Landing Pads for Rocket Vehicles

For vehicle designs that do not meet rough-field criteria (Ref. 1),  they should not be sent to the lunar surface,  until a hard-surfaced,  strong landing pad surface has been constructed.  The same applies to Mars,  most of its surface is similarly weak. 

Such involves a deep excavation,  back-filled with size-graded rock of decreasing sizes toward the surface,  with the rocks in direct touching contact,  and the void spaces in each layer filled with appropriate hard-packed fines,  to include sands and dusts.  The last layer of fill is gravel with sand and dust fines,  on top of which the final finished paved surface is laid.  This is shown in Figure 1: 

Figure 1 – How Roadbeds and Foundations Are Supported Upon Softer Ground

There is a load-spreading effect of the backfill-rock substrate,  which is how you spread a concentrated large force on the surface,  onto a much larger area at the bottom of the excavation.  This behavior reduces the applied bearing pressure at the surface,  to what the regolith or soil below the excavation,  can actually withstand. 

Estimates of the proper load spreading angle vary,  but the usual civil engineering practice assumes angles from about 30 degrees to as much as 45 degrees,  with the usual default being 34 degrees.  Angles as low as 26 degrees have been seen experimentally,  but are not common. 

For this rocket landing pad application,  the author recommends (in the absence of any real off-world experience) something like 30 degrees,  and an allowable soil bearing pressure that is around factor 2 below measured failure pressures.  That sets the required excavation depth for a given load force with a certain surface footprint,  as Figure 2 shows:

Figure 2 – Excavation Depth Depends Upon Pressure Reduction Ratio and Spread Angle

Bear in mind the virtually all the regolith on the moon resembles nothing so much as “sand-dune sand” here on Earth.  Fine dry loose sand here on Earth has a minimum allowable bearing pressure of about 1 US ton per square foot,  equal to about 0.10 MPa.  The max allowable value is only twice that,  and the safety factor below failure is also only about 2 (meaning the 0.1 MPa allowable fails at about 0.2 MPa,  and the 0.2 MPa allowable fails at about 0.4 MPa).  Most of Mars’s regolith is similar.  The rocks embedded in these regoliths generally do not touch,  and so offer no reinforcement,  unlike a properly-built roadbed.  

These heavy load-bearing pad foundation construction techniques described here,  were developed and used with great success by the Romans building roads,  and are still used today for Earthly road-building.  Unfortunately,  doing it "right" is quite expensive,  so today our roads are built with inadequate excavation and inadequate quantities and size-grading of the rock fill underneath the paved finish surface. 

So,  most roads today do not hold up nearly as well as the old Roman roads.  Big heavy trucks do the most damage,  by crushing the inadequate roadbed (and pavement) down where the wheels track,  one after the other,  thus "rutting" the road.  Rain fills these ruts,  presenting a loss-of-control danger to automobiles,  if the water depth exceeds the tread depth on the tires.  This kind of roadbed damage is illustrated in Figure 3,  and is not properly repaired by simply resurfacing the pavement:

Figure 3 – What a “Crush Rut” Looks Like

The photo was taken right near my driveway on the country highway that runs by my house and farm.  It has so very clearly never been properly repaired!  This highway is posted as “58,420 lb max gross weight” (about like a 10-wheel dump truck),  but I see 18-wheel big-rigs out here all the time,  and the big-rig grain trucks during harvests appear to far exceed the statewide 80,000 lb gross weight limit!  A rough guess puts them in the 100,000-120,000 lb range,  pretty close to the original factory gross weight limits for most of them.

This kind of back-filled excavation construction,  whether here on Earth,  or off-world on the moon or Mars,  is all "dirtwork" to well-known civil engineering standards,  except for the final pavement finish surface.  To land rockets,  that finish pavement must be both heat-resistant and blast-erosion resistant!  Concrete usually requires some repair after a rocket landing because of heat-induced spalling,  but concrete as we know it is simply unavailable on the moon (or Mars). 

Some sort of tough,  resistant “tiles” laid like close-fitted flagstones might work on the moon or Mars.  But they need to be thick,  and as heavy as possible,  in order not to get ripped away by jet blast shear forces!  It would help if there were projections from their bottoms that penetrated into the top gravel-and-fines layer of the bedding fill.  This is an approach option that needs development:  it is not experience-proven,   and therefore not yet ready to apply!

However,  laying such “tiles” directly upon the weak regolith will NOT work!  They will simply be crushed down into it by the large concentrated load forces,  and also tilted by those same forces acting off-center!  That kind of behavior is just unacceptable,  especially since a rocket that topples over is a rocket that fatally explodes!

References

(1 (1)    “Criteria for Rough-Field Landings” by GW Johnson,  posted 12-01-2025

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Search code                  01012026

Search keywords       space program, Mars

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On Recent Activities At Sea

The following article is what I submitted to the Waco "Tribune Herald" newspaper as a possible column,  21 December.  As of this posting they have not used it,  although that might change.  I reproduce it here word-for-word as submitted,  in the hopes of wider public exposure of the real issues needing resolution.  

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There are three things going on at sea ordered by the White House.  They are drug boat strikes,  seizing tankers,  and the buildup of invasion forces near Venezuela.  The first two are notorious in the press,  the third is not.  These require comment for the public to understand.

Under the laws of war as embodied in US law,  international law,  and the US Uniform Code of Military Justice,  armed forces are forbidden from deliberately targeting civilians!  That does not apply to collateral damage civilian deaths when attacking a proper military target.  To deliberately target and kill civilians themselves is a crime comparable to war crimes. 

Under those same laws,  to kill survivors in the water,  whether they are civilians or not,  is a war crime!  That first drug boat strike,  where a second missile killed two survivors in the water,  was therefore a war crime,  despite what Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said trying to justify it.  There is no doubt about that.

The question about the other boat strikes relates to how they are done:  destruction from a distance as if an enemy military vessel.  These boats were not stopped and boarded to find out “for sure” who and what is aboard.  To have the White House and other officials designate them as “narco-terrorists”,  and use that to “justify” making war upon them,  is simply not right.   

Words from a politician’s mouth do not reclassify criminal civilians as a hostile armed force!   Characteristics do,  as in the case of wars made after the 9-11 attacks.  Those terrorist forces had more than just guns as weapons,  and they had targets to capture or destroy.  The drug runners have none of those characteristics!  While criminal scum,  they are civilian!  There is simply no doubt about that.

The drug boat strikes as they are being done are therefore definitely the crime of deliberately targeting civilians by military forces.  There is no doubt about that! 

The Coast Guard stops and boards vessels.  That is the right way to do it!  If the speedboat is too fast for the Coast Guard cutter to intercept,  you could pair it with a US Navy frigate that has an armed helicopter.  The helicopter is fast enough to intercept the speedboat,  and being armed with a machine gun,  can target the boat motors to stop it.  If there are casualties from doing this,  having a real target avoids the commission of the crime of deliberately attacking civilians.

Doing it correctly this way creates a lot less chaos and controversy.   It does not rate nearly as much news coverage.  Now you know why they are continuing to do this the illegal way:  to get political faces in front of cameras as often as possible. 

Killing people for publicity.  How heinous is that?  How is that not a “high crime or misdemeanor”,  as the Constitution describes it?

There is another centuries-old aspect of the law of the sea that also applies here,  regarding flagged versus unflagged vessels.  A vessel not flying a flag of national identity (or flying a false flag) is presumed to be “pirate”.   The designation “pirate” would cover “criminal” today.  It can be stopped and boarded,  to determine the truth of “pirate” or not.  You can only try to sink it,  if it uses arms to resist. 

This applies to any unflagged vessel,  including your pleasure boats.  You have the right to be boarded,  not sunk on sight!

That law of the sea would also apply to the drug boats.  And my helicopter suggestion for stopping the fast ones stays within all aspects of our laws,  and that law of the sea.

The same law of the sea applies to the two tankers that have so far been seized by the US Navy and the US Coast Guard,  off Venezuela.   You’ll note that these were not fired upon from a distance,  they were boarded.  That’s because unarmed tankers are inherently civilian,  despite any personal guns the crew might possess. 

That’s doing it the right way!   And I think all the furor over the drug boat strikes,  plus the size of these ships,  is why they did it “right”. 

One tanker stopped willingly,  the other was boarded by an armed team dropped from a helicopter onto the moving ship.  At least one of them was flying a national flag.  Both were engaged in the illegal shipment of sanctioned oil. That is “criminal” (“pirate”) activity,  and so they were legitimate civilian targets to be stopped and dealt with.

The buildup of invasion forces near Venezuela is different.  According to the Constitution,  only Congress can declare war.  And Venezuela has not attacked us with its armed forces.  Our forces are in place,  trained,  and ready,  and President Trump so very clearly is not going to Congress for the authorization to start a war with another country!

President Trump may be doing the right thing trying to topple evil dictator Maduro in Venezuela,  but he is going about it the wrong way!  He is doing it wrong just like the drug boat strikes,  where the words he chooses do not actually justify what is being done!  How is that not another “high crime or misdemeanor”?

When you read about these things,  or see it on TV or the internet,  what you have to do is not listen to what the politicians are saying,  look only at what they are actually doing!  Only there lies the truth!  And you need that truth to decide what to do with those politicians!

Update 12-30-2025:  It would appear that Trump had the military strike some dock facility in Venezuela where the smuggling boats were supposedly loaded.  I do not yet know the real truths of this,  but it seems like we committed an act of war,  striking another country,  whose military had never struck us.  

Ordering such an unprovoked strike without going to Congress is against the Constitution,  certainly another "high crime or misdemeanor",  as the Constitution phrases it.  Calling civilian crime scum "terrorists" does not make them so,  nor does it make them into an "enemy army" that we can legally kill upon sight.  

Everyone in America should be rising up in protest over this!

 

Evaluating Trump’s Ukraine Actions

President Trump is touting his peacemaking efforts between Ukraine and Putin’s Russia.  Those efforts and the related actions bear a closer look,  and over a longer time interval.   They are NOT what they seem to be!  Here is why I say that:

First bear in mind that Russia became an enemy of the US and Europe again,  after Putin became its “president”,  in which position he was rapidly revealed to be a hostile dictator.  Ukraine became the de-facto proxy of the US and Europe (essentially NATO),  holding back part of Putin’s stated objective of re-conquering those parts of Europe that had been part of the Soviet Union,  and perhaps more.   Ukraine is one of those parts.  Some others are now NATO members,  risking open war if he tries.  This is therefore quite serious!

Ukraine’s role as NATO’s proxy began with Russia’s illegal annexation of the Crimea in 2014,  during the Obama administration.  The US and NATO did nothing militarily themselves to roll back the Russian takeover of the Crimea,  but did start supporting Ukraine’s efforts to prepare to defend itself against further Russian conquest.  That further conquest actually started with Russian troops,  illegally disguised as “not-Russian”,  operating as supposed Ukrainian separatists,  in the Donbas region.  This started shortly after the Crimea was annexed,  and continued until the more recent full-scale military invasion by Russia.

Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022,  during the Biden administration,  starting a war of conquest then only expected to last mere days.  The US and NATO did supply money and weapons by which Ukraine could resist,  but we did not actually intervene militarily.  Instead,  economic sanctions were applied to put pressure on Russia to stop,  which slowly damaged the Russian economy fairly-seriously. 

The Ukrainians have been resisting this invasion valiantly on their own ever since,  supported only by lots of money and weapons from the US and NATO.  That is the very definition of a NATO proxy against Putin’s ambitions in Europe!  And I remind you,  the US is part of NATO,  despite Trump’s evident and stated desires otherwise.

Then Donald Trump became the US President for his second term in January 2025,  and almost immediately reduced US monetary and weapons support for Ukraine to near-zero levels,  leaving only the much smaller amounts of support from the other NATO countries,  and not all of them.  At the same time,  he removed the US sanctions upon Russia,  thus greatly reducing the pressure on Russia to stop their war of aggression.  He thereby rewarded Putin’s efforts,  and punished Ukraine.  This even included publicly insulting Ukraine’s Zelenskyy in the White House,  to the total embarrassment of all who saw this. 

In the months since,  Ukraine has been running out of money and weapons with which to continue the fight,  forcing them to consider the possibility of having to surrender.  That means the end of their independence from much larger Russia. 

Trump got angry with Putin for a very brief interval,  but has since returned to his support for Putin’s Russia,  not our ally and proxy Ukraine.   The initial draft of his so-called “28-point peace plan” has since been revealed to be quite literally many of Putin’s demands,  just on White House letterhead!  THAT TRAVESTY is what the “peace negotiations” are trying to force upon Zelenskyy and Ukraine.  And Putin is greedy,  he wants even more.

Meanwhile Russia pounds Ukraine with near-daily lethal strikes,  deliberately targeting civilians (a war crime) and civilian infrastructure,  unimpeded in any way since the lifting of the sanctions!  The longer Trump can delay things while Putin pounds Ukraine,  the more likely Ukraine will run out of supplies and be forced to surrender.  Now you know the real plan behind Trump’s “peace proposal”!

What Trump is really trying to do is force Ukraine to surrender to end the war,  so that he can take political credit for “being a peacemaker”!  To do that,  Trump has betrayed our ally Ukraine!   And,  Trump has threatened in public to renege on the NATO treaty,  more than once,  which would weaken NATO enough for Putin to retake the countries he wants who are members of NATO.  Trump puts pressure on Ukraine,  and takes it off of Russia!  Yet Putin’s Russia is the so-very-evident enemy of NATO,  and the US!  Trump is literally and overtly providing aid and comfort to our enemy Putin’s Russia,  by trying to help them to win their war of aggression in our ally Ukraine!  There is no other reasonable interpretation of this!  

For Putin,  it is clear that retaining any (or all) of Ukraine’s territory is his “win”!  He has said so.  And Xi in China is just waiting to see Putin have some success against the US and NATO,  before invading Taiwan and annexing the South China Sea.  Which would likely start World War 3 in the Pacific!   And,  the longer the Ukraine debacle drags on,  the more aggressive Xi becomes!   We’ve all seen that happening,  in the news reports. 

Now you know the really-terrible threat to the entire world that Trump’s Ukraine “policy” actually poses,  beyond just the evil devastation heaped onto the people of Ukraine!

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I quote from the US Constitution (highlights are mine):

From Article III:

Section 3

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court. The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted. From Article II: Section 4 The President, Vice President and all Civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

 

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“Adhering to their enemies,  giving them aid and comfort” from Article III is EXACLY what Trump’s efforts to aid Russia,  and deplete our ally and proxy Ukraine,  actually do!   So,  Trump’s efforts there are treason!  There is no other reasonable interpretation!

The quote from Article II says “shall be removed from office upon impeachment for,  and conviction of,  treason … ”.   The use of the wording “shall be” leaves no other option for Congress but to act,  once the crime is apparent.  There is no other option for them under the Constitution! 

For members of the House and Senate not to act once Trump’s crime of treason is publicly apparent,  likely makes them complicit in that treason themselves,  and certainly puts them in defiance of the Constitution’s requirement that they act (which would also thereby certainly qualify as “high crimes or misdemeanors” on their parts).  

You have always had the power to remove them from office by simply voting for somebody else,  at every election up to now!   However that power only continues,  if there are any more honest elections from this point forward,  but that is another issue for another article.

Trump’s crime of treason is blatantly (and now publicly with this posting) apparent,  and his tendency to commit it has been evident since his first term as President!  This initially became apparent almost 8 years ago,  when during his first term,  Trump went to a meeting at Helsinki in July 2018,  and met with Putin,  among other world leaders!

There at that meeting,  on live TV,  he publicly sided with Putin,   and publicly said he disbelieved his own intelligence agencies,  regarding Russian interference in the 2016 election.  Some,  including myself,  thought that was treason back then. 

That Russian election interference has since been proven to have occurred,  despite Trump’s claims otherwise to this very day!   And he still sides with Putin at every opportunity,  as the current situation in the Ukraine war demonstrates! 

You have an evident traitor as your president,  and you elected him twice!  THAT is the power of misinformation given to the public,  without any legal requirements for telling the truth! 

Trump and Putin at Helsinki, July 2018

Unfortunately,  the Supreme Court has granted Trump immunity from prosecution for crimes committed while in office as the President.  That mistake on their part needs to be rectified quickly and retroactively!   But even if Trump cannot be prosecuted in federal court and actually punished for his treason,  at least he can be removed from office by Congress with impeachment and conviction,  so that he cannot commit such treason again so easily! 

I have now with this posting,  viewable by anyone,   publicly pointed out the crime of treason apparently committed by President Trump,  and I have justified this allegation with known facts and with relevant citations from the US Constitution in this very article! 

Millions witnessed these events live as they happened on TV,  so certainly there could be at least two who could testify before the House and Senate as to what they have witnessed.  That meets the Constitutional requirement of at least “two witnesses” in order to convict!

All you Senators and Representatives,  you are now obligated by the Constitution to act upon this publicly-apparent Trump treason,  lest you be in violation of the Constitution,  and also likely complicit in Trump’s crime of treason!  Why must you act?  Precisely because the allegation is public,  and well-supported,  too!

Final Remarks

All of this complicated treason issue is separate from the issue of Trump and his minions committing possible war crimes by destroying alleged drug-running boats,  and killing their occupants,  at sea ***.   And it is separate from the multi-faceted issue of a Trump dictatorship now already partly imposed upon the US.   And it is also separate from the issue of Trump and his minions illegally mistreating immigrants by detentions and attempted deportations,  all without due process,  and evidently racially motivated,  so far. 

Each of those is also an impeachable and convictable “high crime and misdemeanor”.  But those three issues are not covered here. 

The issue at hand here is only evident treason by President Donald Trump,  betraying our ally Ukraine,  by trying to force its surrender to our common enemy:  Putin’s Russia!

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*** See the article titled “About the Drug Boat Strikes”,  posted 7 December 2025,  search code 077122025,  search keyword “bad government”.  It covers the boat strike issue,  presenting strong cases for what is legal,  and what is illegal,  under the laws of war and the law of the sea. 

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This article:

Search code                  09122025

Search keywords         bad government,  treason

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About the Drug Boat Strikes

This is an article written and submitted as a guest column to the Waco “Tribune-Herald” newspaper 12-5-2025.  I am on the board of contributors for that newspaper.  We will see if they use it.  It is reproduced here,  word-for-word as submitted,  because I think this argument needs to be made as public as possible,   as soon as possible.

Update 12-10-2025:  The Waco "Trib" used a slightly-edited form of the as-submitted article on their op-ed page Tuesday,  12-9-2025.

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About the Drug Boat Strikes                           

I see a lot of emphasis in the news media and among members of Congress,  on the “second strike to kill survivors” incident,  and not very much emphasis on whether it is legal at all,  for our military to strike drug-smuggling boats in the first place!  I have to disagree strongly with that emphasis.  Here is why:

After the 9-11 attack,  then-President George W. Bush immediately made war upon the terrorist group and its armies that did that attack upon us (Al Qaida).  Congress enacted a war powers act that gave him continuing authorization to do so,  and he quickly expanded this to include the Taliban,  and later Iraq (although the reasons for going into Iraq have since proved false).  After that,  the enemy became ISIS.  There are many of these groups that still try to attack us today with the terrorist armies that they operate.  Many of them (but not all today) are proxy terrorist armies operated by Iran.

These were,  and are,  all terrorist organizations that operated their own armies.  These armies are assigned targets to attack,  with military style weapons (to include missiles and explosives,  beyond just guns),  just like the military armies operated by many countries.  Israel faces similar terrorist armies in the form of Hamas and Hezbollah,  and some others. 

All of this is long well-known!  The asymmetric warfare aspect of dealing with a terrorist army versus a proper national army,  does not diminish the truth that these really are armies,  operated by those terrorist organizations.  They have the characteristics of armies!

President Trump has used that same war powers act to start military operations against the drug running cartels in and around Venezuela,  and other places,  without any further authorization from Congress.  He and his administration merely made the public claim that these are “narco-terrorists” that we will wage war upon,  and he threatens to expand this war into the interior of Venezuela.   And maybe even places like Columbia and Mexico.

The label “narco-terrorists” merely means designating these drug running organizations as “terrorists”.  Not all terrorist groups operate armies!  One has to presume that the war powers act intended that all terrorist groups can have war waged upon them,  to justify the current military actions against drug runners.  But,  that is not what the war powers act was intended to authorize!  It authorized action against terrorist armies,  not all terrorists!

As his “justification”,  President Trump and his administration point to the large drug death tolls as the “attack” upon the US,  by these “narco-terrorists”.  Yes,  there are a lot of drug overdose deaths,  especially in the years since these evildoers starting making fentanyl.  There has always been a large death toll due to drug overdose,  be it heroin,  methamphetamine,  or any of the others.  And yes,  it is worse with fentanyl. 

But,  no,  these cartels and other drug-running organizations are essentially just civilian criminal organizations and enterprises,  like the Mafia and many others.  They are quite fundamentally civilian organizations!  Their operating groups might have guns with which they kill people,  but they lack the missiles and explosives.  They do not have specific targets to go and kill or destroy.  Their only purpose is to profit from selling illegal drugs!  They do not match the characteristics of a terrorist group-operated army!

Therefore,  they are not “hostile armies” in any sense of that word!  They are but a lethal civilian criminal threat!  Under US law,  under international law,  and under the US Uniform Code of Military Justice,  these are civilians!  And under those laws,  for our military to go and deliberately kill them on sight,  is the deliberate killing of civilians!  And under those same laws,  such deliberate killing of civilians is murder,  not a legal military operation!   The legal seriousness of such a crime ranks right up there with “war crimes”. 

The orders to go and do any of these boat strikes are therefore illegal orders!  They should never have been obeyed by anyone in our military!  We are all informed of that obligation not to obey illegal orders,  upon joining up,  and we have been,  since Vietnam.  I certainly was so instructed,  when I entered the Navy 56 years ago. 

Now you know why I so strongly disagree with the reporting emphasis that mostly ignores these more generalized considerations about the drug boat strikes!  And why I am so terribly disappointed by the admiral who carried these lethal strikes out. 

President Trump has been firing or otherwise “cashiering” all the high-ranking military officers who might oppose whatever he does,  which is why I am unsurprised about what that admiral did.  This weeding-out opposition among the officer class is beginning to have definite effect,  and in a way that is not just wrong,  but truly evil!

If I have in any way persuaded you,  then do please contact your federal representation about this.  I have been doing so repeatedly,  for some months now.  They are the ones who have to stop this.  That is why you “hired” them,  with your vote!

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End of article as submitted 

Boat about to be struck

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About the only thing that I might add,  concerns the application of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.   That code says,  among many other things,  that deliberately killing civilians is a crime,  and that the order to do so is illegal and should not be obeyed.   Military personnel actually have a legal obligation not to obey illegal orders!

This restriction and the corresponding justice were not done correctly,  regarding the My Lai massacre in Vietnam,  some 5+ decades ago.  Several service people were investigated,  and a few tried by court martial,  over this incident.  It was never very clear to the public exactly who ordered the massacre of the civilians,  when they entered the village and unexpectedly found no Viet Cong. 

Only one was convicted (William Calley),  and he was quite low on the totem pole from whence the order must have come.  And,  be aware that there were many such incidents during that war that never really made the news.  This one was publicized because a reporter was able to take pictures afterward of the slain civilians,  which included women,  children,  and very old people.  The culture of the military to comply with the prohibition on deliberately killing civilians was then,  and apparently still is today,  quite imperfect.

In the case of the boat strikes,  the illegal order to kill civilians came from very high up:  straight from the White House and his Secretary of Defense,  to that admiral and his staff.  It goes down the totem pole to the commanders at sea who actually sent the planes with the missiles.  This kind of murder so very clearly rates courts-martial for the service members,  and criminal prosecution for the civilians. 

Based on his remarks and behavior,  Donald Trump is apparently the one that told the military to do all these killings at sea.   At Nuremberg,  we preferred to go after the higher-ranking Nazis who actually gave the orders to commit the war crimes,  more so than the field troops who carried them out.   It is so very clear that it is Trump and his “top dogs” that should be brought to justice.  That definitely includes at least Pete Hegseth.

See how wrong it was for the Supreme Court to grant immunity to President Trump for any crimes he commits while in office as the President?   They were not anticipating murder.  That egregious error committed by the court majority,  prevents trying Trump for the 80+ murders he has so far ordered,  whether now,  or after he is out of office!   And that is just plain wrong!

I do hope somebody out there knows how to get this posted article in front of the Supreme Court.  They certainly need to correct their very egregious error!   And the Navy chain of command needs to see this,  too,  and they need to stop obeying these illegal orders from Trump and Hegseth.  That goes for the other branches,  too! 

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Search code                                 07122025

Search keywords                       bad government

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Update 12-9-2025:  Feedback indicates the persistence of the idea that drug addiction and the related overdose deaths qualifies as an attack upon America.  And that "justifies" classifying these drug running criminal scum as a "hostile army",  in turn "justifying" killing them on sight.  In response,  I would point out the comparison of the characteristics between a hostile army (terrorist or not),  and a criminal organization,  in the portion of the paragraph above that I have now highlighted in yellow.  These drug runners really are criminal scum,  but even so,  they are definitely civilian.  

The real problem is the near-70 mph speed of some of these smuggling speedboats.  The Coast Guard cutters (which are lightly armed) cannot overtake and catch them!  But,  solving that problem does NOT require a missile attack from a carrier aircraft,  which is inherently sudden death launched remotely.  If these really are civilian criminals,  then under my interpretation of the laws,  that deliberate missile attack upon civilians is the crime of murder!  Period!

The only "justification" for doing it this way,  is that it gives the White House something chaotic,  controversial,  and consequently newsworthy,  to point at and say "look what I am doing for you".  Murder for political gain is even more heinous than just murder.

The solution to the fast speedboat problem that also lies within the law,  is to pair a Navy frigate carrying an armed helicopter with the Coast Guard cutter.  When they do spot a fast speedboat that the cutter cannot catch,  launch the helicopter from the frigate,  which can easily catch that speedboat.  A burst or two of machine gun fire into the boat motors will stop the speed boat,  allowing the Coast Guard cutter to reach and board it.  

That approach has a definite target:  the boat motors.  Under the various laws of war,  collateral civilian deaths are legal when you have an actual target,  in this case the boat motors.  I do think it likely that there will be casualties (and survivors) from that machine gun fire,   but at least the pilots and gunners,  and those who gave the orders,  are in the clear legally.  The Coast Guard boarding party from the cutter can determine "for sure" who and what was aboard,  and make any arrests,  as appropriate.  Which is what they do anyway,  and quite properly and legally.  That generates less "political hay" for the White House,  but it accomplishes the mission within the law,  no matter what!

A final piece of information:  also under the various laws for the last several centuries,  an unflagged vessel at sea is presumed to be "pirate",  and anybody may stop them,  board them,  and find out if they really are pirate,  and if they are,  deal with them appropriately.  "Unflaggged" means exactly what it says:  a vessel not flying any national identity flag at all.  If you are out there in a yacht or other craft unflagged,  you can also be stopped,  but you have the right not to be destroyed,  sunk,  or killed,  without being boarded first.  The designation "pirate" would certainly cover criminal scum like the drug runners,  too.  My suggested approach with the paired cutter and frigate would stay well within that aspect of the laws,  too.  Rocket round strikes from a carrier jet would not. 

One final note:  while the majority of the strikes already conducted have proven to have killed or injured real drug runners,  there have been some survivors who were not drug runners at all!  Intelligence gathering and remote sensing are not perfect,  by any measure!  You simply have to go aboard the craft in question to be sure.  If you do not,  you run the credible risk of killing not just civilians,  but innocent civilians.  Another very heinous crime!

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Update 12-14-2025:  It occurs to me there is a third possibility to deal with,  under the old law of the sea regarding flagged versus unflagged vessels.  The vessel may be flying a false flag!  If so and it is armed,  that flying of a false flag more or less falls either in the pirate/criminal category,  or in the enemy vessel category.  If armed,  the vessel can resist being stopped and boarded.  If unarmed,  it cannot resist being stopped and boarded.  Either way,  you must attempt to stop it and board it,  to find out in fact who and what is aboard.  If they resist,  armed conflict is then appropriate.  Otherwise,  it is not appropriate at all.  

I also heard an interview with Machado,  the leader of Venezuelan resistance to dictator Maduro.  She asserts that Maduro really is deeply involved in narcotics smuggling and in the black market oil activities to avoid sanctions.  She says he deals with Russia,  Iran,  Hamas,  Hezbollah,  and others.  His is basically a criminal dictatorship,  and she further claims that he has killed hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans in his terror and oppression campaigns.  I would tend to believe her claims.

In that case,  seizing the tanker was actually the correct and legal thing for the US Navy to be doing!  It was either unflagged or flying a false flag,  the news story photography is not clear on that point.  But it was involved in criminal smuggling activity,  qualifying as "pirate".  And,  it was apparently known that its location transmitter was tampered-with to send a false signal of its location.  And,  very noteworthy,  the Navy boarded this ship,  from a helicopter,  while it was underway.  They did NOT sink it on sight!

While most of the speedboats may be identifiable from a distance as drug smugglers,  not all the boats moving around "out there" are drug smugglers.  There are lots of small boats out there,  all unflagged.  There is the distinct possibility of misidentifying one,  and we have already seen that happen with a fishing boat.  Even if real drugs and drug smugglers are aboard,  they are civilians,  regardless of their criminality,  as argued above.  And THOSE TWO THINGS TOGETHER are why the law of the sea must be followed with respect to drug smuggling speed boats:  you must stop and board to find the truth,  you DO NOT OPEN FIRE first!  

And I already suggested above exactly how to do that,  even when the speed boat can outrun the Coast Guard cutter.

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Criteria for Rough-Field Landings

The image in Figure 1 is some kind of artificially-generated image that I found on LinkedIn.  It shows what could happen with a SpaceX “Starship” variant trying to make a rough-field landing on the moon,  when not properly equipped to do so.  It digs in unevenly and topples over,  and a rocket falling over is a guaranteed fatal explosion! 

This sort of thing is a definite risk,  because the lunar regolith is a weak “soil”,  quite unable to support large loads concentrated upon small areas.  It actually rather-closely resembles Earthly sand-dune sand.  The rocks in it that do not touch each other,  cannot reinforce its strength.  (The same is true of most Martian regolith.)

Figure 1 – Concept Image of Vehicle Not Configured for Rough-Field Landings

The "how to design for rough field landing" image in Figure 2 shows what I estimated for a lunar "Starship" variant properly equipped for a rough-field landing on the moon.  A rough-field design for Mars would be similar,  but the numbers would be different,  and it would be very difficult to protect such externally-mounted legs during Mars atmospheric entry. 

Figure 2 – Options for Adding Rough-Field Capability to Lunar “Starship” Variants

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There are three critical design criteria a rough-field lander must meet: 

(1) The transient pressure underneath the pads (or other contact surfaces) during the touchdown event cannot be allowed to be any greater than the bearing strength of the lunar regolith,  which is rather similar to Earthly sand-dune sand.

(2) The minimum span across the polygon created by the landing leg outer contact points must exceed the height of the vehicle center of gravity above the surface. 

(3) The pads need to “tip toward the center”,  so that the lead pad cannot “dig in” if there is horizontal velocity at touchdown.

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These three critical design criteria were amply demonstrated to be appropriate,  by the Apollo LM lander,  and by the Surveyor probes before it.  There are too many today who ignore,  or never learned,  these well-established criteria.  It shows in the recent overturned commercial lunar landers.

There is an image of the "Blue Ghost lander" in Figure 3.  It is the Firefly Aerospace commercial lander design that was actually quite successful landing on the moon.  Note the squat low form relative to the landing leg pad span,  and the large size of the landing pads,  that do indeed “tip” toward the lander body in the center.  It meets the same criteria by which the Apollo LM and the Surveyor probes were designed.  So,  its success at a rough-field landing should not be much of a surprise.

 

Figure 3 – Image of the Firefly Aerospace “Blue Ghost” Lunar Lander

The take-home lesson here is simple:  if making rough-field landings upon the moon (or Mars),  the lander vehicle design must meet the three critical design criteria listed and highlighted above. 

Vehicle designs that do not meet these criteria should not be sent to the moon (or Mars) until a properly-constructed,  hard-surfaced,  and very strong landing pad has been built there to receive them!  How to build such landing pads in such hostile places is the topic for a future article. 

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Search code                  01122025

Search keywords         space program, Mars

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Dr. Suess on Trump

The illustration speaks for itself! 

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Search code                                 15112025

Search keywords                        bad government,  idiocy in politics

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Where Should the New Space Stations Be Located?

The International Space Station (ISS) is due to be retired and de-orbited sometime during 2030.  It replacements are very likely to be commercial stations.  The question arises:  in what orbit should these new space stations be located?

This is an important question,  because they will all be located in one or another low circular Earth orbit (LEO),  in order to stay out of the Van Allen Belt radiation (roughly about 900 miles = 1400 km up).  Plane changes in low circular Earth orbit are very costly to achieve,  in terms of rocket delta-velocity (dV) requirements. 

This is because the plane change dV requirement (direction only,  with no speed change) is dV = 2*V*sin(angle change/2).  At typical LEO speed (around 7.8 km/s),  a 10 degree plane change costs about dV = 1.36 km/s.  A 20 degree change costs 2.7 km/s.  A 30 degree plane change costs about 4.0 km/s.  It gets worse very quickly,  the bigger the plane change angle.

The “right” answer to this important question depends upon what you really intend to do with these new space stations.  If you want them to support human or robotic missions to the moon and planets,  the ISS orbit is just flat wrong,  and by a large amount! 

Such missions need to be flown from an orbit near the plane of the moon’s orbit,  or the planes of the orbits of the planets.  All the planes of the various planets’ orbits about the sun are rather close to the plane of the Earth’s orbit about the sun,  called the “ecliptic plane”.  This situation is illustrated in the figure.

All these possible destinations do not require large plane changes,  if mounted from Earth orbits inclined somewhere close to a band between the Earth’s equatorial plane and the ecliptic plane,  a band that also contains the orbit of the moon about the Earth. 

The plane of the ISS is at 55 degrees inclination to the Earth’s equator,  set there to enable easy access for the Russians from launch sites in Russia.  That’s a 60+ degree plane change to go elsewhere,  at least dV = 7.8 km/s!  Earth surface escape is only 11 km/s!

That high ISS inclination is just plain wrong for easy access to the moon or planets.  It always was.  An equatorial orbit about the Earth has the very lowest velocity requirements to reach from an equatorial launch site,  but all the orbits in the equatorial-to-ecliptic band are fairly easy to reach,  from pretty much any launch site in the US.

So,  if you really want these future space stations to actually successfully support future missions to the moon and planets,  manned or robotic,  you want them to be in this band of low-inclination orbits about the Earth.  Simple as that!

What might such mission support be?  Well,  perhaps assembly by docking together a lunar or interplanetary craft,  at a space station using remote manipulator arms,  from components sent up from Earth.  This is an approach well documented by the experience of building the ISS from the Space Shuttle with its arm,  and by the experience ever since of using the ISS arm to dock supply and crew vehicles.

These lunar or interplanetary craft could be fueled for their missions,  using propellants previously sent up by tanker vehicles from Earth,  and kept in tanks at the space station for such a purpose.  We would need a way to load and unload cryogenic propellants for this job,  since many such craft will need them.  So far,  only room temperature storable propellants have been transferred in weightlessness,  using expulsion bladders inside the tanks.  You cannot do that with cryogenics!  No materials have the necessary very large elongation capabilities,  at such low temperatures!

SpaceX wants to do this tanker vehicle transfer with cryogenic oxygen and methane in their “Starship” soon,  using ullage thrust.  That approach does alter the orbit,  something not tolerable when operating at a space station. 

But there might be an easy way to do that cryogenic transfer job,  without spinning huge vehicles,  or without applying any ullage thrust that alters their orbits.  See the article “Tank Design for Easy Cryogenic Transfers In Weightlessness”,  posted 26 July 2025 to this site (search code: 26072025,  search keyword:  space program).  As the article indicates,  this concept is undergoing the patent process.  A patent is pending.

You turn the system on,  wait several seconds,  then start the propellant transfer pump.  No ullage thrust gets applied,  and no vehicles or space station are spun up.  There are no unwanted forces at the tank mountings,  applied to anything!

The notion of elliptic departure and capture was explored in the posting “Elliptic Capture”,  dated 1 October 2024 this site.  The notion of space tug assist was first explored in the article “Tug-Assisted Arrivals and Departures”,  dated 1 December 2024 this site.  The search codes for those articles are 01102024 and 01122024,  respectively.  Both share the search keyword “space program”.

This selection of proper space station orbits,  an effective cryogenic propellant transfer tank,  the notion of elliptic orbit departure and arrival,  and a reusable space tug stage,  together make possible a space program of cost effectiveness that dwarfs anything ever seen before!  And THOSE FOUR THINGS are what really needs to happen!

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Search code DDMMYYYY                     11112025

Search keyword                                         space program

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