Sample return missions to last up to a century

http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...re_030910.html

" Beginning in 2011, the COMPLEX study states, the first in a series of
perhaps ten automated Mars return-sample missions would be launched to dot
the red planet. This robotic search and seize campaign of hauling back to
Earth Mars specimens might stretch out for three or four decades, to as much
as a century"

Ow, what kind of crap is this? Not the kind of visionary stance I was hoping
for and it completely dashes any hopes for a manned mission anytime soon.

Ultimate Buu wrote:
http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...re_030910.html

" Beginning in 2011, the COMPLEX study states, the first in a series of
perhaps ten automated Mars return-sample missions would be launched to dot
the red planet. This robotic search and seize campaign of hauling back to
Earth Mars specimens might stretch out for three or four decades, to as much
as a century"

Ow, what kind of crap is this? Not the kind of visionary stance I was hoping
for and it completely dashes any hopes for a manned mission anytime soon.



Baby steps.

Mike Rhino wrote:
"Ultimate Buu" wrote in message
...
http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...re_030910.html

" Beginning in 2011, the COMPLEX study states, the first in a series of
perhaps ten automated Mars return-sample missions would be launched to dot
the red planet. This robotic search and seize campaign of hauling back to
Earth Mars specimens might stretch out for three or four decades, to as
much
as a century"

Ow, what kind of crap is this? Not the kind of visionary stance I was
hoping
for and it completely dashes any hopes for a manned mission anytime soon.

Would a sample return mission be less expensive than sending 100 tons of
equipment to Mars? What about the quality of the science? Would you learn
that much more by returning the samples to Earth?

Yes. You can do much more science on Earth. How flexible is that 100 tons
of equipemnt and what percentage of it is taken up by solar panels?

roughly in that order.


Suppose you bring a sample back from Mars and use 1000 tons of equipment to
analyze one pound of dirt. You can't do anything else with this equipment,
because it's quarantined. This equipment is going to be sitting there
waiting for the next sample return mission.


Not true. But anyways, why does the amount (and even more so, its weight!)
matter? you could set up a whole lab - would you then count the weight of the
buildings too?

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

In article ,
Ultimate Buu wrote:
"...This robotic search and seize campaign of hauling back to
Earth Mars specimens might stretch out for three or four decades, to as much
as a century"

Ow, what kind of crap is this? Not the kind of visionary stance I was hoping
for and it completely dashes any hopes for a manned mission anytime soon.

NASA *has* no realistic hopes for a manned mission any time soon. Goldin
was exactly correct about that: all hopes for getting Congress to fund
resumption of manned exploration hinged on drastic reform of the space
station, to demonstrate that NASA could run a big program well. But that
attempt at reform was a disastrous failure.

The COMPLEX report comes from the unmanned side of the house, which will
go far out of its way to avoid any entanglement with manned spaceflight.
Some of this is irrational prejudice, but some of it is a realistic
assessment of what happens to your project when JSC gets involved.

The key thing to understand here is that NASA is never, ever, ever going
to make our dreams come true. It is part of the problem, not the solution.
Give up on hoping that this dinosaur will magically become a mammal. That
won't happen.
--
MOST launched 1015 EDT 30 June, separated 1046, | Henry Spencer
first ground-station pass 1651, all nominal! |

So they are essentially saying that it is cheaper, quicker and more useful
to send people and labs.


Blurrt

"Ultimate Buu" wrote in message
...
http://www.space.com/businesstechnol...re_030910.html

" Beginning in 2011, the COMPLEX study states, the first in a series of
perhaps ten automated Mars return-sample missions would be launched to dot
the red planet. This robotic search and seize campaign of hauling back to
Earth Mars specimens might stretch out for three or four decades, to as
much
as a century"

Ow, what kind of crap is this? Not the kind of visionary stance I was
hoping
for and it completely dashes any hopes for a manned mission anytime soon.

But that
attempt at reform was a disastrous failure.

Why do you say that? Under O'Keefe, the station overruns were stopped. In
fact, if Columbia hadn't crashed, the only controversy coming out of NASA would
be nuclear powered spacecraft., not space station overruns.

The key thing to understand here is that NASA is never, ever, ever going
to make our dreams come true.

It depends on what your dreams are. If your dreams are solar-powered
airplanes, NASA's there. If your dreams are inspiring new generation of
engineers, NASA's there. If your dreams are exploring Saturn or Mars, NASA's
there. If your dreams are monitoring Earth's climate, NASA's there. But if
your dreams are colonization of the solar system, well, don't hold your breath.

That said, I am fully supportive of all alternative efforts to NASA, especially
the X-Prize and Elon Musk's rocket company. Assuming your dreams _are_ to
colonize the solar system, these alternate efforts represent a better shot than
NASA. Not because anything's wrong with NASA in particular, but because of the
nature of the private sector versus the government.

In article ,
Centurion509 wrote:
But that
attempt at reform was a disastrous failure.

Why do you say that? Under O'Keefe, the station overruns were stopped.

More likely, they were put on "pause". Remember, for example, that NASA
is officially committed to providing a station lifeboat, and currently has
no money for it. Yes, that has to count as part of the station budget,
i.e. as part of its overruns, however much NASA tries to hide it under
other headings like OSP.

But even setting that aside, the station was already a monumental
management disaster. The fact that (for the moment) it has stopped
getting worse is not much comfort. What was needed, as Goldin said, was
to turn it into a *conspicuously* *well-run* program -- under budget,
ahead of schedule, above expectations. There's no chance of that, not
any more.

...if Columbia hadn't crashed, the only controversy coming out of NASA would
be nuclear powered spacecraft., not space station overruns.

The lifeboat issue was already providing plenty of controversy, and is
only temporarily in abeyance. And looming on the horizon is the matter of
station operations costs, especially since several of the station partners
have happily made deals with NASA in which they built necessary items of
station hardware in exchange for -- surprise, surprise -- NASA shouldering
part or all of their share of down-the-road costs.

The key thing to understand here is that NASA is never, ever, ever going
to make our dreams come true.

It depends on what your dreams are.

Quite so. If your dreams of spaceflight are feeble little things, NASA
may be able to deliver on them. Maybe.

If your dreams are solar-powered airplanes, NASA's there.

This is sci.space, not sci.aeronautics.

If your dreams are inspiring new generation of engineers, NASA's there.

Horse****. Sorry, but that's the mildest description I can think of for
this. NASA and its contractors are bleeding good engineers like crazy,
and are discovering that poor pay, lousy working conditions, long hours,
intensely bureaucratic organizations, and gross mismanagement do a really
****-poor job of attracting the best and brightest of the new generation.
Surprise, surprise.

If you look at NASA/contractor statements on such topics, you'll find that
they admit they have a big problem here, which is going to rapidly get
worse as the guys who were young in the 1960s all hit retirement age. And
they have no idea how to solve it. Which is not surprising, since they
*can't* solve it -- they are incapable of fixing the problems well enough.

There was a time when the sheer excitement of the work made up for a lot
of hassles, especially since many of the problems weren't then nearly so
bad. For some people it still does, especially if they luck out and find
themselves in the right job. But their numbers are dwindling.

The second edition of Nise's "Control Systems Engineering" had DC-X on the
cover. I forget what's on the third edition, but it's not space hardware.

One way of measuring what young engineers are excited about is to note
what subjects they're willing to buy books about. Check out XCOR's
recommended-aerospace-books list:

http://www.xcor.com/library/aerospace-books.html

Note how many of the titles are forty years old and long out of print,
but still the best books available. There's no market for newer ones.

If your dreams are exploring Saturn or Mars, NASA's there.

Maybe, and maybe not. Depends on what you want to do there, and whether
you want to see it done before you're old and gray. Even Mars sample
return is currently beyond NASA's planning horizon, never mind manned
expeditions.

Unless something changes radically, NASA is *never* going to put men on
Mars. Never. The estimated launch date is receding at more than one
year per year.

If your dreams are monitoring Earth's climate, NASA's there.

Actually, NOAA is there -- this is not primarily NASA's job at all.

But if
your dreams are colonization of the solar system, well, don't hold your breath.

Or anything which involves you or me being able to get into space. Or
indeed, almost anything which involves going much beyond what NASA was
doing in about 1980.

That said, I am fully supportive of all alternative efforts to NASA, especially
the X-Prize and Elon Musk's rocket company. Assuming your dreams _are_ to
colonize the solar system, these alternate efforts represent a better shot than
NASA.

Not just a better shot. The only shot.

It's not just a case of "don't hold your breath". That phrase implies
that you'll merely have to be patient. To borrow someone else's slogan:
what part of "never" don't you understand?
--
MOST launched 1015 EDT 30 June, separated 1046, | Henry Spencer
first ground-station pass 1651, all nominal! |

Richard Schumacher wrote:


Centurion509 wrote:

But that
attempt at reform was a disastrous failure.

Why do you say that? Under O'Keefe, the station overruns were stopped. In
fact, if Columbia hadn't crashed, the only controversy coming out of NASA would
be nuclear powered spacecraft., not space station overruns.

The key thing to understand here is that NASA is never, ever, ever going
to make our dreams come true.

It depends on what your dreams are. If your dreams are solar-powered
airplanes, NASA's there. If your dreams are inspiring new generation of
engineers, NASA's there. If your dreams are exploring Saturn or Mars, NASA's
there. If your dreams are monitoring Earth's climate, NASA's there. But if
your dreams are colonization of the solar system, well, don't hold your breath.

Also if your dreams are merely expanded economic exploitation of space. NASA is
not the path to remotely affordable tourism, for example.

But is it a reasonable expectation that NASA should provide for such? If you want
to commercialise space, go ahead and do it - and I'm sure NASA technology transfer
and knowledge will help you along the way. But why do you insist on NASA doing the
work for you?

--
Sander

+++ Out of cheese error +++

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 21:28:15 +0000 (UTC), in a place far, far away,
Sander Vesik made the phosphor on my
monitor glow in such a way as to indicate that:

Also if your dreams are merely expanded economic exploitation of space. NASA is
not the path to remotely affordable tourism, for example.

But is it a reasonable expectation that NASA should provide for such?

No.

However, it is a reasonable expectation that it shouldn't be a
roadblock, which it has been in the past, in many ways both great and
small.

--
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:

On Sat, 13 Sep 2003 05:48:11 GMT, (Henry Spencer)
wrote:

In article ,
Centurion509 wrote:

If your dreams are solar-powered airplanes, NASA's there.

This is sci.space, not sci.aeronautics.

All the same, you're talking about NASA, not NSA. You have to take
the agency's roles as the agency finds them.

If you look at NASA/contractor statements on such topics, you'll find that
they admit they have a big problem here, which is going to rapidly get
worse as the guys who were young in the 1960s all hit retirement age.

They're already hit it. It's 55, after all. Ken, hired in '62, left
with forty years, well past the 55 years of age limit. There was only
one civil servant who had been at Dryden longer when he retired and
most of those hired after him had already left.

There was a time when the sheer excitement of the work made up for a lot
of hassles, especially since many of the problems weren't then nearly so
bad. For some people it still does, especially if they luck out and find
themselves in the right job. But their numbers are dwindling.

I know some young engineers who think it's exciting now.

But if
your dreams are colonization of the solar system, well, don't hold your breath.

Or anything which involves you or me being able to get into space. Or
indeed, almost anything which involves going much beyond what NASA was
doing in about 1980.

Not to be contrary, but is it really NASA's job to get you or me into
space? Should it be?

The NACA and NASA did a lot of things that have resulted in getting us
into the sky in airliners, but swept wings and winglets weren't really
invented with the goal of a cheaper advance-purchase ticket in mind.
That these reduce the cost of flying and the airlines pass the saving
on to us is nice, but it's not the major driver for aeronautical
research.

--
Mary Shafer Retired aerospace research engineer