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China Launches First Moon Orbiter
hey0you0guy writes "China has launched its first lunar orbiter, on a planned year-long exploration mission to the Moon. Analysts say it is a key step towards China's aim of putting a man on the Moon by 2020, in the latest stage of an Asian space race with Japan and India. Earlier this month, a Japanese lunar probe entered orbit around the Moon. India is planning a lunar mission for April next year."
The United States has been slipping on the technology front, and this is another outwardly visible sign of that. If it does not turn itself around and fast, forgetting this political chess game it tries with the world, it will be left behind and forgotten, another empire whose time had come and gone.
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
We, as a species, should pool all of our assests together and put forth as much effort as possible at exploring space and figuring out a way to get off this rock.
"But Pojut, there are so many issues down here already! Hunger, Homeless, Terrorism, Etc.!"
And a lot of those problems would go away if we stopped acting like little children (our club is better than your club), united our efforts internationally, put some real money towards it, and actually went out and learned things.
We will all either explore space together and get off this tiny planet, or we will all kill each other and our species will die out. I don't know about you, but I know which one I would prefer.
Living With a Nerd
Nie hao ma? (How are you?)
Wo hun hao. (I'm fine.)
Ke bu ke yi wo qui nie de huo jian? (May I go in your rocket?)
See what I've been reading.
What?
Gee what about this Lunar orbiter? http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/lunarorb.html
Take a look at the date.
Yea it was 40 years ago.
Your right it isn't like the US has done anything recently. Like say a mission to the asteroid belt http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=2007-043A
Or a fly by of Mercury http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=2004-030A
Or a mission to Pluto...
But what about the moon?
Well there was at least two missions to the moon in the 1990s Clementine and the Lunar Prospector.
Does it look like China is getting interested in space? Yes.
Seems like you are getting a little worked up with the US just having a 40 year lead at this point.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Just who do you think explores the planets? The United States isn't losing space superiority, the US's focus is different. The US and Russians have been there, done that, all before. Now is the time for the new kids on the block to earn their wings. Thank goodness they are focusing on national pride through space exploration rather than warfare.
The US has plans to go back to the moon but support for the "current" Adminstration doing it is not high. We finally have seen the Shuttle given a real end of life which honestly, to me at least, was holding back the whole manned project in the first place. KISS.
Yeah there is a danger we could lose our superiority, but now that we have challengers that is less likely.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
are belong to us...
It sure seems like China is changing rapidly. While we are still well ahead of them in Space Tech., they have a lot of motivation. We are economic buddies, but will we enter a cold war with China, if they come to threaten us on the fronts we have historically been ahead on?
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If others want a shot at it, I say go for it - at least someone is reaching upwards and towards getting humanity out of its cradle. More power to 'em if they can help establish a peaceful and vigorous plan in motion to reach that goal.
I was literally less than 24 hours old when Apollo 11 launched. I'd like to think that we'd have people living and working full-time on the Moon sometime before I die of old age...
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Oh I don't know about that. Seems to me the Chinese are merely proving they can do in 2007 what the Americans and Soviets did in 1966. Indeed, the Chinese are having it way easier, since (1) they don't have to invent the ideas and technology, it already exists, and (2) one of the biggest problems in early space shots was the immense amount of calculation that couldn't be done quickly and in a small machine. That problem has been solved by the development of microprocessors.
Furthermore, you're overlooking many other "technology fronts" that are arguably more exciting. What about networked computing software? Hear of any killer Internet apps (other than viruses) that have come out of China lately? What about biotech? Have the Chinese come up with any novel AIDS or cancer drugs? (Or any AIDS or cancer drugs at all, for that matter.) Where do you expect breakthroughs in treating Alzheimer's to come from? Or how about materials? Boeing is building a composite airplane (the 787 'Dreamliner') that will be 20% more fuel efficient than any other passenger plane in its class. Can the Chinese do that? Nope. Lockheed-Martin is building an air superiority fighter (the F-22) which is fast and stealthy, due in significant part to clever computer-assisted design and new materials. Can the Chinese do that? Nope, not even close.
Even in the space-related front, the Americans have a probe on its way to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt (New Horizons) and another on its way to Mercury orbit (Messenger). They've got 2 spacecraft in orbit around Mars, 2 rovers driving around, a lander on its way, and a bigger rover in the works. Cassini is still sending back marvelous pictures of Saturn. The Space Shuttle is delivering another chunk of ISS this week. NASA is busy with a new crew exploration vehicle (Orion) for lunar or possibly even Martian manned trips. The Americans even now have a private space industry. Virgin Galactic is taking reservations for suborbital flights on Spaceship Two, and Bigelow has put up prototypes of inflatable orbital hotels.
If you compare China and the US in terms of population or GDP, the Chinese ought to be behind the US by at least a bit. But they are way behind. I know it's popular to think they're "catching up," but they're not. They're certainly moving, catching up to where they might have been, had they not indulged in the spectacularly suicidal folly of Communism for 50 years. But you can't forget the US is moving, too, and generally faster. Maybe it's not moving as fast as you'd like it to, but that's a different story.
"The United States has been slipping on the technology front, and this is another outwardly visible sign of that."
How does China planning to do something FIFTY YEARS after we did it show we're slipping on the technology front?
You may be right, but I don't see this as demonstrating what you claim at all.
I only go to buffets for the unlimited soft serve.
Perhaps we can get some pictures of the US moon landing hardware left behind on the moon from the Chinese. If they send us pictures THEY took, perhaps we can lay to rest the notion that we never went to the moon at all.
Nie hao ma? Does it really help to speak Chinese with a Russian accent?
Except that such an 'aim' is a creation mostly of the analysts themselves, China has made no goals or national policy statements. This so called 'moon race' is a creation of pundits looking to justify their paychecks.
Ke bu ke yi wo qui nie de huo jian? (May I go in your rocket?)
Bu ke yi.
Wo men mei xu yao mei guo ren. Wo men zuo so you de ni men de dong xi.
3D Printing Tips and Tricks at Zheng3.com
Distribute a pirated copy of America's moon landing?
Nation's been asleep and nobody has done anything in all that time, huh?
Computers sure seem better than they were 35 years ago. I carry a phone in my pocket. Apartheid has ended in South Africa. Disco music has been successfully crushed, tainted as "no longer cool." Lead has been vanquished from our gasoline, resulting in the virtual elimination of all crime. Wal-Mart distribution has efficiency that people couldn't even dream about 35 years ago. And last, but not least, The breakfast burrito has been perfected.
We didn't piss away the years; we just didn't use the years the way you want. Technology (and more generally: the inventive capabilities of the human spirit) carried on, its passion at odds with an uncaring universe. It developed what it wanted to, solved problems that it thought needed solving.
And now we have the most literally awesome breakfast burrito mankind has ever seen. I'm sure those who enjoy the fruits of that burrito research and development (yeah, like any of them actually eat fruit, when such a lusciously filling burrito is around), had the resources been spent on continuing the Apollo program continued instead, would say,
Think about it. Life is what you make it, and we made something. You just don't like it.
So go ahead, eat your fruit and drink your Tang, and live in willful ignorance of (and spite for) Hardee's groundbreaking Country Breakfast Burrito. Daydream of a renewed Apollo program. Meanwhile, the Prime Movers of human progress -- the people who make the world turn! -- will continue to work on what they think is important. Is the Monster ThickBurger really the upper end of burger thickness? Is there a barrier that cannot be crossed? The intrepid human spirit screams, "No! There are no limits! With passion and ingenuity, anything is possible!"
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
First off, there are no plans for the saturn. In fact, NASA had to go study one of the spares sometime ago to figure things out. Secondly, your engineering friend is clueless. We have the ability to fab currently. We do a lot of it. What we do not do, is cheap fabing. For that, you go elsewhere. But rockets are NOT built on cheap fabs. They are built on high quality machines. And as to an inability to build it, well, I suggest you go look at scaled composites, Spacex, spacedev, armadillo, and even new shepard, as well as Boeing AND l-mart. We are building plenty of rockets . In fact, we launch more in less than a year than China does in 5.
And since you got the previous stuff so wrong, well, then I will tell you that your ISS comment is way off. Why? Because it allowed us to do a number of things. It taught us to work with other countries. In fact, NASA has disseminated a load of information to Russia, Canada, and Europe. What did we get in return? We have learned how to survive in close space. That has been hard. It was hard for USSR/Russia with Mir. It is hard for the ISS. We have also learned about what works and what does not work. Now, I know that kids like you say the same thing. But lessons are not always about what works, but many times are about what does not work. America, and the world, assumed that Russia had all the knowledge about building and surviving. Have you seen how well their oxygen generator has done? It has not been bad, but not great either. Likewise, the computer malfunction was interesting to note. New approachs have been designed at NASA and RSA because of these 2 items. Likewise, the construction of the ISS lead to transhab, which lead to bigelow. Bigelow will end up building not only local space stations, but will be used for transportation to the moon AND mars, as well as surface buildings on both luna and mars. Yes, the ISS has been far more expensive than it should have been. It is also not in the orbit that it should be. And finally, if we are really going to make it extremely useful, we need to bring up the CAM. But this has been about crawling, before walking. And all this info is going well beyond NASA. It is also going to scaled composites, Spacex, spacedev, armadillo, etc.
If you buddy is a real engineer, then tell him to find a new line of work.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Helium 3 could solve the worlds energy problems, the only place to get it is the moon.
That would be fascinating if it were true. First of all, we do not have any He3 fusion reactors, especially not on the scale that commercial power generation requires. Second, to supply the US with its power needs would require 15-20 tonnes of He3 per year. To power the world, you'd need, say, 100 tonnes per year (note: this is just electrical power, not fuel in general. You'd still need gas for cars, diesel fuel for ships and trains, aviation fuel for jets, etc.). One million tonnes of lunar regolith yields only 10 kg of He3. In other words, you'd need to process 10 BILLION tonnes of regolith per year to power the Earth. According to google, lunar regolith has a density of between 1.8 and 2.6 tonnes per cubic metre. Let's call it 2. You'd need to process 5 billion cubic metres of regolith per year. I'm not sure how deep the He3 goes, but it's estimated that the regolith is only 4-5 metres thick, so let's say the He3 goes down 5 metres. In order to supply the Earth, you'd have to strip mine 1000 square kilometres of lunar surface per year. It would require far too much infrastructure. Third, we have no vehicles for ferrying the He3 back to Earth. Fourth, it would be very, very expensive. Some estimates put it at 20 trillion dollars to get the mining equipment in place. That's just the launch costs. It doesn't count the cost of the equipment itself. For that kind of money we can build He3 breeder reactors right here.
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