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Russia Loses Inflatable Spacecraft
Treeluvinhippy writes: "This article is a little light on details, but it looks like the Russians lost the Demonstrator-2 spacecraft. For those who don't know this craft was the inflatable launched from a submarine. Slashdot has the scoop of the launch right here"
My car insurance company will never believe me when I tell them that I ran into a Russian space craft.
-516
"On Friday, Russia's Ryazan nuclear sub launched Demonstrator-2 on a converted Volna SS-N-18 intercontinental ballistic missile"
Have they tried looking around the Pentagon to see if it landed there? How about the White House? NORAD perhaps? Sometimes those guys forget to take the target off the defaults you know...
To make a pun demonstrates the highest understanding of a language
I wonder how much they are spending on theses launches? I assume that using an ICBM rocket is probably far cheaper and (with nuclear arms cutbacks - especially in long range specs) far more expendable.
Still this is probably costing several million in administration and R&D alone.
Hopefully they are learning a lot and this will aid missions in the future.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Earlier, Babakin Space Center spokeswoman Lidia Avdeyeva confirmed the landing, but efforts to locate the vehicle so far have failed to bear fruit.
And now somebody is sporting the coolest inflatable mattress ever! Keep an eye out for it next time you go to the beach.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Undoubtably if some Russian engineer had remembered to put batteries in the GPS, the mission would have been a "success."
Losing a spacecraft is bad
They are just waiting on Taco Bell to determine the grand prize winner....
*rimshot*
Sent from your iPad.
It's probably as good as anything else Russia's government has produced in the last 10 years.
Kinda rude.... Russia has maintained her space program, despite the inability of the government to afford it. We have cut the living shit outta ours also, and Nasa hasn't been having such a great time with it. Mars?
Russia should be commended for trying a cool idea. reusing ICBM's and creating cheap spacecraft seems like a good idea...Too bad
They can track my stolen vehicle in under a minute but they can't locate a space vehicle!?!?
"If you can't learn to do something well, learn to enjoy doing it poorly"
This makes me wonder, how would they have prevented it from blowing when it reached the vacuum in outer space?
Do you care about the security of your wireless mouse?
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
Of course details are sketchy.... Nobody is buying the Weather Ballon theory this time.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
According to the article:
"Earlier, Babakin Space Center spokeswoman Lidia Avdeyeva confirmed the landing, but efforts to locate the vehicle so far have failed to bear fruit, TVS reported."
They may be covering for their short-sightedness, etc though so who knows. I suppose it depends on how high the inflatable re-entry device was released and what sort of protection it had to re-entry forces/temp. I thought of this as a problem with the concept when I first heard about it.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Why is it that every single post on some good idea that does not come from the USA ends up on /. getting trolled and flamebaited to all hell? One would think , or at least hope, that the kind of people who frequent /. would be a little bit more open minded than that.
Apart from that, I like the idea of this experiment that the Russians are doing. Apart from turning ICBM's into space launchers and having a good way of protecting packages that must return to earth, it seems like it is providing the basic research for Astronaut emergency reentry technology.
It would be nice if Slashdot would leverage it's community and reader base into an effective first-hand account news source. The potential is definitely there... motivation and/or purpose seems lacking though.
/. became something like the Routers service or even like the BBC.
Could be a result of being a subsidiary of VALinux/parent company instead of part of a larger media co.
I think we's all love it if
Vision:
Politically neutral tech and tech related news/media/public forum. It is all of these things already but doesn't take itself seriously... and that very well could be a Good(TM) thing.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
" Russia should be commended for trying a cool idea. reusing ICBM's and creating cheap spacecraft seems like a good idea...Too bad"
Yep and they gotta do 'something' with all those missile/rockets they built during the cold-war... what else are they going to do but strive for an economically appealing and viable use. The US should pay attention, especially at the rate that we obsolete our own National Defense Technology.
A fool throws a stone into a well and a thousand sages can not remove it.
Then again, maybe their aim is so off that we would have all survived a WW3
This just in, Canada brutalized by Russian nuclear weapons... 10 dead. Film @ 11...
Hey, if they had used Duct tape it would have worked. That stuff lasts forever!
Have you compiled your kernel today??
Or the fact that ~70% of the ISS is of Russian construction and design?
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"This makes me wonder, how would they have prevented it from blowing when it reached the vacuum in outer space?
The same way you keep an ordinary balloon from exploding. Make sure that the balloon's materials can take the pressure difference.
There's nothing magical about vacuum.
Yup, the same you keep the astronauts suit from exploding, and the same way you keep the space shuttle from exploding and the same way planes can fly at 30,000 feet and the people inside can still breath but the plane doesn't explode.
What?
I'd say it was probably struck by some of the space junk that's orbiting the earth at thousands of miles per hour. They should ask the folks on the ISS to keep an eye out for a deflated beach ball.
No wonder they can't find it, check the webpage of the GPS part makers GPS Tracking of the IRDT-2 Re-entry Capsule quote: "...The IRDT-2 capsule will be launched by a Volna rocket from a Kalmar type submarine in the Baltic sea north of Murmansk..."
Murmansk is nowhere near the Baltics...
A Cool idea but not a new idea. The Apollo program's Saturn boosters were NASA's first man rated booster that wasn't a recycled ICBM. All the Mercury and Gemini astronaunts rode ICBMs into space.
Quemadmodum gladius neminem occidit, occidentis telum est
.. the natives are worshipping their newly discovered floating God.
Rogue members have tried unsucessfully to rid their new God, but the rocks and sticks they throw at it magically bounce off and repel back.
Live web cams
It has just become invalid. After you changed it, see if you can book a trip there and see for yourself.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Produced perhaps, yes... but the various military and civilan design bureaus in Russia can still out-engineer many western top outfits, especially in military and aerospace.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Natalie Portman is so last year. Now it's all about Kirsten Dunst.