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NASA studies adding crew to super rocket test flight
CBS News ^ | February 24, 2017, 3:45 PM | William Harwood

Posted on 02/24/2017 4:42:53 PM PST by BenLurkin

NASA managers said Friday they hope to know within a month or so whether it might be feasible -- or advisable -- to put two astronauts on board the first test flight of a huge 322-foot-tall Space Launch System super booster scheduled for its maiden launch late next year.

The study, requested by the Trump administration, already is underway, but William Hill, deputy associate administrator for Exploration Systems Development at NASA Headquarters, said major technical challenges will need to be resolved, and the agency will need more money to make it happen.

“It’s going to take a significant amount of money, and money that will be required fairly quickly to implement what we need to do,” he told reporters. “So it’s a question of how we refine the funding levels and the phasing of the funding for the next three years and see where it comes out.”

If the feasibility study doesn’t pan out, he said, “we still have a very exciting mission.”

The current plan calls for launching a “Block 1” SLS rocket in late 2018 -- Exploration Mission 1, or EM-1 -- to boost an unpiloted Orion capsule on a three-week flight beyond the moon and back to a high-speed re-entry and splashdown.

EM-2, featuring an astronaut crew, would be launched atop a Block 1B SLS rocket in the late 2021 timeframe. Unlike the EM-1 rocket, the Block 1B version of the SLS would feature a more powerful, human-rated “exploration upper stage,” or EUS.

(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: nasa; orion; sls; spacelaunchsystem

1 posted on 02/24/2017 4:42:53 PM PST by BenLurkin
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To: BenLurkin

Very exciting....

For the Astronauts?


2 posted on 02/24/2017 4:47:09 PM PST by Del Rapier
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To: BenLurkin

Don’t put people on cargo ships.

Crew ships should maximize safety. They should be small, and expensive, and safe.

Cargo ships should maximize efficiency. They should be big, cheap, and get the job done.


3 posted on 02/24/2017 4:49:53 PM PST by Born to Conserve
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To: BenLurkin

Could be a setup, send the astronauts to their doom then blame trump...

Shades of how they blamed Ronald Reagan for the Challenger Disaster.


4 posted on 02/24/2017 4:54:51 PM PST by GraceG (Only a fool works hard in an environment where hard work is not appreciated...)
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To: BenLurkin

Load it up with illegals and refugees.


5 posted on 02/24/2017 5:17:34 PM PST by TonyM
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To: BenLurkin

IIRC, we did this with the Saturn V.


6 posted on 02/24/2017 5:44:33 PM PST by null and void (Drain the swamp!)
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To: BenLurkin

I’ll volunteer to be their guinea pig. Slingshot me around the moon and back. What weight will I need to be?


7 posted on 02/24/2017 6:31:16 PM PST by Two Kids' Dad (((( More and More Winning! ))))
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To: TonyM

And top it off with Muzzy outreaches.


8 posted on 02/24/2017 7:56:05 PM PST by mcshot (MSM = MST = Main Stream Thash. They report all but the truth.)
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To: null and void
Apollo IV and VI were unmanned Saturn V test flights, before people got on top of them. They had to make sure there were no POGO effects and such.
9 posted on 02/24/2017 8:00:24 PM PST by LimitedPowers (Citizenship is not a Hate Crime!)
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To: GraceG

Shades of how they blamed Ronald Reagan for the Challenger Disaster.

...

I’m sure they tried, but I don’t think it’s remembered that way.


10 posted on 02/24/2017 8:04:32 PM PST by Moonman62 (Make America Great Again!)
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To: null and void

I learned the other day that the Shuttle had what should have been a fatal mishap on the first flight. The solid rockets created a shockwave on the pad that bent the body flap way beyond limits and should have broken it. John Young said if he’d known about it, he would have flown to a safe altitude and ejected. But they were lucky and the flap worked, otherwise they wouldn’t have made it through reentry.


11 posted on 02/24/2017 8:09:25 PM PST by Moonman62 (Make America Great Again!)
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To: BenLurkin

Send it up with Obunghole and Schmucky Schumer as crew.


12 posted on 02/24/2017 8:15:49 PM PST by beethovenfan (I always try to maximize my carbon footprint.)
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To: Moonman62

https://www.amazon.com/Challenger-Revealed-Insiders-Administration-Greatest/dp/1560259809

Libtards spared no chances to slam ronnie.


13 posted on 02/24/2017 10:30:27 PM PST by GraceG (Only a fool works hard in an environment where hard work is not appreciated...)
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To: null and void

True, but the tested partial stacks of saturn V i think....

The first test of all three stages was manned apollo 8 i think...


14 posted on 02/24/2017 10:33:01 PM PST by GraceG (Only a fool works hard in an environment where hard work is not appreciated...)
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To: GraceG

That’s a book written many years after the fact (2007) by a Democrat whackadoodle. Read the second editorial which states that the nutbag author used hearsay from an astrologer to support his claim that Reagan was to blame.


15 posted on 02/24/2017 10:54:31 PM PST by Moonman62 (Make America Great Again!)
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