Slashdot Mirror
ISS Gyro Fixed Via Spacewalk
Teahouse writes "After a failed attempt last week, the ISS Astronauts finally got to fix the external gyroscope circut breaker in the station. Tests are being run today, but it looks like the ISS is back to having attitude stability with redundancy. This is particularly significant with the Shuttle being grounded for an extended period because the ISS would have had to use thruster fuel to keep the Station's solar panels pointed in the right direction without the gyroscopes, and no guarantee when more fuel would be arriving."
So... Mir died of Russian neglect, and so early into its mission the ISS seems to be dying of US neglect. Even if shuttle missions resume the importance of the ISS in US plans has been eclipsed by a moon base and a Mars mission. Lots of people criticize the ISS because it was largely conceived with politics in mind moreso than economics or science. Surely they hate the new US direction even more -- billions more will be blown, over the course of far more administrations who will always be gunning to kill it for more cash -- just to give the impression of superiority over the Chinese. I say either fund and finish the ISS or start a new economical, science-based space project from scratch. But moon bases? Please, ISS doesn't deserve to fall apart for this...
Specifically, the line "Why is this room here" when they're in thec hompers room. Note to self, when designing something where it is incredibly dangerous to go outside and fix, spring for the extra twenty feet of cable and put the circuit breaker INSIDE THE DAMN SHIP.
meh
They spend all their simply MAINTAINING the station. Not much actual science happens aboard the debacle called ISS.
It's supposed to comback online in 2005. Aside from that, safety concerns are a joke. These astronauts want to go to the space and the government, for political reasons is preventing them. What do you think test pilots, and the true explorers have been doing for ages? Sure, we don't want to needlessly die, but we're a bunch of water-meat-bags attached to a ball of rock -- if we're interested in the giant cosmos that supports us, and are willing to risk our lives to do so, isn't that a noble cause? My god. The USA will send thousands to their death to a country rich in oil, and yet, they won't even risk 5 or 10 people to explore the vast universe they live. What a short-sided pitiful view of the world. Right now, if I could fly in the shuttle, and they'd take me into space for some dangerous mission, I would go. No shit.
We are one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. Back to you with the weather, Bob!
http://www.nasatechnology.com/ NASA's byproducts make the missions thus far almost pale in compairson, if you're actually so spiritually devoid that you consider exploring your own universe, that which sustains you, a waste of money. Hell, if the USA hadn't invaded IRAQ we could have given NASA 10x its budget, and learned about us, as a species, a people, a planet, a consciousness. And yet, here we are, grounding our efforts because a few people died tragically. It's sad, yes, but so it sending thousands to their death for a questionable cause. How can we value life more in war, but less in understanding ourselves as people? The Earth spins round and round. It's all a mystery.
We are one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. Back to you with the weather, Bob!
"The NASA of today should focus on the practical, useful aspects of space, instead of being used as a political tool by whatever president is in office." pratical? spiritual? I agree it shouldn't be used as a tool, but no matter what we do in space, with humans there, as of 2004, we will learn remarkably more than we know now about how we live, who we are, and where we can go.
We are one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. Back to you with the weather, Bob!
You're confusing 'risk' and 'return'. People haven't put their investments into US companies because they knew their investment was safe, they did it because they felt they could get a high rate of return on their money. If they wanted a safe investment, they would buy US treasury securities, currently the safest investment on Earth.
Now, they're investing more money in the Chinese economy, because they feel that Chinese companies will grow faster (and thus provide a higher rate of return). That's not terribly surprising, as it's easy to see that China has enormous economic growth potential. Much the same occurred with southeast Asia in the early-to-mid 1990s, until their bubble collapsed.
It can do basic, medium and even some high-tech manufacturing for a fraction of the price to do so in the US.
The reason for this is not some magic, but because China has vastly lower labor costs. To some extent, this is because China uses a huge amount of slave labor.
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
"The real issue here isn't astronaut safety, but asset safety. We have hundreds of astronauts, but only three shuttles. As such, we should be concentrating solely on how to maximize their survivability and not expending so many resources on crew survivability in the event of a catastrophic failure." When we start supporting materialism over life, we've gone the wrong direction. I believe in searching for answers to our questions, but if we start caring more about our means instead of those that may risk their lives to achieve it, it's possible we've missed the purpose.
We are one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively. Back to you with the weather, Bob!
This is the same reason we don't leave Iraq in order to save hostages and the same reason we don't spend ten billion trillion dollars installing tons of high-tech armor on every humvee. Government is about assessing cost/benefit ratios, and when those in charge forget it, we all land in deep trouble.
Microsoft delenda est!
The Shuttle costs around $1 bil each launch. If you figure that the average NASA or NASA contractor employee makes about $50k a year and has a working lifetime of about 40 years, that's about $2 mil per working lifetime in salary. Thus the equivalent of 500 people put their life's work into each launch. A person's life's work is not the same as his life, but it's in the ballpark. The shuttle's construction is far more complicated than just launching it once, so to say that the shuttle is more valuable than its crew is true. It is the life's work of thousands upon thousands of people. Something like the shuttle is one of the only artifacts we have that is comparable to, for instance, the cathedrals of Europe in its scale.
Just replying to inform this parent poster.
Many of rocket boosters can be used to launch something into LEO. No problem there. But they are NOT designed to carry human inside the loading cargo on its tip of a rocket. One consideration, which is often ignored, is a supersonic vibration within the closed cavity. [The downside of it is your gut may explode under the supersonic vibration.]
In any manned rocket design, the vibration is suppressed and is safe for human to ride inside. But not so for many unmanned rocket boosters.
Cheers,
-b
Having a job is not important. Survival and living a happy life is. If you have enough money to survive and live a happy life, you don't need a job. If you can survive and live a happy life without money, then you don't need money.
Do you think a person's life is defined by the work he or she does? Does work equal life?
Let the robots do the boring jobs. Let humans come up with things the robots can't do.