End of an era: the final shuttle launch.

[Encryptshun]

First off, I find it funny that some of the folks arguing against scrapping the shuttle program in favor of private, commercial enterprises are usually the voices I hear arguing FOR private, commercial enterprises in virtually any other context. Private manned space flight is not progressing because there is no void to fill. Now there is. So let economics deliver faster, better results since you're so sure that unfettered industry is always better than government.

Second, as a life-long space program supporter and overall FANATIC, I applaud the gutsy move to eliminate the shuttle program. Shuttle missions were inordinately expensive (At an average of $1.3 BILLION per launch, far moreso than rocket programs which could deliver the same tonnage of cargo or human occupants), and the tech involved is wasteful, overly complex and obsolete. The fiscally correct solution to a funding gap is to cut programs in order to fund those with a more strategic and impactful ROI. That is EXACTLY what happened here. Cut shuttle funding, increase overall funding by $6 billion over the next 5 years, and have a goal of landing a human on Mars by 2030. To do so, we need to invest in R&D for the tech necessary to get us to our goal. In this case, long-term environmental and housing solutions, and development of the next-generation of ion-drives which will reduce the transit time and improve efficience of fuel consumption to a reasonable level. This was part of George W. Bush's vision for space exploration, and the only changes the current administration made were to cancel the bloated Ares and Orion programs and increase overall funding.

The space program, since the very beginning, has served two primary purposes:

1) Establish tangible ideological and military superiority over our adversaries
2) Provide an outlet for overbudget and underperforming military weapons technology

NASA's governance and project procurement have been complete shams and are dictated by the whims of congressmen who have promises to keep to astronautical and defence contractors in their districts.

I loved the shuttle and everything it stood for. Just like I love the Gemini, Mercury, Apollo, SkyLab, and ISS programs. But they are a means to an end, and the shuttle has outlived its usefulness.

[sbird1]

This was part of George W. Bush's vision for space exploration, and the only changes the current administration made were to cancel the bloated Ares and Orion programs and increase overall funding.

I didn't know that they canceled these programs. So what is next? Obviously rockets instead of the shuttles, but tell me what you know! If they want men on Mars by 2030, what is the plan of action?

[Encryptshun]

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-04-15/poli ... M:POLITICS

It's from over a year ago, but that will give you the overall strategy. Nothing much has changed. The Constellation program was selected specifically because it re-used Shuttle technology (which was flawed to begin with) and there were conflicts of interest at work.

Here is NASA's 2011 plan:

http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/516579main_NASA ... icPlan.pdf

With the current hyper-political debate over the future of our budget and raising the debt ceiling, I'm surprised there hasn't been a huge outcry around NASA funding (since that's usually one of the first on the chopping block).

[sbird1]

Seems to me that NASA should be one of the last on the chopping block. There have been countless invaluable inventions to come out of NASA in the last 50 years. If we are to stay ahead in tech, NASA should be a fully funded program. But that's beside the point. I'm totally excited to see what's going to happen in the near future with NASA.

[Encryptshun]

There are a metric ton of government-funded science projects (either indirectly funded through grant money or directly funded by a spending entity such as the military or DARPA), most of which are on the chopping block now thanks to propaganda about "shrimp on treadmills" and the like from those who are simply trying to get the public to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

NASA and the JPL happen to be among only a handful of remaining think-tanks who are actually government-run. Most others have now been farmed out to educational institutions and private labs (i.e Fermilab, Argonne, Tellabs, etc).

[themadscientist]

I would be happy to volunteer my lab for NASA research. If they will help me move the car parts out of the way and bring beverages I'm sure we can put something together. I've been trying to find a use for this F-CON and VPC, liquid oxygen control, hmmm?

[carloslebaron]

Oh please, because you don't like someone must not be a cause to assert without a valid reason that he/she exaggerates when talks about an issue.

WTF is your problem? Who said anything about that?

I tried to answer in specific the question posted in the first message, apparently neither you or others want to recognize the crude reality about the hard to be for humans to survive in outer space. I guess many people should stop brainwashing themselves with fiction literature and movies, and start to get informed with real scientific information, because I understand that is painful when someone that you don't like, breaks the fantasy and showes you things the way they are.

You seem to be ignoring a large part of the technology that is/was being developed to counter those problems. Either that, or you are ignorant of it. Either way is no excuse when you put yourself in a position claiming to know all about space and the issues associated with it.

And again, like an as$, you automatically assume we use fantasy and movies as a basis for what there is out there. Seriously, grow up and try to debate without loading your post up with negative attention and finger pointing.

Yeap, I konw guys who think excatly like you, they also ressemble dudes who have opium dreams.

I can tel you this, millions of Americans IGNORE the effects of low gravity on the human body. Try to find a clear article online -even from NASA records, and they will be very evasive to present with specific details how much harm the outer space causes to the human body when astronauts stay for months over there. I can even bet that most participants here ignored about it.

The PBS programs, the NASA specials, etc, show how astronauts encourage children to become astronauts someday, but they never explain the consequences of being in space for months. That is dangerous, bringing hope and hidding facts, facts that if they are told, the children won't be so excited about it.

And there is no solution up to today for that problem, because even when you put an astronaut making aerobics most of the time in the Space Station, the red cells still lowering, the osteoporosis still showing to accelerate in their bodies at fast rate, they still getting disoriented, their bodies distorted, etc. Actually, the longer than an astronaut has been in the Space Station is less than a year.

So, we have learned that a travel to Mars, taking more than a year might be a good metal coffin full of insruments and special fuel to travel carrying voluntary suicidal dudes inside, specting to arrive alive to mars, ha ha ha...

For this reason, the 20 years delay is an estimate to find drugs, or something that will change the human body and make it capable to survive such a trip. Until 20 years from now, maybe a new technology -unlnown by now- will create an "earth's gravity alike" inside the space ship. So far, such doesn't exist, for this reason, 20 years is an expectation to find something to make such a travel possible OR just to expect that that new generation won't care, won't remember the topic, maybe NASA will be own by Chinese investors at that moment, probably the US government will make the excuse that cooling the poles is a more important task, etc, etc.

We have not lost everything, because still we will use Russian's space ships, they have not air conditioner, leather seats, chrome rims, etc -you should read the complaints of the American astronauts criticizing their machines, when they had to be rescued by the Russians because the Shuttle wasn't ready to bring them back- but they work at a low cost, and are amanzingly safe, and I think that safety wins over superfluous comfort at last.

Surely, the Russians and Chinese will continue sending men to the outer space anyway, and this is a shared goal which includes US. I'll hope that a new vehicle might be built at lower cost and that will provide NASA to start sooner the sending of astronauts to outer space from American ground, which by the way, was a great spectacle to be watched.

[themadscientist]

Artificial gravity by centrifuge takes care of those problems. It's not a lack of exercise, it's a lack of load on the skeleton. Create an artificial load equivalent to earth gravity and all is well.

[Jesda]

I commend NASA for decades of impressive research and technological breakthroughs, but expecting the future of humanity to come from the US government is... far-fetched. With NASA no longer able to take the lead, there may be motivation for private interests to take over.

Or not. We'll see.

[snwbrdr435]

We get to send our boys up in the russians rocket now. I wonder how much thats costing us.

[Encryptshun]

We get to send our boys up in the russians rocket now. I wonder how much thats costing us.

I'll bet it's less than $5.2 billion per year...

[carloslebaron]

Artificial gravity by centrifuge takes care of those problems. It's not a lack of exercise, it's a lack of load on the skeleton. Create an artificial load equivalent to earth gravity and all is well.

I understood that artificial gravity by centrifuge was just another card over the pocker table, not so "the solution".

http://www.space.com/558-artificial-gra ... -idea.html


Young is co-investigator for the work, teamed with William Paloski, principal scientist, in the Human Adaptation and Countermeasures Office at the NASA Johnson Space Center....""As far as I'm concerned," Young concluded, "the purpose of all these studies is not to show how to use artificial gravity. Rather, it is to determine whether or not artificial gravity is an acceptable solution."

And you are correct, the physical exercise won't "cure" the lose of density in the bones, because the lost of density can't be stop, but it help them to be capable of moving and walking when they leave the space ship.

[themadscientist]

Meanwhile, in England, a low cost alternative is being researched.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5OTe8hU ... re=related[/youtube]

[Dattebayo]

Yeap, I konw guys who think excatly like you, they also ressemble dudes who have opium dreams.

Again, what is your problem? Why can't you debate without making this personal?

You seriously have to be joking, since you have AGAIN, IGNORED all the studies that have been done in this area of research. Also, you used an opinion of one person as proof of your so-called facts.

[Encryptshun]

It's kinda like getting trolled by Google Translator.

[carloslebaron]

Yeap, I konw guys who think excatly like you, they also ressemble dudes who have opium dreams.

Again, what is your problem? Why can't you debate without making this personal?

You seriously have to be joking, since you have AGAIN, IGNORED all the studies that have been done in this area of research. Also, you used an opinion of one person as proof of your so-called facts.

What do you want me to say after you wrote the following in your first reply

You seem to be ignoring a large part of the technology that is/was being developed to counter those problems. Either that, or you are ignorant of it. Either way is no excuse when you put yourself in a position claiming to know all about space and the issues associated with it.

And those are opium dreams, words with complete ignorance about the problems that NASA, the Russians and anyone who want to travel for years in outer space, must confront until today to make it a reality.

No technology is available yet to confront the lack of gravity or to find a way of adaptation to such different environment that is the outer space.

I have gave the reference of the 2001 National Geographic magazine, January issue, also a link -released in 2004- from a site where an interview to one of the heads of a project to solve such a situation, still saying that the problems indeed happen and can't be solved yet.

Now, I will update it again for you,

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37120546/

Did you see the date? 2010 and still no solution, but you said in your reply, "You seem to be ignoring a large part of the technology that is/was being developed to counter those problems." And I wonder what the h*ck are you talking about.

And worst, it's laughable in your last reply, when you call Mr Young as "the opinion of one person"...ha, ha, ha...check that in the last news -the link right above, that his name appears again, same as the article from 2004.

Surely I don't know all about space, but it appears that I have received better information than the one received by you...if you have really received it of course, because by your answers, your replies appear to be of a person who don't want to recognize that indeed are problems with traveling long trips to outer space, that those problems have NOT been solved yet, and that you have the idea that NASA has took care of this issue already, not today but long ago, perhaps with some feelings of superiority, I don't know.

I have tried to answer the question made in the first message, and I have not broken any rule about copyrights, and neither have deviate or changed the original information given by magazines or web sites.

Now well, I guess you didn't like what you have read from my messages, and I can't do anything agasinst that. And, if you disagree with Mr Young's opinion, I would like to know what your opinion is, to tell the truth, you don't need to be a scientist to have a valid or an expert opinion about it, and who knows, maybe you have a better alternative to the point of being tested and be successful for NASA's expectations of man traveling to Mars.

My regards.

[themadscientist]

<<<<<<only one here with scientist in the name.

[s0m3th1ngAZ]

You are also riding an ACME rocket...obviously there is a conflict of interest here sir.

[bcar240]

We get to send our boys up in the russians rocket now. I wonder how much thats costing us.

I'll bet it's less than $5.2 billion per year...

It's $63 million per person.

The other thing of note is that the cost "per launch" of the shuttle is a moving target. The exaggerated figures we've seen recently are due to amortizing pretty much the entire cost of the human spaceflight program (including design, infrastructure, construction, testing, maintenance, upgrades, etc.) from 1976 to current over the number of shuttle launches in the same period. If you actually look at cost only related to the work and consumables per launch it is closer to $500-750 million per. That is still quite a bit though. The financial situation was never favorable to be able to develop a shuttle replacement while still flying the shuttle. The budget was never there so the shuttle had to be retired so they could spend the shuttle money on designing the replacement. Of course, now the last shuttle flight has launched, but we still don't know what the replacement is going to be...

The rumormill says that the administration wants a mixture of the previous Ares V rocket (part of the Constellation program) with more shuttle parts. It is called SLS (Space Launch System), and will be a shuttle external tank, with shuttle engines mounted directly on the bottom, with solid rocket boosters on the side like the shuttle. There will be a capsule (or upper stage for cargo) placed on top of the center tank. The supposed benefits to this is that because it uses shuttle propulsion elements, it will reduce design time in the short term and allow us to start launching again sooner. And in the meantime we can be working on new propulsion systems to swap in later. Which will be needed because there are only so many shuttle main engines left, and they would be destroyed after launch with this system.

[bcar240]

Thats not what im referring to. Look at this picture, inside the nozzle you will see something white near the edge of the nozzle. It starts in the middle of the nozzle and gets bigger until it reaches the edge.

I think what you are referring to is flow separation in the nozzle (the exhaust is separating from the walls of the nozzle). As the engine comes up to full power and proper mixture, the flow stabilizes from the top down.

The SSME is actually designed to have a best efficiency at an altitude of around 80,000 feet, so it is operating a bit outside the envelope at sea level (nozzle is overexpanded), which is why we get the beautiful shock diamonds. Check out this view for a cool slow-mo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFwqZ4qAUkE&t=02m38s
*Also cool to note in that video, even though the engine is generating exhaust of 6000°F, there is frost forming on the outside of the nozzle due to the cryogenic cooling.

[ADDirishboy]

<<<<<<only one here with scientist in the name.

Sounds legit to me.

[PapaSmurf2k3]

The SSME is actually designed to have a best efficiency at an altitude of around 80,000 feet, so it is operating a bit outside the envelope at sea level (nozzle is overexpanded), which is why we get the beautiful shock diamonds. Check out this view for a cool slow-mo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFwqZ4qAUkE&t=02m38s
*Also cool to note in that video, even though the engine is generating exhaust of 6000°F, there is frost forming on the outside of the nozzle due to the cryogenic cooling.

Wow, that is AWESOME! Thanks for posting!

[themadscientist]

While we have a lot of earthly issues to contend with we must push out from our earthly bonds. There are any number of threats to our very survival on this, our only home, and we need to pursue the technology it will take to sustain human life in space or on other celestial bodies. The universe cannot be denied the cultural contribution our species has to offer such as the snuggie and mindless hatred of dissimilar persons.

[carloslebaron]

" The universe cannot be denied the cultural contribution our species has to offer such as the snuggie and mindless hatred of dissimilar persons."

So far, we can't find other cultures outsude our planet, and I guess you are right...planet Mars might be crazy to experience our way of polluting earth...

[PapaSmurf2k3]

Actually, Mars needs a healthy dose of pollution (mostly in the form of CO2) just to help it build/maintain an atmosphere. "Marble warming"?

[s0m3th1ngAZ]

Yeah I think Mars would be down for some carbon trading.

[Dattebayo]

Mars doesn't have the gravity or magnetic field to be able to support a stable atmosphere. The solar wind will blow away too much, It would be something like breathing high altitude... You'd need a massive replenishable source to get anything like what we have here.

I always thought that it was understood that living on Mars would mean living in airlocked buildings...

[bigbadberry3]

^^Or under ground^^

[Encryptshun]

Mars doesn't have the gravity or magnetic field to be able to support a stable atmosphere. The solar wind will blow away too much, It would be something like breathing high altitude... You'd need a massive replenishable source to get anything like what we have here.

I always thought that it was understood that living on Mars would mean living in airlocked buildings...

THIS ^

^^Or under ground^^

this too^


The most current models suggest that Mars had an atmosphere as recently as 100,000 years ago, complete with liquid water on the surface. Once its magnetic field dissipated, however, the constant pummeling from the solar wind (and a magnetic solar super-storm) shucked off the atmosphere like a pair of panties on prom night.

[MinisterofDOOM]

Mars doesn't have the gravity or magnetic field to be able to support a stable atmosphere.

Yup. Mars is no longer geologically active, which means it has no magnetosphere. That's bad for sustaining life. Even if we could modify the atmosphere to be breathable, unshielded life on the surface would be subject to all sorts of nasty cosmic energy that earth's magnetosphere and ozone and other related features we take for granted protect us from. Mars can't be "terraformed" for this reason. Artificial habitats would have to be built instead.