Is NASA's Ares doomed?
October 27, 2008 By Robert BlockBit by bit, the new rocket ship that is supposed to blast America into the second Space Age and return astronauts to the moon appears to be coming undone.
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sorry, but the russians were never able to even finish their moon rocket.
Ladies and gentlemen, please get your act together.
A symptom of the nation as a whole. Over the past 40 years we have drifted into mediocrity.
@cybrbeast; that is what I expected them to do to save money. My experience w/ engineers though is that they HAVE to have the newest and best toy instead of what is best for the overall mission.
That would be very wise of them, but (correct me if I'm wrong) NASA LOST THE BLUEPRINTS.
LOL!
-Axemaster
We seriously need to develop high impulse nuclear rockets. These ion drives are fine for unmanned probes, but in terms of anything practical for human spaceflight they are complete crap. If we had started out using nuclear from the beginning we wouldn't be in this stupid mess. It would all be figured out by now and going to the Moon, while not trivial, would be easily within reach.
OK sorry folks, I just checked and need to debunk myself. This is not true. The blueprints were not lost. Here's a good link:
http://www.space....313.html
-Axemaster
OR, have NASA step back into a supporting role and fund SPACEX, their getting the job done with a fraction of NASA's budget.
yeah give him a break, this IS rocket science.
Do they think astronauts are all expendable like marshmallows?
"At the highest levels of the agency, there seems to be a belief that you can mandate reality, followed by a refusal to accept any information that runs counter to that mandate," said Finckenor, whose farewell letter to his colleagues denouncing NASA management was posted (without his permission) on NASAWatch.com, an independent Web site.
this also appears to be the case with many of the comments here.
I think NASA is doomed...
I can't say what I'd like to about the current quality of NASA's administration and scientists, and I honestly don't like to see anyone lose their jobs...but these people need to go.
There is NOTHING good I can say about the agency at this point. I believe it is totally unredeemable and needs to be privatized albeit government funded (at least for a while longer).
Had the U.S.continued to build upon known systems with gradual improvements and use expendable rockets utill we could build a decent true "delivery truck" (can you say "Soyuz"?), today we would have something better then the most expensive and dangerous use of "duct tape". The shuttle has roughly a 1 in 100 chance of not coming back in one piece. Bottom line? #1, You NEVER launch people on top of a big bomb with out an automatic escape system. #2, You can gradually impove capacity, range and flexibility. And a variant can be used for manned and unmanned transportation.
The government needs to lay the groundwork and really push the private sector in getting into space. In the short, and intermediate time frame, its the most practical/economical method.For at least the next ten years we need a combined CONSISTENT government/private effort to put humans back in space, starting w/ orbital access and the moon and STAY THERE.
Mars will still be there.But the need to both develope the Ares lifter NASA wants, and also at the same time LISTEN to the people working on their own time for a rocket they think is just better is a no brainer. In time it's going to get very crowded w/every country et.el. staking their claim. We need very quick use-ability and, private sector incentives for cost control to take advatage of the maximum effective,economic
process. This is to important to come in second.
Since NASA cannot handle any job more than monitoring current systems, perhaps we should upgrade our space program and allow NASA to go the way of the Saturn 5 and declare it's obsolescence.
I love science fiction and, when I was kid, I liked to watch Star Trek. All those glorious fantasies about colonizing space! It's all part of our primordial Western mythology: find new lands, send people there, overcome the barriers and the pesky people who already live there, etc. It dates back to the nomadic pastoral people who invaded Europe when the Roman empire fell. They were always going "West", into new lands.
Let's be realistic. Sending people into space is motivated by a fantasy. Sure, it's a powerful fantasy, a popular fantasy. It's compelling. But it's not based on good economics. Sending people into space is expensive, and requires overcoming a lot of physical obstacles like gravity, vacuum, radiation. That costs a lot of money.
If you want to advance science, spend some money sending robotic spacecraft. You get a lot more science per dollar spent. There is no good reason to risk human life packing people into large tin cans on top of piles of combustible materials and lighting the fuse.
Alejo Hausner
Overlooking the fact that it would be extremely difficult (impossible with current technology) to dig or navigate such a hole, there would actually be no point in doing it anyway. No net energy would have been gained from the fall by the time it got to an equal distance on the other side of the center (of mass.) This is because once it is on the other side of the center it begins to be pulled more and more strongly back towards the center (until it gets to the surface on the other side.)
There is more energy and resources in space than on earth..one day it will be cheaper to mine and manufacture in space. And guess what..no environmental damage done to earth if done off world. Space is harsh and vast and if you pollute an already dead planet or asteroid who cares. There is limitless expansion, overpopulation would be a thing of the past. And if we get out there, people who never leave the comfort of a clean climate controlled environment would think weather on earth is nuts and why get grimy and possibly catch a virus...or get bitten by a mosquito.
So get with the program, this is where we have to go..up and out, rather then being stuck in 40 years of being down and out with NASA and a broke Russian space program.
(research; the derivation of "Ares", who gave the program that name, what recent "culture" was hell bent on controlling the world, what culture now controls NASA/JPL, what relationship is there between the name and the mission, what is the mission a stepping stone for)
It's sad, 40 years later and no progress forward - China will get there before we can return...
http://www.directlauncher.com/
You forget, they had a Nazi genius back then. Now all they have are Americans...