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Author
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Topic: Where to now? Where should NASA go to next?
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Rick Boos
Member Posts: 851
From: Celina, Ohio
Registered: Feb 2000
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posted 02-03-2010 10:48 AM
   
With Constellation canceled where would you like to to see us go and why? Maybe this thread would help us "dream again" and get us away from all our disappointment and anger. Who knows, maybe someone at NASA will pick up one of our ideas and run with it! I for one would like to see us go to the asteroids. Why? For one reason to track them. I really believe we need to put a tracking device on them. This can be done with unmanned probes or manned. Everyone is so worried about climate change but I for one believe the real threat is from NEOs. |
jimsz
Member Posts: 644
From:
Registered: Aug 2006
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posted 02-03-2010 11:38 AM
I still firmly believe the the moon or nothing.NASA I don't think can make a realistic proposal for the moon so I don't see how they can sell asteroids. If it were going to take NASA a decade or more and $5 billion in the first 5 years to re-figure out how to get to the moon it will take then 25 years to get anywhere else. My hope is that NASA charts a real plan to get anywhere other than the ISS/Shuttle. The faster we dump that money pit the more it frees up real exploration. NASA needs to propose the impossible and then make it happen. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-03-2010 11:50 AM
The primary advantage that an asteroid mission presents over the Moon is that you do not need to develop a lander (saving time and money). Astronauts could spacewalk from the spacecraft to the surface and back due to the very low gravity. There are asteroids with known orbits that come within the same distance as the Earth is to the Moon, so the time to reach them is similar. |
Michael Davis
Member Posts: 559
From: Houston, Texas
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted 02-03-2010 12:26 PM
Mars I think. One of the chief underlying ideas always floated to justify human flight is to find a safe haven for us in the future and to truly explore the solar system. So why would we want to return to the moon? I keep hearing that the lunar project would be a "testbed" for a Mars mission, but that makes little sense to me. The testbed for Mars is Mars.If our longterm goal really is to reach Mars and to explore the solar system, then I think that needs to frame our short term goals as well. If reaching Mars isn't the goal, then we should stop pretending that it is and simply hang out in LEO. Perfecting propulsion systems to get there in months and not years, solving shielding issues that would fry the crew of a long duration mission outside of LEO, and solving the issue of how to land a large craft in the thin atmosphere of Mars should be the short term goals. Much needs to be done to make this a reachable goal. Or maybe it can't be done at all, but at least we will know for sure. I think that's what we should be shouting at those who will control the budget. |
Delta7
Member Posts: 1733
From: Bluffton IN USA
Registered: Oct 2007
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posted 02-03-2010 12:39 PM
Mars. For me it's about continuously expanding our frontier. I envision eventually having a permanent base there, followed by self-sustaining human colonies. Going to the moon has it's purpose and benefits, but let's face it. Not many people are going to want to spend a good portion or even all of their lives there. I imagine it more as a place for scientific research and eventual mining of minerals. Maybe even a penal colony.  |
bobzz
Member Posts: 100
From: Batavia, Illinois
Registered: Aug 2007
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posted 02-03-2010 01:20 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
The primary advantage that an asteroid mission...
How about practicing moving an asteroid's orbit as a prelude to protecting earth from a known threat. Exciting and practical! |
Glint
Member Posts: 1116
From: New Windsor, Maryland USA
Registered: Jan 2004
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posted 02-03-2010 03:45 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
There are asteroids with known orbits that come within the same distance as the Earth is to the Moon, so the time to reach them is similar.
I am skeptical about this statement. Yes, once in a while an asteroid or rock will pass within a lunar orbit radius of earth. But they are usually discovered after the fact, photographically, or only a day or two ahead of their passage, so would not be good candidates for a mission. By their nature, their orbits are not well known prior to passing near earth. And the close encounter would likely perturb their orbit. Of all asteroids with well known orbits, how many are there that pass earth at a lunar distance? There's 2004 MN4 expected to pass within 22,600 miles (36,350 kilometers) of earth in 2029. It will be traveling some 20 mps -- about 3 times faster than escape velocity reached by the Apollo missions. Not sure what kind of maneuver it would require, but the TEI at the end would certainly be challenging, unless they rode it around the sun, but that would be much different than a trip at lunar distance. |
ross426
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Registered:
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posted 02-03-2010 06:49 PM
I don't like disagreeing with someone like Buzz Aldrin, but my, admittedly inexperienced opinion, thinks that a Moon mission is necessary to test the new Martian spacecraft. Buzz seems very interested in manned Mars flights, as am I. As in the Apollo days, new spacecraft were tested in low Earth orbit before sending them to the Moon (Apollo 7, Apollo 9). However, canceling the Constellation programme seems, and maybe I'm missing something, wrong! When something that took so much effort and expense to build, and it WORKS, it is so tremendously wastefull... NOT economical to cancel.I'm Canadian and remember the cancelation of the Avro Arrow, a mach 2 interceptor with fly-by-wire technology in 1957! Wrong politics took away thousands of jobs and something us Canucks would have been proud of for decades. Your space programme ended up with a lot of our engineers because of this. Of coarse, the economic situation has to take priority, but I think the Costellation programme had teeth! Low Earth orbit? Mankind has been doing this for 50 years! I'm certain that kids of today would be a zillion times more interested in a flight to the Moon. But why am I talking about Mars, when your astronauts will be thumbing a ride with the Russians to the ISS. This is not the stuff that dreams are made of... |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-03-2010 06:53 PM
quote:
Originally posted by ross426:
I'm Canadian and remember the cancelation of the Avro Arrow, a mach 2 interceptor with fly-by-wire technology in 1957! Wrong politics took away thousands of jobs and something us Canucks would have been proud of for decades. Your space programme ended up with a lot of our engineers because of this.
Wayne Hale, NASA's Deputy Associate Administrator for Strategic Partnerships, touched on this very topic today on his blog. Some of the very best of the laid-off Avro engineers found work with a new agency of the US Government. They went to work for the Space Task Group in Langley, Virginia. The old timers and the history books tell us that these immigrants played an absolutely crucial role in the success of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs. Their legacy in aerodynamics, engineering, management, and leadership still resonates in the agency. The legacy of the Arrow can even be seen in the delta winged Space Shuttle. They had "marvelous careers."Change is inevitable; life goes on. Change moves us out of our comfort zones. The question is not whether there will be change, but what will you do when change occurs? Out of a personal disaster, how will you create a marvelous new career? But remember, nothing great was ever accomplished by comfortable men. |
jimsz
Member Posts: 644
From:
Registered: Aug 2006
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posted 02-03-2010 08:41 PM
Some of the very best of the laid-off Avro engineers found work with a new agency of the US Government. So... Mr. Hale is saying al the NASA engineers will move on maybe to Russia, China, Japan or India? I doubt he meant that but it is probably true.The harder the people at NASA try to put a positive spin on this the deeper hole they are digging for themselves. |
KSCartist
Member Posts: 3047
From: Titusville, FL
Registered: Feb 2005
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posted 02-03-2010 09:37 PM
quote:
Originally posted by ross426:
But why am I talking about Mars, when your astronauts will be thumbing a ride with the Russians to the ISS. This is not the stuff that dreams are made of...
Your astronauts as well as ESA and JAXA astronauts will be thumbing a ride with them as well. The Russians developed the Soyuz vehicle 40+ years ago and have stayed with that design with upgrades when possible. When money became tight they started selling seats to help defray the costs of doing business. They have been great partners in the ISS and saved the program when Columbia was lost. ESA developed a great launch vehicle but has yet to build a spacecraft that can carry humans. JAXA has contributed a great lab to the ISS and a cargo carrier but no crew carrier either. The reason is simple: it's hard to do. The fact of the matter remains that Constellation was never given a fair chance to succeed. We are ALL upset by the budget announcment because it didn't include a sexy new program destination with a deadline. I for one think something from Constellation will survive - maybe the Ares 1 to back-up the commercial efforts, I don't know. But we have to face facts that Constellation was not going to get us back to the Moon by 2020. The discussion is just beginning. |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-03-2010 10:12 PM
According to Lockheed Martin, Orion would be ready to fly manned flights in 2013. |
cspg
Member Posts: 6347
From: Geneva, Switzerland
Registered: May 2006
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posted 02-03-2010 11:52 PM
Not related to the woes of the F-35 JSF by any chance? |
Jay Chladek
Member Posts: 2272
From: Bellevue, NE, USA
Registered: Aug 2007
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posted 02-04-2010 03:04 AM
I still think the moon is a good target. The problem with the perception of Constellation is not in the mission, it is the marketing. When NASA says (quoting the Augustine Commission) that Constellation was going to "repeat" the Apollo feats, I shook my head as at last check, Constellation was not going to send three men to the moon, land two of them on it, conduct a mission lasting a day or three and return all three at the end. Instead the plan was to land a whole crew of four to explore for a longer period, test out new ideas, gather new data and build a basis of technology and experience that could be used for an eventual Mars shot. It could lead to possible mining of lunar resources, discovering more about our origins and even lead to colonization of another world.One bit of research that would directly impact a Mars flight is solar radiation exposure and since the moon lies outside most of the Earth's magnetic field, long term research into solar exposure could be conducted on it. Having a manned outpost would help to potentially speed the data collection as samples could be placed, retrieved and new ones placed to test different shielding. The lunar environment is more like space then Mars, but a craft that will take men to Mars is going to spend the vast majority of its operational life in space (probably all of it since a lander will carry the crew to the surface, not the mother craft). The equipment for such a craft could be placed on the moon or in lunar orbit to get a shakedown as it were. Long term effects of reduced gravity (not zero gravity) can also be studied on the moon as Mars is smaller then Earth (albeit not as small as the moon). If they had marketed Constellation it better, then it might have had a chance. In fact, I still think it can HAVE a chance if it is given one. As for an alternative destination, then an asteroid mission is about the only relatively short duration mission to a new frontier that might inspire new ideas. We need to collect data on some of these rocks in case we have to deflect one from an Earth crossing orbit that could cause a collision. Not all asteroids are rock. Some are theorized to be the equivalent to a rubble pile held together by gravity, a cosmic sloppy joe as it were. One where a deflecting nuclear strike won't have much effect as it could absorb the blast more then a hard asteroid. Then perhaps we could try the gravity tug method to deflect one off its path. Another alternative I could see would be perhaps visiting one of the S-IVB rocket stages from the old Apollo program that recently crossed Earth orbit again (I believe Apollo 12 was one, but I seem to recall a second one). If there is a target that meets the criteria and we have the means, a crew could be sent there to retrieve samples from it as it would be the ultimate LDEF lab to gather data on how extreme long term exposure in deep space affects man made materials (something a future manned craft to other planets in the solar system may have to contend with). I consider THAT a worthy mission. |
moorouge
Member Posts: 2486
From: U.K.
Registered: Jul 2009
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posted 02-04-2010 05:08 AM
quote:
Originally posted by jimsz:
NASA needs to propose the impossible and then make it happen.
Back in the days of Apollo 8 someone said words to the effect that once you had decided on high Earth orbit it really didn't matter how high you went. The same might be said about an interplanetary flight to Mars.So, proposing the impossible, how about Titan as a target? Now that would be a challenge. |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 06:55 AM
It's nice to speculate about going places, but we really do not possess the critical technologies to make these voyages a reality.Someone wrote "proposing the impossible". That would be having a life support system that didn't breakdown with alarming regularity. That would also be developing an engine that could reduce the journey times. Here in 2010, we are still talking about chemical rockets as the best way. It's like suggesting biplanes for intercontinental flights! As for a destination? I'm someone who wants to see human beings walk on Mars in my lifetime (I'm under 40). But Phobos would be an alternative. |
Lasv3
Member Posts: 459
From: Bratislava, Slovakia
Registered: Apr 2009
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posted 02-04-2010 07:08 AM
If you wanted to see humans walking on Mars in your lifetime (which I wish to everyone from my heart) you have to rely on chemical rockets. If you wait for "hyperspace jumps" you will have to live for a very very long time.  |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 07:21 AM
quote:
Originally posted by issman1:
Here in 2010, we are still talking about chemical rockets as the best way.
Actually, no, we're not. |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 07:24 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Lasv3:
you have to rely on chemical rockets.
Unless I'm mistaken neither ion or plasma engines use a chemical reaction. Still, I prefer a launch vehicle which uses liquid-fuelled engines over solids. |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 07:30 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
Actually, no, we're not.
Will VASIMR still be tested on the ISS in 2012 as originally planned? |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 07:32 AM
Their flight contract is signed and I understand it is now just a matter of logistics (ride to orbit). Last I heard, they were looking at HTV. |
Rick Boos
Member Posts: 851
From: Celina, Ohio
Registered: Feb 2000
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posted 02-04-2010 08:40 AM
How much will it cost per seat for Russia to take our astronauts to and from the ISS? If Orion would be ready (as Lockheed Martin says) to fly manned flights by 2013, to me it only makes sense to go with it and to man rate the Delta 4 Heavy rather then hitchhiking a ride to the ISS. Any thoughts? |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 10:01 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Rick Boos:
...man rate the Delta 4 Heavy rather then hitchhiking a ride to the ISS.
The option to use Delta 4 was studied in 2004 but dismissed by ex-NASA administrator Griffin in 2005 in favour of Ares 1.The Orion capsule should either be salvaged or integrated into the crew versions of Space X's Dragon and Orbital's Cygnus. |
jimsz
Member Posts: 644
From:
Registered: Aug 2006
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posted 02-04-2010 10:03 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Rick Boos:
...rather then hitchhiking a ride to the ISS.
Any plan that has the US launching their astronauts rather than rent a seat from the Russians is best for the US. I don't understand how NASA could be in the position of not having an orbit-possible manned rocket already set to go. It's no shock the Shuttle program was ending and they were even given extra years. The amount of wasted money and time is still amazing to me. Toss in their new expansion of being climate watchdogs (more or less) and the current people in power are simply using NASA to fit their political means. Space exploration is their business and it should be done with US astronauts on US rockets not the jump seat of a Soyuz. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 11:00 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Rick Boos:
How much will it cost per seat for Russia to take our astronauts to and from the ISS?
NASA has a contract with Roscosmos that sets the price at $51 million per seat, including training (by comparison, current commercial cost to Space Adventures' clients is $45 million excluding training). quote:
Originally posted by issman1:
Space X's Dragon and Orbital's Cygnus.
I think some may be falling into the trap that Dragon and Cygnus are the only two vehicles competing for NASA's business. The competition has just begun. Expect to see very familiar names (companies, rockets and spacecraft) entering the race soon. quote:
Originally posted by jimsz:
Any plan that has the US launching their astronauts rather than rent a seat from the Russians is best for the US.
Then get onboard with the President's plan to hand LEO access to commercial suppliers, as it was specifically crafted to reduce the gap and get American astronauts back on American-built spacecraft (and then allow those American companies to start selling seats to ESA, JAXA and others, rather than having them go to Russia). Heck, it is not unthinkable that, if adopted, this plan could lead to Russians buying seats on U.S. spacecraft. |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 11:22 AM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
Heck, it is not unthinkable that, if adopted, this plan could lead to Russians buying seats on U.S. spacecraft.
Certainly not unthinkable by any means.It is also not unthinkable that the commercial entities will be unable to man-rate their systems in a reasonable amount of time, and NASA will be forced to start from square-one again having lost years in the interim. It is quite a large risk our space program is being forced to undertake. |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 11:35 AM
quote:
Originally posted by capoetc:
It is quite a large risk our space program is being forced to undertake.
No more of a "risk" than it was for the previous NASA leadership to misplace trust in Ares 1. |
ross426
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posted 02-04-2010 01:13 PM
quote:
Originally posted by KSCartist:
But we have to face facts that Constellation was not going to get us back to the Moon by 2020.
I'm amazed that the Ares even got off the ground with its limited budget. Good work, NASA! Doesn't look like Obama is passionate enough about it either.Correct me if I'm wrong, but about 5% of the gross national budget was received by NASA in the Apollo days, but 0.5% today. Unless I'm mistaken, there is no way you can hope to achieve anything beond LEO with that kind of doe! Obviously, NASA has greatly improved thier spending "efficiency", or Ares would have been a firecracker! Will independent contractors be more efficient at spending? What about all of the experience that NASA has digested over the years? This MUST be available and appreciated to it's fullest, especially for safety. I really hope so... the only thing that we can hope for at this point. I really appreciate being alive as a 6 year old when men left this planet. NEVER has there been a time when such extreme science fiction ended up as real history! |
DChudwin
Member Posts: 1121
From: Lincolnshire IL USA
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 02-04-2010 02:16 PM
A mission to Deimos or Phobos would be a good medium term goal. It would require improvements in propulsion, life support, radiation shielding and human health factors. It would not require a Mars lander.Just like Apollo 8 blazed a trail for the landings, a trip to one of the Martian moons would be a challenging precurser to the eventual landing on Mars. |
Tykeanaut
Member Posts: 2235
From: Worcestershire, England, UK.
Registered: Apr 2008
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posted 02-04-2010 02:39 PM
It's straight to Mars for me too. I'm sure a lot of the testing could be done in LEO - of which we have plenty of recent experience! |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 05:32 PM
quote:
Originally posted by issman1:
No more of a "risk" than it was for the previous NASA leadership to misplace trust in Ares 1.
Why was the trust misplaced in Ares I? Are you that certain that Ares I could not have been a good operational booster for its intended purpose?All I am saying is the same things others in the space business have said: NASA has been operating spacecraft for a long time. No private company has ever operated a manned spacecraft (except for SS1, which of course was sub-orbital). So, there is a decent amount of risk involved with putting all of NASA's eggs in the commercial-manned-spacecraft basket. I think commercial spacecraft are a good (and inevitable) thing. I would simply prefer to see NASA continue to operate its own spacecraft until private industry demonstrates that it can be safely relied upon. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 05:50 PM
quote:
Originally posted by capoetc:
No private company has ever operated a manned spacecraft
That's not exactly true: United Space Alliance, a private company and joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, has been operating the space shuttle for 15 years. USA employees comprise the majority of technicians and engineers who service and prepare the space shuttle for launch and they staff both the launch control center in Florida and mission control in Houston. Yes, USA's work is overseen by NASA managers, but as proposed, NASA would maintain such oversight over the companies providing commercial crew services. |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 06:25 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
That's not exactly true: United Space Alliance, a private company and joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, has been operating the space shuttle for 15 years...
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on whether the USA arrangement is in any way analogous to a commercial company developing, building, testing, and operating a new manned spacecraft.It seems to me, a reasonable similarity would be if NASA develops, builds, and tests a replacement for the shuttle and then hires a commercial company to operate it under its specific direction. Unless I am mistaken, a private company that develops a manned spacecraft to provide space access for NASA could also make its spacecraft available to other paying entities (although they may need to procure alternate launch facilities to do this). USA certainly cannot offer space shuttle access to any entity other than NASA, since ...it doesn't own the spacecraft. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 06:41 PM
quote:
Originally posted by capoetc:
USA certainly cannot offer space shuttle access to any entity other than NASA...
This is also incorrect; USA's existing contract with NASA includes a provision for the company to identify secondary payloads. It was this clause that, in 2002, several champions, including Buzz Aldrin, were working to have re-defined by Congress such that "secondary payloads" could apply to commercial passengers. Further, NASA and Congress were seriously considering privatizing operation of the shuttle -- President Bush included such a proposal in his FY2002 budget request -- essentially giving one or more of the orbiters to USA. The company would then sell back seats and cargo capacity to NASA... The loss of Columbia put an end to these efforts going forward due to the decision to retire the fleet in 2010. |
Blackarrow
Member Posts: 3604
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 02-04-2010 07:58 PM
quote:
Originally posted by issman1:
It's like suggesting biplanes for intercontinental flights!
Alcock and Brown managed to make an intercontinental flight in a biplane. |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 08:58 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
This is also incorrect; USA's existing contract with NASA includes a provision for the company to identify secondary payloads...
So, identifying secondary payloads is the same thing as operating a spacecraft for another commercial customer? Perhaps I was not clear in my previous message. My intent was to say that USA cannot tell any other customer, "Yes, we can allow you to purchase your own space shuttle mission, crewed by your own people." I thought what I said was clear, but apparently it was not. |
Robert Pearlman
Editor Posts: 50516
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999
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posted 02-04-2010 09:58 PM
quote:
Originally posted by capoetc:
My intent was to say that USA cannot tell any other customer, "Yes, we can allow you to purchase your own space shuttle mission, crewed by your own people."
I understand, and in response I was trying to explain that USA came very close to being allowed to do just that -- had the Columbia accident not occurred, this "new plan" would not be so new. |
capoetc
Member Posts: 2337
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005
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posted 02-04-2010 10:23 PM
Still a moot point, but... are you saying that the plan included having someone other than NASA astronauts in the CDR and PLT seats of the shuttle? Or riding as passengers in the back? |
issman1
Member Posts: 1106
From: UK
Registered: Apr 2005
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posted 02-05-2010 12:20 AM
quote:
Originally posted by capoetc:
Are you that certain that Ares I could not have been a good operational booster for its intended purpose?
Why the need for two new launchers? Had the NASA leadership developed only the Ares V as the baseline for both Orion and Altair, then we wouldn't be having this discussion. Ares I was insufficient for "its intended purpose" and they knew it. |
Tykeanaut
Member Posts: 2235
From: Worcestershire, England, UK.
Registered: Apr 2008
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posted 02-05-2010 02:46 AM
Should have brought back the Saturn V - if ain't broke, don't fix it!! |
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