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Last Titan Launch from Florida
The Breeze writes "Driving along San Diego's freeways, I often passed a large Lockheed Martin facility that had big ATLAS and TITAN logos on them - it looked like it was still operating, even though I thought the Titan missile had been retired years ago. Well, according to CNN, the last Titan to be launched from Florida just took off with a classified military payload. I had no idea that they were still using 50-year old technology to launch stuff into space. If you are not adverse to MS Word documents, Patrick AFB, (the Air Force station at Cape Canaveral) has some press releases about the launch. Interested parties might want to click here for more info on Titan, along with links to the Titan Missile Museum where you can actually see a Titan in a silo -- and where Zeframe Cochrane launched his first warp ship from."
Have physics and the law of gravity changed in the last 50 years?
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sometimes older and simpler is better than supersuper complicated stuff. Soyuz puts the shuttle to shame in the reliability department for example.
So I'd say if Titan rockets worked, why change them?
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
What will the Air Force use now?
Even Hondas suffer from this problem. If I must have the most reliable vehicle, I would choose a Civic model in its last year of production over a brand new, completely redesigned Civic.
Since the Titans have been in use for a long time, the engineers have already fixed any outstanding, serious problems. The Titan is a reliable workhorse and should be the delivery vehicle for a military payload. Such payloads are vital to the national security of the United States, and we absolutely must avoid mishaps, especially given the emerging threat from China.
50 year old technology is proven technology. If you are going to risk a multi-billion dollar satelitte- something that has had thousands of launches under its belt sounds good to me.
Reliable rocketry hasn't advanced far since Goddard's time. The Titan is a perfect example of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" technology.
They might be old, but the fewer parts they use and the simpler the technology is less things will go wrong or brake. Why for instance is the russian space agency so good? They use old stuff. Without the almost 40 year Soyuz spacecraft the ISS would have long gone down the gravity drain...
I suppose the Titan is far more reliable and fault-proof than the Space Shuttle.
Please deliver your classified military payload safely. May the death, destruction and oppression contained in your hallowed cylinder bring freedom to all 'muricans!
Just like the Global Position System (GPS) does, which is a military payload. Bringing better lives to millions.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
Well that an 50 year old cars have terrible gas milage, put out way more pollution than a modern car (orders of magnitude), and require near constant maintence to keep running. People romanticize about old cars all the time, but forget that it used to be rare for a car to make it 100,000 miles, a feat that is commonplace today, even among cheap and nasty cars. The old hardware isn't worthless, but the new stuff is considerably better in most areas. The only major area where modern cars continually score worse than older cars is in maintainability by shade-tree mechanics. Old cars are a lot simpler and don't need sophisticated tools to be worked on, unlike many modern cars.
I read the internet for the articles.
Right, old cars are not as good as new cars -- I never said they were. But they do the job. And so does an old rocket booster.
Let's not forget about the Internet, nuclear power, and the airplane.
Politics / opinion aside, I think too few people realize that military technology often translates into useful civilian technology. The corollary to beating swords into plowshares is better swords make better plowshares.