wrote in message
...
Derek Lyons wrote:
"Vello" wrote:
Just one strange idea: mankind don't have now space capabilities
comparable
what we had 30 years ago. It seems it is first time mankind is "dropping
back" in technology - or is there some other examples in history (well
there
was a time after collapse of Roman Empire when a lot of technologies
were
lost, but my post is about last 200-400 years)

Nice thesis, but it founders on the rocks of reality. There isn't a
capability that we had thirty years ago that we know don't have.


Based on a loose definition of 30 years, the ability to launch a mission
to the moon on a few months leadtime.


We are no worse off for not being dedicated to pointless endeavours like
re-visiting the "ash-pit in the sky". Good science can be done there by
robotic means and nowadays we are absorbed with more interesting targets for
research and investigation. America may be suffering setbacks in it's space
program but the French "Ariane" is a superb and successful piece of
engineering and the Russian & Chinese launchers are also apparently reliable
enough to be commercially viable.
The British developed an excellent launcher, "Blue Streak", which was
capable of launching 100 - kilo packages, but they stepped away from
launcher development to concentrate on satellite-construction. That wasn't a
step backwards but sideways to a scale of production which better suited
their national capabilities at the time. Space programs should serve people
not the other way round.
Are you sure you aren't hankering after an opportunity to revisit not the
Moon, but "past glories"? With nations like India and Japan capable of
launching their own satellites you'll have to look for that elsewhere.

Keigwin.