First commercial Moon landing gets go-ahead

WorldNetDaily ^ | 05 September 2002 | KENDALL POWELL

[GATOR NAVY]

What a coincidence-I drink a pot of coffee a day and Clapton is God...

[Orangedog]

Couldn't they just re-manufacture the 3rd stage of the Saturn 5? The design has been proven and there could be substantial weight saving just by upgrading the on-board computer, electronics and fuel cells. I don't know if it would fit in the shuttle's cargo bay, but I'm sure that it (the 3rd stage w/LEM) could be modified to fit or brought up seperately. Contrary to popular myth, the blueprints to the Saturn 5 were not all lost or destroyed. Why spend the money to design and build an entirely new vehicle when the big dollars and hard work were done 30 years ago?

[Junior]

Now how, pray-tell, does the shuttle get to the Moon? It barely has enough boost to get itself into a low orbit.

[GATOR NAVY]

Ok, maybe I can grumpily see the the State Dept. input now, but where does NOAA come in? I notice the article didn't say where they plan to launch from.

[Frank_Discussion]

'Bout dang time, too! Fire up the boilers, that 14-day lunar night is a-comin', get downright cold!

[Cincinatus]

Why spend the money to design and build an entirely new vehicle when the big dollars and hard work were done 30 years ago?

Your point that we once had a working, heavy-lift launch vehicle is well taken and yes, we could re-manufacture Saturn V. However, it would require an entirely new launch infrastructure at the Cape, whereas we already have a working STS processing, assembly, and launch facility available. Also, Saturn V, while a superb machine, was even more labor-intensive than Shuttle (the S-II second stage was (literally) hand-made -- thousands of man-hours work in each one. And those guys were not paid minimum-wage).

NASA has an architecture in hand that could return us to the Moon within 5 years, using existing STS and Delta-IV launches and other easily made, Shuttle-derived hardware.

And it even uses the Space Station, too! :-)

[Frank_Discussion]

"Contrary to popular myth, the blueprints to the Saturn 5 were not all lost or destroyed."

Actually, the bulk of the documentation was warehoused and govenment excess some time ago, but excessed items are often destroyed after a time. Very DAMN sad. NASA didn't realize they had a national treasure on their hands.

"Why spend the money to design and build an entirely new vehicle when the big dollars and hard work were done 30 years ago?"

It could be reverse-engineered without the bulk of the blueprints, but it would be expensive. And the tooling to build the Saturns is pretty much gone or beyond the ability to refurbish.

Besides, new technology has already proven to be better in the commercial sector. A guy named Andrew Beal built and tested with his own capital an engine at the same power as the Saturn V main engine. He was aiming at a sattellite market saturated by the government, though, and realized he would never be able to compete. Much sheaper than NASA's development, and actually a simpler design, to boot.

[Onelifetogive]

Now how, pray-tell, does the shuttle get to the Moon? It barely has enough boost to get itself into a low orbit.

I have been wondering about the physics of this. It has engines, fuel (does it need in space refueling?).

Additional boosters would be a deal-killer.

Is it unable to achieve escape velocity?

[Junior]

Is it unable to achieve escape velocity?

That'd be the case. Orbital velocity, IIRC, is 8000 m/s. Escape velocity is 11,000 m/s. That extra three kilometers per second is the real killer.

[Prodigal Son]

This would be great. I would love to pack all those "The Moon Landing Never Happened!!" feebs onto the shuttle and take them on a tour of the Apollo landing sites.

They wouldn't believe they were on the moon even if you took 'em. They'd say the Gov't had built a very realistic model and taken them there (or something). Like the warden in Cool Hand Luke said:

"Some men you just can't reach..."

[Gothmog]

Professional point-missers like this are the reason why the US space program has declined:

"But Wendell Mendell of NASA's office for human exploration at the Johnson Space Center in Houston contends that public efforts will make it to the Moon before commercial endeavours, and cites European and Japanese trips scheduled for the next year."

Yeah, Wendell, keep cheering on those "public efforts." We were on the moon what, 30 years ago? Haven't been back since. And then he cites the success of "foreign" "public efforts." We were way ahead of the curve and now we can only point to the successes of other governments because govt. employees like him seem to be completely content sitting on earth collecting a "public" paycheck.

What a knee-jerk socialist response from our space agency. Instead of promoting a US company's efforts to explore space (NASA's mission), he tries to downplay it -- by pointing to the success other government's are having. What a moron.

[GATOR NAVY]

LMAO-in the late '70s I had a girlfriend whose father thought the moon landings were a hoax-or maybe he was just messing with my head. He also liked to eat raw onions like apples...

[Prodigal Son]

Well, if they were Vidalia onions it's ok. Matter of fact I wish I had one of those right now (never seen 'em here in the UK)- I sure do miss 'em.

I used to know an old fellow that thought the Earth was flat. He said everybody that's ever circumnavigated the globe in a commerical airliner was flat out lying- no joke. He of course didn't believe in the moon landings either.

[SerpentDove]

BG

[GATOR NAVY]

No, I think they were Walla Walla Sweets

[Frank_Discussion]

I met Mr. Mendell some years ago, and he's actually quite a nice fellow, and very intelligent. It just goes to show that even very educated people can be fitted for blinders.

[SerpentDove]

>> LMAO-in the late '70s I had a girlfriend whose father thought the moon landings were a hoax-or maybe he was just messing with my head. He also liked to eat raw onio<<

I had an aunt who thought the moon landings were fake, but that wrestling was real.

(actually, that's a joke I heard somewhere...)

[GATOR NAVY]

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