Space Updates From Three Countries (indiatimes.com) 62
The Indian Space Research Organisation continues developing a reusable launch vehicle, which could cut the costs of satellite launches by 90%. William Robinson quotes the Business Times: India will use a mini-rocket with a booster to fly a winged reusable launch vehicle into lower earth orbit on May 23... If everything goes well, it will reach about 70 kilometers from earth, and will plunge into the Bay of Bengal...to demonstrate hypersonic and aero-thermodynamics of the winged re-entry vehicle with autonomous mission management
Meanwhile, Thelasko shares this reminder from BlastingNews that the U.S. Air Force's mysterious X-37B celebrated the one-year anniversary of its launch: Today, the maneuverable craft operates in a 220-mile orbit, a higher altitude it briefly held last fall and roughly the same perch occupied twice by the previous X-37B mission, according to satellite-tracking hobbyist Ted Molczan. This X-37B carries at least two payloads, revealed by the military before the ship took off â" an experimental electric propulsion thruster to be tested in orbit and a pallet to expose sample materials to the space environment.
And MarkWhittington writes that "The latest Chinese space station, the Tiangong 2, is slated to be launched later in 2016 and will be visited by Chinese astronauts in a Shenzhou spacecraft. But, according to Spaceflight Insider, the Chinese are already looking ahead to their permanent low Earth orbit space facility, the Tiangong 3, slated to begin construction in 2018."
Meanwhile, Thelasko shares this reminder from BlastingNews that the U.S. Air Force's mysterious X-37B celebrated the one-year anniversary of its launch: Today, the maneuverable craft operates in a 220-mile orbit, a higher altitude it briefly held last fall and roughly the same perch occupied twice by the previous X-37B mission, according to satellite-tracking hobbyist Ted Molczan. This X-37B carries at least two payloads, revealed by the military before the ship took off â" an experimental electric propulsion thruster to be tested in orbit and a pallet to expose sample materials to the space environment.
And MarkWhittington writes that "The latest Chinese space station, the Tiangong 2, is slated to be launched later in 2016 and will be visited by Chinese astronauts in a Shenzhou spacecraft. But, according to Spaceflight Insider, the Chinese are already looking ahead to their permanent low Earth orbit space facility, the Tiangong 3, slated to begin construction in 2018."
Dawn of a new round of space race (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually this is good for humanity
No matter which entity wins, we all win
Re: Dawn of a new round of space race (Score:5, Insightful)
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's 5th Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress estimated that 1.56 million people, or one in every 200 Americans, experienced homelessness
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
They really gotta shut that NASA down .
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The difference is that we've evolved to shit in an outhouse
Speak for yourself, Mr. "Evolved Yesterday" - you might have mutant "outhouse genes" amongst your DNA (Arkansas or West Virginia?) but the rest of us most assuredly do not. ;)
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First off, experiencing homelessness at some point in ones lifetime != habitually shitting where you live.
Secondly, the homeless in the USA generally use public accessible facilities connected a functional sewer system. In India, even people with homes just dump it out the window.
That said, I'm not one of those who says "people need to take care of social ill X before spending any money on space.
Re: Dawn of a new round of space race (Score:5, Informative)
And you have got to stop wasting time posting on slashdot, playing video games, watching tv, and going to the movies. You should also eat the cheapest food possible and work as much as humanly possible.
You should then take all that money and use it to help the homeless....
Let me teach you about the logical fallacy called the fool's dilemma.
Shutting down NASA will not fix the homeless problem. At no time has there been a vote in congress to spend x on the space program or spend it on the homeless.
Do you want to give up weather satellites? Communications satellites? How about GPS?
I don't and I do not want to give up all the basic research that NASA does as well as space exploration. I am willing to bet that the majority of people on slashdot agree with me.
So NO YOU ARE WRONG!
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reference?
Of course the funny part is that none of the programs in the story are being funded by NASA. Also one projects is being funded by India which has a much higher poverty rate than the US.
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Actually, many Ivy League colleges did a study
And clearly a study of such magnitude wouldn't be possible with just one Ivy League "college," hence the need for "many" (those are actually universities, by the way).
Incidentally, have you considered the possibility that you might just be stupid??
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The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's 5th Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress estimated that 1.56 million people, or one in every 200 Americans, experienced homelessness
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] They really gotta shut that NASA down .
NASA doesn't have a spacecraft capable of launching a pencil to orbit. They are relying on private contractors. The X-37B in the article is a US Air Force project. If you want to see some government funding [slashdot.org] squandered, [slate.com] look at the military. [wikipedia.org]
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As opposed to? NASA has always used private contractors. Boeing built the shuttle:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
So, how is commercial rocket launches really any different?
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Because clearly 1.56 million people who are homeless (1 in 200), likely due to addiction or other mental disorders, is equivalent to a 640 million Indians (1 in 2) without running water.
http://www.theguardian.com/soc... [theguardian.com]
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Ummmm no.
Half of the population of India have no access to any type of sewage system. They take their sewage waste to the nearest river or street. The small upper class of India have no sympathy for those people and rather put their money in these ridicilous space expeditions that help no one. A third world shit hole wasting money in missiles and crappy space probes is a waste of time and money.
Ah, I see.
So what you're saying is that unless a society is already living the utopian dream, they absolutely must not spend any money on anything other than fixing their problems.
Right.
Perhaps the US should fix all their problems before launching any more rockets as well?
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600 million Indians have no running water. That is 1 in every 2 Indians.
1.56 million US citizens live in homelessness (and likely use restrooms, rather than the street), that is 1 in 200.
Please, don't act like these two things are equivalent.
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Not to be a party pooper (sorry, couldn't resist). I recently looked through photo albums of my grandparents' home in a German town, pre WWII. In those days wood and water would be carried in, and toilet waste be collected in a certain area right next to the house (throwing distance with a chamber pot from a window if you were lazy - ahhh, remember the concept of a chamber pot?) These collection bins would be emptied once a month or so. My mom recalls that farmers in the vicinity would often come to collect
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Your post oozes "they're just not smart enough to solve their own problems" racism and/or class-ism. We already know how to solve these problems cheaply (and city housing in India isn't so cheap, at least by third world standards - Bangalore isn't cheap by anyone's standards). It is a matter of will, and to some extent education.
That doesn't automatically mean the government isn't a good way to sort it all out, but when your government is quite corrupt, maybe that isn't the right way.
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Sounds a lot like the US in the 60s. Though the "small upper class that has no sympathy for them" sounds more like the contemporary US.
You sure you're talking about India?
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If non-Indians have no sympathy for Indians (read: do nothing to help), then why should an Indian? Just because you arent from someone's country doesnt mean you cant or shouldn't help does it? You are not a _____ so you won't help a _____? How is that any more ethical than being a _____ and helping a _____?
Re: Dawn of a new round of space race (Score:4, Interesting)
More like ummm, maybe.
It all comes down to marginal utility in the long term, which of course is uncertain because it hinges on predictions of the future. Things would be easier if you could just spend all your money on your most pressing problem, solve that, and move on to the next most pressing problem. You would take money,say, from education and put it into hunger, because hunger is lower on Maslow's hierarchy of needs than self-actualization. After you'd licked hunger you'd go on to the next thing and eventually get around to education.
Clearly a space program makes no sense for a country like Bengladesh with a GDP of 150 billion. India has a GDP approaching two trillion dollars. And while it has a lot of poor people, there are more middle class Indians than the middle class Americans. Those people work in industries like defense, technology and aerospace, that generate revenue.
Does this mean any space project makes sense for India, given its poverty problems? Of course not. But the development of hypersonic aircraft/spacecraft is clearly applied research. That not only helps Indian companies, it helps with the brain drain project by giving the most capable engineers all the more reason to work at home rather than going overseas.
Three articles in one (Score:5, Funny)
Three articles in one. Another brilliant idea.
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Maybe it's an attempt to get the comment count into double figures.
Re:Three articles in one (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Three articles in one (Score:5, Funny)
I predict Partial Dupes in the near future.
Freemason (Score:1)
Illuminati = 666.
"Chinese astronaut" (Score:1)
A "Chinese astronaut" is actually called a taikonaut.
Re:"Chinese astronaut" (Score:5, Informative)
Not in China. Unlike "cosmonaut" which is an Anglicisation of the Russian word "kosmonavt", the word "taikonaut" seems to be an invention of English-speakers. Official English translations issued by the Chinese government use "astronaut". The native Chinese is yuhangyuan or hangtianyuan.
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3- Do not launch in temps below 32 degrees f if you are not sure your o-rings are going to withstand launch stresses.
Perhaps India's lesson from this should be don't let politicians determine where your boosters are built, let the engineers decide. The reason that o-ring exists is that congress dictated that the SRBs be built in Utah, despite it causing the SRBs to be built as two pieces instead of a single unit and requiring the addition of the o-ring to seal the two pieces together. NASA wanted them built near a harbor so they could be sent on ships instead of trains, therefore be a single piece. I think their sugges
Lookslike everything has gone well... (Score:1)
India will use a mini-rocket with a booster to fly a winged reusable launch vehicle into lower earth orbit on May 23... If everything goes well, ...
Lookslike everything has gone well [http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2016/05/23/indias-isro-says-it-successfully-launched-test-spacecraft/]
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Congrats to them!
Am I the only one here who thinks what they're doing is great? It might even lead to a small space race with Pakistan - if they succeed, Pakistan isn't going to be happy with India having cheap access to space but not them. And the space race turned out to be a great pressure release valve between the US and USSR.
That said, a second-stage reusable isn't enough - they'll also need a reusable first stage that's cheap to refurbish for relaunch. But that, too, is potentially achievable.
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Cheap: These days, sub-$4k/kg would do.
Access: Ability to reach LEO or beyond.
Achieve: Private companies and government agencies pay huge amounts of money for you to launch their payloads for them.
Any more questions?
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It's a great step, and I don't like being pedantic... but they did not launch into orbit as stated in the article. This is clearly a suborbital launch, to an altitude of 70 km with the flight lasting about 10 minutes.
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At least they are making with improving very most their English.
Shouldn't that be Engrish?
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Chinese food delivery to the ISS? That would make the stay livable!