Posted on 04/27/2006 7:13:11 PM PDT by KevinDavis
New York - Shipping on a global level has its many challenges, but shipping within the solar system is almost too daunting to imagine.
The challenges of space logistics are staggering, given the scale of the distances to be traveled and the complexity of launch and mission technology.
A team consisting of Professor David Simchi-Levi of Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Professor Diego Klabjan of the University of Illinois at Urbana is working on a project that involves interplanetary supply-chain management and logistics architecture. The team is developing a tool that they refer to as SpaceNet, and NASA is funding it.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Loooooooong haul trucking.
Supplies necessary for life and a functional lab for surface research should be prepositioned on Mars. The lab would be used during a manned visit, and the supplies would be there in case their short visit became unexpectedly much longer. A serious mechanical failure could easily strand a crew there for at least 2-3 years, and there is no where to get spare parts.
The "emergency" 3 year supply cache, lab, and living space could be confirmed landed and functional before any manned ship left earth.
Another cache and "space station", or a ship with return capabilities, could be placed in orbit, and confirmed to be functional (or at least functional with known reparable problems), again before any ship left earth. If you can't send a pair of ships together, you can at least pre-position the life raft.
Voyages of this length will have to have engineering crewmen capable of making repairs of vital subsystems, and they will have to have a supply of parts. If they have a serious failure on the way, they may be able to get where they are going, but unable to return. They would be forced to wait (27 months) for the rescue ship to get there, at the very least.
My cousin was a Chief Petty Officer on the supple ship Seattle. When I toured his ship, he showed me a huge parts supply room. I asked him if these parts where for the task force The Seattle was deployed with, he said no, it was for his ship so if they have to make repairs in the middle of the ocean or in a battle setting, they will have all the parts they need. Blew me away.
I guess they need to take that mentality into space if they are to be successful.
Thousand tons to orbit heavy lift capability, plllt, problem solved.
Can't handle the forbes webpage. The Enterprisemission webpage is bad, but this is worse.
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