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Russia Doubles Price For Launching US Astronauts
Third Position writes "NASA on Tuesday signed a contract to pay $55.8 million per astronaut for six Americans to fly into space on Russian Soyuz capsules in 2013 and 2014. NASA needs to get rides on Russian rockets to the International Space Station because it plans to retire the space shuttle fleet later this year. NASA now pays half as much, about $26.3 million per astronaut, when it uses Russian ships."
"You wanted us to adopt market pricing, yes Comrade?"
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What does it cost with Shuttle?
http://opencm3.net, http://www.nongnu.org/gm2/
How much did they pay with the shuttle, per astonaut?
Prices go up when competition declines. Shock and horror expressed by those ignorant of basic economics. Film at 11.
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20090513/155009780.html
Yawn.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Supply vs. Demand curve. It's economics 101. There is less supply to meet demand thanks to Obama gutting NASA. And considering the only other market provider is China, we've effectively given Russia a monopoly.
Supply and demand baby. Supply and demand. We sure taught those commies well.
Participatory Governance : The only feasible option for a real democracy, where everyone really does have a say.
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/about/information/shuttle_faq.html
Funny how it was cheaper to fly as a paid passenger than astronaut.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Its just another round of outsourcing.
Soon the USA will be lacking cutting edge skills and capacity in hi-tech manufacturing, and won't be able to compete with India.
The UK dropped all that sort of stuff in the mid-60s and look at us now. We welcome the US to the third-rate Nations club!
So reduce the demand. Stop supporting the ISS and take it down as planned. Why not?
It's hugely expensive (in the scheme of science funding), and we'll get a much better ROI on other investments. The intellectual rewards of science done on the ISS (what little there is) aren't great. Better to spend the money on terrestrial science, other satellite based experiments, robots, or even NEW kinds of manned exploration.
Just because we spend a boatload of money to build it doesn't mean we should waste more.
Will Russia be happy to lose one of their remaining prestige points in space?
Thats like NASA's entire yearly budget right there these days. Well at least whatever they have left after having to waste so much on manbearpig investigations.
Seriously? $55.8 million for a single seat? And that's value for money compared to launching a shuttle?
Hear me out for a minute... the rocket is just going straight up, what's so hard? Just strap a sealed chamber onto a grain silo of fuel, surely? Are you telling me that if I had the best part of $60 million I couldn't design, build and fly my own rocket in to space? Even a brute force solution wouldn't be that expense, surely?
Well, if any private up-and-comers can offer a better price with comparable reliability, they have a perfect opportunity.
How's that Falcon-9 coming along? I'm sure people won't object to "buying American" space travel rather than paying out to another country. It's bad for the economy and national pride.
Caffeine is my anti-drug!
Duranin - A NWN2 Roleplaying Persistent World
What if the kill the astronaut? Do we get a refund?
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
26.3 x 2 = 55.8 ...nothing's going to fly with that kind of math.
If you think imaginary property and real property are the same, when does your house become public domain?
the rocket is just going straight up, what's so hard?
No, it's not.
Are you telling me that if I had the best part of $60 million I couldn't design, build and fly my own rocket in to space?
Elon Musk has spent a good part of a billion so far, has some of the brightest minds in the world working for him, and that's the cheapest *anyone* has developed a launcher for so far.
Just strap a sealed chamber onto a grain silo of fuel, surely?
Good luck with that.
How we know is more important than what we know.
But I bet they don't loose their luggage....
Rocket rides YOU!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
ISTM the russians would be in a much stronger bargaining position to make the journey up free. Then, once the americans are up there, to open the bidding on the price to bring them back down. After all, with no viable alternative means of getting people there, it's now basically their space station.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
That would be Kombucha.
If USA hadn't canceled the constellation program, the perception of exclusivity for Russia would be diminished, and USA would have a big shiny carrot to barter some short term help with.
"It's a doughnut stuffed with M&M's. That way when you finish the doughnut, you don't have to eat any M&M's."
I am the cardholder of an ISS frequent-flyer card.
We lead the space race, put men on the moon, landers on Mars, explored the furthest reaches of our system, made huge technological breakthroughs via the space race and now we're reduced to begging for rides from the commies?
What the hell is going on with our country?!
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
In other news, the dollar has dropped in value on the exchange market and foreign providers have been forced to double their prices to make up the difference.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Hehehe.
Start looking into what is involved. Look for twang, max-q, etc.
Realize also that the Saturn V rockets could gimble somewhat to maintain stability.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
We get the price of the seat, what does it cost to the NASA to set an astronaut into that seat? The NASA budget / 6 ?
Problem 1 - the burning fuel is hotter than the melting point of the engines.
Problem 2 - the engines have to run at sea level and in a vacuum.
Problem 3 - flying through atmosphere at 2000 MPH
Problem 4 - getting down
Get back to me after you think you have those solved cheaply and safely.
It's no wonder we can't make much progress in space when it costs so much just to barely get there. Where are our space elevators?!
The US got side tracked with the Apollo project and putting a man on the moon before the commies. If they continued developmental on the X-15, then we may have had a reliable space plane a lot sooner.
I agree, but meanwhile the GP's rocket has already gone *whoosh* into orbit...
Colorless green Cthulhu waits dreaming furiously.
>Problem 4 - getting down
Piece of cake. Oh, you mean getting down SAFELY... "Remember, it's not the fall, it's the sudden stop..."
Any other self respecting capitalist nation would have used multiples of ten...
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
essentially - yes.
There are serious problems. Like, the engines are running a sustained explosion of hydrogen-oxygen mix, which produces temperature quite a bit higher than anything we have at our disposal could survive. It's pretty much only the shape that keeps the explosion far enough to be safe. Oxygen oxidizes everything it touches for prolonged time, hydrogen leaks through thinnest gaps deemed secure normally. Add stability - like ballancing a broom vertically on top of your finger, the unstabilized rocket will happily fly DOWN. Control acceleration - you could easily bring astronauts to orbit in half the time and quite a bit less fuel, except they would have to be scooped with a spoon from the rocket. Your "grain silo" has walls that aren't much thicker than alufoil, and can be easily pierced with a pencil, but it holds liquid hydrogen at room temperature. Check what pressure is liquid hydrogen at room temperature.
When you start adding it up, and especially if you add up all the -failed- tests before you get things right, you come up with much more than $60mln.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
I'm sure I remember watching this film once where this guy and his dog - his name was Grummit or something - managed to build this pretty cool rocket that ignited using a fuse. It was a bit old fashioned, but it seemed like a really cheap way to get to the moon. They didn't look like millionaires, and they seemed to have built it just using a saw, some metal, and a few household items, so I'm sure it can be done for a lot less than $60m. I think they managed to harvest a lot of cheese from the surface, too, so there could be an exciting business opportunity there for you. If I recall, the film also showed their design plans for this rocket, so perhaps watch it and copy it. Good luck!
'If Christ had tweeted the sermon on the mount, it might have lasted until nightfall.' - John Perry Barlow
Problem 2 - the engines have to run at sea level and in a vacuum.
If you plan on SSTO, then yes, you will either end up with a horribly un-optimized exhaust manifold design, or with variable geometry manifolds (or aerospikes or whatever). If however, you do multi-stage to orbit (like most conventional launchers), you simply optimize the first stage engine for sea level up to 20 miles (or whatever the hell the cut off point is for stage 1), and stage 2's engine can be optimized for 20 miles and up.
The shuttle is pretty much the only vehicle i can think off with liquid fuel engines running both at sea level and in actual space, and it cheats by using SRBs and dumping its fueltank
The problem still stands though, there is a reason we have actual rocket scientists, because it is frickin hard, especially if you want something where the risk of loss of life is acceptably low to todays society (which is rather hypocritical in that respect)
People, what a bunch of bastards
While you are oversimplifying things a bit, I do think you have a point. It is not the technical challenges that are so expensive. I believe Elon Musk himself has commented on how the regulatory requirements (Clearances, Insurance, Inspections, Approvals, Launch Site leases, ect) are just as expensive, if not more so, than the development and construction of the craft. The space shuttle for example, I have heard estimates that it only costs 40-60 Million to refurbish the shuttle for launch (Parts, fuel, External Tank), the rest of the 800-950 Million are Security personnel, Employee salaries, Insurance, support personnel (thousands of them), site maintenance, building maintenance, retrieval ships, emergency services, administrative, ect that are tacked on. The problem is, as I believe it often is in our country, is the bureaucracy.
If the US pays in dollars, the US might be getting a great deal due to inflation. There's going to be a lot of wild stuff between now and 2014 IMHO.
Oh, he's not going to build the space elevator first? Or use nanotech microengines?
Somewhere out there, Sergey Korolyov must be having a chuckle over this one.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
I really hope that there are no loose ends in this deal... it would be suck that, after getting the astronauts to the ISS, they discover that back-to-earth service is not included and they need to negotiate a new contract for it...
Yes, I am Dogbert.
Why can't
At 20 miles you're pretty much in a vacuum.
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/air-altitude-pressure-d_462.html
Those capitalist pigs!
Is the US Government stupid or what. The things that government will spend money on. No wonder people in the US have no jobs and there is no money to help the people out, because the government pisses money away. Will some one please slap NASA in the back of the head and say WTF!!
Russia Doubles Price For Launching US Astronauts VS. NASA now pays half as much
Well, which is it?
But does each astronaut have to pay extra (say another 45 million per bag) for their carry-on luggage?
"My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right." --Senator Carl Schurz (1872)
Are you telling me that if I had the best part of $60 million I couldn't design, build and fly my own rocket in to space? Even a brute force solution wouldn't be that expense, surely?
Hear that sound? that's every rocket scientist on Earth laughing at you.
China holds about 23% of the US Treasury securities. Whether that means that China owns the US or if the US owns China that remains to be seen. In the corporate world, 8% is usually considered controlling shares. China has that three times over. So it is up to how much they are willing to lose.
Another player is Gates or the whole Bill Gates Movement. China, Israel and others are probably playing him like a jig doll against the US. For them, the longer run the Gates Party has, the more it tears down the industrial and academic capacity in the US. The former is short term strength, the latter longer term and its loss hurts more. The US doesn't manufacture much now, not for about a whole generation. The same is happening to research and advanced education, especially in regards to ICT. You get once famous, high tech universities that can't even scrape up the skill in house among its student body to manage even a simple web site, groupware service or authentication system. Instead, brushing the loss under the rug by outsourcing while the faculty spend their time in useless meetings and clicking Windows Widgets.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Turzyx, there's a reason why "rocket scientist" is synonymous with "friggin' blazing genius."
And there's also a reason why you'll never be one, because you clearly don't even begin to appreciate the blazing heat of genius required to understand how to launch a rocket without killing its passengers and laying waste to vast tracts of land as far as the eye can see.
Stick to your day job, pal.
One day I feel I'm ahead of the wheel / the next it's rolling over me / I can get back on / I can get back on
It seems our friends in Russia have learned the virtues of capitalism and monopolies.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
i would think it is very difficult. After all, it is ROCKET SCIENCE!
Wealth is the gift that keeps on giving.
That's nothing. I saw this show once where a guy made a rocket from parts in a junkyard, and he even used a cement mixer as a crew compartment! And it was an SSTO, too!
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
What the hell is going on with our country?!
Us libtard socialists have discovered how to vote ourselves all the money from the national treasury, and then some.
Redistribution of the wealth, baby. Thaaassss whut I'ma talkin bout!
We're here to punish all those rich people who work to better themselves, and take from them everything we can.
Gotta "level that playing field" doncha know!
We outnumber you now and we've taken over.
And when there's nothing left and the USA has collapsed into shambles, we'll riot in the streets.
With waistlines constantly expanding, it's not just the budget airlines that have decided to charge more for fatter people. Now the Russians are doing it too :D
Hear me out for a minute... the rocket is just going straight up, what's so hard? Just strap a sealed chamber onto a grain silo of fuel, surely? Are you telling me that if I had the best part of $60 million I couldn't design, build and fly my own rocket in to space? Even a brute force solution wouldn't be that expense, surely?
Find $60G and prove that to us. Although there are probably plenty of rocket scientists laughing at you right now, I am sure they love to hear of someone who has achieved cheaper space flight.
There are many factors involved and we are at the current cutting edge of space technology. Until we have a spacecraft that can single stage to orbit and be able to return to orbit in two days, then the costs will be very high.
Another factor that effects the costs of NASA, is that if I remember rightly, all USA states must be included in the program. This is a big factor is cost increases. (BTW I couldn't find a reference to this, so please provide one or correct me).
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
At least 11% of the increase in price is simply due to the relative currency value changes between the dollar and ruble from 1 year ago. I would suspect there is some speculation as to the future worth of the dollar as well. That doesn't account for the full doubling of the price, but it's a key factor I'm sure.
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... although this is only a prototype, the European Space Agency (ESA) hopes that this technology can be scaled up to put folks in orbit: http://www.pearl.de/a-PE8174-5924.shtml?query=scheulder
Click on "Beratungs-Video" to see the demonstration.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Nope.
The last thing China wants now is the strong yuan. That will immediately make China less competitive with domestic factories. In fact, US is currently trying to pressure China to strengthen yuan.
If US dollar collapses it will be a catastrophe for China. But not because their reserves will be worth nothing, but because US will stop pumping resources into the Chinese market.
Bender: Demand suddenly skyrocketed! YOU ALL SAW IT!
Find $60G and prove that to us
I believe you're a few orders of magnitude off.
please...correct me
You're welcome.
The Russians aren't communists any more. They are capitalists, as shown in the fact that they are taking advantage of the shortage in space vehicles and the rise in demand for their ships. So now they are just like the US... greedy, corrupt corporatist pigs.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
... NASA announced their new criteria for selection of Astronauts.
"We're looking for really short and really thin persons, with proven ability to hold their breath for long periods of time" - said a NASA spokesman.
Khagendra Thapa Magar, the latest candidate to shortest man in the world, was unavailable for comments.
The US is no longer the largest market for a lot of things, from cell phones (China has more cell phone users than the entire American population) to cars (China is #1 in new car sales worldwide).
They can now pick and choose the markets the enter. It's why they refused to buy the Hummer, and why China/Walmart Refuses To Bid On NASA Contract. They're simply not that desperate for business any more, not with their economy still growing at almost 10% per year.
Actually, in this case, the fall itself could rather easily kill you... entering the atmosphere at nearly mach 23 is a bitch.
Given that SpaceX is charging between 45 and 51.5 million per launch, and a Dragon capsule will have capacity for up to 7, I think the Russians should take advantage of their monopoly pricing while they can...
Weather balloons can reach that altitude, so clearly it isn't vacuum. But I'll agree that the air is incredibly thin at that point.
By the way, 4 days from now is the 12th of April. April 12, 1961 will be then 49 years ago. Where is the Mars colony?
You can't handle the truth.
Andy Griffith, is that you?
I thought Lance Bass just had to come up with 1 million!
It was stupid to retire the shuttle. NASA should design an updated version that can use the same parts for 1 shuttle and work on the Constellation program. ARES 1 was tested and looked good. Then the hatchet job. Get the engineers on the same page/project and restore funding. Otherwise the costs of Russian transportation will continue to go up and be less and less cost efficient. America needs to stay in the Space Exploration arena. We need to keep the engineering talents and develop new talent. Funding private sector projects does not promote this much. NASA is one of the best things we have in the US. We can only hope in less than 3 years the country wises up, votes in a new administration that sees the value and restores funding for NASA and stops making apologies for the US being a great country. Enough said.
Who do they think they are, American Corporations ?
Richard Branson will soon be announcing a budget Virgin Galactic New Mexico Spaceport to ISS with all the style of Virgin Atlantic.
MASA (Mexican Aeronáutica y Spacial Administración)
Well, he didn't state the requirement that he should reach space alive. That alone should cut a huge amount of the cost. :-)
He also didn't tell from where he wants to start. If his self-designed rocket is first carried into the upper atmosphere by a professional rocket, this again saves a lot of cost and probably considerably simplifies the design. AFAIK, space officially starts at 100km height, so if the professional rocket carries him to a height of 99.9km, I guess designing a rocket which manages the last 100 meters before it breaks shouldn't be that hard.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Wait until the shuttle is irretrievably mothballed and see what happens to the price.
..Astronaut pays YOU!
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
And that's why it makes sense to use engine optimised for vacuum from around that point.
One that hath name thou can not otter
To be pedantic - while in orbit, you're falling all the time.
One that hath name thou can not otter
And how much would it be to send a whale to the moon?
I think this is a good point. Gold speculation and advertisements have been talking about double digit inflation in the USA, and based on the current debt load, deficit spending by both the Federal Reserve and the U.S. government, and increased tax obligations from things like the health care legislation are only putting more pressure to devalue the dollar as a way to get a handle on the debt load.
BTW, this is also one of the reasons why China is concerned with holding so much debt that is dollar denominated, and why OPEC is now considering to move its pricing off of the U.S. dollar.. For the past half century (with the exception of perhaps the Carter administration) U.S. foreign policy has been to maintain a strong dollar against other currencies, and that has led to a presumption that dollar denominated assets were considered equivalent to gold (more or less). That is no longer the case.
Just strap a sealed chamber onto a grain silo of fuel, surely?
Don't forget the video camera, tripod, and zoom lens. We want your next of kin to put this on YouTube.
Why? I'd say that society simply recognizes the value each life brings to it. For example, my life is much less valuable to society than the life of any astronaut.
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PV = nRT
It has a segment near the end on US Astronauts going up in a Russian launch.
The Russians have always used a single launch site. A train brings the rocket to the pad, they stand it upright on the pad. Friends and family are crowded around as they astronauts climb up to the capsule.
By comparison, the US program is platinum plated on top of gold plated on top of silver on top of ...
The safety records of the 2 programs is about the same, so far as I know.
In any case, NASA is an enormous ripoff of the US taxpayer.
It will bring some business and money into our parts, into Eurasia.
By the way, I've bought several items in the original US company shop "Levi Strauss & Co." today. That how it works.
By the way the clothing, which this company produces, is of superb quality. Sometimes I see the items of this trade mark in other shops, but those that sold in the original shops are different, of much better quality and choice.
Since the USA buys services from our industries, I'll try to buy the US goods and services too.
no diss on the russians, they are superb in making things work. I did aerospace and I know we have brilliant resources. It's so sad that we are no longer a viable space player. Men and machines made us, I cry when I go to Dayton and touch Apollo.
What, me worry?
Also, apparently the Helios aircraft managed to make it up to 96,863ft / 18.3 miles
Sure, the why dont you just pause termanitor 2 and built a terminator urself
In Soviet Russia, FALL frees YOU!
Well, a quick check on wikipedia shows that the average cost per flight over the life of the shuttle has been about 1.0 Billion per, lately as cheap as 750 million and historically as high as 1.7 Billion, minimum seating is 2, typical is 7, max is 11, do the math and see that if the payload is just astronauts its a good amount cheaper to do this; I wonder what the luggage limit is, 2 carry-ons ? 2 checked? addition 50 lbs?
Unix, an obscure operating system developed by bored researchers in an attempt to get a better game playing experience.
Getting down is easy. Surviving the down is the hard part.
Find $60G and prove that to us
I believe you're a few orders of magnitude off.
Doh, indeed. That should be $60M.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Hear me out for a minute... the rocket is just going straight up, what's so hard? Just strap a sealed chamber onto a grain silo of fuel, surely? Are you telling me that if I had the best part of $60 million I couldn't design, build and fly my own rocket in to space? Even a brute force solution wouldn't be that expense, surely?
Totally, dude, have a crack at it. It's not like it's rocket science.
i'm not saying astronauts are worthless, i'm saying that if an astronaut would be willing to take a 1 in 25 chance of blowing up on the ride to space, i don't think we should stop him. I think it is hypocritical for some bureaucrats to decide how safe a rocket has to be before someone can strap themselves to it.
Not that i'm saying it would be ok to kill half our astronauts on failed launches, but i think the people putting their life on the line riding the things would be more just in deciding what risk is acceptable, then some paper-pusher in washington
People, what a bunch of bastards
lol yeah retard it's just like that