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NASA Watch
Personal blog · nasawatch.compoliticsscience
NASA Watch is a personal blog at nasawatch.com about politics and science. Since 2008, 40 different Hacker News readers have linked it 45 times, most often “Nearby Star Has 7 Earth-Sized Worlds”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-30, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (16) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN commenters cite NASA Watch as a source for NASA news, budget and policy documents, and past coverage, such as the OMB memo and the Venus phosphine story.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 16 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
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Most-linked posts?
- Nearby Star Has 7 Earth-Sized Worlds3 people · 3 mentions · first linked 2017-02-21
- You Can Still Read NASA's Deleted "First Woman" Graphic Novels2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-03-27
- NASA Is Now Primarily an Intelligence and National Security Agency2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2025-08-30
- /archives/2020/09/phosphine-detec.html2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2020-09-14
What Hacker News says?
The problem with single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) is mainly weight. I think using composite tanks is enough to make a SSTO rocket. X-33 was supposed to use a composite tank, but the fuel tank failed during testing in 1999. Recently, NASA has succesfully tested a composite tank[1]. 1. http://nasawatch.com/archives/2013/07/composite-cryog.html
Comment linking /archives/2013/07/composite-cryog.html
on “Grasshopper 100m Lateral Divert Test”Submitted Hubble Space Telescope Is In Safe Mode After Gyro Failure as a story · 274 points
HN discussionHe does seem like a bit of a "character." But maybe he had a webscraper that just happened to catch the premature post, and is just trying to self-aggrandize on a real scoop? Nasawatch [0] is saying that several sources have confirmed it to them... [0]: http://nasawatch.com/archives/2020/09/phosphine-detec.html
Comment linking /archives/2020/09/phosphine-detec.html
on “Signs of Life discovered on Venus and atmosphere”Submitted You Can Still Read NASA's Deleted "First Woman" Graphic Novels as a story · 43 points
HN discussionUrl changed from http://astrobiology.com/2020/09/phosphine-detected-in-the-at... , which points to this. Edit: changed from http://nasawatch.com/archives/2020/09/phosphine-detec.html to what appears to be the canonical source.
Comment linking /archives/2020/09/phosphine-detec.html
on “Phosphine detected in the atmosphere of Venus – an indicator of possible life?”Submitted SpaceX is Building a Vertical Take of and Landing, Reusable Launch Vehicle as a story · 40 points
HN discussionA few random comments: There's a video of the Soyuz explosion mentioned above at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyFF4cpMVag&noredirect=1 that shows the escape system saving the crew. The use of solid rocket boosters for human space flight (as was planned for Ares I) is hugely controversial because they can't just be shut down in the event of a problem, as regular engines can, making survivability more difficult. Per…
Comment linking /
on “Is SpaceX changing the rocket equation?”Submitted SpaceX Launch Scrubbed – But No One Could See It Happen as a story · 36 points
HN discussionIn March, 2024 the US Department of Defense fiscal year 2025 budget request was $849.8 billion. The 2024 JWST budget was 0.022% of that. https://nasawatch.com/exploration/ernst-stuhlinger
Comment linking /exploration/ernst-stuhlinger
on “James Webb, Hubble space telescopes face reduction in operations”Submitted The NASA RIF has begun as a story · 18 points
HN discussionhttp://nasawatch.com/archives/2017/02/spitzer-discove.html
Comment linking /archives/2017/02/spitzer-discove.html
on “NASA to Host News Conference on Discovery Beyond Our Solar System”Submitted Internal NASA Memo on Diversity Erasure as a story · 10 points
HN discussion“Now before every flight I always send out an email company-wide saying, ‘If anyone can think of any possible reason to hold off on launching, they should call me immediately on my cell phone or send me an email, whether their manager agrees with it or not.’ But thats sort of something I’ve always sent before every flight, but the 20th time I send that email it just seems like… you know, ’There’s Elon being paranoid…
Comment linking /archives/2015/07/spacex-releases.html
on “SpaceX CRS-7 Failure Investigation Teleconference Thread”Submitted SpaceX Releases Preliminary Analysis – Strut Failure Likely Cause [With Audio] as a story · 9 points
HN discussionSource: https://nasawatch.com/education/you-can-still-read-nasas-del...
Comment linking /education/you-can-still-read-nasas-deleted-first-woman-graphic-novels/
on “NASA Deletes Comic Book About How Women Can Be Astronauts”Submitted Nearby Star Has 7 Earth-Sized Worlds as a story · 8 points
HN discussionLooks like NASAWatch has come to a similar conclusion based on various (and extensive) open sources: http://nasawatch.com/archives/2017/02/spitzer-discove.html Rather than signs of an oxygen atmosphere (which was rather anthropocentric of me) it now looks like they may have found evidence (ie. escaping hydrogen) of liquid water oceans on one or more of the planets. P.S. Ain't kremlinology fun?
Comment linking /archives/2017/02/spitzer-discove.html
on “Nasa to host major press conference on 'discovery beyond our solar system'”Submitted NASA Is Now Primarily an Intelligence and National Security Agency as a story · 7 points
HN discussionNASA Watch has a copy of the "resume work" order. https://nasawatch.com/transition/omb-memo-about-payment-free... The State Department has issued the following guidance https://www.state.gov/emergency-humanitarian-waiver-to-forei... However, someone in charge is interpreting programs like PEPFAR as not "life saving" so all data systems needed by medical personnel and researchers are still down. https://data.pepfar.g…
Comment linking /transition/omb-memo-about-payment-freeze-retracted/
on “White House rescinds federal aid freeze”Submitted Let's Destroy American Science as a story · 6 points
HN discussionSome context: http://nasawatch.com/archives/2010/04/is-a-human-spac.html (definitely worth reading the comments on that too)
Comment linking /archives/2010/04/is-a-human-spac.html
on “Neil Armstrong: Obama NASA plan 'devastating'”Submitted NASA Is Now Primarily an Intelligence / National Security Agency as a story · 6 points
HN discussionIt's a Delta 2, not the shuttle. Relevant "It's on the Internet so it must be true" discussion at: http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2008/08/todays_video_sh_1....
Comment linking /archives/2008/08/todays_video_sh_1.html
on “Guy Films Space Shuttle Launch from Passing Airliner”Submitted NASA Puts SpaceX HLS Contract on Hold as a story · 5 points
HN discussionFrom an internal e-mail ('someone'@smd.nasa.gov): "Today Alan Stern announced that he had resigned his position as AA. In his talk to the Science Mission Directorate he said that the management issues were about cost control and that he did not see a way for him to do what needs to be done. He didn't go into details. Evidently there are extremely strong opinions about all this. ... Staff reaction to the resignation…
Comment linking /
on “NASA’s Science Chief Resigns”Submitted NASA Is Removing Space Station Sighting Website Info as a story · 3 points
HN discussionOh, welcome back to the worm, and f * off to Dan Goldin who wasted taxpayer money in his obsession to get rid of it, and would get mad at people when he saw it: https://www.nytimes.com/1999/01/10/magazine/on-sunday-januar... http://nasawatch.com/archives/1999/12/
Comment linking /archives/1999/12/
on “NASA brings back worm logo”Submitted NASA center director attends reception with an Anybot as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI used to work in ISS mission control, this is not an emergency return but an early return Also coming down on the Soyuz is pretty routine and only takes a few hours- I’d say it was overall a far less risky situation than being in Antarctic on a deep ocean vessel with appendicitis etc We have dozens and (hundreds behind them) of men and women monitoring those folks from a global network of control centers 24 hrs a d…
Comment linking /iss-news/crew-medical-telecon-summary/
on “NASA announces unprecedented return of sick ISS astronaut and crew”Submitted Random Employee Searches to Resume at NASA HQ as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
