The Register

Biting the hand that feeds IT — Enterprise Technology News and Analysis

SpaceX scrubs Starship launch with seconds to go

SpaceX called off the launch of its huge Starship rocket seconds before liftoff due to a ground equipment problem. The countdown clock reached a planned hold at T-40 seconds after a relatively trouble-free process. Some iffy weather had cleared, and everything looked good for the twelfth Starship test flight - the first try-out for the latest generation of the vehicle and launchpad. Alas, it was not to be. After repeatedly resetting the countdown clock to the T-40 second mark due to problems, which included warnings from sensors on the quick-disconnect arm on the launch pad and issues with the pad's water diverter, SpaceX eventually threw in the towel and scrubbed the launch. Boss man Elon Musk blamed the scrub on the ground equipment, and posted on X: "The hydraulic pin holding the tower arm in place did not retract." Musk wrote that if the issue could be fixed, SpaceX will try again later today. The next window opens at 5:30 pm CT, according to the billionaire. Considering that this was the first launch attempt from a new pad and the first of this vehicle's iteration, the countdown problems are unsurprising. As such, getting to the T-40 second mark was an achievement in its own right. Sadly, the team had only a few minutes to deal with the problems, since the propellant loading was complete and the fuel temperature could not be maintained for long. Expectations are high for this mission. Despite years of development and Musk's promises, Starship is still non-operational, and its launches remain on suborbital trajectories during its test phase. The vehicle has quite a way to go before it can play a part in NASA's goal of landing a crew on the Moon. According to the company's recent IPO filing, "We expect Starship to commence payload delivery to orbit in the second half of 2026." The second half of 2026 is only weeks away, so it'll be an interesting few months. The IPO filing also states that Musk's performance-based restricted shares in SpaceX vest upon the establishment of a permanent human colony on Mars "with at least one million inhabitants." First, however, the SpaceX needs to get to Mars. During the scrubbed launch attempt, it announced that crypto billionaire Chun Wang, who commanded the Fram2 private human spaceflight mission in 2025, would be on the crew for a future flyby of the red planet. Hopefully, Wang's jaunt to Mars won't end up canceled like the dearMoon project, a mission to the Moon financed by Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa. The project was unveiled in 2018, but was eventually canceled in 2024. Starship has yet to hit Earth orbit, let alone head to the Moon. ®

MetaFilter

The past 24 hours of MetaFilter

Labour Tribes Mapped

This resource from LabourList ("supportive of the Labour Party, but independent of it") categorises and groups Labour MPs by measures including majority size, second party, position on the prime minister's leadership, etc. One can also select an individual MP and see the measures for them.

VK: Voorpagina

Volkskrant.nl biedt het laatste nieuws, opinie en achtergronden

Kabinet wil goedkoop zomerabonnement voor NS, maar alleen buiten de spits

Er is in de sport altijd spektakel, emotie en opwinding. En zoniet, dan worden ze gemaakt

Wel.nl

Minder lezen, Meer weten.

Bijna 750 vermoedelijke ebolagevallen in Congo, meldt WHO

GENÈVE (ANP/RTR) - In de Democratische Republiek Congo (DRC) is het aantal vermoedelijke ebolabesmettingen opgelopen naar bijna 750 en ligt het aantal verdachte overlijdens op 177, meldt Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus van de Wereldgezondheidsorganisatie (WHO). Bij 82 personen is besmetting met ebola bevestigd. "Maar we weten dat de epidemie in de DRC veel groter is", aldus de topman op X.

De WHO stuurt extra personeel naar de provincie Ituri in Congo, het epicentrum van de ebola-uitbraak. Ghebreyesus noemt de situatie in het land "zeer zorgwekkend" en "geweld en onveiligheid" belemmeren volgens hem de bestrijding. Donderdag werden tenten voor ebolapatiënten in brand gestoken, omdat het lichaam van een vermoedelijk slachtoffer niet werd vrijgegeven. Nabestaanden geloofden niet dat hij aan ebola was overleden.

Naast Congo zijn er ook ebolagevallen in Oeganda vastgesteld. Volgens Ghebreyesus is de situatie in dat land stabiel, met twee bevestigde gevallen en een gerapporteerd sterfgeval.


Van Essen stelt nieuw plan voor mestbeleid halfjaar uit

DEN HAAG (ANP) - Landbouwminister Jaimi van Essen stelt zijn plan dat ervoor moet zorgen dat grond- en oppervlaktewater minder worden vervuild door mest met een halfjaar uit. De D66-bewindsman verschuift de deadline van 1 januari naar 1 juli 2027. Dat doet hij omdat hij de mestregels wil laten aansluiten op beleidsvoorstellen op het gebied van stikstof die hij over een paar weken bekend zal maken.

"Ik denk dat het heel verstandig is om te zorgen dat die dingen goed op elkaar afgestemd zijn", aldus de D66-bewindsman na afloop van de ministerraad.

Nederland moet door Europese afspraken elke vier jaar een plan maken met maatregelen om te voldoen aan de Nitraatrichtlijn. Het verwachte achtste actieprogramma was al een keer uitgesteld door het vorige kabinet-Schoof, omdat bewindslieden het onderling niet eens werden. Van Essen heeft in Brussel laten weten dat het plan nu weer is uitgesteld. Tot het nieuwe plan van kracht wordt, blijft het huidige actieprogramma van kracht.


Rijksoverheid.nl - Nieuwsberichten

Nieuwsberichten op Rijksoverheid.nl

Benoeming 3 leden Adviesraad Migratie

Monika Sie Dhian Ho, Marco Pastors en Viola Bex-Reimert worden lid van de Adviesraad Migratie. De ministerraad heeft hiermee ingestemd op voorstel van minister Van den Brink van Asiel en Migratie. De benoemingen gaan in per 1 september 2026.

Ayu fishing

peaceful-jp-scenery posted a photo:

Ayu fishing

Ayu Fishing
鮎釣り

On April 20th, the ayu fishing season opened in the Okitsu River system. The cosmos garden near my home is a popular spot, and many anglers were there. It seems they caught quite a few fish.

4/20 興津川水系は鮎釣りの解禁となりました。コスモス園の所は人気で、多くの釣り人が訪れていました。この写真の左側がコスモスとフジバカマを植えている所です。結構、釣れたようです。

Shimizu-ku, Shizuoka pref, Japan

poppy

peaceful-jp-scenery posted a photo:

poppy

Poppy
ポピー

This year, I'm expanded the area and created a cosmos field along the riverbank. It's poppy blooming in a corner of the field.

今年は拡大して河原にコスモス畑、作っています。
畑の片隅に咲いたポピーです。

Shimizu-ku, Shizuoka pref, Japan

The Guardian

Latest news, sport, business, comment, analysis and reviews from the Guardian, the world's leading liberal voice

The Mandalorian and Grogu shows Star Wars is a cursed franchise – on the big screen at least

As a standalone, the new adventure is perfectly fine matinee fodder – but the galaxy is now so congested that we seem doomed to shiny retreads of the same old story

When Disney bought Lucasfilm for roughly $4bn in 2012, it must have felt like an obvious piece of business: who wouldn’t throw wads of cash at a saga boasting an entire galaxy in a box? For a while, it seemed too good to be true. The Force Awakens made more than $2bn worldwide. Rogue One did more than $1bn. The Last Jedi conjured up more than $1.3bn, even while triggering a culture war so radioactive it could power the Death Star. Most of the fandom hated The Rise of Skywalker, but that most execrable of movies still earned Disney more than $1bn.

Then came Disney+, the perfect delivery system. No more waiting years between films: just hang around for a few months and something else would pop up on the conveyor belt. Andor, The Book of Boba Fett, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Ahsoka, The Mandalorian. Plot holes were filled, animated side characters got their magnum opus, and we all learned far more about the middle-management structure of galactic fascism than we had ever imagined possible. So why are we, almost 14 years on from that monumental shift in the Star Wars power structure, reading yet another slew of critical notices declaring that the saga has run its course? The Mandalorian and Grogu, at time of writing, has a rating of 61% on Rotten Tomatoes, pushing it just into the “fresh” category. The positives, broadly speaking, are that it is charming, brisk, visually polished and has Baby Yoda, a character precision-engineered for adorability. On the negative side, critics have complained the film feels thin, formulaic and weirdly televisual, less a grand restoration of Star Wars on the big screen than three Disney+ episodes.

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