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U.S. astronauts are climbing back into space capsules. Here's howthey've improved over the past 50 years
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September 15th 17, 10:51 PM posted to sci.space.policy
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U.S. astronauts are climbing back into space capsules. Here's howthey've improved over the past 50 years
On Friday, September 15, 2017 at 11:44:09 AM UTC-7, Fred J. McCall wrote:
wrote:
"In 1961, an American astronaut reached space for the first time and soared
through the heavens in a gumdrop-shaped capsule.
Since then, people have flown to the moon, created space planes and designed
rockets that return to Earth for precision landings. But when astronauts lift off
next year from U.S. soil for the first time in six years, their vehicle of choice
will be another capsule."
See:
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-f...htmlstory.html
How do the benefits of capsules and spaceplanes compare?
Capsules have lower dry mass for the cargo they carry, since you're
not carrying along all that lifting structure. I was rather
disappointed to see SpaceX back away from a powered landing on land
for the Dragon V2, since that would have addressed one of the
advantages of spaceplanes in that they don't require 'recovery forces'
to fish them out of the water. Small spaceplanes tend to be more
'reusable' than capsules. However, the fiasco that was the Space
Shuttle backed everyone away from the idea of spaceplanes.
--
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
--George Bernard Shaw
The USAF still likes spaceplanes:
https://www.space.com/25275-x37b-space-plane.html
https://www.space.com/36985-darpa-xs...m-express.html
There's also Dreamchaser:
https://www.space.com/37636-dream-ch...v-rockets.html
The Chinese and Europeans also have spaceplane projects:
https://www.theverge.com/2016/10/5/1...rism-20-people
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/2017...nside-a-rocket
But SpaceX, NASA, and the Russians are still sticking with capsules.
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