Posted on 02/18/2018 1:00:44 AM PST by blueplum
NASA is eager for humans to venture beyond the International Space Station, leave boot prints in the red dust of Mars and fly into the vast unknown—but first, the moon. Before the space agency puts astronauts on our natural satellite for the first time since the Apollo missions touched down, it needs a lunar outpost to be its gateway to the future. The Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway is the brainchild of NASA scientists joining forces with ISS and commercial partners to explore the concept of such an outpost floating around the moon. After months of brainstorming, the concept is going to become a reality as part of NASA’s budget proposal for fiscal year 2019, and will be set to take off sometime in...
(Excerpt) Read more at syfy.com ...
Paging Commander John Koenig...
The budget overall is still flat-lined, although Trump is starting to get out of the ‘social-engineering’ part of it.
But a top-line decent increase is needed, on the order of 50% to get the ball rolling if they’re serious. Otherwise look for it to continue ‘dragging out’ for decades more.
the only thing NASA wants is
another monkey-crap-mission STS-51
(not sure about that number)
Would Rocket launches from the moon alter it’s orbit?
I don’t know, but I hope others have wondered.
Uh, no. Does jumping up and down alter the earth’s orbit? First of all, rockets fly by their own fuel’s impulse, not by pushing against the moon. Second of all, the moon weighs 73,500,000,000,000,000,000 metric tons.
Until we develop warp drive, space travel is impossible. The distances are too vast. And even with travel at the speed of light or faster, the dialation of time means anyone who does it will never see loved ones on earth again.
I think you’re referring to interstellar space travel, not interplanetary. We’ve been doing the latter for decades. Interstellar travel is actually possible, but it would take a very long time as well as huge amounts of energy. The only question is will it ever be practical, or within our own means. There are very practical applications to space travel our own solar system, however. A single asteroid can contain more valuable heavy metals than all the gold mines on earth.
Interstellar travel is actually possible, but it would take a very long time as well as huge amounts of energy.
—
Plan died in 1964 when Project Orion was killed. Orion interstellar would have had a crew of over 2,000 and possibly reach 50% light speed.
Inter-system Orions would have had crews in the hundreds, gotten to Mars by 1968 and to Saturn by 1970.
Killed in favor of the very limited Apollo.
Expanding into the solar system is both feasible and profitable. There are lots of resources available, and much of it can be done with robotic vehicles.
As others have said, the Earth is too small and fragile a basket, to keep all our eggs in.
We probably need to find loop holes in the laws of physics, rather than straight technological advances.
Like an alternate route "through" space rather than across it.
SLS and Orion funding dwindling - perhaps reliance on Musk's BFR?
21st Century Space Launch Complex no funds.
Planetary Defense receives funding under the DART (Double Astroid Redirection Test) program. It is a kinetic impactor, that will impact the astroid (65803) Didymos, an 800 meter astroid with a 150 meter moonlet. "The collision will change the speed of the moonlet in its orbit around the main body by a fraction of one percent, enough to be measured using telescopes on Earth." (And in a moment of rare irony be just enough to redirect the astroid to Earth creating a accidental ELE in the year 2020-2021).
Lunar Discovery and Exploration jumps way up from 19M to 218M; Discovery program funding nearly doubles.
James Web receives less funds; Hubble chugs along; Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) nosedives and is zeroed by 2021.
Cis-lunar station:
This is a very stupid idea, unless there are compelling reasons not to build a base on the moon.
1) Station would have to have all needed fuel brought to it, base could make its own.
2) Station would have to heavily invest in shielding (no longer partially sheltered by Earth's fields like ISS). Means weight gain (cost) and space loss as well as extra funds to ship. Plus no guarantees it would work as advertised - thus more time and money studying the problem.
3) Huge extra costs for no appreciable return over a surface base.
4) Built in the right place, the surface station would never be out of contact with Earth.
I'm sure there are a host of other reasons why this is a very stupid idea,.
So why not the surface of the moon, or more properly subsurface - we already know there are large cave systems which could be used?
Is somebody already there and hostile to our presence, as some believe?
I tend to think that loopholes in physics aren’t possible. You can’t cheat the universe like you can tax laws. It may be that there are no shortcuts through space or time, just like you can’t set your clock an hour earlier thinking you’ll still get up for work on time.
The Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway is the brainchild of NASA scientists joining forces with ISS and commercial partners to explore the concept of such an outpost floating around the moon.
...
It’s a plan by NASA and its contractors to raid the Treasury.
I think Larry Niven wrote something like that once. What was it, world of ptavvs. Why would so many people rely on a single fragile ecosystem? One supervolcano or asteroid could wipe us all out. Not to mention our own selves.
Until they're stumbled upon.
Do you believe super-luminal speeds are possible? Sub-atomic particles travelling backwards in time?
We don't truly understand the nature of light - a wave? a particle?
Heck, ordinary lightening still confounds us.
I don't know if there is an answer, but I think it's possible there could be.
Anything is possible of course. But if we think there is a 1% chance of it, does that mean it is guaranteed to happen 1 out of 100 times? No, because it may actually have a 0% possibility. Meaning you can’t make 2 + 2 = 400 even if 4 is 1% of 400. Some things just may not be possible.
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