Taking bets: next to fly in space

In article ,
Dave wrote:
In terms of technical readyness and capability,
both Japan and ESA are in good position to move
forwards into manned spaceflight. Neither has
an active short term program...

Ditching Ariane 4 was a mistake in that regard. I'm not sure what
Man-rating Ariane 5 would take.

It ought not to be terribly difficult. Ariane 5 was designed with it in
mind, since it was the designated launcher for Hermes (and, after Hermes's
demise, various capsule projects).
--
MOST launched 1015 EDT 30 June, separated 1046, | Henry Spencer
first ground-station pass 1651, all nominal! |

In article ,
Paul Blay wrote:
Isn't Europe interested in obtaining its own manned space flight capabillity?

Hasn't shown much signs of it, apart from a brief flirting with Hermes.

*France* has long been interested in European manned spaceflight, but
Hermes was their only (temporary) success in talking other countries into
it. Even they seem to have put the matter on the back burner for budget
reasons, of late.
--
MOST launched 1015 EDT 30 June, separated 1046, | Henry Spencer
first ground-station pass 1651, all nominal! |

In article ,
Dave O'Neill dave @ NOSPAM atomicrazor . com wrote:
So, orbital is ANOTHER form of action. However, it's no more genuine than
sub-orbital.

There is an implicit idea that one evolves from the other.
Looking at the current solutions none of them have an obvious evolutionary
path to an orbital vehicle.

The evolutionary path is more in the organizations than in the vehicles:
gaining experience, establishing credibility with investors, establishing
a regulatory track record. *And those are the hard problems.* Getting
into orbit is not primarily a technical problem.
--
MOST launched 1015 EDT 30 June, separated 1046, | Henry Spencer
first ground-station pass 1651, all nominal! |

"Henry Spencer" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Dave wrote:
In terms of technical readyness and capability,
both Japan and ESA are in good position to move
forwards into manned spaceflight. Neither has
an active short term program...

Ditching Ariane 4 was a mistake in that regard. I'm not sure what
Man-rating Ariane 5 would take.

It ought not to be terribly difficult. Ariane 5 was designed with it in
mind, since it was the designated launcher for Hermes (and, after Hermes's
demise, various capsule projects).

There is that slight problem with reliability ;-) - may be it'll get them to
take a better look at the software.

In article ,
Dave O'Neill dave @ NOSPAM atomicrazor . com wrote:
Man-rating Ariane 5...
It ought not to be terribly difficult. Ariane 5 was designed with it in
mind, since it was the designated launcher for Hermes (and, after Hermes's
demise, various capsule projects).

There is that slight problem with reliability ;-) ...

If NASA could man-rate the Atlas in 1961, reliability history clearly is
not a big factor in the process. :-)
--
MOST launched 30 June; first light, 29 July; 5arcsec | Henry Spencer
pointing, 10 Sept; first science, early Oct; all well. |

"Henry Spencer" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Dave O'Neill dave @ NOSPAM atomicrazor . com wrote:
Man-rating Ariane 5...
It ought not to be terribly difficult. Ariane 5 was designed with it
in
mind, since it was the designated launcher for Hermes (and, after
Hermes's
demise, various capsule projects).

There is that slight problem with reliability ;-) ...

If NASA could man-rate the Atlas in 1961, reliability history clearly is
not a big factor in the process. :-)

I remember a dinner in Paris many years ago with a team of Ariane 5 Dynamics
engineers - I still wouldn't want to use it myself ;-)

Perhaps in a way, this situation is like the computer OS and software market. A
known Microsoft tactic is to announce projects "in development" similar to
something newly released by a small competitor. The vaporware announcement has
the effect of chilling purchases of the competing products while people wait
for a chance to at least compare the upstart with a shipping MS product. Guess
I'm saying the US/Russian capbility and especially the continuous rolling out
of new viewgraphs and proposals and x-projects by the US might have a
dampoening effect on what ESA and other nations want to do on their own. I
mean, if I'm running a country and thinking about making my own new space
vehicle, then I hear US compaies already have something close to what I want
"on the way", I'm probably going to wait and see, because I might save money
going with the American product. Does this ring true to you gents? I'm
thinking HOTOL, HERMES, HOPE, any number of these projects, all were certainly
set back to a certain extent by this issue, besides others. Or am I wrong?

On Sun, 19 Oct 2003 17:52:30 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Dave
O'Neill" dave @ NOSPAM atomicrazor . com made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

If NASA could man-rate the Atlas in 1961, reliability history clearly is
not a big factor in the process. :-)

I remember a dinner in Paris many years ago with a team of Ariane 5 Dynamics
engineers - I still wouldn't want to use it myself ;-)

I think that the notion of "man rating" expendable launchers is
oxymoronic, on several levels, which will be worth a near-future
column, if not a chapter in the book...

--
simberg.interglobal.org * 310 372-7963 (CA) 307 739-1296 (Jackson Hole)
interglobal space lines * 307 733-1715 (Fax) http://www.interglobal.org

"Extraordinary launch vehicles require extraordinary markets..."
Swap the first . and @ and throw out the ".trash" to email me.
Here's my email address for autospammers:

"Rand Simberg" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 19 Oct 2003 17:52:30 GMT, in a place far, far away, "Dave
O'Neill" dave @ NOSPAM atomicrazor . com made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

If NASA could man-rate the Atlas in 1961, reliability history clearly
is
not a big factor in the process. :-)

I remember a dinner in Paris many years ago with a team of Ariane 5
Dynamics
engineers - I still wouldn't want to use it myself ;-)

I think that the notion of "man rating" expendable launchers is
oxymoronic, on several levels, which will be worth a near-future
column, if not a chapter in the book...

Agreed.