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House Asks NASA to Postpone Space Plane
PipianJ writes "The House Science Committee has requested NASA to postpone the orbital space plane program (official letter (pdf)), thanks to lingering concern about the safety of the existing space program. On the other hand, isn't one of the ideas behind the orbital space plane program the fact that our current space program is getting more unsafe through the use of 20-year-old equipment?" The Senate is also getting into the act.
saftey should be paramount, and if that isn't the case I would urge congress to put a stop all manned flights until that is the case.
When anger rises, think of the consequences.
Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC)
>> ...isn't one of the ideas behind the orbital space plane program the fact that our current space program is getting more unsafe through the use of 20-year-old equipment.
No. The idea behind the prbital space plane is find a way for NASA to shovel money to a few big quasi-monopolies.
NASA's been trying to put wings on spacecraft for decades. They've spent bilions and they still don't know how to do it. There's no guarantee that a space plane will be any safer than the Shuttle. Remember, old technology didn't crash the Colombia.
There are other, cheaper, ways to get people to and from orbit. We've been able to do that, safely, for more than 40 years. Since we know how to do that, we ought to concentrate on going someplace in space (where wings are pointless, obviously) rather than some useless technical chimera like the orbital space plane.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Check out the FAA or NTSB websites to determine the cause of airplane accidents. Some of them actually were because of worn out parts!
Probably one of the more famous ones was an Alaska Airlines flight that crashed in the pacific off the coast of oregon. A worn out worm gear in the rudder actuator was the cause. The gear wore out in part due to poor maintenance.
Apparently Robert Zubrin, manned Mars mission advocate, is going to testify as part of this review. At the moment the US is spending $3 billion/year on the shuttle, and an unknown amount on the new OSP (Orbital Space Plane), all without any clear objective in mind. It is very hard not to feel, at least as far as manned exporation goes, NASA is floundering at the moment.
It is me worth re-posting this related extract from a piece posted on www.space.com, by Robert Zubrin - an advocate of reform in the US space program - interesting reading...
In the recent Columbia hearings, numerous members of congress continually decried the fact that the US space program is "stuck in Low Earth Orbit." This is certainly a serious problem. If it is to be addressed adequately, however, America's political leadership needs to reexamine NASA's fundamental mode of operation.
Over the course of its history, NASA has employed two distinct modes of operation. The first, prevailed during the period from 1961-1973, and may therefore be called the Apollo Mode. The second, prevailing since 1974, may usefully be called the Shuttle Era Mode, or Shuttle Mode, for short.
In the Apollo Mode, business is conducted as follows. First, a destination for human spaceflight is chosen. Then a plan is developed to achieve this objective. Following this, technologies and designs are developed to implement that plan. These designs are then built, after which the mission is flown.
The Shuttle Mode operates entirely differently. In this mode, technologies and hardware elements are developed in accord with the wishes of various technical communities. These projects are then justified by arguments that they might prove useful at some time in the future when grand flight projects are initiated.
Contrasting these two approaches, we see that the Apollo Mode is destination driven, while the Shuttle Mode pretends to be technology driven, but is actually constituency driven. In the Apollo Mode, technology development is done for mission directed reasons. In the Shuttle Mode, projects are undertaken on behalf of various internal and external technical community pressure groups and then defended using rationales. In the Apollo Mode, the space agency's efforts are focused and directed. In the Shuttle Mode, NASA's efforts are random and entropic.
Imagine two couples, each planning to build their own house. The first couple decides what kind of house they want, hires an architect to design it in detail, then acquires the appropriative materials to build it. That is the Apollo Mode. The second couple polls their neighbors each month for different spare house-parts they would like to sell, and buys them all, hoping to eventually accumulate enough stuff to build a house. When their relatives inquire as to why they are accumulating so much junk, they hire an architect to compose a house design that employs all the knick-knacks they have purchased. The house is never built, but an adequate excuse is generated to justify each purchase, thereby avoiding embarrassment. That is the Shuttle Mode.
In today's dollars, NASA average budget from 1961-1973 was about $17 billion per year. This is only 10% more than NASA's current budget. To assess the comparative productivity of the Apollo Mode with the Shuttle Mode, it is therefore useful to compare NASA's accomplishments between 1961-1973 and 1990-2003, as the space agency's total expenditures over these two periods were equal.
Between 1961 and 1973, NASA flew the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, Ranger, Surveyor, and Mariner missions, and did all the development for the Pioneer, Viking, and Voyager missions as well. In addition, the space agency developed hydrogen oxygen rocket engines, multi-staged heavy-lift launch vehicles, nuclear rocket engines, space nuclear reactors, radioisotope power generators, spacesuits, in-space life support systems, orbital rendezvous techniques, soft landing rocket technologies, interplanetary navigation technology, deep space data tr
"You lied to me! There is a Swansea!"
Robert Park is best known as the wit behind the APS What's New newsletter, a fantastic weekly mailing of science and policy-related blurbs. Park is also responsible for Voodoo Science, a book that debunks science myths and demonstrates how to identify science scams.
While Bob Park's name still appears in the credits, I think his involvement with the newsletter has lessed somewhat since his run-in with an oak tree a few years back. The witty remark per sentence ratio just hasn't been the same.
John Harrison wasn't a cabinet maker. He was a clock maker and an unschooled mechanical genius. He was also, apparently, almost impossible to understand. You failed to mention an important constraint: The chronometer had to keep time while at sea, which is what made the task so difficult. The british wanted this because it would give them the ability to determine longitude accurately on long voyages.
What you also don't mention about Harrison is that he was not a member of the Royal Society, and had powerful enemies inside it. This made it very difficult for him to collect his reward. He had to wait many many years.
The current X-prize task is one thing. Getting a substantial payload into orbit is another. The other goals you mention are even more lofty. I don't think any organization could afford to do it just on the hope of winning a prize.
MM
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If anyone's interested in the current state of asteroid mining tech, have a look here. Thought provoking stuff.
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
The answer to the question is not as straight forward as you might think.
I remember reading that the astronauts of Apollo 15 were able to gather an equal the amount of gross geological survey information of all the unmanned spacecraft (the rangers and surveyors totalling about 45 hours) in the first 15 seconds of being on the moon. The astronauts, trained in the expected geology of the moon were able to observe and develop plans for closer study much faster than what was possible with the probes and humans have the ability to move about very easily compared to a robot. Apparently this ratio (three hours of machine time equals 1 second of trained human time) has been proven repeatedly in different studies.
Along with this, despite some amazing work arounds over the years (I'm thinking of the Pioneer 10/11 stuck bits and Galileo's faulty high gain antenna specifically), humans can fix problems at the source and have a high degree of success working with damaged equipment.
So, I think the answer is that we do want a human presence in Earth orbit, the moon is probably just as certain, but going further out, the costs in supplying and protecting humans quickly outweigh their usefulness. I would think that it would never be cost effective to send humans to any of the outer planets.
Probably the more important question is, is it appropriate/cost effective to send humans to Mars and the asteroid belt?
myke
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