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NASA 'Moving On' From Low-Earth Orbit (arstechnica.com)
An anonymous reader writes: NASA has issued a warning to private space companies: the agency is moving on from its focus on low-Earth orbit. William Gerstenmaier, chief of human spaceflight, said, "We're going to get out of ISS as quickly as we can. Whether it gets filled in by the private sector or not, NASA's vision is we're trying to move out." This leaves a void for the private companies building rockets to supply the ISS. "NASA says it would like to see the private space industry "take over" low-Earth orbit, although it acknowledges that any successor space station or orbiting module will be far smaller than the $140 billion space station, a collaboration between 15 countries. The message from NASA to the US industry is simple: we're serious about the commercialization of low-Earth orbit, we have this marvelous facility available with unique capabilities, and we want you to use the heck out of it."
It's a nice idea: commercial space exploration. But what are commercial, for-profit companies supposed to do in LEO? Space tourism, maybe some very specific R&D that requires freefall, but other than that?
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
This is actually great news for many who were pro-space exploration.
After their wildly successful lunar missions, NASA got stuck in LEO decades ago and has never been able to escape. It's continuously drained all of their money and talent into stationkeeping for the US military and corporations and eliminated the possibility of human exploration in space.
Ultimately, I think this is just gamesmanship. The government won't let NASA completely abandon LEO, it's really a strategic asset. However, they may have to cough up more funding or split the agency to support both LEO efforts and actual space exploration. That is likely what NASA wants.
"Also zero gravity ball bearings"
This particular pile of dung has been repeated since the 1960s. It made no sense then, it makes no sense today. We are already able to make atomically perfect spheres right here on Earth. Oops, so sorry, technology got better and we don't need your antique space dreams.
"art"
You're shitting me?
"biology research in 30 categories"
See above. Technology gets better, we don't need your space fantasies anymore.
" preparing to exploit asteroids"
Beyond delusional.
"crystal growth"
May I point out we are perfectly able to not only make atomically perfect speres right here already, but IC fabs are doing just fine, thanks.
The rest of your list sounds like a Tim & Eric sketch.
"This is the list of the things I like, IN SPACE!!"
Your sad devotion to ancient space religions is as tragic as it is hilarious.
Did you hear about the group of cows that NASA wanted to send into low earth orbit?
It was the herd shot round the world.
Yeah, because absolutely no good has come from NASA, ever. Absolutely no materials science or technology that allows for more efficient food production to "feed the children". Definitely not things like weather satellites or GPS - those are complete boondoggles that have absolutely no effect on modern agriculture.
People like you would still have us using oxen to plow fields, and then bitch that so many still go hungry.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
The less red tape needed to just use the thing the more use it will get. Part of the reason the ISS is so ridiculously over budgets is because of all the BS redundancy and BS "safe" tech high-pork approach (as in, scared to use fancy new things like "kevlar" and "carbon fiber", or scary words like "inflatables"....but lets keep using laptops from 15 years ago because they are COTS approved.).
As someone who used to work there, all I can say is NASA is often NASA's worst enemy....budget issues aside.
The recent Commercial Space Bill mandates that NASA maintains the ISS as a "viable and productive facility capable of potential U.S. utilization through at least 30 September 2024".
Moving on is hard to do sometimes.
Left MS Windows for Linux Mint and never looked back!
Vote for Bernie in 2016!