Bush:"To Moon!" Congress: "Only if it's free

[Jigsaw]

January 14, 2004. Bush says, "Hey, guys! Let's go back to the Moon, and, like, explore the whole solar system and everything! It'll be fun! And it'll only take about 20 billion dollars! Whaddaya say?"

April 29, 2004. Congress says, "Do we look like we're made out of money? What did you do with the money we gave you last week? You spent it? I told you to put it in the bank! All right, that's it, no more money for you, mister...Oh, all right, you can have some..." [grudgingly doles out a couple dollars]

[wedgebert]

Two words:

Congress
Progress

[stu]

Are those two words supposed to be related, or are they supposed to be opposites?

[Zac]

Are those two words supposed to be related, or are they supposed to be opposites?

"CON"gress
"PRO"gress

get it?

[stu]

woops

Be kind, I just took my QM II final -- 3 hrs long.

[Grey]

Be kind, I just took my QM II final -- 3 hrs long.

Mine was five hours... :-?

[Launch window]

http://www.flightinternational.com/A...ing+plans.html
NASA spells out CEV and Moon landing plans

NASA could land astronauts on the Moon in the first days of April 2018, according to the just-released Phase 2 solicitation for its Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV). Launch of the first Moon landing mission has been set for 31 March 2018, while lunar outpost construction is to begin in 2019.

Astronauts could be on board the CEV for two earlier lunar risk-reduction flights, the first of which is scheduled no later than 31 March 2017 and could go round the Moon and back. The Phase 2 schedule also gives 28 September 2012 as the latest preferred date for the first CEV crew transport mission to the International Space Station (ISS).

“The schedule is a draft schedule. We’re using it to estimate life-cycle costs and address reusability issues. But we have said we want to return to the Moon in 2018,” says NASA.

NASA ESAS Final Report: TEXT OF FULL REPORT
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=19094

http://www.aero.org/publications/cro...ng2005/05.html
http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php?t=18880&page=2 http://www.safesimplesoon.com/heavylift.htm

http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question...comparison.jpg
http://uplink.space.com/attachments/255092-SDLV.jpg

http://www.miomanager.com/Mio_Files/...016/sdlv1a.JPG
http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/.../eelv_pr_m.htm

http://www.epower-propulsion.com/epo...elv_launch.htm


NASA keeps its eye on Vision goals
http://www.dailynews.com/antelopevalley/ci_3408394

Space commission offers plan for future,
funding inadequate ?
http://www.floridatoday.com/apps/pbc...601190317/1004

NASA On Tight Budget
http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7001869795

[Spherical]

So NASA wants to take twelve years to do what it did in ten years the first time it tried. Adding insult to injury, it wants to take more time and spend more money despite all the improvements in materials, computers, et cetera. One must ask. Haven't we learned how to do some of these things better by now? What could possibly be the cause of this conundrum? Politics as usual--or perhaps politics worse than usual.

It is absurd, and if our beloved President had sense enough to obtain four from two plus two, he would demand another estimate out of NASA and its contractors. Optionally, we could go to foreign contractors to get some of this work done. There are some good ones out there--Saab, for instance, or even Mitsubishi.

Here's the deal, Boeing, Lockheed, Northrup, if you guys don't find a way to get the job done, someone else will. And, one way or another, they will get the job done while that big pile of money your duffs are resting on dwindles to nothing. Get the picture? Off your butts and on your feet! Out of the shade in the heat!

[baric]

It is absurd, and if our beloved President had sense enough to obtain four from two plus two, he would demand another estimate out of NASA and its contractors. Optionally, we could go to foreign contractors to get some of this work done. There are some good ones out there--Saab, for instance, or even Mitsubishi.

Putting men in space seems like an absurd folly right now. We already won that [Expletive removed by moderator] contest with the Soviet Union, so why do it again?

All of those dollars spent to get humans to the Moon and back safely will take away from more useful and necessary astronomical projects...

It would be more useful to let the Japanese build a robot to walk on the moon, plant a flag, and wave to the camera than to send a real person.

[Doodler]

Putting men in space seems like an absurd folly right now. We already won that [CMB removal]-sizing contest with the Soviet Union, so why do it again?

All of those dollars spent to get humans to the Moon and back safely will take away from more useful and necessary astronomical projects...

It would be more useful to let the Japanese build a robot to walk on the moon, plant a flag, and wave to the camera than to send a real person.

Putting men on the moon is a necessary astronomical project. Its called "giving space exploration a point". All the pretty pictures and fascinating theories, wonderful though they are, amount to a worthless thought experiment without the possibility of one day getting out there to see it up close and personal. You take out the human element, you take out any purpose to even looking up in the first place.


As far as taking 12 years to engineer a new vehicle, I'll accept that. Apollo, though it succeeded, was the equivalent of NASA winning 8 rounds of Russian roulette with the Sun. Long range and long duration exploration of the Moon is going to require a vehicle that hopefully addresses this concern with some finality. Apollo's operational lifespan was nothing next to the shuttle. There's nothing to say that we wouldn't have seen one or more Lunar exploration crews barbequed by an X-class flare if we had acheived upwards of 100 missions. If we're going to go back and start going back with some regularity, there's NOTHING wrong with taking the time to engineer a far superior vehicle to the one with which we measured our manhood in the 60's.

[NEOWatcher]

Read the reports:
Apollo was simply "Let's get there".
This time its "Let's develop the technology for future human spaceflight including deeper space missions of which Mars will be first"
Add that to smaller budgets, and lowered tolerance for mishaps, then it all adds up to "it's going to take time".
If the goal was "Let's get there [the moon]" then I'm sure it wouldn't take long at all. But; Apollo extended technology, and we are still extending technology by doing it in new and untried ways.
And; we are still going to maintain unmanned science (maybe not to everyone's satisfaction), where apollo's space science was a "while we are there" situation.

[Spherical]

Putting men in space seems like an absurd folly right now. We already won that [Expletive removed by moderator] contest with the Soviet Union, so why do it again?

All of those dollars spent to get humans to the Moon and back safely will take away from more useful and necessary astronomical projects...

It would be more useful to let the Japanese build a robot to walk on the moon, plant a flag, and wave to the camera than to send a real person.

No Buck Rogers, no bucks. It's that simple. You may think it less than pragmatic and to a degree you are right, but the pragmatic is entirely dependent upon what it is you want to practice. People have a hard time being impressed with a bunch of geeks teleoperating robots and I don't blame them. Exploration is a human endeavor and we should not be surprised that the public wants humans to go there and do the work rather than machines.

Besides, I think a lot of the estimates about cost benefit ratios are entirely fallacious. There is a lot of wealth to be made in space, the problem lies in getting started.

[Spherical]

Read the reports:
Apollo was simply "Let's get there".
This time its "Let's develop the technology for future human spaceflight including deeper space missions of which Mars will be first"
Add that to smaller budgets, and lowered tolerance for mishaps, then it all adds up to "it's going to take time".
If the goal was "Let's get there [the moon]" then I'm sure it wouldn't take long at all. But; Apollo extended technology, and we are still extending technology by doing it in new and untried ways.
And; we are still going to maintain unmanned science (maybe not to everyone's satisfaction), where apollo's space science was a "while we are there" situation.

But a lot of that work has already been done by people interested in such projects and NASA seems bound and determined to ignore that work. It could be done for a heck of a lot less, but NASA is a captive of our politics.

[NEOWatcher]

But a lot of that work has already been done by people interested in such projects and NASA seems bound and determined to ignore that work. It could be done for a heck of a lot less, but NASA is a captive of our politics.

I don't think you understook my point. Yes, it can be done faster and cheaper, but the goal is to make more advances. Do you drive a Model-T?

[Spherical]

I don't think you understook my point. Yes, it can be done faster and cheaper, but the goal is to make more advances. Do you drive a Model-T?

No, I don't drive a Model T. That's a rich man's game. The goal is to go to the moon and explore the rest of the solar system. If we already have what we need, and we do, then we should get on with it. The advances will come as a matter of course. In fact, some of the stuff I have seen coming from outside NASA are considerably advanced over the Atlas V and have been thought through quite a bit better. Bigelow has come up with a habitat design that beats the hard-shell design of ISS like a drum. Why aren't we using those things?

The real trouble lies with Congress, not NASA.

[NEOWatcher]

No, I don't drive a Model T. That's a rich man's game. The goal is to go to the moon and explore the rest of the solar system. If we already have what we need, and we do, then we should get on with it. The advances will come as a matter of course. In fact, some of the stuff I have seen coming from outside NASA are considerably advanced over the Atlas V and have been thought through quite a bit better. Bigelow has come up with a habitat design that beats the hard-shell design of ISS like a drum. Why aren't we using those things?

The real trouble lies with Congress, not NASA.

Bolded - That's my point.
1) the goal is not simply to go to the moon, the "explore the rest" will take additional technologies and advances.
2) Without a goal, then why strive for advances. Necessity is the mother of invention.

And Congress, yes the trouble lies there, but it's also caused by public opinion. They're trying to sort it all out, and it's not in thier line of work so they will inevitably get it wrong.

[Wolverine]

Putting men in space seems like an absurd folly right now. We already won that [Expletive removed by moderator] contest with the Soviet Union, so why do it again?

Please remember where you are posting.

3. Language

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