Russia To Establish Bases On the Moon 249
ananyo writes "Vladimir Popovkin, the head of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, has said that Russia will pursue extensive, long-lived operations at the Moon's surface. 'We're not talking about repeating what mankind achieved 40 years ago,' Popovkin said, through a translator at the Global Space Exploration Conference in Washington DC. 'We're talking about establishing permanent bases.' The heads of the space agencies for Europe, Canada and Russia, along with senior representatives from the space agencies of India and Japan were in Washington DC talking about the benefits of international collaboration. JAXA, the Japanese Space Agency, also issued a clear pronouncement about targeting the Moon."
Re:Yeah, okay. (Score:5, Informative)
By the original, Cold War definition, Russia/USSR was 2nd world.
1st World was US/NATO/allies. 2nd World was USSR/Warsaw Pact nations. 3rd World nations were everyone else.
This has now devolved into 1st world/3rd world, mainly based on economy.
Re:It's all well and good until (Score:2, Informative)
Shuttles are a complete write-off at this point... (Score:5, Informative)
The decommissioning work done to prepare the shuttles for museum display rendered them beyond any practical ability to return to service. Large parts of the internal structure were chopped out to remove contaminated fuel tanks, etc. It would likely be faster and cheaper to build a new shuttle than to try to fly one of the museum display orbiters again.
Add in the fact that the supply chain for things like external tanks and other shuttle parts was dismantled several years ago, and many of the specialized jigs and fixtures sold off for scrap.
Re:Yeah, okay. (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah, their space program is such a joke. All they did was put the first satellite in space, first orbit, first man and woman in space, first space station, first probes on Venus and Mars--in fact, pretty much every space "first" except man on the moon. And they're currently the only country in the world capable of even putting a man in orbit. Ha, ha, what a joke! Let's all laugh at them!
And the Italians used to rule most of Europe and the Middle East. Your point?
Russia's space program hasn't done anything but produce small incremental improvements on *Soviet* technology. Technology built by a country under the auspices of its military that *no longer exists*. Technology built using quantities of labor and resources that are no longer available to it.
If you believe for an instant that the current space program in Russia could do something like this, you're completely ignorant of the reality of the existing space program in Russia or its history. (You'd be equally ignorant if you thought NASA could do it either -- it couldn't... not even close. Technical ability has no bearing on the political or economic realities of a program like that.)
Re:That's... (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, yes it is a moon. But it can definitely be a harsh mistress.
Re:No , but NASA has launched a damn site more (Score:3, Informative)
There are 113 launches in below list and 45 of them are since 1992.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Russian_manned_space_missions [wikipedia.org]
BTW. Do you remember that at a specific long period, Mir space station was the only human residence in space?
Re:No , but NASA has launched a damn site more (Score:2, Informative)
How many people have the russians put in space since the 1970s compared to NASA? Not many! The shuttle had something like 140 launches and each one could carry up to 7 people. There have been 26 soyuz launches and each capsule takes up to 3.
No idea where you got that 26 figure from but since 1981 there have been 135 shuttle launches and 74 soyuz launches, 2 shuttles lost and 0 soyuz lost...
Re:Empty posturing (Score:2, Informative)
If Obama (for some reason we blame NASA, but put the blame on your hero) didn't cut NASA we could be talking this as well. What I find a shame are those welfare scum who take money away from projects such as these because they refuse to work. The so called poor today are just lazy thugs.
Try paring down the Defense budget first and see how much money is there for NASA. The poor make a convenient target, especially for those with no compassion or concept of what creates poverty. But if you look at actual entitlements and Keynesian make-work projects, our defense industry tops the list.
Re:Yeah, okay. (Score:5, Informative)
The rest of the story: Before the landers, the US had the first successful flyby of Venus with Mariner 3 in 1962 and the first successful flyby of Mars with Mariner 4 in 1964, ahead of the Russians in both cases. As for landers: Luna 9, first soft lander on the moon (Russian) -- landed Feb 3, 1966, operated for 8 hours on the moon, returned 3 series of TV pictures. Surveyor 1, first American soft lander on the moon -- landed June 2, 1966, returning 11,237 photos over 42 days of operations, continued to return engineering data until Jan 7, 1967, over 7months later. Mars 3, first soft lander on Mars (Russian), landed Dec 2, 1971, 14.5 seconds after landing communications from the lander permanently ceased, one partial image was transmitted containing nothing identifiable. Viking 1, first US soft lander on Mars -- landed Jul 20, 1976. Operated for over 6 years until Nov 11, 1982, returning several hundred photos along with life search and other science experiments. The Russians landed first and I commend them for it, but the US missions were vastly more productive; this information should always be included when the statements about who got there first are made.
Re:Yeah, okay. (Score:4, Informative)
And they're currently the only country in the world capable of even putting a man in orbit.
China says "Hello"