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New Russian Space Station 'Real Possibility'
su-geek writes: "BBC is reporting that the Russians are looking into the feasibility of a commercial space station. The Station would be used to promote space tourism and would help pay for future supply missions to the ISS." I think they should get into the business of crashing space stations into the Pacific, and bringing tourists on boats to watch the fireworks.
The sad thing about space travel is that it is currently being used for science. Don't mistake me here though - I happen to think that science is the best possible use for space programs, if anything there is not enough money to go around for scientific research in any field.
Currently, the only real "business" in putting things into space is in military hardware and communications satelites. If "big business" gets involved in space tourism, (and here is the key!) and space tourism becomes profitable, more advancements into space travel will be achived. It is ironic really, that profit will create a drive for better space accesability than research does.
The more trips that there are into space, the more the process will become streamlined - and the greater the economic drive to make it less expensive to get people into space.
And finally, just like the article mentions - space tourists coule cover much of the cost of space missions. This would allow for more research to take place in space.
All in all. It is about time.
Now if we were only able to put nuclear powered spaceships in space (such as the "Orion" design mentioned by Carl Sagan in Cosmos) and have craft capable of 1/10 the speed of light.
Perhaps someday.
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I tried submitting information on just this issue several hours ago and it got rejected. Anyway here's the scoop I had.
MirCorp, despite the ditching of their namesake, is still in the business of space tourism. They have proposed a new space station dubbed "Mini Station 1", which would house 3 space tourists for upto 20 days at a time. They hope to make a commercial venture of it through corporate endorsements and giving clients with ultra deep pockets an out of this world vacation. This news story gives additional response from the Russian Space Agency and the spacecraft builder Energia.
The runway at Baikonur has just been refurbished, this is the runway that was built specifically for the Buran and AN225.
Reportadly Buran is virtually ready to fly with very little work, strap on an Energia and boosters roll her out to the pad and jump on in.
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Reminds me of the story of the "space pen". At the dawn of the space age, astronauts needed the ability to write in zero gravity environments. The trouble is that the ball point pen needs gravity to work. NASA spent a million bucks (in the 1960s, when that was still a lot) developing the "space pen" which can write in space (or upside down back here on Earth).
Facing the same problem, the Soviets used pencils.
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I just came back from a 9 week trip to Russia a little over a month ago. Yes, they have some severe economic problems, mostly stemming from corruption. The government needs to stamp out corruption within the country in order for an economy to thrive. Stamp out corruption and they would be fine, trust me.
As for Russia throwing away its science programs, that is just plain dumb. They cannot afford to have another brain drain. Frankly, what space has is money. Tito payed $20 million dollars to go up in space for a while. If I remember correctly the Soyez space vehicle only takes roughly $10 million per launch. This is money in the pocket. Money desparately needed to fund other programs, education, military, science, you name it. Russia IS focusing on rebuilding their "ruined" country by focusing on space.
Doctors are not paid in trade by the government anymore. There are not huge lines for buying food at markets. In fact I bought food at a fancy place called an univermag, which translates to supermarket, where they had everything that a US supermarket would have except for the automatic doors. Moscow looks as clean and modern, discounting the 14th-19th century architecture that seems randomly scattered about the city and the lack of a "sky line", as most of Denver. St. Petersburg is going through major restoration as they prepair for their 300th birthday in 2003. While I was there a good portion of the St. Petersburg lost hot water because they were fixing all of the pipes.
Russia is focusing on rebuilding their country, and if it weren't for the corruption, they would be doing very well. People are working hard to try and get their country back on track. I am not surprised at how frustrated they get, and the drinking they do, when all of that hard work seems to be going nowhere as the ruble slips to the dollar weekly. They are hard working people, and smart people, they just don't have a handle on capitalism yet, nor have they eliminated the biggest problem that is preventing their economy from growing.
I only wish that the US honored and reviered its scientists and poets as the Russians do. They continue to fund science because they know that when their economy turns around, their being on par, or slightly behind, the rest of the major economic players scientifically is going to be necessary. When their economy turns around they will be a major force quickly.
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