Slashdot Mirror
Mir Lives
hyperstation writes "An article at abcnews.com says that Mir will stay up, thanks to a $27 million donation (that's 750 megarubles) from Russia. Look's like they're not broke after all." *sigh* Someone wake me up when Mir finally falls to the planet.
Can that be the end of the stupid 'Mir is crashing' 'oh wait it's not after all!' stories? It's not intersting anymore.
If they run out of cash, it falls out of the sky. Period. Every time they run out, they say it's gonna fall. Every time someone gives them money, it stays in orbit longer.
That about sums it up.
At this rate, it should be renamed to:
"The Amazing Space Yo-Yo!"...
ManicHawk - Just because you're manic doesn't mean the walls aren't bouncy
Would someone please shot down that aging pile of floating crap. All we need is for another major incident to happen, thus giving the anti-space exploration lobby more ammo. NASA must be having a fit.
Dirty Pirate Hooker
niceFire.com - Humor and Lego's or Lego's and Humor or Some Combination of
Well, as long as we are going to do that, could we pack away a few of the "less desireable" *coughtacobellchiuauacough* elements on board?
Dirty Pirate Hooker
Sorry, the headline just made me think of Sinistar.
"This is your world. These are your people. You can live for yourself today, or help build tomorrow for everyone."
(I ain't saying, I'm asking.)
errrr.. mir will already be a tourist attraction, exploited by Amsterdam-based MirCorp (IIRC). MirCorp will rent it from russian government, brining in some extra cash (more than those few million just spent on keeping it in the air.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
"US Pledges more money to Russia for ISS" "World Bank releives Russia of debt to help fund ISS" "Russian citizens mugged to give more money to ISS" Now all of a sudden we have, "Russia pledges 750 million ruples to space station because 'It's been such a good space station this week, so it gets an advance on its allowance'" Is it just me or does it seem like Russia is becoming that Hamburger dude from Popeye? "I'll gladly pay you back (whenever) if you loan me money today"
Information is the catalyst for revolution
How bout we launch it out towards Mars. The NASA guys can plan the flight path, they're pretty good when it comes to at least hitting the planet. All the fungus can then populate Mars and start an ecosystem out there so when humans actually get out there there'll be plenty of life.
Honestly though, I don't like the idea of space fungus crashing into the ocean. You think oil spills are bad, how about bacteria that didn't even originate on this planet. Which sounds more harmful to the environment?
In this past yahoo article described in the slashdot article about the Mir being deorbitted, the russian government was supplying the spacestation fuel to bring it into higher orbit so that it can control its deorbit and put it in the ocean. They are going to bring it down at the end of february. And this article states that it will stay up until at least february. So you are repeating yourself...
.sigs??
-- Don't you hate it when people comment on other people's
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
I'm sure there would be scads of pr0n producers (Vivid Video being the one that comes to mine) that would leap at the chance to produce a zero-g sex movie... just a though for our pr0n lovin friends
Information is the catalyst for revolution
You guys remember the Mir-is-filling-up-with-fungus story?
/.)
Wouldn't it have sucked for the first Mars mission people to find this out, oh, halfway across?
NASA's philosophy is to be as certain as possible that everything must be perfectly planned before the first countdown. Baikonur's philosophy is "we'll jump off that bridge when we get to it." Guess what: the Mars mission will need a mix of both philosophies.
Every new Mir disaster is another data point, another caveat, for the Mars mission. Let's
give some praise for the Russians for putting up with these disasters (and the American haughtiness they inevitably provoke). We need it.
(Next Mir story: Mir held hostage by mutant fungus. Neo-organism demands net connection and account on
Now I'll have to cancel my pre-sale of flaming Mir wreckage on eBay.
--
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Isn't there still a body on that thing?
I thought some rich dude, who was funding Carl Sagan's sisters' SETI research, died up there or something.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
Is there any value to be had from MIR in relation to the new (and now in theoretically 'on-line') International Space Station?
Usually the biggest hurdle in space exploration is simply getting out of the gravity well of Earth. MIR is already up there. Isn't there a way that it could be used to some benifit for ISS (even if it is only stripped for spare parts)? (or as a last line of evacuation if all else fails?)
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
If a space station drops into the ocean when nobody's around, does it make a sound?
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
First, the Russian space program is heavily subsidized by international efforts, both through direct grants and through IMF credits, so the burden doesn't fall so greatly on the Russian government itself. Besides, the space program is an important part of international diplomacy and is necessary for that reason alone.
Second, Russia isn't doing nearly as badly right now, thanks to the threefold increase/barrel in the price of oil. They have incredible problems with infrastructure (especially with factories falling apart), but that's an argument in favor of continuing the program, not shutting it down.
Third, fundamental domestic problems have never stopped any other country from pursuing these high-profile feats of national pride (and maintaining MIR is a much different and cheaper proposition than building nuclear weapons like Pakistan and other countries are doing). Why should it stop Russia now?
-- Anne Marie
Mir means peace.
"Mir" means both "world" and "peace". This is the point in the conversation where I always point out that Lev Tolstoy's "War and Peace" should have been translated better as "War and the World".
-- Anne Marie
How much do you think I would have to pay the Russian Gov. just to make sure they throw MIR into the ocea and never ever talk about it again?
"When I was a little kid my mother told me not to stare into the sun...
"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear"
Carol: ... so we need everyone's support to keep this research station up in orbit, we need you to call in and pledge your support, 10, 50, 100 million rubles, whatever level you feel comfortable with, and, ok, for the next 10 callers, yes, the next ten callers will receive a FREE "Great MIR Accomplishments" CD, so pick up the phone and, oh yes, here's Ed with some news...
Ed: That's right Carol, this just in the Russian Government has pledged 750 - that's right 750 million Rubles to help keep MIR in orbit...
Carol: Wow!
Ed: Yes, but this will only help keep it going until February folks, so we can't stop now, our goal is 3 Billion Rubles....
Carol: Thanks Ed, a big show of thanks for the Russian Government for that tremendous pledge, wow [applause] now , ok, we challenge anybody out there, if you can match the Russian pledge we'll send you not only the CD BUT also this coffee table book "MIR Photography" so pick up that phone now, call 1-800-SAVE-MIR and make that pledge, is easy to do, operators are - yes, we have operators just waiting for your call, so do it now, we've only got another week and....
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
It is an amazing achievment keeping a space station around for so long. It has taught cosmonaut's alot about living in space and it has contributed greatly to research science.
I say keep it going as long as possible. Just because it's not new doesn't mean it can't contribute. I mean it's already built and running. Nothing to shoot up into space just repair it and keep going, Maybe build onto it.
Why not scrape that overpriced ISS and spend the money on expanding and improving Mir?
Could it be American arogance? Just because the US did not build it does not mean it's not worthwhile.
Stupid sig.
The Russians run out of Duct tape and Lysol dysinfectant.
Russia pledged 750 million rubles ($27 million) on Thursday to launch two supply craft to keep its aging Mir space station flying until February, Itar-Tass reported, but its fate beyond that remained unclear.
The first line if the article.
Wasn't this the plan last week when you posted a very similar article?
Mir will crash and burn soon.
The basic sleazeware produced in a drunken fury by a bunch of UCBerkeley grad students was still the core of BIND. --PV
Reminds me of "Friday the 13th: Jason Lives", and I think in one of the many sequels, Jason cuts up a bunch of people on a space station.
I see a sequel of a sequel here.
Wow! It sounds like you really want a close encounter with the space fungus. Don't be depressed! It'll fall back to earth eventually!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Couldn't they permanently dock Mir onto ISS?
This would give Mir it's supply link and orbital stability, and instantly give ISS a larger work area and array of instruments.
Admitedly, Mir's instruments are old and it's living quarters not exactly to Hilton standards. it also has it's fongus problems and other issues. but being grafted onto ISS could make Mir an adequate backup solution for both instrumental issues and life support.
Karma karma karma karma karmeleon: it comes and goes, it comes and goes.
How else will NBC get to broadcast "Destination Mir"?
Maybe RSC Energia should hit up NBC for some buck$!
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Sardonica enabled: Isn't it just terrible the way IMF, World Bank and internal Russian money slated for Russian needs ends up in the Gibralter bank accounts of the oligarchs, as, of course, it should -- but when the time comes for the space bureaucracy to be given a little money so they can go through the charade of an international space station with NASA, they don't just turn the money they've been given over to NASA the way they should -- they keep that awful, dirty, creaky, smelly, garbage-heap of a "space station" MIR alive and victimize the one true and only international space station?
Sardonica disabled: NASA, even more than most other bureaucracies, abhors competition. The last thing NASA can tolerate is a major political embarrassment. The worst political embarrassment imaginable is some other, more poorly-funded organization obviously outperforming NASA. Another Shuttle disaster is more politically tolerable than that because NASA can always say, "You just didn't give us enough money so we were forced to cut corners." the way they can do with anything just but only to the extent that it is unique, no matter how wasteful or stupid it is.
So, the uniqueness of the space station is absolutely essential to NASA's politics. Any alternate space station means NASA will continually have to be thinking about what the competition might be doing that could prove embarrassing.
NASA is the true heir of Soviet central planning.
Seastead this.
This also would be a good platform for studying the deterioration of materials in space, (never mind the fungi on board).
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
No people, the station is going down...
Right here people has talked more and more on bringing it down without question.
Yeah it may live theoretically five years more. But do the risks cost it? The station is really old. Everything there is overaged. Even the main structures. Cosmic radiation does not forget about them also... So upon a certain moment such things turns from national pride to a useless weight and a dnagerous headache. I believe that, if the station was not so battered by lack of funds then it could have lived some years more. No one cared and the station got not only older but also beaten... Right now I consider that it is a risk to hold it up there, as future glitches may be too serious to be controlled. Besides if the real wrong thing happens, then it will be a serious financial burden to the Federation. And a blow in prestige.
Frankly, if I was the decisionmaker I would not send the station into sea. No, I would send it to the Moon. This stuff is somehow a museum. Maybe we cannot bring it down in one piece. But today we can send it only in little pieces today. But future generations would manage to do this in a much better way and save this monument of Mankind.
Let the damned thing crash and burn.. what I want is my own personal HoloDeck. Then everyone will be able to synthesize little green monsters on little round planets and there won't be any little edge rednecks running around with shotguns.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
It doesn't "affect" any balance of power, but it's useful nonetheless as a place for common ground and common endeavors. Look at it this way: it's useful for diplomatic relations between you and your playmates if you own and operate a videogame machine (or a terminal for reading slashdot, for that matter). It doesn't give you an extra card to play in times of war, but it does give you something you and your allies can play with in times of peace and build on your relationships.
-- Anne Marie
They were all gung-ho air force jocks with advanced degrees. Geek and jock are not mutually exclusive, you know.
~luge
IAAL,BIANLY
Fucking crack addicted moderators!
As I said elsewhere, crack addicted means you have your head shoved so far up your ass that you cannot smell anything but your own crack.
This seems to be a pre-requisit for moderation anymore. What a fuck-hole!
Bite my yammer.
Mir goes up, Mir goes down, Mir goes up, Mir goes down ...
In case people are still wondering why we get an announcement one week that Mir will come down, and the next week we get one that it will stay up ... and then two or three months down the line the cycle repeats itself ...
The Russian Space Agency is much less in charge of their space program than are the two main contractors (which became private companies after the breakup of the USSR), Energia and Krunichev. These companies can see the writing on the wall: the vaunted Russian space program is no more. They're not sitting around, though. They know that they need to generate business outside of Russia. Energia formed MirCorp as a Western company to attract investment dollars, yes, but also as a base for networking with the European and American aerospace industries.
Some of the constant tug-of-war over ISS and Mir is Energia and Krunichev competing cold-bloodedly for scarce aerospace dollars. Another part of it is these companies singly or jointly playing chicken with the Russian government over the operation of Mir. By forming MirCorp, then holding out their empty pockets, they perform a neat hat trick of appearing to make every effort to attract Western dollars, of appearing to make every effort to become fully privatized and self-sustaining Westernized companies, and of increasing their power to pull the rug out from under the Russian government -- which after all still technically runs the space program and can't bear to see it shut down.
The realistic prospects for MirCorp as a permanent source of funding for Mir were always extremely dubious. Even if you assume that everything in Russia costs less, US$50M is still a ludicrously low figure for the cost of a single Soyuz mission. The true cost to the government of Russia must be several times that. It follows that MirCorp is essentially a way to get hard Western currency directly into the pockets of the Russian space industry, rather than the just-barely-not-worthless Russian government scrip.
If you see another report that Mir is coming down, read it carefully. It's probably a calculated political maneuver, more than hard-and-fast news about the station's fate.
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lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}