Comic Discussion > QUESTIONABLE CONTENT
WCDT December 1-5, 2014 (2845-2849)
GarandMarine:
Didn't SpaceX's last test shot blow up?
Mr_Rose:
--- Quote from: GarandMarine on 07 Dec 2014, 04:40 ---Didn't SpaceX's last test shot blow up?
--- End quote ---
That was a commercial launch and it was destroyed by the range safety officer because a midair explosion is better than it landing on something then exploding.
(I would make such a terrible RSO; the temptation of a big red button marked "blow it up" would be just too great ;) )
DSL:
--- Quote from: ReindeerFlotilla on 07 Dec 2014, 03:43 ---I'm sure there's a physical answer to the deorbit problem. But finding that answer in NASA, getting it funded, and built... That's impossible.
--- End quote ---
Damn unlikely, that's for sure. NASA's going to think, then overthink, and the only way it'll move beyond that is to "freeze the design," which is a slightly less unpleasant way of saying, "OK, let' stick with something 10 years behind the times just so we can get some damn thing built and maybe even flown."
What i like about the private designers and builders is, when you look at them in the aggregate, you get a sense of what aeronautics was like in the 1920s and the 1950s, full of people saying, "OK, let's try this." Lots of things that didn't quite work out -- and a glorious few that did.
KOK:
--- Quote from: DSL on 07 Dec 2014, 03:21 ---Sure is. We're talking about two sides of the bootstrap situation, though. You the initial side, where the human space program is now and we have to pack.everything we need at the beginning, and I'm thinking ahead to that place I hope we get, when there's enough of a.support infrastructure in place, in orbit or even at destination, that future flights will be able to lean on it and not have to carry everything. It'll.tale a.long time to get to that point but once it's reached, the growth will (be able to be) exponential.
Meanwhile, I'm kicking myself for.not paying more attention to the Dawn mission to Vesta and, soon enough, Ceres. And Pluto Express not long after that.
--- End quote ---
It is some years ago that I read a proposal for a return trip to Mars. First you send a chemical factory that will produce oxygen for the stay and fuel for the return trip. Raw materials come from the Martian atmosphere. Only when the factory reports full tanks, you send the astronauts.
Zebediah:
That was Robert Zubrin, a former NASA engineer. Supposedly NASA adopted a modified version of his plan in the Constellation program, but that part has been cancelled.
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