Next Goals For The ESA

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Posted by timothy on Monday January 19, 2004 @05:21PM from the cheese-mining-lunar-base dept.

zeux writes "With all the news we got recently from space I tried to gather some information about the next goals of the ESA (European Space Agency). Along with a space vehicle designed to carry supplies to the ISS between 2004 and 2013, they are working on the new 'Vega' launcher (2006) and still playing with the SMART-1 probe which is slowly heading to the moon testing an ion drive that is ten times more efficient than the usual chemical systems (1500 hours cumulated thrust time so far)."

8 of 178 comments (clear)

Ion drives... by FooAtWFU · 2004-01-19 17:23 · Score: 1, Funny

Efficient, but not fast. :) 1500 hours thrust time and they're still not there? Meh.

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1. Re:Ion drives... by WolfWithoutAClause · 2004-01-20 07:00 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  The good news is that fusion is only 30 years away, unlike 50 years ago, when it was 50 years away.
  
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  -WolfWithoutAClause
  "Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"
Re:Apart from the costs of launch by Anonymous Coward · 2004-01-19 17:32 · Score: 1, Funny

Having them thrown back at you when the colonies revolt.

Sieg Jion!
Re:Apart from the costs of launch by kfg · 2004-01-19 17:35 · Score: 5, Funny

What are the technical obstacles to Lagrange point colonies?

Mostly all that vacuum and radiation and fast moving rocks and stuff.

Ya know. The usual.

KFG
Additional picture of Vega launcher by nacturation · 2004-01-19 18:17 · Score: 2, Funny

available here

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France? by graveyardduckx · 2004-01-19 18:44 · Score: 1, Funny

With the Control Center for the transport to the ISS being in France, would this be the "French Transport to ISS" or the "Freedom Transport to ISS"? I still call them French Fries....
Re:IIRC by houghi · 2004-01-19 19:41 · Score: 3, Funny

Concorde was a miracle, and probably the limit of English/French co operation

Other things DO work. CERN is ione, wich brought us HTTP. Airbus is another example. The question remains if Europe wants it at this moment. It will naturaly be good footage on newsprograms. OTOH it will draw away money that could have been used better. I am not saying it would not be a good idea. I just wonder if the money spend can't be used better.

I also wonder if we already know all there is to know about the moon, because we send things to mars and not the moon, or is that just imagebuilding?

Also let us not forget the last time Europe send somebody into the unknown. He stumbled upon a new continent. Look what mess that brought us in. Europe does not want to make that same mistake again. ;-)

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Beagle by Anonymous Coward · 2004-01-19 20:06 · Score: 5, Funny

Beagle is alive! I just got a message from it in my inbox! Lemme double-click it and see what it says..

Oh.. wait...