Predictions 2020

[jadebenn]

it's my prediction and it's not entirely subjective.

Did you want to nitpick the rest too? Not a good look.

Uh, sorry? I was confused since it's not really something that's objectively provable, so you can't really say whether or not it was "right." But I'll drop it. It wasn't meant to be a snipe.

[cyberops27]

SpaceX:
-  Mk1 lifts off successfully but suffers a failure with the flip manouver causing in a hard landing and the vehicle falling over after engine shut down.
- JRTI arrives at Cape Canaveral and first mission is SAOCOM 1b
- MK2 makes successful first flight. Does a second flight to altitude above 50km.
- Super Heavy construction begins
- First smallsat rideshare in March sees very limited amount of customers
- SpaceX awarded 60% of NSSL2
- Fifth flight of booster in Q2 Other fifth flight and a sixth flight in H2.
- Starship Super Heavy reaches orbit in late 2020
- Starlink enters service for the USA and Canada
- SpaceX suffers no landing failures for the first time since 2017

ULA
- ULA win 40% of NSSL2
- Mars 2020 launches successfully
- Vulcan remains on track and Tory releases info and pictures of nearly completed Vulcan scheduled for 2021

Ariane Space
- Vega returns to flight
- Ariane 6 suffers partial failure on first flight
- Ariane Recieves funding to develop a reusable technology concept rocket by 2026

China
- Long March 5 return to flight
- Tiangon 3 first module is launched
- Long March 3B suffers failure
- Grid fins seen on 40% of flights with a engine re-ignition test
- Change 5 launches perfectly

Rocket Lab
- First launch from LC-2
- After two splashdowns of Electron in Early 2020 and one in late 2019, the first attempt to catch the booster is a success
- Photon makes flight debut

Virgin Group
- Non-tourist demonstration flight suffers engine failure and achieves 50km apogee, no one hurt
- Launcher one achieves orbit on first try
- Richard Branson announces first tourist flight with him onboard will happen in 6 months

Firefly
- First orbit attempt ends in failure following stage seperation
- Beta launch vehicle officially revealed
- Orbit attempt 2 is successful in December 2020

Blue Origin
- First tourists fly in July 2020
- New Glenn delayed to 2022
- New Armstrong announced
- Recieve contract to make lander for Artemis 3

Northrup Grumman
- Minotaur 4 suffers partial failure, no harm to NROL satellite
- OmegA has successful test fire, given a proper launch date
- Artemis Ascent stage revealed

Russia
- Angarra takes second flight in Early 2020
- Soyuz 2 suffers failure with OneWeb satellites
- Announcement and fullfunding for a return to Venus mission

India
- Dates announced for uncrewed flight of Gaganyaan. Manned Gaganyaan pushed to 2022
- GSLV MKIII suffers failure
- Vikram lander failure finally found in several pieces


NASA
- Insight fails to release heat probe
- Uncrewed Starliner in January
- DM-2 happens in April and spends a month in space
- Crewed flight in June
- Curiosity has half a wheel break, continues journey after 2 months of trouble shooting
- Juno's camera falls to the effects of radiation
- USCV-1 in August
- SLS Green run shut down early due to engine problem, recycle happens 2 months later
- Artemis 1 given mid 2021 launch date

Globally
- Nearly 200 Orbital launches
- Two dead satellites collide in LEO

[GWH]

NASA

Gateway Logistics Services:
- Awarded in February (2 months late!) to NGIS (Cygnus derivative) & SNC (their Comet module or whatever).
- Someone protests the decision.

Human Landing System:
- 3 awards to mature systems but funding shortfall requires heavy initial investment by contractors
- National Team (Blue and all) wins a spot, maybe even larger portion of funding.
- SpaceX wins a spot with Starship *Bonus prediction its actually a Dragon derived ascent vehicle and Starship descent to best fit requirements*
- Boeing and their SLS flown proposal wins a spot.
- With Boeing in the mix but underfunded, congress helicopter drops a load of cash into the program.

CLPS:
- Both SpaceX and Blue Origin are selected to fly some form of cargo to the lunar surface, VIPER flies on Blue Moon
- Masten finally gets a task order (Although I feel this is too optimistic).

Commercial crew:
- All is well with SpaceX
- Boeing test flight has a minor mishap where astronauts take manual control and complete the mission

SLS:
- 2 month delay over the length of the green run campaign.
- Software issues pop up posing additional delays.
- Early Summer 2021 looking likely for a launch date with daytime launch being a convenient reason to take political pressure off the software issue delays.
- EUS use for some Gateway element is mandated by congress even though its more likely to delay the project.


Launch Service Procurement
- ULA wins 40% (the most complicated and expensive missions)
- SpaceX wins 60%
- OmegA is shelved


Commercial Space
- Nanoracks continues to do awesome things
- Axiom Space announces tourists to fly to ISS after commercial crew test flights completed
- Bigelow announces something and cancels it before the end of the year, generally does nothing.
- Constellation flights like crazy
- Tugs are the big thing for small sat launchers to GEO and beyond with lots of new proposals and a few test flights
- Virgin Orbit and Firefly both get test flights into orbit
- After missing out on LSP Blue Origin publishes their pricing, trying to undercut the competition. This forces the hand of both ULA and Arianespace to publish their next gen vehicle pricing. SpaceX publishes reused pricing, including clarity on Falcon Heavy.  2020 is the year in which commercial competition really heats up.
- this begins to enter the conversation politically as SLS continues to plod along and next gen vehicles are really close to fruition. Nothing actually changes though.


ULA
- Other than a few scrubs have a great consistent year.
- Vulcan progresses well and 2021 launch date holds.
- Will win a commercial launch of stacked GEO sats to GTO.
- Promotion of direct to GEO capabilities with Vulcan for small to mid size GEO sats.
- ACES development is slow, cis-lunar 1000 doesn't get mentioned (thanks to Boeing) frustrated employees involved in these programs head over to Blue Origin.


Blue Origin
- Along with pricing on New Glenn they publish updated performance numbers showing removed margins, therefore higher performance figures.
- Aggressive pricing and dual launch capabilities see them cut into Arianespace's market share significantly.
- Springtime launch of crewed test flight on New Sheppard, 1st customer flight late 2020.
- 3rd stage for New Glenn with refueling and long duration capabilities is teased, possibility of flying Orion on New Glenn emerges. 3rd stage is proposed commercially for direct to GEO flights of multiple small GEO sats.
- To support development of the 3rd stage Blue Origin poaches staff heavily from ULA.
- No other mention of new hardware like New Armstrong or a crew capsule.


SpaceX
- Lots of starlink, lots of flights
- 5th flight of a core happens
- FH flies once, great success, 3x landing (if margin is available)
- After winning LSP they move forward on the mobile gantry and longer fairing for Falcon Heavy, allowing them to offer dual launch missions to GTO like Ariane 5. These are priced very aggressively and win a few customers.
- Successful 20km hop of Starship SN1 in summer, Fall flight somewhere higher.
- A series of changes and the lack of TPS on Starship SN1 make it ineligible for high energy test flights. SN2 begins construction scheduled for sub-orbital test flight in early 2021.
- Minimum Viable Super Heavy for testing is well under way in construction. Should be ready for orbital test of SN2 in summer 2021.


ESA & Arianspace
- ESA waffles on Gateway plans and surface missions, proposing ideas with timelines far off on the horizon.
- Ariane 6 doesn't fly in 2020, delayed to "early" 2021
- As Ariane loses market share long term viability of Ariane 6 called into question.

[Toast]

It was always going to be one of to be one of the safer predictions, but credit to niwax, FalconH, jebbo, AndrewRG10, freddo411, Darkseraph, Lar, Gliderflyer (and myself) for calling it: looks like SLS's maiden launch is being delayed.
https://twitter.com/NASAWatch/status/1214221879193612289

Sources report that the EM-1
@NASA_SLS
 launch is being delayed From Nov 2020 to TDB because EM-1 personnel are being shifted from EM-1 safety/software to EM-2 because EM-2 requires more people to do human rating (more complex than EM-1 which is not human-rated) #Artemis #Moon2024

zubenelgenubi: Please remember to remove the "?s=XX" characters from the end of a Tweet hyperlink.

[GWH]

It was always going to be one of to be one of the safer predictions, but credit to...

NASA
SLS:
- Software issues pop up posing additional delays.

I swear, despite my edit being dated after that tweet came up my prediction was made first 

Woooo 1 prediction nailed within hours of making it! 

[jadebenn]

It was always going to be one of to be one of the safer predictions, but credit to niwax, FalconH, jebbo, AndrewRG10, freddo411, Darkseraph, Lar, Gliderflyer (and myself) for calling it: looks like SLS's maiden launch is being delayed.
https://twitter.com/NASAWatch/status/1214221879193612289

Sources report that the EM-1
@NASA_SLS
 launch is being delayed From Nov 2020 to TDB because EM-1 personnel are being shifted from EM-1 safety/software to EM-2 because EM-2 requires more people to do human rating (more complex than EM-1 which is not human-rated) #Artemis #Moon2024

zubenelgenubi: Please remember to remove the "?s=XX" characters from the end of a Tweet hyperlink.

I'd take anything NASAWatch says with a grain of salt, though I suppose even a broken clock is right once a day.

I wonder why he still calls them "EM-1" and "EM-2?"  It reminds me of that brief stint where he called SLS Block 1 "Block 1A."

[IanThePineapple]

My predictions:

NASA

- SLS stays in mid-2021
- Green Run goes well with a few small delays, but no major problems
- Shipped to KSC in Q4 and preps for integration begin
- Gateway PPM assembly starts, resupply contracts awarded to NGIS and possibly others.
- Mars 2020 launch goes well
- InSight mole doesn't make it all the way down, work continues
- New Horizons team starts the selection process for the third flyby target, ETA 2022
- Osiris-Rex successfully snags a sample
- Juno continues to return troves of data and images

SpaceX (I was way off with last year, let's see how poorly I do here )

- 35 Falcon 9 launches (17 customers, 18 Starlinks)
- 1 FH, late Q4. Core stage lands and is brought back intact
- DM-2 launches in May, a great success
- Crew-1 flies in late Q3 with payloads in trunk, Crew-2 pushed to Q2 2021
- Mk3/SN1 first flies in mid May after extensive tank & static fire tests
- Mk3 reaches space in Q4 after 2 low- & medium-altitude tests (20km, 50km).
- Mk2 is scrapped in late Q1
- Cape Starship is shelved until Q3, when work slowly resumes at Roberts Road.
- SN2 or 3 starts construction at Roberts Road (one in Florida, other at Boca)
- Parts of first Super Heavy begin to be built in Boca in Q4, but it isn't close to finished by year's end
- SN2 or 3 starts assembly in Boca Chica in Q4. Will be the first orbital ship, and fly on Super Heavy SN1
- Starlink launches ramp quickly, more details revealed, but no specifics. Revealed to go public mid next year.
- Starship gets first external launch contract
- At least 2 F9 landings fail
- Fairing recovery successes increase throughout the year, first successful double-catch in late Q1
- Fairing reuse becomes more common on Starlink flights, with at least one reflight on a non-Starlink mission by year's end
- Uncrewed Lunar Starship landing set for late 2023, crewed in late 2024
- Mars flights pushed back to next transfer windows (2024 uncrewed & 2027 crewed)

General

- SpaceX and ULA win the DoD contract competition, with SpaceX getting 60% and ULA getting 40%
- Boeing CFT launches in June. Successful flight, no major issues
- Boeing Crew-1 pushed to early 2021 (No big deal since CFT is a full crew rotation mission)
- Vulcan gets more customers, first flight stage is completed
- New Glenn stage prototypes finished by year-end
- New Shepard flies crew in Q3 or Q4, customer flights pushed well into next year
- Virgin Galactic continues test flights
- Rocket Lab launches from LC-2 in late Q2, and opens LC-1B in Q4. Recovers an Electron stage from the ocean.
- Electron launch ramp continues, LC-2 helps.
- Firefly launches in early Q3 from Vandenberg
- Omega gets one or two contracts, but doesn't pick up steam. Antares starts to look more and more like a one-off rocket.
- Wallops starts getting busier, passes Vandenberg to become the second-busiest US spaceport
- Cape orbital launches begin, Vandenberg's future is uncertain

Phew, this will be a really good year.

[JEF_300]

It was always going to be one of to be one of the safer predictions, but credit to niwax, FalconH, jebbo, AndrewRG10, freddo411, Darkseraph, Lar, Gliderflyer (and myself) for calling it: looks like SLS's maiden launch is being delayed.
https://twitter.com/NASAWatch/status/1214221879193612289

Sources report that the EM-1
@NASA_SLS
 launch is being delayed From Nov 2020 to TDB because EM-1 personnel are being shifted from EM-1 safety/software to EM-2 because EM-2 requires more people to do human rating (more complex than EM-1 which is not human-rated) #Artemis #Moon2024

zubenelgenubi: Please remember to remove the "?s=XX" characters from the end of a Tweet hyperlink.

I honestly didn't realize it wasn't already delayed back to 2021, so I didn't even address it. And now my assumptions have cost me a free prediction.

[moreno7798]

It was always going to be one of to be one of the safer predictions, but credit to niwax, FalconH, jebbo, AndrewRG10, freddo411, Darkseraph, Lar, Gliderflyer (and myself) for calling it: looks like SLS's maiden launch is being delayed.
https://twitter.com/NASAWatch/status/1214221879193612289

Sources report that the EM-1
@NASA_SLS
 launch is being delayed From Nov 2020 to TDB because EM-1 personnel are being shifted from EM-1 safety/software to EM-2 because EM-2 requires more people to do human rating (more complex than EM-1 which is not human-rated) #Artemis #Moon2024

zubenelgenubi: Please remember to remove the "?s=XX" characters from the end of a Tweet hyperlink.

I'd take anything NASAWatch says with a grain of salt, though I suppose even a broken clock is right once a day.

I wonder why he still calls them "EM-1" and "EM-2?"  It reminds me of that brief stint where he called SLS Block 1 "Block 1A."

Well, time is really more of an illusion. The only thing that the brain can experience is every moment in the present, which it then stores as memories, which the brain then interprets as the past - the illusion of time. The illusion of aging is nothing more than the change of matter from one state to another. The future is already there. We just haven't experienced it yet. The past present and future are already written.

Botton line is...

"A broken clock as well as a working clock" are both always right and because future states are already written, I predict SLS is already cancelled. We just haven't experienced it yet.

[Eric Hedman]

I predict SLS is already cancelled. We just haven't experienced it yet.

That's true about every product ever designed.  Everything becomes either obsolete or fails to perform and gets canceled.  It's up to history to decide if the time from start to cancellation is successful or not.

[scienceguy]

NASA’s Mars 2020 rover suffers some mishap, technical or political, that delays its launch till the next launch window

I was glad to be wrong about that one

[Eric Hedman]

My 2019 predictions weren’t as good as my 2018 predictions.  Most of my misses were from being too optimistic on timelines for things to happen.  So here goes:

NASA planetary program
        Mars 2020 launches as planned.

Space Tourism
        Blue Origin  (everything a year later than last year’s predictions)
                Manned flights of New Shepard by end of Q2
                Jeff Bezos takes flight in Q3 to show customers ready
                Commercial flights with tourists start in Q4
                Jeff Bezos Offers Elon Musk a ride – Musk passes on opportunity
        Virgin Galactic
                Richard Branson takes flight in Q2
                First tourist flight in Q3

I got my first prediction for 2020 right.  WooHoo!!

Once again too optimistic on Space Tourism.

 Too early to tell on the rest of my predictions.

[RocketLover0119]

Not as many predictions here, or as in depth, and is also USA specific, but here goes nothing:

SpaceX
-We see Crew Dragon hoist astros for the first time to the ISS in February/March
-4/5 Crewed launches in all, and no anomalies/aborts
-25-30 F9/FH launches
-At least 1 booster will fail to land
-Over half of launches will have a successful fairing catch (one or both)
-No launch/on pad failures
-Starlink becomes operational by Q3
-Starship Mk 3 serves as another “pathfinder”, hops no higher than 10 KM, occurs Q1
-Mk 4 hops 20KM + but fails landing/ belly first entry, occurs Q2
-Mk 5 succeeds hops and “sky diver” entry, retires with valuable data, occurs in Q3
-Mk 6 flies with first Super Heavy, misses orbit narrowly, Occurs in Q3
-Mk 7 flies with SH and achieves orbit/successful reentry, occurs in Q4

ULA
-Keeps it’s 100% success rate
-No more than 12 flights during the year
-Vulcan flies twice, both flawless, certified by USAF for flights
-S.M.A.R.T reuse works only once in a Vulcan flight during the year
-Launches crew to ISS in Q2, no more than 3 flights with crew to ISS during the year
(Rather bland considering how little was done this year in 2019 besides the Starliner launch)

Blue Origin
-Space Tourists launch on New Shepherd in Q2
-New Glenn launch pad completes construction in Q2
-Flight hardware for first New Glenn launch will start to arrive Q4
-More information given about supposed “New Armstrong” rocket

SLS Artemis 1 Mission
-Artemis 1 core has successful “green run” campaign at Stennis, ships to Cape in late Q2
-Orion succeeds all testing, ships to cape in Q2
-Other components arrive in Q2/Q3
-Stacking of the Artemis 1 mission begins in late Q3
-Full stack rolls to 39B in late Q4 for testing/WDR’s

Certainly is fun to come back to predictions! I was way to optimistic for starship it seems. Wrong on crewed flight end, was a gutsy prediction to begin with. Can’t believe I thought Vulcan would fly. Awaiting final WDR/firing of Artemis core, still think it will succeed. Obviously blows keep coming for first SLS flight date. Blue origin is much more silent than I predicted for the year. Starlink still yet to be operational.

[Zed_Noir]

<snip>

Certainly is fun to come back to predictions! I was way to optimistic for starship it seems. Wrong on crewed flight end, was a gutsy prediction to begin with. Can’t believe I thought Vulcan would fly. Awaiting final WDR/firing of Artemis core, still think it will succeed. Obviously blows keep coming for first SLS flight date. Blue origin is much more silent than I predicted for the year. Starlink still yet to be operational.

Obviously everyone's 2020 predictions got stomped on by the COVID-19 situation.

[hektor]

One prediction was pessimistic : -Orion succeeds all testing, ships to cape in Q2

It shipped in Q1 (March 26)

[scienceguy]

Well others are checking their predictions so I may as well too

Evidence of a nitrogen and carbon dioxide atmosphere found at an extrasolar planet

Nope. This didn't happen so far.

Starship Hopper hops twice, each time higher than before

Yes, something did hop twice but the name as changed. 0.5 point.

SpaceX reaches orbit at least 6 times with Falcon 9 and one time with Falcon Heavy

Yes, this happened and probably will happen. 2 points.

SpaceX will start taking astronauts to the ISS

Yes, this happened. 1 point.

NASA’s Mars 2020 rover suffers some mishap, technical or political, that delays its launch till the next launch window

Thankfully this didn't happen. 0 points.

NASA’s Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 both keep transmitting

As far as I know they are still transmitting. 1 point.

NASA’s Curiosity rover gets stuck somewhere, due to terrain or wheel failure. Engineers figure it out and the rover is soon mobile again.

This did not happen. 0 points.

ESA’s ExoMars rover launches without incident

This was delayed till 2022, if I'm not mistaken. 0 points.

Virgin Orbit/Galactic will start taking paying passengers into space

Again this was delayed. 0 points.

Blue Origin will do exactly the opposite of what I predict for them

Blue Origin will launch people into space before the end of the year

Blue Origin did not launch people into space therefore they did the exact opposite of what I predicted for them. 1 point.

A large meteor will burn up over Canada. It will be caught on video

Nope. 0 points.

Elon Musk will get a NASA Spaceflight account, but not post much because of a barrage of questions

Nope. 0 points.

There will be some kind of technology breakthrough that will really help spaceflight

This could still happen. 1 point for future prospects.

Well 6.5 out of 13. It's a pass, but I did better last year.

[scienceguy]

A large meteor will burn up over Canada. It will be caught on video

apparently this happened!

https://www.ctvnews.ca/video?playlistId=1.5214786

I get one more point!

[Stan-1967]

Blue Origin will do exactly the opposite of what I predict for them

Blue Origin will launch people into space before the end of the year

Blue Origin did not launch people into space therefore they did the exact opposite of what I predicted for them. 1 point.

I think you get 2 points for that one? Bold prediction I must say...

[jebbo]

100+ orbital launch attempts worldwide.

100th attempt happened today. 1 point.

I'll have to be more aggressive on this for 2021. 100 is now looking too easy :-)

SpaceX (edited post-mk1 "RUD")
-   >20 F9/FH launches

Already at 23. 1 point

Again, more aggresive for 2021. Too easy.

-   At least one booster achieves 5+ launches

Yup. 1 at 5, 1 at 6 and 1 at 7. 1 point.

-   At least one fairing half is reused for the 2nd time.

Yup. 1 point

-   Starlink enters limited service (US only)

I think beta counts, so 1 point.

-   Starship manages a 20km belly-flop in Q4

Looks like this will only be 15km, so 0 points.

-   No orbital Starship launches

Yup. 1 point

But I think I'll predict they do in 2021.

Blue Origin
-   First crewed launch of New Shepard

No. 0 points.

-   Completion of LC-36

I think this is complete enough to partially count. 0.5 points

-   First New Glenn flight hardware seen
-   First hints of New Armstrong emerge (because of Artemis / lunar stuff)

Nope on both. 0 points.

Overall, Blue Origin have disappointed me; I expected at least visible pogress with New Shepard.

Artemis / Lunar
-   Artemis 1 slips to 2021
-   Increased commercial involvement

Yup. Currently Nov 2021 and likely to slip to 2022. 1 point
2nd one is not measurable, so 0 points.

Other US
-   Rocket Labs successfully catch a booster

Nope. 0 points.

-   LauncherOne first launch attempt

Yup. 1 point.

Shame it was a failure though.

Europe
-   First Ariane 6 launch

Nope. 0 points

-   Commit to a reusable ArianeNEXT (possibly in 2019 at Ministerial Council)

Yup. 1 point.

China
-   40+ launches

Unless they have an end of year surge, no (projecting 38 launches). 0 points.

-   Long March 5B flights resume in Q1

Yes. 1 point.

-   Chang’e 5 launches successfully

Yes. 1 point.

-   More progress on reuse (no successful landing but boost-back/landing burns; legs fitted)

Unmeasurable. 0 points.

Other
-   Iran finally launch successfully

Yes. Successful launch in April. 1 point.

Science
-   I’m not making any detailed exoplanet predictions, but TESS discoveries continue and CHEOPS refines the mass/radius/density relationship

Unmeasurable. 0 points.

-   LIGO adds the Japanese Kagra instrument and detects at least 1 NS-NS merger with an EM counterpart

Nope. 0 points.

Overall 12.5 out of 24.

--- Tony

[hektor]

-   Commit to a reusable ArianeNEXT (possibly in 2019 at Ministerial Council)

Depends what you call commit. There is certainly no commitment in Europe for a FSD of ArianeNEXT yet.