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To: mjones@dzn.com, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Suggestion for starship fuel cycle (fusion)
Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999 20:11:13 EST
Dear Michael,
Thanks for your interest in the site, and your comments. I'm afraid I don't
know what you mean by a "proton-catalyzed carbon cycle reaction" or any type
of "regenerative fusion cycle". All fusion cycles we could find consume fuel.
Some like the Lithium-6 cycle can use the reactants from the first cycle to
power the second cycle, but you can't just recycle the same fuel mass over and
over.
Also its important to note that we chose anti-nutronic fuel cycles that
release their energy in the kinetic energy of the fusion products. No
radiation. Virtually no heat. So they make highly effective rocket fuels.
However the basic limitations of the power a given mass of fusion fuel can
generate, becomes a staggering limitation. As you noted, the fuel loads
required would be massive! Grossly dwarfing the starship.
As to you other main points:
The Explorer-class vehicles Bussard ramjet idea was abandoned after the
diagrams and web site were worked up. It looks pretty unlikely that a
ramscoop could even scoop up its own weight in interstellar material, assuming
you could even make it work at all. So the Explorer concept now uses large
fuel canisters (tankers?) boosted up to it to refuel it as it boosts out of
the star system. Effectively it boosts out using fuel feed to it in a just-
in-time system, and decels using internal fuel reserves.
We toyed with the idea of using a scoop like system to brake the ship, but
were skeptical that it would save us any fuel.
Explorers hardware, living quarters designs, and such, are the nominal
reference design for the other concepts.
As to the M.A.R.S.-class
It relies on beamed power from our Solar system, but we could never figure a
solid idea on how we could use that to decelerate, nor were we optimistic at
getting it to the ship over interstellar distances. To put it mildly this
would be a staggering challenge. Thou your inverse square issue can be
avoided by a maser beam, it would still defuse and the aim would degrade at
such distances.
The financial and political investment in Sun-orbital photoelectric collector
arrays would be a problem. MARS and Fuel/Sail would both need vast emitter
systems, with astronomical costs. Unless their was some major advance in
automated, low cost manufacturing of such platforms, these systems would be
undoable. Explorer has a similar problem with its fuel launcher system.
Your security issue for the emitter array is also a common problem. Thou
Fuel/Sail and Explorer only need the transmitters for a few months at boost,
they also depend on them being their to slow them down on return to Earth. If
for example that can't ABSOLUTELY prove they pose no contamination threat, the
array will likely not be fired up to break them on their return.
Since Alpha Centauri isn't in the ecliptic plane, Sols planets wouldn't cross
the beam's path.
We assumed their would be few if any mid flight maneuvers, so tearing the sail
didn't seem an issue.
I'm afraid your mistaken, the sail can not be decelerated by tacking into the
beam. This only works in our star system due to orbital mechanics. Useless
on a fast interstellar mission.
Sail erosion at high velocities would be a major issue. Fuel/Sail could furl
its Sail after a couple month, but MARS would take it hard!
Like all our designs, MARS is unaffordable with out major technical
improvements in manufacturing. A society that could attempt the degree of
space based construction needed for the emitter arrays, would have taped the
huge resources of space, so raw materials wouldn't be an issue, and power
would have to be common through out the developed world or its space based
colonies. But that's a very big if!
Not being able to change course isn't much of a problem though. If you look
out in the night ski, you'll notice there is little if anything near any
given course to or from any star.
Fuel/Sail seems the most promising at the moment. Offering fairly high speed
(.4c) and less extreme technical challenges, but it still is unaffordable.
Thanks for all the time you put into your response. I'll forward it to the
group. If you'd like, you might join the group if you wish to make frequent
comments. Thou I'm afraid we haven't had a lot of activity the last year or
two. We frankly ran out of new ideas, and developed the old ones about as far
as we could. Without a major break through in technology or physics, these
designs are undoable.
Thanks again.
Sincerely,
Kelly Starks
>Dear Kelly,
>
> Have you considered using a regenerative fusion cycle, such as a
> proton-catalyzed carbon cycle reaction, which uses ordinary boron as a
> "seed" fuel? I mention this to you because, after looking over your
> design summaries, I have some misgivings about each of your propulsion
> approaches.
> To begin with the Explorer-class vehicle, which uses a lithium-6 fuel
> cycle:
>
> * Though Li-6 is relatively plentiful and inexpensive, the cycle is
> non-regenerative (once the fuel is "burned", it is not recycled
> into "new" fuel); therefore, any practical starship would be a
> massive construction, nearly all of which is fuel tankage/storage.
> * The engine system (essentially a 1960-vintage Bussard ramjet) has
> several enormous engineering hurdles to overcome, not least in the
> area of field generation and control. Even if these challenges
> could be met, in the end you are left with a tremendously huge and
> complex vehicle which self-destructs whenever it is throttled up to
> full power. (A slight modification to the system might, however,
> serve as a usable braking system for a starship)
> * Assuming one could get the engine up to full power without
> destroying itself and/or the collection field, the efficiency of
> the system is limited by the hydrogen density in the area(s) of
> operation. Thus, it would be a much more practical propulsion
> system if used near a galactic core than in the environs out here
> in the Orion Arm.
>
> The next type of mission vehicle described is the M.A.R.S.-class
> starship, which relies on beamed power from an outside source
> (presumably located within the Solar system):
>
> * The energy requirements for the microwave emitter are, indeed, very
> large, but are not, in and of themselves impossible given a large
> enough financial and political investment in Sun-orbital
> photoelectric collector arrays.The chief problem in this respect is
> in the received power fall-off at the starship as it moves farther
> into space (and away from the emitter array).due to the inverse
> square law regarding signal propagation. Though this can, in
> principle, be compensated for by continuously increasing the
> emitter's ouput, at some point in the process a limit would be
> reached wherein the emitter is transmitting at full capacity and
> further increases in power output are beyond the physical
> capabilities of the device. Additionally, this system demands that
> the entire emitter infrastructure be in place and operational prior
> to the first mission launch.
> * The emitter system requires near-absolute reliability and security
> during operation; security is required not only to protect the
> infrastructure from deliberate sabotage, but also from damage
> caused by debris, comets, meteoroids, etc. which also inhabit the
> space around our star. Needless to say, security in this case also
> depends, perhaps critically, on guaranteed (or at least assured)
> funding throughout the mission cycle, which is an iffy thing at
> best, especially during the extrasolar stages of the mission when
> it will be difficult to gather public enthusiasm for the mission.
> Another aspect of security, which can be partly planned for, is the
> security of the beam itself.: It would probably have to be directed
> out of the ecliptic plane to prevent periodic interruptions from
> planets, etc. which would cross the beam's path; similarly, an
> exclusion zone of some sort would be necessary to prevent other
> spacecraft from wandering into the path of the beam (if that
> happened, the effect on the beam would probably be negligible at
> worst, but from the vehicle's point of view, it would be a very bad
> thing).
> * The chief difficulty for the starship will be to maneuver the
> (very) large sail during in-flight maneuvers without tearing the
> sail in the process. (By the way, the sail can be decelerated by
> the expedient of tacking into the beam). Aside from this is the
> problem of sail erosion by the interstellar medium, especially at
> high velocities.
> * The Solar system facilities, especially the photoelectric collector
> arrays, must be so designed as to permit changeout of the array
> cells during operation without severely degrading performance. This
> is necessary as the collector arrays (located, most probably, in
> intra-Mercurial orbits for efficiency) will be subjected to high
> thermal loading and intense radiation exposure, which degrades the
> collector cells over a (short) period of time.
>
> In short, the M.A.R.S. concept, while technically feasible in the
> context of the base scenario (i.e. the 2040-2060 timeframe), it is
> probably not politically feasible, especially in a society which would
> be all too eager to divert some (or all) of the power from the emitter
> array to increase the energy supply (hence, wealth) of its members (not
> to mention the fact they would probably not be too eager to divest
> themselves of the resources required to build the infrastructure,
> especially if there are perceived to be greater needs on Earth). And, of
> course, the M.A.R.S. starship is not autonomous, in any sense of the
> word; it cannot, for example, change course to investigate some
> previously unknown phenomenon, at least not without extensive
> consultation with Earth and major modifications in the flight plan.This
> alone suggests that the best use for the system might be point-to-point
> automated cargo transport, which would depend on predictability of the
> mission profile. Any missions of exploration, however, would be limited,
> at least during the cruise phase, of strictly fly-by types of profiles.
>
> The Argosy-class starship design is not detailed on your website, so I
> cannot comment on that concept. The Fuel/Sail-class vehicle addresses
> some, though by no means all, of the drawbacks to the M.A.R.S.-class
> starship, though it is still limited by fuel availability, as is the
> Explorer-class design.
>
> My humble suggestion is that a new class of vehicle be investigated,
> one that uses most (if not all) of the non-propulsive elements in the
> Explorer-class vehicle, but uses a regenerative carbon-cycle fusion
> reactor for propulsion and on-board electrical power. A side benefit to
> this reaction is that its primary waste product is helium-4, which can
> be readily liquified for use in the engine's cooling systems, thus
> reducing the necessary area of the ship's radiator arrays. Similarly,
> another output of the reaction cycle is a stream of positrons, which can
> be reacted with electrons to provide added thrust. The primary benefit
> of this reaction cycle is of course, its reduced need for fuel, thus
> freeing up a larger fraction of the vehicle for useful
> payload/supercargo.
>
> I apologize in advance for having taken so much of your valuable time
> on this matter. If you have any questions on the material above, or if
> you wish my assistance in further development of this concept, please do
> not hesitate to contact me at mjones@dzn.com.
>
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Michael E. Jones
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Been quiet for a while...
Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 23:24:11 -0700
Hi all:
It's been quiet here for quite a long time. I have been thinking, for
now, perhaps we have exhausted our working 'resources' for designing a
starship. Technologically, we aren't concrete yet. But, here is
something we can do: define our overall objectives for exploring the
destination star system. What planets/moons do we investigate the most
heavily? How do we proceed in our exploration of planetary surfaces? I
would like to hear your opinions on this. It might make for some thought
provoking discussion.
Kyle R. Mcallister
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To: "Kyle R. Mcallister" <stk@sunherald.infi.net>
cc: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Been quiet for a while...
Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 23:40:38 -0700 (PDT)
Kyle,
That's an excellent idea. Before we can decide what our
priorities are as far as what bodies we study, we should ask what we might
expect to find in a target starsystem. comets, big planets, li'l planets,
asteriods of wildly varying compositions. My vote is that we give the
most 'earth-like' planets the most emphasis if there is one, and also
scout the system for water and other resources, especially on the minor
bodies, in anticipation that humans might try to take up permanent
residence there someday. In the absence of any earth-like bodies, we
still ought to do the latter. Study of the star is important too: to
compare the detailed measurements that will be possible from proximity
with data on Sol. Also, does this system have a Kupier belt/oort cloud
type thing? why/why not. Are there differences?
Just trying to keep the ball rolling.
Best regards,
Nels Lindberg
On Sun, 4 Apr 1999, Kyle R. Mcallister wrote:
> Hi all:
>
> It's been quiet here for quite a long time. I have been thinking, for
> now, perhaps we have exhausted our working 'resources' for designing a
> starship. Technologically, we aren't concrete yet. But, here is
> something we can do: define our overall objectives for exploring the
> destination star system. What planets/moons do we investigate the most
> heavily? How do we proceed in our exploration of planetary surfaces? I
> would like to hear your opinions on this. It might make for some thought
> provoking discussion.
>
> Kyle R. Mcallister
>
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To: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: response to latest
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 10:48:41 -0400
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Hello everyone,
I like the idea of "defining the mission"; it does give another
direction for thought. It's caused me to wonder already, if anyone has
previously considered what sorts of instrumentation would be considered
essential for the mission, as I've seen nothing about this here before,
and it would effect the final design. One of the first steps in
designing any vehicle is to define its payload, if only in terms of
gross vehicle weight.
Once you start asking where you want to go and what you want to look at,
it seems reasonable to me that you begin to develop different designs
for different missions. I think we can all agree that our primary
interest would be in systems with a star much like our own, most likely
to harbor life as we know it, and these would be the manned missions.
Too bad our frail humanity can't stand much acceleration; it makes these
the slowest.
We then have choices concerning unmanned missions (depending on budget
limits). We could send these to star systems without a star like our
own, out of pure curiosity (knowledge is never wasted), or we could send
one in advance to a system that we have chosen for a manned mission.
This seems good to me, as it would be a pity to send men to an
interesting star, only to find that it had no interesting planets. Our
astronomy currently isn't up to finding earthlike planets, though we may
get there, perhaps with something like a super-Hubble-type device or the
1000 AU "solar lens" telescope. Either way, it will be a slow search.
We might be able to speed up the search, though, with a different kind
of remote probe. Pick an area of space with, say, three or four
candidate stars, and send a huge-ass telescope halfway there (more or
less). The telescope would then have a closer look at all of the
candidates and send back information that we could use to narrow our
choices.
What think ye?
Curtis
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<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en">
<html>
Hello everyone,
<p>I like the idea of "defining the mission"; it does give another
direction for thought. It's caused me to wonder already, if anyone has
previously considered what sorts of instrumentation would be considered
essential for the mission, as I've seen nothing about this here before,
and it would effect the final design. One of the first steps in designing
any vehicle is to define its payload, if only in terms of gross vehicle
weight.
<p>Once you start asking where you want to go and what you want to look
at, it seems reasonable to me that you begin to develop different designs
for different missions. I think we can all agree that our primary interest
would be in systems with a star much like our own, most likely to harbor
life as we know it, and these would be the manned missions. Too bad our
frail humanity can't stand much acceleration; it makes these the <i>slowest.</i><i></i>
<p>We then have choices concerning unmanned missions (depending on budget
limits). We could send these to star systems <i>without</i> a star like
our own, out of pure curiosity (knowledge is never wasted), or we could
send one in advance to a system that we have chosen for a manned mission.
This seems good to me, as it would be a pity to send men to an interesting
star, only to find that it had no interesting planets. Our astronomy currently
isn't up to finding earthlike planets, though we may get there, perhaps
with something like a super-Hubble-type device or the 1000 AU "solar lens"
telescope. Either way, it will be a slow search.
<p>We might be able to speed up the search, though, with a different kind
of remote probe. Pick an area of space with, say, three or four candidate
stars, and send a huge-ass telescope <i>halfway there </i>(more or less)<i>.</i>
The telescope would then have a closer look at <i>all</i> of the candidates
and send back information that we could use to narrow our choices.
<p>What think ye?
<p>Curtis</html>
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Subject: starship-design: Starship-Design: Let's build the thing!
Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 11:15:18 EDT
Kyle,
I first found LIT back in mid-late 1994. I think for the discussion
that have been going on, five years is incredible. I do think that maybe
people might be getting all talked out. How long can you talk about going to
Disney World before you just want to go there. I myself had always hope that
LIT could take all the ideas and information collected in this think tank and
attempt to get real-world backing. After all, someday someone will be the
first to actually do this feat, why not us?
I know the group had discussed destination star systems back in 1995,
but I honestly forgot which one was selected. Of course, now there have been
real planets discovered since the destination discussion and that may well
change where we should go. Since this would be a prototype vessel (we are
still planning a single ship aren't we?), I would make a recommendation that
we shoot over to Proxima Centauri and back to make sure everything works well
before we do any really big trips. Any comments on this?
Another thing we could start doing is trying to put a price tag on
this mission, unless that's already been done and I missed it when I was in
Australia. If it hasn't been done, we should try and attach some real
figures to the construction, launching, testing, and maintenance of the ship.
That information could then be used to see how much backing we need to get
the thing going. It would give LIT some good publicity (Worldwide Internet
Think Tank Attempts to Acquire Backing for Interstellar Spacecraft), and show
everyone on the planet that we feel that space advancement and exploration is
proceeding at a snail's pace. Why if it weren't for McNamara doing so much
damage to NASA, we'd have landed a manned team on Mars in the 1980s. What do
you all think?
Mike Pfeifer
Systems Analyst
Colorado
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Subject: starship-design: Check out the latest (May 99) Discover Magazine for an article on antigravity.
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 23:20:58 -0500
And get ready to eat some crow you guys, Kyle gets a free "I told you so!"
Article is about superconductivity and antigravity (or "gravity
modification" for the politically correct). Basically the same things that
Kyle has been talking about. NASA is taking it seriously, and the results
*have* been reproduced. Right now they are concentrating on eliminating
all sources of possible error, making very detailed measurements (current
weight loss is about 2%. Is it real or is it error?), and trying to
understand the underlying science.
Other related issues have to do with inertia and "borrowing" a little
inertia from the farthest corner of the universe for a split second before
paying it back (and can you pay it back in such a way the both the
borrowing and the payback result in infinitesimal motion in the same
direction?) I don't pretend to understand it (and I am *sure* that I
didn't explain it very well) but it was a fascinating article all the same.
Kevin Houston.
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From: "Kyle R. Mcallister" <stk@sunherald.infi.net>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Check out the latest (May 99) Discover Magazine for an article on antigravity.
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 23:37:24 -0700
Kevin Houston wrote:
>
> And get ready to eat some crow you guys, Kyle gets a free "I told you so!"
Heheheh...well, I had the feeling it could be done. Podkletnov seemed
quite believable, rejection by other scientists notwithstanding. For
instance, on a post to sci.physics, one physicist said that there was no
reason to discuss antigravity results because antigravity cannot exist.
Arrogant, eh? There is bad on both sides though. Worse on the
pseudoscience side, they are the ones who give antigravity and FTL
researchers a bad name. As morbid as it is, a PhD friend of mine may
have put it correctly: we may have to wait for the old generation to die
before progress can be made. I hope this isn't so, and this article
seems to bring a little hope to the matter. I'm not going to belittle
anyone here though, after all, Steve was right many times. You can't
just come up with some half-cocked theory and expect it to be true. You
must do replicable research.
> Article is about superconductivity and antigravity (or "gravity
> modification" for the politically correct). Basically the same things that
> Kyle has been talking about.
Oh, I talked about it, but not very well. Back in '97, I was still about
75% kid, 25% scientist, so I was understandably weird ;) Now, I hope
that the ration of kid to scientist has changed. First rule of
experimenting: "What did I do wrong this time???"
> NASA is taking it seriously, and the results
> *have* been reproduced. Right now they are concentrating on eliminating
> all sources of possible error, making very detailed measurements (current
> weight loss is about 2%. Is it real or is it error?), and trying to
> understand the underlying science.
Yes, I have the article right here. Quite an interesting read. Too bad
they did not mention John Schnurer, he has made much headway in the
research of this effect. He has worked with Podkletnov. In my book,
those two will always be the ones who did it first, not the established
NASA scientists. They did good replications, but I have been critical of
their work. For one thing, they should have hired Podkletnov to show
them exactly how to get it to work. But they had to do it their way.
That is probably why it took them so long to get results. I have dabbled
in the superconductor research of Schnurer, and it does work. It does
*something*. Anyone could probably build it if you wanted to. Search for
John's patent for a gravity modification device. As far as my research
on these subjects, I do a little here and there. As it is 'alternative',
as the NASA antigravity research is, I keep to myself about most of it.
Until I get great results of course... ;)
Kyle R. Mcallister
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Starship-Design: Let's build the thing!
Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 18:14:10 EDT
>From: Stravonski@aol.com
> Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> Reply-to: Stravonski@aol.com
> To: stk@sunherald.infi.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
>
> Kyle,
>
> I first found LIT back in mid-late 1994. I think for
> the discussion that have been going on, five years is
> incredible. I do think that maybe people might be
> getting all talked out. How long can you talk about
> going to Disney World before you just want to go
> there. I myself had always hope that LIT could take
> all the ideas and information collected in this think
> tank and attempt to get real-world backing. ==
Ah, we'ld need something like an O'niel colony in orbit to even support
construction of the ship! The maser array to boost the stuff out of orbit
would involve thousands (?) of full sized space solar power platforms. As a
rough guess were talking costs equivilent to decades of total US GNP to set
up the array.
> I know the group had discussed destination star
> systems back in 1995, but I honestly forgot which
> one was selected. ===
Kind of hard to even get to centauri, so the selection is limited.
> === that we feel that space advancement and exploration
> is proceeding at a snail's pace. Why if it weren't for
> McNamara doing so much damage to NASA, we'd have
> landed a manned team on Mars in the 1980s. What do
> you all think?
I worked at NASA in the shuttle and station programs for about 15 years.
McNamara didn't do anything to NASA. We never went to Mars or back to the
moon because we had no interest in doing it. We really only did the moon to
show up Russia.
Right now NASA is a impediment to space. They have no real budget to do
anything, and won't take any risks on current gen or new technology, and they
fight like hell to keep the new star ups or the military from passing them
by. Fortunatly they are failing and force to try to follow.
Kelly
> Mike Pfeifer
> Systems Analyst
> Colorado
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Tue, 06 Apr 1999 16:18:45 -0700
Sure I am game to build it now...
But we do seem to be lacking in finding a small reusable launch
rocket...
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Been quiet for a while...
Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 18:13:33 EDT
> It's been quiet here for quite a long time. I have been
> thinking, for now, perhaps we have exhausted our
> working 'resources' for designing a starship.
> Technologically, we aren't concrete yet. But, here
> is something we can do: define our overall objectives
> for exploring the destination star system. What
> planets/moons do we investigate the most heavily?
> How do we proceed in our exploration of planetary
> surfaces? I would like to hear your opinions on this.
> It might make for some thought provoking discussion.
I think we covered that way back when. Some folks were pushing everything to
colonize something semi-earth like. I wanted a reasonable survey of all
planets and moons including ground survey teams (where feasable).
I figured the ship would pull drop survey sats around all the planets and
such, then they sit and study the data figuring out what looks interesting.
Then survey teams in bus sized sealed rovers are shuttled down. They wander
around, launch more drones, etc. Then they get shuttled up to a quareenteen
platform. They have to absolutly prove they are not contaminated, or they
are abandoned. (The Starship will not be deceled on return to Sol unless it
can prove its clean.) otherwise they go back into the ship or next survey
world.
Kelly
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http://www.jamesoberg.com/speech/dragon.html
Review of "Dragonfly"
James Oberg
Washington Times, January 3, 1999
Rockets and space vehicles are so overwhelmingly impressive that they
often dwarf the
human figures associated with them. Aside from images of smiling,
steel-jawed astronauts
whose vocabularies consist mainly of ``What a fantastic sight,'' the
people behind the space
dramas rarely are seen.
For the current generation of space-station astronauts, ``Dragonfly''
should change all that.
Bryan Burrough weaves a smoothly readable, intimate portrait of the
highly varied
individual Americans who faced the most difficult and dangerous space
missions since the
first moon landings and shuttle flights - the expeditions aboard the
Russian Mir space
station in 1995-1997.
Through Mr. Burrough's skilled narrative we come to know intimately a
parade of
strong-willed, creative and intelligent individuals who one by one spent
months aboard the
Russian space station. There's solid Norm Thagard, desperate for
confirmation as the
official ``first American to Mir,'' who methodically trains himself to
carry out research that in
space leads him to the brink of malnutrition and well past the edge of
boredom. There's
``grandmotherly'' Shannon Lucid and her friend John Blaha, the ``old
reliable'' pilot, whose
friendship doesn't survive their back-to-back flights on Mir.
We meet Jerry Linenger, the intense physician who nearly is killed in a
flash fire in space
and then agonizes over evidence that NASA and the Russians are covering
up the severity
of the crisis, and we meet British-born Michael Foale, nearly s best
prepared Mir visitor
ever - so much so that when he returns from space, NASA yanks him off
future space
station missions with the Russians.
Lastly there is David Wolf, the brilliant medical scientist whose
personal foibles doomed his
astronaut career until he had one last chance to get back into space, by
volunteering for
Mir, where he triumphantly redeemed himself. Because of the book's
publishing schedule,
the last American on Mir, Australian-born Andy Thomas, gets only brief
mention.
Under unanticipated threats and dangers, each of these astronauts had to
rely on their
highly diverse personal strengths to get themselves through both sudden
crises and
long-term psychological stresses. How they all did so - and how close
some of them came
to being overcome - is an exploration narrative worthy of the traditions
of Lewis and Clark,
of Scott and of Amundsen, of Hillary and Cousteau and Lindbergh.
Beyond the deeply human accounts, Mr. Burrough provides vivid
descriptions of a NASA
bureaucracy caught off guard again and again by the problems of long
space flight and the
politically inspired ``space partnership'' with Russia. Preparations
were inadequate,
personnel were picked with no previous Russian experience (sometimes
deliberately with
no such experience, on request of the Russians) and outside advice was
not sought, nor
accepted when it was offered.
The author also provides, for the first time in any publication, a
portrait of one of NASA's
most mysterious figures, George Abbey. Considered the Machiavellian
``power behind the
throne'' of Administrator Daniel Goldin, Mr. Abbey is currently the head
of the Johnson
Space Center in Houston, and hence in practice the head of both the
space shuttle and
space station programs.
Mr. Abbey's reported leadership style, promoting and rewarding personal
loyalty far more
than professional competence, has had a curious effect on the astronaut
corps. With rare
exception (Mr. Burrough mentions Jerry Linenger and the doomed Blaine
Hammond, but
neglects to give credit to Apollo veteran John Young, who speaks out
freely even as few
listen), it seems to have converted men and women courageous enough to
sit atop millions
of pounds of rocket fuel into timid ``team players'' afraid to show any
contrary opinions.
Mr. Burrough describes how this consequent corps of ``Stepford
Astronauts'' almost
unanimously goes along with every major management decree for fear of
losing future
space-flight assignments, even while privately discussing safety and
efficiency concerns
among themselves.
As a 22-year veteran of the space shuttle program, I read Mr. Burrough's
book with a
mixture of gratitude and envy. I'm grateful he was able to tell this
story accurately and fully,
as I know his account to be. And I'm envious at his exhilarating,
exhausting experience in
digging through the radio and meetings transcripts, talking at length
with many of the
principals and many of the support personnel, and assembling a coherent,
comprehensible
narrative of this dramatic phase of American space history.
There are a number of disturbing aspects of our space program that this
book reveals,
sometimes only implicitly. Most worrisome is the simple fact that much
of what the author
discovered truly is new and original, but shouldn't be. During the
course of the crises
aboard Mir in 1997, NASA should have released more of this material, or
the American
news media should have dug it out.
For example, for the first time in NASA history, reporters are no longer
allowed to listen to
live voice conversations from space - and requests to obtain summaries
often require filing
Freedom of Information Act letters. But neither NASA nor the press corps
did their duty, and
it is only with the publication of this book that the ``full story'' can
in any way be said to be
available to the public.
Meanwhile, NASA's passion to indoctrinate the American public with its
narrow and
self-serving view of its programs (often based on sincere self-
deception rather than
deliberate mendacity) comes across in example after example, as do the
determined
Russian campaigns to dodge blame for major failures.
In a book of more than 500 pages, the minor gaps and oversights are
remarkably rare.
Occasionally characters show up without being introduced or explained.
Mr. Burrough has
mastered almost but not quite all of the space technology he explains so
well, but the
bloopers are only for lifelong rocket scientists to worry about - I
didn't find a single error of
any real significance in the entire book.
The first Americans aboard Mir had a remarkably high attrition rate -
most quit, a few were
transferred to other types of work at NASA. But the leadership at NASA
remains unchanged
from the Mir flights as the agency begins to implement plans for the
International Space
Station. Whether they have learned enough from their past experiences to
perform better
under the even heavier challenges to come is a critical question for
NASA and for the
country. Readers of this book will be in the best possible position
outside of NASA to
understand the institution's shortcomings as we prepare to face the
greatest space-flight
management challenge since Apollo.
James Oberg, a 22-year veteran of the space shuttle program, is now an
independent
consultant and author in Houston.
--part1_e7fb4b66.243bfb25_boundary--
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 09:05:23 EDT
In a message dated 04/06/99 16:21:01 Mountain Daylight Time,
bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca writes:
<< Sure I am game to build it now...
But we do seem to be lacking in finding a small reusable launch
rocket... >>
Excellent, then we know what areas we need to focus on. Does anyone
else know of any holes in our plans?
Mike Pfeifer
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To: KellySt@aol.com, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Starship-Design: Let's build the thing!
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 09:05:24 EDT
In a message dated 04/06/99 16:20:57 Mountain Daylight Time, KellySt@aol.com
writes:
<< I worked at NASA in the shuttle and station programs for about 15 years.
McNamara didn't do anything to NASA. We never went to Mars or back to the
moon because we had no interest in doing it. We really only did the moon to
show up Russia. >>
Sorry Kelly, I read some stuff back when I first joined LIT that said
that NASA had partially completed a ship in 1981 that could get us to Mars.
It further said that McNamara got it axed. I guess the information was not
as reliable as I thought. Thanks for the correction.
Mike Pfeifer
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Subject: starship-design: URANOS Club Newsletter No. 2
Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 20:29:04 +0200 (MET DST)
---------------------------------------------------------------
--> http://www.uranos.eu.org/uranose.html <--
* * **** *** * * *** ****
* * * * * * * * ** * * * * * *
* * * * * **** ***** * * * * * *** * * *
* * * * * * * * * ** * * * * *
*** * * * * * * *** ****
CLUB * for * EXPANSION * of * CIVILIZATION * into * SPACE
---------------------------------------------------------------
No. 2 URANOS CLUB NEWSLETTER 6.IV.1999
This is the new issue of our irregularly published
electronic newsletter.
To receive further issues of this newsletter, please send
a letter expressing such a wish to the address:
<uranos@uranos.eu.org>
---------------------------------------------------------------
Changes to the URANOS site:
- An English version of the "Great Contributors to Space
Exploration" page has been added.
- A general change of the structure of site navigation aids
has been made (in anticipation to the soon-coming
significant extension of the site - through adding the
"Poland and Poles in space" pages): this includes the main
layout change of the "Contents" page and adding new
navigation menus on every page.
- Link pages were shortened (by changes in HTML coding),
many new links added (especially to the list of Polish
WWW sites), and a number of others updated.
- Many small improvements of graphics, coding and layout
of most of the pages (especially in order to make them
work well for different browsers) has been made,
including addition of a number of links to items
in the texts and correction of the errors found.
Other information:
- We are urgently looking for volunteers - native speakers
of English - to help us on language checking and proofreading
of English translations of our new pages.
- Our discussion list <klub@uranos.eu.org> grows slowly
but systematically - it counts already 26 participants.
- We contacted and started co-operation with Polish Astronomical
Society (information about our Club appeared in No. 11 of
the Society's internet newsletter, and the newsletter is
also being forwarded to our list <klub@uranos.eu.org>),
as well as with the Polish Astronautical Society (information
about our Club appeared in No. 2/1999 of the newsletter
"Astronautyka").
Special information - The POLSTAR Project:
- We advise you to become acquainted with a current problem
concerning Polish presence in space - troubles with planned
Polish geostationary satellite. Details can be found in
an article in the Polish weekly "Wprost" from December 1998,
available on the Web (sorry, in Polish only),
at one of the addresses:
http://www.wprost.pl/iso/12.06.1998(836)/numer/s90.htm
http://www.wprost.pl/ascii/12.06.1998(836)/numer/s90.htm
A discussion of the problem goes currently on our list
<klub@uranos.eu.org> - we invite you to take part in it!
---------------------------------------------------------------
Please forward!
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To: Stravonski@aol.com, bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca,
"starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Wed, 07 Apr 1999 22:07:43 -0400
Stravonski@aol.com wrote:
> In a message dated 04/06/99 16:21:01 Mountain Daylight Time,
> bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca writes:
>
> << Sure I am game to build it now...
> But we do seem to be lacking in finding a small reusable launch
> rocket... >>
>
> Excellent, then we know what areas we need to focus on. Does anyone
> else know of any holes in our plans?
>
> Mike Pfeifer
The small, reuseable launch vehicle is in aggressive development. See
www.rotaryrocket.com.
Keep looking up,
Curtis
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: The Nordley Relativistic Particle Beam (RPB) drive requires a
number of beam dr
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 02:01:19 EDT
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As to the topic of the cost of a project like this. Out of the artical I
attached comes that a 1000-ton RPB-drive ship accelerating at 1 earth gravity
requires one million drivers, with a required power input of 3 GW/driver.
Thats a thousand trillion watts. At current electric plant costs, that would
be about a thousand trillion dollars. Or about 300 years of the the US GNP.
Given our ships (loaded with deboost fuel) weigh in at 25 million tons, thats
25,000 times more cost.
Manufacturing cost have to come WAY down.
Kelly
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1Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 15:33:16 -0500Message-Id:
<H000070300785569@MHS>Subject: The Nordley Relativistic Particle
Beam (RPB) drive requires a number of beam drivers "fixed" in theTO:
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The Nordley Relativistic Particle Beam (RPB) drive requires a number of
beam drivers "fixed" in the
Solar System, which shoots a relativistic neutral particle beam at a
magsail-equipped spacecraft. The
spacecraft ionizes the incoming particle beam, which is them reflected
by the magsail.
To minimize focusing distance of the beam, Nordley suggests performing
acceleration to terminal
velocity while still close to Sol. This requires accelerations
approaching or even exceeding one earth
gravity, which has the problem of requiring thousands of terawatts of
power for massive (> 1000 tons)
payloads.
A 1000-ton RPB-drive ship accelerating at 1 earth gravity requires a
mass flow of 43 grams/sec from
the beam drivers back home. If split among one million drivers, this
results in 43
micrograms/sec/driver, with a required power input of 3 GW/driver. For
those who think these are
impossible numbers for engineering such a system, Nordley adds:
"The point is that a million beam drivers for an interstellar
propulsion system is not
unreasonable for a civilization that made ten million automobiles a
year before robotics."
To get a feel for the energy required, he scales the acceleration back
to 0.036 earth gravities and
compares the a 1000-ton RPB-driven probe with a 1000-ton laser lightsail
at the same acceleration. The
RPB-driven probe requires 11 GW/ton to accelerate, as opposed to 65
GW/ton for the lightsail.
Nordley suggests a massive neutral particle, such as a heavy atom or
molecule (C60 or C60F60
surrounding a heavy atom was suggested) for use in an RPB driver.
Massive particles will not be
disturbed by encounters with interstellar hydrogen atoms, but still be
able to be manipulated by light
pressure so as to collimate the beam downrange from the drivers.
The primary reflection scheme Nordley discusses is the magnetic sail
concept developed by Andrews
and Zubrin. He notes that while other reflector concepts (such as an
Orion-style pusher plate and
D-He3 pellets) are readily usable by this system, there would be losses
due to heating of the reflector
which would not translate to propulsion. Magnetic fields are
conservative, require little if any
additional energy (if using superconductors), and have little energy
dissipation upon establishing the
field.
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CC: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Starship-Design: Let's build the thing!
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 02:01:06 EDT
> Sorry Kelly, I read some stuff back when I first joined
> LIT that said that NASA had partially completed a ship
> in 1981 that could get us to Mars. It further said that
> McNamara got it axed. I guess the information was not
> as reliable as I thought. Thanks for the correction.
>
> Mike Pfeifer
???
McNamara was out of government in '81, and I can't for the life of me
remember any LIT statement like that!
NASA, or rather the US, pretty much has the tech to get people to Mars, but
nothing in '81 was built specifically for manned Mars.
Kelly
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FYI
Interesting site.
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http://www.sff.net/people/geoffrey.landis/STL.htp
>>>>BRIN: I have heard that there are enough warheads in the arsenals of
the United States and the former Soviet
Union that, if we beat them all into plowshares and used them all for
Orion ships, that we could send a mass
equivalent to the United States Navy to Mars.
LANDIS: What are some of the other possibilities for ways that we might
get to the stars with real technology that
we know today?
BRIN: All sorts of possibilities have been discussed. At the opposite
end of the spectrum from the image of a
fiery antimatter rocket, was the idea of sending a little "Starwisp"
spacecraft streaking out of the solar system.
This was originally Bob Forward's notion; a broad, very light sail that
takes a focused microwave beam to drive
this little one-ounce spacecraft. The microwave beam sends it hurtling
across the starscape.
FORWARD: One of the newest ideas is one that Dana Andrews, Bob Zubrin,
and Geoffrey Landis have
proposed, particle-beam propulsion. The basic idea is to have a particle
beam generator, stuck to an asteroid
(because you can't use it on the Earth, the atmosphere gets in the way,
and once it gets firing it has a lot of
recoil, so you have to put it on something heavy). So you take an
asteroid and you build your particle beam
generator, and you beam both positive particles and negative particles
out into space--
BRIN: You make your vehicle a hoop.
FORWARD: Right, a hoop. And you put current through it to make a strong
magnetic field, and when the
charged particles come they hit the magnetic field, and they give the
magnetic field a push, and it gives the wire
a push, and the wire gives the spacecraft a push, and so that's the way
you get up to speed.
BRIN: This is a variant on the idea of sending a microwave
beam--Forward's Starwisp--or of hitting a solar sail
with a laser.
FORWARD: Beamed power propulsion.
BRIN: What all three of these ideas have in common is that you can send
a ship out that doesn't have to carry its
own energy, doesn't have to carry its own fuel. Because the biggest
problem in approaching the speed of light is
that you not only have to accelerate your own ship, but you have to
accelerate the fuel that you're going to use
for later acceleration. So people have been swinging over to this idea
that the best way to reach the stars is to
have a home base shoot power out to you, whether by particle beams,
lasers, or microwaves.
FORWARD: I think that, after years of study, it's now very obvious that,
if you want to go to the stars, don't use
rockets. You have to use something else. Beamed power is one way.
The beauty about this engine is that, unlike some of the ideas I've had
where you push it with lasers or
microwaves, is that when you enter the target solar system, you can use
it as a drag brake against the solar
wind to slow down and come to a stop, without doing anything fancy
except re-energizing the magnetic loop.
POST: In fact, any kind of interstellar craft can use a magnetic sail to
brake. So we're talking about hybrids, good
ideas that combine two other good ideas.
The ancestor of the magnetic sail was the interstellar ramjet of Robert
Bussard. Many people played with that
concept, which uses interstellar hydrogen as freely-available fuel, but
the scoop to collect the hydrogen seems
to produce more drag than thrust. James Stephens of JPL tried to patent
the magsail first, under the name
'loopsat.' When I worked for Dana Andrews on Boeing's 1981 survey of
advanced propulsion, I tried to hybridize
huge superconducting loops with ion drives, and considered trajectories
through the Earth's magnetotail, the
Jovian magnetosphere, and the Io Flux tube. Bob Zubrin deserves credit
as father of the magsail--he derived the
essential equations--but the idea has many grandfathers, and clearly
Bussard is the great-grandfather.
--part1_48001d3b.243da028_boundary--
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Thu, 08 Apr 1999 10:32:26 -0700
"Curtis L. Manges" wrote:
> The small, reuseable launch vehicle is in aggressive development. See
> www.rotaryrocket.com.
>
Thanks for reminding me, I have not checked that site out this week.
The catch is like the rest of the ship the launch vehicle must fully
bootstapable. You land on a planet you better be able to fix it.
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Subject: starship-design: todays news at nasa
Date: Thu, 08 Apr 1999 14:59:27 -0700
http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/prop08apr99_1.htm
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Starship-Design: Let's build the thing!
Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 18:30:54 EDT
In a message dated 04/08/99 00:01:06 Mountain Daylight Time, Kelly St writes:
<< McNamara was out of government in '81, and I can't for the life of me
remember any LIT statement like that!
NASA, or rather the US, pretty much has the tech to get people to Mars, but
nothing in '81 was built specifically for manned Mars.
Kelly >>
The information I read wasn't from LIT. It was some other space web
site I was visiting. It had an interview with one of the Apollo astronauts
and I think it was he that said that about the ship and McNamara.
Mike Pfeifer
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Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 18:29:39 EDT
>> NASA, or rather the US, pretty much has the tech to
>> get people to Mars, but nothing in '81 was built
>> specifically for manned Mars.
>>
>> Kelly >>
>
> The information I read wasn't from LIT. It was some
> other space web site I was visiting. It had an interview
> with one of the Apollo astronauts and I think it was he
> that said that about the ship and McNamara.
>
> Mike Pfeifer
Haven't a clue what he was talking about. Could have been a misquote I guess.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Echo of dragon fly
Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 18:29:51 EDT
I was told this got scrambled the first time.
Kelly
Subj: Review of "Dragonfly"
Date: Tue, Apr 6, 1999 11:26 AM EST
From: kelly.g.starks@mail.sprint.com
X-From: kelly.g.starks@mail.sprint.com (kelly g starks)
To: kellyst@aol.com
http://www.jamesoberg.com/speech/dragon.html
Review of "Dragonfly"
James Oberg
Washington Times, January 3, 1999
Rockets and space vehicles are so overwhelmingly impressive that they
often dwarf the
human figures associated with them. Aside from images of smiling,
steel-jawed astronauts
whose vocabularies consist mainly of ``What a fantastic sight,'' the
people behind the space
dramas rarely are seen.
For the current generation of space-station astronauts, ``Dragonfly''
should change all that.
Bryan Burrough weaves a smoothly readable, intimate portrait of the
highly varied
individual Americans who faced the most difficult and dangerous space
missions since the
first moon landings and shuttle flights - the expeditions aboard the
Russian Mir space
station in 1995-1997.
Through Mr. Burrough's skilled narrative we come to know intimately a
parade of
strong-willed, creative and intelligent individuals who one by one spent
months aboard the
Russian space station. There's solid Norm Thagard, desperate for
confirmation as the
official ``first American to Mir,'' who methodically trains himself to
carry out research that in
space leads him to the brink of malnutrition and well past the edge of
boredom. There's
``grandmotherly'' Shannon Lucid and her friend John Blaha, the ``old
reliable'' pilot, whose
friendship doesn't survive their back-to-back flights on Mir.
We meet Jerry Linenger, the intense physician who nearly is killed in a
flash fire in space
and then agonizes over evidence that NASA and the Russians are covering
up the severity
of the crisis, and we meet British-born Michael Foale, nearly s best
prepared Mir visitor
ever - so much so that when he returns from space, NASA yanks him off
future space
station missions with the Russians.
Lastly there is David Wolf, the brilliant medical scientist whose
personal foibles doomed his
astronaut career until he had one last chance to get back into space, by
volunteering for
Mir, where he triumphantly redeemed himself. Because of the book's
publishing schedule,
the last American on Mir, Australian-born Andy Thomas, gets only brief
mention.
Under unanticipated threats and dangers, each of these astronauts had to
rely on their
highly diverse personal strengths to get themselves through both sudden
crises and
long-term psychological stresses. How they all did so - and how close
some of them came
to being overcome - is an exploration narrative worthy of the traditions
of Lewis and Clark,
of Scott and of Amundsen, of Hillary and Cousteau and Lindbergh.
Beyond the deeply human accounts, Mr. Burrough provides vivid
descriptions of a NASA
bureaucracy caught off guard again and again by the problems of long
space flight and the
politically inspired ``space partnership'' with Russia. Preparations
were inadequate,
personnel were picked with no previous Russian experience (sometimes
deliberately with
no such experience, on request of the Russians) and outside advice was
not sought, nor
accepted when it was offered.
The author also provides, for the first time in any publication, a
portrait of one of NASA's
most mysterious figures, George Abbey. Considered the Machiavellian
``power behind the
throne'' of Administrator Daniel Goldin, Mr. Abbey is currently the head
of the Johnson
Space Center in Houston, and hence in practice the head of both the
space shuttle and
space station programs.
Mr. Abbey's reported leadership style, promoting and rewarding personal
loyalty far more
than professional competence, has had a curious effect on the astronaut
corps. With rare
exception (Mr. Burrough mentions Jerry Linenger and the doomed Blaine
Hammond, but
neglects to give credit to Apollo veteran John Young, who speaks out
freely even as few
listen), it seems to have converted men and women courageous enough to
sit atop millions
of pounds of rocket fuel into timid ``team players'' afraid to show any
contrary opinions.
Mr. Burrough describes how this consequent corps of ``Stepford
Astronauts'' almost
unanimously goes along with every major management decree for fear of
losing future
space-flight assignments, even while privately discussing safety and
efficiency concerns
among themselves.
As a 22-year veteran of the space shuttle program, I read Mr. Burrough's
book with a
mixture of gratitude and envy. I'm grateful he was able to tell this
story accurately and fully,
as I know his account to be. And I'm envious at his exhilarating,
exhausting experience in
digging through the radio and meetings transcripts, talking at length
with many of the
principals and many of the support personnel, and assembling a coherent,
comprehensible
narrative of this dramatic phase of American space history.
There are a number of disturbing aspects of our space program that this
book reveals,
sometimes only implicitly. Most worrisome is the simple fact that much
of what the author
discovered truly is new and original, but shouldn't be. During the
course of the crises
aboard Mir in 1997, NASA should have released more of this material, or
the American
news media should have dug it out.
For example, for the first time in NASA history, reporters are no longer
allowed to listen to
live voice conversations from space - and requests to obtain summaries
often require filing
Freedom of Information Act letters. But neither NASA nor the press corps
did their duty, and
it is only with the publication of this book that the ``full story'' can
in any way be said to be
available to the public.
Meanwhile, NASA's passion to indoctrinate the American public with its
narrow and
self-serving view of its programs (often based on sincere self-
deception rather than
deliberate mendacity) comes across in example after example, as do the
determined
Russian campaigns to dodge blame for major failures.
In a book of more than 500 pages, the minor gaps and oversights are
remarkably rare.
Occasionally characters show up without being introduced or explained.
Mr. Burrough has
mastered almost but not quite all of the space technology he explains so
well, but the
bloopers are only for lifelong rocket scientists to worry about - I
didn't find a single error of
any real significance in the entire book.
The first Americans aboard Mir had a remarkably high attrition rate -
most quit, a few were
transferred to other types of work at NASA. But the leadership at NASA
remains unchanged
from the Mir flights as the agency begins to implement plans for the
International Space
Station. Whether they have learned enough from their past experiences to
perform better
under the even heavier challenges to come is a critical question for
NASA and for the
country. Readers of this book will be in the best possible position
outside of NASA to
understand the institution's shortcomings as we prepare to face the
greatest space-flight
management challenge since Apollo.
James Oberg, a 22-year veteran of the space shuttle program, is now an
independent
consultant and author in Houston.
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Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Interesting, if large idea...
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 02:22:03 -0400 (EDT)
One idea I've been pondering lately is that most people are focused on
building space-fairing vessels that are too small. IIRC, the distance
from earth to mars is 309 million miles(depending on position in orbit),
right?
That's a huge scale - modern craft are microscopic by comparison. I've
been thinking about a much larger craft, a cylinder, approximately 50,000
miles long and 1,500 in diameter, with a suitable bar in the middle to
provide illumination. A spin is put on the vessel to produce artificial
gravity, and buildings are built on the interior surface. I've been told
by certain sources that such a vessel over 23 kilometres is unfeasable to
construct (wall thickness becomes incredible), any thoughts on using
braces to overcome the limitation?
---
Paul Anderson
madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net
"We have learned to imitute you exarctly."
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To: "Paul Anderson" <madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net>,
<starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: Interesting, if large idea...
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 12:58:16 +0100
Where do you get all the metal/material from?
I'd guess that that would be a fair percentage of the metal available in the
asteroid belt...
Don't wanna think how long that would take to build, and what it would cost
if it were to go wrong somewhere along the line, even if it were possible.
You'd probably also be looking at some pretty exotic materials if you could
make something that big and spin it/accelerate it, not the sort of thing
you'd find in asteroids anyway - so you'd need lots of synthesis etc also.
Also, for craft that carry their own fuel, to get to a decent percentage of
C (tho not really necessary on this sort of ship, as it's basically a planet
anyway) you are looking at many many times more fuel than craft, so you'd
need a LOT of fuel, even if it were water, I expect you'd be quite pressed
to find enough of it?
----- Original Message -----
From: Paul Anderson <madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net>
To: <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Sent: Saturday, April 10, 1999 7:22 AM
Subject: starship-design: Interesting, if large idea...
> One idea I've been pondering lately is that most people are focused on
> building space-fairing vessels that are too small. IIRC, the distance
> from earth to mars is 309 million miles(depending on position in orbit),
> right?
>
> That's a huge scale - modern craft are microscopic by comparison. I've
> been thinking about a much larger craft, a cylinder, approximately 50,000
> miles long and 1,500 in diameter, with a suitable bar in the middle to
> provide illumination. A spin is put on the vessel to produce artificial
> gravity, and buildings are built on the interior surface. I've been told
> by certain sources that such a vessel over 23 kilometres is unfeasable to
> construct (wall thickness becomes incredible), any thoughts on using
> braces to overcome the limitation?
>
>
> ---
> Paul Anderson
> madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net
> "We have learned to imitute you exarctly."
>
>
>
>
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From: "L. Clayton Parker" <lparker@cacaphony.net>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: "Paul Anderson" <madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net>
Cc: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: RE: starship-design: Interesting, if large idea...
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 09:42:53 -0500
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> [mailto:owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu]On Behalf Of Paul
> Anderson
> Sent: Saturday, April 10, 1999 1:22 AM
> To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> Subject: starship-design: Interesting, if large idea...
>
> That's a huge scale - modern craft are microscopic by comparison. I've
> been thinking about a much larger craft, a cylinder, approximately 50,000
> miles long and 1,500 in diameter, with a suitable bar in the middle to
> provide illumination. A spin is put on the vessel to produce artificial
> gravity, and buildings are built on the interior surface. I've been told
> by certain sources that such a vessel over 23 kilometres is unfeasable to
> construct (wall thickness becomes incredible), any thoughts on using
> braces to overcome the limitation?
>
What you seem to be describing is a Dyson Sphere redesigned as a cylinder on
a somewhat smaller scale. Nevertheless, it is still way, way beyond any
foreseeable technology. Not only must you deal with mechanical loads far
beyond even what diamond is capable of withstanding, you also have to worry
about gravitation loads. This structure is large enough to produce its own
tidal forces and due to its shape they are not going to be very evenly
distributed.
If your central "light source" also produced a gravitational gradient, then
I suppose in theory you could use it to balance the tidal stresses on the
cylinder and remove most of the structural difficulties. Now the only thing
you have to do is build a small, thin, cylindrical star....
Lee Parker
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Check it out
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 15:28:38 EDT
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The dark Side of space commerce. ;)
Kelly
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Wed, 10 Mar 1999 19:46:54 -0600
"Curtis L. Manges" wrote:
> Stravonski@aol.com wrote:
>
> > In a message dated 04/06/99 16:21:01 Mountain Daylight Time,
> > bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca writes:
> >
> > << Sure I am game to build it now...
> > But we do seem to be lacking in finding a small reusable launch
> > rocket... >>
> >
> > Excellent, then we know what areas we need to focus on. Does anyone
> > else know of any holes in our plans?
> >
> > Mike Pfeifer
>
> The small, reuseable launch vehicle is in aggressive development. See
> www.rotaryrocket.com.
>
> Keep looking up,
>
> Curtis
I enjoy turning notions on their heads. Instead of a totally reuseable
launch vehicle, I came up with a totally expendable launch system,
all made of fuel except for the payload. Since efficiency is ultimately
the basis of cost, you won't get much cheaper launch to orbit, than
with the Paper Cannon concept.
It's not really paper after it's been nitrated, it's nitrocellulose, like
guncotton. And it's not really a cannon at all, but a shock tube,
meant to squirt the slug of hydrogen gas contained within it, at
hypersonic speeds, through the air. This breeze blows past the
chunk of hydrogen ice which is fastened to the payload,. but this
package catches up very soon, by mixing and igniting the column
of hydrogen behind it. When the head of the jet of gaseous
hydrogen has been passed, and all is burned behind it, the payload
package rides on a chunk of solid hydrogen ice, which rapidly
dwindles because it is the final stage fuel.
The Paper Cannon, as I call it, will get your cargo in orbital
momentum space real cheap, and there's nothing left to worry
about, whether you should reuse it or not. The sleeve was gasified
as it imploded, to squeeze its contained hydrogen forward in a
big rush. The resulting jet of hydrogen was all consumed, by
the traverse of the payload and cryofuel package, inducing
turbulence and ignition in its wake. The solid hydrogen ice
was ablated and ignited by all that fire behind it, and the payload
then sailed naked into space. By designing from fundamentals,
we reduced the rocket mass to zero.
Like that one? Care to help with the math? Of course it isn't
very accurate, but adjusting your orbital paramters can be
done leisurely when you don't have to worry about falling
down, nor about shoving your way through a lot of
thick air. I posted this on the Beanstalk board, at
http://www.insidetheweb.com/messageboard/mbs.cgi?acct=mb153173
so drop in and see the scheme. Say hi to Allen over at the Virtual
Beanstalk Project. He wants to launch from stratospheric height,
from a tethered aerostat platform. Tell him I sent you.
http://members.aol.com/beanstalkr/project project home page.
That sleeve, a.k.a. paper cannon, was originally puffed out of
a launch tube by compressed hydrogen. The hydrogen ice and
payload package beat it out, like a pea coming out of a peashooter,
before the bottom of the sleeve was ignited, to start up the seriously
speedy stuff. The payload package burns its way up a low
pressure lane of pure hydrogen. Its fuel is all laid out in front
of it, in its path, so all it has to do is mix it and burn it. That trick
it pulls easily, by virtue of being a solid body passing through.
The final stage, the solid hydrogen ice fuel tacked to the payload,
forms the simplest external combustion SCRAMJET, and probably
the simplest reaction engine. The combustion chamber is formed
of that handy hypersonic shock wave coning around it, tough stuff
even if you can see through it. The fuel sublimes and ignites. This
is hydrogen ice, after all, on top of a great big bonfire, inside of
an oxidizing atmosphere. It sublimes, it ignites. It goes on, out to
where the oxygen peters out. Then you're in the gravy, for your
package is in orbit, and there's no mess to clean up.
Keep it lite,
Johnny Thunderbird
http://www.dejanews.com/~liteage
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["215" "Sunday" "11" "April" "1999" "21:54:27" "+0200" "Christoph Kulmann" "kulmann@uni-bremen.de" nil "10" "starship-design: Image" "^From:" nil nil "4" nil nil nil nil nil]
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Subject: starship-design: Image
Date: Sun, 11 Apr 1999 21:54:27 +0200 (DFT)
Hello Group,
I have an image which directly affects our topic. The starship is very
similar to those discussed here. I hope you like it:
http://www1.uni-bremen.de/~kulmann/bryce/arrival.html
Greetings
Christoph
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To: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: Evil Clones
Date: Sun, 11 Apr 1999 19:56:46 -0500
Has anyone noticed that Kelly has been replaced by a clone? It is fairly
obvious, the new Kelly uses a different e-mail program and knows how to
spell...now the only question is whether this is a good thing or a bad
thing!
Lee Parker
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.
- B.F. Skinner
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Evil Clones
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 09:32:24 +0200 (MET DST)
> From: "L. Clayton Parker" <lparker@cacaphony.net>
>
> Has anyone noticed that Kelly has been replaced by a clone? It is fairly
> obvious, the new Kelly uses a different e-mail program and knows how to
> spell... now the only question is whether this is a good thing or a bad
> thing!
>
Wow! I have had no time recently to read posts from the list
(all are waiting patiently in a lit.unread file...), so I did not notice.
That is good, as a shock of noticing that might have been traumatic!
I became so used (not to say - fond...) of the Good Ol' Kelly...
Kelly, is that really true??
-- Zenon
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Fwd: Check it out
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 10:01:20 -0700
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> The dark Side of space commerce. ;)
>
> Kelly
That is the dark side... remind me to invest in products
not on the shuttle...
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Mon, 12 Apr 1999 10:08:50 -0700
Johnny Thunderbird wrote:
>
> I enjoy turning notions on their heads. Instead of a totally reuseable
> launch vehicle, I came up with a totally expendable launch system,
> all made of fuel except for the payload. Since efficiency is ultimately
> the basis of cost, you won't get much cheaper launch to orbit, than
> with the Paper Cannon concept.
I wonder if that idea will work for fireworks too!!!
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To: bfranchuk <bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca>
CC: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 03:49:56 -0600
bfranchuk wrote:
> Johnny Thunderbird wrote:
> >
> > I enjoy turning notions on their heads. Instead of a totally reuseable
> > launch vehicle, I came up with a totally expendable launch system,
> > all made of fuel except for the payload. Since efficiency is ultimately
> > the basis of cost, you won't get much cheaper launch to orbit, than
> > with the Paper Cannon concept.
>
> I wonder if that idea will work for fireworks too!!!
What counts is the social question which often accompanies innovation.
Is that what we really want?
Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to build that Mauritania
can have all the satellites it wants? The threshold for non shall we say
governmental institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery, is
crossed long before the smallest nations put up their peaceful scientific
payloads.
I write science fiction, so I try to think about what people do with their
gadgets. The Paper Cannon notion, in my story about it ( sorry, not finished )
is really used for a weapon against satellites, more than a satellite launcher.
Some among the have-nots decide not to get trounced so badly by the haves,
and use this device, in thousands of low cost clone installations, to destroy
everything in low Earth orbit. That levels the playing field, especially since
hypervelocity artillery can sweep the skies clean of all flying objects. You
can call it fireworks. Actually, hydrogen burns with little flame.
Peace & Love,
Johnny Thunderbird
http://fly.to/heavyLight
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Subject: starship-design: anti-matter news
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 16:34:11 -0700
http://science.nasa.gov/newhome/headlines/prop12apr99_1.htm
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To: lparker@cacaphony.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: Evil Clones
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 18:33:54 EDT
Has anyone noticed that Kelly has been replaced by a clone? It is fairly
obvious, the new Kelly uses a different e-mail program and knows how to
spell...now the only question is whether this is a good thing or a bad
thing!
Lee Parker
:)
Sorry I'm stuck using a very old computer that can only support a very old
mail program. Other then a couple times when I type things at work (with its
spell checker) I can't think of how my spelling could have changed. But I'll
try to undo it.
;)
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Interplanetary Propulsion (was VASIMR)
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 17:34:31 -0500
The Grand Challenge: A New Plasma Thruster
Samuel A. Cohen and Michael A. Paluszek
Manned Mars mission. The top plot shows total vehicle mass including the
100,000-kilogram payload. The second plot shows the maneuver duration and
the bottom plot shows the thrust generated by the thruster. The minimum
mission duration is obtained with a specific impulse near 3000 seconds.
Other figures referenced in text can be found in the print version of
Launchspace Magazine.
Visionary leaders at NASA have set "Grand Challenge" goals for America's
space program. Among the ambitious candidate missions are comprehensive
explorations of the solar system and manned ventures to remote planets. For
these types of missions to be practicable, rocket engines are required to
have larger exhaust velocities, greater efficiencies and more reliability
than those currently available. A novel plasma thruster design offers great
promise for providing these revolutionary advances in propulsion technology.
Advanced electric propulsion systems, both ion and plasma thrusters, have
been developed over recent years because of their high propellant exhaust
velocity, ue. The presently available high-ue systems, however, produce too
low a thrust for many of the Grand Challenge missions. Here, we describe
technical features that make a new plasma thruster design a revolutionary
step beyond the existing systems and able to provide a propulsion method
scaleable to more demanding Grand Challenge missions.
The primary innovative technical features are the wave-heating mode,
thrust-generation mechanism and the technique for decoupling the exhaust
plume from the engine. These are predicted to result in more than an
order-of-magnitude increase in thrust, while also significantly extending
specific impulse, Isp = ue /g (where g is the gravitational acceleration,
9.8 m2/s), thruster life and reliability.
Electromagnetic waves heat a fully ionized gas that is confined by a
super-conducting magnetic coil and expelled through a magnetic nozzle. The
novel nozzle in this design is a constriction in the plasma flow channel set
by shaping (tapering) the magnetic field rather than a material surface.
Magnetic fields strongly inhibit charged particle motion perpendicular to
them while allowing easy flow parallel to the field lines. This reduces
plasma contact with nearby materials, considerably extending their lifetime.
Plasma expanding through the magnetic nozzle is accelerated to supersonic
speed by a strong electric field that develops in the nozzle. In the
expansion process, plasma cooling occurs; if sufficiently rapid, the plasma
will recombine into a supersonic stream of neutral gas. Neutral particles
are free of the magnetic force. Proper shaping of the magnetic nozzle
subsequent to the recombination zone will generate a small angle exhaust
plume, increasing thrust efficiency. This propulsion concept can lead to
high-thrust, high-specific-impulse propulsion systems that could grow in
capability over a 40-year period. A fusion power reactor could be
incorporated as the direct-drive power source, if scientists are able to
produce a working fusion reactor.
Before describing these technical features in more detail, we give a
comparison of the parameters of this novel thruster with existing electric
propulsion methods. Figure 2 shows the thrust, T, and specific impulse, Isp,
of various electric propulsion methods, including the proposed wave-heated
thruster (WHT).
In terms of thrust and power capability, the closest competitor to the WHT
is the Magnetoplasmadynamic (MPD) thruster. In MPD thrusters, strong
currents flow between electrodes in the plasma. The most promising fuel for
MPD thrusters is lithium. However, lithium presents a contamination problem
to the rest of the spacecraft. Even though lithium is the best of all fuels
in this regard, plasma contact with the electrodes causes them to degrade,
limiting the thruster lifetime and mission duration. Hall thrusters, now
used on satellites, have somewhat less severe electrode degradation but
produce lower thrust. These two configurations use magnetic fields to
increase the plasma density. Their magnetic fields are oriented
perpendicular to the plasma exhaust; electrical currents are driven along
the magnetic field, between electrodes, to heat and accelerate the plasma.
This is a surface power input method, a major difference from the WHT and
one reason why these thrusters are difficult to scale to the higher powers
needed for certain Grand Challenge missions.
In the WHT, plasma flow and thrust are generated by the plasma pressure
gradient parallel to the magnetic field. There are no electrodes in contact
with plasma to degrade. The magnetic field forms an insulating barrier
between the plasma and the surrounding material surfaces. (The "thermal
insulation" provided by this magnetic field shape exceeds that of
Styrofoam.) The WHT can potentially produce higher thrust/specific impulse
products than the other systems on the graph, to a large degree, because of
the high densities achievable with the confinement properties of the
specific magnetic field configuration of the method, a wave-heated magnetic
mirror configuration.
Maximizing Thrust
Many wave-heated plasma systems have operated with similar magnetic geometry
to that in the WHT. None has employed a feature essential for space
propulsion applications: a method for decoupling the plasma exhaust from the
magnetic field. Without this feature, plasma expelled from the rear of the
spacecraft will follow magnetic field lines back to the nose of the
spacecraft, counterbalancing the thrust. In this specific WHT design, the
decoupling is achieved by causing plasma cooling and recombination - ions
combining with electrons to produce neutral atoms - in the expansion zone of
the magnetic nozzle. Other decoupling methods may be possible, such as
asymmetric magnetic nozzles, but analyses of these predict lower
efficiencies in converting input energy into thrust.
The main advantages of the WHT are: higher power capability, because of
volumetric heating; higher plasma density, because of better plasma
confinement produced by the magnetic geometry; and ability to use a magnetic
nozzle for plasma cooling and recombination, because of the linear
magnetic-field geometry.
An important consideration for Grand Challenge missions is the power
available to the thruster. Large thrust and high specific impulse require
high power. Power levels up to 20 kW will be available on near-term
commercial satellites. Power levels up to hundreds of kilowatts may be
feasible using multijunction and concentrator solar photovoltaic technology
or solar dynamic systems using heat engines. If the power source is solar,
then large solar collector areas, and possibly high pointing accuracy and
tight figure control of the solar collectors, are required.
Megawatt power levels could be supplied for extended periods by an external
fission or fusion reactor. Both make consideration of radiation and
environmental effects essential. In an internal fusion-powered option, the
application of high-power RF would ionize the mixture in the WHT chamber,
form a reversed-field configuration (FRC) there and heat the fuel to fusion
temperatures.
The FRC is an intrinsically high-beta plasma, favorable to the use of
advanced (neutronless) fuels. (Beta, b, is the ratio of plasma thermal
energy to magnetic field energy.) Recent research has shown more potential
for p-11B fusion than earlier predicted. In an optimal FRC fusion reactor, a
mixture of boron and hydrogen is injected into the FRC. Fusion creates
energetic helium, which further heats the fuel, sustaining the burn. Plasma
crosses the FRC's closed flux surface, flows along the open magnetic field
lines to the nozzle and exits there, providing thrust, as shown in Figure 3.
The FRC requires a solenoid-shaped magnetic field, the same geometry needed
by the wave thruster and the magnetic nozzle. These factors make the FRC the
most attractive fusion reactor from an engineering perspective. Many of the
components are common to both the nearer (non-fusion) and longer-term
(fusion) propulsion systems. As a consequence, development of the
wave-heated plasma thruster will create technology that will be directly
applicable to future fusion propulsion systems.
Wave-heated plasma propulsion
This novel thruster differs from earlier wave-heated thermal thrusters in
that it employs a confined, fully ionized warm plasma, a strong axial
magnetic field and a magnetic nozzle with large expansion. Wave heating in
this field geometry is a volumetric method; that is, waves launched from
antennas at the plasma's edge propagate deep within the plasma before their
energy is absorbed. This reduces the power loads on and losses to the
surrounding structures.
Five different frequency ranges are candidates for wave heating: electron
cyclotron (EC), lower hybrid (LH), helicon, ion cyclotron (IC) and rotating
magnetic field (RMF). Although a thruster must produce high-velocity ions,
apparently favoring the IC method, acceleration in the proposed thruster
design is caused by the nozzle's electric field. This converts electron
thermal energy into directed ion momentum. Thus, there is no clear reason
yet for selecting one candidate from the others. Indeed, the optimal choice
may change with each mission's specific requirements. For thruster
parameters noted in Figure 2, a plasma density of 5 x 1014 cm3 is needed at
an electron temperature of ~20 eV. For hydrogen propellant, this would
provide a thrust of about 2 x 104 N per m2 of nozzle area.
The magnetic field required by each is similar, between 1 and 5 kG. The low
end is set by the plasma b requirements. The upper end may be more practical
by easing antenna design. The nozzle magnetic field strength is about 10
times higher than that needed by the heating method. Even 50 kG field
strengths are readily achievable by present-day superconductor technology.
High-temperature superconductors would improve the attractiveness of the
engines by reducing the cooling requirements.
Table 1: Candidate RF and mwave modes for heating plasmas for thruster
applications
Mode EC LH Helicon RMF IC
Approximate frequency (GHz) 2.5-10 0.5-2.5 0.1-0.5 0.3-100 0.03-10
Temperatures achieved (eV) 20 5 3 20 5
Densities achieved (cm-3 ) 5 x 1012 1 x 1014 1 x 1014 1 x 1014 1 x 1013
Ionization fraction (%) 50 90 50 10 10
The LH system has achieved more than 90% ionization, primarily because of
the high density and controlled startup procedures. This is desirable for
improved fuel utilization efficiency. (The RMF has yet to achieve a high
ionization fraction because of the low magnetic fields used and the high
fill pressures necessary with the traditional plasma formation procedures.)
With improved operational techniques, all the candidate frequencies are
likely to produce full ionization at high power. The main question is
whether they can also produce the proper electron temperatures within the
plasma - temperatures that produce high thrust without compromising the
recombination properties of the nozzle.
The achieved parameters shown in Table 1 were at relatively low power,
typically 0.5-3 kW. The only exception was RMF, which needed higher power
because of the enhanced losses and high fill pressure. Extending the
database for each heating mode to higher power is needed and one of the
technical objectives to be addressed by research and development efforts.
Scalability, i.e., achievable plasma parameters versus nozzle radius, is
another subject that must be addressed by R&D.
The overall energy efficiency of this method will depend on the product of
the usual factors: the efficiency for converting power from the spacecraft
power source to the wave power supply; the coupling of the wave power to the
plasma; the power lost to the thruster structures by radiation and plasma
conduction; and the frozen-in power loss. The choice of propellant is
particularly important for determining the frozen-in losses.
Magnetic nozzle: thrust and plasma recombination
The axial magnetic field used by these wave-heating methods allows both ions
and electrons to be exhausted along B. As noted, the nozzle generates the
thrust by converting random electron thermal motion into directed ion motion
in the nozzle's electric field. Strong electric fields have been found in
many mirror machines, such as studied in the fusion program. Potential drops
of kilovolts were obtained, very good for ion acceleration. As we shall soon
see, this was too large to allow recombination. Contrary to Mae West's
statement, too much of a good thing was too much.
In 1995, a steep electric field of approximately the proper strength, ~ 10
eV/cm, was discovered in a linear plasma device in our Princeton University
laboratory. This was accomplished by collision cooling of the plasma
electrons, rather than by magnetic expansion cooling. The remarkable
observation associated with this modest electric field was rapid plasma
recombination to neutral gas, something not attained in the hotter fusion
magnetic mirror experiments.
This brings us to the major conceptual leap provided by the magnetic nozzle.
The question arose, how can the plasma exhaust be decoupled from the strong
magnetic field? In an axially symmetric magnetic nozzle, the plasma is
constrained to follow the field lines, even for high plasma dielectric
constant, 8pmnc2/B2. (This is in contrast to the flow of a plasma slab
across a magnetic field with simple, one-dimensional curvature.) A
resolution to this vexing problem is to cause sufficient plasma cooling in
the nozzle expansion that recombination transforms the plasma exhaust into a
supersonic stream of neutral gas. Figure 4 shows that cooling to
temperatures below ~ 1 eV (11,600 K) is necessary to get rapid
recombination.
Expansion from a nozzle results in cooling and acceleration. There is a
direct relation between the cooling and the Mach number achieved by a
nozzle. Our calculations show that the recombination rate coefficient
increases with Mach number approximately proportional to M3 for g=5/3 and
proportional to M5 for g=2, where g is the usual ratio of specific heats. By
examining the calculated Mach number as a function of magnetic field
expansion we predict that nearly complete recombination can be generated by
a magnetic expansion of 50 for g=2 or 1000 for g=5/3 (g is expected to be
between 5/3 and 2 for a magnetized monatomic plasma of initial density 1 x
1014 cm-3).
How did the Princeton experiment show extensive recombination? The plasma
appeared as different as night from day. Recombining plasmas are
characterized by emission of intense light with a special spectral
signature. Warm plasma, viewed through a window of the linear apparatus,
flows from left to right. As the plasma cools from 50,000 K to 10,000 K, its
brightness dramatically increases. Detailed analysis of the spectrum showed
this could be quantitatively explained by three-body recombination.
A critical aspect of the thruster design is the selection of the fuel. At Te
< 1 eV, helium has the most rapid three-body recombination rate of all the
singly charged monatomic ions. However, its high ionization potential
unfavorably increases the frozen-in losses. Other inert gases like xenon are
much better in that regard, but have relatively low second-ionization
potentials. The optimal fuel will depend on the overall plasma temperature
and plasma confinement time. R&D are essential for selecting the optimal
electron temperature, hence wave-heating method and plasma shape.
Propulsion system designs
Two candidate WHT operating points are described to illustrate the potential
of this engine. The first, at 30 kW power, is for a reusable transfer orbit
vehicle for low Earth orbit operations. The second, at 30 MW power, is for
interplanetary and trans-lunar operations. The 30 kW mission is an orbit
transfer mission from a 400-kilometer orbit to a 2000-kilometer orbit,
including a return mission with the full payload. The low Earth mission is
shown in Figure 7. A thruster with this power level could also be used as a
drag makeup thruster on the International Space Station. It would be
difficult to perform the drag makeup mission or the reusable upper stage
with other electric thrusters due to their relatively short lifetimes. Two
missions are shown for the 30 MW thruster. One is a manned Mars mission.
The second is a near-sun flyby for an interstellar mission. The Mars mission
assumes a 100,000-kilogram payload, including the propulsion system. The
minimum one-way travel time is about two months, which is a reasonable
amount from an operational cost and radiation dose standpoint. The power for
this mission would need to come from a nuclear reactor, which could be the
internal fusion reactor described above. The spacecraft for the interstellar
mission is inserted into an elliptical heliocentric orbit with its perigee
close to the sun. The idea is to perform all of the delta-V near perigee to
get an additional boost due to the sun's gravity well and to take advantage
of the high solar flux at that distance. The plots show a numerical
simulation of the mission in which the propulsion system produces a 40
km/second delta-V. The final velocity is in excess of 100 km per second and
it passes the orbit of Jupiter 160 days after injection into the elliptical
Earth/sun transfer orbit. The specific impulse is held constant at 2500
seconds and the thrust is allowed to vary up to the limit of the available
power. This trajectory is by no means optimal, nor does it account for
thruster limitations.
Numerous advanced electric propulsion concepts have been developed over
recent years because of higher propellant exhaust velocity, me, compared to
chemical systems. The wave-heating method, thrust-generation mechanism,
decoupling of plasma from magnetic fields and scalability make the WHT
system a significant advance over existing electric thruster concepts.
Wave-heated plasma propulsion is a revolutionary concept that could be used
in the short term to produce a high-thrust, high specific-impulse electric
thruster and could incorporate a fusion propulsion, if a practical one is
ultimately developed. It is in an early stage of development. Considerable
effort will be required before a prototype is ready for flight.
Samuel A. Cohen received a Ph.D. in Physics from MIT in 1973. He has been at
the Princeton University Plasma Physics Laboratory ever since, now serving
as a lecturer with rank of professor in the Astrophysical Sciences
Department and director of the Program in Plasma Science and Technology in
the School of Engineering and Applied Science.
Mr. Michael Paluszek is the founder of Princeton Satellite Systems, Inc. He
received his S.B. degree from MIT in Electrical Engineering in 1976 and his
E.A.A. and S.M. degrees from MIT in Aeronautics and Astronautics in 1979. In
1986 he joined GE Astro Space, where he led the design of the attitude
control systems for GPS IIR, Inmarsat 3, GGS Polar Platform and the Mars
Observer Delta-V mode. His current research includes collaborative work with
the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory on advanced plasma thrusters and the
development of artificial intelligence techniques for embedded systems.
© 1997-1999 Launchspace Publications.
Please send any questions or comments for Launchspace via our feedback page.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.
- B.F. Skinner
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Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: billy_man@hotmail.com, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Your great web site
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 18:33:39 EDT
> Subj: Your great web site
> Date: Sun, Apr 11, 1999 11:55 AM EST
> From: billy_man@hotmail.com
> X-From: stoianb@sl.bia-bg.com (Stoian Belchev)
> Reply-to: billy_man@hotmail.com
> To: KellySt@aol.com
>
> Hi Guys,
> You turned out to have a great site on the net! No kidding.
> It's very interesting and helpful for people.
Thanks, glad you liked.
> A have a problem and surfing on the net I decided to
> drop you a line and see if you can help me. Would you
> please continue reading this message to the end?
> OK, I am researching (nothing scientific) how the
> Moon influences people. Not only the different zodiacs
> but a large mass of people. I am trying to find the
> relation between the Moon and the History of all
> mankind. Can You help me in any way?
As soon as you said zodiacs I was tempted to dump the letter. Astrology has
been conclusively shown to have no validity, and beyound people
suggestability, no effect.
There are medical effects of the moon (we evolved to sync lots of our actions
to full moon, etc) and of course lots of political military events are
effected by a full moon of light at night, but it doesn't sound like your
interested in that. So I don't think we can help you.
> If you are interested, just reply to billy_man@hotmail.com
Kelly Starks
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Subject: RE: starship-design: Evil Clones
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 18:10:39 -0500
NO! No, No No! We like the evil clone! Please don't undo it! <VBG>
Lee
> -----Original Message-----
> From: KellySt@aol.com [mailto:KellySt@aol.com]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 13, 1999 5:34 PM
> To: lparker@cacaphony.net; starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> Subject: Re: starship-design: Evil Clones
>
> Sorry I'm stuck using a very old computer that can only support a
> very old
> mail program. Other then a couple times when I type things at
> work (with its
> spell checker) I can't think of how my spelling could have
> changed. But I'll
> try to undo it.
>
> ;)
>
> Kelly
>
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Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 19:11:35 EDT
>===Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to
> build that Mauritania can have all the satellites it
> wants? The threshold for non shall we say governmental
> institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery,
> is crossed long before the smallest nations put up their
> peaceful scientific payloads. ==
Interesting. That was the same logic the White House and DOD used to stop
funding of low cost launcher studies. The high cost of access to space keeps
the lessor natinos and groups out of the big guys battle space. NOt the best
reason in the world to lock a frountier.
Kelly
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Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 14:25:54 +0200 (MET DST)
> From: KellySt@aol.com
>
> >===Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to
> > build that Mauritania can have all the satellites it
> > wants? The threshold for non shall we say governmental
> > institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery,
> > is crossed long before the smallest nations put up their
> > peaceful scientific payloads. ==
>
> Interesting. That was the same logic the White House and DOD used to stop
> funding of low cost launcher studies. The high cost of access to space keeps
> the lessor natinos and groups out of the big guys battle space. NOt the best
> reason in the world to lock a frountier.
>
I fully agree with Kelly here.
Sorry for possible breach of netiquette with such an "one-liner",
but I have thought it important to state my opinion on this issue.
-- Zenon Kulpa
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From: KellySt@aol.com
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: jdavis@crcom.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Re: starship design
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 21:49:09 EDT
Hi Timothy,
Sounds like you have some good ideas. You might want to join the group to
discus them. I'll comment on a couple points here and forward the message to
the group.
> Fusion drives can convert only about 1% of the mass of
> their fuel into energy.
Actually its usually less then 1/2 to 1/3rd of that.
> This means That a direct thrust fusion drive can attain
> a maximium exchaust velocity of abot 10% of light
> speed. The velocity attained by a rocket is = to the
> exchaust velocity tiimes the natural logarithim of
> the mass ratio. A mass fraction per stage of about 5-1
> is the most that is realistic. ==
Here we disagree. In space the mass ratio of a stage can be expanded to
rediculas degrees. I assumed a Lithium-6 fuel cycle since the stuf has a lot
of power and is a stable structural metal. With no tank required you could
have a fuel mass ratio of 100's. Your acceleration rate would suffer, but
you could do it, and for a starship you would need too!
> == A fusion rocket stage with an exchaust velocity of .1c
> and a mass ratio of 5-1 burns out at 16% of light
> velocity. A two (5-1) stage fusion rocket is required
> to reach .32c. A three( 5-1) stage fusion rocket can
> reach .48c. The maximium delta v availible on a
> roundtrip mission is thus .12c. A one way decelerated
> mission could reach .24 c. ==
I think I figured a 50-1 ratio would give you about a .4c delta V. Hence
things like fuel/sail or explorer where external sources of fuel/thrust were
used to provide half the delta-v, and they needed to refuel in the target
system. I.E. we'll need a big telescope array to verify a good fuel ore bed
in system orbit!!
> ==There are 2 types of fusion pulse rockets that could
> be used in this way.These are an Orion class fusion
> nuclear pulse rocket which detonates a sequance of
> multimegaton h-bombs behind an inertial plate or a
> deadalus class nuclear pulse rocket. To make a practical
> deadalus class system requires the use of lithium
> hydride fuel pellets with a mass of 1mg to 1gm per
> pellet. To theorecticly induce fusion in the pellets
> lasers beams of the following power level are
> required. A 1mg pellet needs to be zapped with at
> least a 500 kilowatt laser discharge to heat it up
> to 200,000,000 centigrade and cause fusion reactions
> to even theoreticly occurr. A 1 gm pellet requires
> a laser discharge of at least 500,000,000 watts to
> heat it up to 200,000,000 centigrade.Also the pellets
> should be in the shape of disks so that 2 laser beams
> can zap them simultaneusly on the top and the
> bottom of the pellets to heat them up.
Well there are other configurations, but I agree pulse fusion systems are a
good idea.
> You would also need a superconducting 10 tesla
> electromagnetic nozzle and a couple of large nuclear
> fission reactors capable of generating 500kw to 500 mw
> of electric power per reactor. ===
Ah you can use the fusion reactors to produce some power. You'ld need some
power for start up, or for base load during the mission.
> ===I have many starship designs of many kinds.
> Nuclear electric ramjets and rockets are not the
> only starship designs that I have.
>
> Timothy J. Mayes
Send them on to the group.
Kelly
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 21:49:17 EDT
>> From: KellySt@aol.com
>>
>> >===Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to
>> > build that Mauritania can have all the satellites it
>> > wants? The threshold for non shall we say governmental
>> > institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery,
>> > is crossed long before the smallest nations put up their
>> > peaceful scientific payloads. ==
>>
>> Interesting. That was the same logic the White House
>> and DOD used to stop funding of low cost launcher
>> studies. The high cost of access to space keeps
>> the lessor natinos and groups out of the big guys
>> battle space. Not the best
>> reason in the world to lock a frountier.
>
>I fully agree with Kelly here.
>
> Sorry for possible breach of netiquette with such
> an "one-liner", but I have thought it important to
> state my opinion on this issue.
>
> -- Zenon Kulpa
Thank you.
Actually the logic kinda scares me the more I think about it. Don't built
the space craft because it could be misused. The same logic would have
canceled aircraft, household cleners, computers. Worries me when that kind
of attitude gets seriously listened to in areas of power.
Kelly
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Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: KellySt@aol.com
cc: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 01:05:14 -0400 (EDT)
On Wed, 14 Apr 1999 KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> Actually the logic kinda scares me the more I think about it. Don't built
> the space craft because it could be misused.
>
What people must realise is that no one can stop science. When it is time
for something to be invented, no one can stop it's invention. Also, you
can never keep someone from developing a technology that you already have.
Consider the situation of, oh, Albania - say they wanted to build a
nuclear weapon. Even if they couldn't hire an accomplished physicist, and
obtain the documentation that was churned out when this stuff was being
first pioneered, they could still build one. It's simply a matter of time
and money. When you think about it, when guys like Oppenheimer started
building the a-bomb, they didn't have the documentation. They didn't know
how to build a nuke, but they figured it out for themselves. What makes
them so special that they would be the only people on the planet that
could come up with this?
IMHO, I don't think that LEO-capable missiles are all that important,
anyways. They're complex, difficult to guide, hard to build, and a
nuisance to launch. How many missiles has NATO used against the Serbs
that went up 60km, waited a half-hour then dropped back down on the
enemy's head? Why do that, with the difficulties of aiming, when you can
just fly in a high-speed jet, and very quickly drop a bomb on your target.
When you think about it, what tactical use would such a device have? On
it's way down, if the enemy has jets(who doesn't these days?), they would
have plenty of time to shoot the sucker down. I admit I'm not an expert
in military tactics, so explain to me how a missile capable of LEO would
be more useful, cheaper and more effective than just flying in a jet, and
dropping a bomb?
---
Paul Anderson
madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net
"We have learned to imitute you exarctly."
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Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: "Paul Anderson" <madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net>
Cc: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: RE: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 06:37:53 -0500
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> [mailto:owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu]On Behalf Of Paul
> Anderson
> Sent: Thursday, April 15, 1999 12:05 AM
> To: KellySt@aol.com
> Cc: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> Subject: Re: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
> IMHO, I don't think that LEO-capable missiles are all that important,
> anyways. They're complex, difficult to guide, hard to build, and a
> nuisance to launch. How many missiles has NATO used against the Serbs
> that went up 60km, waited a half-hour then dropped back down on the
> enemy's head? Why do that, with the difficulties of aiming, when you can
> just fly in a high-speed jet, and very quickly drop a bomb on your target.
> When you think about it, what tactical use would such a device have? On
> it's way down, if the enemy has jets(who doesn't these days?), they would
> have plenty of time to shoot the sucker down. I admit I'm not an expert
> in military tactics, so explain to me how a missile capable of LEO would
> be more useful, cheaper and more effective than just flying in a jet, and
> dropping a bomb?
Paul,
I would suggest reading the US Air Force's Space Forecast report. Or search
for Project Black Horse. The US Air Force apparently not only sees the value
of low Earth orbit capable missiles, they think a manned vehicle capable of
delivery payloads from low Earth orbit would be even better.
As for tactical use, Albania can not dispatch a jet as you suggest to drop a
bomb on the US. Their MiGs don't have the range and they don't have tankers.
So such a system would definitely be of tactical value to them. As Kelly
points out, building a nuclear bomb is actually rather easy now that we know
it can be done. Building a biological weapon is even easier, all that is
missing is a delivery vehicle, and we have been building missiles for a long
time.
Lee Parker
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 08:47:37 -0500
Uh, hey, look, I do too! Agree with Kelly, that is, and the rest
of you who posted on this.
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
> >> From: KellySt@aol.com
> >>
> >> >===Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to
> >> > build that Mauritania can have all the satellites it
> >> > wants? The threshold for non shall we say governmental
> >> > institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery,
> >> > is crossed long before the smallest nations put up their
> >> > peaceful scientific payloads. ==
> >>
> >> Interesting. That was the same logic the White House
> >> and DOD used to stop funding of low cost launcher
> >> studies. The high cost of access to space keeps
> >> the lessor natinos and groups out of the big guys
> >> battle space. Not the best
> >> reason in the world to lock a frountier.
> >
> >I fully agree with Kelly here.
> >
> > Sorry for possible breach of netiquette with such
> > an "one-liner", but I have thought it important to
> > state my opinion on this issue.
> >
> > -- Zenon Kulpa
>
> Thank you.
>
> Actually the logic kinda scares me the more I think about it. Don't built
> the space craft because it could be misused. The same logic would have
> canceled aircraft, household cleners, computers. Worries me when that kind
> of attitude gets seriously listened to in areas of power.
>
> Kelly
I feel that the economic barrier to space access is really kind of artificial.
It's a cover for control games, basically played by the big power governments
which now have space access. The problem is that the powers that be, don't
want people to go far enough from their physical jurisdictions, that they might
get out of control. So the big power instinct, is to fake a desire for a manned
space program ( on any significant scale ), while actually operating
clandestinely
to prevent any activity which could result in spontaneous migration into space.
Well, you know, it's just a guess. If you have to have a conspiracy theory,
pick one that's obtuse and incomprehensible, so you don't worry people.
SF for a long time worked over the thesis of governments restricting space
travel to a privileged few. Then came the beatniks, and the hippies, with their
real and persistent desire to be detatched beyond the reach of control and
coercion. With the information revolution now a fact, odds are good someone
will find a way to tunnel through the economic barrier, with the result that
physical energy considerations, rather than economic illusions, will make up
the bottleneck which limits the rate of human migration into the solar system.
Want me to go over that again, and this time make sense? Low cost access
to space, is a concept which has hooks to political and economic controversy.
As its proponents, we would like to consider its simple, pristine elegance in
isolation, for the good of humanity. Military interests, and their cronies, do
not want individuals moving off Earth at will. Thus they will attempt to control
the technology of orbital, and of deep space access. Only if the launch
technique
is so blatantly simple as to be inherently uncontrollable, will we get a portal
to space in the forseeable future, a gateway through which large numbers of
people can travel at will.
That's why the Paper Cannon was developed. We may be hesitant to
consider this as a man-rated launch system, but I for one, feel the same way
about solid rockets, and did feel this way throughout the 26 Space Shuttle
missions I worked on, STS-2 through Challenger. ( It's a bad idea to put
people on solid rockets. You can't throttle them, and you can't turn them
off. ) A basic characteristic of the Paper Cannon concept is its scalability.
You can build it big, or you can build it small, and still make something go
thataway real real fast. The military is not going to ignore that, not in our
world. They will make a lot of popguns like this, which will cost them lots
of money, so they will take reassurance that it's not all that cheap, after all.
I know people don't like to hear about this kind of realism. I've been
around the block a bit, and I think it's a pretty fair guess about people's
reactions. The roots of conflict lie in our need to get to very high speed
in order to escape Earth, and things that go very fast catch the eye of the
military, who instinctively want to get them under their control. Only if
the design is open and published work, in short an Internet project,
can the military interests be completely foiled in their presumable desire
to bury it. Follow all that?
So please, don't attribute to me any desire to restrict space development.
I have very much the opposite attitude, even though I wrote the paragraph
everyone finds so misleading. Excuse me.
per aspera ad astra,
Johnny Thunderbird
http://fly.to/heavyLight
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: administrivia: list policy update
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 11:01:49 -0700 (PDT)
Appended below is the latest list information that new
subscribers will get when subscribing to the list or that you can
get by mailing the command "info starship-design" to
majordomo@lists.uoregon.edu.
The main changes are some more explicit guidelines for posting
(messages should be less than 40,000 characters and not contain
binary or HTML attachments), and the addition of a paragraph
describing conditions under which I may unsubscribe list members.
I have occasionally had to unsubscribe addresses that began
rejecting list postings persistently; in such cases if the
address is bouncing mail then there's not much point to it being
on the list and I have no way to contact the person at that
address to let them know.
The other clause about unsubscribing list members who are
excessively disruptive to the list is one that I hope never to
have to invoke. I want to emphasize that I did not add it
because of anyone's past activity on the starship-design list;
this mailing list is one of the most civil and consistently
intelligent lists I have been on and you are an excellent group
of people. However, as the list grows in size the possibility of
such behavior increases, and I want to be able to make sure that
the list remains topical and pleasant for its current and new
subscribers.
[Last updated on: Thu Apr 15 10:45:30 1999]
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To: Johnny Thunderbird <jthunderbird@nternet.com>
cc: KellySt@aol.com, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 00:44:18 -0400 (EDT)
On Thu, 15 Apr 1999, Johnny Thunderbird wrote:
> With the information revolution now a fact, odds are good someone
> will find a way to tunnel through the economic barrier,
>
Well, actually, I'm kind of involved in a project to do that sort of thing
right now... The Lunaris Project is working towards putting an unmanned
payload on the moon with volunteer effort. The website isn't entirely
ready for primetime, but you can check it out at:
http://www.lunaris.org
Let me know if you have any questions about the project thus far... TTYL!
---
Paul Anderson
madhobby@geeky1.ebtech.net
"We have learned to imitute you exarctly."
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Subject: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 14:47:16 +0200 (MET DST)
> From: KellySt@aol.com
>
> >> From: KellySt@aol.com
> >>
> >> >===Is what we really want, a super cannon so cheap to
> >> > build that Mauritania can have all the satellites it
> >> > wants? The threshold for non shall we say governmental
> >> > institutions, e.g. gangs, to have hypervelocity artillery,
> >> > is crossed long before the smallest nations put up their
> >> > peaceful scientific payloads. ==
> >>
> >> Interesting. That was the same logic the White House
> >> and DOD used to stop funding of low cost launcher
> >> studies. The high cost of access to space keeps
> >> the lessor natinos and groups out of the big guys
> >> battle space. Not the best reason in the world to lock a frountier.
> >
> > I fully agree with Kelly here.
> >
> > Sorry for possible breach of netiquette with such
> > a "one-liner", but I have thought it important to
> > state my opinion on this issue.
> >
> > -- Zenon Kulpa
>
> Thank you.
>
> Actually the logic kinda scares me the more I think about it. Don't built
> the space craft because it could be misused. The same logic would have
> canceled aircraft, household cleners, computers.
>
Do not forget the knife!
-- Zenon [Pardon the one-liner again ;-)]
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Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: build it now...
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 19:03:30 EDT
> I feel that the economic barrier to space access
> is really kind of artificial. It's a cover for control
> games, basically played by the big power governments
> which now have space access. The problem is that the
> powers that be, don't want people to go far enough
> from their physical jurisdictions, that they might
> get out of control. So the big power instinct, is to
> fake a desire for a manned space program ( on any
> significant scale ), while actually operating
> clandestinely to prevent any activity which could
> result in spontaneous migration into space.===
> === With the information revolution now a fact, odds
> are good someone will find a way to tunnel through
> the economic barrier, with the result that physical
> energy considerations, rather than economic illusions,
> will make up the bottleneck which limits the rate
> of human migration into the solar system.===
> === Only if the launch technique is so blatantly simple
> as to be inherently uncontrollable, will we get a portal
> to space in the forseeable future, a gateway through
> which large numbers of people can travel at will.===
>
> Johnny Thunderbird
Ah, your kinda contradicting yourself. If economics is a sham, why do folks
need to tunnel past it?
Realistically economics is THE issue. Technology is fairly simple and well
known, but no ones come up with a pressing and profitable reason to do it.
We're a wash in resources here, no places out there look like a great place
to live, all teched up and no where to go.
Kelly
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Subject: Re: starship-design: administrivia: list policy update
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 19:03:54 EDT
> Appended below is the latest list information that
> new subscribers will get when subscribing to the
> list or that you can
Looks good to me. You probably want to list the main LIT site at University
of North Carolina though. Kevin doesn't seem very active, and may be more
likely to drop the site then the university.
Kelly
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Subject: Re: starship-design: administrivia: list policy update
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 16:51:31 -0700 (PDT)
KellySt@aol.com writes:
> > Appended below is the latest list information that
> > new subscribers will get when subscribing to the
> > list or that you can
>
> Looks good to me. You probably want to list the main LIT site at University
> of North Carolina though. Kevin doesn't seem very active, and may be more
> likely to drop the site then the university.
>
> Kelly
I've updated the info message with pointers to the original pages
at unc.edu and Kevin's pages at urly-bird.com.
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To: stevev@darkwing.uoregon.edu, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: administrivia: list policy update
Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1999 13:23:15 EDT
>KellySt@aol.com writes:
> > > Appended below is the latest list information that
> > > new subscribers will get when subscribing to the
> > > list or that you can
> >
> > Looks good to me. You probably want to list the main LIT site at
University
> > of North Carolina though. Kevin doesn't seem very active, and may be
more
> > likely to drop the site then the university.
> >
> > Kelly
> I've updated the info message with pointers to the original
> pages at unc.edu and Kevin's pages at urly-bird.com.
Ok, great. Thanks again for your work admining the list!
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Re: starship design
Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1999 13:23:25 EDT
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As to your "The fastest rocket that can be created is a an antimatter rocket"
thats a bit inaccurate. The fastest possible exaust velocity yes, but the
fastest rocket statment assumes some engineering considerations. How much
does the engine weigh? The fuel tanks? How much fuel can you carry?
Just a nit.
Kelly
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Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 20:33:30 -0500
From: Janice Davis <jdavis@crcom.net>
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The fastest rocket that can be created is a an antimatter rocket in most
cases.
If you wish a better performance then is provided by non relatavistic
fusion rockets,
this is best done with a type of antimatter rocket called a pion rocket.
This pion rocket mixs protons, and antiprotons in equal quantitys, and
annhilates them creating pi
mesons which are expelled through a magnetic nozzle at .94 of light
speed. I have designs for pion rockets. I also have designs for nuclear
electric rockets which generate
a beam of relatavistic protons or ions with particle accelerators, and
expell it to propell themselves.
Timothy j mayes
These proton rockets may have exchaust velocitys of 90 percent of light
speed or more.
Timothy J. Mayes
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Subject: starship-design: Urly-Bird.com LIT site.
Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1999 22:54:36 -0500
Hi all,
Lately there has been some concern that the LIT urly-bird site might have
to go to data heaven. There is no need worry. My web hosting business is
not going very well, and I have shut it down. But I will be keeping the
domain name, and I will continue to pay the server fees.
As long as I have a web server, LIT will have a site.
This is my gift to the group. I have been very busy of late with my other
passion (the Libertarian party of Minnesota) I meant to reply on-list to
these concerns, but instead, sent it directly to Kelly. D'Oh! Kelly has
volunteered to do a little work on the web site, and if anyone else would
like to help him, I'm sure he would appreciate it. Since it is my web
site, you will have to get the password from me.
Sincerely,
Kevin
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Subject: starship-design: Re: starship design
Date: Sun, 18 Apr 1999 11:00:36 -0600
----------
> From: Janice Davis <jdavis@crcom.net>
> To: KellySt@aol.com
> Subject: Re: starship design
> Date: April 16, 1999 7:33 PM
>
> The fastest rocket that can be created is a an antimatter rocket in most
> cases.
> If you wish a better performance then is provided by non relatavistic
> fusion rockets,
> this is best done with a type of antimatter rocket called a pion rocket.
> This pion rocket mixs protons, and antiprotons in equal quantitys, and
> annhilates them creating pi
> mesons which are expelled through a magnetic nozzle at .94 of light
> speed. I have designs for pion rockets. I also have designs for nuclear
> electric rockets which generate
> a beam of relatavistic protons or ions with particle accelerators, and
> expell it to propell themselves.
> Timothy j mayes
>
> These proton rockets may have exchaust velocitys of 90 percent of light
> speed or more.
> Timothy J. Mayes
>
Being a great fan of autodynamics ( but lacking great math skills )
I wonder if .94 C is the best escape velocity. If I remember right from the
web site, anything over about .75C the momentum of the particle decreases
so thrust would be lost after that point. Other than that it sounds great.
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Date: Sun, 18 Apr 1999 23:22:56 +0100
In reply to Ben Franchuk's message
>> These proton rockets may have exchaust velocitys of 90 percent of light
>> speed or more.
>> Timothy J. Mayes
>>
>
>Being a great fan of autodynamics ( but lacking great math skills )
>I wonder if .94 C is the best escape velocity. If I remember right from the
>web site, anything over about .75C the momentum of the particle decreases
>so thrust would be lost after that point. Other than that it sounds great.
A few questions:
- Escape velocity from what? The Earth, the Solar system....?
- "The best" regarding what parameter? Money, Fuel, Efficiency...?
You must be mistaken, about 0.75 c isn't a magic number where physics
breaks down. The momentum of a particle goes up when its velocity goes up,
even relativity agrees with that.
You might mean that the efficiency of the fuel usage decreases when the
exhaust velocity exceeds a certain speed. This is true for self-fuelled
designs, but that particular exhaust speed depends on the kind of fuel, the
efficiency of the engine and the final velocity of the starship.
For fusion designs this optimal exhaust velocity is rather low (but still
high compared to todays technology), usually less than 6% of the light speed.
Timothy (van der Linden)
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Subject: Re: starship-design:
Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 12:25:36 -0700
Timothy van der Linden wrote:
> You must be mistaken, about 0.75 c isn't a magic number where physics
> breaks down. The momentum of a particle goes up when its velocity goes up,
> even relativity agrees with that.
>
Here is the Autodynamics web site, if you wish to check the momentem
equation. The theory based on relativity but a 20th century viewpoint
rather than Einstein's 19th century.
http://www.autodynamics.org/
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Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 23:57:48 +0100
Curtis,
>> You might mean that the efficiency of the fuel usage decreases when the
>> exhaust velocity exceeds a certain speed. This is true for self-fuelled
>> designs, but that particular exhaust speed depends on the kind of fuel, the
>> efficiency of the engine and the final velocity of the starship.
>> For fusion designs this optimal exhaust velocity is rather low (but still
>> high compared to todays technology), usually less than 6% of the light
speed.
>>
>> Timothy (van der Linden)
>
>Perhaps Ben meant to say "exhaust velocity" instead of "escape velocity";
that
>would follow the gist of his context. Right, Ben?
I think I addressed that in the last paragraph.
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Subject: starship-design: Autodynamics
Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 23:56:43 +0100
Ben,
>http://www.autodynamics.org/
Could you please be a bit more specific than just the home-address?
Timothy
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Subject: starship-design: new physics
Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 20:50:40 -0400
I've found a website with an interesting theory of physics on it; it is:
www.rideau.net/~gaasbeek/index.html/#contents
This is sensible and credible, well-presented and easy to follow. I find
the Autodynamics site inexcusably sloppy, though even AD is an
improvement over SR.
Give it a look.
Curtis
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To: mcortez@fullcoll.edu, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Is there anyone still at this address?
Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1999 18:33:19 EDT
Wandering around a Lunar Institute of Technology....
Was wandering if you have any other material like the "Contact Project"
Looks like the site hasn't been maintained since 1996, or there abouts...
Thanks in Advance,
Michael Cortez
Development Services
Fullerton College
No, sorry. The site hasn't been updated, and I don't think anyone was
planing on doing anything like "Contact Project" again.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Re: Re: Fwd: Re: starship design
Date: Wed, 21 Apr 1999 18:45:42 EDT
> Here is a little more about the pion rocket. There is
> also a 20,000 pound tank containing the 100,000 pounds
> of ordinary hydrogen to mix with antimatter in the form
> of antihydrogen, This pion rockets useful payload is
> 20,000 pounds.To get more useful payload the pion
> rocket must be scaled up. A 600,000 pound pion rocket
> could carry 40,000 pounds of useful payload and
> accelerate it to 72 percent of light speed in a year.
> A 6000,000 pound pion rocket could carry 400,000
> pounds of useful payload.. The antihydrogen is stored
> in the magnetic bottles in the form of antihydrogen
> ice. The antihydrogen is zapped by a low power uv
> laser to vaporize it a little bit at a time, and ionize it.
> Electrostatic repulsion of the negatively charged
> anti protons causes ===
> ==The vehicle frame, magnetic nozzle, engine, magnetic
> vacume lines, matter-antimattermixing chamber, and
> magnetic storage bottles are made of steel. The rest
> of the vehicle is made mostly of aluminium metal.
> There is also a steel radiation shield around the
> antimatter-matter annhilation engine which is part of
> the 20,000 pound pion engine weight.
> Timothy J. Mayes
You have a lot of numbers, but I don't know where you got them from. How
does a 20,000 pound engine with shielding give 60,000 pounds of sustained
thrust? Where do you get those weight numbers from?
Kelly
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Here is a little more about the pion rocket. There is also a 20,000
pound tank containing the 100,000 pounds of ordinary hydrogen
to mix with antimatter in the form of antihydrogen, This pion rockets
useful
payload is 20,000 pounds.To get more useful payload the pion rocket must
be scaled up. A 600,000 pound pion rocket could carry 40,000 pounds of
useful
payload and accelerate it to 72 percent of light speed in a year. A
6000,000
pound pion rocket could carry 400,000 pounds of useful payload.. The
antihydrogen is stored in the magnetic bottles in the form of
antihydrogen ice. The antihydrogen is zapped by a low power uv laser to
vaporize it a little bit at a time, and ionize it.
Electrostatic repulsion of the negatively charged anti protons causes
them to enter
a superconducting magnetic vacume line which takes them to the
antimatter-matter
mixing chamber in the pion engine. Liquid helium cooling jackets are
used to supercool the magnetic engine, the magnetic mixing chamber, the
magnetic antimatter storage bottles, and the magnetic vacume lines..
The vehicle frame, magnetic nozzle, engine, magnetic vacume lines,
matter-antimattermixing chamber, and magnetic storage bottles are made
of steel.
The rest of the vehicle is made mostly of aluminium metal. There is also
a steel radiation shield around the antimatter-matter annhilation engine
which is part of the 20,000
pound pion engine weight.
Timothy J. Mayes
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KellySt@aol.com writes:
> You have a lot of numbers, but I don't know where you got them from. How
> does a 20,000 pound engine with shielding give 60,000 pounds of sustained
> thrust? Where do you get those weight numbers from?
Uh, Kelly, an engine can produce more thrust than its weight.
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Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 08:27:40 EDT
>KellySt@aol.com writes:
>> You have a lot of numbers, but I don't know where you
>> got them from. How does a 20,000 pound engine with
>> shielding give 600,000 pounds of sustained
>> thrust? Where do you get those weight numbers from?
> Uh, Kelly, an engine can produce more thrust than its weight.
Yeah, but a 30 - 1 thrust to weight ratio is pretty good, and this is a
anti-mater to pion drive. Optimistic.
Kelly
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KellySt@aol.com writes:
> >KellySt@aol.com writes:
> >> You have a lot of numbers, but I don't know where you
> >> got them from. How does a 20,000 pound engine with
> >> shielding give 600,000 pounds of sustained
> >> thrust? Where do you get those weight numbers from?
>
> > Uh, Kelly, an engine can produce more thrust than its weight.
>
> Yeah, but a 30 - 1 thrust to weight ratio is pretty good, and this is a
> anti-mater to pion drive. Optimistic.
>
> Kelly
Rocket engines that have thrust well in excess of their weight
already exist. Otherwise we wouldn't be able to get rockets off
the ground. I don't see why you consider a 30::1 thrust::weight
ratio for an antimatter rocket optimistic considering the fuel
involved. Think about it.
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Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 12:43:57 -0700
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> >KellySt@aol.com writes:
> >> You have a lot of numbers, but I don't know where you
> >> got them from. How does a 20,000 pound engine with
> >> shielding give 600,000 pounds of sustained
> >> thrust? Where do you get those weight numbers from?
>
> > Uh, Kelly, an engine can produce more thrust than its weight.
>
I would like to see the detailed math for the thrust, so I
can do the calculations myself. Right now
anti-matter production not very practical, anybody got ideas for
that.( anybody for huge solar anti-matter production plants in orbit
around the sun. ?) I assume the thrust is for over a year so that
is very good engine.
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Date: Thu, 22 Apr 1999 20:12:24 EDT
>> > Uh, Kelly, an engine can produce more thrust than its weight.
> >
> > Yeah, but a 30 - 1 thrust to weight ratio is pretty good, and this is a
> > anti-mater to pion drive. Optimistic.
> >
> > Kelly
> Rocket engines that have thrust well in excess of their
> weight already exist. Otherwise we wouldn't be able
> to get rockets off the ground.
I know that Steve. I was in NASA for about 14 years. 30-1 even pushing 100
to 1 is possible for some chemical fueled rocket engines.
> I don't see why you consider a 30::1 thrust::weight
> ratio for an antimatter rocket optimistic considering
> the fuel involved. Think about it.
I exactly because of the fuel involved that I doubt it. Curently equipment
to handel a few dozen atoms weighs most of a ton. For an engine like this
your talking about handeling significant mass with magnetic fields, with
cooling and sheilding loads, and triky reaction to induce. This is the kind
of stuff they build things the size of CERN to play with. Most fusion
designs can't even lift their own weight.
I'm not saying it couldn't be done, but it sure isn't an assumption that
should go unchallenged.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Re: Re: Fwd: Re: starship design
Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1999 19:01:32 EDT
> Why do you doubt the 20,000 pound figure for the pion
> engine? The pion engine could simply be a 1 meter long,
> 1 meter diameter 2 inch thick steel cyclinder with about
> 10,000 turns of copper wire carrying ten amps of
> electric current wrapped around it, with a 2 inch thick
> 2 meter long by 2 meter wide square of steel behind it
> as the radiation shield. Matter antimatter annhilation
> produces only one kind of radiation which is gamma rays.
> A light weight material such as beyrellium metal can
> also be used to make the gamma radiation shield.
>Timothy J Mayes
Prove it. How much waste heat will the engine need to stand? All the
radiation heading toward the shield will be come heat. The pipe and wire
will heat up too.
Are you sure that will be all it takes to turn your relatavistic pion stream
toward the rear of the ship? The magnetic feild would have to at least be
strong enough to lift the 600,000 lb ship, since its the force transmiting
the thrust to the ship. Past that though it has to have more power to turn
the random pion stream.
Thats just off the top of my head.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: antimatter--designs
Date: Sat, 24 Apr 1999 13:43:25 -0700
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> > Why do you doubt the 20,000 pound figure for the pion
> > engine? The pion engine could simply be a 1 meter long,
> > 1 meter diameter 2 inch thick steel cyclinder with about
> > 10,000 turns of copper wire carrying ten amps of
> > electric current wrapped around it, with a 2 inch thick
> > 2 meter long by 2 meter wide square of steel behind it
> > as the radiation shield. Matter antimatter annhilation
> > produces only one kind of radiation which is gamma rays.
> > A light weight material such as beyrellium metal can
> > also be used to make the gamma radiation shield.
> >Timothy J Mayes
>
> Prove it. How much waste heat will the engine need to stand? All the
> radiation heading toward the shield will be come heat. The pipe and wire
> will heat up too.
>
> Are you sure that will be all it takes to turn your relatavistic pion stream
> toward the rear of the ship? The magnetic feild would have to at least be
> strong enough to lift the 600,000 lb ship, since its the force transmiting
> the thrust to the ship. Past that though it has to have more power to turn
> the random pion stream.
>
> Thats just off the top of my head.
>
> Kelly
Still confused here. What is "pion"?
Are we talking a anti-matter launch vehicle here or a general purpose
space tug type engine. Will the engine design scale ok for larger
thrust.What trust and size is optimon?
Post Blue prints!!!!
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To: jdavis@crcom.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Re: starship design
Date: Sat, 24 Apr 1999 18:42:38 EDT
In a message dated 4/23/99 6:37:20 PM, jdavis@crcom.net writes:
>The pion decay process works as follows . Pions decay first into muons,
>then into
>electrons and positrons, and then into gamma rays. by the time the gamma
>rays appear the pions, and so on will no longer be inside the engine at
>all. =
Good point, the shielding would need to be more extensive since the
gamasource wouldn't be in a small area of the ship.
>==Remember the magnetic nozzle is superconducting. The nozzle will be
>cooled by a cooling jacket of liquid helium.
Super conductors are vulnerable to radiation or high current loads.
>All the magnetic field does inside the nozzle is deflect, and focous
>the pions into an exchaust beam.
That is the thrust transmition mechanism to the ship.
>The transmission of thrust is the result of Newtons third law which
>states that for every action there is an equal, and opposite reaction.
That doesgethr it the ship,it gets it into pion stream. I.E. the kinetic
energy of particals going one way is balenced by those going the other. It
does NOT get thrust into the ship.
>The magnetic field does not propell the
>ship the expulsion of the pions does this by the third law. The
>strength of the pion engine nozzle magnetic field is 10 teslas which is
>100,000 gauss
>
Kelly
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To: bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu,
jdavis@crcom.net
Subject: Re: starship-design: antimatter--designs
Date: Sat, 24 Apr 1999 18:47:00 EDT
In a message dated 4/24/99 2:44:40 PM, bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca writes:
>KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>>
>> > Why do you doubt the 20,000 pound figure for the pion
>> > engine? The pion engine could simply be a 1 meter long,
>> > 1 meter diameter 2 inch thick steel cyclinder with about
>> > 10,000 turns of copper wire carrying ten amps of
>> > electric current wrapped around it, with a 2 inch thick
>> > 2 meter long by 2 meter wide square of steel behind it
>> > as the radiation shield. Matter antimatter annhilation
>> > produces only one kind of radiation which is gamma rays.
>> > A light weight material such as beyrellium metal can
>> > also be used to make the gamma radiation shield.
>> >Timothy J Mayes
>>
>> Prove it. How much waste heat will the engine need to stand? All the
>> radiation heading toward the shield will be come heat. The pipe and
>wire
>> will heat up too.
>>
>> Are you sure that will be all it takes to turn your relatavistic pion
>stream
>> toward the rear of the ship? The magnetic feild would have to at least
>be
>> strong enough to lift the 600,000 lb ship, since its the force transmiting
>> the thrust to the ship. Past that though it has to have more power to
>turn
>> the random pion stream.
>>
>> Thats just off the top of my head.
>>
>> Kelly
>
>Still confused here. What is "pion"?
A sub atomic partical produced during anti mater conversion to energy.
>Are we talking a anti-matter launch vehicle here or a general purpose
>space tug type engine. =
He was talking stardrive.
>==Will the engine design scale ok for larger
>thrust.What trust and size is optimon?
>Post Blue prints!!!!
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To: cffc@nvinet.com, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: starships
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 1999 22:13:13 EDT
Good evening,
I just got around to reading through the design
study for the explorer class starships. The references
are mostly 3 years old
but quite adequate for the study. I did notice that you
have Li6 yielding an exhaust Velocity of about 8.33%
Cee, When I looked
into this
Li7 + H1 will yield about 4.81% to 6.818% Cee. You can
gather the H in situ and just load the Li&, which is common.
So to go near 30%C you only need about 500:1 FMR
( down to 81.45 :1 at the highest Vex)
You might be able to get by with less, but not if you
use the same propellant on board for the whole trip. A
magsail and solar
induced reaction can act to slow the craft down when
entering the new system.
The life support can also be reduced several ways.
But you want to keep the fresh food and the plants to
make the air smell
fresh. It just may not re4quire 200 tonnes per person.
The landers and exploration satellites are best stored
as parts and designs and not the finished craft so that
they can be reconfigured as needed. Some have to be
ready all the time for outside repairs and other
emergencies.
Jim
F
C'= C
F' Cerulean Freight Forwarding Company
http://www.nvinet.com/~cffc/page2.htm
Hi Jim,
I'm a bit disturbed to hear I might have gotten the exaust velocity wrong.
I'm out of town on a contract, so I can't review my notes.
The later Fuel/Sail configuration deals with some of your concerns. With the
fuel spread out into a microwave sail. The ship can be accelerated to cruse
speed without taping its fuel.
Solar sails are pretty useless since you don't spend enough time near a star
to put it to use. Mag-sail was debated, but no one knew enough to know how
to put it to use, or if it could be.
I'm not sure how storing the the support craft as parts helps any? Since you
need several craft assembled simaltaniously, your might as well store them as
assembled craft, not parts. Most of the parts wouldn't be inter-changable
anyway. Its not like a areo-shuttle hull could be adapted to serve as a
satelight hull?
Anyway, glad you liked the site and were interested enough to write.
Kelly
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Alien life
Date: Sun, 02 May 1999 09:22:32 -0700
SSD:
On the subject of contamination by alien life, we can only speculate.
But we can attempt to make 'educated guesses' and define safety
precautions. I have been thinking long about this subject, and I think
it will be a much more dangerous problem than we think. Let us first
consider what life is: must it be carbon based? Could it be silicon,
boron, or tungsten based? Well, that depends on what you call life. Only
carbon seems able to make well workable amino acids, but what of the
possibility of life that does not use amino acids, or enzymes? Something
truly alien to anything we have previously encountered. On an earthlike
planet, or something similar, life will probably be similar to earth
life, at least in the use of DNA or carbon based amino acids. This life
would not pose a serious threat since it was not adapted to human
proteins. However, as has been pointed out, precautions must be taken in
the off chance they could infect humans. But now consider life existing
in an extremely hostile environment. There are those who believe life
would never exist in an inhospitable environment, but that fact it made
moot by studying life here on earth. Any lifeforms that exist on a
hostile world would likely have to survive on nearly anything. As such,
they could prove to be incredibly dangerous to humans. Something like
the 'andromeda strain,' but possibly much worse. Decon procedures should
be carried out when landing on any world, not just earthlike ones.
Kyle R. Mcallister
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Alien life
Date: Sun, 02 May 1999 23:19:32 +0100
Kyle wrote:
>Any lifeforms that exist on a hostile world would likely
>have to [be able to] survive on nearly anything.
>As such, they could prove to be incredibly dangerous to humans.
Unless they have competition. Take a cactus, they can live on almost barren
ground, with extreme temperature and moist differences. Yet, in less barren
places other plants seem to be able to take advantage of the better
conditions unlike the cactus which will stand little chance.
Timothy
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Alien life
Date: Wed, 03 May 2000 09:22:40 -0700
"Kyle R. Mcallister" wrote:
>
> SSD:
>
> On the subject of contamination by alien life, we can only speculate.
> But we can attempt to make 'educated guesses' and define safety
> precautions. I have been thinking long about this subject, and I think
> it will be a much more dangerous problem than we think. Let us first
> consider what life is: must it be carbon based? Could it be silicon,
> boron, or tungsten based? Well, that depends on what you call life. Only
> carbon seems able to make well workable amino acids, but what of the
> possibility of life that does not use amino acids, or enzymes? Something
> truly alien to anything we have previously encountered. On an earthlike
> planet, or something similar, life will probably be similar to earth
> life, at least in the use of DNA or carbon based amino acids. This life
> would not pose a serious threat since it was not adapted to human
> proteins. However, as has been pointed out, precautions must be taken in
> the off chance they could infect humans. But now consider life existing
> in an extremely hostile environment. There are those who believe life
> would never exist in an inhospitable environment, but that fact it made
> moot by studying life here on earth. Any lifeforms that exist on a
> hostile world would likely have to survive on nearly anything. As such,
> they could prove to be incredibly dangerous to humans. Something like
> the 'andromeda strain,' but possibly much worse. Decon procedures should
> be carried out when landing on any world, not just earthlike ones.
>
> Kyle R. Mcallister
I think the only real danger is the upright creatures with big
brains
and low wisdom. Any other life that could of floated in like the
'andromeda strain,'
would of happened allready. The real danger things that are slightly
harmfull
that could be a big pain.... take rabbits in australia for example...
remember
the tribbles and captain kirk....
Ben.
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To: bfranchuk <bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca>
CC: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: Alien life
Date: Fri, 07 May 1999 02:03:31 -0500
bfranchuk wrote:
> "Kyle R. Mcallister" wrote:
> >
> > SSD:
> >
> > On the subject of contamination by alien life, we can only speculate.
> > But we can attempt to make 'educated guesses' and define safety
> > precautions. I have been thinking long about this subject, and I think
> > it will be a much more dangerous problem than we think.
Strangeness may not be most dangerous. The most dangerous might be
alien life closest to ours. Acute awareness of this principle comes from
my diagnosis 30 days ago with mantle cell lymphoma.
> Let us first
> > consider what life is: must it be carbon based? Could it be silicon,
> > boron, or tungsten based? Well, that depends on what you call life. Only
> > carbon seems able to make well workable amino acids, but what of the
> > possibility of life that does not use amino acids, or enzymes? Something
> > truly alien to anything we have previously encountered. On an earthlike
> > planet, or something similar, life will probably be similar to earth
> > life, at least in the use of DNA
DNA now is definitely wilder guess. There might be a zillion molecular
structures which can record and replicate data. Proteins can.
> or carbon based amino acids.
I find carbon life may be more probable than other elemental bases for
life, due to its easy formation of complex structure on the molecular level.
Structure at this level enables the creation of voids in the material which
may enclose negative entropy zones, as life takes advantage of energy
flux to pump out entropy. Most likely carbon.
> This life
> > would not pose a serious threat since it was not adapted to human
> > proteins. However, as has been pointed out, precautions must be taken in
> > the off chance they could infect humans. But now consider life existing
> > in an extremely hostile environment.
The liquid water temperature / pressure range again has a vast probability
advantage. Like carbon, water is ubiquitous in space. This temperature
zone is very mild and kind to microstructures, particularly, need I add,
of carbon. That molecular water and relatively free carbon can be found
together on the arbitrary planet is a good probability. That this water
happens to be in the liquid temperature zone would boost the chances
for life, and after life is established it may thermoregulate the planet
surface to maintain this temperature zone.
> There are those who believe life
> > would never exist in an inhospitable environment, but that fact it made
> > moot by studying life here on earth. Any lifeforms that exist on a
> > hostile world would likely have to survive on nearly anything. As such,
> > they could prove to be incredibly dangerous to humans.
Prions are protein entities. They are incredibly dangerous to humans.
Mad cow disease. Kwashiorkor. They contain no nucleic acids.
> Something like
> > the 'andromeda strain,' but possibly much worse. Decon procedures should
> > be carried out when landing on any world, not just earthlike ones.
> >
> > Kyle R. Mcallister
>
> I think the only real danger is the upright creatures with big
> brains
> and low wisdom. Any other life that could of floated in like the
> 'andromeda strain,'
> would of happened allready. The real danger things that are slightly
> harmfull
> that could be a big pain.... take rabbits in australia for example...
> remember
> the tribbles and captain kirk....
> Ben.
Prions are not life, yet they are self-replicating disease agents.
This example raises the probability that arbitrary carbon structures
may be a biohazard. It's a jungle out there.
Regards,
Johnny Thunderbird
MCL page: http://www.geocities.com/~jthunderbird/mantle
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 May 8
Date: Tue, 11 May 1999 20:59:58 -0500
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Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 May 8
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S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.05.08
1999 May 8
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/0508/
*** News ***
Delta 3 Lifts Off But Puts Satellite Into Wrong Orbit
Russia May Use ISS Soyuz for Mir
Lockheed Martin Appoints Panel to Study Launch Failures
German Satellite Encounters Problems
Upgraded Software Enables Successful Galileo Flyby
Russian Service Module Renamed
Students to Participate in 2001 Mars Mission
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** Articles ***
The State and Fate of Small RLVs: A Report on the Space
Access '99 Conference
*** Letters ***
The Case for Privatization
*** News ***
Delta 3 Lifts Off But Puts Satellite Into Wrong Orbit
After a month's worth of delays, a Boeing Delta 3 lifted off
Tuesday evening, May 4, but a failure of the booster's second stage
stranded its payload in a useless low orbit.
The Delta 3 launched the Orion 3 communications satellite at
9:00 pm EDT (0100 UT) from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at the beginning
of its hour-long launch window. The countdown and the launch were
problem free.
However, Boeing launch controllers later reported that the
second of two burns scheduled for the Delta 3's second stage may have
been too short. Boeing officials later reported at a late night news
conference that the second burn may not have taken place at all.
The Orion 3 satellite is in a orbit of just 137 by 1,210 km
(85 by 750 mi.), the orbit the second stage and satellite were in
after the end of the stage's first burn. Satellite controllers are
trying to use the spacecraft's own engine to raise its orbit so that
it can use its solar panels more effectively, otherwise the
satellite's batteries will die within a day. It is unlikely the
spacecraft can be placed in its planned geosynchronous orbit.
The launch, previously planned for May 2, was pushed back to
the 4th after the failure of the Centaur upper stage on a Titan 4B.
The Delta 3 second stage uses the same engine as the Centaur,
however, Boeing engineers decided the Delta 3 upper stage was
sufficiently different from the Centaur not to be a problem.
A board of investigation has been convened to study the
incident, and started their investigation Wednesday, May 5.
The failure is the second in two launch attempts for the
Delta 3. The first, in August 1998, ended in failure just over a
minute after launch due to problems traced to the booster's guidance
system, which was not programmed to handle the vibrations from the
booster's strap-on boosters that are ignited after liftoff. These
vibrations caused a "roll instability" which eventually led to the
loss of the booster.
There had been four previous launch attempts for this Delta
3, all of which were scrubbed by various problems with the booster
and range. The most recent launch attempt, on April 22, was aborted
when a software error prevented a command to start the booster's
engines from being sent to the rocket at T-0 seconds.
The Delta 3 is a heavy-lift version of Boeing's workhorse
Delta 2. It is capable of lifting payloads as heavy as 3,800 kg
(8,400 lbs.) into geostationary orbit, twice the capacity of the
Delta 2. Boeing hopes the booster will gain a share of the growing
market for large comsats and related payloads.
The Orion 3 satellite was to be used by the Loral Skynet
system for communications services for the Far East and the Pacific.
Russia May Use ISS Soyuz for Mir
Russia is reportedly planning to use a Soyuz spacecraft that
was to launch the first crew for the International Space Station to
send a new crew to the Mir space station this August, according to
the Times of London.
In an article published by the Times this week, the Russian
Space Agency will use $40 million given to them by NASA last month to
build the Soyuz spacecraft that will ferry a relief crew to Mir this
August, rather than send the first crew to ISS.
NASA gave Russia the money on the understanding, but not
explicit agreement, that the funding would be used to complete a
Soyuz spacecraft that would be used for ISS. The Times said the next
Soyuz spacecraft would not be ready until late next year.
Russian space expert James Oberg told the Times that Russia
was willing do whatever necessary to keep Mir in orbit for at least
the near term. "There is no way they will bring down Mir while the
ISS is unmanned," he told the Times. "Russia wants to be one step
ahead of America, and with Mir in space it is."
If the Soyuz in unavailable for the first ISS crew launch,
they could instead be transferred to the station on one of the
shuttle missions scheduled for ISS assembly and logistics this year.
However, in that case the crew would lack an escape vehicle, in the
form of a Soyuz capsule, in the event of an emergency on the station.
"We are working on several contingency plans, including using
shuttles to go to ISS and modifying Navy satellites," NASA spokesman
Dwayne Brown told the Times. "We are also talking to our
international partners about how we can help Russia keep to its
commitments."
The "Navy satellite" is likely a reference to the Interim
Control Module, a modified Navy spacecraft that would provide station
propulsion if the ISS's Service Module was available on the station.
Russia plans to launch the Service Module late this year.
Energia, the company that built the Service Module, also operates the
Mir space station and is seeking investors to keep the station in
orbit. At the Service Module rollout April 26 company officials said
they were willing to take out loans to keep the station in orbit
until at least early 2000, even if no investors could be found.
The most recent investor candidate, British businessman Peter
Llewellyn, is thought unlikely to have the $100 million Energia
claimed he would pay for a flight to Mir in August. Llewellyn, who
claims that he was offered a free trip to Mir to promote a children's
hospital, was implicated in a number of scams while in the U.S.
Space News, in its May 10 issue, shed some light on the
original investor that Energia claimed in December would support Mir
for three years. According to a Russian Space Agency spokesman
quoted in the article, the investor was from Australia, and backed
out when the Russian government failed to provide guarantees quickly.
Lockheed Martin Appoints Panel to Study Launch Failures
Lockheed Martin has appointed an independent panel, headed by
a former Martin Marietta president, to study the recent rash of
failures by the company's launch vehicles, the company announced May
4.
The decision to create the panel comes on the same day the
Air Force officially declared the April 30 launch of a Milstar
satellite a failure, as the communications satellite is stranded in a
low orbit.
The independent panel will be charged with making a
comprehensive study of program management, engineering and
manufacturing processes, and quality control procedures at Lockheed
Martin's Astronautics, Missiles and Space, and Michoud Space Systems
divisions. The panel's report will be due by September 1.
Although the company claims a 97 percent "mission success"
rate, "it's also clear that recent launch vehicle missions have not
met their objectives," said Lockheed Martin president Pete Teets.
"This is unacceptable in a company that takes the concept of
performance and quality as seriously as Lockheed Martin does."
The panel will be chaired by A. Thomas Young, a former
president of Martin Marietta. Martin Marietta and Lockheed merged in
the mid-1990s to create Lockheed Martin. The rest of the panel will
include experts from both within and outside of the company.
Lockheed Martin has been hit with a string of three launch
failures in less than a month. Two Titan 4B launches, on April 9 and
30, failed when their upper stages failed to place their payloads
into the proper orbits. An Athena 2 failed to put the Ikonos 1
commercial reconnaissance satellite into orbit April 27 when its
payload fairing failed to separate, making the payload too heavy to
put into orbit.
On the same day Lockheed Martin announced the panel, the Air
Force officially declared the April 30 Titan 4B launch to be a
failure. A problem with the Titan 4B's Centaur upper stage stranded
its payload, a Milstar 2 communications satellite, into a useless
transfer orbit.
Air Force officials say the satellite is functioning
normally, with its batteries fully charged and its solar panels
deployed. Air Force and industry experts are studying ways to make
some use of the satellite.
The Air Force has convened a separate accident investigation
board to look into the causes of the launch failure.
German Satellite Encounters Problems
A German X-ray astronomy satellite launched last week has run
into problems with its power supply that may prevent the satellite
from carrying out its mission, SpaceViews has learned.
At least one of eleven battery cells on the ABRIXAS
satellite, launched April 28 from Russia, have failed, according to
the German space agency DLR. This problem with the power supply has
cut off communications with the spacecraft since May 1.
According to reports first published on "The Cosmic Mirror"
news service, initial contact with the satellite after launch was
successful. However, in subsequent passes over ground stations a few
hours after launch, a temperature problem was noted in the battery,
followed by sharp changes in voltage. By April 30 contact with the
satellite was lost and has not been regained.
An international effort has been mounted to try and regain
contact with the satellite, but project officials believe the best
chance to regain contact with ABRIXAS will not come until late June.
At that time the geometry of its inclined orbit will keep it in the
Sun for several consecutive days, which officials hope will give the
satellite enough power from its solar panels to resume contact with
ground controllers.
ABRIXAS, which stands for "A Broadband Imaging X-Ray All-sky
Survey", was designed to provide the first complete survey of the sky
at X-ray energies of 0.5 to 10 KeV, higher than past X-ray
observatories like ROSAT. Scientists believe the satellite will be
able to discover about 10,000 new X-ray sources, such as black holes,
and be able to peed deeper into the heart of our own galaxy. The
satellite was built by the German company OHB for the German space
agency DLR.
The satellite was launched April 28 on a Russian Kosmos-3M
booster from Kapustin Yar. The launch, the first from the
once-abandoned site in southern Russia in over a decade, also placed
MegSat 0, a small Italian communications satellite, into low-Earth
orbit.
Upgraded Software Enables Successful Galileo Flyby
Upgraded, "smart" software allowed NASA's Galileo spacecraft
to make a successful flyby of Jupiter's moon Callisto May 5, avoiding
problems that had foiled earlier flybys.
The software, which allows the spacecraft to deal with an
electrical glitch on the spacecraft without disrupting observations,
was put to use twice in the days before the Callisto flyby, JPL
reported May 5.
Three prior flybys of another moon, Europa, were disrupted
last year and early this year by glitches on Galileo. Those glitches
triggered safe modes on Galileo which shut down scientific
observations as the spacecraft waited for instructions from Earth.
At least some of the problems were traced to electrical glitches.
To prevent those problems from occurring again, spacecraft
engineers developed new software that was uploaded to Galileo prior
to this week's flyby. The software was designed to recognize the
glitch and correct it without entering safe mode.
The software was triggered twice on May 3, as Galileo
approached Callisto. In both cases the software recognized the
glitch and determined it was not dangerous, and kept the spacecraft
out of safe mode. This permitted a successful flyby of Callisto two
days later.
A separate problem, though, did cause Galileo to switch from
its primary control system for its scan platform to a less accurate
backup system. The change means some of the data from one of
Galileo's instruments may not be as sharp as planned, project
officials said.
The flyby was the first of several scheduled to alter
Galileo's orbit. The "Perijove Reduction Campaign" will use four
Callisto flybys over the next four months to reduce the closest
approach Galileo makes to Jupiter, its perijove, from 643,000 km
(400,000 mi.) to 393,000 km (244,000 mi.).
This change in orbit will allow Galileo to make one or two
close flybys of Io in October and November. Galileo has stayed
farther away from Jupiter because of the intense radiation
environment that close to the giant planet. The high-speed charged
particles, accelerated by Jupiter's powerful magnetic field, can
damage electronics on the spacecraft.
Project engineers believe the spacecraft will be able to
survive the passage through the radiation in the vicinity of Io, but
are concerned that radiation exposure to the spacecraft's computers
may reset them or otherwise put the spacecraft into a protective safe
mode. Waiting until the end of the extended mission reduces the
effect of any damage to the spacecraft from the flybys.
Russian Service Module Renamed
With little fanfare or official announcements, the Service
Module, a key Russian contribution to the International Space
Station, has been renamed "Zvezda".
The announcement of the renaming was buried in the middle of
the latest ISS status report issued by NASA Thursday, May 6. The
status report only noted that the Service Module was "recently" named
Zvezda, the Russian word for "star".
The module was officially rolled out in an April 26 ceremony
at an Energia facility near Moscow, but no announcement of its
renaming was made then. No other announcements of the module name
change were made; the rest of NASA's ISS Web site still uses the
generic "Service Module" name.
The renaming is the latest in series that follows a general
philosophy to give station modules descriptive names while the
overall station retains the generic ISS moniker. Most recently,
Japan renamed its major contribution, the Japanese Experiment Module,
"Kibo", a Japanese word for "hope".
The first two station modules, the Russian-built FGB module
and the American Node 1 docking node, were renamed Zarya ("dawn") and
Unity respectively. The U.S. laboratory module has been named
Destiny, while three cargo modules being built by Italy have been
named Leonardo, Donnatello, and Raffaello.
According to the NASA status report, Zvezda is scheduled to
leave it Moscow assembly facility by train May 20 for Baikonur, where
it will be prepared for launch. Zvezda's departure date is the same
day the next shuttle mission, the next ISS assembly and logisitics
mission, is scheduled for launch.
Students to Participate in 2001 Mars Mission
The general public, and students in particular, will have
unprecedented access to a 2001 Mars mission as part of a Planetary
Society project announced Thursday, May 6.
In the "Red Rover Goes to Mars" project, announced during
Space Day festivities in Washington, D.C. by former astronaut and
senator John Glenn and Bill Nye, selected students will become
integral members of teams working on the Mars Surveyor 2001 mission,
including roles operating the spacecraft's rover and robotic arm.
Those students, selected from essay- and journal-writing
contests, will work during the mission from a simulated "Mars base"
while other students and the general public participate via the
Internet, including analyzing real-time data returned by the mission
and suggesting areas to explore and experiments to conduct.
"We stand on the threshold of an exciting millennium of
exploration, one where the global public will become participants in
the exploration of other worlds," said Planetary Society executive
director Louis Friedman. "Internet technology, which has opened up
communications here on Earth, will now provide worldwide access to
the adventure of planetary exploration."
The mission will involve students with the control of the
Marie Curie rover, a nearly-identical twin to the Sojourner rover
that flew on the Mars Pathfinder mission, as well as a robot arm that
will be used to collect samples.
Student participants will be limited to those born between
January 31, 1984 and January 31, 1991. Those age ranges were
designed so that the students would be no more than 18 years old by
the time the spacecraft lands on Mars in April 2002.
The project is an outgrowth of the society's "Red Rover, Red
Rover" program which allows students to teleoperate model rovers over
simulated Martian terrain at various sites on Earth. Both that
program and the current project have been co-sponsored by the Lego
company.
The project is the second student involvement in the 2001
lander. In March the Planetary Society announced a contest to
include a tiny student-designed "nanoexperiment" on the lander, as
part of an existing experiment package to be flown on the mission.
More information about the "Red Rover Goes to Mars" project
can be found on the Web at http://rrgtm.planetary.org/.
SpaceViews Event Horizon
May 6-9 Space Studies Institute Conference on Space
Manufacturing, Princeton, New Jersey
May 15 Delta 2 launch of Navstar 2R-3 GPS satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 6:28 pm EDT (2228 UT)
May 18 Pegasus XL launch of the TERRIERS and MUBLCOM
satellites, staged from Vandenberg Air Force Base,
California, at 1:05 am EDT (0505 UT).
May 20 Launch of the space shuttle Discovery on mission
STS-96 from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, at
9:32 am EDT (1332 UT).
May 22 Proton launch of the Nimiq-1 comsat from Baikonur,
Kazakhastan.
May 23 Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
May 27-31 International Space Development Conference, Houston,
Texas
May TBD Titan 4B launch of the Lacrosse F4 satellite from
Vandenberg Air Force Base, California (under review)
Other News
Liberty Bell 7 Located: An expedition has located the Liberty Bell 7
capsule, in which Gus Grissom flew on America's second manned
spaceflight, at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The team located
the capsule May 1 five km (three miles) below the surface of the
ocean. Plans to raise it were delayed, however, when a cable
connecting the command ship to the Magellan robotic submersible
snapped in rough weather just hours after the capsule was located.
The team plans to return in late June to recover the submersible and
raise the capsule. The capsule sank shortly after splashdown July
21, 1961, nearly drowning Grissom, when the capsule's hatch blew.
New Asteroid Belts: Oxford University astronomers have found
theoretical evidence for two new, sparsely-populated asteroid belts
in the inner solar system. Using computer simulations, N. Wyn Evans
and Serge Tabachnik found that asteroids in two circular belts, one
within the orbit of Mercury and the other just beyond the orbit of
the Earth, could exist there for the history of the solar system. No
known asteroids have been linked to the inner belt, but at least
three recently discovered asteroids may have orbits consistent with
the outer belt.
Don't You Make My Black Holes Pink: Australian astronomers are
puzzling over the discovery of several black holes which, at visible
wavelengths, look pink. The holes themselves are likely not pink,
noted Paul Francis of the Australian National University; rather,
dust and gas around the black hole is glowing pink. "We really don't
have the foggiest idea" why they are pink, he said.
ISS Advertising: The Space Frontier Foundation announced this week
its opposition to recent NASA policy that would prohibit advertising
on any vehicles docking with or operating near the International
Space Station. "Contrary to pronouncements by NASA Administrator Dan
Goldin, this shows that ISS is not open for business," said SFF
president Rick Tumlinson. "NASA says they want the private sector to
be prime users of the station, then they announce plans to gut one of
the cornerstones of commerce -- advertising." Tumlinson said this
shows that NASA should turn over the operation of ISS, once complete,
to a port authority-like organization that would work with both
public and private organizations.
Moon Base Sites: Scientists have identified three areas in the Moon's
south polar regions that would be ideal for lunar bases. In a paper
published in the May 1 issue of Geophysical Research Letters, the
group of American and Dutch scientists picked three locations that,
because of their altitude, would be in sunlight for 65 to 80 percent
of the time, making solar power a viable energy source for any base
there. Nearby sites in constant darkness would be sources of water
ice for the sites.
Briefly: Russia will not insure the launch of the Zvezda service
module for the International Space Station, Russian media sources
reported last week. Neither the Russian Space Agency nor the Energia
corporation have the minimum $125,000 needed to purchase insurance
for the launch... Lockheed Martin will partner with TRW and Telecom
Italia to build the Astrolink satellite network, the company said
this week. The service will provide high-speed Internet and
multimedia services initially to North America and Europe, and later
worldwide. The first four satellites of the system will be launched
starting in 2002... John Glenn on a stamp? The U.S. Postal Service
is accepting votes for the stamps it will include in its 90s
collection, the last in a series of stamps on a decade-by-decade tour
of the 20th century. Glenn's return to space and "interplanetary
exploration" are two of 25 candidates for 15 stamps to honor the
decade. Previous decades' stamp collections have included the space
shuttle for the 1980s, Pioneer 10 for the 1970s, and the lunar
landing for the 1960s. Voting will continue through the end of the
month at local post offices and online at http://stampvote.msn.com.
*** Articles ***
The State and Fate of Small RLVs:
A Report on the Space Access '99 Conference
by Jeff Foust
The case for reusable launch vehicles (RLVs) has seemed
straightforward. RLVs can launch their payload, return to Earth, and
be ready to launch another in a week or less. Reusability and rapid
turnaround times reduce costs, making it far less expensive to place
satellites into orbit.
The picture clouds a bit, though, when examined in more
detail. The technical challenges -- and costs -- of developing RLVs
has limited most planned designs to relatively small payloads, such
as low-Earth orbit (LEO) comsats like Iridium and Teledesic. While
the market for these appears large, it is also uncertain, and that
uncertainty is making it difficult for RLV companies to attract
investors. Meanwhile, the larger aerospace companies are focusing on
the existing, growing market for heavy geosynchronous orbit payloads,
with expendables now and RLVs like VentureStar in the future.
These issues were a primary focus of Space Access '99, an
annual conference held last month in Phoenix focuses on new
developments that promise to reduce the cost of access to space. By
the end of the conference it was clear that there was no shortage of
technical solutions to make space access less expensive, but a dire
shortage of money to make it happen.
The Uncertain Market
Market planning by RLVs developers has, in general, focused
on the growing market for LEO comsats. LEO comsat constellations
could account for several hundred payloads in the next decade,
according to an analysis by the consulting company The Teal Group
earlier this year, as projects like Teledesic and SkyBridge get off
the drawing board and into orbit.
Yet, there is considerable uncertainty in the market.
Iridium, which entered commercial service late last year, has run
into serious financial problems as it has been unable to attract
anywhere near as many customers as it planned. The recent departure
of its CEO and chief financial officer has led to concerns that the
company may not be able to make it, as well as overall speculation
about how large of a market there really is for these services.
These concerns are likely the primary reason why potential RLV
investors are staying on the sidelines for the time being.
The constellations themselves are also changing, noted Eric
Laursen of International Launch Services, a Lockheed Martin/Russian
joint venture that markets Atlas and Proton boosters. The number of
satellites in Teledesic's project has shrunk from around 1,000 to
288, with each satellite growing heavier and flying in higher orbits
-- two factors that work against small RLVs.
This may prove critical, according to a market analysis
presented at the conference by Dave Salt. Since Teledesic's
satellites account for about three-quarters of the "baseline"
payloads over the next several years, any successful RLV may be able
to launch at least one Teledesic satellite to be successful. He also
noted that RLVs need to enter service by 2001 to be able to capture a
share of the projected surge in launcher demand that will last
through 2003, before it declines as current projected projects are
placed in orbit.
In fact, the major aerospace companies are unconvinced there
is a market for any kind of launch vehicle for small payloads. ILS's
Laursen noted that the largest area of growth is in GEO comsats
weighing over 5,500 kg (12,100 lbs.). This is because customers want
as many transponders in orbit as they can get to lease or sell to
broadcasters, and the most efficient way to do that is with large
payloads.
Laursen said that Lockheed Martin has struggled to sell
flights on its Athena series of small launch vehicles. He also noted
the potential new competition from Russia, where the Dnepr-1 rocket,
a converted ICBM, can place up to 3,200 kg into LEO at low cost, with
150 of the rockets available.
Similarly, Boeing has no vehicle in use or planned for small
payloads. Boeing's Dana Andrews said the company is designing an
RLV. Although details on their design had not yet been publicly
released, it would likely be a two-stage design capable of lifting
heavier payloads into orbit, rather than a direct competitor for
smaller RLVs already in the works.
RLV Company Updates
With an uncertain launch market that's being dismissed by the
larger aerospace companies, it would appear that the group of
start-up RLV companies would face a steep uphill path to success.
And while that may be true, the companies speaking at Space Access
'99 showed every sign of optimism that their vehicles will be built
and be a success.
Gary Hudson, CEO of Rotary Rocket, downplayed concerns about
the small LEO launch market. The company's business plan is not
based on launching Teledesic satellites, he said. He believes that
other markets besides satellite delivery are viable, including
servicing of satellites, transfer of International Space Station
crews, and eventually space tourism, although that market may be
10-15 years down the line.
Hudson said the company plans to make the first flight of the
Atmospheric Test Vehicle (ATV), which was rolled out in a March 1
ceremony, in the next few weeks. The company had just completed
tests on the rotors that will be used for the flights, which will
take place from Rotary's test facility at Mojave Airport, California.
Rotary has raised about $30 million of the $150 million it
needs to complete its orbital vehicle. Hudson downplayed reports
that Virgin's Richard Branson was investing in Rotary, calling
published reports "grossly wrong" but declining to elaborate.
Mitchell Burnside Clapp of Pioneer Rocketplane outlined the
status of his company's Pathfinder RLV. The Pathfinder uses
off-the-shelf technologies where possible, he said, ranging from an
RD-120 engine to brakes and tires used in the SR-71. "Pioneer
Rocketplane is all about risk reduction," he said.
Clapp believes the vehicle will be able to put up to 2,250 kg
(5,000 lbs.) in LEO for $5-10 million a flight. He said the total
cost of the Pathfinder will be less than $300 million, a sum the
company is still raising. Once full funding is found, he said, it
will take 35 months to go to first flight.
Steve Wurst provided a look at the plans of Space Access LLC,
an RLV start-up that has shied away from the publicity other RLV
makers have sought. Their SA-1 project would be a fully-reusable
two-stage system. A first stage would take off from a runway and fly
most of the way into orbit using an ejector ramjet and engine. It
would then deploy a second stage that would use a rocket engine to go
the rest of the way into orbit, deliver the payload, and return.
The SA-1 would be capable of launching LEO and some GEO
satellites. Wurst said a redesigned second stage would later be able
to transfer crews and supplies to the International Space Station.
Wurst said the company is doing wind tunnel tests on the SA-1 design,
and is looking to base their vehicle at the former Homestead Air
Force Base south of Miami, Florida.
The uncertain market and lack of investors is also not
deterring companies, both new and established, from entering the
marketplace. Orbital Science Corporation's Tim Lewis described his
company's concept for a "Space Taxi", outlined in Orbital's space
architecture study submitted to NASA. The Space Taxi would be a
reusable vehicle launched atop an expendable vehicle like the Delta 4
Heavy, Atlas 5, or Ariane 5, capable of carrying 7 people into orbit.
Universal Space Lines is also designing its own RLV, Space
Clipper, according to Jess Sponable. The Space Clipper Experimental
(SC-X) would be a vertical take-off and landing vehicle designed to
test RLV technologies for future systems, he said. It would
eventually become the second stage of a two-stage system, perhaps
with USL's Intrepid expendable booster also in development. Sponable
said the SC-X would make test flights from White Sands as early as
2003, funding permitting.
Bob Conger of Microcosm outlined his company's Scorpius
series of launch vehicles, starting with the SR-S suborbital rocket,
which flew for the first time in January. The SR-S is the first in a
series of vehicles that will eventually build up to the Sprite
"mini-lift" vehicle and the Exodus medium-lift, capable of placing up
to 6,800 kg (15,000 lbs.) into LEO for $10 million. While Scorpius'
vehicles are expendable, Conger said the company is also looking at
reusables.
The potentially-lucrative sounding rocket market is the
target of TGV-Rockets, according to Pat Bahn. TGV is developing the
Modular Incremental Compact High Energy Low-cost Launch Experiment
(MICHELLE), a reusable suborbital launch vehicle that is designed to
provide more microgravity time for payloads under less stressful
conditions than current sounding rockets. The vehicle would fly a
crew of three and 1000 kg (2,200 lbs.) of payload to altitudes of 100
km (62 mi.) and speeds of Mach 3.
Bahn noted that the market for sounding rockets currently is
small -- about $100 million a year -- but other markets, from
military flights to ISS experimental qualification flights, combined
with the efficiencies gained by using an RLV with lower operating
costs, would result in a much larger market. "Small markets add up,"
Bahn noted. The company needs about $50 million to build the
vehicle, Bahn said.
The Role of Government
The role government can and should play to promote cheap
access to space was also discussed at the conference. Three such
roles were discussed: developing X-vehicles to test new concepts,
regulations to make RLV flights possible, and legislation to
financially support RLV development.
Carl Meade of Lockheed Martin discussed the status of the
X-33. He acknowledged that the project has had problems with the
X-33's engine and hydrogen fuel tank that have pushed back the date
of the first flight until mid-2000. However, such problems should be
expected from X-vehicles, pointing to a chart which color-coded
technologies used in the vehicle green, yellow, or red based on how
ready for flight those technologies are. "All X-vehicles are
yellow," Meade said.
The Air Force and NASA will be cooperating on development of
technologies for a "space maneuver vehicle" (SMV), a small reusable
spacecraft that would be the upper stage of a launch vehicle capable
of going into orbit. The Air Force has already been working on the
X-40, a prototype of which made a successful drop test in August from
Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico. More X-40 drop tests are
planned this fall from B-52s, according to the Air Force's Terry
Phillips.
The Air Force will also get involved with the X-37, a similar
vehicle that is one of the first of NASA's Future-X projects. NASA
and Boeing are working on a cooperative cost-sharing agreement to
develop the X-37. Robert Armstrong of NASA's Marshall Space Flight
center said NASA will conduct atmospheric flight tests of the X-37
before a shuttle flight as early as November 2001 where an X-37 is
carried into orbit and deployed so it can return to Earth.
The Air Force would contribute funding to the X-37 to conduct
tests that would make the X-37, already similar to the Air Force's
proposed SMV, more like it. This would include funding to test solar
arrays, attitude control systems, and sensors. Armstrong said,
though, that potential applications are not driving the design of the
X-37; rather, the vehicle is testing technologies that might be used
in future reusable launch vehicles.
However, tests of technology are not the only purposes
X-vehicles need to serve, USL's Sponable said. Work also needs to be
done to test the operational aspects of vehicles to prove,
particularly to potential investors, that they can provide routine,
low-cost access. A House authorization bill for NASA currently in
the works includes $160 million over three years for such "X-ops"
tests, although Sponable said that the first generation of RLVs will
"live or die" before those tests can be carried out.
Regulation of future RLV launches is also an issue, something
that was addressed by Manuel Vega of the FAA. The FAA released days
before the conference proposed regulations for licensing the reentry
of RLVs. The public comment period on those regulations has begun,
and Vega encourages the industry to provide feedback on the
regulations before the comment period ends July 21.
Government loan guarantees, as proposed in legislation by
Senator John Breaux, also were discussed. The guarantees are almost
universally opposed by launch vehicle companies outside of Lockheed
Martin. One exception, though, is Space Access LLC. Steve Wurst
noted that 20 percent of the loan guarantees would be set aside for
small businesses, which could be beneficial for companies like his.
Tim Pleasant, a lawyer and professor at the University of
Phoenix, pointed out a major downside to companies that accept loan
guarantees. If the company defaults, the government can step in and
claim all the assets of the company, including the RLVs themselves,
and then resell or operate them itself. The bill, he concluded, is
"nobly intended but poorly carried out."
It may be a moot point in the end, though, since the bill is
unlikely to leave the Senate's commerce committee. Tim Kyger and
Henry Vanderbilt noted that the chairman of the committee, John
McCain, is running for President and is paying less time to committee
affairs. Since no one else on the committee appears to care about
the bill, it is unlikely to be considered.
Despite the problems and uncertainty in the market,
conference attendees are still very optimistic about the future, in
part because of the tremendous potential for new markets if low-cost
space access can be realized, including those not yet even
conceivable. Trying to explain that future in space, noted Max
Hunter, would be like "trying to explain Hollywood to Queen
Isabella."
--
Jeff Foust is editor of SpaceViews.
*** Letters ***
The Case for Privatization
[Editor's Note: Letters can be sent to letters@spaceviews.com.]
I beg to differ with Dian Hardison's viewpoint from the April
22 letters column (http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/04/letters3.html).
Since its 1991 peak, the space shuttle budget has dropped 29%, in
part because of the increasing responsibility that NASA has allowed
its contractor team (AW&ST, 4/26/99, p. L5). Over that same period,
the shuttle has also flown a higher sustained flight rate than at any
time in its history. The recent drop in flight rate is due to
critical payloads, ISS and Chandra, not being ready on time, not to
any problems with the space shuttle.
Further privatization will result in more savings by
eliminating dual chains of management that create a "one man serving
two masters" syndrome at the worker-bee level, and by rewarding
results instead of effort on the part of the contractor. This is not
just a good deal for the taxpayers: it is vital to allow NASA to
refocus its energies on the exploration of the moon and Mars instead
of routine LEO operations. The government has made it fairly clear
that NASA's human spaceflight budget will not be increasing any time
soon. Therefore, the funding for any lunar/Mars efforts must come
from savings in the shuttle/ISS budget. Both programs will have to
operate leaner than they have ever done before. Based on past
performance, partial or total privatization of both programs is the
most promising means to this end.
Jorge Frank
========
This has been the May 8, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
SpaceViews is also available on the World Wide web from the
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From VM Fri May 14 11:22:48 1999
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["259" "Friday" "14" "May" "1999" "12:08:02" "-0700" "bfranchuk" "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" nil "7" "starship-design: planetary maps." "^From:" nil nil "5" nil nil nil nil nil]
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To: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: planetary maps.
Date: Fri, 14 May 1999 12:08:02 -0700
While not nuts and bolts of interplantary craft,
here is a few maps that can be used as backgrounds for
when you raytrace your favorite space design.
Also the other worlds look interesting.
http://www.lancs.ac.uk/postgrad/thomasc1/render/maps.htm#index
Ben.
From VM Sat May 15 14:17:30 1999
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To: guzjan@stud.uni-frankfurt.de, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Cool Page
Date: Sat, 15 May 1999 16:52:10 EDT
>Cool Page!
> But no Update in 3 Years (!). What happenend, is the
> LIT dead?
> Greetings
> Aleks Guzijan
Hi,
Glad you like it. Its not dead, but no real big ideas in the last couple
years, and no ones done any work on the site. A couple guys are thinking of
cleaning it up a bit, but no results yet.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 82 (fwd)
Date: Sat, 15 May 1999 17:00:38 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu [mailto:listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu] On
Behalf Of Chris W. Johnson
Sent: Friday, May 14, 1999 11:40 AM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 82 (fwd)
Date: Thu, 13 May 1999 20:10:36 -0400 (EDT)
From: Donald L Doughty <spacelst@world.std.com>
To: DC-X <delta-clipper@world.std.com>
Subject: Space Access Update #82 5/12/99
Reply-To: delta-clipper@world.std.com
Space Access Update #82 5/12/99
Copyright 1999 by Space Access Society
__________________________________________________________________
Just some quick notes this issue...
- Branson Tours Rotary Rocket's Mojave Facility
- Political Followup - Senate and House NASA Authorizations
- SA'99 New Site & Schedule Succeed, Space Access'00 Planned For
April 27-29 2000
__________________________________________________________________
This just in: Richard Branson today toured Rotary Rocket Company's
Mojave manufacturing and test facility. Branson, an airline
executive/owner (Virgin Atlantic Airways) and sportsman/adventurer
(several around-the-world balloon flight attempts) recently
announced he plans a space tourism company (Virgin Galactic
Spaceways) once suitable transports are available, and went on to
mention Rotary Rocket's Roton as the closest to being ready of those
looked into. This touched off a flurry of rumors about a Branson
investment in Rotary, but Rotary representatives have been careful
not to confirm or deny any such negotiations are underway.
(Rotary's Gary Hudson did confirm at our recent Space Access'99
conference that to date his company has raised $30 million of the
$150 million their development plans call for.)
It seems a pretty safe bet under the circumstances that Rotary is in
fact negotiating with Branson over an investment, and that this will
likely be public knowledge soon - a crew from CBS was in evidence
today in Mojave.
________________________________________________________________________
Meanwhile, back at the Congress, a progress report on the political
alerts we've put out recently. The Senate Commerce Committee marked
up their NASA Authorization on schedule last week; the most
noteworthy change was addition of $150 million "for future planning
(space launch)" in FY'00. We expected something like this and can't
take credit - it looks likely to be for "Spaceliner 100"; we hope to
convince key Senators to support our low-cost rocket ops demontrator
program in addition to/instead of this. Your contacts were a step
forward in this effort.
The House Science Committee postponed their NASA Authorization
markup for a week, to tomorrow, Thursday May 13th, to give them more
time to work on various issues. If you haven't yet contacted your
member of the Committee (assuming you have one) tomorrow morning is
the final deadline for this markup. We're cautiously optimistic
about some additional "Future-X" money here plus some language
favorable to low-cost ops demos and the entrepreneurial startups.
The Authorizations markups were the warmup, mind. Now comes the
main event, the NASA Appropriations markups, where the actual money
is allocated. We'll likely be asking for all-out efforts on these
in the next week or two - stay tuned.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access'99 went well, from an organizational point of view.
Attendance was down slightly from last year, about what we expected
given the late start we got after losing our old hotel. The new
hotel worked out well, though - more modern and comfortable than the
old Safari Resort, with a very helpful and friendly staff and a nice
restaurant. The local shopping and restaurants aren't quite as
upscale as in downtown Scottsdale, but they're close by, they're
decent, and the neighborhood is very relaxed and suburban. Our
experiment with a Thursday evening - Saturday night schedule went
extremely well, with much less airline-schedule-induced attendance
dropoff late in the conference than under the old Friday-Sunday
setup - we'll be doing Thursday-Saturday next year too. We're
looking at April 27-29 2000 now - it was pointed out to us that the
previous weekend is Easter next year, and we try to avoid conflicts
with organizations larger than us. We are talking to the same hotel
again about a contract for that weekend; we hope to have the site
and date for next year pinned down ASAP.
More on the full program another time - for now, we'll just say that
we've finally seen video of laser propulsion actually working, after
twenty years of viewgraphs. Time flies when you're having fun...
To everybody who made SA'99 a success - thanks!
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society's sole purpose is to promote near-term radical
reductions in the cost of reaching space. You may redistribute this
Update in any medium you choose, as long as you do it unedited and
in its entirety.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society
http://www.space-access.org
space.access@space-access.org
"Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere in the Solar System"
- Robert Anson Heinlein
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Subject: starship-design: SETI
Date: Sat, 15 May 1999 17:28:51 -0700 (PDT)
This is interesting. The software for SETI@home is availiable. Check out
<http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/>
Best Regards
Nels Lindberg
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 May 15
Date: Sun, 16 May 1999 14:53:49 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-spaceviews@wayback.com [mailto:owner-spaceviews@wayback.com]
On Behalf Of jeff@spaceviews.com
Sent: Saturday, May 15, 1999 1:09 PM
Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 May 15
[ SpaceViews (tm) newsletter ]
[ see end of message for our NEW address to subscribe / unsubscribe ]
S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.05.15
1999 May 15
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/0515/
*** News ***
Hail Damage Delays Shuttle Mission
House Committee Cuts Triana in NASA Authorization Bill
Software Problems May Have Caused Titan 4 Centaur Failure
ESA Approves Budget
Rainwater Leak Delays Delta GPS Launch
Long March Launches Two Satellites
Amateurs Plan Space Launch
Students Take On Mars Mission Planning
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** Articles ***
Bakersfield Hosts California Space Summit
*** Book Reviews ***
Fly Me to the Moon: Lost in Space with the Mercury Generation
*** News ***
Hail Damage Delays Shuttle Mission
The first shuttle mission in nearly half a year will be
delayed by another week to ten days to repair damage to the shuttle's
external tank from a recent hailstorm, NASA announced late Thursday,
May 13.
Insulation on the external tank mated to shuttle Discovery,
scheduled for a May 20 launch on mission STS-96, suffered damage
during a hailstorm last week. An estimated 150 divots were found in
the insulation during an inspection after the storm.
Shuttle officials had hoped that the divots could be repaired
on the launch pad, but found that some were inaccessible from the
pad, requiring that the whole shuttle stack be rolled back to the
vehicle assembly building (VAB) so workers can access the entire
tank.
The divots themselves pose no risk to the shuttle, since
their relatively small size -- an average diameter of 1.25 cm (0.5
in.) and a depth of no more than 0.9 cm (0.34 in.) deep -- does not
penetrate all the way through the insulation to the metal of the tank
itself.
However, shuttle managers are concerned that ice could form
in the divots once the tanks are filled with liquid oxygen and
hydrogen. Chunks of ice could then shake loose from the divots
during launch, striking and damaging the shuttle orbiter.
The earliest date for the rollback is early Sunday morning,
May 16, since Discovery needs to be prepared for the rollback and
room made in the VAB for the shuttle. Once there, repairs should
take 2-3 days, allowing the shuttle to roll back to the pad by the
middle of the week.
If this schedule can be carried out, the launch would be
delayed by one week, with an estimated launch time of 6:48 am EDT
(1048 UT) May 27. If more time is needed to fix the divots, however,
the launch could be pushed back an extra several days.
STS-96 will be the first logistics and resupply mission for
the currently-uninhabited International Space Station. A
seven-person crew led by commander Kent Rominger will bring two tons
of supplies to the station. Two astronauts will also perform a
spacewalk to attach American and Russian cranes to the exterior of
the station to transport cargo and equipment.
The flight will be the first shuttle mission since December,
when the shuttle Endeavour brought the Unity docking module into
orbit and attached it to the previously-launched Zarya command
module. The gap between missions is the longest downtime in the
shuttle program since the Challenger accident.
The rollback from the launch pad to the VAB will be the 13th
in the history of the shuttle program and the first since September
1996, when shuttle Atlantis was rolled back as a precaution because
of the threat of a hurricane. The last time a shuttle was rolled
back for repairs was in June 1995, when Discovery was rolled back to
repair holes in the external tank's insulation caused by woodpeckers.
House Committee Cuts Triana in NASA Authorization Bill
The House Science Committee approved a three-year
authorization bill for NASA in a Thursday, May 13 hearing, including
passing a politically-charged amendment to cut funding for the Triana
Earth-observing program.
H.R. 1654, which increases NASA's budget by 1% over the
President's original request, also prohibits the space agency from
spending money on TransHab, an inflatable module considered as a
potential replacement for the space station's habitation module and
future Mars missions.
The focus of the debate on the legislation, though, was on an
amendment offered by Reps. Dave Weldon (R-FL) and George Nethercutt
(R-WA) to cut funding for the Triana mission and move $32.6 million
allocated to it in the 2000 budget to life and microgravity sciences.
The mission, proposed by Vice President Al Gore last year,
will return high-resolution images from the Earth-Sun L1 point 1.5
million km (900,000 miles) from Earth, and also study the Sun. The
program has been attacked by Republicans for its perceived failure to
follow scientific peer-review guidelines in favor of political
expediency.
In the hearing, Weldon suggested that the program was being
forced upon NASA by Gore as a way to support Gore's 2000 presidential
campaign. "Maybe NASA can't stand up to the White House," he said,
"but Congress certainly can."
Democrats strongly rejected claims that Triana was designed
to politically support the Vice President. "Somehow I don't think
the Vice President needs to rely on a little remote sensing satellite
to get elected," said Rep. Bart Gordon (D-TN).
Gordon also told the committee that he spoke with NASA
administrator Dan Goldin, who said he would recommend to President
Clinton that the authorization bill be vetoed if funding for Triana
was not included.
"I can't believe... the administration is willing to sink an
entire NASA authorization bill," said committee chairman Rep. James
Sensenbrenner (R-WI). "Their priorities are completely mixed up."
The amendment was approved by a 21-18 vote that fell along
party lines, while the overall authorization bill was approved by a
27-13 vote.
The bill authorizes $13.625 billion in funding for NASA in
fiscal year 2000, a figure that rises to $13.839 billion in 2002.
This represents increase of approximately one percent over the
original NASA budget proposed by President Clinton in February.
The bill includes increases in funding for several projects,
including a $7-million increase for near-Earth object studies (to $10
million a year), and a $12-million line item for space solar power
studies. The bill also includes nearly $300 million over the next
three years for advanced space transportation technology.
The authorization also sets down definitions for
commercialization versus privatization in NASA programs and requires
NASA to conduct a study of various space shuttle upgrades as well as
potential uses for the shuttle's external tank in orbit.
However, H.R. 1654 includes a provision to prevent NASA from
spending money on TransHab, a proposed inflatable habitation module.
TransHab was originally designed for use on potential future human
Mars missions, but has more recently been considered as a replacement
for the habitation module under development for the International
Space Station.
In a statement issued after passage of the authorization
bill, Sensenbrenner said the TransHab provision was added as a
cost-saving measure to keep ISS costs down.
The committee's approval of the authorization bill is only an
early step in the budget process. The bill must be approved by the
full House and reconciled with the Senate's version, which passed
through the Commerce, Science, and Transportation committee May 5
with no amendment to cut Triana. Moreover, appropriations bills
which actually fund the space agency have yet to be considered.
Software Problems May Have Caused Titan 4 Centaur Failure
Corrupted software may have been the cause of the April 30
failure of the Centaur upper stage on a Titan 4B booster, Aviation
Week and Space Technology reports.
In an article published in their Monday, May 10 issue, the
magazine says that software uploaded into the control system for the
Centaur upper stage malfunctioned, causing the stage to misfire and
place its payload, a Milstar military communications satellite into
the wrong orbit.
Problems with the Centaur began about nine minutes after
launch, during the first of three Centaur burns, when the Centaur
went off course. The software may have also caused two later
misfirings of the centaur and the premature deployment of the Milstar
satellite.
If correct, the failure suggests quality control problems at
Lockheed Martin Astronautics, the division of the firm that built the
Centaur upper stage. Less than a week earlier, a Lockheed Martin
Athena 2 booster failed to place the Ikonos 1 satellite into orbit
when the payload fairing did not separate, making the upper stage too
heavy to reach orbital velocity.
The software problem also means the failure is likely
unrelated to the failure four days later of a Delta 3 upper stage to
place the Orion 3 satellite into the proper orbit. That launch
failed when the second stage of the Delta 3 did not make the second
of two planned burns.
Both the Centaur and the Delta 3 upper stage use versions of
the RL-10 rocket engine built by Pratt and Whitney. However, the
boosters themselves are different enough that they likely use
different software for their control systems.
ESA Approves Budget
European space ministers approved a multiyear budget for the
European Space Agency (ESA) this week that includes funding for Earth
and space science, improvements to the Ariane 5, and a competitor to
GPS.
The ministers from ESA's member nations approved a budget of
2.1 billion euros (US$2.25 billion) for the period 1999-2002. This
amount, ESA officials said, is sufficient for it to carry out its
planned scientific programs, including the Mars Express mission in
2003.
The budget also included an emphasis in new projects for the
space agency. Ministers budgeted 593 million euros (US$635 million)
through 2001 for its new "Living Earth" program of Earth studies from
space.
"The agreement to embark on the Living Planet Program is the
first step towards providing an assured long-term program of research
which looks at the Earth and its environment from space," said UK
space minister Lord Sainsbury, who was elected chairman of the ESA
Ministerial Council. "We are putting Earth sciences on a more equal
footing with ESA's traditional strengths in scientific research."
Ministers also agreed to spend 58.4 million euros (US$62.5
million) through 2001 on a definition study of the proposed "Galileo"
navigation satellite project. This system of navigation satellites
would serve the same role as American GPS satellites, but is looked
upon more favorably by European nations since Galileo would not be
controlled by the American military, unlike GPS.
Upgrades to the Ariane 5 booster were also included in the
budget. ESA will spend 533 million euros (US$570 million) until 2001
on the Ariane-5 Plus program to improve the performance of the
heavy-lift booster. An additional 54 million euros (US$57.8 million)
will be spent on studies of future launch systems.
The budget agreement is the last financial hurdle for the
Mars Express project, ESA's first mission to Mars. The project had
been threatened by stringent science funding for ESA that threatened
either to squeeze out funding for the 150-million euro (US$160
million) project, or delay or cancel other ESA programs to support
the mission.
The project still needs funding, through, for the Beagle 2
rover that will fly on the Mars Express lander. The British
government has made no announcement whether it will fund the
25-million pound (US$40.5 million) rover. Colin Pillinger, lead
scientist for the mission at Britain's Open University, told the BBC
he is optimistic finding can be found for the rover by summer.
Rainwater Leak Delays Delta GPS Launch
A leak of rainwater into a Global Positioning System (GPS)
satellite atop a Delta 2 rocket has delayed its launch for at least
eight days, Air Force officials announced Monday, May 10.
A Delta 2 was scheduled to launch on the evening of Saturday,
May 15, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying the Navstar 2R-3 GPS
satellite into orbit.
Technicians were working on the satellite in a clean room
that is part of the launch tower at Pad 17A. The technicians were
forced to leave the clean room when a heavy thunderstorm hit the
launch site on the afternoon of Saturday, May 8. When they returned,
they found that rainwater had leaked into the clean room, and
moisture was found on the satellite.
How rainwater managed to leak into the clean room is under
investigation. The Air Force has decided to move the satellite back
to a processing facility at the launch site to assess any damage done
to it by the rain. Even if no damage is done to the satellite, the
process of moving the satellite from and back to the launch site
would delay the launch a minimum of eight days.
The Delta 2 had recently been given a green light by
investigators looking into the cause of the failure of a Delta 3
launch May 4. Investigators determined late last week that the
problems that caused the Delta 3 to strand the Orion 3 satellite into
a useless low orbit were not common to the Delta 2, which uses a
different upper stage.
Long March Launches Two Satellites
A new variant of China's Long March booster launched weather
and science satellites early Monday, May 10.
A Long March 4B lifted off at 9:33 pm EDT Sunday, May 9 (0133
UT May 10) from the Taiyuan in eastern China. There were no problems
with the launch, Chinese officials reported, and both satellites were
successfully placed in polar orbit.
The Long March carried into orbit the Feng Yun ("Wind and
Cloud") 1C weather satellite. The satellite began to return images
and data within a day of launch. The rocket also launched the Shi
Jian ("Practice") 5 scientific satellite.
The launch was the first for the Long March 4B, a variant of
the Long March 4A (CZ-4A). Little is known specifically about the
4B, but it is thought to be substantially similar to the CZ-4A, a
three-stage booster that uses nitrogen tetraoxide and unsymmetrical
dimethyl hydrazine propellants. It can place up to 1,500 kg (3,300
lbs.) into polar orbit.
The launch was the first for a Chinese booster this year. A
Long March 2C/SD is planned to launch two replacement Iridium
satellites some time next month.
Amateurs Plan Space Launch
A group of amateur rocketeers plan to launch later this month
a rocket which, if successful, will be the first amateur booster to
fly into space.
JP Aerospace, a California-based amateur organization, plans
to launch a rocket from a balloon the weekend of May 22-23 which they
believe should reach an altitude of at least 100 km (60 miles), high
enough to pass internationally-accepted boundaries marking the
beginning of space.
The rocket, christened "Spirit of Freedom 7" in honor of the
late Alan Shepard, the first American to fly into space, will be
carried aloft by a cluster of 10 helium-filled weather balloons to an
altitude of approximately 30,000 meters (100,000 feet.) Liftoff will
take place from the Black Rock Desert in northwestern Nevada.
At that point, about ninety minutes after leaving the ground,
the rocket separates from the balloons and ignites its engine. The
motor burns for five seconds, accelerating the rocket to Mach 3.7.
The rocket then coasts to a peak of altitude of about 100 km (60
miles) before deploying a parachute and slowly descending to Earth.
The rocket itself is 2.23 meters (88 inches) long and 7.5 cm
(3 inches) in diameter, and weighs 7.7 kg (17 lbs.), of which a
little over half is taken up by the motor.
The launch attempt is the cumulation of several years of work
by the amateur group, who has tested various versions of the rocket
and balloon system since 1993. A previous attempt at a space launch
in September 1998 was aborted when a tether snapped minutes before
balloon liftoff.
This is not the first attempt by an amateur group -- one not
funded by a corporation or government agency -- to launch a rocket
into orbit. The High-Altitude Lift-Off (HALO) project, by HAL-5, the
Huntsville, Alabama chapter of the National Space Society, developed
a similar "rockoon" system, although with a different type of rocket.
A May 1997 launch by Project HALO sent a rocket to an
altitude of approximately 65 km (40 mi.), despite a premature rupture
of the balloon. However, an attempt to launch a rocket into space in
June 1998 failed when a tether snagged on the rocket as the balloon
lifted off from a barge in the Gulf of Mexico, knocking the rocket
out of launch cradle and onto the deck of the barge. Additional
attempts have been stymied by a lack of money.
While these amateur efforts are typically attempted to prove
it can be done, there may be money for a future success. The Space
Frontier Foundation is sponsoring the Cheap Access To Space (CATS)
Prize, which will award $250,000 to the first amateur rocket to
launch a 2-kg (4.4-lb.) payload to an altitude of at least 200 km
(120 mi.) by November 8, 2000.
Students Take On Mars Mission Planning
Once strictly the province of NASA experts, students are
becoming increasingly involved with the development of credible,
innovative proposals for human missions to Mars, as the efforts of
two recent groups show.
While a team of California Institute of Technology students,
affiliated with the Mars Society, develops a new proposal for sending
humans to the Red Planet, a group at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology and Harvard University is putting together a business plan
to finance such a mission.
Caltech's Mars Society Mission, unveiled in public
presentations earlier this month, is a mission architecture that
strikes a compromise between NASA's existing Design Reference Mission
and the Mars Direct proposal developed and advocated by Mars Society
founder Robert Zubrin.
Under the Caltech proposal, two spacecraft would be launched
in the 2011 launch window, using a new heavy-lift booster named
Qahira (Arabic for "Mars"), based on Boeing's Delta IV. One would
carry an Earth-return vehicle that would be parked in orbit around
Mars, while the other, nearly identical vehicle would land on the
surface and start generating propellant for a future trip into Mars
orbit.
In early 2014 two more launches would take place: one of a
spare Mars ascent/Earth return vehicle, and a separate crew habitat
vehicle that would take five people to Mars and land them on the
surface on May 25, 2014. After spending over 600 days on the
surface, the crew would return to Mars orbit using the fueled-up
ascent vehicle, and then rendezvous with the Earth return vehicle in
Mars orbit for the trip home.
The mission proposal takes a middle path between the Mars
Direct mission and its four-person crew and the NASA plans, which
call for a six-person crew. "The Mars Society Mission fixes the
problems with these plans by avoiding over-optimistic assumptions and
politically sensitive technologies, such as nuclear thermal
rocketry," said team member Nathan Brown. In addition, the team
says, built in redundancy makes their proposal safer for the crew
than previous plans.
While the Caltech group develops a new way to send people to
Mars, a group of students at MIT and Harvard are coming up with new
ways to pay for the mission. The "Think Mars" project is an effort
to develop a business plan that would find private funding for a Mars
mission.
Using the NASA reference mission model as the basis for the
mission, the team is exploring a number of avenues to fund the
estimated $50 billion mission. Those plans range from Olympic-style
sponsorships to the sale of television and Internet rights of mission
broadcasts.
The business plan was originally developed as part of a
NASA-sponsored competition to develop such plans. After being
selected as one of six finalists, the Think Mars team decided to take
their efforts even further, and have enlisted new members from
outside MIT and Harvard to develop the plan into a viable business.
"The pool of people who can join is literally anyone who has
access to the Internet," noted Think Mars co-founder Justin
Talbot-Stern.
Think Mars submitted its business plan to MIT's "$50K"
Entrepreneurship Competition, a contest that has helped start a
number of new high technology businesses. The plan was selected as
one of 39 semifinalists, alongside biotech and Internet startups.
The team plans to present its plan to NASA officials in May
at a final meeting with other schools participating. However, the
project plans to continue, with Congressional outreach meetings
planned for the summer and an educational "Mars Week" to be held at
MIT in October.
SpaceViews Event Horizon
May 18 Pegasus XL launch of the TERRIERS and MUBLCOM
satellites, staged from Vandenberg Air Force Base,
California, at 1:05 am EDT (0505 UT).
May 20 Proton launch of the Nimiq-1 comsat from Baikonur,
Kazakhastan.
May 23 (NET) Delta 2 launch of Navstar 2R-3 GPS satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
May 27 (NET) Launch of the space shuttle Discovery on mission
STS-96 from Kennedy Space Center, Florida.
May 27-31 International Space Development Conference, Houston,
Texas
May TBD Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
June 7 Long March 2C/SD launch of two Iridium satellites
from Taiyuan, China
June 23-24 First U.S. Space Tourism Conference, Washington, DC
June TBD Titan 4B launch of the Lacrosse F4 satellite from
Vandenberg Air Force Base, California (under review)
NET = Not Earlier Than
Other News
ISS Costs Rise: Russian contingency planning and overruns by the
prime contractor are driving up the costs of the International Space
Station, the General Accounting Office reports. In recently-released
testimony from a Senate hearing last month, GAO associate director
Allen Li said NASA will have to spend an additional $1.2 billion in
Russian contingency planning, including the development of a
propulsion module should Russia be unable to build Progress
spacecraft to reboost the station. Li also said Boeing's cost
overrun on the space station prime contract is now nearly $1 billion,
up from $783 million last June. The GAO is also concerned about a
lack of shielding for orbital debris on the Russian service module,
Li said, noting that is the module is depressurized by a collision
the entire station might have to be evacuated.
Spacecraft Ready for Y2K: NASA, military, and commercial spacecraft
should not suffer problems from the "Y2K bug" on January 1, a panel
of experts told a House committee May 12. All of NASA's
mission-critical systems, except for the SOHO spacecraft, are
Y2K-compliant already, and SOHO and other non-critical systems will
be compliant in a few months. The only problems may stem from older
commercial GPS receivers, which may not be able to deal with both Y2K
and a "week number rollover" August 21, when the week number, used by
GPS to keep track of time, rolls over from 1,023 to 0. GPS
satellites and ground stations will be unaffected by the rollover,
panelists said.
Jupiter's Supersonic Winds: Astronomers have found evidence that
winds at Jupiter's poles reach speeds of 10,000 km/h (6,000 mph),
according to a paper published in the May 13 issue of Nature. The
winds are driven by Jupiter's aurorae, which in turn come from an
interaction with the planet's powerful magnetic field. Friction
between the fast "auroral electrojet" and slower winds may explain
why Jupiter's upper atmosphere is much warmer than can be explained
by solar heating alone.
Brown Dwarf Weather: Australian astronomers have found evidence that
brown dwarfs -- objects more massive than planets but too small to
become stars -- may have clouds and weather patterns like planets.
Astronomers found variations in the brightness of one brown dwarf at
a wavelength of light associated with titanium oxide, a compound
linked in theory with cloud formation at the 2000-degree temperatures
found in brown dwarfs. The astronomers plan to look at other brown
dwarfs to see if they also exhibit weather patterns.
Space Imaging Plans: Space Imaging plans to launch its Ikonos-2
satellite -- a twin to the Ikonos-1 high-resolution Earth-imaging
satellite that failed to reach orbit last month -- as soon as July, a
company official said this week. Mark Brender, director of
Washington operations for the company, said engineers believe a wire
failed to transmit a signal to trigger explosive bolts on the payload
fairing of the Athena II rocket during its April 27 launch, keeping
the nose cone in place, which in turn kept the payload too massive
from reaching orbit. Brender said the company could launch Ikonos-2,
which was already completed prior to the launch of Ikonos-1, as soon
as July 20.
Briefly: You've got satellites? America Online (AOL) may invest $1
billion in Hughes' Spaceway system of communications satellites
designed to deliver high-speed data, Reuters reported May 14. AOL is
reportedly interested in getting high-speed access to homes by means
other than cable, where deals by AT&T, Microsoft, and others have
locked AOL out. Someone should remind AOL's Steve Case that for a
little bit more, he could invest in a launch company to cheaply
deliver such satellites... China is planning a test flight of a
spacecraft that could carry humans into space as early as October,
the BBC reported. The flight of the "Project 921" capsule, based on
the Russian Soyuz, would coincide with 50th anniversary celebrations
of the People's Republic. If successful, a human spaceflight would
shortly follow... AeroAstro has won a contract to build what it bills
as the first commercial interplanetary spacecraft. The "Encounter
2001" spacecraft will fly as a secondary payload on an Ariane 5 in
late 2001 and swingby Jupiter on its way out of the solar system.
The spacecraft will carry photos, messages, and DNA samples from
thousands of customers... Remember all those missions that carry
CD-ROM's filled with names, photos, and the like? Salon Magazine
notes that the harsh radiation environment in places like the surface
of Mars would destroy the CD in a matter of days. A radiation-proof
case is possible, but unaffordable by projects like the Mars 2001
lander. At least, the magazine notes, you don't have to worry about
your name getting put on a hit list when the Martians invade...
*** Articles ***
Bakersfield Hosts California Space Summit
by Neil E. Michaels
Bakersfield, California has long had an image as a home as a
nondescript city in the southern end of the San Juaquin Valley, home
to agriculture, oil workers, country music, and little else. Yet, to
those who live and work there -- and who move away only to come back
-- Bakersfield is the "center of the universe".
There are a growing number of people and businesses, though,
who would like to make Bakersfield and the surrounding region of Kern
County, which includes Edwards Air Force Base, more of a center of
the commercial space universe. Against this backdrop, the California
Space Development Council (CSDC) -- composed of representatives from
the various California chapters of the National Space Society --
rolled into Kern County on May 1 for a weekend "Space Summit" at
California State University Bakersfield.
Hosted by the National Space Society's Western Spaceport
Chapter, the event drew space buffs from around the state to discuss
the latest technology and spread the word about the future of space
travel to the media, local political leaders and the general public
at large. Over 60 participants came from as far south as San Diego
and Orange County, to as far north as Sacramento and the Bay area;
from Santa Maria to the west and Mojave/Lancaster/Palmdale in the
east.
"There's no good reason why the human race has to stay locked
on the Earth forever," said Donald Johnson, CSDC Vice President of
events. CSDC has been working since the mid-80s to create a
space-friendly mindset among the general public, which Johnson called
the biggest challenge to creating extraterrestrial communities.
"It's not science fiction," Johnson said, "since the technology is
almost at hand."
X-34 Tug-of-War
A key speaker at the conference represented government and
aerospace: California state Senator and former X-15 test pilot
William "Pete" Knight. Knight's participation was the central point
to the Space Summit; it was an extension to two earlier events he had
hosted in the cities of Lancaster and Ridgecrest to address the
aerospace issues that are critically important to the economic growth
of California.
Knight used the talk to push for moving the planned test
flights later this year of NASA's X-34 from Holloman Air Force Base
in New Mexico to Edwards, where much of the X-34's early drop tests
have been held. Knight noted that Holloman can only support flights
to speeds of Mach 2 to 3, well below the X-34's designed limit of
Mach 8.
"It doesn't make any sense to have a test program with all
the elements based out here in California go somewhere else," Knight
emphatically stated. "There is no reason for it to go anywhere
else," Knight said. "This is where it is supposed to be."
Testing for the X-34 has been up in the air since March, when
Acting Secretary of the Air Force F. Whitten Peters expressed concern
that X-34 testing would interfere with operations at Holloman AFB in
New Mexico. NASA said it would move the testing to the Dryden Flight
Research Center at Edwards AFB, but that move has set off a political
tug-of-war between the New Mexico and California congressional
delegations.
Regional Commercial Space Efforts
Much of the conference was devoted to plans by regional
businesses to take advantage of the growing commercial space market,
from the development of new launch vehicles to services that would
take advantage of those launchers.
NSS member Randa Milliron from InterOrbital Systems and
TransLunar Research is one of the many start-ups taking root in Kern
County who are trying to make the rocket business work by making
their products more affordable. "We're going for cheap," Milliron
said. "Cheap, cheap, cheap."
Part of her company's plans call for launching a rocket,
appropriately called "Neptune" directly from the sea -- without the
expensive infrastructure currently being used by the multinational
Sea Launch project. The Neptune design is nothing more than a "Big
Dumb Booster" using off-the-shelf hardware to save costs, she said.
"The technology is proven," Milliron explained. "It draws directly
from the earlier work of rocket pioneer Bob Truax."
"Small businesses will be crucial to the effort," said John
Powell, president of JP Aerospace in Davis, CA. "It's going to be
the small, unknown group -- the people you haven't heard about yet."
Powell's amateur organization plans to launch the first-ever amateur
rocket into space from Black Rock, Nevada on May 22.
A "Good Houskeeping Seal" for RLVs?
Still other private enterprise rocket builders like Stephen
Wurst wants a kind of "Good Housekeeping Seal" of approval from the
Federal Aviation Administration for his spaceship and others like
it. "An FAA licensing standard for reusable launch vehicles could
provide the boost of credibility that serious start-up companies
need," said Wurst, president of Palmdale-based Space Access, LLC.
The space entrepreneur explained to attendees that he had
just returned that Saturday morning after spending the previous week
in Washington, D.C. at FAA headquarters going through the licensing
process as kind of a test case. "I'm totally impressed with their
objectivity and their enthusiasm in working with us," Wurst said of
the FAA.
The proposed process of FAA criteria would create certain
safety and reliability levels for RLV launches. "The result wouldn't
be a rating," Wurst stated, "but simply a thumbs up or thumbs down
response." But Wurst wants to take the process one step further. He
wants the government to be required to purchase some launches from
FAA-approved companies.
Wurst and others want the government to regulate and promote
but also allow the emerging private industry to spur new
development. With about a dozen start-up companies, Wurst feels
there is enough competition in the private sector. "They are not
going to drop a system like the space shuttle overnight," Wurst
stated, "But the government needs to let go."
"Let's say the space shuttle and us," Wurst said. "We're not
saying give us all the business -- but give us some portion of the
business.
Local Reaction
"The comments I heard and personally received from others
were highly favorable," exclaimed Jim Spellman, local director of the
NSS/Western Spaceport Chapter and CSDC President. "More than one
person was amazed at the turnout and interest shown by the local
general public. Although I can't vouch for the attendance figures at
Ridgecrest's Space Summit, I'm certain our "head count" was much
higher than the Space Summit I attended last March in Lancaster."
Seeing and touching actual hardware and learning how
interconnected the roles of various private aerospace companies based
in Kern County are helping to open up the space frontier seems to
make the dream of space travel for the average person that much
closer to becoming reality.
So how much longer will the dream take? "An optimist would
say 20 years," CSDC VP Donald Johnson said. "I don't know. I've
been involved with the movement for about 30 (years), since I was in
school."
"But it's coming."
--
Neil E. Michaels is a member of the NSS's Western Spaceport chapter.
For more information about the next CSDC meeting, August 7-8 in
Oakland, contact Jeanmarie Walker at jeanmariew@mindspring.com or go
to the CSDC website for schedule updates at:
http://home.earthlink.net/~cew/csdc/
*** Book Reviews ***
by Jeff Foust
Fly Me to the Moon
Fly Me to the Moon: Lost in Space with the Mercury Generation
by Bryan Ethier
McGregor Publishing, 1999
hardcover, 240 pp.
ISBN 0-9653846-5-9
US$23.95
Buy this book at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0965384659/spaceviews
The early days of NASA -- from the first Mercury flights
through the Apollo landing -- had a tremendous impact not only on the
national in general, but upon the children of the era, whose
impressions of space flight and exploration were molded by those
programs. Today, those children are now approaching middle-age, with
families of their own, and often wonder if their children will
experience and appreciate space in the same way. Bryan Ethier, a
writer who grew up in the 1960s, tells his and others' stories in
"Fly Me to the Moon: Lost in Space with the Mercury Generation."
Ethier's book is more than just a personal memoir of growing
up during NASA's heyday in the 1960s. He combines stories and
accounts from a wide range of people, from Mercury 7 astronauts like
John Glenn and the late Alan Shepard to others who grew up inspired
by the space program, including some who went on to become astronauts
and mission controllers.
The book is almost written in a stream-of-consciousness
style, mixing in the memories and stories from himself and others to
show how that early era of spaceflight shaped the lives of a whole
generation of people. Interwoven nostalgia is all Ethier needs to
make his book compelling, though.
This book is especially valuable because the "Mercury
Generation" is now in middle age. The next generation, the putative
"Generation X", has no recollection of Mercury or even Apollo --
their formative space memory is the Challenger accident, coloring
their perceptions of space accordingly. "Generation Y", the younger
successors to Generation X, are too young to even remember
Challenger, and have experienced no comparable event. A book like
"Fly Me to the Moon" can help rekindle those fond memories of the
past, and perhaps help instill a little of that vision into the next
generation.
[Editor's Note: Look for more book and Web site reviews in the May 22
issue.]
========
This has been the May 15, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
SpaceViews is also available on the World Wide web from the
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Subject: starship-design: PBS: Voyage to the milky way
Date: Thu, 20 May 1999 14:35:09 -0700
For all the people that missed the TV show on PBS yesterday, you can
view the web site and ask a question or two.
http://www.pbs.org/milkyway/
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Spaceinfo
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Some space links I thought you might find interesting.
One next generation launcher systems
http://msia02.msi.se/~lindsey/RLVCountdown.html
http://www.affordablespaceflight.com/nasa1.html
http://www.affordablespaceflight.com/home.html
http://www.reston.com/nasa/launch.html
On Space Access' specific design
http://www.wtn.org/crda/payloads.htm
http://www.spaceaccess.com/
New, more practical, partial skyhook like design
http://www.affordablespaceflight.com/howitworks.html
Great quotes
http://highways.net/affordablespaceflight/quotes.html
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Subject: starship-design: Billionaires Target Space Tourism
Date: Fri, 21 May 1999 23:17:13 EDT
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Billionaires Target Space Tourism
Two New Companies Add Reality to Space Future's Vision =20
Over the past few weeks, two self-made billionaire
businessmen have established companies with the
stated objective of playing roles in the commercial space
tourism industry that is becoming increasingly
widely recognized as the true future of space activities. =20
Virgin Galactic Airways has been established in Britain by
Richard Branson, the founder and chairman of
Virgin Atlantic Airways and other Virgin Group companies,
to provide space tourism services. Staff are
currently visiting companies working on reusable launch
vehicles - though they're downplaying
expectations that they will make any major moves soon.
Branson announced more than 2 years ago that
one day he hoped to offer space travel services - but only
after the race to perform the first
round-the-world balloon flight was over. True to his word,
he is now moving in that direction, and it will be
very interesting to follow the moves he makes in this new
field. =20
Bigelow Aerospace has been established in Las Vegas by
Robert Bigelow, the founder and president of
Budget Suites of America, a hotel and apartment chain in
the southern United States, and a group of
related companies. Based on its founder's expertise in
building and operating popular low-cost
accommodation on Earth, Bigelow Aerospace is planning to
"design, develop, assemble and market fully
equipped, modular habitats that can be deployed as safe,
financially viable space complexes". Thus it is
aiming to provide accommodation in space rather than
transportation services to carry guests between
Earth and space. Bigelow Aerospace is currently hiring
staff: advertisements have been placed in Space
News, Aviation Week and elsewhere. Like Virgin Galactic,
Bigelow Aerospace is playing down the idea
that it will make any dramatic moves soon. =20
The Power of Entrepreneurs =20
The emergence of Richard Branson and Robert Bigelow as
business champions in the new field of space
tourism fits Space Future's vision exactly. As recognition
of the enormous business potential in this area
grows, it is becoming attractive to successful
business-people with a taste for pioneering. =20
It is worth noting that self-made business-people have
much greater freedom to take new initiatives than
the heads of large publicly-held companies, whose
shareholders generally keep strong pressure on them
to keep to the areas in which they already have expertise.
(Some years ago Richard Branson even took
his company private after finding the influence of
institutional shareholders too constraining.) So the
arrival in 1999 of two experienced entrepreneurs with the
ability to invest hundreds of $millions to develop
space tourism without needing to seek approval from anyone
(except their families!) is very promising. =20
It will be extremely interesting to follow the moves these
companies make in future, decided with the aim
of making money from space tourism. If their leaders can
successfully apply their exceptional business
skills in this new arena of activity, the names of Bigelow
and Virgin will become as famous in future as
Cunard and Boeing are in older travel industries. =20
Space Future wishes both companies the greatest good
fortune. And we hope that their founders will be
as successful in offering space tourism services as they
have been to date in other areas of business. =20
See also "Billionaire Shops for Space Tourism Vehicle",
Space News, May 10, 1999, p 6. =20
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To: starship design <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: Clarke's Laws
Date: Sat, 22 May 1999 13:34:18 -0700 (PDT)
Hello All,
I have heard of Clarke's 2nd Law, "All sufficiently advanced
technology is indisitnguishable from magic", But i have always heard that
second-hand, usually in discussions about human ET relations. I was
wondering if anyone on the group knew what the title of clarke's original
essay/book having to do with the "laws" was.
Thanks,
Nels Lindberg
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To: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: X-33 Tank Delivered, Strength Questioned
Date: Wed, 26 May 1999 06:01:39 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu [mailto:listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu] On
Behalf Of Chris W. Johnson
Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 1999 10:42 PM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: X-33 Tank Delivered, Strength Questioned
Summary of "X-33 Tank Delivered, Strength Questioned" by Michael A. Dornheim
in Aviation Week & Space Technology, May 10, 1999, pp 68-69:
"Lockheed Martin has delivered [the right-hand] X-33 composite liquid
hydrogen tank to NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center for testing, showing
that the experimental rocket program is beginning to recover form a large
structural failure of a tank in December."
* Tests indicate that the right-hand "tank is weaker than expected, and
engineers are trying to calculate what, if any, strength margin remains."
* The left-hand liquid hydrogen tank was more extensively damaged during
the Dec. 23, 1998, autoclave cycle than previously thought. "Besides the
massive delamination of one of the four graphite/epoxy honeycomb tank
walls, another wall (lobe skin No. 4) sprung loose from the graphite/epoxy
frame that holds the walls and end domes together."
* Subsequent tests have shown that the bond between the tank wall's
honeycomb core and its face sheets is 25% weaker than expected under
tension. Shear strength is what's really important, however, and engineers
are still trying to reach useful conclusions about it. Directly testing it
would be destructive. It is believed that the minimum 1.25 safety factor
is still met, though.
* The tank (left-hand) "should be delivered to Marshall for tests by July
or August."
* Questions are being raised about X-33 performance. Intended to fly to
Mach 15, its ability to reach that speed is in doubt. T. Cleon Lacefield,
LockMart X-33 program manager, states that it should reach Mach 13,
at a minimum. That is still sufficient to test the vehicle's thermal
protection system. However, some engineers are reporting that X-33's top
speed will really be Mach 10, and that this has been known within the
project for some time. "Weight is the culprit. The weight at main engine
cutoff has risen to 83,900 lb. from the initial specification of 69,000
lb., a 20% growth. But Lacefield says people may be confused by an upper
limit of Mach 11 to stay within Michael AAF."
Chris W. Johnson | "Do we realize that industry,
| which has been our good servant,
chrisj@mail.utexas.edu | might make a poor master?"
http://gargravarr.cc.utexas.edu/ | --Aldo Leopold, 1925
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From: Steve VanDevender <stevev@efn.org>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: purported "warp-drive" breakthrough
Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 12:40:45 -0700 (PDT)
I can't believe I seem to be beating Kyle to posting this, but
one of the top stories on slashdot.org today concerns a paper
claiming that the energy requirements for an Alcubierre-style
"warp bubble" can be drastically reduced, particularly that the
negative energy required is now only on the order of grams
(still, assuming you can make negative energy at all).
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/gr-qc/9905084
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Reply-To: "Kyle R. Mcallister" <stk@sunherald.infi.net>
From: "Kyle R. Mcallister" <stk@sunherald.infi.net>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: purported "warp-drive" breakthrough
Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 16:45:10 -0700
Steve VanDevender wrote:
>
> I can't believe I seem to be beating Kyle to posting this,
Not a problem! I'm glad you heard about it. I've been too busy lately to
look for things like this. Thanks for reporting this.
Kyle R. Mcallister
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To: "Steve VanDevender" <stevev@efn.org>
Cc: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: RE: starship-design: purported "warp-drive" breakthrough
Date: Thu, 27 May 1999 18:48:38 -0500
Hmm,
I can't seem to get the pdf version to download and I don't have ghostscript
installed on my NT workstation. Does anybody have the full text in either
pdf or txt?
Lee Parker
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> [mailto:owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu]On Behalf Of Steve
> VanDevender
> Sent: Thursday, May 27, 1999 2:41 PM
> To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
> Subject: starship-design: purported "warp-drive" breakthrough
>
>
> I can't believe I seem to be beating Kyle to posting this, but
> one of the top stories on slashdot.org today concerns a paper
> claiming that the energy requirements for an Alcubierre-style
> "warp bubble" can be drastically reduced, particularly that the
> negative energy required is now only on the order of grams
> (still, assuming you can make negative energy at all).
>
http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/gr-qc/9905084
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Space news and our Russian partners
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To: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 17:09:24 +1000
Hi Group,
Alcubierre's original design was flawed by the size of the warp-bubble which
requires immense amounts of energy to create. Such bubbles have an energy E
~ R^2 / Lp , where Lp is the planck length [1.6 x 10^-35 m !], so for any
velocity V the total energy for his design was ~ -6.2 x 10^62 kg * v, which
is about 10^10 times the mass of the visible Universe for even just
lightspeed. So how to avoid such a HUGE energy bill? Make the geometry
different and fit your flat space [R ~ 200m] into a tiny warp bubble {tiny ~
2000 Lp}which is possible. Doctor Who's TARDIS couldn't do better. For the
same energy [milligrams] as the bubble slows down it gets larger, until you
can get out again, but the bubble walls become thinner than Lp very quickly,
so it's unclear whether it can be done. Planck's length is the limit of
space fuzz, as far as we know. Chris Van Den Broeck, the designer, is a bit
unclear and he's not too sure what process would produce enough negative
energy to make an Alcubierre warp, but he hopes that his proof of principle
study will inspire more brains to work on it.
So that's our challenge...
Adam
Is your God image an idol?
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Subject: starship-design: warp bubbles
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 08:46:58 -0600
If we can create a warp bubble will it have the same characteristics
as our unviverse. What will happen to all the heat from the space-ship
inside a bubble?
What is needed is a tube of warp bubbles where the speed of light
is a lot less than C. Say C of 1000C. Assuming time stands still
and the energy cost is lower for low values of C.( I got lost in the
math ).
We can do this.
accellerate (bubble ring)# ship #(bubble ring)
to .001C
Create bubbles # .*@( Ship )@*. #
and time stops.
( wait untill we get there)
Turn off Bubble rings and slow down. Then explore planet.
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Subject: Re: starship-design: warp bubbles
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 10:26:34 -0500
>
>We can do this.
But the first problem is gathering enough energy to create a bubble.
How would that compare to relativistic travel? I have read that entire
universes of energy would be required to run the Alcubierre drive, even a
scaled-down one.
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 11:18:53 -0700
AJ Crowl wrote:
>
> Hi Group,
>
> Alcubierre's original design was flawed by the size of the warp-bubble which
> requires immense amounts of energy to create. Such bubbles have an energy E
> ~ R^2 / Lp , where Lp is the planck length [1.6 x 10^-35 m !], so for any
> velocity V the total energy for his design was ~ -6.2 x 10^62 kg * v, which
> is about 10^10 times the mass of the visible Universe for even just
> lightspeed. So how to avoid such a HUGE energy bill?
Correct. But consider this: if it is found that spacetime can be bent by
means other than concentration of mass, I.E., you can produce some kind
of 'field' that interacts with space more strongly than matter, your
problems could be solved. How can this be done? Good question...
> Make the geometry different and fit your flat space [R ~ 200m] into a tiny warp bubble
> {tiny ~2000 Lp}which is possible. Doctor Who's TARDIS couldn't do better. For the
> same energy [milligrams] as the bubble slows down it gets larger, until you
> can get out again, but the bubble walls become thinner than Lp very quickly,
> so it's unclear whether it can be done. Planck's length is the limit of
> space fuzz, as far as we know. Chris Van Den Broeck, the designer, is a bit
> unclear and he's not too sure what process would produce enough negative
> energy to make an Alcubierre warp, but he hopes that his proof of principle
> study will inspire more brains to work on it.
Negative energy might not be the key, see above. There are some
scientists, notable Terence W. Barrett and H. David Froning, who have
taken a 'step back', so to speak. They note, and I agree with them, that
there are too many speculated points in all these theories about faster
than light travel. Simply writing up a paper that says 'this is how you
travel FTL' is no good, in my mind. First, we must try to answer some
basic questions, such as: what is spacetime? What are its properties?
How can we interact with it? What is the nature of the speed of light?
Granted, we have theories such as relativity, that help us to picture
what happens, but we still do not know much about it. Light is a very
curious form of energy. It is not clear what the factors are that limit
it to 300,000 km/sec. Once we understand these factors, we may be closer
to knowing what it takes to travel faster than light. Who knows? It
might turn out to be simpler than what we currently think. But I don't
think we will be able to do it for at least a few hundred years.
Kyle R. Mcallister
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: What is this???
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 14:56:29 -0700
SSD:
Very strange website...people who claim they have already solved all the
problems of interstellar travel.
http://www.unitelnw.com
While they *do* have PhD physicists on their list of associates, I think
its a little too good to be true. Opinions?
Kyle R. Mcallister
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To: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: What is this???
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 15:05:05 -0600
"Kyle R. Mcallister" wrote:
>
> SSD:
>
> Very strange website...people who claim they have already solved all the
> problems of interstellar travel.
>
> http://www.unitelnw.com
>
> While they *do* have PhD physicists on their list of associates, I think
> its a little too good to be true. Opinions?
>
> Kyle R. Mcallister
The whoossh sound and enterprise speeding across the star field
background
would be more realistic material than what is written there. Untill they
give me hard equations I will remain skeptic.
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Subject: starship-design: another fusion design
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 17:00:00 -0600
At http://www.skypoint.com/members/jlogajan/
check out the PLASMAK links.
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Subject: starship-design: Almost Space craft
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 22:06:02 -0600
3D renerings of space craft that never left the drawing board
from the 50's to the 70's
http://www.deepcold.com/intro_main.html
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Subject: starship-design: Historical space craft
Date: Mon, 31 May 1999 23:04:04 -0600
Space craft designs that never quite left the drawing board.
http://www.webcreations.com/ptm/index.htm
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Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Wed, 2 Jun 1999 00:38:45 EDT
>==Once we understand these factors, we may be closer
> to knowing what it takes to travel faster than light. Who
> knows? It might turn out to be simpler than what we
> currently think. But I don't think we will be able to
> do it for at least a few hundred years.
>
> Kyle R. Mcallister
Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff. They
obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
Kelly
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Subject: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Tue, 01 Jun 1999 22:43:09 -0600
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
> marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff. They
> obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
>
>
Research is ok, but NASA seems to have it's nose in too many places
right now. ( personal comment only ).
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 10:06:01 -0700
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> >==Once we understand these factors, we may be closer
> > to knowing what it takes to travel faster than light. Who
> > knows? It might turn out to be simpler than what we
> > currently think. But I don't think we will be able to
> > do it for at least a few hundred years.
> >
> > Kyle R. Mcallister
>
> Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
> marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff. They
> obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
Well, to do that we will likely need to know about the following:
1. Inertia control. Such as preventing it from skyrocketing when C is
approached. It has been suggested that relativistic 'mass' increase
might be circumvented if we knew how to 'mess' with the cause of
inertia. Note: many top physicists are beginning to doubt Mach's inertia
theory. It would also be nice to accelerate at 1000g's and not be turned
into chunky salsa.
2. Space-time modification. Pretty obvious.
3. Learning more about light speed and what it is based on. Or: how can
we exceed C and live to tell about it? Like I said, when we know the
fundamentals, FTL might not require warps as complex as Alcubierre's.
Something simpler might exist.
Less than a century to do this? It would be nice, but I don't know...
Kyle R. Mcallister
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From: "Kyle R. Mcallister" <stk@sunherald.infi.net>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: Re: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 10:07:02 -0700
bfranchuk wrote:
>
> KellySt@aol.com wrote:
> >
> > Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
> > marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff. They
> > obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
> >
> >
> Research is ok, but NASA seems to have it's nose in too many places
> right now. ( personal comment only ).
Agreed. Such as wasting money on worthless studies. Billions spent to
determine the 'feasability' of the ISS, or whatever they've changed the
name to. Many scientists criticised the studies as unecessary, since we
already knew it (the ISS) could be built. Also, the research they do is
not exactly the best. For one thing, they admit they have confirmed a
slight gravitational modification from E. Podkletnov's spinning
superconductor system. However, they will not give out information on
how to replicate it, saying only that it is a sensitive project and
would not be wise to hand out detailed information. This is not science!
Like Steve told me when I was carrying on about my FTL signalling
research, don't brag until you are willing to disclose replication
information. When I get more accomplished I will give out info on how to
replicate. Until then, I will lay low. NASA seems to think they are
above this somehow. Also note that they could have completed this
research much faster if they had hired either Podkletnov or Schnurer to
show them how to do it right. They're 'research' into Hooper's claimed
electromagnetic/gravity coupling was not carried out well either. They
claim negative results, when they used a setup fundamentally different
from the one Hooper used, and a power level less than half of what
Hooper used. While I don't think Hooper found anything revolutionary,
but NASA's replication was lousy. Now we also have to worry about
whether NASA's already limited funding will be sliced.
Just my $.02
Kyle R. Mcallister
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CC: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 10:04:48 -0600
"Kyle R. Mcallister" wrote:
>
> KellySt@aol.com wrote:
> >
> > >==Once we understand these factors, we may be closer
> > > to knowing what it takes to travel faster than light. Who
> > > knows? It might turn out to be simpler than what we
> > > currently think. But I don't think we will be able to
> > > do it for at least a few hundred years.
> > >
> > > Kyle R. Mcallister
> >
> > Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
> > marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff. They
> > obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
>
> Well, to do that we will likely need to know about the following:
>
> 1. Inertia control. Such as preventing it from skyrocketing when C is
> approached. It has been suggested that relativistic 'mass' increase
> might be circumvented if we knew how to 'mess' with the cause of
> inertia. Note: many top physicists are beginning to doubt Mach's inertia
> theory. It would also be nice to accelerate at 1000g's and not be turned
> into chunky salsa.
>
> 2. Space-time modification. Pretty obvious.
>
> 3. Learning more about light speed and what it is based on. Or: how can
> we exceed C and live to tell about it? Like I said, when we know the
> fundamentals, FTL might not require warps as complex as Alcubierre's.
> Something simpler might exist.
>
> Less than a century to do this? It would be nice, but I don't know...
> Kyle R. Mcallister
As a believer in autodynamics but while not knowing a great deal of math
would not many of the ideas based on Special reltivity and ways to get
around
light speed now be outdated because what was thought to be loop holes
in SR but really SR was wrong? Ben.
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From: KellySt@aol.com
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: starship design: Alcubierre Drive... How?
Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 00:19:36 EDT
> > >==Once we understand these factors, we may be closer
> > > to knowing what it takes to travel faster than light. Who
> > > knows? It might turn out to be simpler than what we
> > > currently think. But I don't think we will be able to
> > > do it for at least a few hundred years.
> > >
> >> Kyle R. Mcallister
> >
> > Don't bet on that. Now-a-days things go from weird physics concepts, to
> > marketed products REAL fast! NASA's funding research into this stuff.
They
> > obviousl expect something far less long term then centuries.
>
> Well, to do that we will likely need to know about the following:
>
> 1. Inertia control. Such as preventing it from skyrocketing
> when C is approached. It has been suggested that
> relativistic 'mass' increase might be circumvented if we
> knew how to 'mess' with the cause of inertia. Note: many
> top physicists are beginning to doubt Mach's inertia
> theory. It would also be nice to accelerate at 1000g's and
> not be turned into chunky salsa.
>
> 2. Space-time modification. Pretty obvious.
>
> 3. Learning more about light speed and what it is based
> on. Or: how can we exceed C and live to tell about it?
> Like I said, when we know the fundamentals, FTL might
> not require warps as complex as Alcubierre's.
> Something simpler might exist.
>
> Less than a century to do this? It would be nice, but I
> don't know...
> Kyle R. Mcallister
All the things in your list are being researched.
In the last hundred years we've learned about mass/energy conversions,
fission, fusion, quantum mechanics, relativity, distortions of space and
time, etc. None of that would heve seemed reasonable in the late 1800's.
But of course progress is far more rapid now than then.
All this work, and far more, will be developed or proved impossible in a
couple decades. In ceturies we'll be WAY beyond these questions.
Kelly
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Subject: Fwd: RE: starship-design: Almost Space craft
Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 00:19:28 EDT
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Subject: RE: starship-design: Almost Space craft
TO: erps-list@LunaCity.com, KellySt@aol.com,
starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
CC: bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca
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Very cool. Good imaging too!
Kelly
-----Original Message-----
From: KellySt [SMTP:KellySt@aol.com]
Sent: Monday, May 31, 1999 11:06 PM
To: starship-design; erps-list
Cc: bfranchuk
Subject: starship-design: Almost Space craft
=20
=20
3D renerings of space craft that never left the drawing board
from the 50's to the 70's
=20
http://www.deepcold.com/intro_main.html
=20
=20
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 1
Date: Thu, 3 Jun 1999 18:15:49 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-spaceviews@wayback.com [mailto:owner-spaceviews@wayback.com]
On Behalf Of jeff@spaceviews.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 01, 1999 3:03 PM
Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 1
[ SpaceViews (tm) newsletter ]
[ see end of message for our NEW address to subscribe / unsubscribe ]
S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.06.01
1999 June 1
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/06/
*** News ***
Shuttle Mission Proceeds Smoothly
Mir Likely to Remain in Orbit until 2000
Asteroid Poses Greater Future Threat
Hubble Measures Expansion and Age of Universe
Chandra Launch Preparations Resume
Lunar Prospector Mission Might End in Ban
New 3-D Map Reveals Martian Geography
Amateur Rocket Sets Record, Falls Short of Space
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** Articles ***
The First Reusable Spaceship
*** Letters ***
More on RLVs and Financing
*** News ***
Shuttle Mission Proceeds Smoothly
Despite a nearly six-month gap since the previous shuttle
mission, flight STS-96 has gone smoothly from a trouble-free countdown
and launch to its mission to service the International Space Station.
The shuttle Discovery lifted off on schedule at 6:49 am EDT
(1049 UT) Thursday, May 27, after a nearly trouble-free countdown.
The launch was the first for the shuttle program since the STS-88
mission in early December of last year.
The shuttle successfully docked with the station at 12:24 am
EDT (0424 UT) Saturday, May 29. The shuttle is scheduled to remain
docked with the station until Thursday, June 3.
The first task after docking was a spacewalk to install
equipment to the exterior of the station. Astronauts Tamara Jernigan
and Daniel Barry spent nearly eight hours outside the shuttle on the
night of May 29-30, installing the American-built Orbital Transfer
Device to one side of the Unity module and pieces of the Russian
Strela ("Arrow") crane to another side of the module.
The cranes will be used during future assembly spacewalks to
more efficiently move spacewalkers and cargo around the exterior of
the module.
The spacewalkers also attached three tool and equipment bags
to the exterior of the station that will be used on future assembly
spacewalks, and conducted an inspection of the station.
The seven-person crew has since turned their attention to the
interior of the station, including hauling nearly two tons of
equipment -- ranging from food and clothes to computers -- into the
station.
The shuttle crew will also deal with repairs and workaround on
the new station. Astronauts will repair a balky American
communications system and investigate why some Russian batteries on
the station are having problems charging. While working in the
Russian-built Zarya control module, the crew will wear earplugs
because noise levels there reach 72 decibels, equivalent to a busy
highway and higher than NASA standards. Mufflers to be installed by
the astronauts should decrease noise levels there somewhat.
After Discovery undocks from ISS, the crew will release a
small satellite that will be used in educational programs. The
STARSHINE satellite will be visually tracked by students on the
ground. Even through the satellite is only slightly larger than a
basketball, the 900 mirrors on its surface will allow it to reflect
sunlight and be easily seen on the ground.
Commanding STS-96 is Kent Rominger, making his fourth shuttle
flight, while rookie astronaut Rick Husband is the pilot. Mission
specialists include Ellen Ochoa, Canadian astronaut Julie Payette, and
Russian cosmonaut Valery Tokarev, in addition to Jernigan and Barry.
Payette and Tokarev are making their first space flights, while
Jernigan is making her fifth.
If all goes well, the shuttle is scheduled to land at the
Kennedy Space Center at 1:59 am EDT (0559 UT) Sunday, June 6.
Mir Likely to Remain in Orbit until 2000
Even if no private investors can be found, Russia's Mir space
station is likely to remain in orbit until at least early 2000,
Russian officials said this week.
However, one controversial source of private funding, British
businessman Peter Llewellyn, will not be paying or raising money to
fly on the station, although the reasons for his leaving cosmonaut
training are unclear.
Speaking in Florida prior to the launch of the shuttle
Discovery, Boris Ostroumov, deputy director-general of the Russian
Space Agency, said Mir will remain in orbit until at least February
2000, even if no funding is found to keep the station operating beyond
August.
"We've got more than 10 tons of scientific hardware on board
the Mir station," Ostroumov said. "It simply does not make too much
sense to get rid of such a treasure."
He said that Mir's orbit is currently high enough to allow it
to remain in orbit until at least February 2000, even if no funding is
found to keep the station operating. If funding is not found the
station would stay in orbit but be unoccupied, he said.
Last week Russia President Boris Yeltsin signed a decree
allowing Mir to remain in orbit of Energia, the company that operates
Mir for the Russia Space Agency, can find the funding to keep
operating the station. The decree appears similar to one signed in
January by now-former Prime Minister Yevegny Primakov.
A "final" decision on the fate of Mir should come as soon as
early June, Russia Space Agency officials said late in the week, based
on the likelihood of private funding.
One source of private funding, though, has apparently backed
out of plans to fly on Mir in August. Russian sources reported this
week that British businessman Peter Llewellyn left Russia this week
after arriving earlier in the month to begin cosmonaut training for a
August flight to Mir.
The reasons why Llewellyn, who was reportedly going to pay or
raise $100 million to fly on the station, left cosmonaut training are
uncertain. The Itar-Tass news agency reported May 26 quoted the
deputy head of the cosmonaut training center, who said Llewellyn
"turned out to be an unreliable partner."
The next day, however, Russian Space Agency officials said
Llewellyn was dropped from training because, at 188 cm (6 feet 2
inches) in height, he was too tall to fit safely in the Soyuz
spacecraft. While it is true that there is a maximum height of about
183 cm (6 feet) for Soyuz passengers, it is not clear why this became
a factor after training began.
Doubts about Llewellyn's ability to pay for the flight had
been met with skepticism, particularly by Western observers. While
working in the U.S., Llewellyn faced fraud charges in a Pittsburgh
court until he agreed to repay approximately $40,000 to a former
business partner. Local police there had considered him something of
a con artist.
A lack of private investment raises new concerns about the
fate of Mir. While Russian officials say the station can be left
unstaffed, others, such as Viktor Blagov, deputy head of Mir mission
control, have claimed that the station must be kept occupied at all
times, or else the attitude control computers, which require frequent
maintenance, will fail.
A failure of the attitude control systems on Mir could cause
it to start tumbling uncontrollably, which would make a controlled
deorbit of the station into the Earth's atmosphere impossible.
Asteroid Poses Greater Future Threat
A near-Earth asteroid which earlier this year was found to
have a one-in-a-billion chance of striking the Earth in 2039 may have
a larger -- but still very small -- chance of a collision five years
later, JPL astronomers said.
In an interview with MSNBC, Don Yeomans, head of NASA's
Near-Earth Object Program Office at JPL, said that asteroid 1999 AN10
has a 1-in-500,000 chance of hitting the Earth in 2044.
That probability is still less than that for a unknown
asteroid. Astronomers estimate a 1-in-100,000 chance that an
undiscovered asteroid one kilometer or larger in diameter will strike
the Earth in a given year.
However, that very small probability has raised interest among
astronomers. "I'm not worried in the least about this object, but I'm
not going to ignore it," Gareth Williams of the Minor Planets Center
told MSNBC. Yeomans said the asteroid's impact probability is at a
threshold above which it might warrant special attention.
The revised orbit for 1999 AN10 came after new observations of
the asteroid by an amateur astronomer in Australia. Those
observations were likely triggered by debate in April when a preprint
of a scientific paper, publicized on a mailing list used by near-Earth
asteroid researchers, showed that the asteroid had a one-in-a-billion
chance of colliding with the Earth in 2039.
The revised calculations based on the new data also increased
the probability of a 2039 impact to ten million to one, 100 times
higher than previously but still far smaller than the odds of an
impact from an unknown object.
The asteroid will also make a close flyby of Earth in 2027,
coming as close as 32,600 km (20,200 mi.) of the surface of the Earth
on August 7. The chance of an impact on that date is essentially
zero, but the close passage the asteroid, within the Earth's magnetic
field, might levitate dust off the surface of the asteroid through
electrostatic repulsion and create a dim "dust coma."
Astronomers earlier noted that the asteroid's orbit will bring
it close to Earth many times in the coming centuries. Further
observations of the asteroid are planned in coming weeks that should
refine its orbit and better determine any impact probabilities in
future close approaches.
Hubble Measures Expansion and Age of Universe
Astronomers, marking the completion of one of the Hubble Space
Telescope's major projects, have made the most precise measurement yet
of a key cosmological factor that governs the age of the universe and
its rate of expansion, NASA announced May 25.
A team of astronomers, having completed an eight-year study of
distant galaxies with Hubble, found that the Hubble constant, a
measure of the rate of expansion of the universe, is approximately 70
km/sec per megaparsec (Mpc, equal to 3.25 million light-years),
corresponding to an age of 12 billion years.
With an error of only 10 percent, the result is the most
precise measurement made to date of the Hubble constant (often
referred to as "H0" or "H-nought"), one of the key values in
astronomy. The factor, named after American astronomer Edwin Hubble,
had also been hotly debated by astronomers, with the field at one time
divided into two camps: one who believed H0 was 100 km/sec/Mpc, while
others believed H0 to be just 50.
H0 is important because it also provides a measure of the age
of the universe: simply inverting the result and adjusting the units
gives a rough estimate of the age of the universe. The age is then
adjusted by accounting for the density of the universe and other
effects.
"Before Hubble, astronomers could not decide if the universe
was 10 billion or 20 billion years old," said Wendy Freedman of the
Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, who led the
HST Key Project Team. "The size scale of the universe had a range so
vast that it didn't allow astronomers to confront with any certainty
many of the most basic questions about the origin and eventual fate of
the cosmos."
The new value from Hubble greatly improves our knowledge of
the universe, say astronomers. "We used to disagree by a factor of
two; now we are just as passionate about ten percent," said Robert
Kirschner of Harvard University. "A factor of two is like being unsure
if you have one foot or two. Ten percent is like arguing about one
toe."
The Hubble results are in accordance with research by other
astronomers, who have found values of H0 ranging from the mid-sixties
into the low seventies in recent years, using different techniques.
"It's exciting to see the different methods of measuring galaxy
distances converge, calibrated by the Hubble Space Telescope," noted
team member Jeremy Mould of the Australian National University.
The Hubble team measured the variation in brightness of
Cepheid variables, a class of variable stars with a well-known
relationship between the period of variation and its absolute
brightness.
By measuring the period and apparent brightness of Cepheids in
distant galaxies with Hubble, astronomers are able to estimate the
distance to these galaxies. This distance, combined with information
about the redshift of the galaxies caused by the Doppler effect,
allows astronomers to compute the Hubble constant and hence the rate
of expansion.
Combining the new value of H0 with current estimates for the
density of the universe, Freedman and colleagues found the age of the
universe to be about 12 billion years. This is in accordance with
estimates for the age of the oldest stars of the universe, ending past
concerns where some globular star clusters appeared to be older than
the universe itself.
Not everyone is in agreement with the new value for H0. Allan
Sandage, a colleague of Freedman's at Carnegie, is still a proponent
for a value of H0 in the range of 50 to 60. "If NASA is giving the
impression that the problem is solved, then we would dispute that,"
Sandage said in a telephone interview with the Associated Press. "They
have announced a final number, and they are not correct."
More discussion about the new value of H0 is expected at the
next meeting of the American Astronomical Society, scheduled to take
place in Chicago in early June.
Chandra Launch Preparations Resume
NASA has resumed preparations for the launch of the Chandra
X-Ray Observatory after resolving issues with the upper stage that
will be used to boost the satellite, the space agency reported Friday,
May 28.
The resumed preparations will permit the launch of the shuttle
Columbia, which will place Chandra and its upper stage into orbit, no
sooner than July 22.
Project officials at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center said
the Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) that will be used to boost Chandra will
be delivered to NASA on Tuesday, June 1, permitting launch
preparations to resume. The upper stage will be mated to the
spacecraft and, after mechanical and electrical tests, the whole
assembly will be placed in the shuttle's cargo bay.
The delivery of the IUS and its integration with Chandra was
scheduled to take place a month earlier, but was delayed when another
IUS failed to place an Air Force early-warning satellite into its
proper orbit after an April 9 Titan 4B launch.
NASA said in a press release that the space agency "has taken
all appropriate actions to mitigate any issues raised regarding the
Inertial Upper Stage."
Plans now call for the launch of STS-93, previously planned
for early July, to take place no sooner than July 22. Columbia will
deploy the satellite on a four-day mission commanded by Eileen
Collins, the first woman to command a shuttle mission.
Lunar Prospector Mission Might End in Bang
Lunar Prospector project managers are considering ending the
spacecraft's mission later this year by deliberately crashing the
spacecraft into a region of the Moon thought to harbor water ice,
Space News reported in its May 24 issue.
The crash would through up a cloud of debris which would
include any water ice in the region of impact, allowing for a direct
detection of ice from telescopes on the Earth.
Lunar Prospector is the second half of an extended mission
which is expected to conclude this summer when the spacecraft runs out
of maneuvering propellant. The Moon's irregular gravity field would
then cause Prospector to crash to the surface.
However, project officials are considering deliberately
crashing Prospector in the crater Mawson in the Moon's south polar
region. That crater has a 33-km (20.5-mi.) floor thought to be rich
in water ice.
The impact would throw up a plume of material that could be
observed from minutes to hours after impact from telescopes on Earth.
Those telescopes could spectroscopically detect the presence of any
water ice in the debris.
Prospector has already amassed considerable evidence for water
ice on the Moon from its neutron spectrometer, which has detected high
concentrations of hydrogen in permanently-shadowed regions of the
lunar poles. Water is the most likely source of the hydrogen detected
by Prospector, scientists believe.
A final decision for targeting Lunar Prospector will come from
NASA administrator Dan Goldin, project officials said. If given the
go-ahead, the impact procedure would begin July 29 or 30.
Because the limited amount of debris a Prospector impact would
be able to throw up, scientists note that the odds of actually being
able to observe any water ice in the plume would be slim. "Lunar
Prospector is going to crash somewhere" anyway, noted Mike Duke of the
Lunar and Planetary Institute. "So if you aim it at a place that you
think is in shadow, there are instruments and people that stand a
chance of actually seeing something."
New 3-D Map Reveals Martian Geography
A new three-dimensional map of the surface of Mars, released
by NASA Thursday, May 27, has provided new insights on the geology of
the Red Planet.
The map, generated from data collected by a laser altimeter on
the Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft, allows scientists to know the
topography of the Red Planet to a greater detail than some regions on
Earth, NASA officials said.
The topographic map shows a striking difference between the
planet's northern and southern hemisphere, with the southern
hemisphere an average of five kilometers (three miles) higher than the
northern. The southern hemisphere is also more rugged and
crater-pocked than the smoother northern hemisphere.
The depressed northern hemisphere is likely a result of
internal geologic processes on Mars early in its history, and not the
result of an impact, according to David Smith of the Goddard Space
Flight Center, lead author of a paper on Martian topography published
in the May 28 issue of the journal Science.
The high elevations in the southern hemisphere may have been
partially caused by an impact that created the Hellas basin, the
scientists said. The impact threw up enough material to cover an area
the size of the continental United States to a depth of 3.2 kilometers
(2 miles).
Overall, the difference in planetary elevations, from the top
of Olympus Mons to the bottom of the deepest basins, is 30 kilometers
(19 miles), one and a half times the difference between the highest
and lowest elevations on the Earth.
The new map has also provided new insights about the drainage
of water on the early Mars. Portions of the eastern end of the giant
Valles Marineris canyon is actually up to one kilometer (0.6 miles)
below the level of neighboring outflow channels, suggested that water
may have collected there.
Information about the poles collected from the topographic
data show that if the residual polar caps on Mars are composed
entirely of water ice, there is enough water on the planet to cover
the surface to a depth of 22 to 33 meters (66 to 100 feet). This is
estimated to be about one-third of the minimum amount of water to
account for a proposed ancient ocean, suggesting that Mars either lost
the rest of the water to space or it is stored deep underground.
"This incredible database means that we now know the
topography of Mars better than many continental regions on Earth,"
claimed Carl Pilcher, science director of NASA's solar system
exploration program. "The data will serve as a basic reference book
for Mars scientists for many years."
The laser altimeter will continue to collect data as Mars
Global Surveyor continues its mapping mission, including data on the
topography of the planned landing site of the Mars Polar Lander
spacecraft, scheduled to land in early December.
Amateur Rocket Sets Record, Falls Short of Space
An amateur rocket launched Sunday, May 23, set an unofficial
altitude record but weather conditions prevented the amateur group's
bid to be the first to launch a rocket into space.
The balloon-launched rocket reached a maximum altitude of at
least 21,885 meters (72,223 feet) according to JP Aerospace, the
California-based amateur group that built and launched the rocket.
The rocket likely traveled to a higher altitude, John Powell,
president of JP Aerospace, said. The maximum altitude reported by the
group was the highest they measured from the rocket's onboard GPS
receiver. At that time the rocket was still traveling upwards at 240
meters per second (800 feet per second).
Powell said the group has calculated the estimated maximum
altitude the rocket has reached, but has chosen only to report the
lower, but verified, altitude from the GPS measurement.
The group had hoped that the rocket would exceed an altitude
of 97 km (60 mi.) and become the first amateur vehicle to fly into
space. However, after delaying the launch one day because of winds,
the group concluded that the upper-level winds above the Black Rock
Desert, Nevada, launch site would blow the balloon and rocket out of
operational range before they reached their planned launch height of
30,300 meters (100,000 feet).
Instead of scrubbing the launch all together, the group
decided to launch the rocket from just 7,880 meters (26,000 feet).
"We learn nothing from a rocket on the ground so we decided to 'cycle
the system' and verify that the launch system works," Powell said.
The maximum verified altitude of the rocket would set a record
for an amateur rocket, breaking the record of 20,000 meters (66,000
feet) by Ky Michelson. Powell said Michelson was on hand for the
launch and "unofficially handed over the title."
Other launches have claimed higher altitudes, but those
altitudes were calculated based on the trajectory of the rocket and
other parameters, but not directly measured. Other amateur launches
have also had NASA involvement, Powell noted.
In May 1997 Project HALO, an effort by the Huntsville, Alabama
chapter of the National Space Society, also launched a rocket from a
balloon. They estimated a peak altitude of 55,200 to 66,300 meters
(182,300 to 218,700 feet). However, they had no direct measurement of
the altitude since they were unable to pick up transmission from the
rocket's GPS receiver beyond 9,100 meters (30,000 feet).
Powell said this his group's record could be questioned as
well, since the launch took place from a balloon and not from the
ground. "The situation [about the record] is such a mess that we're
staying away from it like the plague," he said. "We flew our rocket
to 72,223 feet as part of our spaceflight project and next time it
will be even higher."
SpaceViews Event Horizon
June 6 Shuttle Discovery landing at the Kennedy Space Center,
at 1:59 am EDT (0559 UT).
June 7 Long March 2C/SD launch of two Iridium satellites from
Taiyuan, China
June 8 Delta 2 launch of four Globalstar satellites from Cape
Canaveral, Florida at 10:22 am EDT (1422 UT)
June 11 (NET) Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
June 12 Proton launch of Russian Raduga comsat (and initial
flight of the Breeze-M upper stage) from Baikonur,
Kazakhstan.
June 23-24 First U.S. Space Tourism Conference, Washington, DC
July 15-16 Lunar Base Development Symposium, League City, TX
Other News
SETI@home Overload: SETI@home, the project that allows users to
analyze data from a University of California Berkeley search for
extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) project, may be a victim of its
own success. Over 300,000 users have downloaded the software and
started analyzing the data, some on multiple computers. The crush of
users has caused problems for the Berkeley computers that send out the
data and receive the analyzed results. Project officials say a new
server, to be donated by Sun Microsystems within the next month,
should alleviate problems, as well as planned bug fixes to the
SETI@home software.
India Commercial Launch: An Indian rocket launched three satellites
May 26 in what was billed as the first commercial launch for the
country. A Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) launched the Indian
Remote Sensing IRS-P4 satellite as well as two small experimental
satellites for Germany and South Korea. The foreign satellites were
launched under commercial agreements, marking the first time Indian
Space Research Organization (ISRO) had sold launch services. ISRO
plans to sell launches on both the PSLV and the more powerful
Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) under development.
Beal Seeks Alternative Site: Beal Aerospace is looking at a South
American alternative to its planned Caribbean launch site. Last month
company officials visited the nation of Guyana, in northern South
America, to check out a potential launch site in a swampy region along
the country's Caribbean coast. The site could be an alternative to
Sombrero Island, an uninhabited island 55 km (35 mi.) from the British
colony of Anguilla. That site has run into opposition from
environmentalists, who are concerned that a launch site could
adversely affect sea birds who use the island as a breeding ground.
Leonids No Big Worry: The heavy storm of Leonid meteors expected in
November 1999 should not be a major concern for satellite operators,
experts said at a conference last month. While the peak of the storm
is forecast to be up to four times the rate of the 1998 storm, it will
still be far below the extremely heavy rates seen in the last Leonids
storm in 1966. The 33-year cycle of heavy Leonids storms had caused
concern that satellites could be damaged by the flux of small meteors,
but no satellites were damaged in the 1998 storm.
Cosmic Call: For the first time since 1974, humans have sent a
deliberate signal into interstellar space with a May 24 transmission
from a Ukrainian radio observatory. The message, sponsored by
Houston-based company Encounter 2001, consisted of one part designed
by a team of scientists and a second part that included 30-word
messages from members of the general public, who paid $14.95 each for
the privilege. The message was beamed to four Sun-like stars 51 to 71
light-years away in the Summer Triangle.
Briefly: China may be accelerating plans to put a human into space.
A Chinese newspaper article last week, reported by Reuters, claimed
that a manned launch may occur before the 50th anniversary of the
People's Republic on October 1. Previously, Chinese officials had
reported plans to launch the spacecraft, based on the Russian Soyuz,
on an unmanned test flight in October... Russian mission control
director Vladimir Lobachev, in Florida for the STS-96 launch, was
arrested on assault charges May 23 when he attacked two paramedics who
were transporting him to a hospital after discovering the Russian
semiconscious near a Cocoa Beach, Florida, pier. Lobachev was later
released on a $1,000 bond and left the country immediately thereafter.
When taken to the hospital authorities found that his blood alcohol
level was more than three times the state limit for being declared
legally drunk... AT&T, which has engaged in a $100 billion spree of
mergers and acquisitions, may have its sights on something even
larger: NASA. A joke passing through AT&T's email network and
reported in the May 31 issue of Business Week claimed that the company
was going to purchase the space agency in excess of $100 billion.
AT&T would then string coax cable from "Cape Canaveral to Mars" before
rolling out a "10-planet trial of communications services." However,
the joke continues, a lack of identified extraterrestrial
intelligences could limit the market for the company's services, but
if any would be found, the company would win them over with free
subscriptions to the Showtime premium movie channel...
*** Articles ***
The First Reusable Spaceship
by Andrew J. LePage
Ask the typical space enthusiast to name the first reusable
piloted spaceship and the most likely answer would be the Space
Shuttle. While the Space Shuttle's external tank is discarded on each
mission, its pair of solid rocket boosters as well as the highly
complex and expensive orbiter (the actual "spaceship") are certainly
reusable. But the Space Shuttle was not the first piloted spacecraft
that could be flown over and over. Nor was some little known piece of
Soviet engineering genius. The honor belongs to the grandfather of
all modern aerospace planes, the X-15.
While the X-15 is certainly the most famous of all the
X-series aircraft, the fact that it flew into space on no less than 13
occasions while the Mercury and Gemini programs came and went is
frequently overlooked. Even in NASA's "official" count of American
manned space missions, the suborbital X-15 flights are notably absent.
This despite the fact that three NASA pilots (not to mention five USAF
pilots) earned their astronaut wings during the program including Joe
Engle who went on to fly NASA's Space Shuttle in the 1980s.
There are several possible reasons the X-15 spaceflight
accomplishments are often forgotten: First the majority of the X-15's
199 flights were never meant to fly high enough to qualify as an
"official" spaceflight. Extremely high altitude flights were only one
of this long running program's many objectives. Combined with the
almost routine nature of what was really a test program, X-15 flights
did not generate the media coverage afforded to the far less "routine"
space missions of the Mercury and Gemini programs. Finally, when the
X-15 passed the threshold into space, it barely did so and only
briefly - hardly newsworthy to some when men are spending days or
weeks in orbit in preparation for a manned lunar mission. But exactly
where is this threshold where one "officially" passes into space?
The Edge of Space
There really is not a clearly defined altitude where one
passes out of the sensible atmosphere and into the vacuum of space.
In the late 1950's the USAF decided to award astronaut wings to pilots
who flew over 50 statute miles (80.45 kilometers) above sea level.
Besides being a nice round number (at least in English measurement
units), 50 miles is higher than any balloon or conventional aircraft
has ever flown (about 30 miles or 50 kilometers) yet lower than the
lowest perigee of a marginally stable satellite orbit (about 55 miles
or 90 kilometers). Eventually flying as high as about 108 kilometers
(67 miles), the X-15 was the first craft capable of flying in the
transition region between the sensible atmosphere and space.
The need to explore this region as well as the effects of
hypersonic flight (i.e. at speeds exceeding five times the speed of
sound or Mach 5), had been recognized in the early 1950s. In the
years after the last World War, rocket-powered aircraft such as the
USAF's X-1 series and the X-2 as well as the US Navy sponsored D-558
series of test aircraft first broke the sound barrier and proceeded to
set a string of speed records up to Mach 3. In addition, these
aircraft also flew at increasingly greater altitudes eventually
reaching as high as 38 kilometers (24 miles) above sea level. But
military planners anticipated the need for future aircraft to fly
faster and higher still. In addition, since the prevailing view of
manned spaceflight at the time called for a pilot to fly his rocket
powered aircraft into orbit and back, there was an obvious need to
explore the issues associated with high altitude hypersonic flight.
After a meeting held by the Executive Committee of NACA
(NASA's pre-Space Age predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for
Aeronautics) it was recommended that NACA start research into the
problems of flight at speeds of Mach 4 to 10 and at altitudes from 12
to 50 miles (19 to 80 kilometers). What would become the X-15 was
designed to meet this goal. A further resolution on July 14 extended
NACA goals to speeds from Mach 10 to escape velocity and altitudes
from 50 miles (80 kilometers) to infinity. Meeting this latter goal
lead to the USAF X-20 "Dyna Soar" and NASA's Mercury program (see "The
Beginnings of America's Man in Space Program" in the October 1998
issue of SpaceViews).
During the coming months NACA engineers performed numerous
studies on hypersonic aircraft designs and soon the USAF took an
interest. They had been performing similar studies and, along with
NACA officials, knew that such a research program would be best
carried out by pooling the resources of several agencies. By July 9,
1954 a joint NACA/USAF/US Navy committee started meeting to discuss
the need for such a vehicle and its basic design. By late 1954 the
base design criteria were determined and on January 17, 1955 the USAF
officially assigned the new aircraft the "X-15" designation.
The Design
Four aircraft manufacturers responded to the joint
NACA/USAF/US Navy call for proposals. Bell (the builder of the X-1
series) submitted its D-171 design, Douglas its Model 684 D-558-3, and
Republic its Model AP-76. While every agency involved had its
favorite design, ultimately they agreed on the North American NA-240
proposal and a contract for three aircraft was signed on September 30,
1955. This design was chosen because of its simplicity and ease to
modify to meet the agencies' various specifications. The final design
that emerged from this long process became an aerospace classic.
The X-15 was designed to attain speeds of Mach 6 and altitudes
in excess of 250,000 feet (76 kilometers). It was 15.2 meters (50
feet) long and weighed 15,100 kilograms (33,300 pounds) at launch.
Midway down its fuselage were a pair of low aspect ratio, trapezoidal
shaped wings with a span of 6.7 meters (22 feet). Based on NACA
research, the X-15 used a pair of thick, wedge shaped vertical
stabilizers and thin, down sloping horizontal stabilizers to provide
directional control during flight. These also gave the aircraft its
classic arrow-like profile. A set of a dozen small hydrogen
peroxide-fueled jets located in the nose and wingtips with thrusts of
180 and 450 Newtons(40 and 100 pounds) provided attitude control when
the X-15 was too high and the air too rarefied for its aerodynamic
control surfaces to work. A similar system was later used by NASA's
Mercury space capsule.
The bulk of the X-15 airframe was made from titanium while
most of the outer skin was composed of the heat resistant and then
exotic nickel-based alloy, Iconel X. Such materials were needed to
withstand the anticipated 650 C (1,200 F) temperatures generated
during hypersonic flight. The air conditioned, climate controlled
cockpit provided enough room for a single pressure suit clad pilot.
It was equipped with an advanced ejection seat that would work safely
at speeds up to Mach 4 and an altitude 36.6 kilometers (120,000 feet
or 22.7 miles). It provided an extra safety margin for what was
recognized as a risky test program.
Most of the X-15 fuselage housed a set of tanks holding 8,540
kilograms (18,800 pounds) of propellant for the X-15's single rocket
engine. Ultimately the XLR-99 engine built by Reaction Motors, Inc.
(which later became a division of Thiokol) was chosen based on a bid
the company submitted in December of 1955. This engine produced 223
kilonewtons (50,000 pounds) of thrust at sea level and was intended to
be restartable and throttlable in flight. Initially the engine was to
be throttled from 30% to 100% of its maximum thrust. Early versions
of the engine would only throttle between 50% and 100% but even later
versions were limited to a minimum 40% rating to avoid running
problems found during test flights at low thrust settings.
The turbopump fed XLR-99 ran on an unusual combination of
liquid anhydrous ammonia and liquid oxygen (LOX). While there are
certainly rocket fuels more powerful than liquid ammonia available,
Reaction Motors did have much experience with this propellant
combination and knew that engines burning it were very forgiving
during restarts - a very important safety factor. This powerful
engine would easily allow the X-15 to exceed its speed and altitude
design goals. Ultimately the performance of the X-15 would be limited
by the heat generated during high speed flight or reentry and not by
its engine.
But as development of the X-15 and its XLR-99 engine proceeded
it became increasingly clear that the first X-15 airframes would be
available long before their innovative powerplants. By February 1958
it was decided that the first two X-15 aircraft would initially be
equipped with a pair of less powerful XLR-11 engines similar to the
ones that powered the Bell X-1 series and the Douglas D-558-II
aircraft. Each XLR-11 engine consisted of four thrust chambers that
could be fired independently allowing for an eight-step throttle
capability. With all eight chambers running, the pair of alcohol/LOX
fueled XLR-11 rocket engines produced a total of 71 kilonewtons
(16,000 pounds) of thrust. While this was only a third of the maximum
thrust generated by the XLR-99, it did allow the X-15 test program to
proceed with the previously planned low speed trials that would be
flown initially.
But even with the powerful XLR-99, the X-15 would waste far
too much propellant taking off directly from the ground. Like many
other rocket powered test aircraft, the X-15 would be carried by a
large carrier aircraft to altitude before being dropped for the
beginning of a test flight. But the B-29 and its sibling, the B-50,
bombers used by earlier X-series aircraft were too small to handle the
much larger X-15. After much debate a modified B-52 bomber, which was
just entering service, was selected to be the X-15 mother craft. The
X-15 would be mounted under the B-52's starboard wing on a special
pylon that provided a variety of support functions before the X-15 was
launched. B-52A serial number 52-003 and B-52B serial number 52-008
were sent to North American for their transformation into the NB-52A
and NB-52B carrier aircraft.
First Flights
By the time the first X-15 was rolled out on October 15, 1958
the Space Age was already a year old and there was a new sense of
urgency in the program. The X-15 was the first craft ever built that
was capable of sending a man into space and it had a good chance of
not only beating the Soviet Union but NASA's just announced ballistic
man-in-space initiative. Because of the advanced state of
development, North American even proposed using an X-15 variant called
the X-15B to be launched into orbit using Titan boosters. Since NASA
was committed even at this early date to using a ballistic capsule for
its first manned flights, the North American plan lost out to the
proposal submitted by the McDonnell Aircraft Company (see "America's
First Spaceship" in the April 15, 1999 issue of SpaceViews).
In the mean time the X-15 was put through its paces in
anticipation of its first powered flight. The first captive flight
with the first X-15 attached to the NB-52 carrier took place on March
10, 1959. After several more captive flights, the X-15 flew its first
unpowered glide flight on June 8, 1959. At the controls of this and
most early flights was North American's test pilot Scott Crossfield -
a former NACA pilot who had flown the X-1, D-558-I and D-558-II and
had been the first man to fly faster than Mach 2 on November 20, 1953.
The first XLR-11 powered flight took place using X-15 #2 on September
17, 1959 with Crossfield easily reaching a speed of Mach 2.11 and an
altitude of 15.95 kilometers (9.91 miles).
A near repeat was accomplished a month later but the fourth
flight on November 5 was almost catastrophic. An engine fire forced
an emergency landing which resulted in a structural failure with the
X-15 almost breaking in two between the cockpit and propellant tank.
Fortunately Crossfield was not injured. The structural design defect
that lead to the failure was corrected and the aircraft was repaired.
Over the coming months the X-15 performance envelope was gradually
increased and new USAF, US Navy, and NASA pilots began flying this
manned bullet. After 29 flights with the XLR-11 engines, the X-15
made its first XLR-99 powered flight on March 7, 1961. While the
delay in the delivery of the XLR-99 powerplant meant that the X-15
would not make the first manned spaceflight, it did mark the beginning
of an unprecedented test program that blazed the trail for future
aerospace planes.
Bibliography
Ben Guenther, Jay Miller, and Terry Panopalis, North American
X-15/X-15A-2, Aerofax, Inc., 1985
Robert S. Houston, Richard P. Hallion, Ronald G. Boston, "Transiting
from Air to Space: The North American X-15", from The Hypersonic
Revolution Case Studies in the History of Hypersonic Technology Air
Force History and Museums Program, 1998
Jay Miller, The X-Planes: X-1 to X-29, Specialty Press, 1983
Milton O. Thompson, At the Edge of Space: The X-15 Flight Program,
Smithsonian Institute, 1992
Author
Drew LePage is a physicist and freelance writer specializing in
astronomy and the history of spaceflight. He can be reached at
lepage@visidyne.com.
*** Letters ***
More on RLVs and Financing
[Editor's Note: These letters are in response to one published in the
May 22 issue of SpaceViews, available at
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/05/letters2.html. Letters can be sent
to letters@spaceviews.com.]
While there are seeming dark clouds on the horizon for RLVs,
the situation is not as bad as some would paint it. The development
cost for privatized RLVs today is comparable to the cost of a single
ELV failure. If the Delta III program had been run by a start-up
venture rather than by the biggest aerospace company in the world, it
would have gone broke by now. Kistler and Roton haven't made any
money yet, but they'll never lose as much as the Delta III program
already has.
And there have been a lot of ELV failures of late. The
venerable Delta and Titan are having their share of problems, and the
vaunted Zenit doesn't make satellite customers comfortable, either.
Based on actual events, it's rather unrealistic to claim that ELV
technology is "proven" and "highly reliable." And if it's not proven
and highly reliable by now, when will it be?
The small first-generation RLVs are not necessarily excluded
from the heavy-lift market as the ELV proponents assert. The Kistler
K-1 and Roton can both boost fairly large payloads into LEO. From
there, a teleoperated vehicle -- a space tug -- can rendezvous with
the payload, join it with fuel tanks, and transfer it into GEO. My
company, Astrotug (http://astrotug.com) is developing a reusable space
tug for this purpose.
When teleoperated space operations become commonplace,
megasatellite builders will begin to think about redesigning their
payloads as snap-together to-be-assembled-in-orbit modules that could
be shipped up in multiple small-lift missions -- rather than a single
"'all the eggs in one basket" heavy-lift mission. We don't even need
this to recognize that if an RLV engine fails, the craft may yet abort
safely -- but if an ELV engine fails, your $100 million payload sleeps
with the fishes.
In the long run -- that is, about five years from now -- small
RLVs could be in competition with heavy-lift ELVs, and seen as both
the less expensive and less risky alternative. The ELV, like the
socialist utopia which conceived of it, is an idea whose time has
gone.
Joe Schembrie
Robert Clements' letter in the May 22 issue of SpaceViews also
forgets one additional and important point. Interest in developing
RLV's will remain low while it is cheaper to buy insurance for your
spacecraft launch rather than try and develop new, more reliable,
launch capabilities.
The failure of nearly every launcher in the US arsenal in the
past few weeks is going to have a significant impact on the space
insurance market and cause rates to rise. Like the oil shortages in
the 1970s -- which led to the development of lean-burn engines and an
increase interest in new sources of energy -- higher insurance rates
may lead to a new interest in developing new launch capabilities.
Over 36,000 people have involved in prepping the Space Shuttle
for launch, if you can get this down to the same number that look
after Concorde for example (148), significant cost savings could be
made.
Paul Guinnessy
========
This has been the June 1, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 83 (fwd)
Date: Fri, 4 Jun 1999 18:41:53 -0500
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Sent: Friday, June 04, 1999 4:15 PM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 83 (fwd)
Date: Fri, 4 Jun 1999 16:23:20 -0400 (EDT)
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Subject: Space Access Update #83 6/3/99 (fwd)
Reply-To: delta-clipper@world.std.com
Space Access Update #83 6/3/99
Copyright 1999 by Space Access Society
__________________________________________________________________
Stories This Issue
- Congressional Update: So Far, So Good on NASA X-Ops, DOD
Spaceplane Funding
- News Roundup: FAA AST Reentry NPRM Out, NASA STAS Results Out,
Kistler Gets More Financing, Rotary Begins ATV Systems Tests
__________________________________________________________________
Congressional Update
The House NASA Authorization was amended and passed in floor action
in late May; text is available at http://thomas.loc.gov as HR-1654
and Report 106-145. We got what we needed in this bill, additional
money over the next few years, specifically designated for Future-X
tests of low-cost operations, with language urging NASA to avoid
overemphasis on bleeding-edge technology and to give consideration
to the startups. This is short of the explicit small-business
setaside we'd like to see, but it's not bad. Our thanks to everyone
who helped make this happen, with a special tip of the hat to some
who worked very hard indeed.
The Senate NASA Authorization is out of committee but still has not
reached the Senate floor - this version, as we mentioned last week,
adds money for "future planning (space launch)" but it's not clear
yet what that will turn out to be.
Interesting features of the two NASA authorization versions include:
- House defunding of the "Triana" solar-observatory/Earth-view
satellite along partisan lines. We note that numerous activists
were involved in this one and caution that taking sides in such
partisan issues can be counterproductive in the long run. In this
particular case, we further note that much misinformation seems to
have been circulating. Complicating the issue, a story on
spacer.com floated a trial balloon for the idea of trading a
restoral of Triana funding for, of all things, support for Future-X
X-ops funding. We think X-ops can stand on its own merits, but we'd
have no objection to such a trade - we're neutral on Triana. We do
suspect that regardless of whether that particular horse-trade gets
made, Triana funding will end up back in the final budget, given the
combination of Administration and Senate support - some sort of deal
will likely be made.
- Senate capping of Space Station's budget at $2.1 billion per
year. Given the recently revealed overruns and the current crucial
stage of the project, NASA, the White House, and much of the
Congress have reached a consensus that going some half billion per
year over the previously agreed $2 billion/year for the next couple
years is the least bad thing to do. The Senate Commerce Committee
led by Senator McCain do not agree, and inserted the cap in their
version. It is unclear whether this cap would survive on the Senate
floor or in conference with the House, but it's quite clear the
White House won't sign a bill with such a cap. It is quite possible
NASA will once again be operating without a final authorization bill
next year, as it has been (apparently quite happily) for most of
this decade.
It might seem from the previous that our efforts to affect the NASA
Authorizations bill have been a waste, if it likely will never
become signed law. Not so - authorizations in general are
expressions of Congressional intent, and thus can have a useful
effect on both the agency involved and on the appropriators who
actually decide what will be spent, even if the Authorization bill
never does grind through to the end of the process.
Speaking of appropriations... The House NASA Appropriation is we
are told not likely to be considered until September. The Senate
NASA Appropriation may be introduced in committee in June, but also
will not likely hit the Senate floor until September. We may want
to work the Senate appropriators soon - stand by on this one.
Meanwhile, over on the defense budget side, we've had some good
results in both House and Senate DOD Authorizations. The House
added $5 million for Military Spaceplane to the program element
where SMV (Space Maneuver Vehicle, the X-40, closely related to
NASA's X-37) lives, while the Senate added $35 million to be used
specifically for building a second, USAF-version copy of the X-37.
__________________________________________________________________
News Roundup
- FAA AST Reentry NPRM Out
The FAA's Advanced Space Transportation office released a Notice of
Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) dealing with reentry of reusable launch
vehicles at the end of April. An NPRM is one of the last stages
before proposed Federal regulations become final and have the power
of law - after NPRM release, there's a statutory 90-day comment
period (the clock is ticking.) The regulatory agency has to record
and respond to all comments then publish the results before the new
regulations can go into effect - sometimes the comments result in
changes to the NPRM version, sometimes not.
This NPRM, in .pdf format, can be found at:
http://ast.faa.gov/pdf/Nprm4_20_99.pdf
We're still looking it over; so far our only criticism is that the
inspection access provisions seem a bit draconian. Early word from
our friends in the industry is that this NPRM looks OK. But if you
have an interest in the results of this process, read the NPRM for
yourself, and get your comments in to FAA AST before the clock runs
out in late July. Speak now or live with the results.
- NASA Space Transportation Architecture Study (STAS) Results Out
Last year, NASA contracted with a number of aerospace outfits,
established and startup both, to look at what to do about continuing
to meet NASA's manned space transportation needs, IE to continue
supporting the missions currently flown (expensively) by Shuttle.
The recently published STAS results vary from the ultra-conservative
(decades of incremental Shuttle upgrades and rebuilds) to
recommendations for various ultra-advanced Shuttle replacements.
The one we like the most involves developing a Crew Transfer Vehicle
(CTV) to be launched with an in-line cargo carrier on the heavier
versions of the USAF/commercial Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle,
EELV, also known as Delta 4 and Atlas 5. This would be phased in
gradually as a supplement to Shuttle, eventually replacing it.
This would save money over the next couple decades - NASA JSC &
friends *will* fly their six-to-eight missions a year, and a
hundred-million-dollar EELV plus a reusable CTV would have a hard
time costing more than a half-billion dollar Shuttle flight. This
approach to replacing Shuttle would avoid massive up-front
government expense - even NASA would have a hard time spending more
than a billion or two developing a simple CTV, whereas the advanced
Shuttle replacements would require several times that. This would
reduce technical risk - a simple CTV has got to be easier to develop
than some flavor of massive Shuttle-replacement reusable spaceplane.
Most important from our point of view, this approach meets NASA
JSC's needs while avoiding disruption of the commercial launch
market. Privatized Shuttle upgrades or VentureStar-class Shuttle
replacements both have a major problem: They would have significant
capacity beyond NASA requirements that would almost certainly end up
"dumped" at subsidized prices on the commercial market. Government
financed vehicles creaming off the most lucrative core of the launch
market is a show-stopper for potential investors in private low-cost
launch - who in their right mind wants to compete with the
government?
An EELV-launched CTV would conclusively avoid this problem - why
would commercial users pay the extra cost of the CTV when they could
just buy an EELV commercially? Any subsidy that made a CTV/EELV
cheaper to commercial customers than an EELV alone would be far too
obvious to get away with. Reusable launch investors would then face
the much more predictable environment of having to compete with
commercial expendables, and reusable launch ventures could then
succeed or fail on their own merits, rather than being strangled in
the cradle by government-subsidized grabs of the core launch
markets.
The various STAS public results (much is still being held
proprietary) can be seen at:
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codea/codeae/stas_results.html
- Kistler Gets More Financing
First Northrop-Grumman effectively bought into Kistler's two-stage
reusable launcher project, and now a Taiwanese bank has announced a
$50 million additional investment from a consortium of regional
banks. Kistler still doesn't have all the money they need to do
flight tests and proceed to commercial operations, but they're
significantly closer. One curious note in the story we saw
mentioned technology transfers as part of the deal - this seems a
little odd, in the current very restrictive tech-export climate.
- Rotary Begins ATV Systems Tests
Rotary Rocket did the first all-up systems test of their "ATV"
atmosphere test vehicle on May 22nd. The ATV is designed to prove
out both the general Roton configuration and construction, and the
final rotor-borne apporach and landing segment of an operational
Roton mission. The ATV is a full-sized composite structure with
many of the orbital Roton's internal features, but lacking the main
rocket engine. The ATV will take off and climb to 10,000 feet
powered by 300-lb thrust peroxide monopropellant thrusters on the
rotor blade tips, then fly a standard helicopter-style autorotation
descent, with the peroxide thrusters to provide extra maneuvering
margin. The Rotary test pilots have described the challenge as
rather like flying a conventional helicopter with a large load slung
underneath.
The May 22nd test saw the vehicle rolled out and tied down solidly
to the ground; then the rotors were spun up using the tip jets. A
rotor RPM sensor failed and the system was shut down, ending the
test. According to a Rotary press release, all-up ground tests will
resume once the rotor systems have been thoroughly inspected and if
necessary repaired. Once successful full-duration ground systems
tests have been completed, the ATV will begin flight test. Non-
rotor systems test are meanwhile going forward.
In other Rotary news, rumors are circulating that Rotary is looking
at a lower-cost alternative to the Russian engine baselined for
their suborbital PTV-1 test vehicle. Maximum performance is not
vital in this application, while development money is tight - a few
million here, a few million there, soon it adds up to real money...
That's all for this issue!
__________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society's sole purpose is to promote radical reductions
in the cost of reaching space. You may redistribute this Update in
any medium you choose, as long as you do it unedited and in its
entirety.
__________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society
http://www.space-access.org
space.access@space-access.org
"Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere in the Solar System"
- Robert A. Heinlein
From VM Tue Jun 8 10:26:38 1999
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From: Mike Cross <mikec@cyberportal.net>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: starship-design: silly question
Date: Tue, 8 Jun 1999 08:35:17 -0400 (EDT)
Hi, I've been lruking on this list for about 18 months now, and I really
enjoy reading what you all post.
I have a question that has been bugging me, and you guys seem like the
best people to ask on the matter. I know it's just some simple physics,
but I'm horrible at these things.
So here goes-
If you had a rock floating in space, and another rock 1 light year away,
and a pole in between the two, and assuming you were strong enough to move
the pole (strong being all the mass and strength and everything I dont
account for that would keep the rocks from moving apart when you push the
pole) would it take one year for the pole to move on the receiving rock,
or would it be instantaneous?
I think it would take a year, but my friend thinks it would be instant.
Of course, the answer is probably something like 'it's impossible to move
a pole that big', but I thought I would find out instead of wonder about
it.
Thanks!
--mike cross
mikec@cyberportal.net
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["1897" "Tuesday" "8" "June" "1999" "14:50:49" "+0200" "Zenon Kulpa" "zkulpa@zmit1.ippt.gov.pl" nil "43" "Re: starship-design: silly question" "^From:" nil nil "6" nil nil nil nil nil]
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From: Zenon Kulpa <zkulpa@zmit1.ippt.gov.pl>
Sender: owner-starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu, mikec@cyberportal.net
Cc: zkulpa@zmit1.ippt.gov.pl
Subject: Re: starship-design: silly question
Date: Tue, 8 Jun 1999 14:50:49 +0200 (MET DST)
> From: Mike Cross <mikec@cyberportal.net>
>
> Hi, I've been lruking on this list for about 18 months now, and I really
> enjoy reading what you all post.
>
> I have a question that has been bugging me, and you guys seem like the
> best people to ask on the matter. I know it's just some simple physics,
> but I'm horrible at these things.
>
> So here goes-
>
> If you had a rock floating in space, and another rock 1 light year away,
> and a pole in between the two, and assuming you were strong enough to move
> the pole (strong being all the mass and strength and everything I dont
> account for that would keep the rocks from moving apart when you push the
> pole) would it take one year for the pole to move on the receiving rock,
> or would it be instantaneous?
>
> I think it would take a year, but my friend thinks it would be instant.
> Of course, the answer is probably something like 'it's impossible to move
> a pole that big', but I thought I would find out instead of wonder about
> it.
>
It will take much more than a year - it has nothing
to do with relativity, speed of light, etc.,
it simply follows from quite classical physics.
The disturbance caused by the push at one end
will move along the pole with the speed of sound
in the material of the pole, very much smaller than
the speed of light, and different for different materials
(depending on the so-called Young modulus, measuring the
stiffness of the material).
You can test it youeself easily, making your "pole" from something
with very small stiffness (e.g. a long, helical spring of wire),
push (or better in this case, pull) one end and observe,
when the other end jerks...
It would be instantaneous (within classical physics)
if the pole was made from an "absolutely stiff" material,
but such materials do not exist (that they can't,
follows, however, only from quantum relativity...).
-- Zenon Kulpa
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 8
Date: Thu, 10 Jun 1999 07:28:06 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-spaceviews@wayback.com [mailto:owner-spaceviews@wayback.com]
On Behalf Of jeff@spaceviews.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 08, 1999 8:06 AM
Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 8
[ SpaceViews (tm) newsletter ]
[ see end of message for our NEW address to subscribe / unsubscribe ]
S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.06.08
1999 June 8
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/0608/
*** News ***
Shuttle Completes ISS Mission
Current Mir Crew to Be the Last
NASA Confirms Plans for Lunar Prospector Crash
Power Glitch Cause of WIRE Satellite Failure
Roton Tests Proceed Slowly
Complex Europan Life Unlikely
NEO Searches Require Funding, Cooperation
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** Articles ***
Space in the Next Millennium: The 1999 International Space
Development Conference
** NSS News ***
Upcoming Boston NSS Events
*** News ***
Shuttle Completes ISS Mission
The space shuttle Discovery landed at the Kennedy Space
Center, Florida, early Sunday, June 6, bringing to a successful end
the first resupply mission to the International Space Station.
The shuttle touched down at the Kennedy Space Center's
Shuttle Landing Facility at 2:03 am EDT (0603 UT), ending the nine
day, 19 hour STS-96 mission. The night landing, only the 11th in the
shuttle program's history, went smoothly.
The landing came less than 24 hours after the shuttle
completed the last major task of the mission. In the early morning
hours of Saturday, June 5, the shuttle deployed the small educational
STARSHINE satellite from Discovery's cargo bay.
Although the satellite is only a little larger than a
basketball, the 900 mirrors on its surface will reflect sunlight and
allow students on Earth to track the satellite. The satellite was
already widely observed in eastern North America just after its
deployment, as it flew in formation with the shuttle and ISS.
The shuttle undocked from ISS at 6:39 pm EDT (2239 UT)
Thursday, June 3, a little more than twelve hours after the
seven-person shuttle crew closed the hatches separating the shuttle
with the ISS's Unity module.
After the hatches were sealed, the shuttle used its thrusters
to raise the orbit of itself and the ISS by about 10 km (6 mi.), to
an altitude of 397 km (246 mi.) NASA estimates that ISS's orbit will
slowly delay to an altitude of 358 km (222 mi.) by the time Zvezda,
the Russian-built Service Module, is launched by the end of the year.
The undocking brought to a successful close the first shuttle
logistics mission to ISS. While the two spacecraft were docked the
crew of STS-96 transferred over 1,620 kg (3,565 lbs.) of material to
the station, including water, clothes, food, and computers. Shuttle
astronauts Tamara Jernigan and Daniel Barry also mounted an
additional 300 kg (660 lbs.) of equipment to the exterior of the
station during their eight hour spacewalk May 29-30.
The next shuttle mission will be the long-delayed launch of
the shuttle Columbia on mission STS-93 to deploy the Chandra X-Ray
Observatory. Shuttle program managers have tentatively set a July 22
launch date for the five-day mission, although that date is still
under review.
The next shuttle mission to the International Space Station
will likely not take place until the end of the year, when the
shuttle Atlantis launches on STS-101. That launch will not take
place until the Russians launch Zvezda. That launch may take place
as soon as September but is not expected until at least November.
Current Mir Crew to Be the Last
The three-man crew currently aboard the Russian space station
Mir will be the last to occupy the station and will leave the
orbiting facility in August, Russian Space Agency officials announced
Tuesday, June 1.
Mir will remain in orbit unoccupied after the crew's
departure until it is deorbited in early 2000, barring a last-minute
infusion of private funds, officials said.
The announcement was an acknowledgment by Russian officials
that efforts to raise private funding to keep the station in orbit
have failed and that the Russian government is unwilling to continue
funding the station beyond August.
"We can't keep the station aloft, because we have no money,"
RSA spokesman Sergei Gorbunov told Russian television. The Russian
government has been under American pressure to devote its limited
funds to the International Space Station.
Under the current plan, the three-man crew on Mir --
commander Viktor Afansayev, flight engineer Sergei Avdeyev, and
French guest cosmonaut Jean-Pierre Haignere -- will remain on Mir as
previously planned until August, then return to Earth. Before
leaving, they will install a new flight computer on the station that
will allow it to be more reliably controlled from the ground.
Rather than deorbiting the station immediately after the
crew's departure, controllers will allow Mir's orbit to slowly decay
until it can be deorbited in early 2000. The delay will allow
Energia, the company that operates Mir for the Russian Space Agency,
to make one final effort to raise funds to keep operating the
station.
Energia had made several efforts to raise funding from
private foreign sources, but those efforts fell through. Most
recently, Energia claimed that British businessman Peter Llewellyn
would pay or raise $100 million to fly to Mir in August. However,
Llewellyn apparently did not raise the money and he was dismissed
from cosmonaut training last month for reportedly being too tall to
safely fit in a Soyuz capsule.
"This station is unique and it can continue serving Russia
for quite a long time," Gorbunov said. "All cosmonauts agree that
it's a great pity to abandon it."
NASA Confirms Plans for Lunar Prospector Crash
Lunar Prospector's mission will come to an end in late July
when the spacecraft is deliberately crashed into a lunar crater in an
effort to observe water ice, NASA confirmed Tuesday, June 2.
Lunar Prospector, whose extended mission was set to end this
summer, will be targeted for an impact in a permanently-shadowed
region of the crater Mawson, near the lunar south pole, on July 31.
Scientists hope the impact will throw up a plume of material,
including water ice, that will be visible from telescopes on Earth.
Based on estimated concentrations of water ice in that region, up to
18 kg (40 lbs.) of water or byproducts like hydroxyl ions will be
thrown into the plume.
The plume, which will last only a few minutes, will be
observed by the Hubble Space Telescope, the McDonald Observatory in
Texas, and potentially other observatories, such as the powerful Keck
telescope. Water molecules may also be detected in the Moon's very
tenuous atmosphere for several hours after the impact.
The odds of detecting any water are thought to be rather low,
based on the limited energy of impact from the small spacecraft to
uncertainty on the impact location. However, with Lunar Prospector
set to crash into the surface anyway at the end of its mission, NASA
officials and outside scientists agreed the deliberate impact would
be a good test.
"While the probability of success for such a bold undertaking
is low, the potential science payoff is tremendous," Gunter Riegler
of NASA's Office of Space Science said. "Since the implementation
costs are minimal and the mission is scheduled to end anyway, it
seems fitting to give Lunar Prospector the chance to provide
scientific data right up to the very end of its highly successful
mission."
The impact was first suggested by David Goldstein, an
aerospace engineering professor at the University of Texas, and was
later peer-reviewed by a scientific panel. While defending the
experiment, Goldstein notes that the impact is a "long-shot
experiment," with about a 10 percent chance of success.
Lunar Prospector has indirectly detected the existence of
water ice on the Moon through its neutron spectrometer. The
spectrometer detects hydrogen, which scientists then infer to be
water based on the observed concentrations and locations. "A
positive spectral detection of water vapor or its photo-dissociated
byproduct, OH [hydroxyl], would provide definite proof of the
presence of water ice in the lunar regolith," Goldstein said.
The impact would not be the first time the demise of a
spacecraft has been used for scientific purposes. At the end of its
Venus-mapping mission, the Magellan spacecraft dipped into the
planet's dense atmosphere to test aerobraking techniques using the
spacecraft's solar panels. The results of these tests have been used
on later missions, like Mars Global Surveyor, that have used
aerobraking to change their orbits.
Power Glitch Cause of WIRE Satellite Failure
A brief power glitch in a minor electronic component is
believed to be the cause of the failure of a $80-million NASA science
satellite, investigators reported Friday, June 4.
A board of investigation at Utah State University (USU),
where the instrument for the Wide-Field Infrared Explorer (WIRE)
satellite was built, concluded that a power surge in a $2,000
integrated circuit led to the failure of the mission in March.
Engineers at USU's Space Dynamics Laboratory (SDL) found that
the telescope experienced a power surge lasting just 1/40th of a
second when it was first turned on. The surge was powerful enough,
however, to prematurely blow the explosive bolts on a sunshade used
to protect the cryostat, a container of solid hydrogen that cools
WIRE's instruments.
With the sunshade gone, the solid hydrogen began to sublimate
and vent out of the spacecraft, spinning the spacecraft up. By the
time spacecraft engineers were able to bring WIRE's attitude back
under control all the hydrogen had been lost, effectively ending
WIRE's planned scientific mission.
The power surge was an undocumented feature of the circuit
not seen in tests, USU/SDL officials said. "The circuit that caused
the problem is very commonly used. We've used it many times before
and it hasn't been a problem in systems for computing and other
tasks," WIRE program manager Harry Ames said. "The anomaly occurs so
intermittently and fast that it went undetected during multiple tests
at SDL, and Goddard Space Flight Center before the launch."
However, Ames and his lab did not shirk responsibility for
the failure. "As the program manager and an SDL executive, I don't
believe SDL should rely on anyone else ensuring that we're doing our
job correctly," he told the Salt Lake Tribune. "In that respect, I
personally accept accountability and responsibility for this
failure."
Ames said the lab will bolster its parts selection and review
process to reduce the chance of a similar problem cropping up on a
future mission.
The USU report is not the final word on the failure of the
WIRE mission, which was to perform observations at long infrared
wavelengths of everything from nearby asteroids to distant galaxies.
A NASA report is expected later this year.
While the loss of the hydrogen prevented the spacecraft from
carrying out its scientific mission, the rest of the spacecraft is
now working well, engineers report. WIRE is now being used to study
ways to control and maneuver satellites.
Roton Tests Proceed Slowly
The first prototype of Rotary Rocket's Roton reusable launch
vehicle (RLV) has yet to make its first flight test as ground tests
continue, three months after its rollout, the company reported this
week.
When the Roton Atmospheric Test Vehicle (ATV) was rolled out
to the public in a ceremony March 1, plans called for the first
low-level atmospheric flight tests within several weeks. However,
according to a May 31 Rotary Rocket press release, the company did
not begin full ground testing of the ATV until early May.
Those ground tests, which verified the ATV's rotors and other
vehicle systems, led to an "all-up" ground test on May 22, with a
two-person crew in the ATV performing a limited test of the vehicle,
which was tied down to prevent it from taking off. That test ended
prematurely when a sensor in the rotor failed.
Company engineers are now making unspecified inspections and
checks to the ATV before performing another tie-down test. A series
of tie-down tests, which will conclude with a full-throttle test of
the rotor, will precede an actual flight test.
The ATV is designed to test the low-level, low-speed flight
characteristics of the Roton RLV. The ATV lacks the rocket engines
that will be used to propel the Roton into orbit, but does have the
rotor system, including small rocket thrusters on the tips of the
rotors, that will be used to land the vehicle like a helicopter.
Fundraising, a major hurdle for most launch vehicle
start-ups, has not slowed down testing of the Roton ATV, company
officials said. "While space funding clearly represents a bigger
challenge than space technology to RRC and the other nascent space
companies," said Geoffrey Hughes, vice president of sales and
marketing for Rotary, "we have more than enough funding in-hand to
complete the flight test program and continue on."
Complex Europan Life Unlikely
Future spacecraft missions to Europa may uncover simple life
forms swimming in the Jovian moon's subsurface oceans, but are
unlikely to find more complex life, Caltech scientists reported last
week.
In a paper published in the June 4 issue of the journal
Science, a team of Caltech geobiologists concluded that Europa lacks
the heat sources needed to provide the energy required for the
development of complex multicellular life.
Unlike the Earth, where sunlight is the most significant
source of energy for life, even those living deep in the ocean, life
on Europa would have to rely on the heat generated by the moon's
core, as the moon's ice crust would prevent sunlight from reaching
the underground ocean.
"One must be careful when doing comparative planetology,"
said Eric Gaidos, lead author of the paper. "It is not a safe
assumption to use Earth as an analogy. A liquid-water ocean on Europa
does not necessarily mean there is life there."
The energy available in the assumed Europan oceans would be
enough to support simple, single-celled life forms, Gaidos and
colleagues believe, but would hinder the evolution of more complex
lifeforms that require additional energy sources.
Alternative energy sources for Europan life forms do exist,
Gaidos notes, such as the possibility of deriving energy from
oxidized iron -- rust -- that may be found in the ocean. "But we are
talking about very simple organisms that can live on these energy
sources," Gaidos said. "These are not multicellular creatures."
Any spacecraft mission that would be able to detect life of
any kind in Europa is still many years in the future. NASA is
currently planning Europa Orbiter spacecraft for launch in 2003 that
would go into orbit around the moon three to five years later. It
would be able to measure the thickness of the ice crust and discern
any subsurface ocean, but would not be able to directly detect life.
NASA has informally discussed follow-on missions to Europa
Orbiter that would land on and/or penetrate the ice crust, including
submersibles that would navigate within the Europan ocean.
Additional planning has taken place outside NASA, from a group at
Cornell University to an Internet-based group that has discussed the
basics of such a mission.
NEO Searches Require Funding, Cooperation
Astronomers involved in the search for near-Earth objects
(NEOs) stressed the need at an Italian conference last week for
greater funding and international cooperation to improve their
searches.
Scientists attending the International Monitoring Programs
for Asteroid and Comet Threat (IMPACT) conference in Torino, Italy,
representing a large fraction of the NEO science community, worked on
a number of recommendations to pass on to the International
Astronomical Union.
Key among the recommendations generated by scientists was the
need for greater cooperation among the various national research
programs to look for NEOs. Participants called for the creation of
national "Spaceguard" centers that would work together with the
international Spaceguard Foundation to coordinate searches and
follow-up efforts.
Such cooperation is seen as necessary as the number of NEO
search programs grows. However, even with all the new programs, it
is uncertain whether they will be able to reach Spaceguard's goal of
detecting 90 percent of all NEO's more than 1 km (0.6 mi.) in
diameter in the next ten years. In addition, followup observing
programs, as well as efforts to observe smaller objects, will require
more and larger telescopes.
Participants also made recommendations on the best way to
communicate reports of potentially hazardous objects, including the
use of a "hazard scale" to more effectively describe the risk of
impact by an NEO. The specifics of those recommendations will be
finalized later this summer.
Conference members also called on more efforts devoted to
followup searches and compositional studies of asteroids to determine
their true nature (although such studies will require the use of
large telescopes) as well as new search programs based in the
Southern Hemisphere.
The final recommendations from the IMPACT conference will be
passed on to the IAU and published in July or August.
SpaceViews Event Horizon
June 8 Delta 2 launch of four Globalstar satellites from
Cape Canaveral, Florida at 10:22 am EDT (1422 UT)
June 12 Proton launch of Russian Raduga comsat (and initial
flight of the Breeze-M upper stage) from Baikonur,
Kazakhstan.
June 16 Proton/Blok DM flight of Astra-1H comsat at 8:48 pm
EDT (0048 UT June 17) from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.
June 18 Titan 2 launch of the NASA Quikscat Earth science
satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base,
California, at 10:15 pm EDT (0215 UT June 19)
June 23-24 First U.S. Space Tourism Conference, Washington, DC
June 26 (NET) Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
June TBD Long March 2C/SD launch of two Iridium satellites
from Taiyuan, China
July 15-16 Lunar Base Development Symposium, League City, TX
Other News
Iridium Extension: Iridium has gained an extra month, until the end
of June, to restructure its finances and avoid a possible bankruptcy
of the first global satellite phone company. he financially-troubled
company had faced a May 31 deadline to deal with $800 million in
loans due to various creditors. The extension gives the company more
time to restructure the debt in a manner agreeable to both creditors
and investors. Under terms of an agreement made with creditors
earlier this year, the company was to have at least 27,000 customers
by the end of May. However, by the end of March, the latest data
available, the company had barely 10,000 phone and pager customers,
with a growth rate too small to allow the company to reach its goals.
Mars Microbes: Scientists at the University of Arkansas have
succeeded in growing one kind of microbes in conditions similar to
those on the surface of Mars. Biologist Tim Kral tested how
methanogens, microbes that exhale methane and can exist in harsh
conditions on the Earth, grow in an atmosphere of carbon dioxide,
hydrogen, and water. To simulate Martian soil they used ash from an
Hawaiian volcano, whose composition is similar to what has been seen
on Mars. Kral found that the microbes continued to live in the harsh
Mars-like environment, based on emissions of methane. Even when the
amount of water was decreased to nearly zero the microbes continued
to thrive. Other potentially-hazardous aspects of the Martian
environment, including oxidizing soil chemistry and ultraviolet
radiation, were not included in the test.
Rotary/ASR Agreement: Applied Space Resources (ASR) has signed a
letter of intent with Rotary Rocket Company to launch its Lunar
Retriever I spacecraft on Rotary's Roton launch vehicle, ASR company
officials report. The five-year letter, beginning in 2002, sets a
fixed price for the launch that was not announced. Lunar Retriever I
is planned as a mission that will return over 10 kg (22 lbs.) of
lunar samples to the Earth for use by scientists as well as for
commercial sale.
Mars Plane Work Begins: NASA is beginning in-house development of an
airplane that will fly on Mars in 2003, Space News reported in its
June 7 issue. The Langley Research Center will develop the aircraft,
rather than private industry, as the space agency sees this as a
technology development project that could aid future missions. The
exact design of the aircraft is still being debated, with a number of
different designs being considered. Engineers will work closely with
scientists to maximize the limited payload for scientific instruments
on the vehicle, which will be no more than a few kilograms.
TransHab Debate: Strong words are being exchanged in the space
activist community about the fate of TransHab, an inflatable module
that could be used on ISS and Mars missions, but whose funding was
prohibited in the NASA authorization bill passed by the House of
Representatives last month. Mars Society president Robert Zubrin
claimed in an editorial in Space News (reprinted as a Mars Society
alert) that Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) opposes TransHab because he
opposed manned missions to Mars. Not so, say others, including Keith
Cowing of NASA Watch, who notes that Rohrabacher's opposition to
TransHab has noting to do with Mars. Rather, Rohrabacher favors
commercial development and procurement of ISS modules, rather than a
NASA-developed TransHab.
Briefly: Watch out, John Glenn, someone may be gunning for your
title of oldest man to fly in space. The Xinhua news agency reports
that 80-year-old Yang Jiaxi, a renown Chinese aerospace engineer,
would like to fly in space on one of the first manned Chinese
launches, which may take place as soon as late this year... The space
history community is mourning the death of Maxim Tarasenko, a young
Russian space history scholar who died in a traffic accident last
month. To financially help Tarasenko's wife and two children,
American space historian James Harford has created a memorial fund.
Checks made out to the "James Harford-Tarasenko Account" can be
mailed to Harford at 601 Lake Drive, Princeton, NJ 08540. Over
$3,000 has been raised to date.
*** Articles ***
Space in the Next Millennium:
The 1999 International Space Development Conference
by Jeff Foust
Participants at the 1999 International Space Development
Conference (ISDC) last month had an opportunity to both honor the
past of space exploration and get a glimpse at what the future of
space exploration and development holds.
Several hundred space enthusiasts attended the 1999 ISDC,
held May 27-31 in Houston. At a meeting that fortuitously coincided
with the STS-96 shuttle mission, attendees learned about everything
from the past of space exploration to cutting-edge technologies and
commercial endeavors that may open the space frontier for everyone.
Remembering "The Forgotten Apollo"
The 1999 ISDC was held almost exactly 30 years to the day
since the Apollo 10 mission, the "dress rehearsal" for the successful
Apollo 11 landing two months later. All three Apollo 10 astronauts
-- Gene Cernan, Tom Stafford, and John Young -- were in attendance at
a gala dinner May 28 to honor the anniversary.
"Apollo 10 is sort of the forgotten flight of Apollo," noted
Cernan in an emotional address towards the end of the evening, when
he shared the podium with Stafford.
Cernan called on NASA to involve younger generations,
including teenagers, into the space program. "If we can send a
77-year-old into space, why can't we send a 17-year-old?" he asked,
saying that such a flight would give kids a greater "ownership" of
space.
Young, who spoke earlier in the evening before returning to
Johnson Space Center to monitor the ongoing shuttle mission, looked
instead at the future, including sending humans back to the Moon and
on to Mars. "It will happen," he confidently said. "We'll make it
happen."
To make it happen, though, Young said we need to better
educate the public on the importance of such missions. "The only
'war' we have to be successful on is the war on ignorance," he said.
Life on Mars: An Update
Everett Gibson, a leading member of the team of scientists at
the Johnson Space Center who announced evidence of possible past life
in Martian meteorite ALH 84001 nearly three years ago, provided an
update on their team's research.
Gibson said that despite repeated challenges to their
conclusions, their initial conclusions are still valid. "All four
legs [aspects of their work that support their conclusions] are
standing today, and are standing stronger," he claimed.
Gibson said initial claims by other researches on a variety
of fronts, including reports of terrestrial contamination, high
temperature formation of carbonates, and the small size of the
nanofossils and magnetite crystals, have upon further scrutiny ended
up supporting claims that the meteorite supports evidence of past
Martian life.
Gibson also discussed new evidence from two other Martian
meteorites, Nakhla and Shergotty, which also show evidence of
primitive Martian life. Nakhla, in particular, shows evidence of
nanofossils and "biofilms" of organic material, and the isotopic
rations seen there are consistent with a biogenic origin.
The new findings lend support to the belief that life on Mars
exists today: while ALH 84001 is 4 billion years old, Nakhla is just
1.3 billion years old and Shergotty a mere 165 million years old.
"There have been no major events in the last 165 million years to
keep life on Mars from surviving to this day," Gibson said.
New Paths for Commercial Space
While some focused on the past and present of space
exploration, one track of the conference was devoted to plans for
commercial development of space, including some relatively
unconventional paths to space development.
Given the lack of low-cost access to space currently, it
might seem premature to consider developing space hotels. However,
Greg Bennett of Bigelow Aerospace -- a new division of the Bigelow
Development Company, owners of the Budget hotel chain -- said that's
precisely what his company is currently planning.
We're just now beginning to see the "seeds of space tourism",
he said, but tourism worldwide is the sending largest export industry
in the world, behind only oil. He said that billion-dollar luxury
cruise ships are being built every year, and filling up just as
rapidly, indicating the growing market for tourism.
Bigelow is looking at plans to build the space equivalent of
such cruise liners, such as a ship that could carry 150 people on a
6-day round trip to the Moon. Bennett said that while the company is
just starting up, its plans are well past the stage of "just an
idea."
Although the conventional notion of commercial space involves
the development of spacecraft or launch vehicles, Charles Chafer of
Encounter 2001 discussed that there may be far easier ways to make
money and involve a larger portion of the market.
Encounter 2001 is developing a spacecraft to be launched in
late 2001 that will carry the records of up to 4.5 million people,
who will pay $50 each to fly a personal message and a sample of their
DNA into interstellar space.
By marketing to a far larger audience than the typical "space
geek" community, and by eschewing investment capital, "we're not
perceived as a commercial space company," Chafer said.
The company also recently completed a project called the
Cosmic Call, where people paid $15 each to transmit a brief personal
message to four Sunlike stars 51 to 71 light-years from Earth.
Chafer said 45,000 messages were sent in this transmission, with two
more planned in early 2000 and 2001.
"That ain't something you do in a typical space geek
approach," Chafer said.
The company is ahead of projections on sales for its
Millennial Voyage spacecraft, and has signed a contract with
AeroAstro to build the spacecraft. Chafer said the company is
willing to work with NASA to fly scientific payloads on the
spacecraft, which will launch as a secondary payload on an Ariane 5.
Cities, in addition to state and federal governments, may
also have a role in promoting commercial space, noted Rob Todd, a
Houston city council member whose district includes the Johnson Space
Center. A city the size of Houston has over $1 billion in pension
funds to invest, he notes, some of which can be used to support local
aerospace startups.
"Even if 9 of 10 fail, the one that succeeds can more than
make up the difference," Todd said. City governments can also
provide mentoring and small business support services, he noted, as
well as create "incubators" for startups, such as one he has proposed
for Houston's Ellington Field.
States are also playing a role in the scramble to propose
spaceports for VentureStar and other reusable launch vehicles,
according to former Apollo astronaut Walt Cunningham, who leads the
Texas Aerospace Commission. He said that 18-20 states have submitted
proposals for spaceports, but "some make more sense than others."
In Texas along, Cunningham said, there have been 13 proposals
submitted, although those have been self-selected down to three, one
in Pecos County in west Texas and two in eastern Texas. Both Kistler
and Space Access have expressed an interest in these sites, in
addition to Lockheed Martin's VentureStar.
NSS Awards
The National Space Society handed out a number of awards in
its annual awards ceremony, emceed this year by actor Bruce
Boxleitner (Captain/President Sheridan of "Babylon 5" fame), a member
of the NSS Board of Governors.
Space Pioneer Awards went to former NSS president Charlie
Walker for Activist of the Year; actor Tom Hanks for Mass Media; and
former astronaut and senator John Glenn for "Wide Media". In
addition, NSS gave the biannual von Braun award to Robert Seamans Jr.
for his work on the Apollo program. None of the award recipients
were present, but Seamans did provide a videotaped acceptance.
Chapter excellence awards were given to Oregon L5 for its
research into the use of lava tubes as potential lunar habitats, and
Wichita NSS for its numerous educational outreach and other
activities. Other chapters earning awards included Boston NSS,
OASIS, Western Spaceport, NSS Atlanta, Austin Space Frontier Society,
Orange County Space Society, and the Milwaukee Lunar Reclamation
Society. The U.S. Air Force Academy chapter was recognized as the
most promising new chapter.
The ISDC will move out west for the next few years, with the
2000 conference to be held in Tucson, Arizona, while the 2001 meeting
will take place in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
*** NSS News ***
Upcoming Boston NSS Events
Thursday, June 10, 7:30pm
"There's 'Real Science' on Gore-Sat:
The Triana Satellite Plasma-Mag Solar-Weather Instrument"
by Dr. Alan J. Lazarus, MIT Space Plasma Group
Dr. Lazarus will discuss The Triana Satellite "Faraday cup,"
a sun-viewing instrument to measure the solar wind at the L1 orbit
and how to use this data to detect Solar flares.
The AP reports: "Solar flares may add to Y2K trouble, Expect
energetic January sun."
Can we provide rapid warning of solar flares and other
extreme solar events to allow utility companies and satellite
operators timely and effective warning?
Triana carries a sun-viewing instrument to measure the solar
wind (Faraday cup) and a magnetometer, the data can be used to
provide early warning of solar events that might cause damage to
various electrical devices (e.g., power generation, communications,
and satellites).
Meetings of the Boston chapter of the National Space Society
are held in the 8th floor "playoom" of the Laboratory of Computer
Science, 545 Main Street (Tech Square), in Cambridge. The building is
located just past the railroad tracks on Main Street, near the
intersection with Vassar/Fulkerson Street. Free parking is available
in the parking lot adjoining the building. By T, take the Red Line to
the Kendall/MIT stop, then walk up Main Street (away from Boston)
about three blocks to the building.
More information is available at
http://www.spaceviews.com/boston/ .
========
This has been the June 8, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
SpaceViews is also available on the World Wide web from the
SpaceViews home page:
http://www.spaceviews.com/
or via anonymous FTP from ftp.seds.org:
ftp://ftp.seds.org/pub/info/newsletters/spaceviews/text/19990608.txt
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jeff@spaceviews.com
For questions about the SpaceViews mailing list, please contact
spaceviews-approval@spaceviews.com.
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: space.com
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Humm. Interesting player for this interest.
http://www.space.com/
=3D=3D=3DDobbs said in an interview that it became impossible for
him to stay at CNN once he "moved from a passive
investor in Space.com to wanting to do something more,
to be active in its creation. I truly believe space is the
biggest story of this century and the next, and I really
wanted to be part of it."
Andy Serwer, Fortune's editor-at-large, said that Dobbs
"personified CNNfn and business news. He's a giant of
the field. Before there was CNBC, there was Lou
Dobbs."
Dobbs has privately maintained that he is not quitting
because of the difficulties with other CNN executives,
and he said last night that the decision comes with
"some pain for all the blood and sweat I put into this
place."
The soon-to-be-launched venture, backed by Venrock
Associates, a major investment firm founded by the
Rockefeller family, will feature space news, space
fiction, live feeds, science and business content, and
educational material for children. Dobbs said he hopes
to take the company public, which could bring him many
millions of dollars if the market for Internet stock
offerings stays hot.
Dobbs, 53, a close friend of CNN founder Ted Turner,
was the driving force behind the creation of
three-year-old CNNfn, which reaches just 11 million
homes and lags well behind industry leader CNBC,
which reaches about 75 million. But "Moneyline," which
is carried on the main CNN network and recently
expanded to an hour of general and business news,
remains an important force on Wall Street.
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: physics meets SF
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New artical on FTL theories.
Kelly
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http://www.eurekalert.org/releases/ns-frl060899.html
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Subject: starship-design: The Grand Challenge: A New Plasma Thruster
Date: Sat, 12 Jun 1999 20:10:28 -0500
The Grand Challenge: A New Plasma Thruster
Samuel A. Cohen and Michael A. Paluszek
Manned Mars mission. The top plot shows total vehicle mass including the
100,000-kilogram payload. The second plot shows the maneuver duration and
the bottom plot shows the thrust generated by the thruster. The minimum
mission duration is obtained with a specific impulse near 3000 seconds.
Other figures referenced in text can be found in the print version of
Launchspace Magazine.
Visionary leaders at NASA have set "Grand Challenge" goals for America's
space program. Among the ambitious candidate missions are comprehensive
explorations of the solar system and manned ventures to remote planets. For
these types of missions to be practicable, rocket engines are required to
have larger exhaust velocities, greater efficiencies and more reliability
than those currently available. A novel plasma thruster design offers great
promise for providing these revolutionary advances in propulsion technology.
Advanced electric propulsion systems, both ion and plasma thrusters, have
been developed over recent years because of their high propellant exhaust
velocity, ue. The presently available high-ue systems, however, produce too
low a thrust for many of the Grand Challenge missions. Here, we describe
technical features that make a new plasma thruster design a revolutionary
step beyond the existing systems and able to provide a propulsion method
scaleable to more demanding Grand Challenge missions.
The primary innovative technical features are the wave-heating mode,
thrust-generation mechanism and the technique for decoupling the exhaust
plume from the engine. These are predicted to result in more than an
order-of-magnitude increase in thrust, while also significantly extending
specific impulse, Isp = ue /g (where g is the gravitational acceleration,
9.8 m2/s), thruster life and reliability.
Electromagnetic waves heat a fully ionized gas that is confined by a
super-conducting magnetic coil and expelled through a magnetic nozzle. The
novel nozzle in this design is a constriction in the plasma flow channel set
by shaping (tapering) the magnetic field rather than a material surface.
Magnetic fields strongly inhibit charged particle motion perpendicular to
them while allowing easy flow parallel to the field lines. This reduces
plasma contact with nearby materials, considerably extending their lifetime.
Plasma expanding through the magnetic nozzle is accelerated to supersonic
speed by a strong electric field that develops in the nozzle. In the
expansion process, plasma cooling occurs; if sufficiently rapid, the plasma
will recombine into a supersonic stream of neutral gas. Neutral particles
are free of the magnetic force. Proper shaping of the magnetic nozzle
subsequent to the recombination zone will generate a small angle exhaust
plume, increasing thrust efficiency. This propulsion concept can lead to
high-thrust, high-specific-impulse propulsion systems that could grow in
capability over a 40-year period. A fusion power reactor could be
incorporated as the direct-drive power source, if scientists are able to
produce a working fusion reactor.
Before describing these technical features in more detail, we give a
comparison of the parameters of this novel thruster with existing electric
propulsion methods. Figure 2 shows the thrust, T, and specific impulse, Isp,
of various electric propulsion methods, including the proposed wave-heated
thruster (WHT).
In terms of thrust and power capability, the closest competitor to the WHT
is the Magnetoplasmadynamic (MPD) thruster. In MPD thrusters, strong
currents flow between electrodes in the plasma. The most promising fuel for
MPD thrusters is lithium. However, lithium presents a contamination problem
to the rest of the spacecraft. Even though lithium is the best of all fuels
in this regard, plasma contact with the electrodes causes them to degrade,
limiting the thruster lifetime and mission duration. Hall thrusters, now
used on satellites, have somewhat less severe electrode degradation but
produce lower thrust. These two configurations use magnetic fields to
increase the plasma density. Their magnetic fields are oriented
perpendicular to the plasma exhaust; electrical currents are driven along
the magnetic field, between electrodes, to heat and accelerate the plasma.
This is a surface power input method, a major difference from the WHT and
one reason why these thrusters are difficult to scale to the higher powers
needed for certain Grand Challenge missions.
In the WHT, plasma flow and thrust are generated by the plasma pressure
gradient parallel to the magnetic field. There are no electrodes in contact
with plasma to degrade. The magnetic field forms an insulating barrier
between the plasma and the surrounding material surfaces. (The "thermal
insulation" provided by this magnetic field shape exceeds that of
Styrofoam.) The WHT can potentially produce higher thrust/specific impulse
products than the other systems on the graph, to a large degree, because of
the high densities achievable with the confinement properties of the
specific magnetic field configuration of the method, a wave-heated magnetic
mirror configuration.
Maximizing Thrust
Many wave-heated plasma systems have operated with similar magnetic geometry
to that in the WHT. None has employed a feature essential for space
propulsion applications: a method for decoupling the plasma exhaust from the
magnetic field. Without this feature, plasma expelled from the rear of the
spacecraft will follow magnetic field lines back to the nose of the
spacecraft, counterbalancing the thrust. In this specific WHT design, the
decoupling is achieved by causing plasma cooling and recombination - ions
combining with electrons to produce neutral atoms - in the expansion zone of
the magnetic nozzle. Other decoupling methods may be possible, such as
asymmetric magnetic nozzles, but analyses of these predict lower
efficiencies in converting input energy into thrust.
The main advantages of the WHT are: higher power capability, because of
volumetric heating; higher plasma density, because of better plasma
confinement produced by the magnetic geometry; and ability to use a magnetic
nozzle for plasma cooling and recombination, because of the linear
magnetic-field geometry.
An important consideration for Grand Challenge missions is the power
available to the thruster. Large thrust and high specific impulse require
high power. Power levels up to 20 kW will be available on near-term
commercial satellites. Power levels up to hundreds of kilowatts may be
feasible using multijunction and concentrator solar photovoltaic technology
or solar dynamic systems using heat engines. If the power source is solar,
then large solar collector areas, and possibly high pointing accuracy and
tight figure control of the solar collectors, are required.
Megawatt power levels could be supplied for extended periods by an external
fission or fusion reactor. Both make consideration of radiation and
environmental effects essential. In an internal fusion-powered option, the
application of high-power RF would ionize the mixture in the WHT chamber,
form a reversed-field configuration (FRC) there and heat the fuel to fusion
temperatures.
The FRC is an intrinsically high-beta plasma, favorable to the use of
advanced (neutronless) fuels. (Beta, b, is the ratio of plasma thermal
energy to magnetic field energy.) Recent research has shown more potential
for p-11B fusion than earlier predicted. In an optimal FRC fusion reactor, a
mixture of boron and hydrogen is injected into the FRC. Fusion creates
energetic helium, which further heats the fuel, sustaining the burn. Plasma
crosses the FRC's closed flux surface, flows along the open magnetic field
lines to the nozzle and exits there, providing thrust, as shown in Figure 3.
The FRC requires a solenoid-shaped magnetic field, the same geometry needed
by the wave thruster and the magnetic nozzle. These factors make the FRC the
most attractive fusion reactor from an engineering perspective. Many of the
components are common to both the nearer (non-fusion) and longer-term
(fusion) propulsion systems. As a consequence, development of the
wave-heated plasma thruster will create technology that will be directly
applicable to future fusion propulsion systems.
Wave-heated plasma propulsion
This novel thruster differs from earlier wave-heated thermal thrusters in
that it employs a confined, fully ionized warm plasma, a strong axial
magnetic field and a magnetic nozzle with large expansion. Wave heating in
this field geometry is a volumetric method; that is, waves launched from
antennas at the plasma's edge propagate deep within the plasma before their
energy is absorbed. This reduces the power loads on and losses to the
surrounding structures.
Five different frequency ranges are candidates for wave heating: electron
cyclotron (EC), lower hybrid (LH), helicon, ion cyclotron (IC) and rotating
magnetic field (RMF). Although a thruster must produce high-velocity ions,
apparently favoring the IC method, acceleration in the proposed thruster
design is caused by the nozzle's electric field. This converts electron
thermal energy into directed ion momentum. Thus, there is no clear reason
yet for selecting one candidate from the others. Indeed, the optimal choice
may change with each mission's specific requirements. For thruster
parameters noted in Figure 2, a plasma density of 5 x 1014 cm3 is needed at
an electron temperature of ~20 eV. For hydrogen propellant, this would
provide a thrust of about 2 x 104 N per m2 of nozzle area.
The magnetic field required by each is similar, between 1 and 5 kG. The low
end is set by the plasma b requirements. The upper end may be more practical
by easing antenna design. The nozzle magnetic field strength is about 10
times higher than that needed by the heating method. Even 50 kG field
strengths are readily achievable by present-day superconductor technology.
High-temperature superconductors would improve the attractiveness of the
engines by reducing the cooling requirements.
Table 1: Candidate RF and mwave modes for heating plasmas for thruster
applications
Mode EC LH Helicon RMF IC
Approximate frequency (GHz) 2.5-10 0.5-2.5 0.1-0.5 0.3-100 0.03-10
Temperatures achieved (eV) 20 5 3 20 5
Densities achieved (cm-3 ) 5 x 1012 1 x 1014 1 x 1014 1 x 1014 1 x 1013
Ionization fraction (%) 50 90 50 10 10
The LH system has achieved more than 90% ionization, primarily because of
the high density and controlled startup procedures. This is desirable for
improved fuel utilization efficiency. (The RMF has yet to achieve a high
ionization fraction because of the low magnetic fields used and the high
fill pressures necessary with the traditional plasma formation procedures.)
With improved operational techniques, all the candidate frequencies are
likely to produce full ionization at high power. The main question is
whether they can also produce the proper electron temperatures within the
plasma - temperatures that produce high thrust without compromising the
recombination properties of the nozzle.
The achieved parameters shown in Table 1 were at relatively low power,
typically 0.5-3 kW. The only exception was RMF, which needed higher power
because of the enhanced losses and high fill pressure. Extending the
database for each heating mode to higher power is needed and one of the
technical objectives to be addressed by research and development efforts.
Scalability, i.e., achievable plasma parameters versus nozzle radius, is
another subject that must be addressed by R&D.
The overall energy efficiency of this method will depend on the product of
the usual factors: the efficiency for converting power from the spacecraft
power source to the wave power supply; the coupling of the wave power to the
plasma; the power lost to the thruster structures by radiation and plasma
conduction; and the frozen-in power loss. The choice of propellant is
particularly important for determining the frozen-in losses.
Magnetic nozzle: thrust and plasma recombination
The axial magnetic field used by these wave-heating methods allows both ions
and electrons to be exhausted along B. As noted, the nozzle generates the
thrust by converting random electron thermal motion into directed ion motion
in the nozzle's electric field. Strong electric fields have been found in
many mirror machines, such as studied in the fusion program. Potential drops
of kilovolts were obtained, very good for ion acceleration. As we shall soon
see, this was too large to allow recombination. Contrary to Mae West's
statement, too much of a good thing was too much.
In 1995, a steep electric field of approximately the proper strength, ~ 10
eV/cm, was discovered in a linear plasma device in our Princeton University
laboratory. This was accomplished by collision cooling of the plasma
electrons, rather than by magnetic expansion cooling. The remarkable
observation associated with this modest electric field was rapid plasma
recombination to neutral gas, something not attained in the hotter fusion
magnetic mirror experiments.
This brings us to the major conceptual leap provided by the magnetic nozzle.
The question arose, how can the plasma exhaust be decoupled from the strong
magnetic field? In an axially symmetric magnetic nozzle, the plasma is
constrained to follow the field lines, even for high plasma dielectric
constant, 8pmnc2/B2. (This is in contrast to the flow of a plasma slab
across a magnetic field with simple, one-dimensional curvature.) A
resolution to this vexing problem is to cause sufficient plasma cooling in
the nozzle expansion that recombination transforms the plasma exhaust into a
supersonic stream of neutral gas. Figure 4 shows that cooling to
temperatures below ~ 1 eV (11,600 K) is necessary to get rapid
recombination.
Expansion from a nozzle results in cooling and acceleration. There is a
direct relation between the cooling and the Mach number achieved by a
nozzle. Our calculations show that the recombination rate coefficient
increases with Mach number approximately proportional to M3 for g=5/3 and
proportional to M5 for g=2, where g is the usual ratio of specific heats. By
examining the calculated Mach number as a function of magnetic field
expansion we predict that nearly complete recombination can be generated by
a magnetic expansion of 50 for g=2 or 1000 for g=5/3 (g is expected to be
between 5/3 and 2 for a magnetized monatomic plasma of initial density 1 x
1014 cm-3).
How did the Princeton experiment show extensive recombination? The plasma
appeared as different as night from day. Recombining plasmas are
characterized by emission of intense light with a special spectral
signature. Warm plasma, viewed through a window of the linear apparatus,
flows from left to right. As the plasma cools from 50,000 K to 10,000 K, its
brightness dramatically increases. Detailed analysis of the spectrum showed
this could be quantitatively explained by three-body recombination.
A critical aspect of the thruster design is the selection of the fuel. At Te
< 1 eV, helium has the most rapid three-body recombination rate of all the
singly charged monatomic ions. However, its high ionization potential
unfavorably increases the frozen-in losses. Other inert gases like xenon are
much better in that regard, but have relatively low second-ionization
potentials. The optimal fuel will depend on the overall plasma temperature
and plasma confinement time. R&D are essential for selecting the optimal
electron temperature, hence wave-heating method and plasma shape.
Propulsion system designs
Two candidate WHT operating points are described to illustrate the potential
of this engine. The first, at 30 kW power, is for a reusable transfer orbit
vehicle for low Earth orbit operations. The second, at 30 MW power, is for
interplanetary and trans-lunar operations. The 30 kW mission is an orbit
transfer mission from a 400-kilometer orbit to a 2000-kilometer orbit,
including a return mission with the full payload. The low Earth mission is
shown in Figure 7. A thruster with this power level could also be used as a
drag makeup thruster on the International Space Station. It would be
difficult to perform the drag makeup mission or the reusable upper stage
with other electric thrusters due to their relatively short lifetimes. Two
missions are shown for the 30 MW thruster. One is a manned Mars mission.
The second is a near-sun flyby for an interstellar mission. The Mars mission
assumes a 100,000-kilogram payload, including the propulsion system. The
minimum one-way travel time is about two months, which is a reasonable
amount from an operational cost and radiation dose standpoint. The power for
this mission would need to come from a nuclear reactor, which could be the
internal fusion reactor described above. The spacecraft for the interstellar
mission is inserted into an elliptical heliocentric orbit with its perigee
close to the sun. The idea is to perform all of the delta-V near perigee to
get an additional boost due to the sun's gravity well and to take advantage
of the high solar flux at that distance. The plots show a numerical
simulation of the mission in which the propulsion system produces a 40
km/second delta-V. The final velocity is in excess of 100 km per second and
it passes the orbit of Jupiter 160 days after injection into the elliptical
Earth/sun transfer orbit. The specific impulse is held constant at 2500
seconds and the thrust is allowed to vary up to the limit of the available
power. This trajectory is by no means optimal, nor does it account for
thruster limitations.
Numerous advanced electric propulsion concepts have been developed over
recent years because of higher propellant exhaust velocity, me, compared to
chemical systems. The wave-heating method, thrust-generation mechanism,
decoupling of plasma from magnetic fields and scalability make the WHT
system a significant advance over existing electric thruster concepts.
Wave-heated plasma propulsion is a revolutionary concept that could be used
in the short term to produce a high-thrust, high specific-impulse electric
thruster and could incorporate a fusion propulsion, if a practical one is
ultimately developed. It is in an early stage of development. Considerable
effort will be required before a prototype is ready for flight.
Samuel A. Cohen received a Ph.D. in Physics from MIT in 1973. He has been at
the Princeton University Plasma Physics Laboratory ever since, now serving
as a lecturer with rank of professor in the Astrophysical Sciences
Department and director of the Program in Plasma Science and Technology in
the School of Engineering and Applied Science.
Mr. Michael Paluszek is the founder of Princeton Satellite Systems, Inc. He
received his S.B. degree from MIT in Electrical Engineering in 1976 and his
E.A.A. and S.M. degrees from MIT in Aeronautics and Astronautics in 1979. In
1986 he joined GE Astro Space, where he led the design of the attitude
control systems for GPS IIR, Inmarsat 3, GGS Polar Platform and the Mars
Observer Delta-V mode. His current research includes collaborative work with
the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory on advanced plasma thrusters and the
development of artificial intelligence techniques for embedded systems.
© 1997-1999 Launchspace Publications.
Please send any questions or comments for Launchspace via our feedback page.
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Russian national interest holding NASA hostage
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FYI
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Subject: starship-design: Is this fiction?
Date: Tue, 15 Jun 1999 20:10:15 -0600
I picked up a paperback novel today cause it had nice SSTO craft
on the cover. The is the development of such a craft and the support
structures in the very near future ( Ie. 1999-2000) from Brazil without the
support of the US-Goverment. Firestar by Micheal Flynn, is the
books title - isbn 0-812-53006-3. This is good reading, and a good reminder of
the dream of Real space travel.
Ben.
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 15
Date: Wed, 16 Jun 1999 18:05:33 -0500
-----Original Message-----
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Sent: Tuesday, June 15, 1999 8:11 AM
Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 15
[ SpaceViews (tm) newsletter ]
[ see end of message for our NEW address to subscribe / unsubscribe ]
S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.06.15
1999 June 15
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/0615/
*** News ***
Delta 2 Launches Globalstar Satellites
Long March Launches Replacement Iridiums
July 20 Tentative Date for Next Shuttle Launch
Advocacy Groups Split on TransHab
Photos Give First Glimpse of Chinese Manned Launcher
Japanese Lunar Mission Delayed
Lockheed Martin, Boeing Continue Launch Investigations
Another Asteroid with Earth Impact Probability Discovered
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** CyberSpace ***
HobbySpace
Yahoo SETI Club Team
The Starpages
*** News ***
Delta 2 Launches Globalstar Satellites
After two days of weather-induced delays, a Boeing Delta 2
successfully launched four Globalstar satellites Thursday morning,
June 10, from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
The Delta 2 lifted off at 9:48 am EDT (1348 UT) from Pad 17B
at Cape Canaveral, in the first of two launch windows available for
Thursday's launch. After a smooth countdown the rocket successfully
delivered the four satellites into low-Earth orbit.
Launch officials chose to try the first window, rather than a
later one at 12:35 pm EDT (1635 UT), because weather forecasts showed
a higher probability of acceptable weather with the earlier launch.
Boeing could only try one of the launch windows because of
limitations regarding the liquid oxygen propellant on the booster.
The launch is the first of four scheduled through mid-August
to deliver one-third of the Globalstar constellation of low-Earth
orbit comsats. Three more launches, each carrying an additional four
spacecraft, are planned for July 2, August 6, and August 16.
There are now twenty-four Globalstar satellites in orbit.
The first eight were launched on two Delta 2's in early 1998. After
the failure of a Zenit 2 in September that destroyed 12 Globalstar
satellites, three Soyuz launches in February, March, and April
launched 12 replacement satellites.
Globalstar rearranged their launch schedule after the Zenit
failure to use the smaller, but more reliable, Soyuz and Delta 2
boosters. After the series of four Delta 2 launches is completed in
August there are three more Soyuz and one more Delta 2 launch planned
by the end of the year that will place the full 48-satellite
constellation, plus four on-orbit spares, into orbit.
This summer's launches will put enough satellites into orbit
to allow Globalstar to start offering limited commercial telephone
service as early as September, company officials have previously
said.
Long March Launches Replacement Iridiums
A Chinese Long March rocket launched two replacement Iridium
communications satellites Friday afternoon, June 11.
The Long March 2C/SD lifted off at 1:15 pm EDT June 11 (1715
UT, 1:15 am June 12 Beijing time) from the Taiyuan launch site in
eastern China, the Chinese news agency Xinhua reported. Two Iridium
satellites were placed in low Earth orbit by the booster.
The launch had been scheduled for June 7, but was delayed;
the Xinhua report gave no reason for the delay. The launch was to
have occured in March, but was delayed because of technical problems
"on both sides", a Chinese spokesman said then.
The two satellites will serve as on-orbit spares for the
Iridium system of 66 satellites. Iridium has been providing global
phone and pager services since late 1998.
The LM-2C/SD booster is an upgraded version of the LM-2C
designed specifically for launching Iridium satellites. The LM-2C/SD
is similar to the older version but includes an improved upper stage,
called the Smart Dispenser (SD), capable of placing 2,800 kg (6,160
lbs.) into low Earth orbit. There have been six past launches of the
LM-2C/SD, each carrying two Iridium satellites.
July 20 Tentative Date for Next Shuttle Launch
NASA shuttle managers have set up a plan to launch the next
shuttle mission as early as July 20, thirty years to the day after
the landing of Apollo 11 on the Moon, the space agency reported
Tuesday, June 8.
The announcement comes one day after the shuttle Columbia was
rolled out to pad 39B in preparation for the launch of mission
STS-93.
The July 20 launch date is tentative and the earliest the
shuttle could launch, if all goes well. A firm launch date will no
be announced until after the launch readiness review meeting planned
for July 8.
The launch of STS-93 has been delayed by nearly a year
because of various problems with its primary payload, the Chandra
X-Ray Observatory. Most recently, the launch was pushed back by at
least two weeks while an investigation continued into the failure of
an Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) on a Titan 4 launch in April. An IUS
will be used to boost Chandra into its elliptical Earth orbit.
The relatively brief mission -- just under five days long --
will be commanded by Eileen Collins, the first woman to command a
space shuttle mission. Jeffrey Ashby will be pilot on the mission,
with Catherine Coleman, Steven Hawley, and Michel Tognini from the
French space agency CNES serving as mission specialists.
Advocacy Groups Split on TransHab
Various space advocacy groups are taking different positions
on the fate of TransHab, a proposed module for the International
Space Station which may be cut by Congress.
H.R. 1654, a NASA authorization bill passed by the House of
Representatives last month, prohibits NASA from spending any money on
the inflatable TransHab module as a replacement for the planned
habitation module for ISS, on the rationale that TransHab would cost
more, adding to ISS's overall costs.
That plan has met with strong opposition by the Mars Society,
who supports TransHab for its potential use as a habitat for future
human Mars expeditions -- the original purpose of its development.
The Society has started a major campaign to drum up support for the
project.
A recent Mars Society bulletin targeted Rep. Dana Rohrabacher
(R-CA), chair of the House Science Committee's space subcommittee and
author of the TransHab language in the authorization bill.
"Rohrabacher wants the program cancelled because he believes TransHab
represents progress toward sending humans to Mars, a goal he
opposes," the bulletin stated.
That language has put the Mars Society in conflict with one
of the members of its own steering committee, Rick Tumlinson, who is
also president of the Space Frontier Foundation. While not opposed
to the TransHab concept in general, he is opposed to developing
TransHab as a government built and run facility.
"A government purchased facility attached to ISS does not
enhance our chances of using inflatables for Mars, maintains the hold
of the two major firms and NASA bureaucrats on all human activities
on the frontier and in fact ties Mars in a negative way to the ISS
tar baby," Tumlinson wrote in an e-mail message published with his
permission on the NASA Watch Web site.
"Although on the surface the call to fight for this right now
and in this form sounds good, it is based on a shallow interpretation
of the facts and a misunderstanding of the big picture in opening the
frontier," he added.
Other space advocacy groups have staked out different
positions, or said nothing at all on the issue. In a message on the
Mars Society site Lou Friedman, executive director of the Planetary
Society, said his organization will mobilize to support TransHab, but
as of yet there have been no public pronouncements from the group
about the project. The Space Frontier Foundation and ProSpace have
made no statements about TransHab.
The National Space Society, seeking a middle ground, issued a
press release supporting the development of inflatable module
technologies in general, but not a government-built TransHab module.
"The complexity of this issue... defies a quick and easy
solution," the NSS noted in its press release. The NSS's Policy
Committee recommended that NASA not develop TransHab on its own and
said that the NSS should endorse the concept of
commercially-developed "supplemental habitation" for ISS.
The NSS board earlier considered a statement that would have
more strongly supported TransHab. However, the measure failed to
garner the minimum number of votes from NSS's board of directors at a
May 30 meeting during the International Space Development Conference,
despite 2-to-1 support for it by the limited number of directors in
attendance.
The issue is likely to heat up later this summer, after the
Senate considers its version of the authorization bill, which
currently does not include any language about TransHab.
Photos Give First Glimpse of Chinese Manned Launcher
A set of images released on the Internet this week appear to
show a new version of the Chinese Long March booster capable of
launching humans into orbit.
Despite considerable speculation that the photos may have
been faked, at least one expert on the Chinese space program
considers the images to be "almost true."
The images, posted anonymously June 9 to an online forum
devoted to discussions of the Chinese military, purport to show a
rollout of a variant of the Long March booster complete with a manned
capsule on the top. The images, said to come from a brochure of an
inner Mongolian construction company, were taken in May 1998 at the
Jiuquan launch site.
The images are the first look at a new version of the Long
March booster, designed "CZ-2F" in the photos, speculated to be in
development to support China's developing manned space program. The
images clearly show a payload shroud similar, but not identical to,
the one used on the Russian Soyuz, consistent with reports that
China's "Project 921" manned spacecraft is similar in design to the
Soyuz.
Unlike other Chinese launch sites, where the booster is
assembled at the pad, the new site at Jiuquan features an assembly
building similar in appearance to the Vehicle Assembly Building at
NASA's Kennedy Space Center. After assembly the booster is rolled
out vertically to the launch site.
Chen Lan, editor of the "Dragon in Space" Web site and an
expert on the Chinese space program, has examined the photos in
detail and concluded that the photos are "almost true."
"I believe, at least, the photos contain some 'truth'," he
wrote in an article on his site. "That is, the photos are true, or
they are 'composite photos' based on true models, or even modified
'true photos' to avoid 'secrets leakage'."
Chinese officials have made claims that the first launch of
this system, either unmanned or with a crew, could come as early as
this October, to mark the 50th anniversary of the People's Republic.
However, officials have released to details regarding the booster or
spacecraft.
"Fortunately, it will be made clear soon," Chen concluded.
Japanese Lunar Mission Delayed
Technical problems have delayed the launch of Japan's first
mission to the Moon by at least three years, project officials
admitted last week.
The Lunar-A spacecraft was scheduled for launch later this
year on a mission to go into orbit around the Moon and deploy the
instrumented penetrator probes into the lunar surface.
However, tests of the penetrators performed last year in New
Mexico found that the penetrators were damaged as they slammed into
the ground, requiring the probes to be redesigned. Project officials
are now planning a launch some time in 2002.
The mission, conducted by Japan's Institute of Space and
Aeronautical Science (ISAS), would place the main spacecraft into
lunar orbit. Its two penetrator probes would be deployed over the
course of the month, with one landing near the lunar equator on the
near side as seen from Earth, and the other on the equator on the far
side.
The probes would hit the surface at 250-300 meters per second
(560-675 mph) and burrow 1-3 meters (3.3-10 feet) into the surface.
The probes contain instruments to measure the lunar heat flow and
measure seismic activity. The main spacecraft, meanwhile, would take
images using its onboard camera.
Lunar-A is the second ISAS mission to run into technical
problems in recent months. Nozomi, formerly known as Planet-B, was
successfully launched on its mission to Mars in July 1998, but when
extra propellant was consumed during a December flyby of Earth,
mission controllers delayed its arrival at Mars from this October
until December 2003, when a more favorable trajectory will allow it
to enter orbit around the planet using less propellant.
Lockheed Martin, Boeing Continue Launch Investigations
While Lockheed Martin announced the initial results into its
investigation of April's Athena 2 launch failure, Boeing has created
a blue-ribbon panel to look into ways to improve the quality of its
expendable launchers.
As previously reported in SpaceViews last month, Lockheed
Martin officials said an electrical problem prevented a signal that
would have initiated the jettison of the Athena 2's payload fairing
several minutes after its April 27 launch of the Ikonos 1 satellite.
An "open circuit condition" kept explosive bolts from firing
that would have split the cone-shaped fairing in half and cause it to
fall away from the booster. Instead, the 518-kg (1,143-lb) fairing
remained in place, and that added mass kept the payload from reaching
orbit.
Lockheed Martin said in a statement that the investigation
into the Athena 2 accident, including plans to correct the problem,
was ongoing, and made no mention of when the booster would return to
flight status.
Last month, however, an official with Space Imaging, the
company that owned the Ikonos 1 satellite, said the booster could
return to service as early as this summer. The company hopes to use
another Athena 2 to launch Ikonos 2, a twin of the destroyed Ikonos
1, as early as next month.
Meanwhile, Boeing announced June 8 it has initiated a
"Mission Assurance Review Team" to look into ways to improve the
reliability of its Delta, Sea Launch, and Inertial Upper Stage (IUS)
expendable boosters.
The panel will be chaired by Sheila Widnall, an MIT
aeronautics and astronautics professor who recently served as
secretary of the Air Force. The panel consists of high-ranking
former members of NASA, the military, and industry, including former
astronaut Frederick Hauck and retired Air Force General Donald
Kutyna, who served on the Rogers Commission that investigated the
Challenger accident.
"We expressly selected team members with a broad range of
senior-level systems experience in aerospace -- from satellites to
academia to launch vehicles," said Boeing Space and Communications
president James Albaugh. "The technical knowledge and breadth of this
independent panel, as well as its extensive background in mission
assurance, will be invaluable in strengthening our reliability."
Boeing has been hit by failures in the first two launches of
its new heavy-lift Delta 3 booster as well as a failure of its IUS
during a Titan 4 launch in April. Separate investigations into those
accidents, as well as other reviews, will continue while Widnall-led
team meets. In addition, Boeing and Lockheed Martin will continue to
participate in the overall review of the nation's launch capability
ordered by President Clinton in May.
Another Asteroid with Earth Impact Probability Discovered
For the third time in a little over a year, astronomers have
found an asteroid that has a very small, but non-zero, probability of
impacting the Earth next century.
Astronomers believe such impact probabilities as the one
found for 1998 OX4 will become more commonplace in the future,
though, as stepped-up search efforts turn up more asteroids whose
orbits bring them close to Earth.
Italian astronomer Andrea Milani and colleagues reported the
impact probability at the end of the IMPACT conference in Torino,
Italy, earlier this month. They found that 1998 OX4, discovered last
year at the Spacewatch telescope in Arizona, has a 1-in-10 million
chance of hitting the Earth in January 2046.
This probability of impact is considerably less than the
probability of an impact in any given year by an undiscovered
asteroid 1 km or greater in diameter, so the discovery is of little
more than academic curiosity. Moreover, Milani and colleagues note
that this probability has yet to be confirmed by other researchers.
The discovery makes 1998 OX4 the third asteroid since last
March which has been found to have a small impact probability at some
point in the future. In April asteroid 1999 AN10 was found to have a
1-in-1 billion chance of hitting the Earth in 2039. Later analysis
changed that probability to 1-in-10 million while uncovering another
possible impact with significantly greater odds -- 1-in-500,000 -- in
2044.
In March 1998 asteroid 1997 XF11 was briefly thought to have
a small possibility of impacting the Earth in 2029. However, within
a day of the public announcement new data eliminated the possibility
of any impact in that year.
The astronomical community has debated the best was to
disseminate information about impact threats. Any such protocols
will likely be needed much more in the future, some believe, as
increased asteroid searches turn up new asteroids with similar impact
probabilities.
"In contrast to XF11 and AN10, however, the vast majority of
these PHAs [potentially hazardous asteroids] will no longer be
newsworthy due to their minuscule chances of actual impact," noted
Benny Peiser, moderator of the Cambridge Conference Network, an
electronic mailing list used by asteroid researchers. "[P]ublic
interest will only arise in exceptional cases which prove to have
significant impact risks."
SpaceViews Event Horizon
June 17 Proton/Blok DM flight of Astra-1H comsat at 9:49 pm
EDT (0149 UT June 18) from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.
June 18 Titan 2 launch of the NASA Quikscat Earth science
satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base,
California, at 10:15 pm EDT (0215 UT June 19)
June 23 (NET) Delta 2 launch of NASA's Far Ultraviolet
Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) mission from Cape
Canaveral, Florida at 11:36 am EDT (1536 UT)
June 23-24 First U.S. Space Tourism Conference, Washington, DC
June 26 Proton launch of Russian Raduga comsat (and initial
flight of the Breeze-M upper stage) from Baikonur,
Kazakhstan.
July 2 Delta 2 launch of four Globalstar satellites from
Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 9:05 am EDT (1305 UT)
July 15-16 Lunar Base Development Symposium, League City, TX
July 16 (NET) Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
Other News
Mir Fundraiser: Two Russian cosmonauts have started a grassroots
fundraising drive to keep Mir alive. Cosmonauts Vitaly Sevastyanov
and Gherman Titov announced the existence of the "People's Charity
Foundation" as a way for ordinary Russians to contribute money to
keep the station operational after this August, when Russian
government funding ends. "To sink the station would be a crime
against posterity," Sevastyanov told the Associated Press. The
charity would have to raise a minimum of $100 million to keep Mir
operational for an additional year. Current plans call for the Mir
crew to leave in August and the station to remain in orbit unoccupied
until it is deorbited early next year.
Ganymede's Dust Cloud: A very tenuous cloud of dust around the
Jovian moon Ganymede, discovered by the Galileo spacecraft, may
provide scientists with new insights into the formation of planetary
rings. The cloud is likely formed by the impact of interplanetary
dust particles with Ganymede's surface. Such impacts on smaller
moons may be sufficient to generate the thin dust rings seen around
Jupiter. While the cloud is too thin to be seen optically -- there is
only one dust grain per 8,000 cubic meters (288,000 cubic feet) --
the data from Galileo's Dust Detector System gives scientists the
information about particle speed and direction needed to understand
the dynamics of its formation not otherwise possible.
Another Kind of Space Sickness: The stress of spaceflight may make
astronauts more susceptible to viruses, NASA researchers have found.
In an article published in the magazine New Scientist, Johnson Space
Center's Satish Mehta found that levels of one kind of relatively
benign virus were elevated in saliva samples collected from
astronauts in shuttle missions by as much as a factor of 40 over
those collected before and after missions. The stress of busy,
hazardous spaceflight is the likely cause, Mehta believes. Antiviral
agents could help combat this problem on future long-duration
missions. Additional advice from Mehta: "Don't kiss an astronaut."
European Rocket Spat: France and Italy, two major members of the
European Space Agency, do not see eye to eye on the development of a
new launch vehicle, Reuters reported June 14. Italy is interested in
developing the Vega rocket for launching small payloads while France,
the traditional leader in European rocket development, has expressed
its doubts about the commercial viability of such a booster. While
both countries are supposed to cooperate in the development of Vega,
Italian officials have said that if Franc continued to oppose the
project, Italy would pursue Vega separately.
Cassini Protests: An estimated 50 people gathered outside the gates
of the Cape Canaveral Air Station in Florida June 12 to protest the
Cassini mission to Saturn, which is scheduled to fly by the Earth in
August. Protestors expressed their concern that an accident could
scatter plutonium into the Earth's atmosphere, as well as their
belief that Cassini represents an "icebreaker" for future
nuclear-powered missions. "Part of the problem is that Cassini was
an icebreaker to get the public used to plutonium being sent up into
space," protestor Maria Telesca-Whipple told Florida Today,
apparently unaware of the many previous missions that have used
radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs). A similar protest
outside NASA Headquarters in Washington the previous day attracted
only eight people.
Briefly: Longtime CNN anchor Lou Dobbs shocked many last week when
he announced he was leaving the network to join an Internet space
news startup. Dobbs, who was president of CNNfn, the financial news
spinoff of CNN, will now devote his time to Space.Com, a venture
capital-funded startup that will provide space news and other
information starting July 20. "I truly believe space is the biggest
story of this century and the next, and I really wanted to be part of
it," he told the Washington Post... Our condolences to the friends
and family of actor DeForest Kelley, who passed away June 11 after an
extended illness. The 79-year-old actor was best known for his role
as Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy in the original Star Trek series and six
subsequent movies.
*** CyberSpace ***
HobbySpace
The HobbySpace web site is an effort to answer the question:
"What fun space stuff can you do?" This site provides information on
a wide range of activities that the average space enthusiast can take
part in, from model rocketry to satellite observing to space
activism. Each of the 30 sections of the site contains information
about the activity and a comprehensive set of links to other
resources online. If you've always wanted to somehow get involved in
space, this is place to turn!
http://www.hobbyspace.com/
Yahoo SETI Club Team
If you're participating in the SETI@home project to help
process SETI data on your home PC, you've probably wished you could
process data faster. If so, check out this site, which features over
two dozen tips on how to speed up your SETI@home efforts, ranging
from software tweaks to hardware upgrades. There's also information
about joining their team and a link to the SETI club at Yahoo! (hence
the name of this site) which features discussion and more information
about SETI@home and SETI in general. (Be sure to also check out the
SETI@home mailing list at talkSpace
(http://www.talkspace.net/mlists/setiathome.html), a partner of
SpaceViews.)
http://zap.to/clubteam
The Starpages
The Starpages is an online astronomy-oriented yellow pages.
The site is split into three components: StarWorlds, with more than
6,000 entries of astronomy organizations, institutions, and the like;
StarHeads, with more than 5,000 entries of professional astronomers
and related scientists; and StarBits, with 130,000 astronomical
acronyms and abbreviations. Each section is searchable, so you can
easily locate information about the desired person, institution, or
abbreviation.
http://cdsweb.u-strasbg.fr/~heck/spages.htm
========
This has been the June 15, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
SpaceViews is also available on the World Wide web from the
SpaceViews home page:
http://www.spaceviews.com/
or via anonymous FTP from ftp.seds.org:
ftp://ftp.seds.org/pub/info/newsletters/spaceviews/text/19990615.txt
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For editorial questions and article submissions for SpaceViews,
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jeff@spaceviews.com
For questions about the SpaceViews mailing list, please contact
spaceviews-approval@spaceviews.com.
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From VM Thu Jun 17 10:21:43 1999
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["679" "Thursday" "17" "June" "1999" "10:39:46" "-0600" "Ben Franchuk (Woodelf)" "bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca" nil "23" "Re: starship-design: Is this fiction?" "^From:" nil nil "6" nil nil nil nil nil]
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To: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: Is this fiction?
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 10:39:46 -0600
> As for the private SSTO angle, its a big interest of a lot of folks,
> including US interest. Thou NASA, and to a lessor degree DOD, are
> against making space that open - corporate interests are chewing around
> the edges to get past those roadblocks.
>
> check out
> http://www.spaceaccess.com/
> http://www.wtn.org/crda/payloads.htm
> http://www.wtn.org/ProjectStories/crada/payloads.htm
>
> For a us Company quietly working toward a ship like the FireStar cover.
> ;)
>
> Kelly
>
I use a different reviewing method -- read book in store
first...
www.spaceaccess.com is currently being updated, so looks to
be offline for a few days.
Thanks for the urls.
From VM Thu Jun 17 10:56:27 1999
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KellySt@aol.com
CC: bfranchuk@jetnet.ab.ca
Subject: RE: starship-design: Is this fiction?
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 10:45:46 -0500
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-----Original Message-----
From: KellySt [SMTP:KellySt@aol.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 15, 1999 9:10 PM
To: erps-list; starship-design; starship-design
Cc: bfranchuk
Subject: starship-design: Is this fiction?
=20
I picked up a paperback novel today cause it had nice SSTO craft
on the cover. The is the development of such a craft and the support
structures in the very near future ( Ie. 1999-2000) from Brazil
without the
support of the US-Goverment. Firestar by Micheal Flynn, is the
books title - isbn 0-812-53006-3. This is good reading, and a good
reminder of
the dream of Real space travel.
Ben.
Hum, sounds interesting. I searched for it on the Amazon.com site.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0812530063/o/qid=3D929633315/sr=3D2-=
1
/002-1524617-7012049
General reviews on it there were good (Reviews below) thou some of the
elements might be a bit over the top.
As for the private SSTO angle, its a big interest of a lot of folks,
including US interest. Thou NASA, and to a lessor degree DOD, are
against making space that open - corporate interests are chewing around
the edges to get past those roadblocks. =20
check out =20
http://www.spaceaccess.com/
http://www.wtn.org/crda/payloads.htm
http://www.wtn.org/ProjectStories/crada/payloads.htm
For a us Company quietly working toward a ship like the FireStar cover.
;)
Kelly
=20
------------------------------------------------------------------------
------- =20
Firestar =20
by Michael F. Flynn =20
List Price: $6.99
Our Price: $5.59
You Save: $1.40 (20%)
Availability: Usually ships within 24 hours.
Mass Market Paperback - 960 pages Reprint edition
(March 1997) =20
Tor Books; ISBN: 0812530063 ; Dimensions (in inches):
1.51 x 6.83 x 4.22 =20
Amazon.com Sales Rank: 42,613 =20
Avg. Customer Review: =20
Number of Reviews: 9
Write an online review and share your thoughts with
other readers!
Customers who bought this book also bought: =20
Rogue Star; Michael F. Flynn
Moonfall; Jack McDevitt
Moonwar; Ben Bova
Moonrise; Ben Bova =20
Click here for
more suggestions...
Reviews =20
From Kirkus Reviews , March 1, 1996
Part one of an ambitious near-future multivolume saga
from the author of
Country of the Blind (not reviewed). Rich heiress
Mariesa van Huyten has
developed plans to save the human race. She sets up
Mentor Academies, an
educational foundation, and contracts to take over part
of the crumbling New
Jersey public school system, hoping to find among its
hopelessly drug-ridden or
sociopathic or cynical populations some sparks of
creativity--talents that will be
vital in the near future if humanity is to transcend
its self-imposed limits. She also
prepares the Prometheus project, using political,
industrial, and economic
pressure to develop a sustainable space program. Once
established in
space--where raw materials need only be gathered and
processed; where
there's nothing to pollute; where power from the sun is
free and
inexhaustible--humanity can expand and prosper without
constraint. There is,
however, a cloud on the horizon: one Cyrus Attwood, a
reactionary who will use
religion and violence to stop Mariesa and her
progressive notions. Not quite a
Libertarian party tract, but call this a textbook,
retitle it How to Save the World, in
Umpteen Very Large Installments, and you'd be close. A
dense, vastly overstated
yawner. -- Copyright =A91996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All
rights reserved. --This
text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition
of this title. =20
Book Description =20
It is the beginning of the twenty-first century and one
woman is determined to
bring America and the world back on track in the
technological future. She has
the strength, the intelligence, the money. It will be
done. This is the story of the
rebirth of innovative technological expansion on Earth
and in space. =20
Synopsis =20
Firestar is a chronicle of private enterprise and
individual initiative, the story of
one woman's quest that becomes the focus for a whole
new world of the future.
This is a saga of hard-won optimism, about a
technological future where things
are better for everyone. =20
Synopsis =20
A popular Analog short story writer, several times a
Hugo nominee, Michael
Flynn launches a bold, multi-volume epic of the future
in the tradition of Robert A.
Heinlein's Future History seres. In this first volume,
a young heiress with a vision
begins a private educational system for America's
public schools. The story of
one woman's quest becomes the focus for a whole new
world of the future.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable
edition of this title. =20
Click here
for all reviews...
Customer Comments =20
Average Customer Review: Number of Reviews: 9
Randi (randi_pattersen@hotmail.com) from Tucson,
Arizona , June 1,
1999 =20
Distressingly dull How-to-save-the-world manifesto. =20
Flynn's exposition of a Rand-esque privatization of the
US education system and
space program reads like a Libertarian Party position
paper -- it is interesting
only to other Libertarians. The characterizations would
be laughable if they
weren't so trite. Rich young idealistic heiress finds
love and destiny with old,
poor, burned-out teacher, incidentally solving the
crisis in the American
educational system and putting the American space
program back on track. Feh.
A disappointing rehash of themes Rand and Heinlein have
already championed
with far more style. =20
dragonsmithent@bigfoot.com from Grand Junction,
Colorado , April 23,
1999 =20
Excellent book for anyone fed-up with the current
system =20
This book has some excellent ideas for changing the way
people are educated.
It may be science fiction now but in five years it will
be science. With the
increase in competition in the education industry look
to see some changes that
closely resemble the ideas in this book. And once
people are properly educated
we will see a resurgence in the space programs. Pretty
soon more and more
people will see the need to get off this rock! And with
the help of this book and
some other ideas from pioneering authors such as
Michael Flynn we will get off
this rock. =20
A reader from Salt Lake City, Utah , March 25, 1999 =20
Gripping, great story line =20
I really liked this book, and found it difficult to put
it down. The characters are
good, the writing is good, the plot is good. Can't wait
to read Rogue Star. =20
atomicbohr@aol.com from Hamilton, OH , November 9, 1998
Top notch near future novel that makes one wish it were
true =20
FIRESTAR is a very near future novel about an extremely
wealthy business
woman who believes that we need to be in space. She
launches a very
complicated, expensive, and VERY BELIEVABLE plan to get
us there.
There are good guys, bad guys, flawed heroes and
heroines, action, "police
action," intrigue, great science, and extremely
believable characters and
situations. =20
If you want a book that will make you think as well as
challenge your
assumptions in a lot of different areas you will love
it. If however, you are a
doctrinaire Liberal, Libertarian, or Conservative you
will hate this book. =20
Flynn has a deep respect for Robert Heinlein. A number
of writers over the years
have been acclaimed as the next Heinlein only to
falter. Flynn is the first I have
seen that has a real chance of truly deserving that
type of honorific. This novel
fares very favorably with Heinlein at his best and is
head and shoulders above
90% of what passes for SF.
Mike =20
lphillip@redrose.net from Lancaster, PA USA , September
7, 1998 =20
inspiring hard science in the near future =20
If only we had a Mariesa van Huyten to lead us back to
space. The characters
are complex. The politics nerve racking. The hard
science exciting. All together a
great read that makes me wish for more from this
author. =20
tmiho@pcinternet.com from So Cal , March 2, 1998 =20
Great near future novel...only hope we can get there. =20
I just finished reading Ben Bova's "Moonrise" and both
novels make a GREAT
case for privatization of global space programs. Flynn
really knows how to
develop characters, both protagonists and antagonists,
that contain positive as
well negative attributes. Great reading and hard to put
down, although the last
100 pages seemed a bit ambiguous and crunched for an
ending. It definitely left
me with a desire for more. SSTO is now one of my
favorite subjects. =20
from Austin, TX , January 22, 1998 =20
Dominique Francon in space =20
A model for how corporate invasiveness in the
educational system might prove
Ayn Rand right. This book demonstrates in
can't-put-it-down fiction how rational
billionaires might choose to finally ditch NASA and
really get mankind into space.
Any objectivist would love this book (but I liked it
too.) =20
drewthacker@earthlink.net from Dallas, Texas , December
19, 1997 =20
=20
New hope for the Apollo Generation! =20
One of the best reads I've had in years! Good story
line development with
reasonable extrapolation of technology rather than the
fantasy tales of many
other authors. Liked especially the detailed character
development and the
interaction between them and our central visionary,
Mariesa. She was at times a
bit vague and removed on feelings toward others
(somewhat unrealistic) but
"Dreaming the Vision" of what our future in space could
be is what makes this
book so real. For those of us who lived through the
excitement of the early lunar
landings and the ultimate rise and fall of high
technology in aerospace during the
mid sixties to the early eighties it provides a renewed
enthusiam for sustained
development of the high frontier. I also felt that the
approaches for education are
refreshing. As any parent with college age children can
attest, our high schools
need encouragement to develop a more challenging
approach to nuture stronger
values and problem solving. Would definitely recommend
this book for
highschool through adult ages. I am sure you will find
yourself, as am I, waiting
with high expectations for the sequel. Give this book
to your children to stimulate
them about the future that is there if they reach for
it! A great gift. --This text
refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of
this title. =20
arc@inetport.com from Lago Vista (Awestin), TX ,
November 30, 1997 =20
=20
True "science" fiction, classical in construction. Want
More =20
This story offers a traditionally-constructed approach
consisting of 3-dimensional
people with human motivations and relationships and
built upon a
solid-appearing foundation of scientific principles. I
delight in extrapolations
based on current societal conditions and trends. This
author has such a "John
Brunner"-like ability, without sinking into the dark
dead-end gloominess of the
nihilistic. The only negative I care to mention is that
I hate finding a series like
this at the git-go, because I then have to wait
impatiently on the rest of the
author's work. I recall such impatience with Juanita
Coulson, for one. :) I'd say
this book is worth the price paid and requires little
effort to read because it is so
engrossing. I'm also keeping it on the shelf to read
again just prior to reading the
next installment. --This text refers to an out of print
or unavailable edition of this
title. =20
=20
=20
=20
=20
--openmail-part-02a48e96-00000001--
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To: "Starship-Design" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 84 (fwd) (Since Kelly mentioned it...)
Date: Fri, 18 Jun 1999 17:48:51 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu [mailto:listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu] On
Behalf Of Chris W. Johnson
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 1999 7:42 PM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 84 (fwd)
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 19:58:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: Donald L Doughty <spacelst@world.std.com>
To: DC-X <delta-clipper@world.std.com>
Subject: Space Access Update #84 6/17/99 (fwd)
Reply-To: delta-clipper@world.std.com
Space Access Update #84 6/17/99
Copyright 1999 by Space Access Society
__________________________________________________________________
Editorial: Right Intentions, Wrong Direction -
NASA's Destructive Approach To Cheap Access
Let us be clear from the start: NASA's leadership may well share our
vision of the importance of cheap access to our future - but their
organization has screwed up the cheap access initiatives entrusted
to it to date, from the mismanagement of DC-XA into a crash (we
still haven't seen full public release of the predictable blame-the-
contractor report on that mess) to the muddled morphing of X-33 into
a half-assed Shuttle II. As far as we are concerned, the current
push to do "X-Ops" reusable rocket low-cost operability demos in
Future-X is NASA's last chance - if they mess this up too, come 2001
we'll be pushing hard for removal of RLV (Reusable Launch Vehicle)
technology development responsibility from NASA entirely.
We reluctantly came to this conclusion last fall, and started
working quietly behind the scenes to advance Future-X X-Ops work.
Why are we going public now? Because over the last two months the
evidence has become overwhelming that the NASA old guard is
reverting to malign old habits - they are once again pushing their
internal agendas with reckless disregard for the interests of US
industry and of the country as a whole, to the point of actively
attacking the credibility and investment-worthiness of the reusable-
launch startups. They have done so repeatedly, and (under the most
charitable interpretation) factually incorrectly.
This must stop, NOW. If NACA in 1930 had been allowed to tell
potential investors that Douglas and Boeing couldn't possibly build
robust all-metal monoplane airliners without ten additional years of
massive NACA research funding, we'd all still be taking trains.
Assuming, of course that we survived WW II at all.
If NASA can neither usefully support entrepreneurial low-cost launch
ventures, nor at minimum shut up and stay out of their way, then
it's time to start looking carefully at the parts of NASA involved,
constraining the ones still needed, and defunding the rest.
Why?
Our evaluation is that NASA is doing this to advance two major
agendas. One is to maintain the massive NASA Shuttle/Station
bureaucracy into the indefinite future, by preempting all possible
alternatives to some sort of huge full-employment Shuttle Upgrade or
Shuttle Followon project.
The other is to fund a wish-list of blue sky launch technology
projects (including hypersonic airbreathing launch vehicles - NASP
II, anyone?) at most of the other NASA centers under the name
"Spaceliner 100", by attacking current (rocket) technologies as
simply not good enough. (For a NASA Spaceliner 100 briefing, see
http://www.reston.com/nasa/congress/06.09.99.spaceliner.html)
That's only our estimate of their motives, mind. It's always
possible NASA is attacking the commercial RLV outfits out of sheer
random institutional bloodymindedness. But attacking they are - and
in general, the main content of their attacks is, uh, incorrect.
In evidence, point #1
- From the April 8th speech by Administrator Goldin to the US Space
Foundation (at http://www.nasa.gov/bios/goldin_speeches.html) in the
context of supporting Spaceliner 100 (by the way, we totally agree
with the grand vision expressed in this speech, of the importance to
coming generations of investing in cheap space access now. It's the
proposed implementation that we vehemently disagree with. We
suspect Dan Goldin has been getting very bad technology advice
lately): "At NASA, the technology barrier is the rocket." He goes
on to state, more or less correctly, that Shuttle launch costs are
about $10,000 per pound, and then says "Expendable vehicles are not
significantly cheaper" (with the unspoken corollary that reusable
rockets can't possibly be much better.)
It depends on your definition of "significantly", we guess - aside
from the Titan 4, which involves almost as much bureaucracy as
Shuttle, current medium-to-heavy commercial expendables cost from
about half (Delta 2, Atlas 2) to about one fifth (ILS Proton) of
$10K per pound to LEO. NASA's recent line that even reusable
rockets can't make more than a factor of ten reduction over Shuttle
launch costs looks pretty foolish when decades-old expendable
designs already undercut Shuttle by factors of two to five. And at
least two credible current expendable ventures are shooting for that
factor of ten reduction.
It is indeed possible that rockets, *as conceived by NASA*, can
never get much cheaper than Shuttle. There's considerable evidence
to support this in NASA's recent RLV efforts. But, if we can keep
NASA from strangling the innovative RLV startups in their cradles,
there is no fundamental law of physics preventing clever engineers
without NASA's forty years of bureaucratic baggage from undercutting
Shuttle costs by factors of ten right from the start, getting down
to factors of as much as a hundred once experience refines systems
and flight rates rise.
In evidence, point #2:
- May 8th "New Scientist" magazine - at
http://www.newscientist.com/keysites/netropolitan/19990508netro.html
>From an article on Richard (Virgin Atlantic Airways) Branson's
investment negotiations with Rotary Rocket Company, a quote from a
top-level NASA official dismissing Roton and other such reusable
rocket concepts as "...system gimmicks to overcome the unbelieveable
lack of technology they [the startup reusable rocket companies]
have."
Hmm. NASA, by implication, has far better technology. Oh, really.
Who has full-scale graphite-epoxy LOX tanks? Who has access to the
best (Russian) rocket engines in the world? Who can build composite
fuel tanks, liquid hydrogen or plain old kerosene, that *don't* leak
like sieves? Who knows how to tow-launch high wing-loading
vehicles? Who has the biggest concentration of expertise in the
world on vertical-landing rockets? On aerial cryo-propellant
transfer? On rapid prototyping of high-strength ultra-light
composites? On high-performance non-toxic storable propellants?
If you answered "NASA" to any of the above, you are *wrong*. The
answer in every case is "private industry", and in most cases the
startups. NASA still has pockets of excellence, but they float in a
sea of mediocrity. NASA slamming the startups' technology in order
to get more funding for their own endless noodling is, frankly,
nauseating.
That said, precisely what is wrong with "system gimmicks" if they
*work*? Are they somehow impure, unclean, unworthy of the true
scientific guardians of higher-tech-at-all-costs? A case in point:
Modern military aircraft require a base with a ten thousand-foot
concrete runway to operate effectively, right? No possible way to
cut that to one-tenth the size and, better yet make it mobile, short
of some ultra-advanced technology like anti-gravity? Right?
Uh... What is an aircraft carrier but a collection of "system
gimmicks" - massive victorian-tech steam catapults for takeoffs,
arrestor wires and tailhooks and mirror-and-light flightpath
indicators for landings, angled flight decks to allow both at once,
plus the accumulated operational expertise to make it all work, a
mobile airbase a tenth the size of fixed landbased versions. If the
"system gimmick" RLV startups can make a major dent in launch costs,
and it looks as if, given a chance, they can, we do not give two
figs how "gimmicky" their technology is. To quote some anonymous
Cold War weapons designer, "'better' is the enemy of 'good enough'".
In evidence, point #3:
This week's "Space News" - "Reusable Launch Vehicles A Decade Away,
NASA Says." We mentioned in Update #83 that the results of an
industry study on what to do about Shuttle (STAS, the Space
Transportation Architecture Study) were out, and that while many of
the proposals were (predictably) for massively expensive one-size-
fits-all Shuttle replacements, at least some of the conclusions were
sensible, IE gradually replace Shuttle with an EELV/CTV system that
would meet NASA manned-space's basic needs with a relatively small
investment while having (a major point to us) negligible impact on
the commercial launch market.
(STAS public non-proprietary results are at
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codea/codeae/stas_results.html )
(EELV are the heavy-lift versions of the Enhanced Expendable Launch
Vehicle, aka Delta 4 and Atlas 5. CTV is a proposed Crew Transfer
Vehicle version of the X-38 Station "Crew Rescue Vehicle" lifeboat.)
Now it seems the NASA/Aerospace Corp response to the various STAS
reports has been leaked to Space News, and the gist of it is: NASA
slams the various RLV proposals as unrealistic regarding schedule
and budget (not surprising if they're geared to actually getting a
contract to replace Shuttle; spending too much money over too long a
time in all the right districts is an unspoken requirement for any
would-be Shuttle replacement - it seems unfair to slam the proposals
for soft-pedalling these unspoken specs) and proposes that NASA
essentially micromanage a drawn-out process to eventually replace
Shuttle sometime in the 2010's.
Previous intentions to encourage commercial RLV developments have
evaporated; NASA Shuttle II will be the only game in town, at least
by this tell-the-customer-what-they-want-to-hear custom blueprint.
Mind, we haven't seen this study ourselves yet; we're going on Space
News's reading - but this agrees with the other recent evidence. By
essentially dismissing the chances any of the current crop of RLV
startups could succeed and thus position themselves to meet a
significant part of NASA's space launch needs, NASA significantly
reduces the startups' chances of getting the investment they need to
succeed, in a fine example of pernicious self-fulfilling prophecy.
Meanwhile, by ignoring the meet-JSC's-needs-and-no-more EELV/CTV
approach in favor of some flavor of massive-overcapacity Shuttle II,
this study continues NASA's implicit threat of a subsidized grab of
the core of the existing commercial launch demand, adversely
affecting the investment climate for commercial space launch in
general.
This is rapidly approaching the point where we'll be able to make a
convincing case that this nation's future in space would be better
served by a radically reduced NASA. We'd rather not find that road
the only one left to us.
Fixing the problem
For starters, we'd like to see whoever's peddling this line at NASA
HQ fired, or at least transferred to counting seabirds at some
remote tracking station. Not that the person in question is more
than a representative of widespread NASA tendencies, but it will at
least serve as an example to the rest.
We'd like to hear an unambiguous repudiation of the totally
unacceptable anti-RLV startup investment advice voiced in the May
8th New Scientist article.
We'd like to see a firm NASA committment to "X-Ops", supporting
interested startups in proving out and refining their low-cost
launch approaches via low-cost subscale flight demonstrations on
NASA's dime, in order to get them to the point where they are
unmistakeably ready to raise commercial funds to develop full-scale
commercial vehicles on an acceptable commercial timescale.
Under those circumstances, we would find it appropriate to support a
minimum-investment approach to guaranteeing Shuttle's NASA-unique
missions, and to support a moderate level of investment in getting
the various "Spaceliner 100" technologies closer to ready for prime
time - we note that the proposed RBCC (Rocket-Based Combined Cycle,
a hybrid rocket-airbreather) engine in particular has huge remaining
unknowns in terms of weight, cost, and speed range, and much work
needs to be done before any Trailblazer-class (~$500m) flight
vehicle program is appropriate. In other words, "show us the
engine!" - given X-33's develop-a-partially-new-engine problems,
this should go without saying, but it apparently doesn't.
We can understand why there might be dissatisfaction with reusable
rockets at top levels in NASA, given the reluctance of the post-
consolidation aerospace majors to compete with themselves by
committing significant resources, and given the organizational
cluelessness in efforts to date. But stomping the startups in an
effort to fund NASP II and/or Shuttle II is not the answer.
Give the startups a real chance now - tight funding, tight schedule,
tight accounting, but minimal engineering elbow-joggling - and in
three to four years, we'll know what's really possible.
Stick with business as usual, and sooner or later the country will
realize what damage NASA is doing, and will act appropriately.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society's sole purpose is to promote radical reductions
in the cost of reaching space. You may redistribute this Update in
any medium you choose, as long as you do it unedited in its entirety.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society
http://www.space-access.org
space.access@space-access.org
"Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere in the Solar System"
- Robert A. Heinlein
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To: moschleg@erols.com, Sdudley6@aol.com, MARK.A.JENSEN@cpmx.saic.com,
DTaylor648@aol.com, JohnFrance@aol.com,
starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu, bbbark@surfree.com,
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Shealiak@XS4ALL.nl
Subject: starship-design: NASA Space arcitecture study
Date: Fri, 18 Jun 1999 18:57:59 EDT
Hi,
I assume you have the latest space access update (#84). They are pissed.
good ol boys in NASA ruling. But check out the NASA space arc study papers.
Most are old hat. Boeing suggests NASA keep shuttles going until at least
2020 (Boeing has all the ground support contracts). Kistler and orbital have
their bits. But space access's paper is cool.
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/codea/codeae/stas_spaceaccess/sa_stas.pdf
I'm surprised NASA would even carry it on their site. It off handedly talks
about replacing all shuttle ops in under ten years with a system costing
1/10th as much as shuttle. It details their current stats and stuff. Why
they intend to use FAA flight certification standards for their craft,
especially its flight reliability standards, etc.
I'm not kidding I'm surprised NASA would even carry it on their site. I know
they will slander them any chance they get, but just giving them visibility
is a political risk to NASA. Maybe they are just to overconfident.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: Space Access Updsate no. 85 (fwd)
Date: Tue, 22 Jun 1999 13:19:05 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu [mailto:listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu] On
Behalf Of Chris W. Johnson
Sent: Monday, June 21, 1999 8:50 PM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: Space Access Updsate no. 85 (fwd)
Date: Sun, 20 Jun 1999 14:17:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: Donald L Doughty <spacelst@world.std.com>
To: DC-X <delta-clipper@world.std.com>
Subject: Space Access Update #85 6/18/99
Reply-To: delta-clipper@world.std.com
Space Access Update #85 6/18/99
Copyright 1999 by Space Access Society
__________________________________________________________________
Stories This Issue:
- Rotary Rocket Layoffs, Reorganization
- NASA Now Faces Significant FY'00 Cuts
________________________________________________________________________
Rotary Rocket News
This just in - Rotary Rocket Company, of Redwood City and Mojave
California, is laying off a large part of their current staff due to
lack of timely additional investment. Rotary is approximately $30
million into an overall $150 million program to build, test, and
operate commercially the Roton medium-lift reusable launch vehicle.
We understand that Rotary will retain a small core staff and will
continue preparing their ATV (Aerial Test Vehicle, a systems,
airframe, and landing-mode demonstrator) for its first test flight,
pending reorganization of the company.
[Editorial] We cannot say for certain that recent NASA public
positions implicitly and explicitly advising against investment in
Rotary and other reusable launch startups were directly responsible
for this turn of events. But they sure didn't help - and NASA's
silence even after we contacted the Administrator's press secretary
back in May, about the New Scientist story slamming the startups
(www.newscientist.com/keysites/netropolitan/19990508netro.html) is
inexcusable.
To expand on that specific instance, the New Scientist quote, about
the startups depending on "system gimmicks" to cover for their
"unbelieveable lack of technology" (see SAU #84 for our rebuttal) in
the context of a story on a possible Richard Branson investment on
Rotary, looks to us far too likely to have been a factor in
Branson's presumed non-invest decision.
To amplify and emphasize what we said in SAU #84: We demand an
unambiguous repudiation of the totally unacceptable anti-RLV startup
investment advice voiced in the May 8th New Scientist article.
We also demand that NASA state clearly that it supports the low-cost
launch startups, and that it will contract for their services to
accomplish NASA missions as appropriate, as soon as those services
are available on a regular commercial basis.
________________________________________________________________________
NASA Budget Cuts Now Likely
In other news just in, for a variety of arcane political reasons,
the Senate and House NASA Appropriators both now look likely to
stick with the deficit-deal budget caps this year after all - this
will mean something on the order of a $1 billion cut in NASA's
budget for the coming year, rather than the moderate increases
everyone had anticipated. The Senate markups are supposed to start
the week after next.
[Editorial] We will have to think long and hard over the next few
days on what we will fight for, and what we won't.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society's sole purpose is to promote radical reductions
in the cost of reaching space. You may redistribute this Update in
any medium you choose, as long as you do it unedited in its entirety.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society
http://www.space-access.org
space.access@space-access.org
"Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere in the Solar System"
- Robert A. Heinlein
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Subject: starship-design: Re: LIT Library
Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1999 19:19:38 EDT
> Kelly,
> Many of your "green" hyperlinks in the relativity section
> of the Library don't work. I'd really like to examine some
> of these papers.
>
>Edward Solberg
Sorry, the sites a little under maintained. I don't know where the
origionals might be, but I'll forward your request to the group.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Space tourist projections for 2030
Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1999 19:19:59 EDT
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Bit of an artical opn space tourism. Interesting artical if you want to
check out the URL.
Kelly
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Subject: Space tourist projections for 2030
TO: indy@the-line.com, kellyst@aol.com
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http://www.spacefuture.com/archive/space_activities_space_tourism_and_e
conomic_growth.shtml
A figure of 5 million passengers/year in 2030 would
imply that the
cumulative number of passengers at that time would
be some 40 million
people - or perhaps 2% of the middle class
population of the time. Yet in
market research, not only do most people say that
they would like to
travel to space, but a large proportion,
particularly of younger people,
wish to do so several times. And in view of the
likely fall in costs as well
as the development of progressively more
entertaining facilities in orbit,
this seems probable. Thus a traffic level of 5
million passengers/year by
2030 will be very far from satisfying the known
demand, and so traffic
levels even several times higher than this must be
considered a
possibility. =20
Such growth will also have interesting implications
for the hotel industry.
From market research, the great majority of
customers can be expected
to stay in orbit for 2-3 days or longer, from which
it is simple to calculate
that 5-10 million passengers/year will entail some
30,000 - 80,000 guests
staying simultaneously in orbital accommodation.
Assuming an average
occupancy rate of 80%, this will require capacity
for some 35,000 to
100,000 guests in orbit. It is worth noting that
the technology required for
initial orbital accommodation is much simpler than
that needed for
passenger launch vehicles or an orbiting research
station. However, by
2030 orbital hotels will have moved beyond the
first generation,
comprising clusters of standard pre-fabricated
modules, to include large
structures like resort hotels and entertainment
complexes assembled in
orbit. =20
A further implication is that, assuming a
staff:guest ratio of between 1:3
and 1:2, the number of hotel staff working in orbit
30 years from now will
be between 10,000 and 50,000. Since staff will work
shifts (probably of 2
- 3 months), the total number of people engaged in
this work will be at
least twice this figure, or between 20,000 and
100,000. Staff who work in
space for the travel and tourism industry as hotel
staff and space tour
conductors (or "Specon" as they are coming to be
known in Japan) can
therefore be expected to outnumber government
astronauts by
hundreds-to-one by 2030. (These are therefore much
more realistic
career-goals for young people to aim towards than
trying to be selected
as one of the tiny number of government
astronauts.) =20
Based on this simple analysis, we can project that
30 years from now
there will be 100 hotels or more in orbit - the
majority probably being in
high-inclination orbits for economical access from
high latitudes (21), and
to give guests views of much of the Earth. There
may be perhaps 20
hotels in equatorial orbit (the cheapest to reach)
for customers who are
more interested in zero gravity activities such as
sports than in the range
of views of Earth, 10 in polar orbit to give views
of the whole of Earth,
and a few in highly elliptical orbits to give
guests views of the distant
Earth. =20
With 100 or more scheduled flights/day to these
hotels, and probably
many more private flights, traffic control will be
a long-established
system: an integrated Space and Air Traffic
Management System
(SATMS) is, after all, already under study by the
US Federal Aviation
Authority, FAA, (22). In addition, hotels will
probably operate in a small
number of defined orbits, due to the safety and
operational benefits that
they will gain, and for which a number of legal
innovations will be
required (23). =20
Due to the commercial incentives that will exist in
such a scenario there
is likely to be at least one propellant "service
station" in each of the main
hotel orbits, and the supply of water from the
lunar surface and comets to
these stations (for conversion to oxygen, hydrogen
and other chemicals),
and to orbital hotels and entertainment-complexes
will probably be a
regular commercial activity (24). =20
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Subject: Re: starship-design: Fwd: Space tourist projections for 2030
Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1999 23:55:18 -0600
KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>
> Bit of an artical opn space tourism. Interesting artical if you want to
> check out the URL.
>
> Kelly
>
That is a lot of travel out there or Up there by 2030.
Is the monolithic system of current space design
to ridged to work is my question for the day.
Thinking about this quickly and all the plans I have seen
call for big space hotels. Giving a transport shuttle
a crew of 2 and 14 passengers or a cargo mass
2500 lbs with a heavy launch booster for the hotel
this does seem to me the wrong way to go because the overall
scale is too large. Hotel chain X builds a hotel
in space but can't adapt to a new market ( made in space yo-yo's
for example ) because the it is scaled up for something else.
Big projects want bigger boosters, that can't be tested.
No private group has the vision for a long range goals
and the large groups consider this too small a investment return.
I think we need to create the market now for everybody
and have payloads ready in sync with the launch vehicles.
My own ideas on the subject is the Spudnick-1 capable
of putting 200 lbs of payload ( say potatoes ) into orbit.
With a air launch I guess a 3% payload to fuel ratio...
9.7 tons of space plane... Now if I had some land on the west
coast of africa and a solar farm for h20 into H2 & O.
I would be set assuming I could fly the launch plane.
Fight controls would be simple auto pilot. Complex flying
for space docking would be done by a docking shuttle
( microwave powered H2 rocket ) that grabs the space plane
and brings it in as well as the last stage of thrust.
A lot of flights to do anything but I guess ( Big guess )
the cost of such a vehicle would be about $ 250,000 not
counting labor and red tape. Something a small group of
families could run. With fuel free the cost is time and overhead.
Ben.
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 22
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 11:18:28 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-spaceviews@wayback.com [mailto:owner-spaceviews@wayback.com]
On Behalf Of jeff@spaceviews.com
Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 1999 1:14 PM
Subject: SpaceViews -- 1999 June 22
[ SpaceViews (tm) newsletter ]
[ see end of message for our NEW address to subscribe / unsubscribe ]
S P A C E V I E W S
Issue 1999.06.22
1999 June 22
http://www.spaceviews.com/1999/0622/
*** News ***
NASA May Cancel Two Planetary Missions
ISS Orbital Maneuver Fails
Layoffs at Rotary Rocket
Another Mir Crew Planned for December
NASA Launches QuikScat Satellite
ESA Signs Mars Express Launch Contract
Arianespace Plays Waiting Game with Satellite Companies
Britain Seeks International Cooperation in Asteroid Search
SpaceViews Event Horizon
Other News
*** Book Reviews ***
Back to the Moon
Two Moon Art Books
*** News ***
NASA May Cancel Two Planetary Missions
Proposed cuts that may trim up to $1 billion from NASA's 2000
budget could mean the end of two proposed planetary missions,
including a Mars lander, SpaceViews has learned.
The Planetary Society has put out an alert claiming that two
proposed missions, the Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander and the Space
Technology 4 (ST4) "Champollion" comet mission, will be canceled in
the near future by NASA.
"NASA's budget is decreasing and funding for future space
science missions is in doubt, so apparently NASA is going to fix these
problems by canceling two missions that are proceeding on schedule and
within budget," The Planetary Society wrote in a alert. "We strongly
object."
It's not clear why these two missions have reportedly been
selected with cancellation, since both are proceeding on schedule and
budget. However, both missions have run into problems in the last
year.
Last summer mission planners elected to remove Athena, a large
rover originally planned to be included with the 2001 lander, because
of cost overruns and delays. The rover was eventually replaced with
Marie Curie, a clone of the Sojourner rover that flew on Mars
Pathfinder, while Athena was delayed to the 2003 lander.
Since then planning for the lander, which will feature a
number of educational projects as well as experiments oriented towards
future human missions to Mars, has proceeded smoothly.
Earlier this year the ST4 mission team worked feverishly to
redesign the mission, which will land on the nucleus of comet Tempel 1
three years after a 2003 launch, after NASA threatened the New
Millennium Program mission with cancellation.
The ST4 team at JPL did present a revised mission proposal
that combined orbiter and lander sections into a single spacecraft
that will land on the comet nucleus. That mission proposal won
approval from NASA Headquarters officials in April.
NASA's space science budget has been under pressure this year
because of delays with the launch of the Chandra X-Ray Observatory as
well as a separate servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope
needed this year to replace its failing gyros.
NASA's proposed 2000 budget may be placed under additional
stress. The Space Access Society reported June 18 that Congress will
maintain caps on the 2000 federal budget mandated by a
deficit-reduction plan, which could result in a cut of up to $1
billion in NASA's 2000 budget.
The Clinton administration originally proposed a $13.6 billion
budget for NASA in 2000, less than $100 million below its 1999 budget.
A House authorization bill passed last month increased this amount
over a three-year period to $13.8 billion by 2002.
ISS Orbital Maneuver Fails
A orbital maneuver scheduled earlier this month to move the
International Space Station (ISS) away from a potentially dangerous
piece of orbital debris failed and left the station temporarily
without its guidance system.
The maneuver was ultimately not needed, as ISS passed a safe
distance away from a Russian upper rocket stage, but the incident
raised concern among Russian and American officials about guidance and
control of the station.
The Air Force Space Command notified NASA late last week that
a piece of orbital debris could pass within 1 km (0.6 mi.) of ISS
early Sunday, June 13. Since this approach was too close for comfort,
NASA decided to maneuver the station away from the path of the debris.
The maneuver was planned for late Saturday, June 12, and
commands were sent from Houston to Russian Mission Control in Korolev,
near Moscow, where commands are uplinked to ISS. However, as sent to
ISS, the commands called for one of the thrusters on the Zarya module
to burn longer than allowed by the onboard computer system. The
computer system on ISS thus decided to cancel the maneuver.
ABC News reported that in addition to the canceled maneuver,
the whole guidance system on ISS shut down for 90 minutes -- nearly
one full orbit -- as a result. This shutdown kept controllers from
doing any maneuvers to the station, a potentially hazardous situation.
In the end, the maneuver turned out not to be necessary. The
debris, thought by experts to be the rocket stage from the launch of
Cosmos 100, passed 7 km (4.3 mi.) from ISS.
NASA officials explained that this was the first time such a
maneuver has been performed by ISS, and added that in the future such
an incident would be less of a problem since a crew on the station
could resolve the problem. Nonetheless, American and Russian
officials plan to evaluate procedures for such maneuvers.
"This is just the first of many opportunities to be humble,"
James Van Laak, deputy manager of space station operations, told ABC.
"I hope that everyone will keep in mind that were learning as fast as
anybody."
Layoffs at Rotary Rocket
Rotary Rocket Company, a startup firm privately developing a
reusable launch vehicle (RLV), has reportedly laid off a large
fraction of its work force because of funding problems.
The news, first reported late Friday, June 18, has raised
questions among space activists about the actions, or inaction, NASA
has taken to support the private development of RLVs.
Sources say Rotary Rocket has laid off most to all of its
employees not directly working on the prototype of its Roton RLV. The
company will devote its remaining resources to complete the testing of
the Roton Atmospheric Test Vehicle (ATV).
Rotary has been testing the Roton ATV on the ground in
preparations for low-level atmospheric test flights. Those tests had
been proceeding slowly, but Geoffrey Hughes, vice president for sales
and marketing at Rotary, told SpaceViews earlier this month that the
company had "more than enough funding" to complete the ATV testing.
Hughes told SpaceViews on Monday, June 21 that an official
announcement about "managerial changes" would be made later in the
week. He said the changes Rotary has made are "fairly major changes
for the better" that have been "taken in a different way than
intended."
Rotary, which has raised $30 million of the $150 million the
company says it needs to build the first flight version of the Roton,
had been actively seeking additional investment in the company. For
weeks the leading potential investor appeared to be British
businessman Richard Branson, head of the Virgin group of companies.
Company officials had publicly tried to downplay any possible
investment role Branson might have, although media in the US and
Britain played up reports of visits to Rotary Rocket's California
facilities by Branson this spring.
The layoffs at Rotary have led some activists to speculate
that any deal for Branson to invest in Rotary fell through, and some
are pointing their fingers at NASA as a possible cause.
Henry Vanderbilt, head of the Space Access Society (SAS),
noted that NASA administrator Dan Goldin was quoted in New Scientist
magazine last month as dismissing the Roton and other proposed private
RLVs as "system gimmicks to overcome the unbelievable lack of
technology that they have."
"...[T]he New Scientist quote,... in the context of a story on
a possible Richard Branson investment on Rotary, looks to us far too
likely to have been a factor in Branson's presumed non-invest
decision," Vanderbilt concluded.
"We cannot say for certain that recent NASA public positions
implicitly and explicitly advising against investment in Rotary and
other reusable launch startups were directly responsible for this turn
of events," Vanderbilt said. "But they sure didn't help."
Vanderbilt said a lack of any clarification of Goldin's
remarks, even after such requests by the SAS, was "inexcusable." He
called for a "unambiguous repudiation of the totally unacceptable
anti-RLV startup investment advice" represented by Goldin's quote.
Report: Another Mir Crew Planned for December
Russian will send a two-man crew to the Mir space station in
December to either prepare it for continued use or finalize plans to
deorbit it, the BBC reported Thursday, June 17.
The BBC reported that Yuri Semionov, head of Energia, the
Russian company that operates Mir for the Russian Space Agency, said a
crew would be launched to Mir in December, four months after the
current crew leaves.
The exact tasks the crew would undertake during the
apparently-brief stay on Mir are unclear. It had been believed that
the current Mir crew would mothball the station prior to their
departure, so that it would be ready to be deorbited or put to use
should funding be found to continue operations.
Any December docking would put to the test an upgraded
attitude-control computer that is planned to be installed on Mir
before the current crew leaves. The current attitude computer on Mir
has failed several times, but the crew on Mir was able to bring it
back online and restore Mir's attitude.
If the attitude system fails while Mir is unoccupied, the
station would lose attitude control and may start to tumble. This
would make any docking difficult at best, and most likely impossible.
Russian officials had announced earlier this month that Mir
would be left unoccupied after the current crew leaves in December,
marking the end of nearly 10 consecutive years of occupation of the
space station. The station would remain in orbit, unmanned, until it
was deorbited over the Pacific Ocean in early 2000.
The BBC report, which has not been verified by other news
agencies, did not specify the cost of the mission or who would be
paying for it.
NASA Launches QuikScat Satellite
A Titan 2 booster successfully launched a NASA satellite
designed to study wind patterns over the oceans Saturday night, June
19, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.
The Titan 2, a refurbished ICBM, lifted off at 10:15 pm EDT
(0215 UT June 20) from Pad 4W at Vandenberg Air Force Base. The
rocket successfully placed NASA's QuikScat (Quick Scatterometer)
spacecraft into polar orbit.
QuikScat carries one instrument, called SeaWinds, designed to
measure the direction and speed of winds over the oceans. The
instrument bounces radar signals off the ocean surface and measures
the signals that are returned, or "backscattered", to the spacecraft.
The backscatter varies according to the wave pattern on the ocean
surface, allowing scientists to infer the wind speed and direction at
the ocean surface.
Scientists will be able to use this data to explore the
Earth's weather and climate, from the study of hurricanes and other
severe storms to monitoring the development of global weather systems
like El Niño.
"Knowledge about which way the wind blows and how hard is it
blowing may seem simple, but this kind of information is actually a
critical tool in improved weather forecasting, early storm detection
and identifying subtle changes in global climate," said Ghassem Asrar,
NASA associate administrator for earth sciences.
The QuikScat spacecraft was the first procured under an
"Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity". This program allows for
the rapid development of spacecraft mission by selecting core systems
from a catalog provided by industry. In this case the satellite
design was based on an existing commercial design by Ball Aerospace.
Total cost of the mission, including launch, was $93 million.
The mission was rushed through after a similar NASA-built
scatterometer was lost when the spacecraft it was on, the Japanese
ADEOS earth-observing satellite, lost power in June 1997.
ESA Signs Mars Express Launch Contract
The European Space Agency (ESA) signed a launch contract this
week with a French-Russian consortium for the launch next decade of
ESA's first Mars spacecraft.
The agreement calls for the launch in June 2003 of the Mars
Express spacecraft on a Soyuz booster from Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The
agreement was made between ESA and Starsem, a French-Russian company
that markets the Russian Soyuz rocket in the West.
Mars Express will go into orbit around Mars six months after
launch, studying the planet from orbit with a suite of seven
instruments that will have an emphasis on mapping the planet and
looking for water. Mars Express will also deploy a British lander,
Beagle 2.
"I'm very happy to sign this contract with Starsem and to have
a launcher for Mars Express, the first European mission to the Red
Planet," said Roger Bonnet, ESA's director of science.
The agreement comes one month after Mars Express received
final approval by the science ministers of ESA's member nations.
There had been some concern in past months that a tight ESA science
budget would squeeze out funding for the mission, but the budget
approved last month included enough money for the mission.
Funding is not yet certain, however, for Beagle 2. Funding
for the lander will come directly from Britain and not from ESA
sources, and to date the British government has not allocated the
final $40 million needed to build the lander. However, with a British
commitment to spend over $100 million on a Earth-observing program,
Mars activists are hopeful that the additional funding for Beagle 2
can be found.
The Mars Express launch will be the third ESA launch using a
Soyuz. Two launches are planned in summer 2000 to launch the
constellation of four Cluster II solar science satellites. All three
Soyuz launches will use the Fregat upper stage, based on the
propulsion system used to send the two Phobos spacecraft to Mars in
the late 1980s.
Arianespace Plays Waiting Game with Satellite Companies
Arianespace, which has not launched a payload in two and a
half months, is unlikely to launch another until at least the end of
July as it waits for companies to deliver their satellites.
These delays, caused by satellite and not launch vehicle
problems, could have an impact on the French company's bottom line,
which saw modest growth in 1998.
Arianespace does not anticipate launching another Ariane 4
until late July at the earliest, when the K-TV direct broadcast
satellite for New Skies, a Dutch company, will be ready. That launch,
originally planned for late April, was delayed when satellite
manufacturer Matra Marconi discovered problems with the spacecraft's
solar panels.
Delays with other satellites have also pushed back the first
commercial launch of the heavy-lift Ariane 5 booster, originally
scheduled for early July. No firm date has been set for that or any
other Ariane launch.
There have been only two Ariane launches to date in 1999: the
February launch of British military and Arab commercial communications
satellites, and the early April launch of an Indian remote sensing
satellite.
Arianespace had originally planned to launch as many as 14
missions in 1999. If launches start up again in late July as they
hope, the company believes it can still launch an additional 5-7
Ariane 4 and 3 Ariane 5 boosters by the end of the year, a pace that
would require up to two launches per month through the end of the
year.
"Faced with an unpredictable market, Arianespace offers three
key assets: flexibility, availability and anticipation," the company
said in a press release. "Arianespace is ready to increase its launch
rate starting end of July in order to compensate the important delays
in satellite delivery to French Guiana over the first semester."
The delay could have a significant impact on Arianespace's
profits, which showed modest growth in 1998 according to figures
released June 16. The company posted profits of 14 million euros
(US$14.6 million) on sales of $1.086 billion (US$1.13 billion) in
1998. Profits were up 18.6% over 1997 and sales were up 8.6%.
The company elected not to pay a dividend to shareholders so
that the money could be invested in future upgrades for the Ariane 5.
Britain Seeks International Cooperation in Asteroid Search
The British government would prefer to cooperate with other
nations to set up searches for near-Earth asteroids, rather than
establish its own program, the British science minister told
Parliament June 15.
Speaking in the House of Lords, science minister Lord
Sainsbury of Turville told members that the preference of the
government would be to work with fellow European Space Agency
countries on any near-Earth object (NEO) detection programs.
"The Government take the potential threat of impact by near
earth objects very seriously, but we regard it as an issue where a
common international approach is essential," Sainsbury said.
Sainsbury was asked several times by members of the House of
Lords if it would be prudent for Britain to establish its own
"Spaceguard" program to search for NEOs, using such resources as the
Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland. On each occasion Sainsbury
declined to show support for such a British-only effort.
"At the present moment, the Government have no plans to set up
a national spaceguard agency," he said, although a final decision
would wait until after the government reviewed reports from a recent
NEO conference in Italy. "Any additional work undertaken in the UK
must have benefit over and above that being taken internationally."
The debate in the House of Lords comes three months after a
similar debate in the other branch of Parliament, the House of
Commons. At that time, John Battle, the Minister for Energy and
Industry, told members the government would talk with British
astronomers and other experts on ways the UK could support NEO
research.
Since the March debate in the House of Commons, two asteroids
have been discovered on trajectories which have small but non-zero
probabilities of hitting the Earth next century. Those discoveries
have intensified interest worldwide in continuing and expanding the
search for other NEOs.
Sainsbury said the British government does not consider the
threat posed by NEOs to be a "trivial matter" but rather one that
calls for cooperation. "Of all subjects which come before this House,
this is one in respect of which an international effort is the key,"
he said. "We shall play our part in that rather than acting
independently."
SpaceViews Event Horizon
June 23-24 First U.S. Space Tourism Conference, Washington, DC
June 24 Delta 2 launch of NASA's Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic
Explorer (FUSE) mission from Cape Canavwral, Florida
at 11:39 am EDT (1539 UT)
June 26 Proton launch of Russian Raduga comsat (and initial
flight of the Breeze-M upper stage) from Baikonur,
Kazakhstan.
July 8 Delta 2 launch of four Globalstar satellites from Cape
Canaveral, Florida, at 5:17 am EDT (0917 UT)
July 15-16 Lunar Base Development Symposium, League City, TX
July 16 (NET) Atlas 2A launch of the GOES-L weather satellite from
Cape Canaveral, Florida (under review)
August 12-15 Mars Society 1999 Conference, Boulder, CO
Other News
Cosmonaut Record: Sunday, June 20 was just another day in space for
the crew of the Russian space station Mir. But for cosmonaut Sergei
Avdeyev, it was his 679th day in space ever, setting a new cumulative
record for most time spent in space. Avdeyev broke the cumulative
mark of 678 days, 16 hours, and 35 minutes at 0256 UT June 20 (10:56
pm EDT June 19), previously held by cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov.
Polyakov sill holds the record for longest continuous space flight, at
438 days; Avdeyev, who has been on Mir since last August, will not
break that since he is due to return August 23. Polyakov set the mark
with two previous six months stays on Mir in addition to the current
mission.
Proton Launch: A Russian Proton booster launched a European
communications satellite Thursday, June 17. The Proton lifted off on
schedule at 9:49 pm EDT (0149 UT June 18) from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.
The Proton D-1-e and its Blok DM upper stage successfully placed the
Astra 1H satellite into a geosynchronous transfer orbit. The
satellite, operated by the Societe Europeenne des Satellites (SES),
will be used to provide "broadband interactive applications to
low-cost user terminals." The launch was the second commercial Proton
launch in a month; a Proton launched the Canadian Nimiq direct TV
satellite May 20.
U.S., Europe to Build Radio Observatory: The United States and
Europe, and potentially other countries, will join together to build a
new radio telescope in Chile that promises to become one of the most
powerful in the world. The Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) will
consist of up to 64 12-meter (40-foot) radio antennas spread over an
area 10 km (16 mi.) across, capable of observing the sky at millimeter
and submillimeter wavelengths at very high resolutions. The array of
telescopes will allow astronomers to make observations of everything
from the birthplaces of stars to distant galaxies created early in the
history of the universe, all at resolutions as sharp as 10
milliarcseonds, not currently possible with existing radio telescopes.
ALMA will begin with a three-year development phase, which will
include the construction of two prototype antennas. Japan and Chile
have also expressed interest in joining the project.
Refurbished Telescope to Join Asteroid Hunt: JPL announced plans June
21 to refurbish an existing telescope at California's Palomar
Observatory to turn it into a tool to search for near-Earth asteroids.
The 1.2-meter (48-inch) Oschin Schmidt camera telescope will get an
automated control system and electronic camera so that JPL's Near
Earth Asteroid Tracking (NEAT) team can use the telescope in the
search for asteroids. The telescope's larger aperture and wider field
of view should allow the NEAT team to discover more asteroids than
their current telescope, a 1-meter (39-inch) Air Force scope atop
Maui's Haleakala mountain.
Gemini Photos: The first of the two 8.1-meter (319-inch) telescopes
of the Gemini project has returned extremely sharp images of Pluto and
its moon Charon. The images, taken with an adaptive optics system
that compensates for the aberrations created by the Earth's
atmosphere, clearly resolved the two bodies as resolutions as sharp as
0.08 arcseconds. The telescope, located atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii, has
not started regular science observations yet; its formal dedication is
scheduled for June 25-26. A second, identical Gemini telescope is
under construction in Chile to observer southern skies.
*** Book Reviews ***
by Jeff Foust
Back to the Moon
by Homer H. Hickam, Jr.
Delacorte Press, 1999
hardcover, 448 pp.
IBN 0-385-33422-2
US$23.95/C$32.95
Buy this book at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385334222/spaceviews
It's not often that we review fiction books in SpaceViews; our
preference has long been for non-fiction books that explain what we do
(or don't) know about the universe, where we've been in space and
where and how we'll be going in the future. However, Homer H. Hickam
Jr. is not an ordinary fiction writer and "Back to the Moon" is not an
ordinary piece of fiction. The retired NASA engineer (and author of
"Rocket Boys", lated made into the movie "October Sky") has written a
compelling and realistic thriller full of shuttle and other
technologies.
"Back to the Moon" takes place a few years in the future, in a
world where a treaty is about to outlaw all fusion energy research.
One scientist has a test reactor that appears to show promise, but he
needs more helium-3 to show it can work. Helium-3 is rare and
expensive on the Earth, but plentiful elsewhere, including the surface
of the Moon. However, when an unmanned spacecraft designed to return
lunar soil samples is destroyed in a fire on Earth, its builder,
former NASA engineer Jack Medaris, finds an alternative way to obtain
soil samples, one that involves taking the shuttle Columbia on its
most incredible journey ever. (We don't want to say too much more
about the plot of the book; that would spoil all the fun!)
Like in nearly any thriller, the string of events in this book
seem mildly implausible, at the very least. However, the technology
described in the book is not; Hickam based it on his own insider
knowledge of the space program as well as plans he knew for such
things as the ability to take a shuttle to the Moon. The book is full
of technical jargon and descriptions, but there's also a fascinating
plot full of twists and turns up to the very end. "Back to the Moon"
is a fun, interesting page-turner.
Apollo: An Eyewitness Account
by Alan Bean with Andrew Chaikin
Greenwich Workshop Press, 1998
hardcover, 176 pp., illus.
ISBN 0-86713-050-4
US$45
Buy this book at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0867130504/spaceviews
Full Moon
by Michael Light
Alfred A. Knopf, 1999
hardcover, 244 pp., illus.
ISBN 0-375-40634-4
US$50/C$75
Buy this book at Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0375406344/spaceviews
"Apollo: An Eyewitness Account" and "Full Moon" have some
basic similarities: both seek to provide new artistic perspectives on
our exploration of the Moon 30 years ago. In addition, both are
oversized "coffee table" books that feature the writing of Andrew
Chaikin (of "A Man on the Moon" fame) in a supporting role. However,
each book goes about this in a different way: while Alan Bean paints
vistas of lunar exploration in "Apollo", Michael Light revisits the
archives of photos taken by the astronauts in "Full Moon". Both are
equally successful.
Bean, who was the LEM pilot on Apollo 12 and thus the fourth
man to walk on the Moon, had an interest in art dating back to before
he joined the astronaut corps, but didn't fully pursue it until after
he left NASA in 1981, when he chose painting as a way to communicate
his and other moonwalkers' experiences. The subjects of his
paintings, done in a more impressionistic rather than realistic light,
run the gamut from the mundane (taking a core sample) to inspirational
(an astronaut raising his arms in victory in front of an American
flag) to fantasy (all three members of the Apollo 12 crew, including
command module pilot Dick Gordon, standing on the lunar surface.) The
book includes dozens of color prints of these paintings, along with
commentary about Bean, Apollo 12, and painting.
While Bean chose painting as his medium, photographer Michael
Light went into NASA's archives of thousands of photos from the Apollo
program. Getting unprecedented access to the master rolls of film, he
rescanned the photos and selected over 100 to show in this book. The
photos are far better than anything printed before, because of the
treatment Light provided: the sharpness, clarity, and colors are truly
incredible. The photos are organized in an uncaptioned photo essay
that runs from liftoff through landing on the Moon to return to Earth;
a written essay by Chaikin follows along with further information
about the photos.
Both "Apollo: An Eyewitness Account" and "Full Moon" provide a
useful visual look at the Apollo program that goes beyond the usual
set of photos used to illustrate the program. Bean's art gives us a
glimpse of Apollo from the mind's eye of someone who went to the Moon;
Light's treatment of the Apollo photos gives us perhaps the best
images yet from the actual missions. Both books carry fairly hefty
price tags, but if you're interested in the visual aspects of Apollo,
both books, particularly "Full Moon", are well worth it.
========
This has been the June 22, 1999, issue of SpaceViews.
SpaceViews is also available on the World Wide web from the
SpaceViews home page:
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or via anonymous FTP from ftp.seds.org:
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Subject: starship-design: GRB's
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 16:36:48 -0500
Galactic Explosions Inhibit Life
by Robert Matthews at New Scientist
London - January 21, 1999 - Gamma-Ray bursts -- incredibly powerful
explosions that may be caused by collisions between collapsed stars -- could
solve one of the oldest riddles about extraterrestrial civilizations: why
haven't they reached Earth already? After studying the effects of gamma-ray
bursts on life, an astrophysicist has concluded that aliens may have just
started to explore their galaxies.
Enthusiasts for the existence of extraterrestrials have long been haunted by
a simple question supposedly posed by the Nobel prizewinning physicist
Enrico Fermi around 1950. Fermi pointed out that the Galaxy is about 100 000
light years across. So even if a spacefaring race could explore the Galaxy
at only a thousandth of the speed of light, it would take them just 100
million years to spread across the entire Galaxy. This is far less than the
Galaxy's age of about 10 billion years.
So if ETs exist in the Milky Way, where are they? Maybe they don't share the
human urge to explore. Or perhaps there's another reason, says James Annis,
an astrophysicist at Fermilab near Chicago. He thinks cataclysmic gamma-ray
bursts often sterilize galaxies, wiping out life forms before they have
evolved sufficiently to leave their planet (Journal of the British
Interplanetary Society, vol. 52, p 19). GRBs are thought to be the most
powerful explosions in the Universe, releasing as much energy as a supernova
in seconds. Many scientists think the bursts occur when the remnants of dead
stars such as neutron stars or black holes collide.
Annis points out that each GRB unleashes devastating amounts of radiation.
"If one went off in the Galactic center, we here two-thirds of the way out
on the Galactic disc would be exposed over a few seconds to a wave of
powerful gamma rays." He believes this would be lethal to life on land.
The rate of GRBs is about one burst per galaxy every few hundred million
years. But Annis says theories of GRBs suggest the rate was much higher in
the past, with galaxies suffering one strike every few million years -- far
shorter than any plausible time scale for the emergence of intelligent life
capable of space travel. That, says Annis, may be the answer to Fermi's
question. "They just haven't had enough time to get here yet," he says. "The
GRB model essentially resets the available time for the rise of intelligent
life to zero each time a burst occurs."
Paul Davies, a visiting physicist at Imperial College, London, says the
basic idea for resolving the paradox makes sense. "Any Galaxy-wide
sterilizing event would do," he says. However, he adds that GRBs may be too
brief: "If the drama is all over in seconds, you only zap half a planet. The
planet's mass shields the shadowed side." Annis counters that GRBs are
likely to have many indirect effects, such as wrecking ozone layers that
protect planets from deadly levels of ultraviolet radiation.
Annis also highlights an intriguing implication of the theory: the current
rate of GRBs allows intelligent life to evolve for a few hundred million
years before being zapped, possibly giving it enough time to reach the
spacefaring stage. "It may be that intelligent life has recently sprouted up
at many places in the Galaxy and that at least a few groups are busily
engaged in spreading."
New Scientist Magazine
Issue 23rd Jan 99
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Regarding an old discussion within the group on SETI...
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-setiathome@klx.com [mailto:owner-setiathome@klx.com] On Behalf
Of Brian Straight
Sent: Thursday, June 24, 1999 2:21 PM
To: seti@sni.net; setiathome@klx.com
Subject: New Scientist PR
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE: 23 JUNE 1999 AT 14:00:00 ET US
Contact: Claire Bowles
claire.bowles@rbi.co.uk
44-171-331-2751
US Contact: New Scientist Washington office
newscidc@idt.net
202-452-1178
*New Scientist
If the Sun is exceptional, alien life may be hard to find
What a star!
**
Don't believe everything you read in books-our Sun is no ordinary star. And
its very uniqueness has implications for SETI, the search for
extraterrestrial life, claims Guillermo Gonzalez of the University of
Washington in Seattle: "Unless astronomers narrow down their search to
stars as exceptional as the Sun, they are wasting much of their time."
The Sun is a single star whereas most stars are in multiple systems. But
that apart, textbooks say the Sun is pretty average. However, after
trawling through the data on the Sun, Gonzalez has found many
idiosyncrasies. It is among the most massive 10 per cent of stars in its
neighbourhood. It also has 50 per cent more heavy elements than other stars
of its age and type, and about a third of the variation in brightness.
The most unusual aspects of the Sun concern its orbit around the centre of
the Galaxy, says Gonzalez. Its orbit is significantly less elliptical than
that of other stars of its age and type, and hardly inclined at all to the
Galactic plane. What's more, the Sun is orbiting very close to the
"corotation radius" for the Galaxy-the place at which the angular speed of
the spiral pattern matches that of the stars.
Gonzalez argues that these exceptional characteristics made it possible for
intelligent life to emerge on Earth. He points out that stable planetary
orbits such as the Earth's are much more likely around single stars like
the Sun. For a massive star with inhabitable planets that are relatively
far away, stellar flare-ups would be little threat to the planets. Heavy
elements are essential to make planets like Earth, and a star with a stable
light output is essential for life.
As for the orbit of the Sun, its circularity prevents it plunging into the
inner Galaxy where life-threatening supernovae are more common. And its
small inclination to the Galactic plane prevents abrupt crossings of the
plane that would stir up the Sun's Oort Cloud and bombard the Earth with
comets. By being near the Galaxy's corotation radius, the Sun avoids
crossing the spiral arms too often, an event that would expose it to
supernovae, which are more common there.
Because life-bearing stars have to be close to the corotation radius, that
rules out more than 95 per cent of stars in the Galaxy in one fell swoop.
"There are fewer stars suitable for intelligent life than people realise,"
says Gonzalez, who has submitted his findings to Astronomy & Geophysics.
"I'm amazed at how little thought the SETI people put into selecting their
stars."
Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, disagrees.
"Our targets are all very close to the Sun. They share our Galactic
neighbourhood and motions. If the Sun is the most suitable type of star to
be scrutinised, then we are, indeed, looking in all the best places."
"Most astronomers disagree with Gonzalez," adds SETI researcher Dan
Werthimer of the University of California at Berkeley. "Our Sun is pretty
average. In any case, you don't need a star exactly like our Sun for life."
###
PLEASE MENTION NEW SCIENTIST AS THE SOURCE OF THIS ITEM
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charset="iso-8859-1"
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<HTML><HEAD>
<META content=3Dtext/html;charset=3Diso-8859-1 =
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<BODY bgColor=3D#ffffff>
<DIV><FONT color=3D#0000ff face=3DArial size=3D2><SPAN=20
class=3D606063920-24061999>Regarding an old discussion within the group =
on=20
SETI...</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=3D#0000ff face=3DArial size=3D2><SPAN=20
class=3D606063920-24061999></SPAN></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=3D#0000ff face=3DArial size=3D2><SPAN=20
class=3D606063920-24061999></SPAN></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV class=3DOutlookMessageHeader><FONT face=3D"Times New Roman"=20
size=3D2>-----Original Message-----<BR><B>From:</B> =
owner-setiathome@klx.com=20
[mailto:owner-setiathome@klx.com] <B>On Behalf Of</B> Brian=20
Straight<BR><B>Sent:</B> Thursday, June 24, 1999 2:21 PM<BR><B>To:</B>=20
seti@sni.net; setiathome@klx.com<BR><B>Subject:</B> New Scientist=20
PR<BR><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV>EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE: 23 JUNE 1999 AT 14:00:00 ET =
US<BR><BR>Contact:=20
Claire Bowles<BR><A=20
href=3D"mailto:claire.bowles@rbi.co.uk">claire.bowles@rbi.co.uk</A><BR>44=
-171-331-2751=20
<BR><BR>US Contact: New Scientist Washington office<BR><A=20
href=3D"mailto:newscidc@idt.net">newscidc@idt.net</A><BR>202-452-1178 =
<BR><BR>*New=20
Scientist <BR><BR>If the Sun is exceptional, alien life may be hard to =
find=20
<BR><BR>What a star! <BR><BR>**<BR><BR>Don't believe everything =
you read=20
in books-our Sun is no ordinary star. And<BR>its very uniqueness has=20
implications for SETI, the search for<BR>extraterrestrial life, claims =
Guillermo=20
Gonzalez of the University of<BR>Washington in Seattle: "Unless =
astronomers=20
narrow down their search to<BR>stars as exceptional as the Sun, they are =
wasting=20
much of their time." <BR><BR>The Sun is a single star whereas most stars =
are in=20
multiple systems. But<BR>that apart, textbooks say the Sun is pretty =
average.=20
However, after<BR>trawling through the data on the Sun, Gonzalez has =
found=20
many<BR>idiosyncrasies. It is among the most massive 10 per cent of =
stars in=20
its<BR>neighbourhood. It also has 50 per cent more heavy elements than =
other=20
stars<BR>of its age and type, and about a third of the variation in =
brightness.=20
<BR><BR>The most unusual aspects of the Sun concern its orbit around the =
centre=20
of<BR>the Galaxy, says Gonzalez. Its orbit is significantly less =
elliptical=20
than<BR>that of other stars of its age and type, and hardly inclined at =
all to=20
the<BR>Galactic plane. What's more, the Sun is orbiting very close to=20
the<BR>"corotation radius" for the Galaxy-the place at which the angular =
speed=20
of<BR>the spiral pattern matches that of the stars. <BR><BR>Gonzalez =
argues that=20
these exceptional characteristics made it possible for<BR>intelligent =
life to=20
emerge on Earth. He points out that stable planetary<BR>orbits such as =
the=20
Earth's are much more likely around single stars like<BR>the Sun. For a =
massive=20
star with inhabitable planets that are relatively<BR>far away, stellar =
flare-ups=20
would be little threat to the planets. Heavy<BR>elements are essential =
to make=20
planets like Earth, and a star with a stable<BR>light output is =
essential for=20
life. <BR><BR>As for the orbit of the Sun, its circularity prevents it =
plunging=20
into the<BR>inner Galaxy where life-threatening supernovae are more =
common. And=20
its<BR>small inclination to the Galactic plane prevents abrupt crossings =
of=20
the<BR>plane that would stir up the Sun's Oort Cloud and bombard the =
Earth=20
with<BR>comets. By being near the Galaxy's corotation radius, the Sun=20
avoids<BR>crossing the spiral arms too often, an event that would expose =
it=20
to<BR>supernovae, which are more common there. <BR><BR>Because =
life-bearing=20
stars have to be close to the corotation radius, that<BR>rules out more =
than 95=20
per cent of stars in the Galaxy in one fell swoop.<BR>"There are fewer =
stars=20
suitable for intelligent life than people realise,"<BR>says Gonzalez, =
who has=20
submitted his findings to Astronomy & Geophysics.<BR>"I'm amazed at =
how=20
little thought the SETI people put into selecting their<BR>stars." =
<BR><BR>Seth=20
Shostak of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California, =
disagrees.<BR>"Our=20
targets are all very close to the Sun. They share our =
Galactic<BR>neighbourhood=20
and motions. If the Sun is the most suitable type of star to<BR>be =
scrutinised,=20
then we are, indeed, looking in all the best places." <BR><BR>"Most =
astronomers=20
disagree with Gonzalez," adds SETI researcher Dan<BR>Werthimer of the =
University=20
of California at Berkeley. "Our Sun is pretty<BR>average. In any case, =
you don't=20
need a star exactly like our Sun for life." <BR><BR>###<BR><BR>PLEASE =
MENTION=20
NEW SCIENTIST AS THE SOURCE OF THIS ITEM =
<BR><BR><BR></DIV></BODY></HTML>
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Subject: starship-design: Telescopes vs. probes
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 16:36:45 -0500
To revisit another earlier discussion (its quiet here lately), we were
discussing at one time the importance of observation via telescope compared
to actually going there...I realize this survey is not scientific and is
dealing with planetary rather than interstellar goals, yet it would seem
most people prefer the idea of going there...
Lee
What should be the priority for planetary research? More powerful telescopes
for deep space: 37.2%; Planetary probes to our solar system: 55.2%;
Concentrate on Earth observation probes: 7.6%
Total votes: 1,501
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What happens if a big asteroid hits the Earth? Judging from realistic
simulations involving a sledge hammer and a common laboratory frog, we can
assume it will be pretty bad.
- Dave Barry
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To: <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: Re: starship-design: GRB's
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 18:56:45 -0500
----------
> From: L. Clayton Parker <lparker@cacaphony.net>
> To: Starship-Design <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
> Subject: starship-design: GRB's
> Date: Thursday, June 24, 1999 4:36 PM
> Paul Davies, a visiting physicist at Imperial College, London, says the
> basic idea for resolving the paradox makes sense. "Any Galaxy-wide
> sterilizing event would do," he says. However, he adds that GRBs may be
too
> brief: "If the drama is all over in seconds, you only zap half a planet.
The
> planet's mass shields the shadowed side." Annis counters that GRBs are
> likely to have many indirect effects, such as wrecking ozone layers that
> protect planets from deadly levels of ultraviolet radiation.
Tenuous arguments. Here we have: 1. No ET to study for psychology, biology,
and existence; 2. No information on how many civilizations actually do
exist; 3. No proof that an ET ecological system needs to be based around an
ozone layer; and yet we have a theorem to explain why ET's aren't here. It
is truly amazing what someone with tenure can spread around...we have no
information, but we can invent some and make a solution. They are, in my
opinion, doing the fallacy of Venus all over again. Carl Sagan warned not
to do this, and I think people like Annis and Davies, and everyone, should
take this seriously. There is an even simpler explanation why there are no
ET's here...we aren't interesting. Not for physics, not for knowledge that
is discovered by us. They already know that stuff. So why would they be
interested in us? Anthropological reasons. Would they study us? Sure. Would
they make contact to study us? No. Ask an anthropologist how they would
make clean observations of a race without distorting their actions. You
simply don't let them know you are there. Then you can observe like the
proverbial 'fly on the wall.' Would they ever make contact? That depends on
who the race is. Some probably would not, others probably would. Making ad
hoc assumptions about something we have no information on is not
scientific. Interesting conjecture, but not science. I am a "hardball, nuts
and bolts, belt and suspenders" type of person. I am an experimentalist, an
observationalist. I am not a theorist. IMHO, the scientific community would
be far more scientific if we had less theory clogging up everything, and
more experiments. I.E., If a theory says no, but an experimental result is
not available yet, keep the theory as a valid possibility, but don't go
shouting "It must be this way!" You will likely be proven wrong. (this goes
for other theories too...Stochastic electrodynamics, "ZPE" stuff,
relativity, autodynamics, whatever.)
By the way, the Venus fallacy was one of the stupidest things that ever
happened. It is a good example of how ingenious yet stupid scientists can
be. An astronomer looked through his telescope at Venus. "I can't see a
thing. The surface is obscured by clouds. Hey, if there are clouds, there
must be a lot of water! It must be covered in swamps. And if there are
swamps, there might even be dinosaurs." Later on it is found that there is
a ton of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of Venus. One scientist says,
"There must be tons of petroleum on the surface. Coal, oil, etc." To which
another says, "No, you're wrong. Venus is covered by an ocean of seltzer."
Then we find that there is no water in Venus' atmosphere. Scientist says:
"Must be covered by desert. The clouds must be fine silicate dust." We now
know that all these pictures were wrong. Observation: Couldn't see a thing.
Conclusion: Dinosaurs, seltzer, petroleum, etc. We like to pretend that
scientists are not that gullible anymore. That's not true at all.
Scientists still are, and (in some other situations) have made some very
stupid conclusions. Be careful what you buy just because a tenured
professor/scientists says it. Caveat Emptor.
The opinion contained here is my own, and having the legal right to it, I
said it. ;)
--Kyle
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To: starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: Fwd: Space tourist projections for 2030
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 21:30:31 EDT
>KellySt@aol.com wrote:
>>
>> Bit of an artical opn space tourism. Interesting artical
>> if you want to check out the URL.
>>
>> Kelly
>>
>
> That is a lot of travel out there or Up there by 2030.
> Is the monolithic system of current space design
> to ridged to work is my question for the day.
Design? No. There are plenty of designs that could handel the trafic
easily. Space access proposal to NASA to replace shuttle with it (did I
forward that to the group?) had a cargo cap to orbit that could take up
about 40,000 pounds to orbit at a shot. That should comfortably bring up 100
folks at a time. One craft could fly a couple times a week. Say 15,000 -
20,000 a year per craft? It adds up.
> Thinking about this quickly and all the plans I have seen
> call for big space hotels. Giving a transport shuttle
> a crew of 2 and 14 passengers or a cargo mass
> 2500 lbs with a heavy launch booster for the hotel ==
Thats WAY too small for a maned launch vehical!
> this does seem to me the wrong way to go because the overall
> scale is too large. Hotel chain X builds a hotel
> in space but can't adapt to a new market ( made in
> space yo-yo's for example ) because the it is scaled
> up for something else.
> Big projects want bigger boosters, that can't be tested.
>
> No private group has the vision for a long range goals
> and the large groups consider this too small a investment
> return.
> I think we need to create the market now for everybody
> and have payloads ready in sync with the launch vehicles.
Probably much more trouble from the government (i.e. NASA) working to
suppress things. NASA has always been hostile to competitors.
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To: "starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu" <starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu>
Subject: starship-design: Spudnick 1
Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1999 23:14:44 -0600
A unmanned orbital craft with a payload of 200lbs is a tad
small for the profitable SOT market. I guess I will have to
scale up to a crew of 4 adults with auto pilot and corner
the SPOK (Standard Personal Orbital Kraft) market. :)
With new designs for orbital craft their is no doubt
that space access will be accessible to the the public.
I think for myself I am a little frustrated with the
fact much of the environment around us is controlled by
Big Corporations and you don't have much freedom of what
goes on with the design of stuff around you.(How do you
have a garden patch if the house contractor has decided
to put cement around your house.)
Space access is the last free place left and and I would not like my access to
it hindered by Big Brother is my worry for the moment.
Because space is unforgiving it will require man and the life web around him to
have a very strong sense of community, something that
people with power and wealth often forget. That is why I am
glad the small companies are starting into space,as long as the
don't get too big and forget about people and life.
Ben.
PS.
The other reason I chose that size it is easy for me
to visualize and keep in proportion.
Looking at the Rotory Rocket craft for example
this is something I can say to myself "I can use them as a transport
and have my cargo treated with respect, not just another packet
lost in the hold."
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To: lparker@cacaphony.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: starship-design: GRB's
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 1999 18:26:54 EDT
Galactic Explosions Inhibit Life
by Robert Matthews at New Scientist
London - January 21, 1999 - Gamma-Ray bursts -- incredibly powerful
An alternate I heard was that cosmic rasdiation and burst are infrequent
enough that most galactic civilizatinos would start up in quiet low rad
periods. Then a blast would kill everyone off planet and crash space, and
associated ground based, civilization. would be destroyed. By the time they
rebuilt the knowledge would be lost, and the blast would have cleared.
They'ld make the same mistake again. So we, coming out during a high rad
point, would be lucky, because we would be prepared.
I'm not totally convinced by this idea, but its interesting.
Kelly
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To: stk@sunherald.infi.net, starship-design@lists.uoregon.edu
Subject: Re: Re: starship-design: GRB's
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 1999 18:27:01 EDT
==There is an even simpler explanation why there are no
ET's here...we aren't interesting. Not for physics, not for knowledge that
is discovered by us. They already know that stuff. So why would they be
interested in us? Anthropological reasons. Would they study us? Sure. Would
they make contact to study us? No. Ask an anthropologist how they would
make clean observations of a race without distorting their actions. You
simply don't let them know you are there. Then you can observe like the
proverbial 'fly on the wall.'==
That trips on another falicy. EVERYONE reacts this way? NO race - No
individual in a race - Breaks the isolation? A unbeleavable degree of
consistency.
Kelly
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Subject: starship-design: Fwd: Believe it or not.
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 1999 21:44:02 EDT
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In case you thought Mir and the Russians couldn't get weirder....
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Subject: Believe it or not.
TO: indy@the-line.com, kellyst@aol.com,
jason.torrey@openmail.mail.sprint.com,
ken.ward@openmail.mail.sprint.com
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http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/sc/story.html?s=3Dv/nm/19990625/sc/sp
ace_mir_1.html
Friday June 25 10:00 AM ET =20
Mir Set For New Role -- As Movie Set
By Elizabeth Piper
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's aging Mir space station may have won a
reprieve thanks to a film
director who wants to shoot part of a movie on the 13-year-old
spacecraft.
Russian space officials were cautious Friday about film director Yuri
Kara's plans to solve the space
station's financial problems after its last sponsor failed to come up
with a much-needed $100 million
donation.
``Even if we succeed only in filming a few minutes in space, it will be
a grandiose, distinguishing
event for Russians, who need to feel that again after Yuri Gagarin was
the first man in space,'' Kara
was quoted as saying.
``Everything depends on money and this (film) is all about huge sums of
money,'' a Russian Space
Agency spokesman said.
Russia's government has said it would be unable to fund the Mir after
this summer, but decided the
station could stay in orbit until August or longer if private funds were
found.
Moscow had planned to retire Mir in June 1998 but earlier this month
said it could stay in orbit until
2000 without a crew as officials continued the frantic hunt for
financing.
The spokesman said he had not seen any signed agreement with Kara for
the station's use and
was unsure whether he had put in a formal request to film ``The mark of
Cassandra'' onboard.
``Nothing official has arrived, but Kara has said his actors are
ready...and there is nothing
unrealistic about this project,'' the spokesman said.
He said the actors and crew would have to take special safety measures.
``To ensure everyone's safety, several crews need to be trained and
along with the actors there
should be specialists because it can be dangerous,'' he said.
The film's leading man, popular Russian actor Vladimir Steklov, has
already started his cosmonaut
training, RIA news agency quoted Kara as saying.
``Many artists, not only Russians, have heard about this unique project,
and have dreamed about
becoming the first actor or actress to be filmed in space,'' Kara said.
He said many famous Russian actors had to be ruled out because they were
not fit enough.
For Energiya, the corporation which owns Mir, the film would be a
victory in its fight to keep Mir aloft
-- as long as it paid well.
``A lot of financing is needed,'' the spokesman said. =20
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Subject: starship-design: FW: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 86 (fwd)
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 1999 08:41:29 -0500
-----Original Message-----
From: listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu [mailto:listserv@ds.cc.utexas.edu] On
Behalf Of Chris W. Johnson
Sent: Monday, June 28, 1999 10:22 PM
To: Single Stage Rocket Technology News
Subject: SSRT: Space Access Update no. 86 (fwd)
Date: Fri, 25 Jun 1999 19:11:22 -0400 (EDT)
From: Donald L Doughty <spacelst@world.std.com>
To: DC-X <delta-clipper@world.std.com>
Subject: Space Access Update #86 6/25/99 (fwd)
Reply-To: delta-clipper@world.std.com
Space Access Update #86 6/25/99
Copyright 1999 by Space Access Society
__________________________________________________________________
Stories This Issue:
- Rumors Of Rotary's Death Greatly Exaggerated
- House, Senate NASA Appropriations Markups Both Now Due In July
________________________________________________________________________
Rotary Rocket News
Apparently some people read a lot more into our Rotary Layoffs story
last week than was there - the company is not dead, it is continuing
operations, and it is in no danger of running out of funds anytime
soon. It has laid off, as we reported, a large part of its current
staff - exactly how large is still not entirely clear; the best
figure we can come up with is approximately - very approximately -
half their sixty-or-so employees. The majority (if not the
entirely) of those laid off seems to be the twenty or so "Rocketjet"
rotary engine development team members - Rotary is putting
development of their proprietary high-performance engine on
indefinite hold.
Rotary has meanwhile announced that they plan to use a derivative of
the NASA "Fastrac" low-cost engine in their "PTV", no further
details made public. This has created considerable confusion, as
Rotary didn't specify the PTV-1, a suborbital test vehicle where
Fastrac's relatively low performance might be acceptable, or PTV-2,
the followon orbital prototype where high engine performance is much
more important.
It is now our understanding that engines derived from Fastrac
(Fastrac itself is too heavy for the application) will power the
PTV-1 suborbital vehicle. PTV-2 engine options aren't being
discussed at the moment; anything we said would be speculation.
Rotary has stated that while they may revive the Rocketjet in the
future, it is not the engine they expect to use for initial orbital
vehicles - whatever that engine might be, it was selected on the
basis of reduced schedule risk as compared to the Rocketjet.
Meanwhile, Rotary conducted a successful seven-minute test of the
ATV's tip-jet powered landing rotor systems this week. The miswired
rotor-speed control system was fixed, the overstrained rotor
components were replaced from inventory, and the system is up and
running. Look for initial ATV flight test, if all goes well, in the
next few weeks.
________________________________________________________________________
House, Senate to act on NASA Funding in July
The Senate postponed initial markup of the NASA (HUD/VA) FY'00
Appropriation from early next week to after the July 4th recess.
The House meanwhile moved its NASA Appropriation up from September
to sometime in July also. Our best current guess is that this means
the House and Senate have agreed to both stick to the multiyear
deficit-deal budget caps on the HUD/VA Appropriation bill - this
means trouble for NASA, as sticking to the caps will mean an across-
the-board cut of nearly 10% in all discretionary HUD/VA items,
meaning about a billion dollar reduction in NASA rather than the
slight increase that had been anticipated.
All you self-starters out there, start working any Senators or
Representatives you may have on Appropriations - ask them to support
adding modest funding for X-Ops to NASA "Future-X" - if they want to
know how much, well, we could live with $40 million. It's going to
be a tough budget year, work this one hard. We'll have a more
detailed alert out once the markup schedule is pinned down.
(And as a bonus for all of you who've read this far, look for
interesting and very positive news out of another of the RLV
startups soon. More on this the instant it's a done deal...)
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society's sole purpose is to promote radical reductions
in the cost of reaching space. You may redistribute this Update in
any medium you choose, as long as you do it unedited in its entirety.
________________________________________________________________________
Space Access Society
http://www.space-access.org
space.access@space-access.org
"Reach low orbit and you're halfway to anywhere in the Solar System"
- Robert A. Heinlein
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Subject: NASA Nixes Mission To Land on Comet, AP, Yahoo
TO: kellyst@aol.com
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http://dailynews.yahoo.com/headlines/ap/science/story.html?s=3Dv/ap/199906
28/sc/comet_lander_1.html
28 June 1999: NASA Nixes Mission To Land on Comet, AP, Yahoo
"What we're trying to do is solve our own
problems,'' said [Code S AA]
Weiler, who added the canceled project was
still in its early development
phase. "Nobody is coming to our rescue from
somewhere else in the
government.''
Editor's note: This is sickening, if true. But
it certainly
smells of Code L scare tactics.
Still, Dan Goldin happily trots around telling
people how
proud he is that NASA's budget is being cut -
since it
shows that NASA can do more and more with less
and
less. What can we all expect when NASA's
Administrator
won't even stand up for his own agency's
budget. =20
Alas, Dan will find some way to blame Congress
for all of
this, just you watch. The truth is the White
House cuts
NASA's budget year after year and Dan simply
hasn't the
courage - or the inclination - to fight back -
unless it has to
do with saving Al Gore's pet Triana satellite
or protecting
the Clinton Administration's Russian foreign
aid (ISS)
program - at the expense of everything else at
NASA.
Is this to be your legacy, Dan? After 7 years
you now
preside over an agency with a budget riding
along on a
multi-year, non-stop decline such that new
projects have to
be sacrificed to provide money for
contingencies and cost
overruns - while research at other agencies is
flourishing
amidst budget increases. =20
Well done.
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Subject: starship-design: x34
Date: Wed, 30 Jun 1999 09:41:43 -0600
http://www.wired.com/news/news/technology/story/20487.html