New NASA Shuttle Program "Doomed To Failure" 278
Heartbreak writes "In a recent press release, the
Space Frontier Foundation warns that NASA's Oribital Space Plane program, its latest initiative to take the load off the aging STS (the 'Space Shuttle'), is essentially doomed before it starts. 'NASA's unbroken string of cancelled vehicle programs' going back 20 years makes it a good bet that OSP will also fail. Is this just really, really, bad luck, or is NASA little more than a multi-billion-dollar jobs program for important U.S. aerospace contractors?"
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Shame (Score:5, Informative)
All the early launchers were based on MRBM/ICBMs, getting a man in space simply meant you had the throw-weight to get a bigger fusion bomb to New York or Moscow. Back in the 50s and 60s fusion bombs were big.
Joint USAF/NASA work pushed technology in the 1960s. What became Skylab was going to be an Air Force Orbital Workshop. In Chuck Yeager's bio he talks about training pilots with F-104s modified to manouver with thrusters the same way that Dyna-Soars or X-15s would operate as they went to orbit.
The Soviets worked on the same sorts of military stations. Even MIr was designed to have a military application.
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/mir.htm
"The original Spektr design was to be armed with Oktava interceptor rockets and equipped with sensors to identify and track ballistic missile re-entry vehicles as well as discriminate decoys. In 1992, as directed by the Soviet Union's military and political leadership, all work on such projects was discontinued. The Spektr module was mothballed, then later converted into a civilian platform, partially funded by the United States."
"Minister of Defence Ustinov requested that the Americans be challenged. As a 'warning shot' the Terra-3 complex was used to track the space shuttle Challenger with a low power laser on 10 October 1984. This caused malfunctions to on-board equipment and temporary blinding of the crew, leading to a US diplomatic protest."
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/almaz.htm
htt
http://www.
http://www.ast
http://www.astronautix
No, military bad (at least, inefficient) (Score:2)
I think you're 100% right on the history, and am surprised by how often people don't know of or deny the link between the Space Race and Cold War. Aside from the interaction with military ICBM technology and the like, going to the Moon out of nationalistic pride was for the Americans another way to show we were better than the communist Soviet Union. Now that the competition is settled, it's difficult now to imagine of our nations as economic and scientific competitors that tried to show the world, and themselves, they would outlast the other. Victory and not armageddon was what Khrushchev meant when he declared, "We will bury you." (Sorry, Sting.) [lyricsdomain.com]
I don't agree with the logic that military spending in excess of our need (however one defines excess) is good for science, though realistically it is probably necessary. To the extent their are collateral benefits to essential expenses, wonderful. Beyond that, military programs are not known for their efficiency, and using them as an indirect method to pursue peaceful goals is even worse -- a "trickle down theory" of aerospace. If you want to hit a target, aim at the target.
What's necessary is necessary, but spending what is likely even more with the expectation of a peace dividend, or holding back on direct spending, is unwise. But the argument we need something for defense is what lights the fire under the camel.
As alluded to above, the healthy alternative to overspending that ALSO was a major force behind Apollo is a healthy sense of competition, on ego rather than power, and it now appears very likely that space is going to be a thoroughly international affair. As someone here put it, if China were close to reaching Mars, we'd kill ourselves to be first. Would America have gone to the Moon if not for the Soviets? I don't think so. Thank you, communist dictators.
Re:No, military bad (at least, inefficient) (Score:2, Insightful)
In the US the military gave control of the nuclear weapon production to the Department of Energy. Control of nuclear weapons in the US is in the hands of civilians.
You claim the military is taking over civilian institutions, in the case of NASA/NACA/USAF, NASA took experimental and space flight over from the Air Force, so since then we've had USAF/NRO/DMA working on thier own launchers, thier own testing facilities, thier own optics as NASA does the same thing. It's obvious that USAF and NASA should work togeather since the paths are the same. It's not as if systems designed for the military never get into the hands of civilians. Humvees, A-10 engines, M-16s, megalithic ship building, GPS and a host of other things have crossed the line from military to civilian.
USAF has deeper pockets and better large-scale project management than NASA has, so they should run the program for a next-gen shuttle.
In the case of space systems, no one is saying USAF is going to destroy external enemies with a launch vehicle. The fact is, the Air Force has a real tangable need and use for a SST replacement, NASA doesn't know what the hell it's doing. Thus USAF should be the one to do it.
As for fascism, I've been to fascist countries and studied it, the US has a LONG way to go if it's even going to be a fraction fascist.
Re:Shame (Score:2, Funny)
by John Robbins
If you cannot find Osama, bomb Iraq.
If the markets are a drama, bomb Iraq.
If the terrorists are frisky,
Pakistan is looking shifty,
North Korea is too risky,
Bomb Iraq.
If we have no allies with us, bomb Iraq.
If we think that someone's dissed us, bomb Iraq.
So to hell with the inspections,
Let's look tough for the elections,
Close your mind and take directions,
Bomb Iraq.
It's pre-emptive non-aggression, bomb Iraq.
To prevent this mass destruction, bomb Iraq.
They've got weapons we can't see,
And that's all the proof we need,
If they're not there, they must be there,
Bomb Iraq.
If you never were elected, bomb Iraq.
If your mood is quite dejected, bomb Iraq.
If you think Saddam's gone mad,
With the weapons that he had,
And he tried to kill your dad,
Bomb Iraq.
If corporate fraud is growin', bomb Iraq.
If your ties to it are showin', bomb Iraq.
If your politics are sleazy,
And hiding that ain't easy,
And your manhood's getting queasy,
Bomb Iraq.
Fall in line and follow orders, bomb Iraq.
For our might knows not our borders, bomb Iraq.
Disagree? We'll call it treason,
Let's make war not love this season,
Even if we have no reason,
Bomb Iraq.
Use the space shuttle design (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Use the space shuttle design (Score:4, Interesting)
Still, your point is well taken. NASA-Johnson Space Center always argues that any changes represent an unwise risk to the astronauts' lives. They argue that because NASA-JSC doesn't have to worry about costs.
And when NASA-JSC has upgraded the shuttle, the cost over-runs would take your breath away.
Jim Hillhouse (recovering aerospace engineer)
Re:Use the space shuttle design (Score:3, Interesting)
NASA is, in fact, already upgrading the Shuttles to have a lighter, flat-screen based cockpit instead of using those heavy CRT-screens, but it will simply not change the fundamentals of the vehicle.
Re:Use the space shuttle design (Score:3, Insightful)
Declare proceeds from space exploration and space exploitation free from taxes for 20 years (think land grants during the Westward expansion of the United States.) Everyone will throw money into space, some as a tax dodge, some as legit ventures now that they can drum up investment (a permanent presence in space needs infrastructure, which means many subcontractors and entrepreneurs.) Some of it might come back (orbital manufacturing, refining, and energy production), and with interest to boot.
The key thing is all this investment will drive a new economic boom, as people build stuff, take home paychecks, and spend their money. Eventually, these investments will pay off, or get written down, and EVERYONE benefits. At least this way, we don't need to blow up the items we're building (ie, million-dollar cruise missiles) in order to employ people. And, because it isn't a government program, with government pork, we don't have to spend tax money to do it - and decisions on where and how money is spent can be made on an economic, not a political basis.
Re:Use the space shuttle design (Score:5, Insightful)
At some point some guy is going to discover that some product that people want can only be found/produced in space. They will set up a trillion dollar mining/factory facility and in the process develop all of the infrastructure to get there and back quickly an cheaply.
Americans went west originally in search of Gold in California. Along the way they noticed a rather large land mass in between. (And I wouldn't exactly call Alaska a popular place to live these days.)
Conversely look at the war on drugs, and the prohibition. In both cases the government put its foot down, and got it run over.
I will sum it up as follows: There has to be some intrinsic value for something to be done. Government can either get in the way or profit from it.
Re:Use the space shuttle design (Score:3, Interesting)
With enough people there, you can start looking into closing the loop by building hydroponics farms under the ice, the local ports closest to Anarctica would do thriving business shipping supplies in bulk, etc. Remember, in the gold rush it wasn't the prospectors who made money, it was the inkeepers, saloon owners, whores, suppliers, outfitters, etc. who supplied the poor schmucks, and then took their money when they came to town. The city of San Francisco wasn't built by miners, but by merchants. Same idea in Anarctica - the people who want to have a tax free haven go there, someone has to feed, clothe, and entertain them. That's where the real (and hopefully at some point self-sustaining) economy begins.
A word of caution (Score:2)
Of course there will be a lot of failures ... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh, wait,
-Chris
Re:Of course there will be a lot of failures ... (Score:3, Insightful)
AC > NASA is being run by *administrators*.
No, that's not right either. And it seems to be a very common misconception among SlashDotters.
NASA is, in fact, run by Senators and Congressmen. You could install the world's best brains in NASA's management and the most they could ever do is propose projects and hope that government committees -- politicians, not scientists or engineers -- approve them, and approve sufficient funding. They often do one and not the other.
Anybody who thinks that the U.S. government hands NASA billions of dollars every year and then says "do whatever you want with this" doesn't understand the first thing about government.
Anybody who thinks that the Space Shuttle is an example of inept engineering doesn't understand the political history of the U.S. space program.
And anybody who thinks that government-funded R&D in the Basic Sciences doesn't pay for itself many times over doesn't understand the basics of large-scale economics.
So even though the history of NASA is full of decisions that are easy to second-guess in hindsight, the result is far, far, far better than doing nothing.
All that being said... Like many, I am an advocate of both Space Exploration and Space Exploitation, and moving large parts of it (basically everything within the Moon's orbit) from government control into the hands of private industry. But the undeniable fact that private industry has not yet managed to do it means that the government needs to continue subsidizing it for a while longer.
The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:5, Insightful)
NASA's problem is that they are trying to focus on doing something other than the Shuttle. The reasons the other programs failed is because NASA keeps trying to find better ways to do things. The same things they did in these programs, they did in the 60's and 70's, and the result of those experiements was the Space Shuttle.
The line of failures is due to the fact that NASA can't realize that the Shuttle is the compilation of the best ideas we have. If they want to really boost their space program, they should focus on building a new fleet of SPACE SHUTTLES, with new (lighter) computer systems, and incorporating other modifications, such as an crew ejection/escape system and modules that allow the shuttle to perform more tasks (that it is capable of). Examples of these tasks include the current research lab role, whereas a slight modification could turn the Shuttle into a heavy lifter capable of carrying the biggest of payloads to the Station.
I also think the failures are due to a huge lack of incentive. In the Capitalistic society we live in, there is no monetary incentive for a new shuttle; we can send satellites up on cheaper expendable rockets. The dreams for moon and mars colonies are so far in the future that the risk is far too great for anyone to invest in.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, but that weight can't be changed unless you're talking about a new airframe, which essentially means a new vehicle. But if you can replace a 25 year old 100 lb computer with a modern 10 lb computer, that's ninety pounds of payload you can gain on the current orbiter. Do that eleven times (obviously I'm talking about more than just the five General Purpose Computers) you can gain nearly a thousand pounds more payload. You also reduce power requirements and reduce the heat load on the orbiter, two significant gains. I'd say off the top of my head that there might be as many as fifty such boxes you could replace with modern but reliable technology.
There's also a tremendous weight on the orbiters in just plain wires which deliver both power and data. Replace those with something more modern and you can make significant payload gains.
Of course, replacing an entire orbiter avionics system is going to be an expensive and risky undertaking (risky from the ain't-broke-don't-fix-it point of view). If you're willing to do the job, though, it would probably cost less than a whole new spacecraft program. It would be nice to do both, though. The shuttle's a great workhorse and we should keep flying it as long as possible, but we also need to be committed to building a new spacecraft for manned space flight.
--Jim
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Interesting)
In related news, it appears that they were trying to auction the thing off, and for only $6,000,000!! Google [google.com] for more info.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:2)
The full-scale model is now a restaurant [k26.com] at an amusement park.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Informative)
[rumour]
Apparently the Buran did a very short dive on the glide path to the runway, the quickly correcting itself. It was the Russian equivalent of the FAA that demanded to know why that happened before they'd approve Buran.
After an investigation they found that it was likely that one of the transmitters guiding Buran on an approach path, had failed. But no one could be sure, and apparently this report has circled offices and organisations for a while, with no one daring to sign the thing in cas ethe report turning out to be wrong. There was an attempt to have a whole department sign the thing collectively, but it came to nothing, and the project was delayed.
[/rumour]
Without this glitch they might well have continued the Buran programme, with success even. The basics of the Buran might have been copied from the US Shuttle design, but the overall design of the Buran is supposed to be much better, being the work of smallish groups of engineers and designers working closely together, rather than the gazillion design committees working individually on every Shuttle subsystem, leading to a horrible design. (Feynman wrote something about this in one of his books). Also, Buran was capable of lifting a far larger payload than the shuttle, and it could be piggybacked onto a Proton for an even larger payload.
By the way, the shuttle is almost completely automated as well.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:2)
Buran stopped because the funder no longer existed (Score:2)
Um, wasn't one of the reasons for Buran development stopping that the entire superstate funding the project (USSR) collapsed at that point, so the contributing nations had more on their minds than space research? (like defining their nations, sorting out their economies, avoiding military coups..) I thought this was a main reason for the research getting shelved?
Re:Buran stopped because the funder no longer exis (Score:2)
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Interesting)
THe shuttle is incredibly expensive to launch. The Saturn-V was (if I remember correctly) much cheaper, and could put up almost as much payload.
As it stands, we have a vehicle that does two jobs terribly inefficiently-
1) Putting people in space, and
2) putting payload in space.
The shuttle was originally conceived as a device to accomplish task #1, but was unfortunately subverted and became a compromise vehicle.
Unfortunately, this is one place where compromise can be a terrible thing.
As it turns out, creating seperate launch vehicles, one small one for people, and a big one for big payloads, makes a whole lot more sense.
Oh well, thats politics for you.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Informative)
Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt, wrong answer. It wasn't cheaper, and it could put A HELL OF ALOT more payload into orbit. The real shame is that the Saturn V only had one production run, if they'd kept making them there would have been improvements, and who knows what we could have come up with to do with them?
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Interesting)
You gotta wonder why NASA aren't cranking out Shuttles like Boeing crank out 747s. Any first year MBA will tell you that the key to funding any development that requires substantial upfront investment is to realize economies of scale in production. If there was a weekly - or even more frequent - shuttle run to LEO, that anyone could buy passage on, and shuttles with life support in the unpressurised cargo bay, the economic exploitation of space would happening orders of magnitude quicker than it is today. And ultimately, space exploration has got to pay for itself if it's going to happen.
I also think the failures are due to a huge lack of incentive. In the Capitalistic society we live in, there is no monetary incentive for a new shuttle; we can send satellites up on cheaper expendable rockets. The dreams for moon and mars colonies are so far in the future that the risk is far too great for anyone to invest in.
I'm not so sure that's true. Consider trading missions to the far east in the 16th century. Voyages took years, with no guarantee that everything would not be lost in a storm or other disaster. The banking, insurance and reinsurance industries were created to manage that risk, and make it acceptable to investors. A similar thing will happen with space missions.
As soon as there is a demand on Earth for products from space - raw materials, components or devices that can only be manufactured in low gravity or with plenty of cheap vaccuum, etc - Capitalists will find a way to make it happen.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:2)
Your implication is that we tear down each orbiter following a mission and rebuild it with new components, which is simply not true. Consider the recent case in which cracks were found in the MPS flow liners. To replace those would have taken the entire fleet out of operation for many months, maybe a year, because they hadn't been produced in years, and the maker would have to tool up again to make replacements. Instead we repaired the flow liners with welds and got the shuttles back in the air.
You're right that the turnaround maintenance is huge, and that there are significant recurring costs in the program. But we absolutely do not have an ongoing "production run" for building shuttles.
--Jim
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Interesting)
This version 2 shuttle is the model that should have been mass produced.
Your references to the merchant adventurers is quite accurate, and is the foundation of double-entry accounting and the company limited by shares (I believe both started in Venice). The first English company was founded in the 16th Century for the exploration of a new route to China via a North-East passage. The voyage failed because of the ice and ship wintered in Archangel. The crew eventually were taken to Moscow and met up with the Czar and ended up with special trading rights. An excellent example of how you may fail to achieve the primary objective but achieve something else which is also profitable.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:2)
The real answer is that reusable launchers cannot be justified until either the launch market is much larger or the development cost is much lower. The natural and economically rational path would have been to continue developing expendable launchers, gradually reducing launch costs and increasing the size of the market. NASA shouldn't have been involved except as a customer and perhaps as a developer of pieces of the technology, in a mode similar to the old NACA. However, that approach would not have suited NASA's institutional agenda, which was to preserve their budget.
Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Interesting)
A disposable booster is a little like a formula one car, it only needs to last one race so it doesn't matter if you overrate it, because you will rebuild it from scratch. The Shuttle concept should have been more like the rally car, needing some maintenance but not a total rebuild between races.
What I don't understand is how management ignored the fact that the shuttle would need so much work between flights. The fact that the components were being overrated should have triggered some warning.
Yes, I agree with you that a more commercial approach would have been sensible, but who would want to take the risk?
Not: Re:The Shuttle is the best replacement (Score:3, Informative)
- lack of credible abort modes
- extremely long turnaround times
- use of solid rocket boosters during ascent
- use of bulky hydrogen during ascent to LEO
- use of expensive launch pad
- whole armies of people needed to maintain it
- extremely high cost of launch
- lack of full reuse
- main engines are too complex, too near to the engineering edge
Some of these are fixable with enough money; the boosters might be replaced by liquid engines, or hybrid engines, but most of them are pretty much inherent in the design. The main engines are gradually improving, and need less maintenance now, but the vehicle still is never going to be able to turnaround quickly; it's never going to launch every other day, or once per week. And that's what it would take to make it cheap.Re:Buran replacing Shuttle (Score:2)
Yes, Buran could fly itself (it did to orbit) and I believe it was able to land in winds far higher than the US Shuttle can achieve.
Re:Buran replacing Shuttle (Score:2)
Difference (Score:5, Insightful)
After all, USAF was first to go supersonic with X-1. First to go to Mach 2 with X-1A, first to launch a vehicle get it into space and land it with X-15, first with a lifting body with Dynasoar, etc.
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/orbitalexpress-0
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=45
So when it comes time to write the checks for something that will cost as much as the replacement for SST comes around, USAF will be able to say it has a greater need. Love it or hate it, when it comes down to it, National Defense and Intelligence Gathering gets the bucks. Launching rats and sunflowers for 10 days at a time doesn't really seem like a good spending of 5 billion dollars to Senators.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/sta
USAF/NSA/NRO/DMA/CIA/DIA want to launch a number of birds. Discoverer II calls for 24 new birds. Future Imagery Architecture calls for up to two dozen.
Currently the US has around a dozen spy sats, so within the next decade the number could increase to around fifty. If one looks at articles about the follow-on to B-52/B-1/B-2 it seems more and more likely that USAF will move to an "Orient Express" type aircraft, or even launch conventional weapons from LEO.
I just think that since the DoD is going great guns with more and more systems in space, thats where a reusable launch vehicle will be.
But it did make it into space . . . (Score:2)
By the way, the thing looks pretty much the same in appearance and performance specs as a U.S. Navy/North American A5 Vigilante, except the Vigi had this central tunnel-bomb bay-fuel storage bay while the Arrow has the engines closer together.
Nasa is doing right... (Score:5, Interesting)
Like all managers, NASA managers do not want to be in the public humiliation business, after all. Much better to start a project and leave NASA with it on your resume than have it punch a hole in Mars!
Now, having said that, let's look at the source, shall we: "Rick Tumlinson is a founder of the Foundation for the International Non-Govemmental Development of Space (FINDS), a multi-million dollar foundation which funds breakthrough projects and activities, and a founder of LunaCorp, a 7 year-old firm planning a commercial return to the Moon."
Do these lightly nutty folks have an agenda, or what?
Give NASA a goal, a date to achieve it and the threat of a budget cut and they'll work wonders. All they need is something to work towards. Why not Mars?
Re:Nasa is doing right... (Score:3, Interesting)
new shuttle (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:new shuttle (Score:2)
Re:new shuttle (Score:2)
No, the USA will sit back, drink a cold beer and say "Been there, done that, got the dirt and the rocks already. Boooooorrring."
Anti-NASA group writing anti-NASA press release (Score:5, Insightful)
From their statement:
Our definition of a "frontier enabling" technology or policy is one which has as its effect the acceleration of the creation of low cost access to the space frontier for private citizens and companies, enables or accelerates our use of space resources, and/or accelerates the rate at which wealth can be generated in space. In other words, is the project or policy going to provide a return on the national investment, if we define "return" to be the economically sustainable human habitation of space?
Policies of the Space Frontier Foundation [space-frontier.org]
can't say they are wrong, capitalism help advance (Score:3, Interesting)
So a widening of the space usage to the public would probably allow for more efficient launcher, more research and discovery , (and more accident too...). But it certainly would be a better return to the humanity in general than spy satellite and the ISS.
Re:Anti-NASA group writing anti-NASA press release (Score:5, Interesting)
What's wrong with that?
Right now, the space programme is going nowhere. We have been able to place objects in orbit in the 1950s. Apart from the occasional scientific probe, NASA is basically the Greyhound bus service of LEO.
Space exploration won't happen for real until miners, production engineers, manufacturing corporations, porn stars, hoteliers ands couriers are using space as an everyday part of their jobs.
Apart from the commercial satellite users - telcos and broadcasters mainly - space is a black hole for money. It's got to pay for itself, or we won't be going anywhere.
Re:Anti-NASA group writing anti-NASA press release (Score:2)
Re:Anti-NASA group writing anti-NASA press release (Score:2)
There's an economic return from some unmanned uses of space, certainly. But that's no justification for most of what NASA does.
Re:Anti-NASA group writing anti-NASA press release (Score:2)
Two words, my friend: airline industry. From a toy for the rich to mass transport in a couple of decades. What about cellphones? From wealthy stockbrokers to teenagers in mere years. And computers: from the most massive corporations paying millions of dollars for each unit to the average consumer paying $500 for a machine that makes one of those multi-million-dollar monsters look like a joke.
Your argument that only the rich will benefit simply does not stand up to historical fact.
NASA critical parody (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps it is time to move this effort to the private sector. On the other hand, I would really like to move to Mars (assuming I can get Internet access there), and I don't see a profit-driven operation accomplishing that anytime soon.
Re:NASA critical parody (Score:2)
Re:NASA critical parody (Score:2)
Re:NASA critical parody (Score:5, Interesting)
I know lots of Slashbots hate patents, but the reason a pharma corporation invests hundreds of millions of dollars in R&D every year is because the regulatory environment is such that if you discover something, you can have exclusive rights to it for a few years.
Now consider the state of Alaska. The problem: a lot of land, but no-one who wants to colonize it. The answer was called "homesteading". This basically meant that if you showed up on a plot of unclaimed land, fenced it and farmed it, after a certain amount of time, it was yours legally.
The commercial exploitation of space will be driven by similar concepts. Let's say a treaty is signed that any corporation who lands on the moon gets exclusive mining/colonization rights for a circle x km around their point of landing. That creates the incentive for investment, now a business plan can be written. Unless there's something in it for the investors, why would they invest their money?
Right now money spent on space is not an investment, it's a donation.
Re:NASA critical parody (Score:2)
If we take the Alaska analogy, you have multiple things:
- An authority that can grant property and police conflits (in this case the US governement).
- A clear definition of how a claim is accepted (fencing the area and farming it).
- A reasonably level playing field (while farming in Alaksa certainly involves some money, I think money is not the prime factor).
The problem is that for space affairs, the situation is not that clear.- There is no clear authority on space - the UNO has trouble enough solving problems on earth. What if a conflict occurs between different claimants? Do you really think that the US or China will accept a UNO ruling they don't like?
- The basic idea of the Alaska is that you improve the area, make it civilised, livable. I agree that if an entity (state, corporation whatever) terraforms a planet, it ought to have claims on it. But defining this in a clear way will be tricky (and probably imply a new race of lawyers).
To take your proposal, does landing imply a human being? Very restrrictive, robots could be sufficient for mining. If not what if a country / corporation sent a thousands micro-robots scattered around the moon, they could claim most of it.
- The playing field is not level at all. There are basically five players: the US, the EU, China, Japan and Russia. Dividing extra-terrestrial ressources between those five entities would further the divide between rich and poor countries, this could lead to more anger from third world countries.
Yet I agree with you that this is probably the way to colonise space, simply I doubt this can be done in a peacefull way like Alaska. You might argue that space is big, the problem is, space is not very equal, it is full of unintersting places, with a few places with many resources, or a very strategic importance.You made the comparison with patents, and the analogy holds, the problem is not so much with the concept, most people agree that a person should be able to claim an idea. The problem is to prevent some entity of claiming to many things.
Re:NASA critical parody (Score:5, Funny)
buzzbomb@mars:~$ ping yahoo.com
PING yahoo.com (64.58.79.230): 56 octets data
64 octets from 64.58.79.230: icmp_seq=0 ttl=242 time=757610.6 ms
64 octets from 64.58.79.230: icmp_seq=1 ttl=242 time=757638.2 ms
64 octets from 64.58.79.230: icmp_seq=2 ttl=242 time=757620.5 ms
--- yahoo.com ping statistics ---
3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 757610.6/757623.1/757638.2 ms
Well, it's faster than the actual implementation [linux.no] of RFC 1149 [ietf.org].
Increasing Irrelevance (Score:5, Interesting)
Consider the following: The average age at Johnson Space Center, the focal point of manned space flight, is in the early-50's. Walking around the Engineering Directorate (EOD) is like walking into a retirement home. I applaud the dedication of NASA-JSC's older engineers to continue producing, but they should be mentoring. They are not. While JSC is soon facing a large loss of experience as the older engineers who actually knew how to put people on the Moon, it will only hire those select few who have been either interns or co-ops. That way new hires already know the NASA-JSC way of doing things. And last year JSC did not hire but a few of those co-ops. Why? Because the JSC budget is in dire straights due to program budget over-runs that make anything the DOD every did look tame by comparison. Can anyone say $9 Billion (yes, that's with a "B") for station over-runs?
NASA once was a place where people could dream, where engineering was considered job 1 and people had a can-do spirit. NASA once inspired and led technological change.
Today the top-talent does not try to get into NASA. And that makes challenging projects even more difficult to complete successfully. NASA upper management has misled Congress so many times on estimated project costs that such estimates are treated more as science fiction than anything else.
Meanwhile, JSC's exploration office continues to dream of going to Mars, a mere 1.52 AU (1 AU = 149.5 million km) even as JSC has a very tough time managing the Space Station, a near-earth orbiting craft at 300 km AGL. Never mind doing what managed to get us to the Moon without anyone dying there, that is taking steps along the way. Low-earth orbit, high-earth orbit, lunar orbit, test lunar landing craft to 10 miles above the Moon's surface, THEN actually land. Some say that Steve Jobs creates a reality distortion field. But it's nothing compared to what the Exploration Office people live in.
NASA's new administrator OKeef seems to recognize some of the reality distortion issues. But he faces a NASA that doesn't want to be told that it's gotten itself into such a hole that its very existence isn't a top priority among Americans. And 9/11 and the subsequent Anti-Terrorism War hasn't helped any with that perception.
NASA is loosing its ability to inspire. And with that goes the chance for a long time of inspiring today's young who could be tomorrow's entrepeneurs that figure out a way to make a dollar up there in orbit.
Jim Hillhouse (recovering aerospace engineer)
pigs in space (Score:2, Interesting)
Isn't this the libertarian nutball lobby group that basically wants those damn fatcat governments to get right out of space?
In any event, they don't actually go to the trouble of saying why the OSP itself is allegedly bound to fail - instead they focus on other past failures. Past failures in big monolithic planetary probes are why NASA is now having success with smaller, single-purpose probes. Sometimes you have to break a few eggs, especially when the recipe is inherently difficult to get right. If they do have specific commentary on why the OSP must fail, why don't they propose constructive alternatives? Could it be that they're simply opposed to public involvement in space?
In fact, they seem more concerned about the failure of the X-33 and the spin that was apparently put on it - specifically blaming the pressures of (gasp) commercialisation. You can put people on the moon, but stay away from those sacred cows.
There may very well be legitimate problems that need to be addressed, but you're not going to find out about it from a source as dogmatic and hopelessly prejudiced as this.
NASA can't afford to many more cancellations... (Score:5, Interesting)
China's pushing THEIR space program hard.
Ok, that was actually six words, but I can't see Bush ignoring them for too much longer. NASA will get it's funding one way or another with this issue looming on the horizon...
Bush is (surprisingly) already on it (Score:5, Informative)
Re:NASA can't afford to many more cancellations... (Score:2)
To get (very roughly) to where the US and USSR were in 1963, that is.
That said, we were on the moon 6 years later... and haven't been back in thirty.
Maybe this will help? (Score:5, Funny)
Does the US have to be in a cold war before it realizes its potential?
Re:Maybe this will help? (Score:2)
Re:Maybe this will help? (Score:2)
NASA's flaws (Score:5, Insightful)
NASA insisted on a completely functional vehicle, which would include a number of brand-new, never-before-used technologied. Most prominently: Composite fuel-tanks, a lifting body design, linear aerospike engines and load-bearing fuel-tanks. In the end, the program failed because one of these components (The load-bearing, composite fuel-tanks) didn't pan out as expected.
Now what approach is that?!? This is completely unknown territory, and NASA expects the pioneers that go there to know in advance to that a) they will succeed, b) how long it will take and c) how much it will cost. No room for "Well, we tried X, but perhaps Y is a better approach". Get it right, the first time, or else.
Things simply don't work that way in such cutting-edge R&D work. A better approach is to take small steps: Fund a project to explore the composite fuel-tanks, a separate one to look at engine options etc.
In fact, this was the approach promoted by the original X-33/VentureStar designer. In the end, this guy quit Lockheed Martin because of what he saw as a flawed approach. And he was right.
Of course politics plays a role too. The SLI approach incorporated the more piecemeal approach to vehicle devlopment, but it was essentially axed by the new, Bush-appointed administrator.
Orbital Spaceplane may or may not succeed in the sense that it certainly has a better chance than average of at least producing something. This mainly because of fairly high military interest. This is what gave us the Space Shuttle: A gross compromise between development cost and performance because NASA had to please the military (Which had extreme payload capability demands). Had the DoD not been so influential in the STS design, we would most likely have had a vehicle with less payload capacity, but a lot easier (= cheaper) to operate.
I am pessimistic about the OSP.
Re:NASA's flaws (Score:2)
The problem with the shuttle, in the end, was that the demand for space just wasn't large enough to justify building it or operating it. Incremental improvements in expendable launchers would have been the best approach -- and that's still the best approach today. Spacefans who want $1000 tickets to LEO won't like that, but, well, cry me a river.
Re:NASA's flaws (Score:2, Interesting)
The X-33's composite tanks didn't work because Lockheed never intended for them to work.
I once met a guy from the "Skunkworks" who was working on it at the time. (He called his place of employment "the Nerd Monastery".) He told me that Lockheed knew that the composite tanks wouldn't work and they'd have to replace them with aluminum ones. Why, you ask, did they include composite tanks in the design in the first place? Because Lockheed needed extra time to write the flight software.
They purposefully had a fscked up design so they could buy extra time cause they knew they were incompetent!
Lack of funding (Score:2, Insightful)
The units/numbers for the vertical axis didn't display correctly in openoffice (from the imported PPT lecture). It's something about money, of course.
Re:Lack of funding (Score:2)
I don't understand the point you're trying to make. In every high tech industry, doing more with less money every year is considered perfectly normal. Example: I remember when about the biggest HD you could buy was a few tens of MB, and costs thousands of dollars. Now HDs are a dollar a gigabyte [slashdot.org]. If you want to talk MFLOPS/dollar, screen resolution/dollar, battery life/dollar or any other metric, you will see every year, the industry does more for less money.
Why aren't NASA delivering similar results in kilometres/dollar, crew size/dollar and so on? Answer that, and you'll know why NASA is failing to deliver on all fronts.
A world of fear (Score:5, Insightful)
The top priorities for the Center admin. when I lefts were: (1) Safety, (2) Security, & (3) ISO 9000 compliance. He never even mentioned space flight! It's all about covering your
This war on Iraq is the same thing as well. We have to control everyone in the world, because we're so scared something bad is going to happen.
Everyone goes to chain resturants, because they're afraid to try any place they haven't been before. "Better to play it safe."
As they just look at you like your crazy if you question putting safety or security as number one. "What sane person would disagree with safety?"
I no longer fear a world quite like 1984 where governments control you're every move. I fear a world where everyone is afraid to do anything because they'll get in trouble, or something bad might happen, or you might lose you're insurance. It's really happening as we speak.
The media talks about terrorists or criminals so much that people think they're everywhere. The truth is it just gets the media higher ratings, but that there's very few of either. (ah, now did you just react negatively to that last sentance? That's because you've also been conditioned in to thinking it's not politically correct to ever underestimate the level of threat we are constantly under.)
"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." I never understood that when I was younger. Now, I found it to be more literally true than ever.
Remember, "Fear is the mind killer." and American's addicted to it.
With regard to NASA, they put all the managers in charge of the whole org. and it just hopeless now. None of the higher management care about getting anything done, except "avoiding risk". I would argue HUD gets more done than NASA.
I know there's a lot of support for the space program on Slashdot and I would love to see it too. But believe me, NASA not ever going to get anywhere w/o major change.
Rick.
ISO9000 isn't a bad thing (Score:2)
When NASA wants to make a mission statement, it should start with space and aviation research and end by stating that it should be achieved via ISO9000. Risks are part of research, you don't want to blow anyone up or to lose the mission but if risks are quantified and accepted, no individual should be blamed.
I have spoken with people who worked in the Soviet Union. One of the biggest problems was whenever something went wrong, there would be a formal inquiry. Someone would whisper "Sabotage" and the KGB would be involved. Generally the blame would be transferred to the politically weakest person who could be blamed, and the person fired.
Sound a little like NASA now? That is, except the bit about the KGB (I'm sure that the FBI would be pleased to help).
ISO 9000 - Great theory, not so great in practice (Score:2)
That is true *in theory*. Sometimes it even works that way. (rarely in my experience) But more often it is done because it is required by the company you are supplying. Big assembly companies (Ford, GM, Boeing, NASA, etc) need to have ways of managing the complexity of large supplier bases as well as their own processes. So ISO-9000 helps them create transparency in how they are doing things. (in theory) But automotive suppliers don't get QS-9000 certification because they think it is a great idea for them. They do it because Ford and GM require them to. In theory these registration processes help to manage the work flow and can improve the product. More often they are treated as just a few more hoops to jump through.
For those who might not know ISO9000 and it's bretheren (QS-9000, AS-9100, ISO-14000) are really just documentation processes. The overly simplified explanation of that is you establish a process, document it, and then follow it while documenting the fact that you are following it. They are called quality processes but they really are about consistency of processes. Quality in manufacturing terms is about reducing variability. You can have the worst process in the world but if you document it and follow it, you can be ISO-9000 registered. Granted that's a slight exageration, but only slight.
If someone brags that they are making a quality product because they are ISO-9000 registered they are claiming that their products are great because they document how they make them.
Re:ISO 9000 - Great theory, not so great in practi (Score:2)
Re:A world of fear (Score:2)
It already did (9/11). That is why we are engaged in the War for Islamic Democracy.
Re:Risk (Score:2)
This is the normal mode of death of useless government organizations. It's hard to kill the programs outright, but they can be slowly eroded. NASA is still big enough to avoid outright closure, but that day is a lot closer than it used to be.
NASA responds to its environment (Score:5, Interesting)
Then, it has to award contracts into other different states to get support from the politicians in THOSE states. Ever wondered why Shuttle boosters are constructed in segments so that they can be conveniently shipped halfway across the country? Maybe you thought it had something to do with reliability or safety? (For the humor-impaired, that last sentence was sarcastic.)
It's a tribute to the few idealists left at NASA that it ever got anything done. Its main goal today is to preserve its own funding. It's become a nearly-complete waste of money.
Re:NASA responds to its environment (Score:2)
Sounds like the same problem Amtrak has. It has to ensure it runs money losing routes through every state to get support from that state's congressmen. When they try to cut non-profitable routes, those congressmen scream. When they lose money because of it, those congressmen scream.
(Please don't start an Amtrak thread. This post is to relate that NASA isn't the only publically-funded agency that suffers from the selfish stupidity described in the parent post. I'm sure the military does as well, with bases and operations all over...)
"The case for mars" (Score:3, Interesting)
ISBN: 0-684-83550-9
Don't be harsh on NASA (Score:2, Insightful)
Is this just really, really, bad luck, or is NASA little more than a multi-billion-dollar jobs program for important US aerospace contractors?
Neither! NASA is a multi-billion-dollar program that tackles the most difficult engineering problems known to man. When you're specifically in the business of doing things that have never been done before in the history of mankind, and every project is its own new engineering nightmare of complexity, and the human safety matter is thrown in making the entire thing have to be perfect without exception, then yes, it's going to cost tons of money, and yes, it's going to be absolutely impossible to correctly estimate the work involved. That's why I don't understand everyone who bitches about NASA cost overruns or timetable slips -- that's just an unavoidable part of exploring the unknown.
A lot of us here are software developers. Imagine for a moment that you had to GUARANTEE with KNOWN, STATISTICALLY VERIFIABLE CERTAINTY that your application was defect-free. I would love to see you achieve that level of quality right on an original estimated budget or timeline even 50% of the time. It's simply not realistic. It's very possible (and especially important in space applications) to do the "we won't release it until it's right" thing, but that by its very nature means accepting that you're gonna have to deal with unforeseeable problems and not stick to estimates.
If anything, NASA should simply learn to stop making promises in the first place. If you know a project can't possibly be delivered to perfection on a timetable or on a budget, then don't promise to. Say, "We can do this, but the nature of the problem makes it impossible to estimate budget or deadline. Still want to do it?" Then if the project gets approved, no one has any right to bitch about it being "too late" or "too expensive". Ahh, there's nothing like honesty :-)
Of course it's about jobs for US companies! (Score:2)
In these days of allegedly free trade, governments can't just throw money at their high tech companies to help them to develop new technology, so they fund them via groups such as NASA instead.
In Europe, it's even more explicit. The European Space Agency was created with the stated aim of producing technology that is not compatible with NASA. European nations contribute varying amounts, and the contracts are dished out according to how much money each country puts in. Thus the UK, which has a lot of aerospace know-how, never gets any big contracts, while the ESA has to dream up reasons to give contracts to countries that contribute loadsa money but don't have any useful skills. I worked on a UK pilot study for the ESA, and we knew that the main contract had to go to Austria or Norway, regardless of which country had the right companies. One of the contracts awarded to one Scandinavian country around that time was for research into computer-generated art...
Personally, I can live with this state of affairs. Governments are always going to find ways to subsidise their key industries, and I'd rather they did it by ordering Space Shuttles than by ordering ICBMs.
Re:Of course it's about jobs for US companies! (Score:2)
It is certainly not ESA's stated aim to be develop technology incompatible with NASA, that is just wrong.
I'm basing this on my recollection of the charter they had pinned up on the wall, the first point I think (but their website is down at the moment). Which doesn't mean they don't co-operate with NASA, but it does mean a tendency to reinvent the wheel for the sake of paying European companies to do so. That was exactly the case on the project I worked on: NASA had an off the shelf solution, so we had to think of another solution...
Modern Management (Score:2)
In both organizations the actual working staff has been reduced sharply over the years. Large projects are farmed out to contractors at great expense, and the in house folks are just supposed to keep it running until the next big project.
What management doesn't realize is that if the spent the same amount of money on staff and materials that they spent farming it out, they would have a sustainable environment instead of an underfunded mess.
The perspective from space (Score:2, Insightful)
Now, time for a reality check. To the best of my knowledge, simple low-earth orbit satillite launches by purely commercial entities have only just started. This puts them into line with what, the early 60s? So far, even with it's problems, NASA is the only agency that can do what it does: put people into space on a regular basis and bring them home.
China might get somebody into space this year. They have high goals, but space isn't cheap and it isn't easy. Once they they get someone into space, this will only leave them more than 30 years behind. I suspect they will cover the gap quickly, but not easily. Don't forget that the Chinese program is completely run by the military. I think China is doing this for respect as they already launch satillites and have ICBMs.
Russia... do they really have a space agency anymore? It seems like the last thing I heard was that they couldn't afford to finish up the current projects. Maybe the Chinese should hire the engineers? Personally, I think this is sad because their space agency has such a proud history despite Soviet management. Doesn't it seem like the Euros should be helping these guys out and making a mutually helpful deal?
Japan... they made some interesting announcements lately about a reusable low-earth orbit space plane. Easy to announce... I'll be happy for them when it flies. I think Japan has only recently realized how helpful pushing space tech could be for them.
Europe... didn't Europes new rocket just go to hell a couple of times in a row? Like everyone else, they have been making big plans and announcements. Europe has a lot of potential, but no military spending to back it up. It will be interesting to see where they go in the long run. Nothing would please me more than having French have to speak English all the way to Mars...
So then, NASA doesn't look so bad considering the lack of competition. This is bad as nothing sparks Americans to do great things like being challenged. For God's sake, somebody give us some competition outside of doing things cheap! I want a moon base!
Money_shot
Re:The perspective from space (Score:2)
Re:The perspective from space (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't think it's really fair to say that China will be "30 years behind" if they get a human into space this year. It could reasonably be argued that the US is now "behind" where it was 30 years ago, since at that time we had a launch vehicle (the Saturn V) that could lift considerably more than the Shuttle, and we were regularly putting people on the Moon
I strongly suspect that Russia will essentially sell their space program to the EU at some point, yes. I also suspect that, with the way the US is pissing off the major European powers, they'll do the same with their military, but that's another story
Japan has the technology and the ambition but not, by themselves, the money. They'll have to partner with someone, either NASA or the expected EU/Russian team. (The chances of them partnering with China are roughly the chances of Bill Gates suffering a sudden attack of conscience and giving all his money to Richard Stallman.)
Europe: see above. Also, the recent Ariane failures do not detract from what has generally been a very successful program. (I believe, though I'm not sure, that Arianespace now has a greater total lifting capacity than NASA, though NASA can still put bigger individual loads up.) European money + both European and Russian tech (especially if Russia ever is actually invited into the EU, which could happen in the not-too-distant future) will be a powerful combination.
The US -- well, let's hope the competition gets us off our asses, because apparently nothing else will.
Stop Building Trucks To Nowhere and Explore Space (Score:2)
NASA needs to be given a real mission -- a destination. Until then, they will keep on building trucks with no place to go.
Re:Stop Building Trucks To Nowhere and Explore Spa (Score:2)
Re:Stop Building Trucks To Nowhere and Explore Spa (Score:3, Informative)
1. Permanent human presence on the Moon
2. Mission to near-Earth asteroid with an objective of eventual commercial exploitation
3. Develop space-only propulsion systems with the objective of "going faster", and capaable of sustained 1-G acceleration.
The third point is important. Earth-launched orbital, lunar, and planetary missions in effect have self-imposed speed limits of about 18,000 mph and 25,000 mph, respectively. That's as fast as they need to go to get the job done. Propulsion systems designed only to work in space ought not to be as constrained. If you're going to Mars, travelling at 100,000 mph is better than 25,000 moh.
Re:Stop Building Trucks To Nowhere and Explore Spa (Score:2)
Re:Stop Building Trucks To Nowhere and Explore Spa (Score:2)
Bring back the X-33! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Bring back the X-33! (Score:2)
The shuttle will die, yes, and be replaced by expendable launchers.
Why there is nothing new (Score:3, Insightful)
Mechanical engineering. A rocket is just about the toughest mechanical engineering job there is. Example: there is a problem in rocket design known as 'pogo' instability; the thrust is not instantly delivered to all parts of the rocket at the same time - the distributed masses of the rocket interact with the spring constants of the structural material to cause resonance problems along the length of the craft which cause it to behave like a pogo stick. A rocket's mass is continually changing - so all of those resonance problems change as the fuel is burned off - and it can't have pogo instabilities during any of that process. That is just ONE of the mechanical engineering problems.
Electrical engineering. The electrical engineering problems in a rocket are also profound: a rocket requires all sorts of electrical control systems. You not only need to have a Ph.D. in power engineering you need one in control theory, and one in analog design, and one in digital design.
Chemical engineering - Rockets use exotic chemicals and you had better understand them completely.
Materials science: what materials are appropriate for use where? Better understand that at a deep level.
Combustion engineering. Rockets represent the epitome of combustion engineering; the burning has to be smooth without instabilities (that all ties back to the mechanical engineering problem).
Computer science. Uh, computers are pretty important in rocketry - everyone on this site understands what happens with computers if you don't know what you are doing.
Management skills - a new rocket is a huge management problem.
Political and social skills - If you can't shmooze the politicians at a world class level you won't have any funding to accomplish your goals.
It is more than politics - you need sales skills - you have to be able to sell yourself and your project to everyone involved.
Mass marketing: the country has to buy into what you are doing.
Hydraulics - how do you pump the fuels - do you understand standing wave problems in the hydraulic systems? What happens when all of that is subjected to varying accelerations? Better understand that deeply.
Communications - and radio engineering - don't understand antenna theory - whoops sorry no communications with the space craft. Better understand microphones and cameras, and the problems with audio and visual production and distribution.
Cryogenics - Low temperature physics comes into play in a rocket.
Aeronautics - part of the flight is at very high speed in the atmosphere.
Biomedical issues. How do you keep the crew alive and functioning?
Psychology - how do you keep the crew from going crazy?
Going to Mars? Better understand nuclear physics and plasma physics completely. How to you shield a nuclear reactor from the crew - or better sill - how do you build a fusion rocket? How do you build a magnetic nozzle - what are the plasma containment problems. What is Bremmstralung - why is it important?
The list goes on and on. The architect doesn't do all of the work in each field - but he has to understand all of it deeply because he has to be able to pick the people in each specialty who will solve the detailed problems. One Bozo in the bunch and the project is doomed. Most people outside of computers would pick Bill Gates and Microsoft for the software end of things -not deeply understanding the real issues involved leads to poor choices being made. The architect has to be able to give guidance when the people in each field get stuck. He has to fit all of this together; if he doesn't understand it all who will? If somebody somewhere doesn't understand the whole problem - the project is doomed.
When the Soviet architect - Korolev - was killed in a launch accident that was the end of the Russian moon project - nobody could complete his unfinished designs. We had Wherner Von Braun as our architect. We also had Charlie Feltz - who worked on the P-51 Mustang - designed the X-15 and spear headed the shuttle. Sadly Mr. Feltz passed away earlier this month. I don't know the name of the chinese architect. Do any of you?
Such people are very rare If we decide to go to Mars a person like that is necessary.
The 1973 layoff and its discontents (Score:2)
There aren't many experienced aircraft designers any more. When Apollo was being ramped up, there were whole armies of engineers who'd worked on aircraft from WWII through the early 1960s, the great boom period of aviation when jets came in. There was a big pool of people who'd built machines that fly.
They're gone. Ben Rich, head of the Lockheed Skunk Works wrote in the 1990s that he'd worked on 23 aircraft in his career, and that today's engineer will be lucky to work on one. The Skunk Works itself is gone, lost in the Lockheed-Martin merger. The hangars in Burbank are empty.
Missile design is dead, too. Nobody in the US has designed an ICBM in a while. When the US developed missiles in the 1950s, they had a huge number of failures in a small number of years before the things worked. That was expensive, but it got the job done. The people who worked through those failures are all gone now.
So who's going to design a new spacecraft that will work the first time? Nobody working today has done it before.
Central Florida Government Contractors (Score:3, Interesting)
"'NASA's unbroken string of cancelled vehicle programs' going back 20 years makes it a good bet that OSP will also fail. Is this just really, really, bad luck, or is NASA little more than a multi-billion-dollar jobs program for important U.S. aerospace contractors?""
You just figured it out.
I live in Orlando Florida, on the east side of town where there are a lot of government contractors, including Lockheed Martin's big IT and research center just down the street. Orlando is all about two words, "cheap labor." The people who live here are cheap labor for Disney, the other theme parks, gas stations, food related, lodging related, and for the few companies that have built offices here that has resulted in some call centers and paper filing mills. A few other businesses lay in the area, but it is nothing like any other major metro area. The rest of the jobs just don't exist here in Orlando. The cost of living is high like Denver Colorado, but the standard of living is much lower for most people.
Orlando has only one freeway, and it is terrible. The rest are toll roads -- toll roads like I have seen in no other city anywhere in the U.S. There are no bridges here to go over or anything, they just feel like taxing the local public since Florida does not have a state income tax (stupid). I have been told many times that the toll road just south of my home is the most expensive toll road in the U.S. per mile. If you have ever been in traffic in Seattle, think of that, on the city streets, but worse -- and there is no bad weather here.
The one exception to all of this is the government contractors. They drive around here in their luxury cars and SUVs. There are a lot of nice houses (mansions) just north and just south of the government contractor center. I have had the opportunity to talk to many of them since I moved here about nine months ago, including an MCSE neighbor of mine who works as support staff for Lockheed Martin. I have been told by nearly all of them that they are very happy with their jobs, they have great job security, and that they mostly sit around and do nothing, working on meaningless projects and get paid for it by the U.S. Government.
To quote one of them who worked for L3, "...To work in government contracting you just have to get a contract, then sit back and do nothing. Don't complain, just be late with your project and you will get even more money in hopes that it might ever get done."
A few of the government contractors that I have spoken with have expressed that the new wave of security related contracts will benefit them a lot and that their shops are trying desperately to land some of those. One of these shops was a flight simulation shop that was trying to change it's image over night to be a "security software" shop, so that they could land a contract. This came from one of their software developers.
There may be some shops that are doing something good that gets used by the government or eventually by the U.S. population, but I have generally attributed the technology workers around here as being old fat do-nothing's with no ambition or drive to have pride in their work. It is nothing like the western U.S. technology social environment where there are mostly young and middle aged workers who want to be proud of their work and have lots of ambition. I don't see this from the government contractors around here at all. They are all middle aged or older and almost always bitter.
Re:the fortune for this page is appropriate... (Score:2)
Re:For those who haven't RTFA (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:well (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Funding is NASA's primary problem (Score:2)
Funding is a secondary problem (Score:2)
For those of you too lazy to read the Feynman appendix, the key message Feynman added to the Challenger report was that the Challenger accident wasn't so much a result of the wrong kind of o-ring rubber as much as a result of NASA management's inability to hear the truth from its engineers and suppliers.
When an organization fosters dishonesty, as Feynman documented, you can pour trillions in and not get results.
Re:Funding is NASA's primary problem (Score:2)
What X Program Was That? (Score:2)
What was that? The X-15 was a long way and about 13,000 mph from orbit. I believe someone toyed with the idea of strapping on a bit of throw-away boost and giving it enough oomph for a single high-altitude traverse of the globe, but that's not equivalent to reaching orbit.