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A Look At NASA's Orion Project
An anonymous reader writes "People in north Iowa got a first-hand look at NASA's Orion Project. Contractors with NASA were in Forest City to talk about the new project and show off a model of the new spaceship. NASA has big plans to send humans to an asteroid by 2025. The mission, however, will not be possible without several important components that include yet-to-be-developed technologies, as well as the Space Launch System (SLS) and the Orion spacecraft to fly astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit. In fact, Orion's first flight test later this year will provide NASA with vital data that will be used to design future missions."
About those 'future missions'. They will be conducted by firms in the private sector, so why do we even need NASA, other than a place for research money to go to die.
I can't help but feel naming the module Orion was a throwback to the system they wish they had built:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_(nuclear_propulsion)
Until the next administration replaces the asteroid mission with something else or congress cuts the NASA budget.
... this is an Orion.
Get back to us when you can take a crew of 200 to Mars and back. In a month.
I'm glad they didn't build a ship that propels itself by exploding hydrogen bombs out it's ass.
Alternatively, look at Ukraine. Or Israel. Or North Korea. Or any one of a number of places in Africa. Then call me back if you find the pink unicorns you seem to think exist in the world today.
It's currently being done in a way that makes in inseparable from the SLS rocket, an out-dated and over-budget project enabled by government inertia and congressional pork. Also, the Orion MPCV itself doesn't represent much of an upgrade over existing manned space capsules; if it's to go anywhere outside of Earth orbit it's going to need a much larger and more complex space habitat attachment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D... which has yet to be developed.
A fool and his hard drive are soon parted.
It took 8 years from Kennedy's speech in 1961 to a human on the moon in 1969. Not only did NASA get a moon rocket designed, tested, and launched in that time, it also got an intermediate rocket program (Gemini) designed, tested, and launched prior to the moon program.
From scratch.
Now we're looking at (maybe) 11 years to develop a working rocket to go to an asteroid. Oh boy, journey to an, umm, space rock. Really stirs the heart, doesn't it? And this after willingly withdrawing from manned spaceflight capacity altogether for at least six years, and counting. Yep, just folding the cards and walking away from the table.
Sure, go ahead and tell me how technically challenging the space rock odyssey will be. But the call of space comes from the same place the call of the sea arose from in the past. To Terra Incognita, where "Here Be Dragons." Sorry, there be no dragons around the space rock.
The technical wizardry missions could and should be handled by robots. Humans should be reserved for missions which stir the soul, or the people who pay for such things (you and me) will stop paying.
It's hard to think of a better demonstration of how the US used to get things done, and how it does things now, than to compare the space program we had 50 years ago to the current version.
"If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood, and don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." - Antoine de Saint-Exupery
space has been up (or down, or over) there for... ever. and to be honest, going up there isn't something we HAD to do for any real reason.
don't get me wrong, space exploration has given us all kinds of things, technologies, sciences, pushing the boudries... communications, materials... blah blah blah, yeah, it's totally aweome! i get it. I'm all for pushing NASA all the way...
but to be honest, you NEED a military. You LIKE a NASA. Wars happen, and they aren't all created by some bullshit shadow uberfamilies of elite blah blah bullshit. When you need a military, it's sort of like a parachute... nothing else will do. When you need a military, you can't really WAIT for it to be created ex nihilo. The other guy doesn't wait.
Space, on the other hand... has always been up (etc) there, and you can go explore it on your own timeline.
You wanna pare down the military? Start with all the shit in the military that has nothing to do with warfighting. You'll find some pretty good money that can be used for space there.
Congressional pork for their respectve states.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm going to assume you are from the US. So why does the US NEED such a large military? At first glance it only seems to be used for blowing people up in countries that were never a military threat.
OMB reviews, independent budget reviews and internal NASA reviews all say that at the current funding rate, the system will not be ready for such a mission for a decade beyond 2025.
Ah, so very nice of you to troll both anti-affirmative-action and anti-union.
Were you born wealthy and privileged, or did you somehow fail to realize as you bootstrapped yourself that you'd have been working 16-hour days at the age of 10 if not for unions and the labor movement?
There is absolutely zero possibility that astronauts are going to be travelling to Mars in Orion which is basically Apollo + 1 extra seat. NASA has been misleading the general public about this for years. Oh yeah, astronauts are going to stay strapped to their seats for 18 months...in a capsule with almost no room to move. Major components of the project - including room to live and move around, along with mild gravity provided by a centrifuge - haven't been even designed yet, let alone price spec'd. No one has any idea how they will work or how they will protect astronauts from radiation from the Sun. I'm betting it's 2100 before we ever get to Mars, at least under NASA.
NASA's vaunted "Asteroid Redirect Mission" is now widely regarded as crap. It doesn't give us any new knowledge, it's not a good intermediate step for human colonization of space, and it's been mismanaged so badly that you could tell me it had been infiltrated by Russians intent on destroying America, and I wouldn't much doubt it.
But it does have one saving grace: it's our best shot if we ever find an asteroid headed for Earth impact.
I found this out sort of by accident - I was playing Kerbal Space Program, which has a NASA-sponsored module for doing asteroid redirects. I had a ship designed for that in orbit, and was looking for a good target.
I found one. On a direct intercept course. About a week out.
To make things worse, it was at like 80 degrees inclination. To cut a very long story short, I managed to redirect it to aerobrake, then stabilized the orbit so it wouldn't eventually deorbit.
Now, I fully realize that was a game, and that rocket science is actually a lot more complex than strapping a shitload of boosters to everything (my standard design). But the basic principle remains - something that can redirect an asteroid to enter lunar orbit is also something that can redirect an asteroid off of an impact course.
I don't know if that fully justifies the program - it's an absurd expense for what we get. On the other hand, what price can we put on avoiding extinction?
I thought they meant the real Orion, not Gemini/Apollo redux.
Everything that is old, is new again. Bah.
Alternatively, look at Ukraine. Or Israel. Or North Korea. Or any one of a number of places in Africa. Then call me back if you find the pink unicorns you seem to think exist in the world today.
You seem to think that the US should be poking their nose into ever fucking thing on the planet...
USA World Police mentality at its best..
Unfortunately, I fear that's a distinct possibility.
The main purpose is to let other countries know that if they mess with us they'll get blown up. Of course that strategy doesn't work so well when religious fanatics who think there is a heaven blow themselves up.
Pentagon has wasted 2-3 trillion dollars, tell em give it back or get zero. And give nasa a 500b/year budget.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
What we really need is something like a space Lego set that can be reconfigured for multiple kinds of missions. But, maybe that's not entirely realistic. As software people know, making something generic is not without trade-offs and usually extra complexity.
Table-ized A.I.
I'll preface this by saying I'm a libertarian and we tend to prefer the US government staying within its constitutional bounds. That means none of this post-WWII world police shit.
That said, most of these other countries where we have bases have "outsourced" their defense to us. When the US is mocked for the insanely high levels of spending on military vs these other countries, don't forget to adjust for the fact that countries allied with us have an artificially low defense budget. Take, for example, the UK. They couldn't even manage to mount an air campaign against Libya without US logistical support. That campaign was against an opponent who couldn't even fight back against their air strikes. There are plethora examples of this if you research it.
US government foreign policy prefers it this way, because then these other countries are beholden to us if they want to act militarily. It's hegemony.
I would prefer if we stopped subsidizing the world's defense, returned to operating within our constitutional framework (no standing army, motherfuckers!), and left the rest of the world to sort out their own problems. No one is going to fuck with us; I strongly support retaining our nuclear deterrent.
Stop with the hosts spam.
that somebody apparently taught you.
Werner Von Braun's team of Germans were working for the US Army Ballistic Missile Development organaization in the 1950s where they used their WWII experience with the V2 in conjunction to the experience of their new American colleagues to develop the Redstone and Juno rockets. While Eisenhower was still president in 1958, they began the development of a giant experimental rocket called the "Juno V". The first stage comprised of a Juno rocket body (used as a fuel tank) with 8 redstone bodies clustered around it (half of them used to hold fuel, the others used as oxidizer tanks) with a cluster of Redstone H-1 engines at the bottom. This project was well underway as was construction of launch facilities in Florida (NOT complex 39 yet, rather LC34 and LC37 further south), plans for a liquid hyrdogen-fuelled upperstage, and studies on civilian uses of this rocket (including for possible moon missions) before John F Kennedy even started running for President and before Eisenhower joined with then-Senator Johnson to create NASA.
When NASA was created from NACA in response to Sputnik, the Von Braun team and their projects, including the Juno V, were transferred to NASA and this rocket was renamed to "Saturn I". John F Kennedy won the 1960 election and was sworn-in in January of 1961. He gave his moon speech to congress in May 1961 (and his famous space speech at Rice University in 1962). The first Saturn I flew from Cape Canaveral in October of 1961 (only 5 months after telling congress he wanted to go to the moon). My point is not to take anything away from Kennedy (he had the singular vision to challenge the nation to aim for the goal, and the managerial wisdom to put the right people in place to get the job done) but rather to say that it actually took more than 8 years to get to the moon... it was actually about 11 years from the time the first work started on the Saturn rockets to the time Neil Armstrong planted his boot.
Incidentally, it has now been a decade since the Columbia broke-up on reentry and the Bush Administration set in motion plans to replace the shuttle with Orion sitting atop an expendable rocket for missions to the Moon and Mars, so it's fair to be upset by the sluggish progress on this retro-future path back to the 1960s
When the Obama administration cancelled all of our manned space plans congress went NUTS and did so in a bi-partisan way (you KNOW you've screwed-up when EVERYBODY is mad at you). As a result, the Obama people insisted they actually DID have a plan (about like Nixon's infamous plan to "win in Vietnam") but they had no documentation for it and no destinations (they called it a "flexible path"). When pressed for details and faced with a Senate that basically forced them to continue building a version of the big rocket Bush's people and two congresses had previously agreed to build, the administration announced that it was going to pave the way for a future mission to fly men to an asteroid aboard Orion; they insisted that this mission was better than a moon mission (which they dogmatically insisted was an unacceptable destination) because it was a deep space mission that would prepare the agency for an eventual Mars mission (which they were not willing to plan for because it would be too expensive and too far out in time). Note: The main point of the mission was to have an Orion crew spend months in deep space aboard Orion going to an asteroid, exploring it and getting samples from it and then returning to Earth. When congress pressed for details however, none were available and eventually the mission appears to have been deemed too risky and expensive, so now the administration wants to send an automated probe to go grab a tiny asteroid and bring it to orbit around the moon, where a future Orion crew can spend 3 days flying to it, and another 3 days returning. This will be LESS of a mission than the Apollo 8 mission to orbit the moon for the first time and will not do ANYTHING to prepare for a future Mars (or even Moon) mission. This asteroid faux mission keeps getting smaller and smaller and has been stripped of all value.
Unfortunately I agree with this. And I'm not American. I always wonder what would happen to the world if US would go isolationist like North-korea...
I think we are still better of with US being a world police... and until there are freedom fighters like Snowden who can keep check on the US power, the world is a better place.
Manned spaceflight pork and a pointless mission to an asteroid. The money would be much better spent on unmanned robotic probes to Europa and other places of interest.
I get what you're saying, but in the time when the Constitution was written, a standing army wasn't necessary because you had a good month of lead time before someone else's army could get here to do something untoward.
The technology of flight changes that. There should be a smaller standing army specifically for defense of the nation restricted to North America, and then a reserve contingent that can only be activated by Congress (emergency resolution, war declaration, etc.).
All the hundreds of bases on foreign soil should be liquidated, and the foreign countries that get those back should start footing the bill for their own defense. Then we'll see how much they want to cry about American expansionist policies and so on.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
We don't need it. However, all our allies need it, and we choose to keep footing the bill and helping them out.
Note: I do not agree with this policy, but that's what's going on.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
unless the rocket is fules with corn, it doesn't come to mind as the first place to think about space vehicles.
What was the Iowa connection here?
A former astronut or fickle funding?
All the hundreds of bases on foreign soil should be liquidated, and the foreign countries that get those back should start footing the bill for their own defense. Then we'll see how much they want to cry about American expansionist policies and so on.
In fairness, it's generally not the South Koreans (to pick one obvious example) complaining about American expansionism.
Given how the US Congress funnels money, NASA has to make due what they can get unfortunately.
Asteroid mission is President Obama's only option right now due to lack of money. Notice that a Landing Craft for SLS isn't among the innovations they're touting? Can't land if you don't got the ship to do it. If its not in development right now, it will be longer till we land.
Honestly, I'm tired of Congress playing their games in order to keep themselves in power, cater to people who vote for them and keep their respective state industry going at cost of being able to accomplish anything. Were suppose to be one country, not co-op fighting each other.
Personally, I would have like them to built a reusable interplanetary vessel with Nuclear-Pulse or refuellable Ion-Drive in orbit. Which could be have modules like ISS to plug in for whatever mission and leave orbit for its mission. It does the deed, and comes back. Just make sure it has enough shielding for cosmic rays from messing with the crew. Were still learning the effects on the body, so its always going be gamble.
Private efforts, I'm all for it as long their responsible. Industry only looks to make money and opportunity. if its not cost effective, they don't do it unless their paided too. Thats why I don't have a lot good feelings on them being able do a manned trip unless its non-profit sort deal.
Frankly, I think NASA should be working with SpaceX to get the DragonRider off the ground as fast as possible and work on the Falcon Heavylift. This is basically a pork project to keep the people who where making the solid rocket boosters in business.
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
Complete isolation is a bit harsh, a healthy dash of non-interventionism would be more than enough. Our current problem is that our government likes to meddle. They generally do it with (at least on the surface) fairly reasonable intentions, but it as become abundantly apparent that we're terrible at "helping" others militarily. When you go into a country to "save" a few hundred/thousand people and end up causing (directly/indirectly) tens/hundreds of thousands of deaths and still claim "mission accomplished" you've got a major problem.
I find something lacking, a habitat module. I see lots of articles, PPT, etc. describing how Orion will go beyond but yet I haven't found much on additional space for food, supplies, tools and parts (yes, things can break down needing replacements and repairs), exercise equipment. Maybe there is but I haven't seen anything consistent (I admit I'm not involved in Orion or other HSF programs, and haven't fully searched the internet for references). I see lots of articles about Orion and SLS launch vehicle but that's it. Perhaps a little here and there for habitat modules but no major development program like someone getting a big contract to design and build modules.
I view Orion as a high speed entry vehicle when screaming back into earth's atmosphere but other than that it is limited. It carries only four people, has no airlock, no toilet, not much space for supplies, and has less room per person than the Shuttle Orbiter.
mfwright@batnet.com
US government foreign policy prefers it this way, because then these other countries are beholden to us if they want to act militarily. It's hegemony.
Plus, military weaponry is just about the only US export still bringing in money. Civil wars or border disputes crop up, and the US companies get to sell to both sides. Of course, I'm sure State Department advisers would NEVER do anything to encourage those conflicts...
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
It took us not even 10 years to go from a standing start to the moon. Why is it taking 3 or more years to launch humans now? Is it NASA's management (the structure of which should be flattened, preferably by a sledge hammer), and don't hire more managers while there are unfill tech and engineering jobs), or is it that they're budget, now, is what it was during the moon race... in UNadjusted dollars, meaning it's about a sixth or less of what it was then.
mark
Have they integrated some realism into Kerbals aerobrake maneuvers yet? I was attempting to get into Jool orbit a while back (with a neat little dual lander probe rig) but burnt far more fuel on getting there then I had anticipated, I had little fuel left and was moving at quite a clip. All I know is the aerobraking maneuver I needed to use to get into even an eccentric orbit was FAR from survivable. The Kerbalnauts that I had in a stations/craft in Kerbal orbit probably wondered why their system had a second sun for a few minutes.
The future is not NASA and their bloated bureaucracy, but with private companies like SpaceX, Orbital Sciences, etc. As one poster already said, the present daty NASA is not capable of space operations of the magnitude of the past. I live close to KSC and it represents everything that is wrong with NASA - overpaid people with no real mission doing meaningless work that was overcome by entrepreneurs. SpaceX went from zip to orbiting their first recoverable capsule in less then 8 years and with $278 million in tax dollars. NASA spent an estimated $5 billion on Constellation/Ares over seven years and had one partially successful test launch.
I don't see anything in the Constitution that says we can't be world police. The Constitution provides for an Army and a Navy (treated slightly differently), and makes the President the Commander-In-Chief, with the caveat that Congress declares war.
Now, I'd like it if we cut down on that, but it all seems constitutional to me.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes