Spaceflight by 2020

"bitflip" wrote in message
...
Ok, a question for the fertile minds in this news group.
What will space flight be like by 2020?
My ideas:

Shuttle until 2012-2015
OSP capsules for ACRV 2008-until????
OSP spaceplane 2015-until???

Base on the moon 2012-2015
No chance

Mars mission 2015-2020
No chance.

Clearly the US government is determined to make sure that the ISS is 'seen'
to achieve science

Anything else is basically - scrapped.

DOug

I also expect a Europa orbiter, and possibly a lander, before 2020 --
both obviously unmanned. Finally, I expect some sort of space-based
optical interferometer to be providing us with crude images of
extrasolar planets.


You left out the new infrared telescope.

That wont be taking crude images of Extrasolar Planets.

Doug

"Dholmes" wrote in message ...
"John Ladasky" wrote in message
om...

[snip]

I also expect a Europa orbiter, and possibly a lander, before 2020 --
both obviously unmanned. Finally, I expect some sort of space-based
optical interferometer to be providing us with crude images of
extrasolar planets.


You left out the new infrared telescope.

SIRTF was launched last week. Thus I consider SIRTF to be a done
deal, and I didn't think to mention it in a discussion of the future
of space flight.

I am looking forward to its findings with interest. However, if SIRTF
deploys incorrectly (shudder), I don't think that we'll be replacing
it.

--
John J. Ladasky Jr., Ph.D.
Department of Biology
Johns Hopkins University
Baltimore MD 21218
USA
Earth

On 31 Aug 2003 14:18:39 -0700, (John Ladasky)
wrote:

(Christopher) wrote in message ...
On Sun, 31 Aug 2003 16:59:37 GMT, "Dholmes"
wrote:

Well it might be nice to land a man on the moon in 2019.

Why not Mars?

2019 = 50th anniversary of the first lunar landing. It would be a
nice, symbolic occasion, I guess. It might be all we're able to
accomplish, the way that things are going.

If I remember right NASA was going to land Viking 1 on the martian
surface to coincide with the 200th anniversary of the founding of
America, but martian dust storms put paid to that, so they settled on
the Apollo 11 anniversary for the first American lander.

snip


Christopher
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Kites rise highest against
the wind - not with it."
Winston Churchill

On Mon, 1 Sep 2003 11:00:45 +0100, "Doug Ellison"
wrote:


"bitflip" wrote in message
...
Ok, a question for the fertile minds in this news group.
What will space flight be like by 2020?
My ideas:

Shuttle until 2012-2015
OSP capsules for ACRV 2008-until????
OSP spaceplane 2015-until???

Base on the moon 2012-2015
No chance

Mars mission 2015-2020
No chance.

Clearly the US government is determined to make sure that the ISS is 'seen'
to achieve science

Anything else is basically - scrapped.

If it carries on like that we'll never leave this rock let alone the
system.



Christopher
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
"Kites rise highest against
the wind - not with it."
Winston Churchill

"John Ladasky" wrote:
I also expect a Europa orbiter, and possibly a lander, before 2020 --
both obviously unmanned.

The orbiter is already in the works. JIMO, Jupiter Icy
Moons Orbiter, an impressive and somewhat ambitious
mission. Arrival at Jupiter is penciled in for sometime
around the middle of the next decade, though it's still
in the preplanning phases and won't even reach the "can
we get some money?" phase for a few years. The plan is
to orbit Callisto, Ganymede, and Europa in succession
and study each up close.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/jimo/


Finally, I expect some sort of space-based
optical interferometer to be providing us with crude images of
extrasolar planets.

2020's a good timeframe for that. I might expect it sooner
if NASA weren't so glacially slow.


None of what I've described requires a human presence in space. The
next 16 years of spaceflight belong to the robots. I'll likely find
myself satisfied with the science, on one level, and frustrated with
the deferral of a great human dream on another level.

What's that they say about pessimists? Something about
always being pleasantly surprised I think. I'm sure you'll
find the next 16 years ... surprising.