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On Orbital Fuel Stations

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the complete-with-nukable-burritos dept.

dylanduck writes "Being able to fill up your spacecraft from a fuel depot in orbit round the Earth or Moon is key to the long-term prospects of astronauts exploring the solar system, according to NASA engineers. Trouble is NASA doesn't want to build it themselves. So there's $5 million for any enterprising groups who can develop a simple version themselves."

1 of 152 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Hmmm by NOLAChief · · Score: 3, Informative
    If we go to mars any time soon it might make sense to launch the cruise stage unmanned and then hook it to the command module in earth orbit. That would be a kind of fuel dump.

    Effectively that's what's being planned with the earth departure stage for the proposed lunar missions. That stage would be launched on the Cargo Launch Vehicle into earth orbit, where a CEV launch would rendezvous with it for a trip to the moon. See the Project Constellation article here.