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Russian Group Plans Manned Mars Mission By 2011
weekendwarrior1980 writes "A group of Russian space experts on Friday announced an ambitious plan to send a six-man crew to Mars within a decade, a project it said would cost only $3.5 billion. Russian space officials dismissed the project as nonsense. They plan to have 6 people explore Mars for months before returning to Earth. The Mission would take 3 years, and would depend on fully equipped spacecraft containing its own garden, medical facilities etc."
Should be just about as feasible as the Bush space plan.
Oh wait...
Of course it is nonsense... the russians barely have enough money to keep the country afloat, let alone spend on a manned trip to Mars.
That's almost as crazy as Bush wanting to send people to Mars... How about getting the deficit under control???
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
In Soviet Russia, Mars plans impossible trip to YOU!
(Previous victims include: One Beagle)
It's about time someone set a goal like this. Human expansion to Mars is a great idea -- it will push our technology (and some human beings in the process) to new limits. Personally, I've always wanted to go to Mars... I just don't want to take the trip there. Zero gee ain't for me! (Even if it's just for a while until we get a centrifuge running)
Sounds like they read Mars, by Ben Bova, recently. :P
Good luck to 'em.
Beware he who would deny you access to information,
for in his heart he dreams himself your master.
I wonder if I announced my own space program I could get on Slashdot too!!
I'm gonna get there in THREE years and stay for 17 months and only need a taxi and a Swiss Army Knife!!
I haven't posted in so long, my sig is out of date.
Alexandrov didn't explain how his firm would raise the funds, but said one of the reasons he thought such a mission would be profitable was it could involve a "reality" television show.
Just what we need. Survivor in space. You don't even want to know what happens to the guy who gets voted off the spaceship.
My first reaction on reading this, like the Russian bigwigs', was "bullshit." A Mars mission for a signle percentile of the estimated cost, with funding from a TV show? It sounds like every bad sci-fi "masterpiece" ever written by an over-enthusiastic fourteen-year-old.
... what if they know something NASA and the Russian equivalent don't know? I mean, just about every time some obscure group of private would-be genius inventors announces something great, it turns out to be vaporware. But every once in a while, these obscure people turn out to be the Wright brothers, or Goddard.
But
So, what if they pull it off? What actually happens then?
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Good, luck. Maybe they can get some duck tape, M80's and vinegar and baking soda.
you are going to need at least a zippo and a top hat as well.
The "Insert Quote Here" line is almost as predictable as inserting an actual quote.
Seems to me that any "low cost" mission to mars would be suicide seeing as it's still dangerous with expensive NASA tech, I sure wouldn't want to get on a ship for mars that only cost 3.5 billion, seeing as the U.S. has Bombers that cost 1 Billion and a bomber is far simpler than an interplanetary voyage.
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Imagine the exclusive tv rights for the entire trip! Plus selling one of the seats to the highest bidder, you could get enough funding if you had a good start and credibility, and didnt blow 40% of the budget on hookers and booze like most government contracters (they then outsource the project for 20% of the budget and keep the rest).
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
While it is indisputable that the technology that is required to travel to Mars and establish a rudimentary colony around the hull of the space craft and any transported plants and animals exists and can be taken to Mars (at great cost), it is highly doubtful that they would be able to bring themselves back from the red planet.
The cost of taking the fuel for the return trip would be absolutely astronomical considering the extensive modifications necessary to ensure that the fuel does not leak over the course of the three year mission.
Besides all that, should we really be sending living organisms to a virtually uncontaminated environment so soon? We have just discovered real evidence of flowing water once existing on the planet, and this in turn could lead to evidence of fossilized microbes and other lifeforms that we would threaten with destruction if we were to introduce Earth microbes that the Martian microbes could not fight.
More study is needed, as is more thought on the impact of colonizing Mars. We will no doubt go there eventually and it may become our home away from home, but sending up a bunch of Russians to tromp around what may be a life-rich planet (under the surface) seems like a mission of putting the cart before the horse.
I have been pwned because my
I have my doubts that this project will end in 6 astronauts on Mars by 2011 for 3.5 billion, but it's good to see that there are people who are dedicated to continuing the manned exploration of space. I wish the best of luck to this group and hope that their project can generate some support for this goal.
_____
Thank you.
George has his plan, and Russians have their plan... It looks like the US has been served!
I can see the movie now... Space Race 2: Mars
It'll come to a thrilling climax. The Russian plan is filled with set backs allowing the US to catch up. But the Russians manage to launch first! But the US manages to catch up at the last minute and astronauts from both teams come touching down at nearly the same time.
No one knows who landed first! And there's only one way to prove who gets the title: It's On!
...in Russia, in aerospace/military contracts, it's unlikely the gov would be paying $1100 for a screwdriver, $90 for a single common LED, $150 for a single rack-mounting bolt etc.
If a New Zealander can construct a viable cruise missile for less than $5000US, then quite possibly $3.5B would go as far in Russia as $200B goes in the USA
-- In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was UNSIGNED, and the main(){} was without form and void...
I got this news from my 88 year old Grandmother today before it was posted on Slashdot. Oh well so much for getting the tech news fast on a holiday weekend.
It's funny, the Russians say it'll take $6.5 billion, privately funded, officials say it's impossible on such a budget. The Bush administration says it'll take $12 billion over five years, without setting a definitive timeline for a mission. "Experts" say it'll take upwards of a TRILLION $ and suspect it to happen, at the soonest, a decade. Everyone is just speculating, estimating and without any real plan or budget.
Sounds simplistic but what happens if we just split the bill?
Photo Aspect -- an open, free, J2EE & JBoss photoalbu
I'll send them up for 4 years, with a stop on the moon thrown in as a bonus, only for $2 billion. I'd like my money in advance in gold nuggets in unmarked bags please.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
You have been voted off the crew. It's time to say goodbye and enter the airlock.
1) The first stage will be comprised of the entire population standing on each other's shoulders. Distance: 176,000 miles.
2) Thrust for the second stage will be provided by shaken up coke cans. Stick it to those capitalist swine.
3) Remaining thrust will be provided by removing the vacuum tubes from the flight computer and throwing them behind the ship.
4) The return journey... uhh... screw it, let's invade a neighboring country!
In all honesty, I wish the Russians had the American budget. They have proven their worth more than once in innovation, and it's a shame they can no longer afford it.
webpage
And does the russian space program have $3.5 billion? Last I checked they weren't even able to pay for the space missions they're doing already, and their contributions to the ISS were finished with NASA's money.
I mean, it isn't like I've been paying *that* much attention, but still, they don't seem to be doing great over there.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
"They plan to have 6 people explore Mars for months before returning to Earth. The Mission would take 3 years, and would depend on fully equipped spacecraft containing its own garden, medical facilities etc."
So sending 6 people there and bringing them back. Ok, so you got a space craft loaded with a garden, a medical facility, and a way of getting there and back. What they don't tell you is the people are expected to die about 2 months into the jouney, and the exploration on Mars will be done by bots. Afterwards, the robots are to be brought back to earth.
-Grump
Maybe that is what is going to happen, oh well. What do I know, I'm taking a history class, not a futre-ory space travel class.
Is it true that more people vote for the winner of American Idol, than vote for the president? -Ali G.
Public relations make me GIGGLE! OW! My tummy hurts.
I regularly report MSN spam to the Hotmail admins.
Let me know when they've got Paul Allen sitting behind them when they make one of these announcements.
"Who wants to mate with a martian"
"The Red World"
"Space Rules"
"Last Cosmanaut Standing"
"Inter-Planetary Idol"
"Paradise Planet"
and last but not least "Stupid"
It's all good.
This sounds like a cool sci-fi series. When does it air?
Throw in a roll of duct tape, then you're talking.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
3 years? maybe they should send more than one ship. each having enough on board to support the other if a failure happens. it wouldn't be to much fun having an electric failure millions of miles from no where. the aaa takes long enough on earth!
Alexandrov didn't explain how his firm would raise the funds, but said one of the reasons he thought such a mission would be profitable was it could involve a "reality" television show. Episode II Trump: Igor, your incorrect math has wasted 3 days of valuable research time. This is unacceptable. Put on your spacesuit. You're going to be shot into space. You're fired. (turns to rest of crew) Trump: As for the rest of you, enjoy your trip to the very best craters on Mars, the "Trump Craters."
Why not simply send a few ships to Mars. Have a couple go ahead with the items needed then send the group afterwards. They could go once it's been determined the primary vessels have arrived safely and are ready for human use.
Has Comcast disconnected your Internet account? Same here. You can read about it at http://comcastissue.blogspot.com
Sounds like Red Thunder with real reds.
(Or do we not call russkis reds anymore? I lose track...)
"Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer." - Linux Advocac
nt
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
It was 10 days ago sheesh.
I suppose this group will become the first to claim land for itself on Mars. They can't claim it as an appropriation by claim of sovereignty for Russia, but if it's a private mission they should be able to claim it for themselves, or Fox-Media-Rocket-Corp or whoever.
The Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space says nothing about non-state missions, unfortunately. I'm not even sure the rules apply to entities not parties to the treaty.
Is there a doctor of law in the building?
The only thing that I like about this article is the notion that a voyage to Mars could be made into a reality TV show. Because that's what it should be.
Space exploration is exactly that - exploration, and not science. Every time I turn on the news, I hear of a group that's trying to mountain-bike to the pole, or walk to the pole unsupported, or hot-air balloon to the pole, or walk there backwards. It's so futile it makes me weep.
I believe that exploration is a human need, important to us even when it serves no tangible purpose. Leave the poles to the Scientists. It's time to head for Mars!
Of course they can do it with just $3.5 billion, because they'll be just faking it all from a studio in St Petersburg!
They'll get to Mars by 2011??? HAH! :-)
You are going to attempt interplanetary travel without a towel ? jebus you really dont know what your doing
I remember seeing a documentary when I was a child that said that the Soviet (this was coldwar times) Energia-Vulkan rocket could power a mission all the way to mars and back. Apparently Energia Vulkan was scrapped for Energia Buran (the launch rocket for the now defunct Russian shuttle), but Energia Vulkan's design is an Energia Buran with a total of 8 boosters . . . Apparently its not that different from from the Energia Buran (built to launch the now defunct Russian shuttle). A few details here
a project it said would cost only $3.5 billion.
Were they planning on coming back?
Is this a new space race I smell? Things like this can ONLY be healthy for the space program. American pride will now be greatly hurt if Russia beats them to Mars. Personally, I feel like cooking some popcorn and taking a decade to eat it.
I say quite sending ppl to planet and then bringing them back. Send them there one-way. If this was a one-way mission, you can bet that they would find a way to survive. In addition, they would pave the way for a real base.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
...is broadcast a 24-hr zero-gravity sex webcam, and they'd have ALL THE MONEY THEY WANTED.
If some group had a ship going to mars, how many people would line up to go? How many scientists would be willing to sacrifice their health and safety to be one of the first to set foot on and study another planet?
Simply by being held accountable by the government and the people, NASA is never going to be able to say "Well, this ship will get you there, but we can't guarantee that you will live to make it, and we can't guarantee that you won't get cancer by the time you get back. But hey, you get to go to Mars!"
Where as, a private firm only has to have a lawyer draw up a suitably impressive release of liability, and start charging for tickets.
More power to them, I hope they make it. It will push those damn lolly-gaggers in our over managed space program to actually acheive something instead of throwing money at quadrupal fail-safe indestructible toilet seats.
If you are one in a million, then there are six thousand people who are just like you.
So it seems that the Russians have discovered out-sourcing to India as well.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
actualy, you forgot another potential racer, china. china is like the old URSS, the can raise a unlimited capital for any given programme. (i.e. put staff working for the nation/for free). an actually, perhapse /.ers and OSDN members would work for free as well, if the space programme knowledge is shared under the GPL.
A cool concept for the reality tv show would be something like a Joe Millionaire twist.
Like maybe, they get to Mars and then you tell them we're not really bringing them back.
I know I'd watch.
Didn't anyone watch Total Recall?? MARS = BAD!.. unless of course we discover the scecret to the aliens atmosphere machine!
Wanna bet that if they actually do try this, every single one of those 6 people sent to mars will be dead before the three years is up?
I got a really bad feeling about this... we should try sending a robot to mars and getting it back in one piece before we send living people only to discover that we can't get them back home.
the second era of colonialism
Low-cost mars mission.....
Low-cost technology.....
Unproven Russian technology....
plus a reality show...
Could we plllleeeease send Donald Trump... and Ryan Seacrest and have the first 'good' space disaster*?
*The only exception being Appolo 13 which was a "good disaster". Tons of stuff went wrong and the mission was a failure. However, nobody got hurt, and the whole ordeal proved twice-over the quality of American engineering and ingenuity.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
In Soviet Russia... The project funds you.
... would be on china too, IF they used russian brains to bootstrap it, and IF the "blackops" boys in the "coalition of the willing to profit" didn't sabotage them, which I think will most likely happen once china starts their moon projects.
Basically, even if the US doesn't do more advanced manned space really soon, I don't think they want any other power or nation or private concern to do it either. And I think they would dirty tricks any effort to do so, frankly. They have "we will own the high ground" down as a religious catechism.
Fly me to the Moon
And let me play among the stars
Let me see what spring is like
On Jupiter and Mars
Ad Astra
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
These people are clearly making hooch out of cleaning solvents...if you can't afford vodka, comrade, how the hell are you going to come up with the ludicrous $3.5 billion pricetag you've put on your mission?
You couldn't launch a mission to the moon for $3.5 billion. Hell, you couldn't spend $3.5 billion and make the public forget Brian DePalma's shitheap Mission to Mars much less launch a real mission.
Stop drinking the glass cleaner, comrade, and call us when you sober up.
blog |
Why attempt landing? Better to fly there and go for direct bulls-eye crash into crater.
I suggest you read Slashdot
Assuming that this group uses a Proton launcher (the heavy Russian launcher currently used to lift ISS sections and Soyuz spacecraft) they would only be able to lift 44,000 lbs into LEO per launch.
The likely weight for a fully-fueled Mars base would be in the neighborhood of 1 million pounds - and that's being conservative. You not only need the habitation modules, but the garden modules, consumables for three years, and propellant. 2 million might be closer.
That's about 23 launches to just to get all the material in LEO.
A Proton launch costs about $35-$70 million dollars.
That's $1.14 billion, just to get everything into LEO. Even then, that's a conservative estimate. The real costs, depending on weight could be close to $3 billion.
That doesn't include the hundreds of millions in R&D needed to develop a working spacecraft, training for astronauts, keeping a working command and control center for 3 years, insurance, legal fees, or any of the other costs.
In short, this doesn't even pass the smell test.
The Russians had the N-1 moon rocket, which they did not brag about because they blew it up 3 or 4 times and never could get it to work.
One of the beauties of "capitalism" was once the government came up with a Moon program (Apollo, Saturn, lunar-orbit rendezvous), they stuck with it and threw money at it until it happened. One of the ironies of centrally-planned "communism" is that weren't sure if they were even in a race to the Moon, and when it was decided they were in such a race, they scrapped all their earlier plans and decided to follow the plan of the "capitalists" (L-1/LK, N-1, lunar-orbit rendezvous), only their head rocket airframe guy was in some kind of snit with their head rocket engine guy, so he had to get a jet engine guy to build him a rocket engine that was so underpowered that he needed 30 of them on the first stage, and the original rocket engine guy went over to the rival rocket airframe guy who was running steady political interference to get the whole program scrapped and start over with the second rocket airframe guy and the original rocket engine guy.
While the Russian Moon program was underfunded and supposedly got a lot less money than the American one, and would have worked if their rocket didn't blow up, I wonder how may guys they had working on L-1/LK/N-1 and if it was really fewer guys than Apollo/Saturn?
And how is it that the Russians who couldn't get a successful N-1 launch were able to get (I believe) 2 successful Energia launches without any failures. And how many guys did they have working over what period of time to pull that one off? And even given the starvation wages a person makes in Russian aerospace these days, does the small-n billion dollars for a Russian Mars program make sense?
Even if they throw safety out the window, they are going to need to bring back the Energia, which I understand that exists only as an enormous doorstop right now, and the level of effort of the Energia is a minimum requirement for just getting off the ground.
While I don't know the credibility of their "experts", the experts vs. officials notion vaguely reminds me of the oh-so-many ways the Bush administration ignores experts hmm? ;-)
In all seriousness, I'd love to see it happen, or at least get more discussion going on realistic WAYS to make it happen sooner, safer, and cheaper. I seem to recall reading that one of the obstacles was figuring out how to provide enough food and oxygen for the long trip... it would make sense to have an onboard garden of some sort, to help with both. IMVHO it will also be important to really collaborate with scientists all over the world and pool everyone's knowledge and resources. (AFTER we've got things on our own planet a little more stable, of course.) I don't know if a manned Mars mission could be done with quite the same "we're gonna get there first, nyah nyah!" mentality as the early space race.
On a side note, I read one of the titles at the bottom as "Peru excavates 1,500 tourists from Inca ruins" and said WHAAAA?
"We are the first generation to influence the climate and the last generation to escape the consequences." - John McCain
In soviet Russia Mars flies to you!
--- [Insert intresting Sig here]
That said, perhaps they have a chance. Part of the reason a US Mars mission is going to be so expensive is that we want to carefully set up mars for human exploration. That means that in addition to crashing probes into the planet, as we did for the moon, we are also going to send slow transport ships to provision the planet for a long comfortable human stay, as well as the return vehicle. For the actual crew transport, we will use a very expensive trajectory that will get them to mars quickly. Once there, I think we plan to keep them on planet for a year or so.
From the timeline we can assume the Russians are going just going to load up a ship with as much stuff as possible and send it on it's way. The three year mission timeline with several months on the planet indicates that they will use the minimum energy/longest duration flight path. This will significantly reduce fuel costs at the expense on human provisions. Perhaps a single nuclear drive will get them there and back. They will likely stay on the planet just long enough to meet the return launch requirements. If they use a moon lander type ship, then the big ship will only have to have fuel to enter and leave orbit. This is a significantly more risky venture. They are probably likely to reach the planet, even odds to survive until they can leave, and probably starve on the way back, but that has pretty much been the norm for exploration over human history.
All this is just a guess. I haven't really looked at the mars mission profiles in a long time.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Insert your red planet jokes here! :)
Seriously though, goverment agengies overestimating budgets and scoffing that any other nation is capable of achieving thier goals before them? Gosh thats unprecidented...
-- - REDWiRE
Quote:
"There are two goals here: to be the first ones and to show the rest of the wold that this is possible."
I love it - the typo even sounds Russian.
... guess they got that part down, they COULD do it. Most interesting. Maybe this private company made a deal to get ahold of some surplus of these babies at pennies(whatever a russky penny is) on the ruble, maybe that's why they think it can be done cheap. It'll certainly haul the cargo.
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
Just keep shooting food to them.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
I can understand a ghetto style trip without all the luxuries, but Space Suits are complicated pieces of equipment and last time I checked, NASA's contracted suits cost $10m US each. I'd imagine a custom designed Martian suit would be way more than.
Either way, eventually the aerospace industry will come down in price. I doubt it will be this dramatic though.
Like Teddy with an elephant gun.
Let's assume for a second that these people actually somehow wind up making it as far as putting six human beings into space. They don't necessarily have to make it to Mars, but they've gone out of Earth's atmosphere. Call me the skeptic, but I don't think these "astronauts" are going to survive (whether or not they make it to Mars, I don't know - I personally think they might be able to get close, but at most will die on landing).
So, what happens when a private company sends humans beings into space and they die? Governments around the world will put a cap on private space travel. They'll probably even write up an international treaty banning it, giving governments monopolies over space travel/technology.
Private space travel hasn't begun yet, and it'd certainly be a horrible thing if it's stopped before it starts due to some idiots with a reality TV show.
--
http://nemilar.net - Not your grandmother's soup kitchen
You have a bunch of hacker in their backyard that can do a software that can do a job for 1/100 or 1/1000 of the cost that IBM would charge. Probably you will have a cheap interface, some bugs, but if you only want to do the job for cheap, it CAN be possible. Maybe one bug would be a major failure, so we will crash the mission. But you will always find volunteers to go to mars, even if we tell them that there is 1% chance of comming back, or even 0%. So, why not try? The BEST try in my opinion would be to try to establish a permanent colonization on mars : bring the stuff to generate electricity : with electricity, you can recycle CO2 in O2, you can heat, you can generate light to make plants grow and eat them. Bring the stuff to make the living people here able to produce the basic : electricity and food. After this, when people can think about something else than survival, we will have another earth. I will never see that from my living, but my hopes are that this comes fast.
A ship with its own garden? 3 years? I assume that they want to create a somewhat sustainable ecosystem . . . We couldn't even get that right on Earth . . . see biosphere 2 This sounds more than a little idealistic . . .
It's funny how these asshats can't keep up their end of the space station bargain, and yet they've got money to go to Mars. Who the #$@#@%^ are they kidding?
Russia, give it up! You have no money. Please stop pretending to be a world power. It's not 1980 anymore.
04/01/2011
Sheesh.
Where would one find an accredited medical professional willing to commit rocket assisted suicide with 5 strangers who will be sucking vacuume with him when space decides to get "real?" Witch-doctors don't count.
I know that after episode 3 (when they all decide to space themselves after taking a look at their radiation badges and discover they've already got twice their expected trip dosage), I'm flipping the channel. Who wants to watch desecated corpses float for 10 more episodes while Vangelis plays in the background?
Russia's space history is impressive in some areas, but not Mars. I don't think I'd sign up to be an astronaut for this mission when Russia hasn't landed anything on the surface, and most of the orbital probes have failed. The Martian Defense Network takes a toll on everyone, but seems to take special delight in shooting down Russian craft.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
So, Russia has finally got that movie set?
Posting this AC cause people aren't ready for this kind of mentality in most parts of the western world.
In the second short story in the collection of "The Man Who Sold the Moon". I forget the actual title but basically people are living on the moon and the story (only 20 pages or so) highlights why Mars sucks unless we have unlimited technology. Heinlien has been right about everything so far, so I trust his judgement
"If they existed, they would be here already." - Enrico Fermi
ONOS A RED PLANET WILL BE BORN
onos this little shout thing is annoying caps rule
..its not capitalism there to help fund this.
American spacecraft, Russian spacecraft, both made in Taiwan.
Moo!
I'll believe it when I see it.
---
I didn't want to leave this space blank.
I doubt that this company really has the financial backing to do this. But upon thinking about it, I suspect that they do. Russia has proven that they can get us there (good rockets) and survive in space (1.5 years vs american 6 months). I am guessing that this group has an American backer who believes in getting us off this rock, but with a real plan. Is there anybody who has been backing space programs? anybody who has backed the X-prize as well as the group who was the front-runner from the gitgo? anybody who fits in the top 10 richest ppl in the world?
I suspect that Paul is backing these guys. This is the same guy who bet on a small software start-up, moved into a new industry called internet over cable ( he started in 1992, before others were even thinking of it), and now backs Burt Rutan for the X-prize. In addition, he is backing seti, and had monorail ran through his rock muesum. Quit a few accomplishments.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Those of you interested in the reality TV from space might want to check out Spacestation, an IMAX 3D film about the ISS. It was made two years ago, but is premiered in Russia today, on April 12.
BTW, April 12 is the Cosmonautics Day. 43 years ago Yury Gagarin became a first human ever to fly to space. BTW, during the 43 years that followed, 431 humans have been up there. Think of it, only 10 people per year on average...
Nobody in the US (or in the world for that matter) expected the Soviet space triumth of the 1961. Nobody expects these Russians to pull off their Mars trip. But one thing is for certain - the only way to find the limits of possible is to venture beyond them, into the impossible. Good luck to those trying!
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
What's the big deal about returning? If the return leg is the hardest, most complicated, then why bother? Okay 6 people will die - From the individuals point of view I doubt there'll be a lack of volunteers and from societies point of view 10's of people die in road accidents in Russia every day. The government could ban driving (more offer some incentive not to drive like putting on a must-watch TV show) for a day and save more than the 6 lives that would be lost. People get too worked up about the value of a 'life'.
"Posting this AC cause people aren't ready for this kind of mentality in most parts of the western world."
That IS true!
Mod parent up!
Zubrin has said before that the $trillion price-tags for a mars mission were wildly overinflated, and suggests a way that it can be done for around $20 billion/mission.
Off the rop of my head, each Soyuz mission costs Russia about $60 million - compare that to the $500 million/shuttle-mission cost ("cheap reusable"), or the sky high costs proposed for the possible replacements..
So yes, I think it could be possible that the Russians could do it all for a few $Billion - they dont mind taking a few more risks too. Whether these particular people are the right people to do it - that is another issue - a few Billion is still a lot of doe to hand over to someone.
As for the USA, I say if they dont want to give the money to Russia, let people like Rutan have some & see what comes out of it.
NASA seem to have lost the ability to effectively stage such a project, at least at an affordable cost. The whole question arises as to whether government agencys are the best way to exploit a technology, once it has reached a certain level of maturity. Zubrin wrote an excellent article comparing NASA productivity 61-73 (Apollo motivated) vs the Shuttle years - NASA were so much more productive, for much the same cash when focused on Apollo..
"You lied to me! There is a Swansea!"
and funding stops. Sorry guys, nobody wants to watch you anymore, bye bye, don't fly too fast.
In Communist Russia...
space program funds you.
vodka is fuel for rocket and crew.
pull of Earth's gravity escapes you.
mission volunteers you.
I'm here all week, enjoy the borscht.
JET Program: see Japan, meet intere
In Soviet Russia, Mars lands on you.
I thought the moon would be far enough to send unwanted trash. But I should've figured someone would feel the need to top that...
Apple built a platform for their ideas, Google built one for everyone's.
About the same story was on telepolis (German online magazine) on April 1st 2004 ("Europa und Russland starten 2009 erste bemannte Mars-Expedition" (German) (Europe and Russia launch the first manned expedition to Mars in 2009)). The article on telepolis was obviously a joke and I guess this story also.
Ok so maybe they have boosters and capsules in production they can reuse and save engineering costs. But which lander would they be reusing?
I don't remember any hardware other than the LEM that could land humans. So the lander they have to engineer pretty much from scratch. It's not a small bit of hardware either. On it's own wouldn't that use their entire budget?
So, this is a private russian company doing this?
Is it a Legitimate Russian Business? -nudge nudge wink wink.
I think i remember hearing something once about suspected links between the Russian Mafia and Russian tv.
Well it's about time someone posted something remotely tinfoil hat on this one!
He who fights with Monkeys must take it upon himself not to become a Monkey.
Well believe it or not this is how your tax dollars get spent (in most countries), most of the money goes to the PHBs and the actual techies do the work for peanuts, then the accounts are fixed up and its all good, the government gets their plane/spaceprobe/echelon system/airport scanners/voting machines and the contractor gets their money, just look at the price of a Diebold voting booth, do you really think it costs that much?
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Zubrin estimates the cost at $20 billion, assuming typical government overruns. He figures a private company could do it for under $5 billion. These trillion-dollar estimates are based on what Zubrin calls the "Battlestar Galactica" plan...giant spacecraft assembled in orbit, carrying its return fuel out to Mars, preliminary moonbase, etc.
Why don't this Mars-centric missions do a Moon base before sending something to Mars? It's cheaper to send things to the Moon. And it's only a second (in transmision time) from here. If something begins to go wrong it could be fixed almost real-time. And after having a Moon base, making the equipment for the mars missions would be made in the Moon, having to escape from a sixth of Earth's gravity (cheaper launch).
...) should be send closer. And there's metal in the Moon too, so a mining factory is posible, sending back to Earth some of the minerals (more money to fund a launch) and things done in lower gravity environment (chips? medicines? 1kg tomatoes? :-) ).
Material (propelent, water, food,
Why not mix the popularity of the reality show "Survivor" with the hazards-be-damned attitude of the Russian space industry? Each week, someone gets voted off the spaceship, and FOOMP! Out the airlock they go.
I am a republican for 30 years, I've never voted for a democrat, and bush could be the worst president since before the Civil war.
Please *don't* vote for him. He may be smart, but its mostly on how to manipulate people.
Please send money to ACCT#145253, Trust Bank, Abuja, Nigeria.
The Russian Space Group
RUSSIA: Listen. Ich bin ein Berliner
And I don't mean that in a gay way
.
Going on these missions would also demand that the computer/electronic/ship equipment be designed to work for decades. It would be a bitch if the flight control computers hard drive crapped out 3 months into the mission or crashed because Windows XP was their OS of choice and then needed to call home.
"I bow to no man" - Riddick
= aprox. 33'000'000'000 oil-barrels (33$ per oil-barrel)
> in Russia, in aerospace/military contracts, it's
> unlikely the gov would be paying $1100 for a screwdriver
In Russia you would never pay this much for a screwdriver. The problem is _finding_ the screwdriver.
NASA has many conflicting goals, a big bureaucracy, a risk-adverse culture. The Russian, Chinese, or private enterprise approach may be able to do this more cost-effectively than NASA, though probably not for as little as $3.5 billion.
I prefer the "evolutionary" private enterprise approach like as in the current x space contest. Start out with doable million dollar increments of financing and goals.
you wrote:
"there is too much public pressure for NASA to make any mistakes"
trying not to be troll here, but could nasa be more concerned about their retirement benefits then with why nasa even exists?
i can't help but feel that someone's 'mad hatter tea party' to mars just might work. lets consider that the foundation work is over 50 years old.
"god bless those that go out into space in ships" -- unknown
Plan is simple: fake a trip to Mars. People thought was possible back in 1969, but now we know is possible -- digital effects technology has come long way. I mean, with $3 billion we could pay animators to hand-craft every pixel of footage. It will look totally believeable.
Fake trip to Mars solves all major problems with human space flight:
Problems:
Well, for morality's sake, our first duty is to lecture these people sternly about what idiots they are. When this doesn't work, we can sell them seats in Mars Settlement Simulator. This is big airtight tin can containing 1000 switches and 1000 tins of Spam. Every day, "passengers" are required to flip a switch... otherwise can explodes. If passengers run out of Spam, they die of starvation. One of the switches is secretly wired to shut off can's air supply... when it is switched, passengers unexpectedly die of asphyxiation. If passengers make it through 800 days, we open up can to reveal Gobi Desert, where they are free to wander around until they get bored and decide to go home.
I figure we can get $1M each for these seats -- after all, they are very good simulation of real trip! But passengers may get mad because they don't get weightlessness for their money. Such passengers will be airlifted to secret Russian base at Sanduski where they can ride Weightlessness Simulators until they pass out.
There is potential here
I wish I had some of what they are smoking.
When I look at this, I see a troll for investors. The mission doesn't even have to get off the ground for someone to profit handily.
OMG what a LAMO
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
A 20,000-student US university's annual budget totals $1.5-3 bln while same-size Russian university survives on $30-50 mln. That is 50-100 times less. And remember ACM programming contest? Russian teams are not doing that bad.
So, proposed $3.5 bln spent in Russia worth $200-300 bln spent in US in terms of R&D. Since it's a government contract in US, the price would usually double (hey, those corporate CEO's need to earn money too, right?) becoming $500 bln for the project in US.
Well, sounds realistic, doesn't it?
But anyways, $3.5 bln is an unrealistically high spending in Russia and only government would take such expenses with no immediate return on investment.
Stop wasting resources on this UTTER crap, and fix the planet first. Hunger, AIDs, war etc.
It makes me feel sick. It's obscene. Pah.
Doctors who know enough to be useful, and thus understand the risks? Yes.
It's like signing up to play Russian roulette where they'll be a firing squad, and they'll be using semi-automatic weapons. Could they all jam? Yes. Could you convince random people that this is a special on-time circumstance where this is the likely outcome? Should dihydrogen oxide be banned? Maybe, I suppose it depends on who you ask.
Can you convince people who know better of the same thing? If they got their MD from the Nick Riveara School of Medicine, it's a possability.
> although Russia thinks about safety, it's not the number one concern;
> the number one concern is success
Evidence, please?
Or is this just Cold War-era, jingoism-inspired "knowledge" that has little or nothing to do with the real world?
Russians are people, too, just like you and me. To suggest that Russians don't care about the safety of their friends and compatriots is dehumanizing, and pretty darn stupid to boot.
This sounds like the open source version of space travel to me... Linux has already proven that an intricate piece of software can be produced for next to nothing (compared to similar projects, of course. Free (as in beer) space vehicles wouldn't work).
The US feels like everyone needs to be safe, even if they would prefer not to be. Why don't dying cancer patients get experimental medicine? Why, it might kill them! Better the cancer does that...
Russia (and I'm sure many other countries) lets people do more what they want with less regulation. If a group of six people want to possibly kill themselves in hope of maybe stepping on to the surface of another planet, why not let them?
This is as good a place as any to remind people of the potential of reusable rockets based on Gaseous Core Nuclear Reactors, which could make possible a Mars mission of about 9 months, not 3 years. I highly recommend reading this fascinating detail design for a fully reusable rocket based on the Saturn-V form factor, that could launch a 2 MILLION pound payload and return intact to a powered landing with an equal size payload.
Essentially, the rocket engine consists of a chamber containing a transparent quartz bulb, which contains a core cloud of UF4 gas surrounded by a swirling buffer gas that controls the shape and size of the UF4 core. The core heats to about 30,000 C, emitting intense ultraviolet light that heats hydrogen gas flowing past the bulb. The hydrogen, absorbing the ultraviolet but no neutrons, superheats and shoots out through the rocket nozzle, providing many times the thrust possible with any chemical rocket, and without radioactivity.
One issue the NuclearSpace.com article addresses that is rarely discussed is the need for radiation shielding during interplanetary travel. So far, humans have barely ventured beyond the Earth's protective magnetic field. Prolonged exposure to the solar wind would take a heavy toll on Mars astronauts during a 3-year mission. With a GCNR rocket the round-trip travel time would total only 6 months. The enormous payload capacity would allow for extremely heavy radiation and particle shielding, not to mention ample supplies and equipment for a comfortable, productive stay.
This technology really excites me -- the potential for spaceships that are roomy and well equipped, even luxuriously so, and well shielded from the real-life hazards of space travel. Sign me up!
If this is privatetly funded, even if it doesn't get into orbit before anyone else, surely there should be a similar prize for the first manned mission to mars... The Y-prize? Just like all those X11 successors ;)
I can't remember where I heard this: NASA spent millions of dollars developing a pen that could write in space. The Russian solution was to use a pencil. That's a savings of about 100000000% hmm... if they can pull of those ratios, they just might be able to do it.
Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what's right. --Isaac Asimov