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pnw.hiker
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Joined: 29 Sep 2006
Posts: 158 | TRs | Pics
Location: pacific northwest |
| Bedivere wrote: | | Chico wrote: | | How embarrassing for the US of A. ... |
Yeah, 'cause Russian rockets never fail... 
youtube.com/watch?v=ZWv4ZZArP-g
Oh wait, the one that failed in VA WAS a Russian rocket.  |
Luckily no one was hurt in either crash.
The Chinese haven't been so lucky;
Also, never mix 'Devil's Venom' with a Soviet Field Marshall;
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reststep
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Joined: 17 Dec 2001
Posts: 4757 | TRs | Pics
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reststep
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 Fri Oct 31, 2014 2:33 pm |
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| Backpacker Joe wrote: | | NASA is a shell of what it once was. They have nearly no mission. They should simply dismantle the agency. They certainly dont want to fund it. |
Interesting, I thought you would be in favor of turning it over to private enterprise.
"The mountains are calling and I must go." - John Muir
"The mountains are calling and I must go." - John Muir
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Matt
Tea, Earl Grey, Hot
Joined: 30 Jan 2007
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Location: Shoreline |
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Matt
Tea, Earl Grey, Hot
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Fri Oct 31, 2014 3:44 pm |
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What a horrible week for spaceflight. Now Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo crashed during a test flight and killed the copilot.
“As beacons mountains burned at evening.” J.R.R. Tolkien
“As beacons mountains burned at evening.” J.R.R. Tolkien
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AR
724
Joined: 22 Aug 2007
Posts: 1514 | TRs | Pics
Location: Saratoga Passage |
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AR
724
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Sat Nov 01, 2014 2:56 pm |
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"Virgin Galactic" This is what you get from private companies that dare venture into the space race. Complete incompetence driven by rich mad men that would never step into the rocket themselves.
Only by the unlimited funds of Uncle Sam will the space race be won.
Virgin will be brought to its knees by the lawsuits that follow its incompetence.
Handing the future of rocket travel to private companies is like handing them the defense of this Country. It cannot be done. It will fail.
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
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Bedivere
Why Do Witches Burn?
Joined: 25 Jul 2008
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Location: The Hermitage |
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Bedivere
Why Do Witches Burn?
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Sat Nov 01, 2014 7:44 pm |
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Boeing and SpaceX have been awarded contracts to build the next generation of rockets to shuttle supplies to the space station.
FWIW, Branson has said he will fly on the first commercial flight of his venture.
Private contractors have always participated in space flight, just like they build all of our military equipment.
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pnw.hiker
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Joined: 29 Sep 2006
Posts: 158 | TRs | Pics
Location: pacific northwest |
| arohwed wrote: | | "Virgin Galactic" This is what you get from private companies that dare venture into the space race. Complete incompetence driven by rich mad men that would never step into the rocket themselves.
Only by the unlimited funds of Uncle Sam will the space race be won.
Virgin will be brought to its knees by the lawsuits that follow its incompetence.
Handing the future of rocket travel to private companies is like handing them the defense of this Country. It cannot be done. It will fail. |
Private contractors have always made our space hardware. Historically this was done so at the instruction and under the oversight of NASA or the military.
In 1984 the Commercial Space Launch Act was signed into law with bipartisan support.
Nowadays contractors may create their own designs and programs and sell those services to the government, or anyone else, with a few restrictions. They also build US-owned hardware and US-owned designs at NASA's or the military's instruction, like they did for the moon landings.
NASA does the things that no one has ever done before. They fund and develop technology that private companies could never afford. The world benefits later. SpaceX was able to develop its hardware for between one and two orders of magnitude less money than earlier government design projects- NASA did all the heavy lifting, decades earlier, and actively helped them. This strategy continues with NASA's new rocket and spacecraft, due for its first test launch this December.
arohwed, the current mainstream US launchers (Delta 4 and Atlas V) have a nearly perfect launch record and are among the best in the world. They were designed and are fielded by private companies- the US paid for part of their development. Also, NASA is building itself a new launch system from Shuttle technology. So your argument is wrong on two counts; 1) the government is not handing over space launch to commercial interests, just some of it. And 2) some of the best launch systems in the world are rockets designed, owned and built by private corporations and offered to the US government and others for commercial launch services.
What makes the VirginGalactic failure unique is the level of criticism they and Scaled Composites have received in recent years. Many in the industry think they lack competence. That doesn't mean it's true for all commercial space companies.
A scathing article from The Telegraph; http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/11203634/Branson-spaceship-explosion-The-missed-warnings.html
| Quote: | | ... It also emerged on Saturday that three senior Virgin Galactic executives — the vice-president in charge of propulsion, the vice-president in charge of safety, and the chief aerodynamics engineer — had all quit the company in recent months. |
wow, just ... wow.
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AR
724
Joined: 22 Aug 2007
Posts: 1514 | TRs | Pics
Location: Saratoga Passage |
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AR
724
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Sun Nov 02, 2014 5:37 pm |
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Sending "stuff" into space is one thing. Failures there can be tolerated.
Once a human is placed into the equation only the government can handle the losses. When Challenger was lost each family received millions of dollars and a life time of provisions.
Private companies cannot handle the loss of human life and go on. Even Branson's cheeky grin will not save him at this point.
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
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wolffie
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Joined: 14 Jul 2008
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wolffie
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Tue Nov 04, 2014 4:15 pm |
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When faced with major intractable domestic problems, you invent enemies and other distractions.
I like India's mission to Mars -- certainly a top priority on a subcontinent where the vast majority live on less than $2/day whilst others are building $1 billion (sic) personal residences.
China's space program seems an integral part of their national policy of repeating and surpassing all the mistakes of the West (cigarettes, cars, dams, coal fired powerplants, air pollution, etc. ad infinauseum).
When I asked my father in the '60s why the Soviets and Americans were having a space race, he answered, "It's a big international sporting event".
James(?) Van Allen (discovered the Van Allen radiation belts) wrote numerous articles and published a long list of space science programs that were cut back or discontinued because manned space exploration sucked up all the money. Note how the most spectacular space science achievements, like Voyager, were relatively inexpensive unmanned vehicles.
Although satellite and robotic space technology is nifty, I struggle to imagine any solutions to the critical problems of our time that depend upon it. We must learn to live peaceably, feed ourselves, create a just economy and a sustainable future, and stop wrecking our home. That's not rocket science.
Some people have better things to do with their lives than walking the dog. Some don't.
Some people have better things to do with their lives than walking the dog. Some don't.
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AR
724
Joined: 22 Aug 2007
Posts: 1514 | TRs | Pics
Location: Saratoga Passage |
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AR
724
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Tue Nov 04, 2014 4:24 pm |
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"We must learn to live peaceably, feed ourselves, create a just economy and a sustainable future, and stop wrecking our home. That's not rocket science."
Now that's just damn crazy talk there. Kinda like landing a man on an asteroid and dragging it back to the moon (Current NASA crazy talk).
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
...wait...are we just going to hang here or go hiking?
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