United States:

SpaceX postponed once more its attempt at launching a daring orbital expedition featuring an all-civilian crew that is aiming to carry out the first-ever spacewalk by private citizens.

The Polaris Dawn mission, organized by billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, had been set to lift off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida during a four-hour window early Wednesday.

But SpaceX announced late Tuesday it was pushing back the launch plans “due to unfavorable weather forecasted in Dragon’s splashdown areas off the coast of Florida,” in a message on X.

Isaacman later added on X that, because the spaceship won’t rendezvous with the International Space Station and has limited consumables on board, it was particularly constrained by the forecast during the splashdown window.

“As of now, conditions are not favorable tonight or tomorrow, so we’ll assess day by day,” he said.

The timing of the next launch could be further complicated by the fact the first stage booster of another SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that had sent a batch of Starlink satellites into orbit tipped over and exploded during a landing attempt on a waiting droneship.

Although landing the booster is a secondary consideration, the reusability of the entire rocket system is core to SpaceX’s business model, and the loss snapped a three-year-streak of successful first stage landings.

SpaceX announced it was standing down from launching the next set of Starlink satellites while it reviewed the data.

An earlier attempt to launch Polaris Dawn on Tuesday was scrapped due to a helium leak on a line connecting the tower to the rocket.

High radiation zone

Riding atop a Falcon 9 rocket, the SpaceX Dragon capsule is set to reach a peak altitude of 870 miles (1,400 kilometers) — higher than any crewed mission in more than half a century, since the Apollo era.

Mission commander Isaacman will guide his four-member team through the mission’s centerpiece: the first-ever spacewalk carried out by non-professional astronauts, equipped with sleek, newly developed SpaceX extravehicular activity (EVA) suits.

Rounding out the team are mission pilot Scott Poteet, a retired US Air Force lieutenant colonel; mission specialist Sarah Gillis, a lead space operations engineer at SpaceX; and mission specialist and medical officer Anna Menon, also a lead space operations engineer at SpaceX.

The quartet underwent more than two years of training in preparation for the landmark mission, logging hundreds of hours on simulators as well as skydiving, centrifuge training, scuba diving, and summiting an Ecuadorian volcano.

Polaris Dawn is set to be the first of three missions under the Polaris program, a collaboration between Isaacman, the founder of tech company Shift4 Payments, and SpaceX.

Isaacman declined to reveal his total investment in the project, though reports suggest he paid around $200 million for the SpaceX Inspiration4 mission in September 2021, the first all-civilian orbital mission.

Polaris Dawn will reach its highest altitude on its first day, venturing briefly into the Van Allen radiation belt, a region teeming with high-energy charged particles that can pose health risks to humans over extended periods.

On day three, the crew will don their state-of-the-art EVA spacesuits — outfitted with heads-up displays, helmet cameras, and advanced joint mobility systems — and take turns to venture outside their spacecraft in twos.

Each will spend 15 to 20 minutes in space, 435 miles above Earth’s surface.

Also on their to-do list are testing laser-based satellite communication between the spacecraft and Starlink, SpaceX’s more than 6,000-strong constellation of internet satellites, in a bid to boost space communication speeds, and conducting nearly 40 scientific experiments.

After six days in space, the mission will conclude with the splashdown off the coast of Florida.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

In this photo provided by NASA, astronauts Butch Wilmore, left, and Suni Williams inspect safety hardware aboard the International Space Station on August 9, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

NASA decided on Saturday (August 24, 2024) it’s too risky to bring two astronauts back to Earth in Boeing’s troubled new capsule, and they’ll have to wait until next year for a ride home with SpaceX. What should have been a weeklong test flight for the pair will now last more than eight months.

The seasoned pilots have been stuck at the International Space Station since the beginning of June. A cascade of vexing thruster failures and helium leaks in the new capsule marred their trip to the space station, and they ended up in a holding pattern as engineers conducted tests and debated what to do about the trip back.

After almost three months, the decision finally came down from NASA’s highest ranks on Saturday (August 24, 2024). Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams will come back in a SpaceX spacecraft in February. Their empty Starliner capsule will undock in early September and attempt to return on autopilot.

As Starliner’s test pilots, the pair should have overseen this critical last leg of the journey, with touchdown in the U.S. desert.

“A test flight by nature is neither safe nor routine,” said NASA Administration Bill Nelson. “And so the decision… is a commitment to safety.”

“This has not been an easy decision, but it is absolutely the right one,” added NASA Associate Administrator Jim Free.

It was a blow to Boeing, adding to the safety concerns plaguing the company on its airplane side. Boeing had counted on Starliner’s first crew trip to revive the troubled program after years of delays and ballooning costs. The company had insisted Starliner was safe based on all the recent thruster tests both in space and on the ground.

Boeing did not participate in Saturday’s news conference by NASA but released a statement: “Boeing continues to focus, first and foremost, on the safety of the crew and spacecraft. We are executing the mission as determined by NASA, and we are preparing the spacecraft for a safe and successful uncrewed return.”

Retired Navy captains with previous long-duration spaceflight experience, Wilmore, 61, and Williams, 58, anticipated surprises when they accepted the shakedown cruise of a new spacecraft, although not quite to this extent.

Before their June 5 launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, they said their families bought into the uncertainty and stress of their professional careers decades ago. During their lone orbital news conference last month, they said they had trust in the thruster testing being conducted. They had no complaints, they added, and enjoyed pitching in with space station work.

Wilmore’s wife, Deanna, was equally stoic in an interview earlier this month with WVLT-TV in Knoxville, Tennessee, their home state. She was already bracing for a delay until next February: “You just sort of have to roll with it.”

There were few options.

The SpaceX capsule currently parked at the space station is reserved for the four residents who have been there since March. They will return in late September, their stay extended a month by the Starliner dilemma. NASA said it would be unsafe to squeeze two more into the capsule, except in an emergency.

The docked Russian Soyuz capsule is even tighter, capable of flying only three — two of them Russians wrapping up a yearlong stint.

So Wilmore and Williams will wait for SpaceX’s next taxi flight. It’s due to launch in late September with two astronauts instead of the usual four for a routine six-month stay. NASA yanked two to make room for Wilmore and Williams on the return flight in late February.

NASA said no serious consideration was given to asking SpaceX for a quick stand-alone rescue. Last year, the Russian Space Agency had to rush up a replacement Soyuz capsule for three men whose original craft was damaged by space junk. The switch pushed their mission beyond a year, a U.S. space endurance record still held by Frank Rubio.

Starliner’s woes began long before its latest flight.

Bad software fouled the first test flight without a crew in 2019, prompting a do-over in 2022. Then parachute and other issues cropped up, including a helium leak in the capsule’s propellant system that nixed a launch attempt in May. The leak eventually was deemed to be isolated and small enough to pose no concern. But more leaks sprouted following liftoff, and five thrusters also failed.

All but one of those small thrusters restarted in flight. But engineers remain perplexed as to why some thruster seals appear to swell, obstructing the propellant lines, then revert to their normal size.

These 28 thrusters are vital. Besides needed for space station rendezvous, they keep the capsule pointed in the right direction at flight’s end as bigger engines steer the craft out of orbit. Coming in crooked could result in catastrophe.

With the Columbia disaster still fresh in many minds — the shuttle broke apart during reentry in 2003, killing all seven aboard — NASA embraced open debate over Starliner’s return capability. Dissenting views were stifled during Columbia’s doomed flight, just as they were during Challenger’s in 1986.

Despite Saturday’s decision, NASA isn’t giving up on Boeing.

NASA went into its commercial crew program a decade ago wanting two competing U.S. companies ferrying astronauts in the post-shuttle era. Boeing won the bigger contract: more than $4 billion, compared with SpaceX’s $2.6 billion.

With station supply runs already under its belt, SpaceX aced its first of now nine astronaut flights in 2020, while Boeing got bogged down in design flaws that set the company back more than $1 billion. NASA officials still hold out hope that Starliner’s problems can be corrected in time for another crew flight in another year or so.

NASA today picked Elon Musk’s SpaceX to bring back Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore from space next year. Eighty days ago, the two astronauts arrived at the International Space Station aboard Boeing’s Starliner for an 8-day mission. They were forced to extend their stay because of major technical issues with the Boeing capsule.

The astronauts are expected to return in February next year, after spending a total of eight months in orbit, on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft due to launch next month as part of a routine astronaut rotation mission.

NASA chief Bill Nelson said Starliner’s propulsion system is too risky to carry its first crew home. Starliner will undock from the ISS without a crew and attempt to return to Earth as it would have with astronauts aboard.

The space agency’s decision to pick Boeing’s top space rival marked a fresh setback to the Starliner test mission. Boeing had hoped the mission would redeem the troubled program after years of development problems and over $1.6 billion in budget overruns since 2016.

Nelson said he discussed the agency’s decision with Boeing’s new CEO Kelly Ortberg.

The SpaceX Crew-9 mission will take off in late September, but carrying only two passengers instead of the originally planned four.

It will remain moored to the ISS until its scheduled return in February, bringing back its own crew members plus their two stranded colleagues.

The veteran NASA astronauts, both former military test pilots, became the first crew to ride Starliner on June 5 when they were launched to the ISS.

Starliner’s propulsion system suffered multiple glitches beginning in the first 24 hours of its flight to the ISS, triggering months of cascading delays. Five of its 28 thrusters failed and it sprang several leaks of helium, which is used to pressurise the thrusters.

Since Starliner docked to the ISS in June, Boeing has scrambled to investigate what caused its thruster mishaps and helium leaks. The company arranged tests and simulations on Earth to gather data that it has used to try and convince NASA officials that Starliner is safe to fly the crew back home.

But results from that testing raised more difficult engineering questions and ultimately failed to quell NASA officials’ concerns about Starliner’s ability to make its crewed return trip – the most daunting and complex part of the test mission.

Anna Menon, Scott Poteet, commander Jared Isaacman and Sarah Gillis, crew members of Polaris Dawn, a private human spaceflight mission, attend a press conference at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, U.S. August 19, 2024
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Four members of a SpaceX mission that will carry out the first ever private spacewalk arrived in Florida on Monday (August 19, 2024) ahead of their takeoff next week.

The five-day expedition, named Polaris Dawn, will be led by US billionaire Jared Isaacman, who already chartered the first all-civilian orbital spaceflight in 2021, called Inspiration4.

“It’s been two and a half years since we announced the Polaris program. It’s been a really exciting journey of development and training,” Mr. Isaacman told a press conference Monday (August 19, 2024).

He did not reveal how much he has spent on the program, which includes a total of three missions and which he jointly funds with SpaceX. For the trip, the company has developed its first generation of space suits, which are white and futuristic.

“This will be epic,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on X, which he also owns.

The launch of the Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to take place before dawn next Monday (August 26, 2024) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Two SpaceX employees will be on the trip: The first, Sarah Gillis, is in charge of astronaut training and trained Mr. Isaacman for Inspiration4. The second, Anna Menon, worked for NASA before joining SpaceX.

“I’ve spent years trying to put myself in the seat of astronauts in space, and I am really looking forward to learning firsthand what that experience is actually like,” she said.

The fourth passenger is pilot Scott Poteet, a close friend of Mr. Isaacman.

Challenging training

The quartet has undergone intensive training: some 2,000 hours in a simulator, centrifuge sessions, scuba diving, skydiving and climbing the Cotopaxi volcano in Ecuador.

“I can tell you without a doubt, this has been some of the most challenging training that I’ve ever experienced,” said Poteet, who flew fighter jets for 20 years in the US Air Force.

The mission has three main objectives, in addition to the 40 or so experiments that will be conducted on board. The first is to reach an altitude of 1,400 kilometers (870 miles), the furthest distance for a space crew since the Apollo lunar missions.

Since those missions included only men, Ms. Gillis and Ms. Menon will become the two women to have traveled the farthest from Earth.

By comparison, the International Space Station is located at an altitude of about 400 kilometers. The distance between the Earth and Moon is 380,000 kilometers.

A second objective for the mission is to conduct a laser communication test between the ship and SpaceX’s Starlink satellites. But above all, once in a lower orbit, the astronauts will carry out the first commercial spacewalk, to be broadcast live on the mission’s third day.

Since the Dragon capsule has no airlock, the whole spacecraft will be exposed to the vacuum of space when the hatch is opened. Two passengers will remain on board while the two others venture outside, with each pair having a turn spacewalking.

They will perform movements to test their new space suits, including what Mr. Isaacman called a “hands-free demonstration,” all while still being linked to the capsule.

So much to ‘explore’

The space suits are based on those already used by SpaceX, but have been developed to withstand extreme temperatures and are equipped with cameras.

“Someday, someone could be wearing a version” of the suit as they are “walking on Mars,” Mr. Isaacman said, adding that it “feels like a huge honor to have that opportunity to test it out on this flight.”

A second similar Polaris mission is planned after this trip, and then a planned third trip will be the first crewed flight on SpaceX’s massive Starship rocket, currently under development and ultimately intended for trips to the Moon and Mars.

Mr. Isaacman praised the private sector’s role in helping “unlock this last frontier.”

“I’d certainly like my kids to see humans walking on the Moon and Mars and venturing out and exploring our solar system,” he said. “We haven’t even scratched the surface yet,” he said, adding: “There’s so much to go out and explore and discover along the way.

Anna Menon, Scott Poteet, commander Jared Isaacman and Sarah Gillis, crew members of Polaris Dawn, a private human spaceflight mission, attend a press conference at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, U.S. August 19, 2024
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Four members of a SpaceX mission that will carry out the first ever private spacewalk arrived in Florida on Monday (August 19, 2024) ahead of their takeoff next week.

The five-day expedition, named Polaris Dawn, will be led by US billionaire Jared Isaacman, who already chartered the first all-civilian orbital spaceflight in 2021, called Inspiration4.

“It’s been two and a half years since we announced the Polaris program. It’s been a really exciting journey of development and training,” Mr. Isaacman told a press conference Monday (August 19, 2024).

He did not reveal how much he has spent on the program, which includes a total of three missions and which he jointly funds with SpaceX. For the trip, the company has developed its first generation of space suits, which are white and futuristic.

“This will be epic,” SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on X, which he also owns.

The launch of the Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to take place before dawn next Monday (August 26, 2024) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Two SpaceX employees will be on the trip: The first, Sarah Gillis, is in charge of astronaut training and trained Mr. Isaacman for Inspiration4. The second, Anna Menon, worked for NASA before joining SpaceX.

“I’ve spent years trying to put myself in the seat of astronauts in space, and I am really looking forward to learning firsthand what that experience is actually like,” she said.

The fourth passenger is pilot Scott Poteet, a close friend of Mr. Isaacman.

Challenging training

The quartet has undergone intensive training: some 2,000 hours in a simulator, centrifuge sessions, scuba diving, skydiving and climbing the Cotopaxi volcano in Ecuador.

“I can tell you without a doubt, this has been some of the most challenging training that I’ve ever experienced,” said Poteet, who flew fighter jets for 20 years in the US Air Force.

The mission has three main objectives, in addition to the 40 or so experiments that will be conducted on board. The first is to reach an altitude of 1,400 kilometers (870 miles), the furthest distance for a space crew since the Apollo lunar missions.

Since those missions included only men, Ms. Gillis and Ms. Menon will become the two women to have traveled the farthest from Earth.

By comparison, the International Space Station is located at an altitude of about 400 kilometers. The distance between the Earth and Moon is 380,000 kilometers.

A second objective for the mission is to conduct a laser communication test between the ship and SpaceX’s Starlink satellites. But above all, once in a lower orbit, the astronauts will carry out the first commercial spacewalk, to be broadcast live on the mission’s third day.

Since the Dragon capsule has no airlock, the whole spacecraft will be exposed to the vacuum of space when the hatch is opened. Two passengers will remain on board while the two others venture outside, with each pair having a turn spacewalking.

They will perform movements to test their new space suits, including what Mr. Isaacman called a “hands-free demonstration,” all while still being linked to the capsule.

So much to ‘explore’

The space suits are based on those already used by SpaceX, but have been developed to withstand extreme temperatures and are equipped with cameras.

“Someday, someone could be wearing a version” of the suit as they are “walking on Mars,” Mr. Isaacman said, adding that it “feels like a huge honor to have that opportunity to test it out on this flight.”

A second similar Polaris mission is planned after this trip, and then a planned third trip will be the first crewed flight on SpaceX’s massive Starship rocket, currently under development and ultimately intended for trips to the Moon and Mars.

Mr. Isaacman praised the private sector’s role in helping “unlock this last frontier.”

“I’d certainly like my kids to see humans walking on the Moon and Mars and venturing out and exploring our solar system,” he said. “We haven’t even scratched the surface yet,” he said, adding: “There’s so much to go out and explore and discover along the way.

Starlink is not yet authorised to provide its services in India. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Customer terminals for the satellite internet service Starlink, served by Elon Musk-owned SpaceX, are being listed for sale on a prominent Indian business-to-business retail platform, in a potential security risk. Starlink, which allows its customers to browse the internet by connecting to a series of low earth orbit satellites, is not yet authorised to provide its services in India. 

The listings, by multiple sellers, were found on the platform IndiaMART, which is a popular platform for large sellers selling to businesses. It is unclear whether these terminals were genuine, and how the sellers would allow customers to pay Starlink’s monthly fees from India — prices for the equipment ranged from ₹15,000 to ₹97,000 in a sample of listings. A spokesperson for SpaceX did not respond to a query by The Hindu, nor did the Department of Telecommunications. Listed sellers did not return calls from The Hindu when reached through an IndiaMART facilitated call-forwarding facility. 

Some listings were removed from IndiaMART shortly after The Hindu reached out to the firm for comments, but others remain still. “The content integrated and made available by the advertiser/supplier is on its own through a self-edit tool available on the Website without any intervention of Indiamart,” a company spokesperson said in an emailed response.

“In case of any breach of terms and conditions by sellers, we will not hesitate to take action and disable the impugned listing from our website, if brought to our notice through a court order or notified agency.”

India has among the most stringent prohibitions in the world against unapproved telecommunications, a result of terrorist threats and a hostile neighborhood. Travellers are routinely warned to not bring satellite phones into India without written approval from the Department of Telecommunications.

Officials have long worried of the possibilities of unmonitored internet communications by terrorists or infiltrators in border areas, leading to blanket restrictions that have sometimes ensnared others in national security investigations.

For instance, in 2022, Fergus MacLeod, a senior executive at Saudi Aramco, was arrested and briefly held in jail for switching on a satellite phone he brought to India in Chamoli, Uttarakhand while on holiday.

Late last year, a fisherman from Kozhikode district was questioned for operating a satellite phone that he said was given to him by a friend in Oman for emergencies when in Oman. Phone calls he made to numbers in India were flagged, and Mangaluru police called him for questioning. 

What’s more, India remains one of the few countries in the world with restrictions even on WiFi hotspots, requiring every hotspot operator to validate a phone number for each device connecting to the internet. Foreign travellers often need a physical coupon issued to them at the airport to access hotspots there. 

One of the main reasons that Starlink and OneWeb, its main competitor, have not yet been issued authorisations, is security clearances from the Ministry of Home Affairs. Authorities have sought assurances that all satellite internet traffic can be intercepted through equipment physically located in India, and that terminals brought in from abroad are restricted from functioning in Indian territory.

The Ministry of Home Affairs did not respond to The Hindu’s queries on whether Starlink has provided such assurances to the government’s satisfaction. 

Satellite internet in India is typically only offered for business use, or as so-called backhaul in places such as the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep, which have only recently been connected through an undersea cable network to the Indian mainland.

Firms such as Starlink promise increased bandwidth for remote users, as they have a large number of satellites in medium-to-low earth orbit, offering connectivity in remote areas without the humongous costs of building hundreds of kilometres of cable connectivity to enable this. 

The Starlink listings, by multiple sellers, were found on the platform IndiaMART, which is a popular platform for large sellers selling to businesses. Photo: dir.indiamart.com

Customer terminals for the satellite internet service Starlink, served by Elon Musk-owned SpaceX, are being listed for sale on a prominent Indian business-to-business retail platform, in a potential security risk. Starlink, which allows its customers to browse the internet by connecting to a series of low earth orbit satellites, is not yet authorised to provide its services in India. 

The listings, by multiple sellers, were found on the platform IndiaMART, which is a popular platform for large sellers selling to businesses. It is unclear whether these terminals were genuine, and how the sellers would allow customers to pay Starlink’s monthly fees from India — prices for the equipment ranged from ₹15,000 to ₹97,000 in a sample of listings. A spokesperson for SpaceX did not respond to a query by The Hindu, nor did the Department of Telecommunications. Listed sellers did not return calls from The Hindu when reached through an IndiaMART facilitated call-forwarding facility. 

Some listings were removed from IndiaMART shortly after The Hindu reached out to the firm for comments, but others remain still. “The content integrated and made available by the advertiser/supplier is on its own through a self-edit tool available on the Website without any intervention of Indiamart,” a company spokesperson said in an emailed response.

“In case of any breach of terms and conditions by sellers, we will not hesitate to take action and disable the impugned listing from our website, if brought to our notice through a court order or notified agency.”

India has among the most stringent prohibitions in the world against unapproved telecommunications, a result of terrorist threats and a hostile neighborhood. Travellers are routinely warned to not bring satellite phones into India without written approval from the Department of Telecommunications.

Officials have long worried of the possibilities of unmonitored internet communications by terrorists or infiltrators in border areas, leading to blanket restrictions that have sometimes ensnared others in national security investigations.

For instance, in 2022, Fergus MacLeod, a senior executive at Saudi Aramco, was arrested and briefly held in jail for switching on a satellite phone he brought to India in Chamoli, Uttarakhand while on holiday.

Late last year, a fisherman from Kozhikode district was questioned for operating a satellite phone that he said was given to him by a friend in Oman for emergencies when at sea. Phone calls he made to numbers in India were flagged, and Mangaluru police called him for questioning. 

What’s more, India remains one of the few countries in the world with restrictions even on WiFi hotspots, requiring every hotspot operator to validate a phone number for each device connecting to the internet. Foreign travellers often need a physical coupon issued to them at the airport to access hotspots there. 

One of the main reasons that Starlink and OneWeb, its main competitor, have not yet been issued authorisations, is security clearances from the Ministry of Home Affairs. Authorities have sought assurances that all satellite internet traffic can be intercepted through equipment physically located in India, and that terminals brought in from abroad are restricted from functioning in Indian territory.

The Ministry of Home Affairs did not respond to The Hindu’s queries on whether Starlink has provided such assurances to the government’s satisfaction. 

Satellite internet in India is typically only offered for business use, or as so-called backhaul in places such as the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Lakshadweep, which have only recently been connected through an undersea cable network to the Indian mainland.

Firms such as Starlink promise increased bandwidth for remote users, as they have a large number of satellites in medium-to-low earth orbit, offering connectivity in remote areas without the humongous costs of building hundreds of kilometres of cable connectivity to enable this. 

Detroit:

The United Auto Workers Union said on Tuesday it has filed complaints with the National Labor Relations Board against Donald Trump and Tesla CEO Elon Musk over attempts to threaten and intimidate workers.

It is unclear whether the NLRB would take action against Trump for his comments on Monday during a two-hour conversation with Musk that was broadcast on social media platform X.

pic.twitter.com/47H3HLczZL

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 13, 2024

The UAW seized upon Trump’s remarks as the union rallies behind Democratic presidential candidate and Vice President Kamala Harris and encourages its nearly 400,000 workers to vote for her over Trump. The issue is especially pertinent in battleground states like Michigan which could determine who wins the White House in November. The UAW endorsed Harris at the end of July.

“You’re the greatest cutter,” Trump said to Musk during Monday’s conversation, complimenting the CEO’s ability to cut costs by saying he would not tolerate workers going on strike. “I mean, I look at what you do. You walk in, you just say: ‘You want to quit?’ They go on strike – I won’t mention the name of the company – but they go on strike. And you say: ‘That’s okay, you’re all gone.'”

Musk chuckled but did not respond to Trump’s comments, making it harder for the NLRB to find him liable for making illegal threats to workers at his companies, said Wilma Liebman, chair of the NLRB under former President Barack Obama.

Under federal law, workers cannot be fired for going on strike, and threatening to do so is illegal under the National Labor Relations Act, the UAW said in a statement.

After the union’s action on Tuesday, Musk criticised UAW President Shawn Fain in a social media post, alluding to two past union presidents who went to prison for bribery and corruption. “Based on recent news, it looks like this guy will join them!” Musk said.

A court-appointed monitor of the UAW is investigating several union executives, including allegations that Fain retaliated against a member of his board when the person did not take actions that would have benefitted Fain’s domestic partner and her sister. The UAW could not immediately be reached to comment on Musk’s response.

Trump campaign officials said his pledged 100% tariff on Chinese imports would strengthen the industry, while Harris’ EV policies are hurting American manufacturing.

“This frivolous lawsuit is a shameless political stunt intended to erode President Trump’s overwhelming support among America’s workers,” Trump campaign senior adviser Brian Hughes said in a statement.

The Harris campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment after the UAW’s action.

Fain and Trump have exchanged barbs in the past.

“Both Trump and Musk want working-class people to sit down and shut up, and they laugh about it openly. It’s disgusting, illegal, and totally predictable from these two clowns,” Fain said in a statement on Tuesday.

Trump has called for the union leader to be fired, saying he is responsible for US auto manufacturing becoming weaker.

UAW members in Michigan tend to side with Democrats, but pro-Trump workers have organised their own rallies in recent weeks.

In the 2020 presidential race, 62% of Michigan households with a union member voted for President Joe Biden, helping him win the state, according to Edison Research. By contrast, union households split 53% to 40% for Hillary Clinton in 2016, when she narrowly lost the state and the national race.

Sean O’Brien, president of the Teamsters, another key labour group, said of Trump’s comments, “Firing workers for organising, striking, and exercising their rights as Americans is economic terrorism.”

The Teamsters have traditionally endorsed a candidate after party conventions. O’Brien spoke at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee in July.

The union had also requested a speaking opportunity at the upcoming Democratic National Convention but it had not heard back, spokesperson Kara Deniz said. It had also invited Harris to a roundtable but had not heard back.

Sending a message

The NLRB has limited power to punish unlawful labor practices and the process often lasts years. In cases involving illegal threats, the board can order employers to cease and desist from such conduct and to post notices in the workplace informing workers of their rights. Unions can also use favourable rulings from the NLRB to engage workers they are trying to organise.

“Everyone knows the NLRB remedies are toothless to start with, but it’s not so much for the remedy as for sending both a political message and an organising message,” former NLRB head Liebman said, referring to the UAW’s action on Tuesday.

Fain filed separate complaints with the NLRB against the Trump campaign and Tesla citing Trump and Musk as the employers’ representatives, claiming both men had made statements suggesting they “would fire employees engaged in protected concerted activity, including striking.” The complaints did not provide further detail.

The NLRB has jurisdiction over the Trump campaign as an employer, but not Trump himself.

The UAW led a six-week strike against Detroit’s Big Three automakers last autumn, before winning record contracts.

Musk and the NLRB

Musk, who has endorsed Trump for president, has had numerous run-ins with the labour board. His rocket company SpaceX is currently challenging the entire structure of the agency in a pair of pending lawsuits. Those cases stemmed from NLRB complaints accusing SpaceX of firing engineers who were critical of Musk and forcing employees to sign severance agreements with unlawful terms.

In March, a US appeals court upheld an NLRB decision that said Musk illegally threatened Tesla employees by tweeting in 2018: “Nothing stopping Tesla team at our car plant from voting union … But why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing?”

Tesla is separately facing allegations from the board that it illegally discouraged unionising at a Buffalo, New York, plant.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Washington:

SpaceX is aiming to break new barriers in polar exploration with the first manned space mission over the Earth’s poles — a private flight commanded by a crypto entrepreneur later this year, the company said Tuesday.

The mission, dubbed “Fram2” after a 19th century polar expedition schooner, is due to last between three to five days, and was purchased by Chun Wang, a wealthy bitcoin pioneer who founded f2pool and stakefish, for an undisclosed amount.

He will be joined by three polar experts: Norwegian filmmaker Jannicke Mikkelsen, German robotics researcher Rabea Rogge, and Australian polar adventurer Eric Philips.

It is the latest foray by the aerospace industry into private space tourism, growing fast in the United States in recent years.

“From mission proposal, planning, trajectory design, to crew selection, everything has been done by the customer,” Mr Wang, reportedly born and raised in China but now a Maltese citizen, said in a post on X.

“A new chapter in space exploration is unfolding before our eyes,” he said.

Satellites have flown over the poles, but due to the Earth’s rotation, reaching them can take more power, while radiation can also be an issue, astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell told AFP.

“To date, the highest inclination achieved by human spaceflight has been the Soviet Vostok 6 mission, at 65 degrees,” according to the mission website.

The poles are not visible from the International Space Station (ISS).

The mission will use a SpaceX Dragon capsule equipped with an observation dome. The craft will fly at an altitude of between 265 and 280 miles (425 and 450 kilometers), according to SpaceX, owned by mercurial billionaire Elon Musk.

The crew plans to conduct research including taking the first X-ray images in space and studying an aurora-like light phenomenon, according to SpaceX.

SpaceX has flown 13 manned missions in the last four years. It carries Nasa astronauts to the ISS, but has also carried out several space tourism missions, including the first in 2021, named Inspiration4, financed by American billionaire Jared Isaacman.

“Until 2021, space missions were solely the privilege of governments,” Mr Wang wrote, adding: “Then @inspiration4x came along and changed everything.”

SpaceX is set to launch another private mission, Polaris Dawn on August 26, carrying four crew members including Isaacman.

It is scheduled to include the first private spacewalk.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

Tesla and SpaceX chief Elon Musk, in an interview with American conservative commentator Jordan Peterson, alleged that his estranged transgender daughter, Vivian Jenna Wilson, was “killed” by what he termed the “woke mind virus” after being persuaded into agreeing to gender-affirming care procedures. 

During the interview, Mr Musk referred to gender-reassignment surgery as “child mutilation and sterilisation”. The world’s richest man claimed that during the COVID-19 pandemic, he was convinced to sign documents for one of his children.

“I was essentially tricked into signing documents for one of my older boys,” Mr Musk stated. “This was really before I had any understanding of what was going on, and we had Covid going on, so there was a lot of confusion and I was told [my child] might commit suicide.”

JUST IN: Elon Musk says his son is “dead” thanks to the woke mind virus after he was put on puberty blockers, says he vowed to “destroy the woke mind virus after that.”

“I was essentially tricked into signing documents for one of my older boys… This was before I had… pic.twitter.com/wfWztIziTs

— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) July 22, 2024

Mr Musk, who is also the owner of X (formerly Twitter), accused those involved in promoting gender-affirming care of targeting children “who are far below the age of consent.”

“I was tricked into doing this,” Mr Musk claimed. “I lost my son, essentially. They call it ‘deadnaming’ for a reason. The reason they call it ‘deadnaming’ is because your son is dead.”

The experience, Mr Musk claims, has set him on a mission to combat what he describes as the “woke mind virus.” He said, “I vowed to destroy the woke mind virus after that. And we’re making some progress.”

Vivian Jenna Wilson, Mr Musk’s 20-year-old daughter, legally changed her name and gender at the age of 18. This legal transition occurred on June 22 in 2022 at a court in California.

“I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape, or form,” Ms Wilson had said back then. Ms Wilson’s mother, Justine Wilson, a Canadian author, divorced Mr Musk in 2008.