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Submission + - Musk says DOGE will upgrade Air Traffic Control soon (thehill.com) 1

Submitted by SonicSpike
SonicSpike writes: Tech billionaire Elon Musk on Wednesday said the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) will make “rapid safety upgrades” to the air traffic control systems with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

“With the support of President @realDonaldTrump, the @DOGE team will aim to make rapid safety upgrades to the air traffic control system,” Musk wrote Wednesday on the social platform X, which he owns.

“Just a few days ago, the FAA’s primary aircraft safety notification system failed for several hours!” he added, likely referring to an outage of the FAA’s Notice to Air Mission system over the weekend.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy told CNN over the weekend that the system allows pilots to download flight details ahead of a trip and is required for planes to fly.

Shortly before Musk’s post on Wednesday, Duffy posted on X that he spoke with the DOGE team, who will “plug in to help upgrade our aviation system.”

The Department of Transportation (DOT) did not immediately respond to The Hill’s request for more details on what these upgrades could look like.

When asked about the upgrades, a White House spokesperson doubled down on DOGE’s mission.

Submission + - Boeing, Lockheed Martin Consider Selling Space Launch Business (avweb.com)

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: As NASA brass debate the future of its crew capsule, Boeing is said to be trying to get out of the space launch business. Reuters is reporting that Boeing and Lockheed Martin, who jointly operate United Launch Alliance, are in talks to sell their rocket business to Sierra Space, a subsidiary of Sierra Nevada Corporation, an increasingly influential defense contractor that recently landed a $13 billion deal to build the federal government's new Survivable Airborne Operations System based on five used Boeing 747-8s.

The talks about the rocket business are in their early stages, and ULA has previously tried to unload it without success. The company competes with SpaceX to launch government payloads into orbit. Reuters said the company should bring in between $2 billion-$3 billion and could fit Sierra Nevada's plan to bring its Dream Chaser space plane to market and service the space station it's planning to build in partnership with Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin.

Comment I fear the educational monoculture (Score 1) 35

If everybody begins educating kids the exact same way, Erroneous ideas will propagate throughout the generation being educated. I worry about stifled creativity. There probably shouldn't be one standard way to educate everybody. Richard Feynmann spoke of the power of being able to approach problems using a different set of tools but if everybody gets the same training everyone will be using the same set of tools.

Comment Re: It'll get there technically, but not economica (Score 1) 218

Neither those batteries nor those panels last very long and the production and shipping of both is terrible for the environment. Proponents will quickly point at coal plants or gasoline powered cars and the relative difference. Last I checked destroying the planet still counts even if you destroy it somewhat less than something else.

Meanwhile, please tell us how much concrete a fusion reactor will use? (For our convenience, please express in Cubic Mile units).

Submission + - SPAM: Elon Musk's Starlink helping Ukraine to win the drone war

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: Drone teams in the field, sometimes in badly connected rural areas, are able to use Starlink to connect them to targeters and intelligence on their battlefield database. They can direct the drones to drop anti-tank munitions, sometimes flying up silently to Russian forces at night as they sleep in their vehicles.

PD-1 unmanned aerial vehicles, which have a wingspan of 10ft and are fitted with infrared sensors, are also used to collect information on Russian troop movements.

The Ukrainian drone unit uses a sophisticated system called "Delta" which has been built over recent years with help from Western advisers and can be accessed from basic laptops.

It includes “situational awareness” software which creates an interactive map, incorporating imagery from drones, satellites, sensors and human intelligence so the enemy can be tracked. Delta is said to be compatible with Nato systems, and to have been tested in the Sea Breeze military exercise in the Black Sea last year, which involved the US, Ukraine and 30 other nations.

Now the drone squads face increasing danger as the Russians try to track them, and they have to move frequently. Drones are proving so effective that the Pentagon feels supplying Ukraine with aircraft is not necessary. Instead, it is now sending more lethal Switchblades — so-called “kamikaze drones” — which were designed for US special forces, can be carried in a backpack and can destroy a tank.

As Ukraine's internet is inevitably degraded, Starlink will be an alternative. General James Dickinson, commander of US Space Command, told the Senate armed services committee: "What we’re seeing with Elon Musk and the Starlink capabilities is really showing us what a megaconstellation, or a proliferated architecture, can provide in terms of redundancy and capability."
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