First Private Manned Orbital Flight Announced 165
Miroslav Ambrus-Kis wrote in to tell us that Inter-orbital Systems has announced that Nebojsa Stanojevic and Miroslav Ambrus-Kis will be the astronauts aboard the first completely private orbital flight. This is part of their bid for the Google Lunar X-Prize.
Not Astronauts! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No, according to the TFA, they are "Tweeting Experienced Explorers".
Whatever the Hell that happens to be.
Re:Not Astronauts! (Score:5, Informative)
Nebojsa is a perfect name for someone attempting a feat like this - it translates as "Fear not".
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How About calling them Spacenauts. Give a different name for private space pioneers.
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Bah. Luxemburgish Weltraumonauten are the best! (As soon as Luxemburg will have a space program... in 2355...)
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One's a Serb, one's a Croat. May I suggest "ethniklashinauts [theonion.com]?"
Quite seriously, good for them.
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Re:Not Astronauts! (Score:5, Insightful)
did you even READ the article?
The company is based in the mojave desert in CALIFORNIA! Just because the people they choose to employ are former members of the russian cosmonaut program does not mean this is a product of a "russian free market"
As a matter of fact, AFAIK so far all the MAJOR private space ventures are HQ'd in the US precisely because of the freedom afforded by the market.
Take your politics elsewhere or save them for political topics. This is about commercial spaceflight.
To be quite honest the post reeks of astroturf probably trying to capitalize on the recent annoucements from SpaceX and Orbital Sciences regarding COTS contracts for ISS resupply.
Also with SpaceX coming off the successful launch of RazakSat in July, and the upcoming Falcon9 test sometime this month(sept 2009 according the to website), the whole submission reeks of "me too" and from what I can tell, InterOrbital has not launched any mission hardware as of yet.
So the more I think about it, I think they are getting a little ahead of themselves here. I suspect that SpaceX will launch Dragon before 2011.
In short, I'll get excited about InterOrbital once they have some actual launches. I don't see how they can expect to get from "we're building the rocket" in 2009 to "we're sending people into space" two years later. Seems unrealistic considering the product life-cycle.
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Bollocks. This is a natural consequence of anything to do with rockets or rocket guidance being treated as weaponry, and therefore subject to export limitation by US Government restrictions. Further, most of these technologies are also restricted to work only by "US persons"; something hard to find, for example, in Australia and other "safe" places to play with
I would really like to see it happen (Score:2)
I've got a better solution: (Score:2, Funny)
And the solution is called Energia [energia.ru].
Go Soyuz !
Yours In Akademgorodok,
K. Trout
Color me skeptical (Score:2)
While there's certainly room for improvement over NASA's methods, a two order-of-magnitude improvement from a startup seems absurdly optimistic, no matter what modular rockets and other mission design innovations they use.
However, I wish them the best of luck, and even if costs creep up to $8 million a person, then it will still be a worthwhile endeavor.
Space-age companies (Score:4, Funny)
Why this matters... (Score:3, Interesting)
Okay, so personally I think this particular company doesn't seem to have much chance of succeeding. They don't seem to have the funding or the infrastructure. But what's important is this: for the first time ever we're seeing private companies trying to develop launch capabilities. And not just one or two, and not just so they can resell to governments (like SpaceX), but a bunch of them, with many different business models. You throw enough paint at the wall, some of it might stick. And, eventually, I think it is possible to dramatically reduce launch costs this way--which makes things like solar power satellites and space tourism practical.
In 50 years, the space industry could be transformed by this sort of thing into an actual, profit-making enterprise. And it's only once there is profit to be had that the ideal of true multi-planetary life can become a reality.
SpaceX is already profitable (Score:5, Informative)
OrbitalSciences also looks as though its been profitable for a while (NYSE:ORB)
The space industry is going to move faster than I think anyone expects. We have China and India getting into the mix pretty heavily now as well. I think we could see space become bigger than it was in the 60's both politically and commercially.
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Huh? Where have you been for the past thirty plus years? There's been a steady stream of hopeful startups since the mid 70's at least. More than a few have gotten hardware off the ground, and one (Orbital Sciences) has flown multiple commerc
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And that's if you use the all too common screwball definition that doesn't consider companies like Boeing and Lockheed as private.
To be fair, Boeing and Lockheed developed much of their tech on government contracts, and these remain a major source of their revenue. I get the general impression (and will happily admit to being wrong, if I am) that most of the space tech Lockheed, especially, sells is basically recycled military equipment.
Re: (Score:2)
"that most of the space tech Lockheed, especially, sells is basically recycled military equipment."
Not sure what you mean by that. Right now Boeing "owns" the Delta, Atlas, and SeaLaunch systems.
The current Atlas has no relation to the old Atlas that was based on the Atlas ICBM from the 50s.
The current Delta has no relation the old Delta that was based off the Thor IRBM from the 50s.
SeaLaunch and Atlas use a lot of Russian tech and the Delta uses the first new liquid fuel rocket engine, the RS-70 developed
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So what? They are still private companies who will happily sell launch services to anyone willing to plunk down the cash. Commercial launches have outnumbered government launches for decades.
Go is to chess (Score:2)
as philosophy is to double-entry accounting.
I got a laugh out of this, and couldn't agree more. Unfortunately I haven't played weiqi in about 15 years.
Falcon
The first PLANNED private orbital spaceflight (Score:5, Interesting)
They haven't launched yet (and are at least two years from launch according to their plans), so there's no way to guarantee their claims.
If you look at their news page there is a 2004 announcement that they'd be launching a satellite in 2006, but there is no news of an actual launch.
In fact I don't even see news of a flight test of any sort, let alone a full orbital launch.
TBH the website also looks like a pretty fly-by-night operation. You would think that a company with enough money to launch a manned space mission would be able to hire a web designer.
Subject: LOOKING FOR PARTNERSHIP IN BUSINESS (Score:4, Funny)
Engr David Koni.
(BOARD OF CONTRACT AWARD COMITTEE.)
Cotonou Republic Du Benin.
Sir/Madam,
It is my great pleasure to write to you and present my business proposal for your consideration and possible acceptance which you will find mutually beneficial to both parties.
Orbital Fares and the "Free Ticket to Orbit" Option: When regular orbital tourism flights begin, the cost per spaceline ticket is expected to be $5 million, but you now have the option of spending a week in orbit for free. Buy a spaceline ticket now at the special promotional fare of $250,000 (regularly priced at $5 million), and get a full rebate two years after your orbital mission. That's the equivalent of a $5 million Ticket To Orbit For Free! We are selling ten spaceline tickets at this price.
There are currently only eight spaceline tickets left! Tim Reed of Gladstone, Missouri purchased the first "promotional fare" spaceline ticket.
"Promotional Fare" spaceline tickets must be purchased directly from Interorbital Systems or Astro Expeditions, LLC. IOS is the only commercial space company offering advance-purchase tickets for orbital tourism flights. If you take advantage of our special promotional offer, you can spend seven days on an orbital expedition at an up-front cost of less than $25 per minute. Each "Promotional Fare" spaceline ticket holder will fly an orbital mission with three "full-fare" astronaut-tourists and one astronaut-pilot.
As soon as all ten of the "Promotional Fare" tickets with rebate have been sold, IOS will sell orbital spaceline tickets at the regular price of $5 million.
Re:Subject: LOOKING FOR PARTNERSHIP IN BUSINESS (Score:4, Funny)
Engr David Koni -
Your offer intrigues me. I am very excited to have been selected to receive this offer. It is a great honor as I have always wanted to be an astronaut. It is even better that you are offering me such a great opportunity for free.
However, I am somewhat dubious though, since you state that there are ten spaceline tickets, but only eight left after a Mr. Tim Reed of Gladstone Missouri purchased one such ticket. Perhaps this was just an ambiguity and that you meant Mr. Reed is but one of two sold tickets. So I contacted Mr. Reed in Gladstone, Missouri. He was very surprised to find out that he has a ticket to orbit. He asked me what planet I was orbiting? He must be joking, of course. As such a prominent individual as Mr. Reed must have known that we would be orbiting Earth. Right? Do you offer tickets to orbit other planets?
Also, I am a bit curious about your companies. I could only find a website called "slashdot" ("news for nerds. stuff that matters") that mentioned them. They seemed to scoff at your idea. And, in any case, I assume that this must be a new company because orbital expeditions seem like a new opportunity. So then it would seem reasonable to not yet have a website. So a print out of your website design would make me feel better about your company.
Last question, is it possible to buy a ticket for my cat? I would surely miss my cat if I spent a week in space. Who would feed her? I assume that since it costs merely $25/minute upfront for me that my cat could fly for like $10/minute upfront. Is there are rebate available for her?
With the greatest of respect,
Mr. Reeb MMM
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
That's hilarious. At first I just thought it was a mildly amusing bit of unsubtle satire. But that was before I glanced around the IOS web site and found that this is actually directly quoted from there. That makes it hilarious.
Re: mildly unsubtle (Score:2)
It made me cry. A little.
Is the company described in TFA a bad hoax, a good troll, a Croatian 419?
Tune in next week for more "Pigs in Spaaaaace" ; ).
Re:The first PLANNED private orbital spaceflight (Score:4, Funny)
Well, night launches are more spectacular to watch.
What am I missing? (Score:4, Interesting)
The Google Lunar X Prize has nothing to do with manned space travel. It's about launching a robot that can deliver HD images from the moon.
Maybe their plan is to go up there and launch the robot from orbit - just seems like an awful waste of energy.
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RTFA. They plan to use this rocket in the Google Lunar X Prize.
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RTFA yourself: it says nothing of the sort.
And even if it did, it would still be ridiculous. The load characteristics of manned versus unmanned spaceflight are totally different, and more importantly the safety systems required are at a much higher level.
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That's nothing, I am *planning* to go to Saturn (Score:4, Insightful)
Pah, they have no ambition. I am *planning* to go to Saturn for 2011. Ok, I have no idea how but I could probably sketch up some Photoshop pictures of my rocket, I've got some technical drawings I made when I was 7 years old.
Seriously, can somebody point me at proof these companies can actually launch human-rated spacecraft? It seems that some fairly large nations are still struggling to make steps towards this. Can anybody explain why it will be any easier for a company like this than India, South Korea, Japan, ESA, etc? at least these companies/organisations have a track record of launching unmanned payloads of 10 -20 tonnes so I can believe they are on the way.
Feels like vapourware to me. What happened to that dozen or so original X-Prizes companies that promised they'd be in space and carrying astronauts by now? I seem to remember it was launched in 1996 and those companies were all promising launches in about 2003?
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Two years is a very short period of time, and do they have any orbital launches to their credit yet at all? I see sounding rockets, that's a far cry from being able to achieve orbit. What is the timeline of an unmanned orbital test?
Bah. THAT's nothing! (Score:2)
I'm planning to go to Alpha Centauri! I've already got a realistic rocket concept [wikipedia.org], and Sid Meier did the simulation software to train our Assblastonauts (Yeah! They're ten times fuckin' cooler than your ones! That's why they have cooler names too!)
Wohoo! We'll launch at time X-1. Where X is the time when you will launch yours! So we can nuke it right back to earth!
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What the heck is "human-rated spacecraft" other than a bureaucratic term for "rigorously tested until all innovation has been expelled". The statistical improvements in avoiding failure have been small, very small in fact, over a simple engineering consensus.
Human-rated (they used to call it "man-rated") has always meant engineering consensus -- and there's nothing "simple" about it. Believe it or not, the people who build rockets to carry other people into space tend to be very, very picky about these thi
absolutely, definitely a scam (Score:2)
They are selling lunar samples from their missions to moon starting 2012 ...
http://www.interorbital.com/Lunar%20Sample%20Return_1.htm [interorbital.com]
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hate to reply to my posts, but this is funny:
"What is the RIPPER?
RIPPER is an acronym for the Robotic Interplanetary Prospector Excavator and Retriever. It is an automated two-stage spacecraft and Earth Reentry Capsule (ERC) designed to land on and return samples from the smaller extraterrestrial bodies in the Solar System. This includes the moons, the asteroids, and the comets."
"Ripper"... how appropriate ...
Don't think so... (Score:5, Informative)
This company managed to launch one high powered amateur rocket in the 1990s. That's it. Nothing since then. Complete vapor. The only serious orbital launch company is currently SpaceX. The only serious near term suborbital launch companies are XCOR and Virgin Galactic, with the various VTVL / lunar X-Prize people (Masten, Armadillo, etc.) filling in a different but useful niche down the road.
SpaceX finally succeeded in orbital launch after many millions of dollars of hardware and testing. XCOR has 66 manned rocket flights to its credit (the largest share of manned rocket flights worldwide since 2000.) Virgin/Scaled has SS1, Armadillo and Masten have a large number of VTVL flights under their belt and years of hardware development.
Interorbital has paper and mockups.
Re:Don't think so... (Score:5, Informative)
The companies that have been launching commercial payloads into orbit for years (Orbital Sciences) or decades (Boeing, Lockheed), might beg to differ.
Re:Don't think so... (Score:4, Interesting)
I thought someone might say this :)
I needed to have prefaced that with "NEW private space companies" :)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Missed this the first time around...
But those are rocket powered airplane flights - not at all the type of flight usually considered when discussing space access.
Comparing these, and XCOR's work, to actual booster hardware is roughly a
It'll never get off the ground, Orville..... (Score:5, Interesting)
I've built things in my garage, and flown them multiple times and with more power, than the only thing these people have ever had leave the pad vertically. Sure, they've been static testing all sorts of motors. More's the pity -- I don't have to.
These upstart startups are trying to cash in on investment money (though I do credit IOS with selling tubesat and ad space) and behaving at the functional amateur level as though they're professionals. The startups that don't rely on investors (Armadillo, Scaled until the second half of SS1, etc.) accomplish things the others don't. Still, they're spending a lot on R&D that they don't need to.
My money, and anyone's who wants in, says an amateur-built vehicle made from commonly available materials and off the shelf parts could put itself into orbit for under 6 figures. That includes all incidentals and consultancies. The motors, a major development issue with these companies, are available from Loki Research. Their 96" x 152mm 80,000 ns P motors were used in last April's flight of the 1/10 scale Saturn V. The reason he didn't use three was that (> 200,000 ns) would put it in the FAA/OST's ball park and therefore not amateur. Neither would this be, but the point here is to hit the goal, not just go flying with my NAR and Tripoli friends. I ran the numbers on a 3P booster with 1P sustainer using their older 60" x 152 mm 50,000 ns motors. Ground launched it'd break the 62.5 mile 'space' altitude, and balloon launched it'd break 100 miles. The new motors, obviously proven, pack 60% more power. A ground launched 2.5 stage (the 3 x 1 plus 'dart' payload/nose) should do the job.
Somebody's going to do it, before or after one of these startups. It'll be after if nobody tries before. And if it takes money, rather than investors in a commercial endeavor, sell commercials. Rocketman's GoFast, the first amateur rocket to break the space altitude was named for an 'investor' simply for the advertising. And while Dunkin' Donuts isn't likely to jump in (hey, they didn't for Astronaut Farmer, so why now?) there's some who might.
And once a vehicle gets up there, the next step is human flight. A TV commercial costs between $500,000 and $1M to produce and run the first time. For the bottom end of that, using nothing exotic, and if not off the shelf then built from off the shelf components, a truly amateur enterprise could put a person over 62.5 miles. What are the odds that a company used to paying out that kind of money would be willing to have their name on this project, particularly if at apogee that company's catch phrase got broadcast by the amateur astronaut, for instance: "Can you hear me now? Good."
The major difference is on return on investment. The commercial startups need to return their investors' money, plus. An amatuer project only needs to do what it sets out to do. An ad based amateur project only needs to do what an amateur project does, plus acknowledge the source of the funds, and not return anything to anyone beyond noteriety for the accomplishment. If it weren't for the scale of the designs and the lack of available components, Robert Truax would have done this years ago.
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You are ignoring the problem of control and guidance. A good enough guidance system could be made but then you have the issue of thrust vectoring. Fins will only get you so far so then you a thrust vectoring system. Ever notice how Tripoli seems to stay away from guidance systems? They are actually not allowed and I can think of a lot of good reasons why.
You next issue would be cutting off the thrust. I would probably use a NOX hi-breed upper stage so you could control the cut off. For the real world you do
Production milestones towards orbit (Score:2)
You can track their progress by checking out their Orbital Launch Simulator. [armorgames.com]
did I miss something (Score:2)
USA and private manned space flight (Score:2)
Re:and NASA (Score:5, Funny)
Two Interorbital Systems test pilots---Nebojsa Stanojevic, a 'Tweeting' Serbian, and Miroslav Ambrus-Kis, [vid], a 'Tweeting' Croatian
I think we all just died a little on the inside.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:and NASA (Score:5, Insightful)
Understand that once you start the countdown on a rocket most of the money has already been spent (90% to 99% in my estimation) If that blows up without delivering the results that get you payed (satellite in orbit etc...) your business is dead and your creditors crying. That's life.
What is a real problem is that NASA got to be so large and wealthy a bureaucracy that they were able to under employ most of the best rocket scientists for over a generation. Then put their ideas throgh such rigorous scrutiny that nothing new got built. Until finally rickety old space trucks (Challenger etc...) blew up and took people with them.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Then put their ideas throgh such rigorous scrutiny that nothing new got built. Until finally rickety old space trucks (Challenger etc...) blew up and took people with them.
I am trying to fathom how you can lambaste Nasa for being too rigourous with their safety scrutiny in one sentence, then complain that they blew up (insinuating that they weren't rigourous enough) in the following one.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Hating NASA is like a religion these days. Anything NASA does is bad. No matter. Kinda makes you look a fool, though, when you start letting it warp your logic.
Re:and NASA (Score:5, Insightful)
He is implying that, by vetoing all new ideas by way of ridiculously over-optimistic design standards, they've been stuck using ancient technology for far longer than is safe, economic, or reasonable.
The irony of the situation shouldn't be lost on anyone.
Re:and NASA (Score:5, Informative)
I was going to respond but you cleared it up better than I ever could.
Space travel is inherently dangerous. (Do I have to spell out why on Slashdot?). By trying to force enginears to eliminate rather thasn mitigate the danger NASA has taken far longer than it should to design an improved replacement for the shuttle.
By Improved I mean:
0. lower Construction cost
1. lower cost for throwaway components (boosters etc...)
2. Lower fuel consumption per payload/passenger pound.
3. Lower cost of serviceing between missions.
4. Shorter prep time for flight.
5. Larger cargo bay.
6. Less likely to blow up under stress. etc...
It's not that nobody came up with anything better than the existing shuttle in those years. It's just that none of the improved models met NASA's upgraded standards. Put another way, You are stuck driving an old Corolla because the best replacement anyone has proposed is Camry and your bosses want nothing less than an Armored Roles Royce Limousine that runs on solar and has a self driving AI.
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Similar to the reason that we don't see many new power plants these days. Old plants were grandfathered in after safety and environmental laws were enacted. New plants are held to much higher standards.
So we just have to get by on the old and busted plants which spew tons of junk in the air.
power plants (Score:2)
Similar to the reason that we don't see many new power plants these days. Old plants were grandfathered in after safety and environmental laws were enacted. New plants are held to much higher standards.
So we just have to get by on the old and busted plants which spew tons of junk in the air.
So new plants should be allowed to meet the lower standards? What's the difference between old plants and new ones doing it?
Falcon
Re: (Score:2)
Wow!
2.5 MW.
That's really going to replace those 1,000 MW single nuclear reactors.
Do you think we can fit 1350 of those windcharger things into Lower Alloways Creek Township?
wind tubines (Score:2)
Wow!
2.5 MW.
That's really going to replace those 1,000 MW single nuclear reactors.
Wow, what'ja know, there are wind turbines bigger than 2.5 MW. Erect 10 5 MW [renewableenergyworld.com] or 5 10 MW [nextbigfuture.com] wind turbines a month for 10 months and you add 1,000 MW of capacity. If work is done all year you've added 1.2 GW. How long will that nuclear power plant of yours take to build? And don't say a year. Construction on Finland's Olkiluoto [wikipedia.org] 3 reactor started in 2005. It was originally scheduled to start operations this year, 2009, but is 3
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A 2.5MW plant running at capacity a month produces 1.8 GWh of energy (roughly $180,000 worth where I live).
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Ah, yes, of course, I had some basic unit confusion there. Thank you for the correction.
By Improved I mean: (Score:2)
1. lower cost for throwaway components (boosters etc...)
Shouldn't that be reducing if not eliminating throwaway components?
Falcon
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Shouldn't that be reducing if not eliminating throwaway components?
That depends solely on cost. It is a LOT cheaper to build a disposable unit to spec than it is to build a reusable one.
That's why I said "reducing if not eliminating". If resources are wasted they become more expensive. And throwing away many resources wastes them. Wait until oil production drops to find out if costs don't go up.
Falcon
Seperate the Risk Markets, Tap New Markets (Score:2)
What if inst
Re: (Score:2)
Okay I will bite.
By Improved I mean:
0. lower Construction cost
Not really all that important. We build so few space craft that the cost of construction is actually only a very small part of the life cost of the system.
1. lower cost for throwaway components (boosters etc...)
Yes very important.
2. Lower fuel consumption per payload/passenger pound.
I am not sure that is all that important in the over all cost.
3. Lower cost of servicing between missions.
This is huge. And yes very important.
4. Shorter prep time fo
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Re:and NASA (Score:5, Informative)
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If that blows up without delivering the results that get you payed (satellite in orbit etc...) your business is dead and your creditors crying. That's life.
That's life if you're a private company. If Inter-orbital has some catastrophic failure that sinks the whole company, it's not that big a deal in the big picture. Failure is an option for a private company - it's just not a very attractive option.
shipping (Score:3, Informative)
in the old days it was tough to stay in the shipping business after your ship sank.
This is why corporations were created, because shipping was a risky business. Way back when, before 1600, if a cargo ship or any of it's cargo was lost the ship's owners were liable. They were also liable for the crews. If a ship sank because of a hurricane or was attacked by pirates too bad for the owners. So in 1600 the British crown granted a corporate charter to the East India Company [wikipedia.org]. The corporate charter gave the
Re: (Score:2)
If I'm not mistaken (and Wikipedia's got it right) it's also the origins of Lloyds of London. In fact, shipping risk appears to be one of the major factors in the creation of insurance as we know it, dating back almost 4000 years.
Is there substantially more risk in a modern space launch than in a 400 years ago from England to the East Indies?
I suspect not.
Re:and NASA (Score:4, Insightful)
Private enterprise and investors can't survive the impact of things going wrong.
I agree with you, but I've been very impressed with SpaceX's persistence. I think that most of the private launchers will fail, but the lucky/persistent ones might actually pull it off. Presumably, each of them is convinced that they're the lucky ones.
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It works both ways though - the harder it is to make it happen, the bigger are usually the payoffs when you make it because competitors can't copy you easily. It's after all a big cost/benefit decision under uncertainty.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:and NASA (Score:5, Insightful)
When the business is the people who are paying you it's not a very good business practice to kill them off.
Um ... tobacco? Alcohol? Fast food? Automobiles? The corporate world has never shown any aversion to killing its customers if it thinks it can get new ones to replace the ones who've died.
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Stuff happens. The first automobile wrecks may have delayed what we see today by a few years. The first trucking companies to experience disastrous wrecks may have slowed things down - a few months? The wrecked aircraft of yesteryear caused government to get involved in licensing and so forth. But, stuff happens.
I am thrilled that people are actually doing something that should ultimately prove useful. NASA is a dinosaur that failed to live up to it's expectations. Let's move forward.
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NASA has failed "to live up to expectations". Maybe your expectations are just a lot lower than the people who were alive and paying attention back when those expectations were raised.
Also, (Let's move forward) !eq (Interorbital are going to move forward).
NASA had plenty of good ideas in the 70s, manned Mars missions and the like. Have they achieved those aims ?
Oh, they haven't. Bette
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I don't see a problem here. This is exactly the model that we need to use to get into space reliably. Not the "Well, we had a few launches fail catastrophically, so let's keep doing the same thing just spending more money, and never actually improve anything, oh and by the way your funding is cut" that we get with the involvement of government funded space agencies.
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And thus the strong survive to propagate their superior technology and business model.
Business model yes but not necessarily the superior technology.
Falcon
Re:and NASA (Score:4, Informative)
Trust me on this, NASA is dying laughing on the inside. 'Interorbital Systems' are a joke amongst serious minds in the space industry; they are constantly making grandiose claims yet have never fielded any hardware that couldn't simply be bought off the shelf. They are always a short amount of time from some 'amazing' breakthrough - but to put this in perspective, their nominated 'first teenager in space' is now in his twenties.
The idea that private enteprise is simply 'better' - an idea rubbished by experiences with healthcare, banking, transport, energy supply, and many other things - is blinding you to how clearly absurd these people are.
Re:and NASA (Score:4, Interesting)
While I'm not going to address you argument about the private space endeavors - they were and are a bit grandiose in their claims - but the industries you chose as examples of private enterprise are probably four of the most regulated industries in the US economy. Saying that the results of these industries is representative of a free market is laughable.
FWIW, I work in transportation, and it is becoming less regulated over time - and it is more stable than any of the other three.
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Yes I fear this has all the validity of the Moller flying car. I am not saying that private enterprise can not do it better and cheaper than NASA but this is at best a pipe dream.
Maybe we need a new saying for the 21st century. Renderings are cheap, hardware is real.
SpaceX is far more interesting. They have flown the Falcon I to orbit and seem to have an optimistic but well thought out test program for the Dragon/Falcon 9.
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Wait a second...
capitalism (Score:2)
The idea that private enteprise is simply 'better' - an idea rubbished by experiences with healthcare, banking, transport, energy supply, and many other things - is blinding you to how clearly absurd these people are.
Yeap, communism has triumphed over capitalism.
Falcon
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The idea that private enteprise is simply 'better' - an idea rubbished by experiences with healthcare, banking, transport, energy supply, and many other things - is blinding you to how clearly absurd these people are.
Indeed. Government snake oil has long been shown to be far more efficacious than it's grievously inferior private counterparts.
Re:hypergolic main engines? (Score:4, Informative)
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Anybody find any links to the specific impulse of those fuels?
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I'd presume "Hydrocarbon-X" is some sort of kerosene-like blend of petroleum distillates.
Naw. Hydrocarbon-X is just a combustible version of Chemical X which was used to make the Powerpuff Girls.
Their rocket should be quite spectacular.
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Anti-Safety! (Score:2)
"Sickonauts"!
We keep assuming that we want world-class important fellas going up. Then we fret over safety. Meanwhile per a post above, we fret about health care.
Let's take non-critical terminally ill folks, train them for 3 months on a simulator, and send them along! Send them at 50-per-batch. I'm positive the hardware should be way lower, maybe $100 million, then divided by a much bigger people load.
"It can't be that hard" if we've had 40 years to improve on 1969 tech. Just build a big-a$$ box that itself
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last I heard, a shuttle launch cost ~ $1bn, all told. Dunno about a Soyuz
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But what does the launch actually cost? I mean, vs a shuttle or soyz launch?
About $150 [slashdot.org]
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>>>What the hell is the plural of Soyuz?
Soyuzlent Green? It's People!
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NASA will be asking the Church of Scientology for a lift before these jokers.
The fact is, the private sector does not have a real role in the ISS; Russia can handle the people and Europe the cargo for less money, and can do it right now, than US private enterprise. The only reason SpaceX got a sniff of a contract (when their unproven Dragon capsule being less capable and less value for money than ATV) is because the US government is pushing NASA to go for US private companies even when they aren't the best
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If we can put a man on the moon, why can't we shoot people for Apollo-related non-sequiturs?
If we could put a man on the moon... why can't we now put a man on the moon?
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