both 1) clearly say what it is (I wrote the stub to clearly show it is a funded design concept, aimed to fly six years out; and only in preliminary design at present) and 2) explicate that which is notable.  I think it is clearly notable that the Russian government, like the Chinese (gvmt and private), are following in the path of the (now 7+ year old) US private methalox engine and rocket development programs.  Neither of those US designs is flying operationally yet either; but one has made a few test flights.  But all the methalox directions, plus aiming for first-stage reusability, is quite notable.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 05:24, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

Layout of the "Year in spaceflight" articles
The "Year in spaceflight" articles such as 2024 in spaceflight currently has very large sections (uncollapsed tables) for "Orbital launches". The section is far longer than the "Deep-space rendezvous" and likely of less interest to most readers of the article, making the article less interesting, useful and navigable.

Can you please help decide on the ordering of the articles' sections? I currently see no good reason for burying the very short section beneath these very large tables which mostly contain launches of near Earth satellites even if its contents are considered to be more important by most experts in the broad field of "spaceflight" (in general) who are not the readers of the page.

Here I suggested to move the "Deep-space rendezvous" section further up. Please join the discussion, thank you.

--Prototyperspective (talk) 10:31, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

Category:Articles missing payload orbit parameters from October 2015 has been nominated for deletion
Category:Articles missing payload orbit parameters from October 2015, which is within the scope of this WikiProject, has been nominated for deletion. A discussion is taking place to decide whether this proposal complies with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. -- Brown HairedGirl  (talk) • (contribs) 10:40, 7 October 2020 (UTC)

How can I speed up atricle review?
I have created 2 articles on human spaceflight, they are currently awaiting review. Is there a way to ask other contributors here to review my work (If any of you are Moderators or Admins), or my only option is to wait in line like all others? F.Alexsandr (talk) 14:18, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Articles in question: Draft:Yenisei (rocket), Draft:Argo (Russian spacecraft) F.Alexsandr (talk) 14:20, 8 October 2020 (UTC)


 * You're always welcome to ask! Wikipedia is pretty decentralized so we're not always the greatest about checking up on things. I'd normally be all over helping, but it's been busier than usual. You can befriend folks at the Discord server, too (link is on my user page.) --Neopeius (talk) 15:34, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
 * You can work on further improving the articles. You still need a reviewer to look at the article, but if they see a good article they are more likely to review it fully (the opposite is also true, but that leads to a quick rejection). The Yenisei article structure is confusing I think, some things are redundant, some things are not where you expect to find them. I updated the Argo link above to go to the draft again. --mfb (talk) 21:05, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

Landing zones of SpaceX
I have drafted User:Soumya-8974/SpaceX landing zones to cover all landing zones of SpaceX in one article instead of covering them at different articles a la SpaceX launch vehicles and SpaceX rocket engines. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:39, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

The Downlink newsletter
I am going to make a new issue of The Downlink and release it on 1 November 2020, you can see its current form here, and if you want to see anything / have suggestions on what should be on the issue please put it on the newspaper discussion. If you want it added to your talk page when it is released then add your name to the Recipients section of WikiProject Spaceflight/Downlink. Thanks, Terasail &#91;Talk&#93; 12:58, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Downlink/Issue 4 Deletion
I have nominated WikiProject Spaceflight/Downlink/Issue 4 for deletion at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Spaceflight/Downlink/Issue 4, since it is an old page where an issue was never finalised and there is only two uncompleted versions of an issue kept on the talk page. Terasail &#91;Talk&#93; 14:08, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Amur (launch vehicle) and Soyuz-7 (rocket)
According to ru:Союз-7 (ракета-носитель), Amur (launch vehicle) and Soyuz-7 (rocket) are about the same thing and should be merged into one. Best regards ! Artvill (talk) 22:28, 15 October 2020 (UTC)
 * and (cf. previous topic Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight) Here, Amur, el Falcon 9 ruso, is a relatively complete / worked Spanish speaking article relating the history of this project. This is a source for wp. Best regards ! Artvill (talk) 09:46, 19 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I support. The problem is that people on western Wikipedia have very little knowledge of current developments in Russian space program, which results in such situations. F.Alexsandr (talk) 20:12, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Support per nom. We can request Russophones to translate Russian content where necessary. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:52, 19 October 2020 (UTC)

Interesting new info to me, but I think there is a small matter of process, and where this discussion should happen. WP policy says these sorts of proposals should be on the article page(s), so that editors working on those pages can be aware of the discussion. Currently, neither page has a notice saying this discussion is going on. For a meaningful and robust discussion, that ought to be done, and probably these comments added to whichsoever location is decided for an open discussion that is linked in those notices.

Personally, I'll read into the matter more over the coming days and eventually leave a substantive comment on the merits, but really the proposer needs to provide notice in both of the articles. Pinging Artvill (who opened this section) and F.Alexsandr (who seems to have made the original observation about similarities between the two articles). Cheers N2e (talk) 23:45, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I add Template:Merge to on Amur (launch vehicle) and Soyuz-7 (rocket) articles. Regards. Artvill (talk) 08:10, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Lets abolish the space station working group permanently
I am sorry, but I have to say this. I have realised that it will never go beyond its revival. It is not worthy to have a working group with this subject. We could have working groups related to subjects like history of spaceflight, Space Race, etc. Therefore, it is better to mark the space stations working group defunct and redirect to the parent WPJ. do you agree with my proposal to defunct the working group? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 10:18, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * WHY? How does leaving an inactive working group hurt or cost anything? What does "not worthy" mean? There is a tag template that can be used to flag the group as inactive and kept for historical reference, and keeps hope open that someone may still pick it up. And why are you only interested in N2e's opinion? JustinTime55 (talk) 14:31, 20 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Let's leave the working group inactive instead. N2e is the only participant of SSWP besides me. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:48, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Newsletter
Would anyone be interested in a newsletter which notes the current tasks, current status of the WikiProject, launches of the previous month, new members? Terasail &#91;Talk&#93; 13:48, 17 October 2020 (UTC)
 * We already have a newsletter called The Downlink, which is inactive. You can revive the newsletter if you want. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:40, 19 October 2020 (UTC)
 * I would! Trying to get back to editing. Might start with the news letter. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:43, 23 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Be sure to read two sections down: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight. This is already in progress. JustinTime55 (talk) 14:20, 23 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, thank you! I am aware, that is what I was referring to by the newsletter. I also saw Soumya's comment above. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:35, 24 October 2020 (UTC)

Update from the 1960s
Hello, everyone! With discussion of the return of our newsletter, I thought I'd let you know what I've been working on.

As you know, my specialty is early robotic space missions, which don't get a great deal of love, particularly the Soviet ones. This weekend, I put together Proton satellite using my Elektron_(satellite_program) as a model. I think it turned out rather nicely.

Then, I happened to be reading SP-92 (Significant Achievements in Space Bioscience) and saw a couple of references to the Discoverer program. I'd intended simply to add notes to Discoverer 17 and Discoverer 18, but I found them in such bad shape that I revamped the articles. Whereupon I discovered that the overarching Corona_(satellite) article was an absolute mess (despite somehow having a "B" rating -- probably awarded to an earlier version). So I spent many an hour hacking it into shape. It's far from done, but at least it looks like an article now, and given that it's pretty well traveled, it was important to salvage. This marks the first time I've had the courage to work on such a big, visible entry.

I've decided to go through the Discoverers one by one and give them entries. Many of them don't have individual articles. So far, I've finished Discoverer 2, Discoverer 3, and Discoverer 4.

I like to work on individual spacecraft in a series, and when I feel I've got a handle on the program, modify/create the parent article. That's how I worked with SOLRAD (and I'll need to do SOLRAD 8 soon), Orbiting Vehicle, and (the woefully incomplete) Lincoln Experimental Satellite.

I'd be interested to know what everyone else is working on and what your particular methodologies are!

(and if you'd like to join me in the deep uncrewed past, I'd love the company! Let me know. :) )

--Neopeius (talk) 03:45, 29 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I've recently fixed up the article on the Manned Orbiting Laboratory, an NRO project like Discoverer. (Now at FAC if anyone is interested in reviewing - it hasn't garnered much interest so far). I then created a new article on Shuttle-Centaur. From there I started fixing up the article on Galileo (which Shuttle-Centaur was going to launch). Once that is done (probably in about three or four weeks - I don't work very fast) I was going to continue working on the deep space probes, possibly Voyager, maybe Ulysses, but if you are interested in collaboration, I have good sources on Corona and can work on it with you when I've finished with Galileo in a few weeks' time. My past experience with spaceflight articles has mostly been with biographical articles on astronauts like Alan Shepard, Frank Borman and Buzz Aldrin, so uncrewed is a bit new for me.  Hawkeye7   (discuss)  20:15, 29 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I'd be delighted to work with you! I will try to get over to your FAC this week. MOL is an important and interesting project, and right in the time frame of Galactic Journey, so I'm acquainted with it. Are you ever on the WP Discord? That would be a great place to coordinate. --Neopeius (talk) 21:17, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Reliability of sources
This question comes up a lot: "How reliable is [X]?" usually in reference to Mark Wade's site. I posted this on Hawkeye7's FAC and I think it bears repeating. Your mileage may vary, and/or you may have popular references to add to this:


 * I'll throw in my two cents about Mark Wade's site -- he hasn't updated it in a while, it's not completely accurate, and there are no citations on it. I use it when there's nothing else, but it's about the bottom of reliable-enough sources I use for WP. It's also not as good as it used to be (he cut out a lot of detail about fifteen years ago for some reason). Anatoly Zak of RussianSpaceWeb has a better reputation, as does Gunter Krebs and Andrew LePage (who does show his work), and Jonathan McDowell's (Jonathan's Space Report) is better still; indeed, Jonathan compiled the appendix for one of my invaluable books on Corona. NSSDC has the virtue of being NASA-run and public domain, but they have spurious information on there sometimes too. When faced with a number of conflicting sources, I often have to make a judgment as to which one(s) to include in an article.

--Neopeius (talk) 02:41, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Flags for astronauts of companies
Articles about crewed flights use country icons for the crew. So far it didn't matter if that flag was the country sending the astronaut or the country the astronaut came from, but now we have plans for astronauts sent by companies. Should we assign flags by nationality of the people or should we use company icons for people sent by companies? Or both? Some affected articles: SpaceX Axiom Space-1 and SpaceX Dragon 2 (Michael López-Alegría), Boeing Crewed Flight Test and Boeing Starliner (Christopher Ferguson). I prefer a company logo - make the icon depend on the company or country employing the person. --mfb (talk) 05:42, 20 September 2020 (UTC)


 * For consistency, that raises some related questions. The List of human spaceflights to Mir shows a Soviet and Russian flag for Volkov on Soyuz TM-13, not only a Soviet flag for Aubakirov. The Soviet Union ceased to exist during their stay on Mir, but Aubakirov ought to have a Soviet and Kazak flag, if the flags signify nationality. There is also the question of European astronauts. Did any of them fly for ESA as opposed to their national government? Also, what do we do for astronauts with dual citizenships? Personally, I think company rather than national identification will make more sense in the future, but the national flags would be more recognizable to readers. (E.g. I could recognize the Russian and Soviet flags for Volkov; I have no idea what the Roscosmos logo looks like.) Fcrary (talk) 19:25, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * National space agencies act on behalf of the country, so Soviet/Russian flags for Roscosmos astronauts make sense. Not sure about European astronauts. Today astronauts are selected by ESA. It's still funded by taxpayers of the participating countries. --mfb (talk) 01:00, 21 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Acting on behalf of the country doesn't seem to be limited to national space agencies. Helen Sharman went to space as the first British national, but her flight was funded not by the government, but by a private organization, Project Juno. For ESA astronauts I think that for now, the flag of their nationality is OK; they have a patch of their country's flag on their flight suites. In a sense, they represent the share of funding the country has made for ESA, and they are often treated as national heroes. On a different note, cases of private corporations funding spaceflight have already occurred, such as MirCorp's Soyuz TM-30 mission (in this case the two flown were not MirCorp employees, but Roscosmos cosmonauts acting on behalf of MirCorp). Meanwhile Toyohiro Akiyama's 1990 spaceflight was funded by TBS, a private corporation, and he went to space as a TBS employee. Kind regards, Hms1103 (talk) 09:31, 21 September 2020 (UTC)

Not many opinions and no clear result. Any objection against "both"? Use the nationality for all people. If they fly as employees of a company the company logo can be added. --mfb (talk) 02:25, 4 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I'd argue that the national flags on private company missions is probably not where we'll be long term, as global corporate entities can and often do span many countries. Still, the nation state system humans have been using (for good or bad) as the primary means of large-scale human coordination for some 370 years now is still standing, and those nation states use force to enforce country-specific launch rules and communication rules and so on.  It's is probably not Wikipedidia neutral-point-of-view to treat all companies and private efforts as merely the creatures of the nation state they reside in; but that has been the mainline tradition in recent centuries, and I suspect it will change only slowly.  So, yeah, maybe "both" for now.  But long term, I think we'll see more entities, and people, spanning the nation state boundaries that used to rather neatly contain them, and it will increasingly make less and less sense to lead with all the national flags of the nation states folks happen to live in.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 05:44, 6 October 2020 (UTC)

I accept using logos for private employees and flags for other space travellers. I am concerned that logos aren't always free. For this case, I think flag is necessary. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:40, 11 October 2020 (UTC)


 * Most logos seem to be below the threshold for copyright. Axiom Space logo.png SpaceX logo black.svg Boeing full logo.svg. Could be more complicated for Space Adventures. --mfb (talk) 22:34, 13 October 2020 (UTC)

A potential issue is that there have been cases of spaceflight announcements by those out of touch with reality (Mars One, Excalibur Almaz, Galactic Suites Design, to name a few). And companies previously with a low profile may suddenly announce sending astronauts (for example no one ever heard of Yusaku Maezawa before the dearMoon project announcement). Thus, I suggest that for now, the use of company icons be strictly limited to the following eight: This way, only space companies with well documented histories of operation will be accounted for. Regards, Hms1103 (talk) 07:52, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Private manufacturers of crewed spacecraft : SpaceX, Boeing, RSC Energia, Blue Origin, Scaled Composites
 * Space travel agencies, space station operators : Axiom Space, Virgin Galactic, and Space Adventures (for hired individuals, not for those paying for oneself)

"Not many opinions and no clear result" might be because people who are interested in this (such as myself) had no idea this discussion was going on. My take is that the flag represents ONLY the nationality of the person, not the flag of the national agency or the corporate entity which sponsored them. Otherwise you'd have to go back and retroactively change Charlie Walker (McDonnell Douglas), Greg Jarvis (Hughes), Lodewijk van den Berg (EG&G), Byron Lichtenberg (MIT), Taylor Wang (JPL), Loren Acton (Lockheed), Sultan bin Salman Al Saud (ARABSAT), Jake Garn and Bill Nelson (US Congress), Robert Cenker (RCA), Sam Durrance (Johns Hopkins), Ron Parise (CSC), Martin Fettman (Colorado State University), Albert Sacco (Worcester Polytechnic Institute), Roger Crouch (MIT), Greg Linteris (NIST), Jay Buckey (Dartmouth)? Those are just people who flew on the Space Shuttle, there are others who flew on a Soyuz to Mir or the ISS. Do John-David Bartoe's and Paul Scully-Powers' entries need to reflect their military service branch flags from being Navy Payload Specialists (not NASA astronauts), Gary Payton and William Pailes from the Air Force, or Tom Hennen from the Army? On List of astronauts by first flight they only have a single flag, for nationality, is this a new separate standard that is being proposed? Wizardimps (talk) 21:01, 1 November 2020 (UTC)


 * In the case of all those Shuttle astronauts (baring foreign ones like Salam Al Saud), the astronauts were selected by NASA and NASA paid for the cost of the mission, even if their salaries were not paid by NASA. And, in the case of people like Salam Al Saud, they were selected by their country's government and flew as one sort of agreement between their government and NASA. If they were flying on behalf of their government, I think the national flag alone is sufficient.


 * But, yes, this is a suggestion for a new standard. Because we how have a few people, and shortly will have more, who are citizens of a country but are not selected by that country's government or flying on behalf of that government or on a mission funded by that government. I think that is a fact worth noting, and using a company logo as well as a national flag is a reasonable way to note it. Fcrary (talk) 01:36, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Centralising the working group discussions
Since talk pages of working groups (excluding The Downlink which is not considered a working group) are rarely used, should we centralise discussions (excluding discussions related to The Downlink) to the parent project a la WT:MILHIST? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:08, 1 November 2020 (UTC)


 * There aren't very many of us who are active. We should definitely centralize until such time as it become unwieldy. --Neopeius (talk) 00:25, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I think it would definitely make sense to merge working group discussions to this talk page, since it will also allow non-working group members to contribute. Which could be useful since there are limited working group members. Terasail &#91;Talk&#93; 13:32, 2 November 2020 (UTC)
 * . ✅. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 13:35, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Units
I had read in the Project Spaceflight guidance and had been told by my Spaceflight mentors that SI first with conversion to American units was preferred. I have labored to compose my articles with this in mind.

I recognize that NASA might have done planning in American units, but that was also 60 years ago. For consistency, for promotion of SI (which makes more sense than pounds, furlongs, and fathoms), I would like consensus on this matter.

(I noted that a user had gone through one of the pages I'd worked on and reversed all the unit orders. That's what brought up this conversation.)

What think ye?

--Neopeius (talk) 16:18, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Well being from Spain I may be biased but I think SI units should be the 'main' with American units as a conversion. Even if NASA used/uses imperial for some things metric is way easier to understand for the 60% of English Wikipedia readers who are not from the US and therefore not used to imperial measurements. josecurioso  ❯❯❯  Talk to me!  17:13, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * WP:units has some already established guidelines on unit order. For non-scientific articles, wp:units suggests the strong national ties rule applies, e.g. an article about a subject related to the United States would use the imperial units first because these are the most common units used in the United States. For scientific articles SI is preferred, but it is also acceptable to use non-SI units which are compatible with the SI system but provide a more reasonable scale for the subject (CGS units for small things or longer units of time like minutes, hours, days for slow things) or non-SI units which are used extensively in reliable sources on the subject (rpm for mechanical specifications or hands for racehorses). I see no reason to deviate from these guidelines, though they leave some wiggle room to discuss which of our articles are non-scientific vs scientific and what non-SI units would we accept for scientific articles on different subjects.--Cincotta1 (talk) 18:34, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * Where would you fall with Gemini 1, which I did with SI units (recognizing Strong National Ties but the scientific nature of the mission) but which had its conversion order swapped by another editor? --Neopeius (talk) 19:11, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I am bit on the fence, though my gut feeling would be that Gemini 1 also carries general and historical interest, so I would probably favor imperial units first.--Cincotta1 (talk) 21:01, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * Than you for that, . I think my standard procedure will be to continue as I have but not mind if/when folks swap the order. :) --Neopeius (talk) 23:44, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * Spaceflight articles are always closely linked to science. The values used in the articles are from technical drawings, mission trajectories and so on. They are all scientific in origin. This is not the length of a sports field. --mfb (talk) 06:10, 2 November 2020 (UTC)


 * That's an interesting point, but the many of the articles are historical as well as scientific. I haven't checked all of the Wikipedia articles on the history of science, but articles like the one on Goddard's original rockets give units in imperial units first, with the metric value in parentheses. So I think it makes sense to use the originally used units if the article has historic as well as scientific importance. (And, if we wanted to go all out SI metric for spaceflight, giving specific impulse in seconds rather than effective velocity in meters per second would be a bit odd.) Fcrary (talk) 18:25, 2 November 2020 (UTC)

Spacecraft Prefixes
I tried to add a reference to the VSS (Virgin Space Ship) prefix given to Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo spaceplanes to the Ship Prefix page, but an admin told me it was for surface vessels only, which makes sense. However, I was directed here by him to discuss if a "Spacecraft Prefix" page should be made. I know the Bigelow Commercial Space Station was originally called "CSS Skywalker" (Commercial Space Station). Should these be given their own page, with maybe a reference to USS Enterprise and USCSS Nostromos, etc. Any thoughts? — Preceding unsigned comment added by PythosIsAwesome (talk • contribs) 17:39, 31 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I think a Spaceship Prefix page is worthy, so long as a distinction is made between real and fictional ships. --Neopeius (talk) 02:08, 1 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I have created list of spacecraft prefixes. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 14:26, 4 November 2020 (UTC)

Space mission boilerplate
The former Space misssions WikiProject created a boilerplate template for (specifically human) space missions. However, since the WikiProject is merged to WikiProject Spaceflight, I haved moved the template as a subpage of this project. Are there any interested editors to look into this boilerplate?

Link: WikiProject Spaceflight/Human spaceflight boilerplate.

--Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 08:52, 7 November 2020 (UTC)
 * O, it was a guide to create articles about space missions. Anyway, it does not matter and I am converting it into a boilerplate. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:00, 7 November 2020 (UTC)

Astronauts wives
Hello. I am watching the TV series on Disney+ The Right Stuff — which by the way is slightly below average — and out of curiosity I tried to look in wikipedia for the biographies of the wives of the original Mercury Seven astronauts. I was kind of surprised there is none, except Annie Glenn. These women have been portrayed in a number of books, movies and TV series — and of course in Life — and I was kind of surprised they have not been considered worthy of a wikipedia entry. Thanks Hektor (talk) 22:30, 8 November 2020 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if being married to an astronaut is noteworthy enough for an article. But it's worth noting that the article on Annie Glenn is not focused on being an astronaut's wife. It's more focused on her work advocating for and helping people with speech disabilities. So she's noteworthy for more reasons than being John Glenn's wife. Fcrary (talk) 22:51, 8 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Rene Carpenter and Betty Grissom also have articles. Hawkeye7   (discuss)  22:58, 8 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Slightly off topic but would there be any objection to adding the "Spouse" parameter to Template:Infobox astronaut, to wikilink to those articles? Especially since there seems to occurrences where both spouses and have Wikipedia articles. Bob Behnken/K. Megan McArthur, Doug Hurley/Karen Nyberg, and Shannon Walker/Andy Thomas. Though that would mean having to update a lot of the astronaut articles! (there is a way to do this now like this - but adding the parameter directly would be easier) OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 23:16, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the clarification. I am not in the US and thanks to this discussion I discovered that there was a book and a TV series called The Astronaut Wives Club. At least with The Right Stuff and this other book the creators of such articles would not lack sources. Hektor (talk) 07:33, 9 November 2020 (UTC)

Implemented the proposed header
I saw in Archive 7 of the talk page that an alternative header for SPFLT was proposed. I have implemented it with several new features: --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:56, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
 * The HST is retained in the header as it is. It will be visible in all of the pages.
 * Images varied by sub-projects are visible in the right.
 * The name of sub-projects are visible at the bottom when chosen one.

Any interests to write spaceflight articles in Simple English Wikipedia
I think we have written many spaceflight articles for literate people. Now its time to write spaceflight articles in Simple English with limited vocabulary. Well, there is a Wikipedia for this purpose, which is called Simple English Wikipedia. Are their editors interested to write spaceflight articles in Simple English Wikipedia? If so, then we can form a branch of WikiProject Spaceflight there, with advices, open tasks, and banners written in Simple English. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:52, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Addendum: I have seen in the Simple English guideline of WikiProjects that they are created in userspace since most of them are inactive there. However, we hope that our branch in Simple English Wikipedia should not be inactive and will be created at project space, with discussions hosting at here. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:57, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
 * How visited is the Simple English Wiki? Right now, the articles appear to mostly be NSSDC/Astronautics/Gunter Krebs/Jonathan McDowell cribs. --Neopeius (talk) 19:28, 8 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I have just started editing some of the space articles on the simple wiki, and could make a spaceflight wikiproject. There are definitely limited numbers viewing space articles I have looked at but I think that is partly due to the lack of content on spaceflight articles currently. Terasail &#91;Talk&#93; 17:02, 11 November 2020 (UTC)

Doing away with the term "working group" from WikiProject Spaceflight?
When I began to reorganise the WikiProject, I saw that some sub-projects (all defunct) are called "task forces" and others are called "working groups". According to a 2011 interview between SPFLT members and The Signpost: '''WikiProject Spaceflight has Task Forces as well as Working Groups. What are the differences between the two?''' However, such distinctions are not present in most WikiProjects (for example, sub-projects of WP:MILHIST are called "task forces" regardless of its size by participants or articles). Plus, task forces are defunct and we only have working groups. In order to be consistent with other projects, we should do away with the term "working group" altogether in favour of "task force". Any thoughts? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 18:49, 11 November 2020 (UTC)
 * : They can pretty much be thought of as an experiment in collaboration. The Task Forces are what remains of WikiProject Human spaceflight and WikiProject Unmanned spaceflight, and their model is to operate a large editor base responsible for a range of articles with general aims. The Working Groups on the other hand, we see as task-dependent. Their model is to take a small group of editors and a small group of articles, and carry out a specific task.
 * : When this structure was decided upon, the Task Forces were intended to look after large numbers of articles, taking care of general tasks and breaking the project's content into more manageable sections, as well as maintaining a structure similar to what had existed prior to the reorganization. In practice, the project has become more centralized than expected, so maybe this element of the structure needs to be reviewed. The Working Groups are intended to be small groups of editors collaborating on an area of common interest, and in some cases with a particular goal or end result. We currently have two such groups with very different aims. The Timeline of Spaceflight Group is attempting to produce a comprehensive timeline of spaceflight, listing every spaceflight since 1943, while the Space Stations Working Group works to develop a series of Featured topics on space stations. The working groups are intended to be ad-hoc collaborations, which can be created for any purpose as long as several editors want to collaborate in that area.

Mir, ISS and Gateway task force
I will be working on a task force that will focus on Mir, ISS and Gateway and their missions. I will do so by renaming the existing space stations working group. However, it will be a joint task force between SPFLT and WikiProject International relations. Are their any willing members to be collaborative about this task force? --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 07:07, 13 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Please add your name at WikiProject Spaceflight/Mir, ISS and Gateway task force/Members if you are interested to collaborate on articles about international projects like Mir, ISS and Gateway. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 07:44, 13 November 2020 (UTC)

Australia-New Zealand Space Agency
At List of government space agencies there is an entry Australia-New Zealand Space Agency I think this is not real because the only source is the facebook page which is mentioned. The contact email at FB is stealth10@y7mail.com which doesn't look sirous. I think this is only a fanpage and nothing offical. Therfour it should be deletd from the list. Has somebody more information about it? Malo95 (talk) 12:49, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I removed the segment from the table since facebook is not a WP:RS and since WP:CRYSTAL states that articles about the future should be properly referenced. It should only be added back if there is a more reliable source added to the table. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 16:15, 14 November 2020 (UTC)

Evolution of SPFLT administration

 * I have illustrated the evolution of SPFLT administration at User:Soumya-8974/Evolution of SPFLT administration. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 09:04, 12 November 2020 (UTC)
 * And a lovely job you did of it, thank you! I recently resumed work on 1966 in the spaceflight timeline. --Neopeius (talk) 05:01, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Image request
I am looking for an image of the Galileo spacecraft tape recorder. The Earth test article is on display at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. See There are no public tours at present due to COVID-19, but maybe someone has an image. Hawkeye7  (discuss)  22:19, 16 November 2020 (UTC)
 * You've gave us the COVID-19 excuse, but uh anyway. ❌. --Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 18:09, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/Mir, ISS and Gateway task force
You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/Mir, ISS and Gateway task force. Soumya-8974 talk contribs subpages 18:34, 17 November 2020 (UTC)

Manned Orbiting Laboratory
My nomination of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory is stuck at FAC (Featured article candidates/Manned Orbiting Laboratory/archive1) for lack of reviewers. If someone could drop by and contribute a few comments that would be appreciated. You don't have to review the whole article. But you may find the article an interesting read, being about the USAF's manned space program of the 1960s. The article has been around since 2004, but assumed its current form after the NRO declassified the documents related to it in 2015. Hawkeye7  (discuss)  20:06, 18 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Oh shoot, I'm sorry. I'll continue my text review. Thanks for reminding me! --Neopeius (talk) 00:51, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

November 2020 Update
Hello, folks. This is what I've been up to lately:


 * 1966 in spaceflight is now done through October.
 * I've done up to Discoverer 10 and polished up the ones prior (except for Discoverer 1 which isn't mine and I'm saving for last after I finish KH-1).
 * I took care of the quadruple launch of 21 Dec 1965 (LES-3, LES-4, OV2-3, and OSCAR 4).
 * I've taken on a couple of apprentices: and
 * I helped with the FA for Manned Orbiting Laboratory (which is now complete; congratulations !)
 * I put Galactic Radiation and Background up for G.A. in the aim of making SOLRADs 1-4B a Good Topic.

How 'bout y'all? :) --Neopeius (talk) 15:11, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

An update section
It occurs to me that it would be really cool and useful to have a section just for posting updates on what you're working on and when you'd like a look-over. I recognize we have requests for assessments, but, for instance, 's FAC for Manned Orbital Laboratory isn't even on there. I'd love to know what folks are doing and perhaps coordinate efforts.

Where would we put something like that? A sub-page of Discussion? A page of equal standing in Spaceflight's banner?

--Neopeius (talk) 02:41, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I don't see why we need a new page; we should probably reorganize the Assessment page to promote the Requests for assessment section more prominently. JustinTime55 (talk) 13:21, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * What have you been working on? :) --Neopeius (talk) 13:43, 30 October 2020 (UTC)


 * I think I have Apollo 7 about ready to go to FAC. Since we have the upcoming 50th anniversaries of Apollo 14 and 15 through FAC, there's time to go back and finish the earlier crewed missions (10 and 12) that are not yet through FAC before finishing 16 and 17 that don't have 50th anniversaries until 2022.--Wehwalt (talk) 19:40, 30 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Apollo 7 is at FAC. Reviews welcome, here.--Wehwalt (talk) 13:59, 14 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Congratulations on your FAC! Looks like it's going smoothly. Let me know if you need any further help, but it looks like it's well in hand. --Neopeius (talk) 15:13, 1 December 2020 (UTC)

Using the location parameter on Infobox spaceflight/IP
Hello, I have a question for using the location parameter for Infobox spaceflight/IP. I wanted to add information on where Hayabusa2's capsule landed, but to use the location parameter, the type parameter had to be set as 'lander' or 'atmospheric'. This generates the results Earth lander or Earth atmospheric probe, which doesn't seem accurate for the capsule. Are there any solutions/alternatives for this? Kind regards, Hms1103 (talk) 11:47, 6 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Hi! So you want to specify where the lander returned on Earth or the point it landed on the asteroid? --Neopeius (talk) 03:48, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for asking! To clarify, my intent is to add information that the capsule landed on Earth, at Woomera, Australia. Regards, Hms1103 (talk) 09:43, 7 December 2020 (UTC)

| disposal_type        = | declared             = | deactivated          = | destroyed            = | last_contact         = | recovery_by          = | recovery_date        = | decay_date           = | landing_date         = | landing_site         = New Jersey
 * end of mission


 * landing_site tag under | end of mission will get you Earth;| location tag under | end of mission will get you the initial destination. So you can set it up as a asteroid lander with its location the asteroid it sampled, and then put the final landing spot on Earth under landing site. --Neopeius (talk) 15:19, 7 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Thanks for all the support! I've solved the issue. Kind regards, Hms1103 (talk) 02:01, 9 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Happy to help. :) --Neopeius (talk) 02:06, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Edit request on the Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft) page
Hi all- Wondering if someone might be willing to help complete review of some suggested content about the objectives and goals of the proposed NASA VERITAS mission. We have an edit request on the Talk:VERITAS_(spacecraft) page that's partly complete, just waiting for someone to dig into the "VERITAS Objectives and Goals" section. The existing copy is pretty thin, and the suggested replacement content adds helpful detail about what the mission would do, scientifically. Very open to feedback if modifications would make the edits more acceptable to the community. Thanks very much. Zoomanova (talk) 02:08, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Timeline
Hello folks

Project Timeline hasn't exactly gone semi-active, but it has gone unmonitored. The progress page hasn't been updated in a decade.

I'm happy to work on it, at least up through 1966, but I'd love it if the other members of the task force could post their updates on the discussion page there. :) (yes, I know we've centralized discussions, but timeline is one of the still active groups.)

--Neopeius (talk) 00:52, 19 November 2020 (UTC)


 * I'd be willing to help out in some of my free time, Neopeius! Which page are you looking at specifically, since there's a WHOLE lotta timelines relating to spaceflight? XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:27, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Spaceflight before 1951
,, I have finally gotten Spaceflight before 1951 into shape, though I would like consensus on how frequently items should be linked. But it has a good, well-researched lede, a comprehensive launch section, and a nice summary section. I'd like to get all the timeline articles to Featured List status, and this is the first. :)

(anyone else is welcome and encouraged to assist, but I've earned review karma with the three pinged folk. :) )

--Neopeius (talk) 18:17, 13 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Shouldn't 1950 in spaceflight be split off, so that this can be encapsulated as Spaceflight in the 1940s ? That would cleanly show the decade, and wouldn't have the odd "before 1951". It would also remove any attempts at adding mythological spaceflight from before, as indicated in the talk page.
 * As this article started out as "Spaceflight before 1957", before 1956-1951 were split off, then, the only year left in the 1950s can also be solved away. -- 67.70.26.89 (talk) 03:08, 16 December 2020 (UTC)


 * It's not a bad idea. On the other hand, it's more work for me... :) --Neopeius (talk) 15:17, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Adding to the Apollo Applications Program
The Apollo Applications Program (AAP) page is really short, and it only talks about just a few of the applications that were discussed back in the late 60s/early 70s. Does anyone here know of any good sources that we could use to help beef that page up a little bit? It's not a stub, but I think it only barely qualifies as a page on its own. XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:14, 17 December 2020 (UTC)


 * You might try Dave Portree's site. His specialty is programs that never got made, and he shows his work. --Neopeius (talk) 02:15, 19 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Oh, perfect! Thanks, Neopeius! I'll certainly take a look into that over the weekend! XFalcon2004x (talk) 12:57, 19 December 2020 (UTC)


 * It would also be worth adding something about the Voyager program (Mars). That would have been a very large, robotic Mars lander, launched on a Saturn V, and part of the AAP. The actual Viking landers and orbiters were a descoped version, and the name "Voyager" got recycled for Mariner Jupiter-Saturn. But the original Voyager was part of AAP, so it's worth mentioning in the AAP article. I think the content could just be copied and edited down for the AAP article.

NASA research article
Could someone who knows about such things have a look over NASA research? This is possibly the worst article I've ever seen on Wikipedia, and there's stiff competition for that title. Given that it only has two incoming links, |Cats_That_Look_Like_Hitler consistently averages 1/4 of the pageviews of Cats That Look Like Hitler, and that presumably everything here is already covered in English rather than gibberish on the article for each NASA program, I'm strongly inclined to just delete it, but you're better placed than me to say if there's actually anything here worth salvaging. ‑ Iridescent 16:26, 15 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Yea... In the four sentence lead, I count seven grammatical errors. And the article doesn't get better after that. I can see the value of an article on this subject, but not this article. Unless someone wanted to completely rewrite it (and I'm not volunteering), I'm in favor of simply deleting it. Fcrary (talk) 01:01, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * I would say delete it. I don't think the article can be made useful. The topic of NASA research is very broad. Several of their facilities do little but that.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:09, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Goodness. It certainly is something! I got a good laugh. And now I'll have a good cry. --Neopeius (talk) 04:58, 17 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Now at Articles for deletion/NASA research. &#8209; Iridescent 17:42, 24 November 2020 (UTC)
 * Now at Articles for deletion/NASA research. &#8209; Iridescent 17:42, 24 November 2020 (UTC)


 * Can we acknowledge that there is a site named Cats that Look Like Hitler real fast? That's just... I know it's off-topic, but that's beautiful! XFalcon2004x (talk) 00:54, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

Space construction
currently redirects to space manufacturing. It occurs to me this should be a different topic. As how manufacturing and construction are different topics, and construction could mean a structure.-- 67.70.26.89 (talk) 06:02, 13 December 2020 (UTC)


 * You are probably right. Space construction would be things like the building of moon bases and space colonies, and perhaps Dyson Spheres. :) Care to take a stab at it? --Neopeius (talk) 15:06, 13 December 2020 (UTC)


 * Someone else would need to start the stub off. I think I'd get trouted for converting this redir at this point in its lifetime in this manner. -- 67.70.26.89 (talk) 04:43, 14 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Space manufacturing already describe the aspects of space construction, hence I requested the redirect. --Soumya-8974 (he) talk contribs subpages 06:11, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

Merging of concurrent (Soviet) mission articles?
Recently, the separate articles for Vostok 3 and Vostok 4 have been merged, as they were really two complementary flights in a single, coordinated event: the first group flight. The two missions also launched and landed at very close times to each other, so it does make sense to treat them together in a single article, rather than giving each launch/landing its own article. This might also be appropriate for other existing articles.

This is something I've been thinking about for several months, especially in connection with early Soviet group flights which were explicitly planned and executed as such, and did not link up with a space station. My initial suggestion (on a broader talk, independently of specific articles) is to merge the following three groups of articles along the following schema, per the above:


 * Vostok 5 and Vostok 6 -> Vostok 5 and 6 (second group flight)
 * Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5 -> Soyuz 4 and 5 (EVA crew transfer between two craft on concurrent flights)
 * Soyuz 6, Soyuz 7 and Soyuz 8 -> Soyuz 6, 7 and 8 (concurrent triple spaceflight, failed docking attempt)

I raise the idea of merging certain crewed mission articles here for general discussion, and also to avoid "double work" if others are already working along similar lines (merging Vostok 5 and 6 is the next logical place to go, and perhaps JustinTime55 is already working in this direction). I would also like to distinguish cases: despite the complex crew transfers among later Soyuz missions and space stations, this type of article merger would seem most appropriate to "one-off" events like these earlier group spaceflights (not linking up with any waiting space station) which have definite, concurrent beginnings-and-ends, and not the continuous space station activity which later obtained over several overlapping missions (and crew transfers between craft). I also think that such mergers are most appropriate when the crewed missions have shared launch and landing times very close to each other (hours, say). In principle Gemini 7 and Gemini 6A might be merged along the above lines, but the latter being a much shorter mission would be a point against, in my subjective take on things. Similarly, there is a question of whether stubby-uncrewed target articles like Soyuz 2A and Soyuz 2 might not be merged with their respective crewed mission articles Soyuz 1 and Soyuz 3, and so on.

Another consideration is that other areas of the encyclopedia would manifestly have to (continue to) point to each mission separately (lists, records, etc), but this is easily managed by redirects and clean-up in any post-merge processes, using "what links here".

What do editors think of this general idea, especially the three specific points above? If there is any traction I'll propose merge discussions at the appropriate articles. Are there any other crewed mission articles which ought to be merged with others, or with uncrewed mission/target articles? Pinging JustinTime55 Randy Kryn Soumya-8974 Kees08 Wehwalt on same. MinnesotanUser (talk) 05:37, 25 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Good idea after all. I prefer quality over quantity, thus I support merging articles. --Soumya-8974 (he) talk contribs subpages 06:40, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

As long as no-one deletes all my discoverer, Les, solrad, and OV articles :-) --Neopeius (talk) 20:42, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Fire in space
has been nominated for deletion. Do we have an article(s) on fire experiments in space, combustion in vacuum by supplying oxidizer, and fiery accidents in space? -- 67.70.26.89 (talk) 04:45, 14 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, we do. It is Flame.  Cheers.  N2e (talk) 16:21, 28 December 2020 (UTC)
 * You propbably won't find a lot of reliable sources about fire accidents in space, because there probably haven't been (m)any. Space fires tend to extinguish themselves (at least in a nitrogen- or helium-buffered atmosphere) because sustained burning depends on natural convection, which in turn depends on gravity to control the flow of gases at different temperatures (densities). (On the topic of deletion, I don't know why we don't seem to have a guideline or policy against conflating fiction with real-world topics. I know Wikipedia includes coverage of fiction, but the scope of this project is real-world space travel, not science fiction.) JustinTime55 (talk) 15:21, 14 December 2020 (UTC)
 * There have been several fire accidents in space, so it isn't "many" but more than "any"; there was that one on Mir, where molten metal floated out of an oxygen generator due to the heat of the fire. IIRC some Soyuz capsules have had minor short circuit fires in space. Apollo 13 had an oxygen tank explosion, so a deflagration or detonation fire. And ofcourse, bipropellant rocket motors are fire in space (combustion), some of which have had accidents in space due to some sort of fiery incident. -- 67.70.26.89 (talk) 04:48, 15 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, there's also the kinda obvious examples of fires in space of old solid rocket motors being used in space as upper stages, like with early American launches using the WAC Corporal, I believe. That said, I may also be completely missing the point on this one. XFalcon2004x (talk) 14:29, 16 December 2020 (UTC)
 * Here is an article about fire experiments on the ISS about a year ago. There used to be more about these experiments on NASA.gov, but I couldn't find it with a cursory look. Here are some DOIs about various fire related tech's for space vehicles:
 * An article on the early detection and suppression of fires on space vehicles
 * A review of fire safety in space vehicles
 * An article on signature of different combustion products of spacecraft components
 * On smoke detectors in outer space
 * On xenon fire suppressants in spacecraft
 * Fire spread along wires in spacecraft
 * There are probably many more articles like these and more basic research on the physics of flames in low-gravity if you can find the right search terms--Cincotta1 (talk) 15:53, 23 December 2020 (UTC)

Those sources might be sufficient to write an actual, meets-notability-criteria, article on "Fire in space", or since humans or human-made technology machines are involved, perhaps better would be "Fire in spaceflight."

But either way, near as I can tell no editor has ever tried to write that article. And the redirect being discussed is merely a name of some TV episode, which is also fine for Wikipedia. If some editors chooses to create an article on Fire in space [spaceflight?] I would be happy to weigh in on the RfD discussion. Else, I'll just let it go as TV episodes aren't much of an interest for me. Cheers. N2e (talk) 15:43, 28 December 2020 (UTC)


 * I just now learned that this topic IS COVERED in the English Wikipedia, here: Flame.  N2e (talk) 16:21, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

2021 in spaceflight split
On December 28, 2020, was split into 2021 in spaceflight (January–June) and 2021 in spaceflight (July–December) due to Wikipedia's post expansion include size limit. Some duplicate information remains on both pages, particularly with events which have not been firmly scheduled.

See the discussion at Talk:2021 in spaceflight (January–June). davidwr/ (talk)/(contribs) 🎄  21:13, 28 December 2020 (UTC)

Timeline of spaceflight
Thus far, I've completed to FLC level the following articles:

Spaceflight before 1951 1951 in spaceflight 1952 in spaceflight

All of these have been submitted for FLC review, and I hope they might get some eyes on them. I look forward to the completion of the series -- all are welcome to join me! :)

--Neopeius (talk) 03:33, 8 January 2021 (UTC)

Ever want to ask NASA a question?
Hello WikiProject Spaceflight! I'm Ed Erhart, part of the Wikimedia Foundation's Communications department. (You might know me better as .)

Have you ever wanted to ask an astronaut a question about living in space or the science that's done on the International Space Station (ISS)? Or perhaps you're expanding an article on human spaceflight and can't find a citation for an important bit of information? We're looking for community input on questions to ask a NASA astronaut.

For Wikipedia's 20th birthday, coming up on 15 January, and 20 years of continuous occupation of the ISS, we're working with to broadcast an interview with a NASA astronaut. Suitable topics would include Wikipedia's coverage of astronautics, scientific contributions made by crewed spaceflight over the last twenty years, and plans for the next two decades of spaceflight. We'll select the best questions to put to the astronaut.

If you have questions to submit, please respond below or send them to me via email by Sunday, 10 January (UTC). Thank you! Ed Erhart (WMF) (talk) 01:03, 5 January 2021 (UTC)


 * Please do post any questions you have ASAP - I'm finalising the list this weekend and welcome community input. Modest Genius talk 12:23, 8 January 2021 (UTC)


 * It might be useful if you posted the sort of thing you are asking, MG. You're interviewing an astronaut, and that's great, but if we "can't find a citation" about something, is that something the astronaut is going to be able to respond to? Or would there be subsequent information from someone in, say, NASA's history division?--Wehwalt (talk) 13:57, 8 January 2021 (UTC)


 * I'm preparing questions in the 'suitable topics' listed in Ed's third paragraph above. I agree that it's unlikely the astronaut can find a citation for something in a brief interview. I'm expecting a half hour chat, not detailed follow-up. Modest Genius talk 16:15, 10 January 2021 (UTC)


 * The full interview is now available. <b style="font-family: Times New Roman; color: maroon;">Modest Genius</b> talk 13:26, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

Request for comment
Just started a discussion over at Talk:SpaceX floating spaceport, about what might be a good scope for a new article created earlier today. If the topic is of interest, consider dropping by to discuss. N2e (talk) 04:37, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

Can Everyday Astronaut be considered a reliable source?
Tim Dodd is not a journalist working with editorial oversight. He is also not just some guy with a website. Providing accurate and educational information about spaceflight is his business. Do his articles count as WP:RS?

As for me; I do not consider Tim's site to be WP:QUESTIONABLE, but it would be WP:RSSELF. RSSELF states: Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications. This describes Everyday Astronaut to me, but I am biased because I really, really want to use this article (Starship SN8 12.5 kilometer hop) for citation. What does this community say? <b style="color:#256eff">Jare</b><b style="color:#0044cc">dHW</b><b style="color:#00297a">ood</b>💬 16:31, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Tim Dodd has evolved a lot over time, in fact he really is not just some guy with a website anymore, the Everyday Astronaut brand now has quite a few people behind it (similar to nasaspaceflight). I believe he is a reliable source even if he doesn't meet the WP:RSSELF requirements but I may be as biased as you :) josecurioso  ❯❯❯  Tell me!  17:40, 2 February 2021 (UTC)

Merge plan for Spacecraft propulsion
I have created a plan to fulfill the merge request for In-space propulsion technologies into Spacecraft propulsion. Input from WikiProject Spaceflight editors would be much appreciated. There is a dedicated section for discussion of the merge plan. Please comment there. Once discussion begins, I will wait for it to quiet down before executing the merge. <b style="color:#256eff">Jare</b><b style="color:#0044cc">dHW</b><b style="color:#00297a">ood</b>💬 17:43, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
 * Main merge complete. <b style="color:#256eff">Jare</b><b style="color:#0044cc">dHW</b><b style="color:#00297a">ood</b>💬 04:44, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much, !! --Neopeius (talk) 14:47, 6 February 2021 (UTC)

Toward a more welcoming Wikipedia
(I just posted this in MilHist and would appreciate opening the discussion here as well)

Hello, gang.

Since Mil Hist is possibly the most organized and active WikiProject, and since it's one for which I do frequent work, I wanted to open up the conversation here.

It has been my observation that Wikipedia is becoming an increasingly stagnant community. We still have our regular editors who have been here forever and are still diligently working, but new blood has dropped off, as has a lot of the conviviality that made WP a welcoming place back in the day.

I'm fairly new here, despite my ancient first-edit date. I didn't really start editing in earnest until about two years ago. I floundered at first, figuring out the Wikipedia style. I'm a professional space historian with thousands of articles to my credit, but I hadn't done encyclopedias before. The review process was intimidating.

I was fortunate to have been mentored and helped by a trio of great editors:, , and who very patiently made suggestions and improved articles I was working on (rather than just telling me what I did wrong; they let me learn by their example). They gave encouraging praise and pretty barnstars. Because of their support, I stuck with the project, and now I like to think I'm one of the more accomplished of the (scanty) new crop of Wikipedians. This is what I've managed thus far, most of it just in the last year.

With the departure of Kees08, things have gotten a lot chillier for new Wikipedians, at least in the Spaceflight and Mil Hist communities. I've been working hard to recruit new contributors, either by bringing in external writers who are new to WP, or tapping existing editors who have been mostly at the fringes. But it's been tough. I just lost one today -- when I let him out into the wild and he attempted to GA one of his articles, the reception was demoralizing. It's not that the suggestions people made were necessarily bad, but they were framed in ways that were discouraging and highly critical, especially for someone new to the process.

For example, here I nominated the new Wikipedian's article for GA for him since he's new, and it was summarily reversed, the article's assessment expressed in completely discouraging rather than encouraging tones. The subtext reads as "You submitted it wrong, and the article sucks anyway." Better phrasing might have been "Do you have connection to this article despite your name not being associated with it? Also, while the article has merit and I can see the author put significant work into it, it could use improvement in the following areas before it's ready for GA status (and if the editor be new, I'll be happy to offer advice and assistance.)"

The second attempt can be found here, in which Balon offers a fine review. However, I don't think "this article needs a lot of work. I would currently put it at B or C class. It doesn't do a comprehensive job of discussing Crippen and his career;" was necessary. It dismisses the work done thus far, and was ultimately the straw that broke the camel's back. When I do reviews, I tend to start positive and end positive so as not to dispirit the editor.

Most new Wikipedians aren't going to have the experience and skills that I do and thus have the interest or stamina to become regular editors unless we go the extra mile to help them adapt.

We have to remember that not all of us are grizzled veterans. It doesn't hurt to be friendly, to praise what's good in an article while noting what can be improved. It doesn't help to be brusque or demeaning. It is important to remember that tone never carries well in a text-only medium. "Assuming good faith" is extra tough for newbies unfamiliar with the process.

Now, you may be thinking at this point: "Why should we coddle new editors? They can sink or swim just like I did."

I get where you're coming from if you're thinking that. After all, this is a volunteer gig for you, too. You've only got so much energy to spend, and your experienced comrades require less of it since they already know the ropes. But the consequence of that sentiment is what we are seeing: increased barrier to entry, greater attrition for existing editors, and a declining number of new editors to replace and augment the community. If we can't recruit and maintain new editors, we will eventually fall below the minimum needed to maintain Wikipedia. I'm already seeing this happen in Spaceflight.

Even as a somewhat experienced editor, I have been adversely affected by the growing chilliness at Wikipedia: Despite doing a lot of reviews and producing dozens of solid articles, this last year I've gotten barely a notice for my work. Often, I don't even get a "thank you" for my reviews. I've done my best to be positive and improving for editors, giving out praise and awards (many of which I've made myself), but such overtures are often ignored. I recognize virtue is its own reward, but it's a bit dispiriting to put positive energy out into the community and get virtually none back.

More than any other Project, Mil Hist has the potential to reverse this trend. What does Mil Hist do to welcome and encourage new Wikipedians? How does it keep current ones engaged? I know there's a "Best New Editor" and "Best Editor" although even those can be more negative than positive as they create clear "Winners" and "Losers." I've been trying to greet every new person who joins Spaceflight, and also to give out merit awards for contributions. Are there folks who do that on this project? Who is actively maintaining the community, making editors feel valued and appreciated, maintaining the espirit d'corps?

I'm going to be bringing on more apprentice editors this year. I'm hoping that, if all of us work together, we can make a community that welcomes and retains these and other new editors so that Wikipedia does not ossify.

I welcome, encourage, and look forward to your thoughts. Please let me know if my experience mirrors yours or if I'm missing something.

Thank you for listening. :)

--Neopeius (talk) 18:33, 10 January 2021 (UTC)


 * I hope we can work on this. For better or for worse, Wikipedia is a very egalitarian community, and everyone has their say. It's great that everyone can get an input, but it's also difficult when EVERYONE can get an input. I think the problem is that Wikipedia is popular enough that we don't feel like we need to treat new editors like we need their help, but Wikipedia definitely still needs their contributions. I don't think this issue is limited to WP:SPACEFLIGHT, but that's the area we can most directly impact. I think it will require a mind shift that provides more critical feedback instead of straight criticism. As mentioned above, that is something I have to work on as well, and I hope to encourage future editors. Balon Greyjoy (talk) 00:32, 29 January 2021 (UTC)
 * I've been inactive, but might pick up on editing soon. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 16:56, 1 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Welcome back, ! We'll love to have you. :) --Neopeius (talk) 00:19, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm new and am jumping in here at Spaceflight. There hasn't been much of a welcoming committee but I've been enjoying myself. I'm just working through learning on my own. I've been making mistakes and picking myself back up when I get knocked down.  I was very proud the first time an edit didn't get reverted. I am learning to slow down and be patient.  I am learning to read related articles before making changes and to make arguments using policy instead of opinion.  There is lots and lots and lots to learn.  I agree, it isn't easy to break in as a Wikipedia editor. <b style="color:#256eff">Jare</b><b style="color:#0044cc">dHW</b><b style="color:#00297a">ood</b>💬 04:46, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
 * A mentoring program here at the Wikiproject might be nice. has been helping me out here and there and that has been helpful. Sign me up if anyone wants to create a pilot program for something like that. <b style="color:#256eff">Jare</b><b style="color:#0044cc">dHW</b><b style="color:#00297a">ood</b>💬 04:50, 2 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Sorry I missed this! Were you interested in mentoring or being mentored? We've definitely done this informally, with Kees08 and, to some extent, Balon Greyjoy mentoring me. --Neopeius (talk) 14:46, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I'd appreciate some constructive feedback on some of the edits I've been making. I know about mistakes I am making when they get reverted, but I wonder what mistakes I am making that are getting missed. If you're willing and have some time to give guidance, I'll take it.  I'm even willing to execute some homework assignments to learn some of the important policies and guidelines. Jared.h.wood → <b style="color:#256eff">JH</b><b style="color:#0044cc">elz</b><b style="color:#00297a">er</b>💬 14:46, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I'd be delighted,. Are you amenable to using discord? I send you the link to the WP Discord server on your Talk Page. --Neopeius (talk) 19:11, 7 February 2021 (UTC)

Scope of template Satellite and spacecraft instruments
Hi! I have opened a discussion on Template talk:Satellite and spacecraft instruments about the scope of that template. It would be far too large to include all Earth observing instruments, and indeed most listed instruments observe other planets, except there are a few Earth observing instruments. Inclusion criteria are unclear. I think we need some guidelines here. --Gerrit CUTEDH 10:27, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks! I have responded (in short, it seems a useless template). --Neopeius (talk) 13:22, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

Spaceflight Banner
Hello!

Is it just me, or did we used to have a different banner for this project? Is there a copy of it anywhere?

--03:29, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * This one? User:Soumya-8974 added it in November 2020. --mfb (talk) 11:38, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * I mean, is there a copy of the old one anywhere? :) --Neopeius (talk) 13:06, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * This is the banner before it was changed by Soumya-8974 – Special:PermanentLink/892086007. It can be restored from this, although it would be nice if links to the newsletter could be kept. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 13:20, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Thanks, -- quite frankly, I've never liked this new one. The letters are so muddy against the planet. I won't revert it without consensus though... :) --Neopeius (talk) 13:24, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

Timeline of spaceflight
Hello, gang.

I have been making a push to get all of the Timeline of Spaceflight articles up to snuff. After all, they are classified highest priority, and they serve as good hubs for the project. While folks have done a good job of keeping the modern timeline articles up to date, pre-2009 has pretty much lain fallow for a decade.

So far, I have brought Spaceflight before 1951, 1951 in spaceflight, and 1952 in spaceflight to FLC status (I haven't nominated 1952 yet, but it's ready). 1953 in spaceflight is almost there, and I've made substantial progress on on 1954 in spaceflight. I've updated the working group page, too.

I've gotten a few eyes on the first article and none on the second. If my spaceflight brethren could peek in and give reviews, that'd be great. I would love to be able to have High priority FLCs in the next Downlink :)

Thanks!

--Neopeius (talk) 13:30, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Sure I can add a section about them to the next Downlink, linking to each one, if you want anything in particular said just ping me or add it yourself, I will create the February page now. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 13:41, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Sorry for the confusion. I just meant I'm looking forward to our project having some FLs in the tally of articles :) --Neopeius (talk) 14:05, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Ah, thats fine. If you ever want FLC / FA nominations listed on the newsletter just ping me and I can add a section for it, I don't really understand the process but its good to try to get more spaceflight pages featured.  Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 14:27, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Would you like to learn? :) The more folks we have in the project who can do high level reviews, the more articles we can get to GA and FA status. :) --Neopeius (talk) 14:34, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Not sure, I will definitely be following FLC/FAC more closely in the future and attempt to understand it better, but I do best with minor article updates, and with Templates/Scripts which is why my mainspace edit % is so low. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 14:56, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * That's valuable too! --Neopeius (talk) 18:39, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

"Commercial astronaut"
Currently Hayley Arceneaux and Jared Isaacman have been categorized into. To me this appears wrong, since they are on a single flight jaunt, and not some permanent space employee. I acknowledge that Isaacman is the person who funded the mission, and is listed as "commander". with Arceneaux listed as "medical officer". Should these two be reclassified into one of the other categories? or, for example? -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 14:11, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * They're going into space. Valentina Tereshkova was on a single flight jaunt, too. :) I say they're astronauts. --Neopeius (talk) 14:13, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Tereskhova was a uniformed member of the cosmonaut corps, and was trained in the operation of the Vostok, like other cosmonauts. Isaacman and Arceneaux are going on an autonomously operated SpaceX Dragon 2. They're more like Richard Garriot or Mark Shuttleworth who are classified as space tourists, even though they went into space. And not like Yi So-yeon, who was doing experiments in space, and had full cosmonaut training, and government support. Though a case could be made for them to be similar to Christa McAuliffe, being spaceflight participants. The question though is not if they are "astronauts", but if they are "commercial astronauts", which is where they are currently categorized. They are unlike the others currently so categorized, employees of space companies. Do you mean we should recategorize them into (or rather ) instead of Commercial astronauts ? -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 14:19, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * How about Konstantin Feoktistov? Isaacman and Arcenaux are the only crew of this flight. They are presumably being trained for it. If they were just passengers, I could see them being tourists. A case could be made for Arcenaux being a participant (essentially filling the role of payload specialist). --Neopeius (talk) 14:26, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Feoktistov seems to be a Soviet Deke Slayton, cosmonaut corps medically sidelined. We've already had a candidate space tourist medically sidelined, Enomoto. So, that leaves Isaacman, as a tourist, commercial astronaut, astronaut, spaceflight participant, or soemthing else. -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 01:36, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Wait and see what reliable sources call them. <b style="color:#256eff">JH</b><b style="color:#0044cc">elz</b><b style="color:#00297a">er</b>💬 05:07, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * It is currently in commercial astronaut, so the wait-and-see, would delete this category as being unsupported. -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 00:46, 25 February 2021 (UTC)

File:Inspiration4 Patch Art.png
File:Inspiration4 Patch Art.png has been nominated for deletion on Commons. It seems likely it will be deleted as it seems to require a fair-use rationale, which Commons does not accept. It needs to be re-uploaded to English Wikipedia, with NFURs added for the capsule article and the mission article. -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 02:44, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

A textlogo that does not meet the threshold of originality, and is thusly public domain, can be uploaded to Commons to replace the mission patch, for use on various other language Wikipedias, without any of us needing to know the language in question to write an appropriate NFUR for other languages. -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 02:44, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

These can be used until such a time as the mission patch is uploaded to English Wikiedia under a fair-use rationale. -- 65.93.183.33 (talk) 14:22, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I think these text logos are worse than not showing a logo. --mfb (talk) 14:39, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Request for comment
There is currently a debate on deleting an article about the Vacuum to Antimatter-Rocket: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Vacuum_to_Antimatter-Rocket
 * I have suggested keeping it because:
 * I believe it's the only spacecraft proposal on using Schwinger pair production for uncrewed interstellar travel.
 * JBIS is one of the most prestigious journals on interstellar tavel: https://www.jbis.org.uk/paper/2011.64.378
 * Centauri Dreams (https://www.centauri-dreams.org/2016/08/02/the-evolution-of-antimatter-propulsion/) is written by Paul Gilster, an expert on interstellar travel: https://www.planetary.org/profiles/paul-gilster
 * Space.com and Interesting Engineering and reliable secondary sources as far as I'm concerned.
 * Cheers. ExoEditor 03:36, 26 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Technically, a request for comment like this should never contain your own opinions on the subject. It's supposed to be exclusively a matter of calling other editors' attention to a discussion about deleting an article. That guideline is supposed to prevent people from recruiting others favor their own position.
 * The delete side makes good arguments. I gave it my best shot for saving some of the content.  Good luck. <b style="color:#256eff">JH</b><b style="color:#0044cc">elz</b><b style="color:#00297a">er</b>💬 15:32, 26 February 2021 (UTC)

Sources for orbital elements in the info-boxes of crewed missions ?
Hi everyone,

I have a question regarding the apogee and perigee indicated in the info-boxes of crewed missions (missions linked in List_of_human_spaceflights).

Some do not have sources, so I wonder where the info does come from. Some others have sources that link to obscure websites.

Taking for example the crewed missions to the ISS, it reveals an obvious mismatch with the known altitude of the Station. (Click attached homemade graph)

How can the apogee be so low compared to the ISS ? Maybe I am missing something ?

Most recent missions do not have these elements in their info-boxes. I think it would be a reasonable solution if you think, like me, that a lot of those could be inaccurate.

''First time posting in a wikipedia Project. I did not know where to post this, and stumbled upon this page which seems to be the perfect place to post something like this ?''

--LazyAssed Contender (talk) 15:22, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * I've always been a bit confused myself about the need for the orbital elements in the Apollo article infoboxes, and feel they are of limited utility. The one-in-a-thousand (generously) editor who wants to know the selenocentric orbital parameters of, say, Apollo 14, probably knows that they changed several times and can find better, more specific sources.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:26, 23 February 2021 (UTC)
 * Flights to the ISS never launch to the ISS orbit directly. Most of the time you would not end up in the same place as the ISS, and if you do then it's too risky to approach it using a big and relatively imprecise upper stage rocket engine. The typical rocket launch goes to an orbit below and behind the ISS, from there you "catch up" and then raise your orbit at the right time. I don't know what exactly is plotted in the graph, but it's probably the initial orbit for the lower Soyuz mission and a later orbit for the missions that match the ISS height. --mfb (talk) 08:52, 25 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Yes, I thought it would mean something like this ; except these are articles about the missions, so we might want orbital parameters of the mission itself ? And the mission is the ISS.
 * So I propose to remove orbital parameters of missions to MIR and to the ISS. It it an acceptable change ? It seems too big a decision for someone new here. --LazyAssed Contender (talk) 09:19, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Just referencing the ISS would work I guess. The ISS orbit when docking would be an option, too. The initial orbit would be more interesting in the scope of the rocket launch, not the crewed mission. --mfb (talk) 15:19, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Is Space.com reliable?
A discussion is being held here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#RfC:_Space.com and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Space.com_reliable? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ExoEditor (talk • contribs) 03:05, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

List of...launches page creation and formatting
Starting with List of Electron launches (Which I split away from Electron (rocket) pages) there seems to be increase in articles which split the list of launches from their respective launch vehicle pages. What should (or should there be) a criteria when a split becomes necessary?

When I split the List of Electron launches my intent in was because of Rocket Lab's claim that they will have frequent launches and that would cause the article to become too long. In hindsight this is probably WP:CRYSTAL.

Recently I noticed that there are similar pages or drafts being created:

Current drafts

 * Draft:List of Delta 4 Heavy launches (currently part of Delta IV Heavy)
 * Draft:List of Antares launches (currently part of Antares (rocket))
 * Draft:List of Atlas LV3A launches (not currently anywhere in the encyclopedia)
 * Draft:List of Minotaur launches (currently part of Minotaur (rocket family))

New articles

 * List of Delta 4 Medium launches (originally part of Delta IV, List of Thor and Delta launches (2000–2009), and List of Thor and Delta launches (2010–2019))
 * List of Vega launches (originally in Vega (rocket)
 * List of Delta 4-M launches (originally not anywhere else in the encyclopedia)

Previous created articles
The new pages do add new info in some cases (I like some of the new graphs in particular like "by orbit" - maybe other list of pages can add them too). But also some of the lists have the formatting changed from the original which I found confusing. I don't think infoboxes are needed as readers can go to the main page about the rocket to learn more about it. And the heading "About the " doesn't seem like an encyclopedic tone, but other then that the pages seem fine.

So, at what point should the list of launches be split out (or how many launches of a particular launch vehicle warrant a dedicated list of launches article)? What info should we have on those pages? OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 02:36, 1 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I would say in most cases about 10 launches (including planned) should merit its own article. If a rocket is very notable, however, like Starship (List of Starship flights), it could work with less. N828335 (talk) 03:44, 1 March 2021 (UTC)


 * I added the list of V-2 launches to Spaceflight before 1951. Thanks very much. :) --Neopeius (talk) 04:07, 1 March 2021 (UTC)


 * All of those articles, except for List of Delta 4-M launches, List of Atlas LV3A launches, and soon to be submitted List of Atlas LV3B launches. List of Delta 4-M launches has no other article to move the information too. List of Atlas LV3A launches is notable because it had the first launch ever(according to Space Launch Schedule and Space Launch Now) and also has no other place to move the information too. List of Atlas LV3B launches is notable because Atlas LV3B was the 3rd rocket ever to launch humans to space. Can somebody please review all of the draft articles? Thanks in advance! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.238.109 (talk) 19:52, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.238.109 (talk)
 * Hey, I will get to this soon, probably the weekend. OkayKenji (talk • contribs) 14:35, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

Okay. Just some of them have been waiting for over 5 weeks to be reviewed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.238.109 (talk) 18:06, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.2.238.109 (talk)
 * I've made preliminary edits to said your drafts, will make more edits and publish them soon. Thank you for your patience. OkayKenji (talk) 01:12, 21 March 2021 (UTC)

Sandbox organiser
Hi all

I've been working on a tool for the past few months that you may find useful. Sandbox organiser is a set of tools to help you better organise your draft articles and other pages in your userspace. It also includes areas to keep your to do lists, bookmarks, list of tools. You can customise your sandbox organiser to add new features and sections. Once created you can access it simply by clicking the sandbox link at the top of the page. You can create and then customise your own sandbox organiser just by clicking the button on the page. All ideas for improvements and other versions would be really appreciated.

Huge thanks to PrimeHunter and NavinoEvans for their work on the technical parts, without them it wouldn't have happened.

Hope its helpful

John Cummings (talk) 11:33, 6 February 2021 (UTC)


 * Goodness! Looks very cool. I imagine this will be better than my makeshift system. :) Thanks very much. --Neopeius (talk) 14:49, 6 February 2021 (UTC)
 * thanks very much, please let me know if you have any suggestions for improvements in both the tool and the documentation, also if you look in the wikicode you'll see I've tried to add comments to make it easier to customise. I'm thinking there might be a couple of useful versions of this for different kinds of user. John Cummings (talk) 14:55, 6 February 2021 (UTC)


 * I use it all the time now. I only wish there were a way to delete User pages when I was done with them. --Neopeius (talk) 14:05, 22 February 2021 (UTC)


 * sure, you can add to the pages to get them deleted. John Cummings (talk) 19:36, 22 February 2021 (UTC)
 * , wow thanks! I will definitly be implementing this on my sandbox. βӪᑸᙥӴ • Talk • Contribs 20:40, 23 March 2021 (UTC)

Template:Orbital launches in [year]
2020 is missing most flights, 2021 is starting with the same problem. But do we need these templates? Where is the use case of "I'm looking at this satellite, I want to go to satellites that were launched the same calendar year"? If people think it's useful then the templates should probably be expanded to cover all launches. --mfb (talk) 09:54, 11 March 2021 (UTC)
 * This is a complete guess, but I think the criteria for including something in these navboxes is that a) it has an article and b) it's actually been launched into orbit. At this stage, the vast amount of payloads launched to orbit thus far in 2021, three months in, do not have their own articles, and that might be the reason why it's very bare-bones at the moment. — Molly Brown (talk) 00:58, 25 March 2021 (UTC)

Help with Draft
I would like help with Draft:Starship SN11. If you decide to help, please let me know on my talk page. 64.121.103.144 (talk) 20:27, 4 April 2021 (UTC) I also need help with Draft:Starship SN15. If you decide to help, please let me know on my talk page. 64.121.103.144 (talk) 15:00, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I doubt that SN11 (or any other such prototype) is notable. Ruslik_ Zero 20:25, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
 * SN11 and SN15 are very important. 64.121.103.144 (talk) 22:08, 5 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, I do not see these drafts ever making their way to mainspace, specific prototype development is not particularly notable in the first place, and any information should probably just be placed in the main article (if they are infact influential development steps). While a steel cylinder falling from the sky and proceeding to explode make great clips, it does not make for well sourced article which can't be explained by a few sentences. Terasail &#91;✉&#93; 19:55, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Thank you, User:Ruslik0 and User:Terasil. I was about to tell the unregistered editor to discuss here and see if you agreed with me that they are not individually notable, and I see that we agree.  Robert McClenon (talk) 17:14, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
 * User:64.121.103.144 - See Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, in particular with respect to the road closures. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:14, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I think only Starhopper would pass GNG separate from Starship -- 67.70.27.246 (talk) 00:32, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Please edit
Please edit Draft:Super Heavy (rocket). 64.121.103.144 (talk) 18:03, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
 * That's the wrong name to use, since it could be confused with the superheavy class of rocket, and it should be SpaceX Super Heavy/DRAFT:SpaceX Super Heavy instead -- 67.70.27.246 (talk) 00:36, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 11 March 2021
<div class="boilerplate" style="background-color: #efe; margin: 0; padding: 0 10px 0 10px; border: 1px dotted #aaa;">
 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: No Consensus User:Ceyockey ( talk to me ) 01:39, 18 April 2021 (UTC)

– I thought I'd open the discussion here, as it'd attract as many opinions as possible compared to if I placed it on the talk page of any of these articles. Anyways, it just seemed weird to me that we have different naming schemes going for the Northrop Grumman Cygnus missions and the Orbital Sciences / Orbital ATK Cygnus missions. The article titles for the Northrop Grumman Cygnus missions have a good naming scheme in which the mission name – "NG-10", "NG-11", "NG-12", ect. – is prefixed by the name of the spacecraft class being flown – "Cygnus" – in order to disambiguate the name from being a seemingly random assortment of two letters and two numbers (WP:DAB). We would get the same idea if we applied the same naming scheme to the Orbital Sciences / Orbital ATK Cygnus missions; we really don't need to further disambiguate with "CRS" in order to communicate that these are Cygnus spaceflight missions instead of something else called "Orb" or "OA" (WP:PRECISION), in my opinion. — Molly Brown (talk) 13:51, 11 March 2021 (UTC) —Relisting. BD2412  T 22:55, 7 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Cygnus CRS Orb-1 → Cygnus Orb-1
 * Cygnus CRS Orb-2 → Cygnus Orb-2
 * Cygnus CRS Orb-3 → Cygnus Orb-3
 * Cygnus CRS OA-4 → Cygnus OA-4
 * Cygnus CRS OA-5 → Cygnus OA-5
 * Cygnus CRS OA-6 → Cygnus OA-6
 * Cygnus CRS OA-7 → Cygnus OA-7
 * Cygnus CRS OA-8E → Cygnus OA-8E
 * Cygnus CRS OA-9E → Cygnus OA-9E
 * , I'm not opposed to the move, but I want to point out that it might be better just to create redirects to the pages. βӪᑸᙥӴ • Talk • Contribs 23:44, 12 March 2021 (UTC)
 * I feel that it would be a bandaid solution if the article titles themselves are not being changed to be more consistent with other articles on Cygnus missions and better comply with standards for precision and disambiguation in article titles. — Molly Brown (talk) 03:04, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
 * , OK I guess that makes sense. βӪᑸᙥӴ • Talk • Contribs 15:46, 13 March 2021 (UTC)


 * Comment: Wow, what a mess. Before I oppose let me make a comment and have my mind changed.  I think the CRS is important in the title. In the NASA Mission Overview files (see 4, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12) the official name of the first 9 CRS missions are Orbital ATK CRS-1 to Orbital ATK CRS-9. Then they switched to Northrop Grumman CRS-10 to Northrop Grumman CRS-17. CRS-X is the consistent naming scheme of all the Cygnus missions from 1 all the way through to 17. I do not find "Cygnus" in the mission title anywhere but here on Wikipedia. I would therefor propose title names of OA CRS-1 to OA CRS-9 and then NG CRS-10 to NG CRS-17.  This makes a nice standard beside the SpaceX CRS-1 series of flight articles. <b style="color:#256eff">JH</b><b style="color:#0044cc">elz</b><b style="color:#00297a">er</b>💬 13:53, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
 * OA CRS-1 and NG CRS-10 have the random letter combination issue again. Orbital ATK CRS-1 and Northrop Grumman CRS-10 would avoid this issue. Looking at the category, most flights are "spacecraft_type flight-number". The exceptions are SpaceX (company instead of vehicle) and the ATVs (individual names). --mfb (talk) 14:49, 13 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Do remember that the first three missions were operated by Orbital Sciences, and not Orbital ATK, and therefore it would be "Orbital Sciences CRS-3" and not "Orbital ATK CRS-3". The ISS National Lab refers to the first mission as simply "Orbital-1", and so does NASA themselves. This is what the "Orb" in the first three mission names refers to. — Molly Brown (talk) 04:13, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks Molly, for clarifying that. It didn't register for me until your reminder. I think we should also consider the titles of the upcoming Dream Chaser CRS missions. Will they be Dream Chaser-1 or Sierra Nevada CRS-1? I still think that CRS in the title is important to tie all the Commercial Resupply Service missions together and make them instantly recognizable. <b style="color:#256eff">JH</b><b style="color:#0044cc">elz</b><b style="color:#00297a">er</b>💬 05:04, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Ultimately, I want there to be consistency among the Cygnus mission names; the Dream Chaser, Dragon, and Dragon 2 mission names are a different ballpark with their own WP:COMMONNAME and WP:DAB needs. I ultimately see the "Orbital-x"/"Orb-x", "OA-x", and "NG-x" mission names to be the WP:COMMONNAMEs in the case of Cygnus; take for example, the OA-9E mission, which has been written as simply "OA-9E" by NASA, Orbital ATK, Space.com, SpaceNews, Spaceflight Now, NASA Spaceflight, and others. Using operator names instead to disambiguate them would also lead to very unusual names such as "Orbital Orb-3" or "Northrop Grumman NG-10". In my honest opinion, the spacecraft class name would be a more suitable disambiguator for consistency among Cygnus mission names, especially since the operator name changed three times. — Molly Brown (talk) 05:28, 14 March 2021 (UTC)

Rocket engine question
Do any of you who are rocket engine aficionados know of other rocket engines that are gas-gas cycle? Gas oxidizer + gas fuel?


 * not where liquid fuel or LOX is gasified in the powerhead; but where the supply of oxidizer and the supply of fuel is gas.
 * not cold-gas thrusters, like nitrogen gas thrusters

One I know of is the methox RCS thrusters and methox Moon landing thrusters SpaceX is developing.

Are there other examples? A lot of them? A few? N2e (talk) 01:26, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

NASA and SpaceX sub-projects
I suggest creating subprojects for the most important space companies and agencies, such as NASA and SpaceX. Discuss at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spaceflight/NASA/SpaceX subprojects. 64.121.103.144 (talk) 15:12, 19 April 2021 (UTC)


 * Support. We don't need a separate page to discuss this, we can just do it here. I would definitely support and join task forces/sub-projects about NASA and/or SpaceX, and I think creating these may be beneficial. Typically, if five or more user would join a task-force, then it is worth creating. N828335 (talk) 16:44, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Sister WikiProject
There is a new WikiProject Draft named Draft:Wikipedia:WikiProject SpaceX (company). Maybe, members from this WikiProject could help.


 * That link is unsigned. Did not (yet) look up who added that note to this Talk page.  However, since the link there does not work...


 * I'll add the link that an IP editor posted on my Talk page. A new WikiProject has been proposed, to create SpaceX-specific WikiProject.  Apparently, is being discussed here:  WikiProject Council/Proposals/SpaceX (company)  I hope a lot of WikiProjectSpaceflight members leave feedback.  N2e (talk) 23:26, 18 April 2021 (UTC)


 * The general consensus there is that SpaceX is too specific for it's own WikiProject, and a sub-project/task force would be much more beneficial. Please see discussion below. N828335 (talk) 16:46, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

Space Race modified infobox
(I have moved Halo FC's draft infobox back to Talk:Space Race. Please consider this an informal RfC; you are invited to participate there te establish a consensus as to whether Space Race needs an infobox, and if so, what information that should contain.

FYI, I have been working on getting this article nominated for Good Article, and hopefully Featured Article. I'd also welcome opinions about that. JustinTime55 (talk) 13:54, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

Shuttle-Centaur
I have nominated Shuttle-Centaur for FAC at Featured article candidates/Shuttle-Centaur/archive1, but given that my last FAC was archived for lack of reviewers, I though I would put out a call for reviewers. I found the subject fascinating enough to create an article on it, and I think it will do well on the front page if only we can get it through FAC. There's no need to review the whole article; just dropping by with some comments is enough. Hawkeye7  (discuss)  21:05, 29 April 2021 (UTC)


 * It's a great article. I'll be FACing it next week (work is consuming me through Sunday). Yes, please, everyone who can, give it a look. --Neopeius (talk) 22:45, 29 April 2021 (UTC)

Collection
I need help with making a collection of space-related WikiProjects and articles. I need help!StarshipSLS (talk) 17:32, 2 May 2021 (UTC)


 * A good start might be the assessment page of Wikiproject. That page has a table with article qualities and importances, clicking a number will link you to a list of all articles that match that cross-section. Most Wikiprojects maintain similar tables, so you can probably find similar lists on WikiProject Rocketry, WikiProject Astronomy, and any other useful projects you find in the directory--Cincotta1 (talk) 03:21, 3 May 2021 (UTC)

Draft
I am working on Draft:Habitation and Logistics Outpost (Gateway Module) for the Mir, ISS, and Gateway task force. I need help expanding it. Currently most of it is copied from Lunar Gateway. Please ping me when you reply. StarshipSLS (Talk), (My Contributions) 15:22, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Tianhe (space station module) move discussion
This is a notice that I've proposed to move Tianhe (space station module) to Tianhe Core Module. The relevant discussion can be found here. — Molly Brown (talk) 19:55, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Appeal from WikiProject Rocketry
Currently, only me and @JackReynoldsADogOwner are editing WikiProject Rocketry. We need more editors. Spaceflight and Rocketry are closely connected, so I thought people from this project might want to help. Please ping me when you reply. StarshipSLS (Talk), (My Contributions) 15:20, 7 May 2021 (UTC)
 * StarshipSLS (Talk), (My Contributions) 23:54, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Several people are working on articles that are in both Spaceflight and Rocketry (for instance, the FAC for Shuttle-Centaur). They just stopped coordinating through WP:Rocketry since WP:Spaceflight and WP:Military History are more active. You might find it more productive to, instead of soliciting people to work specifically at WP:Rocketry, identify articles you'd like to see improved and request assessment at those two projects as appropriate. Almost every WP:Rocketry article will fall under one of the other two WP (or both). :) --Neopeius (talk) 00:09, 13 May 2021 (UTC)
 * What I want is help with the project itself.StarshipSLS (Talk), (My Contributions) 00:14, 13 May 2021 (UTC)