Benny Kirk
1,725 ARTICLES
This Building Outside US Space Force Station Chronicles History of NASA's Rocket Programs
31 Aug 2022, 01:09 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It should be more or less a given that the important bits and pieces of tech from the early days of the Space Race should be well preserved and well celebrated. But as it happens, it took the dedication of a particular history appreciating higher u...
NASA Tells All on Scrubbed Launch of Artemis I, Rescheduled for September 3rd
30 Aug 2022, 23:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Rocket science is a tricky business. That's why it shouldn't be a shock that NASA's first SLS heavy-booster rocket set to launch the Artemis I mission to send an Orion crew capsule around the Moon had at least one scrubbed launch att...
T-Minus 12 Hours: The Vibe at KSC The Day Before Artemis I's Launch Is Unreal
29 Aug 2022, 00:46 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / In a time fraught with unparalleled uncertainty, it can be difficult to find something to be truly joyous about. What with all this talk of war, inflation, and environmental devastation, it can get the better of anybody. But ladies and gentlemen, w...
Rocketdyne F-1: The Big Block Muscle Car V8 of Rocket Engines
28 Aug 2022, 17:24 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Nearly every famous motor vehicle has an equally iconic engine. This applies to cars and bikes on land, boats in the water, and planes in the sky. But we'd like to amend that group and add space-rated booster rockets. NASA's SLS carry...
Mother Nature Doesn't Want Artemis I Launching Monday, NASA Will Try Regardless
28 Aug 2022, 15:32 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / As of Sunday, August 28th, 2022, at approximately 10 am, the SLS booster rocket carrying the Orion Space Capsule for NASA's Artemis I mission sits on Launch Pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. All the while, a hidde...
Spotlight USA: The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex Is a Spaceflight Junkie's Valhalla
28 Aug 2022, 03:47 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Do you hate Disneyworld? Would you rather spend a day looking at a painting of a sad person crying instead of spending five minutes walking around the house of a mouse or one of its competing theme parks? Are you vacationing in Orlando regardless? ...
Interview: Apollo vs Orion, The Key Differences Explained by Lockheed Martin Personnel
28 Aug 2022, 01:28 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The Lockheed Martin Orion is the latest arrival of a human-rated spacecraft slated to take humans beyond the bounds of Low Earth Orbit and close to the surface of another heavenly body. But for all its grace, sophistication, and dedicated design te...
People Need to Stop Talking Smack About NASA's SLS Rocket, at Least Let it Launch First
26 Aug 2022, 22:26 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / As of late August 2022, NASA's Artemis I un-crewed the first test flight of the SLS rocket, and the Orion space capsule is set to launch on August 29th at any time between approximately 8:30 and 10:30 am. But even before the darn thing lifts o...
I Rode The JFK Airport Air Train, NYC's Little Known 5th Rail Line, and This Happened
25 Aug 2022, 23:51 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / This week, I had to take a flight from JFK Airport to Orlando. Apart from being my first ever commercial airline flight at the ripe old age of 25, it was the first time I'd ever left my car at home for a long trip. This meant I was stuck t...
USS Enterprise (CVN-80): The Third Generation of America's Iconic Supercarrier Lineage
24 Aug 2022, 20:35 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Eight American warships have donned the name USS Enterprise in the last 250 years or so years. Of those, most are only aware of the existence of two. Of course, they're both flagship aircraft carriers. One which slugged it out in the Pacif...
Republic Seabee: The Delightful Flying Boat Sports Plane With a Touch of Thunderbolt DNA
22 Aug 2022, 20:04 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Republic Aviation is known for one of two iconic warplanes, the P-47 Thunderbolt of World War II fame, and its burley descendant, the A-10 Thunderbolt II, or the Warthog, as so many people lovingly call it. Most aviation enthusiasts aren't...
Bird Innovator: an Executive Flying Boat Based on a WWII Icon With Two Extra Engines
21 Aug 2022, 15:17 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boat is an airplane that needs no introduction. It may not have the appeal of a Hellcat or a Corsair, but the people who served in the U.S. Navy during World War II will tell you it was the Catalina, not any fig...
The Real Story of SS Edmund Fitzgerald, the Lost American Lake Freighter Turned Folk Icon
20 Aug 2022, 17:56 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Countless thousands of shipwrecks dot the Earth's oceans, rivers, and seas. But only a handful are remembered years after these vessels and their crew slipped beneath the waves. Even less become cultural icons. The Germans have the Wilhelm...
Besides Its Rocket Fleet, SpaceX's Recovery Ships Are the Envy of Any Space Agency
19 Aug 2022, 20:27 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / A short time ago, we showed you a pair of sea vessels owned by NASA that might look like no big deal but spend their days hauling spent SRBs back to the Kennedy Space Center. Safe to say, looks can be deceiving. But according to some people, no...
They Put Water Floats on a Spitfire? It Wasn't as Silly as it Sounds
18 Aug 2022, 18:40 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Do any of you remember the meme from a few years ago where everyone pretended to be shocked someone did surgery on a grape? Well, here's a similar sentiment, "They put floats on a Spitfire?!" Same vibe, different scenario entirely. ...
Blohm & Voss BV-238: The Forgotten Colossal Flying Boat Made a Legend by War Thunder
17 Aug 2022, 17:46 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / The Blohm & Voss BV 238 owes its considerable online notoriety these days to a silly little free-to-play game by Gaijin Entertainment called War Thunder. As the largest and heaviest airplane ever to fly during World War II, its addition to the ...
Dornier Do X: The Largest, Most Luxurious Way to Fly 100 Years Ago
17 Aug 2022, 01:44 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / In a previous piece here during Sea Month at autoevolution, we told the tale of a time before the era of colossal international airports. An era when water-bound flying boats were the preferred method of air travel. As Claude Dornier teaches us, th...
Saro SR-A/1: the British Flying Boat Jet Fighter That Even Had the U.S. Intrigued
16 Aug 2022, 19:30 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / In our last item regarding a flying boat built by the British Saunders-Roe Company (Saro), we told the story of the cuddly-looking but equally awful deathtrap, the Lerwick. An anti-submarine and patrol airplane so terrible at its job that it would ...
In Desperate Need of Four Wheels? a Crusty, Dented 2005 Chevy Malibu Classic Beats the Bus
14 Aug 2022, 18:09 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / Remember when the Chevy Malibu used to be a cool car? Neither do we, as most of us weren't fortunate enough to grow up in the late 1960s. But that doesn't mean later model Malibus are completely useless. They may not have a fraction o...
This Restored Grumman Mallard Flying Boat is Classier Than a Yacht, More Useful Too
14 Aug 2022, 17:08 UTC · By: Benny Kirk / It's Sea Month here at autoevolution. A month in which we celebrate all things that sail across the world's seas and oceans (or seas and oceans on other worlds in some cases). For some people, the only sea vessels worth talking about are ...