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Glenn Urges Direct-to-Mars Trip
Posted by
michael
on Fri Mar 05, 2004 08:59 AM
from the one-way-ticket dept.
from the one-way-ticket dept.
Geno Z Heinlein writes "Reuters reports that astronaut John Glenn testified March 4 before the President's Commission on Moon, Mars and Beyond, saying that Bush's plan 'pulls the rug out from under our scientists' and that 'It just seems to me the direct-to-Mars [route] is the way to go.' Referring to the Moon as an 'enormously complex' Cape Canaveral, Glenn said that NASA might spend all the money getting to the Moon and never get to Mars."
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I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
All your other points are excellent.
The point of a moon base, though, would be a resupply base for all your orbital death stars. It's cheaper to get material out of the moon's gravity well than the earth's. It'd take a while to establish the industrial base needed on the moon, though; I'm thinking a permanent manned facility with a population of around 50,000 would be necessary to supply a ring of battle stations in low earth orbit.
"Fear will keep the third world in line...fear of our Orbital Death Lasers!"
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
A: We will never, ever have an anti-missile system that can stop enough incoming ICBM's and/or SLBM's to fend off a massive strike. Period. And if we ever go to war on the assumption that we can, odds are decent that you and everyone you know will die.
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, in some other countries, this might not be the case -- consider the great conventional battles of the past, in young men's lives were spent like pennies for a mile or two of ground. But Americans don't fight that way, and never have. (Gettysburg pales in comparision to the Somme, or Stalingrad.) There are governments which would probably regard the loss of a Chicago-size metropolitan center or two, or ten, as an acceptable risk. But traditionally, we don't think that way, and that's a Good Thing. I will be very saddened, and rather disturbed, if this changes.
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Interesting)
As opposed to that giant thing orbiting the earth called 'The Moon'? And you can shoot down something like the ISS with less difficulty than blowing up the moon.
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Funny)
Any tin-pot third-world dictator threatens you, you just threaten to crash the moon into their country. Not only will they not want that, but their neighbours will probably overthrow said dictator on your behalf as the moon crashing into a country is likely to have severe repurcussions for anyone nearby.
I can clearly see Bush's reasoning on this.
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Funny)
That's no moon. That's a space station!
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Funny)
Strategic deterrant value of the ability to control the international cheese industry. The Swiss and the French would be eating out of your hands for a start.
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:5, Insightful)
a) The moon is easy to defend from Earth-based attacks. It takes a looooot more effort to get something to the Moon from Earth than it does to get something from the Moon to Earth.
b) Anything launched from the Moon can reach any target on the planet, easily enough, using Gravity.
c) The moon has tons of resources for constructing weapons, especially new kinds of nuclear weapons. There's no Greenpeace, no protestors, and no life to destroy, so the Military-Industrial complex can do a looooot of things on the moon that they wouldn't stand a chance doing here on Earth.
This was, incidentally, a hot topic in the 50's and 60's, and I seem to remember more than one sci-fi author getting into a lot of trouble for suggesting that the moon be used militarily in the Cold War
A moon base would be the Top of the Hill for the Pentagon. Its very, very difficult to defend against moon-launched attacks
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Moon having "military value" (Score:5, Insightful)
If not, I suggest ESA had better at least mount some similar type of mission to NASA, making sure that there is more than one "presence" on the moon.
Yeah, OK, it's just a ball of rock - but it's a tad upsetting to think someone else might single-handedly "claim" the entirity of that pretty disc in the sky.
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Re:Moon having "military value" (Score:5, Insightful)
Kinda like the ABM treaty? [fas.org]
*cough*
I've never been accused of being an optimist, but for some reason I don't think international agreements not to militarize space are going to mean a whole lot in the next 15 years unfortunately. The ABM treaty issue is being hotly debated in Canada and will be an issue in the next election. (US Plans call for ABM sites in Canada, leading to space-based weaponry)
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Re:Moon having "military value" (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.antarcticanz.govt.nz/Page
Here's part of it:
" The key elements of the treaty are:
1. Antarctica is to be used for peaceful purposes only. All military activities are banned, although military personnel can be used to support scientific programmes in such things as transportation of people, and equipment to Antarctica
2. There is freedom of scientific investigations and discoveries. Scientific plans, information and staff are regularly exchanged. This scientific cooperation has been genuinely successful among the treaty nations. The Cape Roberts Drilling Project is an example of successful collaborative scientific work.
3. All political claims for territory are frozen for the duration of the treaty and no new claims or enlargements can be made
4. Nuclear explosions or dumping of nuclear waste in Antarctica is banned
5. All stations/bases and equipment are open to inspection be observers appointed by Antarctic Treaty nations."
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Re:I fear that's the whole point (Score:4, Informative)
ISS History article [exn.ca]
Space Station History [centennialofflight.gov]
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Goals (Score:5, Insightful)
Frankly I don't care where we go, Moon, Mars or asteroids. Let's just get off this rock.
Re:Goals (Score:4, Interesting)
Absolutely. We should send robots all over, but we should send humans, too, because it does us good to listen to people who have "been there, done that". I have a greater affinity for our fellow humans who have stood on the Moon, than for the manufactured tools we have sent there. When Armstrong stepped onto the Moon, I thought "gee, I could have been there." Now, I think "gee, my kids or my grandchildren could do that", and it's a nice thought.
I think, as a species, we're designed to go look for ourselves.
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Re:Goals (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's try for some logical progression here. The giant leap was when a man first set foot on something other than Earth. Now let's start walking. There are no lasting benefits right now from a massive Mars bootprint operation, let's go there when it's cheaper and we have some practical Moon colony experience to build on.
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Re:Goals (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead start launching large cargo containers with water, food, nuclear reactors, habitats, bulldozers and rovers. Use the same craft to transport this cargo you will use to fly astronauts there. When the cargo ships are arriving reliably and there is a critical mass of resources on the surface launch people as colonists, not astronauts, on a one way mission to Mars. It will be a lot easier to fly people on a one way flight than it will be to do a round trip. The ROI will be immense on a colonizing mission versus miniscule on a short stay round trip. You could send real geologists who would spend a life time exploring the planet and would have a motivator in they are trying to find the resource to free themselves from cargo flights from earth. You also wouldn't need to continue expensive manned flights from earth if and when a self sustaining colony is established. Mars is better for a colony than the moon because gravity is higher, its not a hard vacuam, and it probably has a lot more resources than the moon. It is only marginally worse than what the scientists living at Antarctica experience (the four added problems being radiation, no air, limited water availability, and long expensive supply runs).
The technology spinoffs form a Mars colony would probably be huge because you would, for example, need to establish a society with zero dependence on fossil fuels and you would need significant advances in food production and manufacturing.
The human race desperately needs a frontier colony with a fresh start. A colony where we might try to lose a lot of the economic and social baggage all the nations on Earth currently carry. The 20th century was the first one where mankind stopped having frontiers on Earth and that is not a positive change.
Moderators probably should mark this redundant because I post the same thing everytime a Mars thread comes up.
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Re:Goals (Score:5, Insightful)
The moon needs to be the proving ground for the technology needed to get to Mars.
This weapons platform gibberish is just the rantings of Bush haters.
If you really want NASA to succeed it needs long range plans like Bush's proposal. AND it needs the opposition party not to fight them. The timelines for going to Mars are so long that political machinations need to be kept out of the equation or Mars exploration just becomes something to kill off the next time the opposition party takes office.
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Re:Goals (Score:5, Interesting)
Some excellent engine choices from low to high:
NERVA - 800-1000 Isp
Gas Core Nuclear Rocket - 2000-5000 Isp
Nuclear Salt Water Rocket - 4500-10000 Isp
Orion - 10000-100000 Isp
M2P2 Orion - >10000 ???
Orions are particularly interesting because of their ability to scale, and be made of traditional building materials instead of composites. (read: Steel) Since the efficiency of Orions climb as the size of the craft does (Thermonuclear H-Bombs give a better bang for the same mass as an Atomic warhead). The largest Orion calculated possible with 1960's technology is 8 million tons. A moving city in space!
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John Glenn doesn't want the rest of us to go moon (Score:5, Funny)
whoops. ignore I said any of that. tinfoil hat slipped
Bush's Moon Plan is a 'shock and awe' tactic: (Score:5, Insightful)
Hero Gone Politician (Score:5, Interesting)
John Glenn lost all credibility with me when, as a US senator, he pulled that garbage line about "exploring the effects of age on space travel" as an excuse to get NASA to launch him back to space.
He was once part of a band of heros. Now he's just another politician.
Re:Hero Gone Politician (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing to see here. Move along.
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Re:Hero Gone Politician (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, of course it was an excuse. Can you blame him for wanting to see space just one more time? Can you blame him for wanting to experience space in something a little less confining than than the Friendship 7 Mercury capsule? Can you blame him for wanting to spend more time up there than the ~5 hours of his 1962 flight?
Well, I suspect that some here can blame him, but I can't. After a lifetime of government service, one ticket on a shuttle flight was as fitting a reward as we could have given the man. And, as other posters have pointed out, he made himself a real part of that crew and did real work while he was up there. I'll never earn a reward like that, but I can't begrudge it to anyone who does.
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China (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:China (Score:4, Funny)
Fry "The president of the world? What's he to us, thus is the United States!"
Leela "Fry, the United States is part of the world"
Fry "Really? Wow, the future really is different"
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The moon is a silly waystation (Score:5, Interesting)
The moon is a gravity well. It may be shallower than the Earth, but it still takes a lot of energy to slow descents and then escape again. Eventually it may be a useful source of material resources, but there's nothing particularly attractive about it now.
Re:The moon is a silly waystation (Score:5, Informative)
With a moonbase, you have space, a stable framework, and ample supplies aluminium silicate dirt, from which you might be able to refine something useful. Even if you can't, you can pile it up to provide bracing, shielding and the like.
If you just want to dock three or four pieces of Mars mission together you might as well just do it, in LEO with no station. If you really want to start building, you want to be somewhere with some ground to lean on.
Of course if Earth->orbit costs come down by a couple of orders of magnitude, for instance with an elevator, then it's a different game entirely, but I think we're probably 20-30 years away from that, if we're lucky.
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waystation != mfg. center (Score:5, Insightful)
A waystation is generally better served in an orbit, yes, but the Moon is a currently unparalleled manufacturing site for space development. It has only 1/6g; is abundant in sunlight, oxygen, aluminum, silicon and iron (with calcium, titanium and other traces); has no atmosphere; and is about a 3-day journey from the mother world.
The problems of the Lunar well are solved by mass drivers built on the surface. With no atmosphere to stop it, an iron bucket carrying cargo (usually basic materials mined from the Lunar regolith) can be flung off the Moon at Lunar escape velocity -- you just have to build the linear accelerator long enough. Then you have to have mass catchers in Cislunar space to capture and make use of said materials.
Really, reaching for Mars without first preparing a Lunar manufacturing site is such abominable stupidity that I can only predict the Mars Adventure will end as Apollo ended
With a well established Lunar base, all other planetary tours can take place as a side-effect of Lunar manufacturing activity. And once asteroidal missions return a sufficient chunk of volatiles to Cislunar space, shipments from Earth can be reduced to personnel and other small, specific cargoes like medicine, special equipment, biologicals and trace elements.
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Re:The moon is a silly waystation (Score:4, Informative)
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There are some reasons to go to the moon (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the big problems with radio astronomy is noise interference from Earth and the many satellites we have in orbit. The nearest zone free of this interference would be the far side of the moon.
Building a radio telescope on the moon would likely require a full-time manned base for handling repairs and maintenance. One of the disadvantages of having a radio telescope on the moon is that radio astronomy has been advancing along with other technological areas and upgrades would be needed periodically in addition to repairs.
I think Radio Astronomy would benefit enormously from such a project, but I doubt that's on the Bush agenda...
Ohio constituents (Score:4, Insightful)
Bush's plan 'pulls the rug out from under our scientists' and that 'It just seems to me the direct-to-Mars [route] is the way to go...
Which translated means Lewis Reasearch Center in Ohio has entrenched interests in the Space Station and stands to loose funding in the short term with President Bush's initiative. What Senator Glenn doesn't make clear is how a direct Mars effort can be funded concurrently with Shuttle/IIS. It can't.
Also Robert Zubrins argument (Score:4, Informative)
The Real Point of the Bush Plan (Score:5, Insightful)
The real point of the Bush policy changes is to promote reform at NASA. Terminate the shuttle program -- and redirect resources to achieving lower costs to orbit. Terminate ISS -- it's not turning out to be a real benefit for science or much of anything else.
I can easily support a manned mission to Mars. But it must be part of a space effort that is more broad based than the current work is. To achieve that, we're going to have change the way we do things. The spectacular project that sometimes succeeds, sometimes doesn't, offers little hope for this style of action.
NASA's predecessor, NACA, helped make revolutionary progress in aeronautics by sticking to technology development and working with nascent aeronautical companies to develop real airplanes that could be used for a wide range of activities by a wide range of organizations. We need the same kind of work from NASA.
Zubrin's Mars Society seems to be doing well ... (Score:5, Informative)
Now, it seems that there are a significant number of Washington players who are getting behind the scientific thinking that Zubrin's program has produced for us
When I think about where we are currently at, evaluating the Mars situation, and where we've come as a result of an independent organization, it warms my heart. The Mars Society have done a lot to get humans thinking about going to Mars properly, and finally it seems like their momentum is having a great effect.
Space Elevator (Score:4, Insightful)
Space Elevators (Score:4, Insightful)
In just 2 decades, this idea has gone from being impossible to far-out to design studies [sciencentral.com].
By comparison, the ISS is a waste and the Moon would be an expensive diversion. Space elevators would really open the solar system up for human - not just robot - exploration.
Re:I don't get Glenn (Score:4, Informative)
No, it's not. Military-related paranoia aside, the potential for long-term residency is far better on Mars because of the higher gravity and existing atmosphere--even if it's not breathable, it still provides some protection from solar radiation.
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Re:How about telling the truth, Glenn? (Score:5, Informative)
Glenn wasn't talking about the complete ISS budget, just the science portion that's projected to be cut.
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Re:I grow weary... (Score:4, Informative)
From His NASA Bio Page [nasa.gov]
He attended Muskingum College in New Concord and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering.....
When astronauts were given special assignments to ensure pilot input into the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project.
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Re:Oh Come on... (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Oh Come on... (Score:4, Insightful)
Glenn never went to the moon. NASA wouldn't let him go, they didn't want to risk losing their hero.
does *not* mean he is an authority on the economic / social / political needs to make a manned trip to Mars
Having served in the US Senate, I'm sure he's much more of an authority on those matters than you would belive.
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Re:One question: why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because man always has and always will seek to further his horizons. We've run out of horizons on Earth.
What can people on the moon or Mars do that a robot can't?"
Experience it first hand. Describe being there in a qualitative as well as a quantitative manner. In short, FEEL what its like to be there. If you fly a kite, you can hardly say you flew, can you? Similarly, putting a robot on the moon or Mars does not justify the statement that man has been there.
Robots are even better suited because, well, they can be specially built to be suited.
No, robots are actually LESS well suited becuase they MUST be built to suit. Being specialised is not a good trait when you are unsure of the circumstances in which you might find yourself. The ability to adapt to changing circumstance is not one that the field of robotics has yet mastered. Thankfully nature has done the work for us, and we are natural adaptors.
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Re:One question: why? because... (Score:5, Insightful)
Can you look at a mountain range on a video or in a picture and see it context to your height, surroundings, atmosphere?
The answers to all thos questions and more is no.
Manned missions are important to the entire human race as accomplishment and to be cliche, "To seek out new life and new information" - Experience moves the human race forward - Robots confine us to to the earth - limit our boundaries. Both are useful - but one is only a step for the other - each is an enhancement to the knowledge gathering.
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Re:The Emperor Has No Spacesuit (Score:4, Interesting)
Samples of moon rocks brought back by the Apollo missions show large amounts of aluminum, titanium, and several other metallic elements that could be used to build spaceship components easily.
Besides, by having a Moon base, we could set up laboratories and living facilities there to support missions to Mars, including safe testing of soil and rock samples returned from Mars.
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It's harder to get to the Moon than Mars (Score:5, Informative)
I keep hearing this idea of using the moon as a refueling station. If you haven't looked at the numbers, t seems like a good idea. However, a quick look at the actual orbital mechanics shows that the Moon is a big waste of time. Here's the breakdown for ow much Delta V is needed to get to the Moon and Mars:
Moon.........Mars
LEO to Moon/Mars..3.2.........4.0
Orbital Insertion.......0.9.........0.1
Orbit to Surface.......1.9.........0.4
Total.............
Yes, it actually takes LESS fuel to get to Mars primarily because it has an atmosphere you can use to aerobrake. The Moon has no atmosphere and so you have to carry fuel to bleed off your transorbital speed. Furthermore, Landing on Mars is assited by being able to use the aerobrake to bleed off speed on the way down unlike the Moon. Those figures even assume that you don't use a parachute and rely upon retrorockets to come to a stop.
OK, what about the idea of the Lunar refuelling station? You now lose the 1.9km/s of energy you need to get back off the lunar surface. (you still pay for it but the refuelling barge now pays that cost) The problem is that the cost of getting to the Moon and in and out of Lunar orbit is as expensive as getting to Mars to begin with. Sure, you now havea refuelled ship that can go to Mars from lunar orbit which is cheap BUT you just spent as much fuel getting to the Moon as it would have taken to go to Mars without stopping!
To use an analogy, I want to drive to New York from Seattle. Now, would it a be a good idea to send a bunch of my friends out to Washington DC to build a gas station for me so that I can drive there, gas up and then drive up to New York? NO! The only way it would make sense is if we were building a spaceship in lunar orbit which is simply insane - we can't even do that in LEO right now. Hell, we have enough trouble doing it on the ground right now.
Furthermore, as the other respondant mentioned, you can't make fuel on the Moon. All rockets that aren't ion drives (which have no need to refuel at the Moon anyways) need an oxidizer and fuel. There's plenty of O2 on the moon in the form of metal oxides. The Moon's something like 70% oxygen. There's plenty of metal and O2 if we want to expend the energy to get it. However, O2 is the oxidizer - we still need the fuel. All our fuels use (to my knowledge) carbon, nitrogen or hydrogen. That includes everything from gasoline and candle wax to hydrazine and liquid H2. The moon has no large supplies of H2, C or N. You'll have to haul all of those in anyways. It really makes no sense to refuel there.
There's plenty of good reasons to go to the Moon, refuelling on the way to Mars is NOT one of them.
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