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posted 07-28-2004 11:48 PM               

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For anyone who is interested, I have one article submitted to Spaceflight, and two more winging their way to the BIS by airmail right now. The submitted one concerns the First Lunar Outpost proposal of the early 1990s, which was the last time that NASA proposed a human lunar mission.

The other two articles are relatively short. One is a piece about how the Lunar Orbiter was derived from a reconnaissance satellite camera system.

The other concerns how during the 1960s NASA Administrator James Webb was using intelligence information to warn against the Soviet space threat. You can find an earlier version of that article here.

I've changed it a bit and added some things.

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From: Brussels, Belgium
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posted 08-05-2004 05:30 AM               

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I'm confident that the MER mission will be covered soon. Time will prove me right.

By the way, the September issue has a superb cover showing Cassini-Huygens near Saturn.

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posted 08-09-2004 09:24 PM               

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The September issue of Spaceflight just showed up on my doorstep today. It features a relatively cool and dramatic computer illustration of Cassini burning into Saturnian orbit.

The issue also features my colleague Joel Powell's interesting article on Atlas ground accidents. The Atlas, as everybody knows, was like a balloon, getting its structural strength from the internal pressure. Punch a tiny hole in it and it crumples. Powell discovered which Atlas with what looked to be an operational spysat payload collapsed on the pad at Vandenberg. It was a slick piece of sleuthing on his part.

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posted 08-16-2004 04:32 PM               

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I just learned that my article on the First Lunar Outpost (FLO) will be in the October issue. This is a pretty decent overview of the proposed 1992 mission.

FLO was essentially the last gasp of the Space Exploration Initiative. By the time it was proposed, SEI was dead because it cost way too much. FLO was an attempt to bring the costs down dramatically, largely by redefining the mission and scaling back the goals. It might have had greater success if it was proposed back in 1989, perhaps as the opening round for the space exploration plan.

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posted 09-06-2004 01:40 PM               

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My copy of BIS arrived this morning. Great story by Dwayne Day on The Last Lunar Outpost; a picture of Valentina Tereshkova, including a written piece about Autographica 04 with Rick Searfoss as attending; and a very good book to buy written by the BIS president Rex Hall and David Shayler entitled Soyuz: A Universal Spacecraft.

Thanks again Rex for a very, very worthwhile magazine, for us space nuts.

regards from Brenda.

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posted 09-07-2004 12:26 PM               

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quote:

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Originally posted by november25:
Great story by Dwayne Day on The Last Lunar Outpost;

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Thanks. My story is about NASA's proposed First Lunar Outpost (FLO) of 1992, which is really the last time that NASA conducted a detailed study of a return to the moon. I thought it was timely because of the new proposal for returning to the moon. I discussed all aspects of the proposal, including the science.

The Congressional Budget Office just came out with a new cost assessment of the current Vision for Space Exploration and it includes a cost assessment of the FLO study. My article included a cost estimate for FLO of around $25 billion. But in the course of doing their study, the CBO determined that this estimate left out some significant costs. The actual cost of the FLO proposal would have been considerably higher, but still reasonable.

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From: Douglas, Isle of Man, UK
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posted 09-07-2004 01:29 PM               

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Hi Dwayne, thanks for the above post. You really are a great asset to BIS. All your articles make very good reading.

All the very best to you and yours,
regards from Brenda on the Isle of Man, in the UK

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From: London, England
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posted 09-07-2004 01:56 PM               

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It is great to see that Dwayne and Jim Oberg have contributed articles in the latest issue of Spaceflight. I admire the was Dwayne is able to do so many different articles on military programmes. He has helped the society to cover this area of space history.

I am looking forward to meeting a large number of BIS members at Autographica. I hope to catch up with many friends both old and new. It will be a great opportunity for everyone to meet Tereshkova who the BIS gave its Gold medal to in 1963. Other recipients were Gagarin and the Apollo 11 crew. I met with her and Bykovsky recently in Moscow and they were really looking forward to it.

Brenda it will be great to meet you. Colin Burgess another member is coming from Australia. He will sign his book Fallen Astronauts if you bring your copy along.

It is only one month away.

Best Wishes
Rex

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posted 09-07-2004 11:50 PM               

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Aw shucks, thanks...

But I do this not for accolades, but because I enjoy it. It's a hobby and occasionally a job. I just like to write and I particularly like to write about things that have long been ignored in space history, like military programs. I was influenced by Bill Burrows' book Deep Black back in the 1980s, and have managed to get a lot of information on Cold War reconnaissance satellites.

Right now I've submitted a bunch of articles to Spaceflight for future issues, including something on ferret satellites and something on Lunar Orbiter's ties to Samos. I have a bunch more that I haven't submitted yet, including a long, detailed article on the KH-6 LANYARD satellite. Only three of those were launched in the early 1960s (with one success). But I've found information on proposed upgrades, including one that was really complex. That program was canceled because the KH-7 GAMBIT entered service. I also have two big three-part series in the works, one on military metsats and another on the Samos E-6 and the KH-7. The problem is that although these articles are essentially complete, there is little point to me submitting them now because it will take many months for them to even appear in print.

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posted 09-17-2004 01:27 PM               

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My issue showed up a little late (usually, when I have an article in the issue, I get it as soon as readers in the UK). There's some nice photos in this issue, especially of the Mars rovers, along with a good overview article on MESSENGER.

For those who have not looked, the big mistake alluded to above is the statement on page 381: [Tereshkova] "will be accompanied by... Valery Bykovsky. The two women orbited the earth simultaneously aboard separate Vostok 5 and 6 craft in June 1963."

Bykovsky will be a little stunned to discover that he is a woman.

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posted 09-19-2004 12:59 PM               

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Thanks. Actually, the photos are not all that rare. Back around that time NASA did both the FLO study and a "Mars Analogue" study. Both had illustrations produced by the same company. I think the FLO ones were nicer (although the one of the booster on the crawler is a rather sloppy Photoshop job). They printed a lot of copies of these and would send them out to anybody who asked. I got copies of the FLO ones that sat in my filing cabinet for a long time. I kept a few of the FLO photos on my office wall because I liked them. (These are what I generally refer to as Space Geek Porn--pretty pictures of things that don't exist in real life which get you all excited, and are ultimately bad for your soul.)

Somehow I also obtained a lot of the FLO reference docs. I cannot remember how I got these, but they are cited in the article. All this stuff sat in my files for a long time. I wanted to write an article about it, but did not have much incentive until the new space policy. I think that there are lessons to be learned from the FLO study, both good and bad. For instance, FLO suggested using the moon for astronomy, but I have since learned that this is a rather stupid idea. So the FLO science model is probably in need of revision.

There was another study done as a response to FLO called LUNOX. The images for LUNOX (along with the FLO images) are all available on the NASA Imagery Exchange (NIX) site. I am thinking about writing an article about the LUNOX study.

Both studies are referenced in the Congressional Budget Office's recent report on the costs of space exploration. You can download that study at www.cbo.gov.

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posted 09-25-2004 01:11 PM               

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Hmm... headline in the recent edition of Spaceflight: "ESA wants to study women in bed"...

Rex, tell us all... what's the editor's problem? ...hidden desires? ...hormonal disbalance? ...phantasizing? ...relational troubles? ...we want to know!

------------------
Jürgen P Esders
Berlin, Germany
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Astroaddies

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posted 09-25-2004 08:01 PM               

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I just got the proofs for an article that I have appearing in the November issue. It is on James Webb's statements about the Soviet N-1 rocket during the 1960s and how closely they tracked with what the CIA was telling him at the time.

In addition, does anybody out there have an extra copy of the June 2004 issue that they're willing to part with? It's the only issue from this past year that I do not have.

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posted 09-27-2004 12:00 PM               

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We recently had a symposium on human spaceflight which had a talk about sex in space given by a very reputable scientist. The coverage we got in the British papers was fabulous and very funny. The tabloid papers included a number of very nubile and partley clothed young women in a spacesuit to accompany an article about the paper. Sex does sell though I have not noticed a change in BIS membership following the articles publication.

Rex

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posted 10-01-2004 12:52 PM               

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Rex, can you please provide some information about the "Spaceflight Index" CD-ROM available at £10.99?

I don't know in what format (Excel spreadsheet, PDF document) the index is available on that CD... does it already contain the year 2004 as well?

Thanks in advance & congrats on an excellent job done by BIS HQ in London!

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From: Douglas, Isle of Man, UK
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posted 10-01-2004 07:06 PM               

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Hi Philip, a friend of mine has the CD, it is an Excel spreadsheet and goes up to 2003. The cost was £10.99, so it should work for you, as most computers can access Excel.

regards from Brenda IOM UK

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posted 10-13-2004 01:31 AM               

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The December issue will contain a centre-page photo spread on the Lunar Pilot flight simulator PC game, that re-creates the Lunar Landing Research Vehicle, used to train the Apollo astronauts. Some real photos of LLRV test flight are also included.

Ed

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posted 10-13-2004 05:40 PM               

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quote:

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Originally posted by Dwayne Day:
What's on the cover of the November issue?

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The issue showed up at my door today. Dirty little secret -- I don't subscribe and only get issues when I have an article inside. Usually this means that I get an issue about the same time that it gets mailed out to people in the UK.

I have an article in this issue on Jim Webb and the use of intelligence information during the 1960s.

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posted 11-17-2004 08:39 AM               

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The December Spaceflight arrived at my door Tuesday. Several interesting articles inside.

I have an article on the F-15 ASAT program of the 1980s. The photos came out quite nice. Good color.

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posted 11-17-2004 02:14 PM               

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Any one read the article about Star City Post office!

Very interesting to find that if the postal service thinks its an autograph request that is being sent to the Cosmonauts home address they route it through Star City.

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From: London, England
Registered: Oct 2001

posted 11-17-2004 07:15 PM               

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I was present when Bert Vis did the interview at Star City Post Office. We both thought it would be very interesting for collectors to see where there post goes and is handled. I provided some of the envelopes shown. It balances the great article by Dwayne.

Regards to all BIS members who are part of collectSPACE.

Rex

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posted 11-25-2004 01:37 AM               

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Received the December issue this morning... great articles in my opinion by Ed Hengeveld on the LLRV and by Bert Vis on the Star City Post Office.

Anxiously awaiting new BIS membership cards & stickers for 2005!

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