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It's Official, Australia Needs a Space Agency
Dante_J writes "In the final report published by the Australian Senate inquiry into 'The Current State of Australia's Space Science & Industry Sector' entitled 'Lost in Space? Setting a new direction for Australia's space science and industry sector,' it calls for the formation of a 'Space Industry Advisory Council' to oversee the creation of a fully-fledged Australian Space Agency. Of the top 20 GDP nations, Australia is the only one without a Space Agency, which impacts on many aspects of ordinary life, not to mention Research and Engineering endeavors. Every satellite operated by Australia is owned by another party and the costs of this alone are comparable to that of a Space Agency. The report is a tidy piece that drew upon submissions form Andy Thomas, and an impressive collection of Australian Academics and Space Science entities frustrated by successive generations of government apathy. While this report is welcome, lethargic Government action in a climate of competing concerns is not expected to stem the flow of Space Science brain drain out of Australia any time soon."
Can't be stuffed with that space stuff. 'slong as the cricket's on anyway ;)
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Maybe it should try to concentrate on getting rid of some of the laws that take away freedoms in that country. Stop trying to filter the Internet into the ground. I dunno, how bout generally pulling it's head out of its ass.
I am speaking to the politicians of course, not the regular people. How can a government be so forward thinking as the people in this article desire it to be, when it so backwards thinking about the rest of it's policies?
Of course, what the hell am I talking about. I live in America, the land of the free and the home of the brave! We have *none* of those same problems.
The only reason NASA exists in my country is because it ALREADY EXISTS. If you have to convince politicians to fund it today, nothing would ever get done. It took a cold war, a charismatic President, and national pride to get our asses into space.
I drove 300 km yesterday without seeing another person.
Looking for a way to burn money? I got a different idea...
...i'll contact you with my SWIFT-code.
Truly yours and thanks in advance, cosmocain
... need a space program, in order to get away from their disastrous government.
... until the US and the Brits told us "not to worry about it", and that was the end of that ...
hmmm, I am surprised they dont have a space agency yet, which means they pay and depend on other countries for launching sats.
OTOH The implications are too many, like they cannot secret sats like the rest of the world.
Australia is generally a very disorganised place. This is somewhat surprising given the excessive tiers of government.
It is well understood by most Australians that if you want to retire in comfort then you should get a job (for life) with the government.
However despite all of the busy-bodies supposedly governing the place, nothing much works properly.
Anyhow, I am hoping we might get decent broadband, proper roads, and reliable electricity, before trying for a Space Agency.
The closest Australia has to a Space Agency is the Australian Space Research Institute. It falls into the category of a serious amateur effort, staffed by volunteers and funded by donations. Underfunded Australian research programs tend to hit above their weight with innovative solutions, simply because they don't have the money to pay for a more conventional solution.
I could not agree more that AU should establish and fund (well!) a proper space agency. I would fucking LOVE that. Perhaps we could start by redirecting all allocated funding for that ridiculous internet filtering scheme.
But let's keep it in perspective. Australia has 21 million people. We're two thirds the population of California. The other city I spend a lot of time in, Tokyo, has more people than my whole god damn country. I think visitors and foreigners often get a mistaken impression about this country - sure, the cities are fairly large, but there's only fucking FIVE of them. It's a big country - I was born in South Australia, we have a military base there that is BIGGER THAN ENGLAND - but there's no people and kangaroos don't pay tax. Yet.
We're rich enough per capita, sure, but the volume just isn't there. For fuck's sake, we're closing down the entire Navy for 2 months for Christmas. We can't get enough people to staff our fricking marine defences (the most important, since we're an island) - but we're going to build a space industry now? With who?
What I would really like to see is some kind of cooperative effort. Why all this competition between nations, duplicated effort, and misplaced nationalism? We'd get so much more done if we pooled our resources and really worked together. And I don't mean in the manner of sclerotic, ineffective jaw-fests like the UN, I mean cooperate like allies in a war, which we're all pretty good at.
We need a war, then. A War on Not Being In Space! Come on, you apes! Do you want to live forever?
Let my new 7-digit UID be a lesson to all - write down your passwords.
Why does Australia, or any country for that matter, need a space agency? In the absence of any space agencies in any country, wouldn't those interested in furthering space exploration bankroll projects in the market?
... until the US and the Brits told us "not to worry about it", and that was the end of that ...
Well it was more that the UK was reluctant to spend too much money on their space program, even though they actually got Blue Streak rocket working as a space delivery system, which they launched from Woomera, Australia, which would have got all the business that Arianne now has.
Since the Australian governments space program at the time was tied to the UK effort (they wanted to have their very own space port which other countries would use, primarily the UK), and they had no native spacecraft research program, that killed the Australian effort, regardless of what the Australian government wanted.
On the other hand Australia has been and remains a critically important part of the NASA space exploration program through its radio telescopes. In fact it was they who captured the footage of Neil Armstrong stepping on to the Moon for the first time.
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
Canada: 30 Million people, has a Space Agency and "une agence spatiale".
Australia: 21 Million people, no Space Agency
Crikey, a project like the Canadarm would be cool, eh?
"a small step for a man... Crikey! look at the size of that beauty!"
To be serious, apparently a few useful things came out of early projects like blue streak. NASA contracts work out all over the world so there are Australian efforts in things like scramjets, skin tight spacesuits and hubble telescope parts. I had the luck to have a few classes presented by Ray Stalker so got to hear enough about orbital mechanics, hypersonic flight and scramjets to get excited about it (but not enough to remotely resemble a rocket scientist).
I'm all for space research but the Australian Federal and State Governments couldn't organize a pissup in a brewery. Sydney's public transport is awful and continually getting worse. Our roads are getting clogged and the solution proposed is to increase taxes, raise fares, decrease the size of the carriages on our trains, and split up the network. Space travel? We can't even get from the suburbs into town!!!
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
They want to remove the dirty parts from space, like Uranus, and the full moon. And not to speak of the dirty images that appear when you connect the right dots.
NASA has piss recycling now and doesn't need help from Fosters. But maybe you could make a barbecue design for the space station...
In fact it was they who captured the footage of Neil Armstrong stepping on to the Moon for the first time.
Take THAT rest of the world !
Do they also need an agency for each other key of the keyboard?
"I think there is a "race to the bottom" between the US, UK, and Australia as far as this goes anyways."
as apposed to countries like china or any asian or middle eastern country, which are just beacons of freedom.
I hope your being sarcastic. (Calm thoughts , Calm thoughts) Asian countries being beacons of freedom thats going to far !!! Someone might actually believe you. This is slashdot were everything typed is treated as fact after all. Australia is the type of country that follows other countries examples: Wars (1,2 ,Vietnam , Korea ,Iraq ) Tv Broadcasting (PAL).
Internet filtering is no different .
I think it would be the great for Australia to have a space program.
The problem is that Australia's political system is not up to the task.
Wheres the votes in a Space Program ?
It would be too hard for the government of the day to explain why money is being spent on a Space program when it could be directed for example to the aged care or the health system.
This will end up in the too hard basket.
I can't remember the exact quote but I think the government at the time saw no future in satellite comms. Another triumph for arts educated politicians with all the technical insight of Mr Bean and the foresight of a comatose goldfish.
I'm sure I'm not the only one...
After my IT degree, I considered enrolling in a space engineering degree at the University of Queensland. It's got a good reputation, as it hosts the famous, but criminally underfunded Centre for Hypersonics. Sadly, after doing my sums, I worked out that it wasn't going to be worth my while if after five years, I ended up on the mines rather than designing spacecraft.
Agreed with other posters, Australia _DOES_ need to pull its head out of its arse and start making science and technology a priority. Sadly, I think that Australia's bias against anything clever is cultural and ingrained. This means that anybody with any ambition, and who wants to work with technology does what I did three years ago, and emigrate.
Look out New Zealand!
Even after they put all that money into a lunar mission, Australia still has a better cricket team.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
Australia needs to expand its high tech industry. Currently we don't have the a internationally competitive aerospace or high-tech industry to support a space program and that's one our big problems. The majority of Australian export are primary goods that is eventually made into something that is sold at significant higher price than what we export because Australia doesn't have a significant industry that can manufacture the goods. I think a major into space industry with home grown technology will do more good than just putting satellites into space and this requires major investment not just at the space program.
Of course they need a space program, that way they can keep the best eye from the sky on all their people all the time. Australia is one of the toughest police states in the western world now after the USA and Britain.
Why is it that we techies just keep inventing better ways to be controlled by the masters of the universe?
Just say no.
If you are in a society that has the privilege just say no to your government's actions that cause evil (harm to others) in the world.
Totally! I'm Australian and I'm *sick* of this not having a space agency! Every day, someone's all like "Can you launch this into orbit mate?" and I'm all bloody like "Nah, ya see, we don't have a space agency mate!", so they go "Throw another shrimp on the barbie then mate!". And then I ride my Kangaroo home, because my bloody spaceship is still in the bloody hangar. Strewth.
Hmm. I think this Space Industry Advisory Council (SIAC) would be much cooler than ASRI.
Especially if they had an additional branch, the Astral Manned-missions for Navigation and Exploration (AMNE).
Everyone's shooting stuff into space these days. Australia should be the one that does things differently. Instead of building a space program, they should use the money they would spend on shooting satellites into space on a program to build robots to drill to the center of the Earth.
You know. Down under.
I don't know, just asking. Seems like aircraft might come before space.
Does this mean that we'll have a successful launch of a Kangaroo into space? Maybe a Drop Bear?
Yeah, and whatever happened to the proposed commercial spaceport based on Christmas Island? From years ago. Which was supposed to begin launches soon if not already.
Seriously, WTF?
Leela: "Is all the work done by children?" Alien: "No, not the whipping."
Hey! Maybe they can call it the National Australian Space Agency! That'll be real confusing.
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
Maybe they can cooperate with other countries? In a various cases some of the countries mentioned are rather crowded and lacking in the land for such things. Seems that far out in the remote outback deserts of Australia would be a really *good* location for a launchpad or something of the like. No people, not necessarily a lot of wildlife, but still fairly accessible by air, etc.
That means: none of that sissy heat-shield armor plating. Oi! Oi! Oi!
Jesus, some of you modders do not seem to HAVE any sense of humor.
Will you do your first test runs with kangaroos and koalas?
Otherwise, how will they ever get the Farscape module into orbit?
Personally, I wish in U.S. we would filter more of the information that comes our way. I mean do we really need those nigeria email scams? By the way, I know someone who's computer got a virus by his friend looking at porn on the internet. Personally, I would rather they filter the stuff then have to see it and have to deal with it. I think it would good if they did form a space agency. I hope it would work with the NASA, and perhaps other ones as well. I think if a bunch of nations got together and shared the burden we could get into space a whole lot sooner.
Thank you. The Sex Party appear to be taking up the slack that the other parties are inexplicably leaving.
Labor and Liberal both have their fingers firmly up their bums. Recently the Greens withdrew their preference vote for Labor as a show of no-confidence - I believe Labor lost every seat that Greens withdrew their preference on. It seems the torch may soon pass to a new top-dog party if Labor and Liberal continue to become more similar (and, ironically, less liberal).
The Sex Party seem to believe that education is the key to most problems (and taboos). I agree. Hopefully a lot of others do too.
We've already got the CIA spying on the Asia Pacific region from Pine Gap.