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Soviet Shuttle Buran Found In a Junk Heap
gruenz noted the somewhat sad photo slideshow showing what appears to be the Soviet Space Shuttle Buran, lying in a Moscow suburb junk heap. Of course I don't read Russian, so it might also be a carnival ride rusting.
If we had done the same and gone back to the Apollo program, 14 people would still be alive.
Because CmdrTaco says so..that's why
That's "could HAVE had" you imbecile.
Forget about Mars -- right now any idea of going to Mars is pure fantasy. The problem is that it currently would take years to get there -- and that's years worth of food and Oxygen you'd have to bring, and years of radiation exposure to deal with. Oh and did I mention years worth of waste products to deal with somehow? Did you know that if poo sits in a sealed plastic bag, it eventually explodes because of the bacteria in it? That's why poo has to be processed to kill the bacteria... with chemicals in a "break-pack" in fecal storage bags, which you then have to kneed with your hands. Yeah. Fun. Have to play with your poo so that the bag doesn't explode and spread it all over the inside of the ship.
And then there's years worth of the problems in the human body that are created due to weightlessness -- constipation, bone loss, muscle atrophy, etc. And astronauts going stir crazy. And what do you do if any of them become involved and there's a pregnancy?
Right now we have NO SHOT at getting to Mars, let alone actually doing anything once we get there. The math doesn't work out on several fonts at once -- energy required, radiation protection required, recycling required, etc, etc, etc.
Now do you understand why we only do stuff within Earth orbit, beneath the Van Allen belt? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Allen_radiation_belt/