Yep, they do. And I forgot to mention that. Clearly, making sure there is usable water there is priority #1, because if there isn’t, the lunar base would never be much more than a bigger ISS - hellishly expensive to keep stocked, and therefore very small and very specialized.
But there’s still a good chance that there’s water on the moon - Lunar Prospector’s hydrogen readings still need to be explained. It’s just that it may not be in big thick sheets, but as more like frost mixed in with the soil. That would make it more expensive to process, but not impossible.
A good start for a return to the moon would be an ice prospecting mission. It doesn’t even have to be manned. A core drilling robot, some rovers that can get into the darker recesses of craters, etc.
This is going to be a very exciting year for space science. Besides Bush’s potential support for a reinvigoration of space exploration, we’ve got a whole fleet of spacecraft reaching Mars next month, three landers for Mars, and Cassini reaches Saturn this summer, with the Huygens probe landing on Titan.
And to cap it off, we’ll probably see at least one attempt at the X-prize soon. Some people think Rutan will go for it before the 100th Anniversary of the Kitty Hawk flight. That’s only a couple of weeks away. Fun time to be a space enthusiast.
If we really wish to focus on the future of extraterrestrial exploration, we will begin terraforming mars for colonization. Studies show that it’ll take around 500 years to fully complete, but once done we can begin to grow food, it’ll be warm enough to live on, and oxygen will become plentiful. Practically, this is a better idea. But frankly it won’t ever happen because politicians will never invest in an idea they won’t see finished in their lives. I think the next best thing may be going back to the Moon, not because of another space race, but simply because there are so many things we learned from the lunar exploraitons, but learning always leaves us with more questions. It would be good to spend a significant amount of time on the surface to collect as much data as possible.
It’s a strong step forward that I’m sure will be criticized by democrats, but anytime Bush does anything (good or bad) they criticize him. Not saying the republican party is better by any means, but what I’m trying to say is that as a nation, something we see as unnecessary and wasteful may be a sound investment for our future. After all, it could solve the problem of overpopulation… but that’s another thread.
All in all, I think that everyone is reading too much into this as a space race: China did say that they wanted to do it over a gradual period as to not make themselves suffer financially much like the russians and americans did during the 60’s. They’re not interested in a race, rather they are in their own sector of exploration. I think this was a good chance for Bush to end a 20 year stagnation in the space program, which is constantly losing public interest and therefore tax money.
The latest results regarding lunar H[sub]2[/sub]O are certainly a bummer.
Sam
---- And plenty of science could be done - deep space astronomy from the other side of the moon, lunar geology, prospecting, etc.
Deep space astronomy can be conducted with satellites: I understand that they are equally effective in blocking errant radio waves from earth as well. (Correct me if I’m off).
Lunar Geology - Why is this interesting? <<i.e. Gimme some links>>
Prospecting - It is probably costly to send moon ore to earth.
Long term, it may make sense to use lunar matter to build power satellites (as Gerard K O’Neill recommended some years back). But I’m wondering about more immediate goals.
Also, I oppose manned expeditions to Mars. One of the most fascinating question about the red planet is whether it contains any forms of life on it (presumably bacterial, but possibly like this). If so, I wouldn’t want to risk contamination with Earth-bacteria: it may leave us uncertain about our results.
Just a reminder. Two Mars rovers are scheduled to land in January and Cassini will arrive at Saturn in June, I hope 2004 will be a good year for robots.
I think the money spent on collecting moon rocks would be better spent on alternative energy and engine research. Chemical rockets will only get us so far, so fast. We need more money being spent on the various Ion engines and whatnot, to make space travel economically feasible with a human payload. I know that there may be some things that only a human in space can do; Are those things worth the massive dollar (and payload) cost? I don’t think so.
The space situation of today reminds me vaguely of the ‘horseless carriage’ situation of the late 19th century: It’s cool, the eventual usefullness is apparent, but just like steam engines suck as automotive engines, chemical rockets suck at getting us jetting around the solar system. We should build advanced ‘core’ technologies first, make snow angels on the moon later.
Heavy lift remains with the shuttle, which means, maybe a Shuttle C configuration. No more people, just big payloads, roughly 40 tones to LEO. So I see this as a focus for NASA, not a destination. Forget LEO, scope out local resources and requirements. I can almost see an assembly of a Prometheus prototype nuclear rocket as a final stage. From there, use the Prometheus platform as a returning barge, it throws payloads out, comes back, get refueled and reloaded through Shuttle C launch and off it goes again.
Pinch me, but I can almost convince myself that we’re going to build a space infrastructure.
Blah blah blah. “The government should make a lunar program” some people say. “The gov’t should make a Mars program” other people say.
What this person says is, the government should get out of the space transportation industry and let the private sector move in. There are too many obstacles right now, NASA being one of the largest. NASA should go back to its NACA (ie. pre-1950s) roots, and rather than building ships, it should do fundamental research on the components needed to make ships, so that end-users can define what they want the ship to be like, and can design and assemble it themselves.
When NACA did basic research on airfoils and other airplane technology, they laid the foundation for over a half-century of American industrial dominance in the airplane industry. NASA should do the same for Earth-to-orbit as well as interplanetary propulsion systems (chemical, nuclear, electric, etc.).
Sorry if this post is too grumpy. I just can’t stand it anymore when people say the government should do x, y or z with their space program, when it seems clear to me that the government is wasting resources rather than doing very much of anything useful in space.
A serious question though…where will the money for this come from? Obviously we are strapped atm. We are running at high deficits, no? We still have a huge amount of money that will be pouring into Iraq in the indefinite future. So…that means, IF we do this (something I’m not convinced we WILL…Bush makes his final decision on Dec. 17th bth) something will have to give. Where will the cuts come from? How would we pay for even the (relatively) modest cost of a foot prints and photos trip to the moon?? Let alone plans to establish a perminent base there (btw, as I read it, the ‘base’ would be automated, not manned).
I’m all for space exploration. I think we, as a SPECIES, should be doing much more. But its wasteful and plain stupid for any one country to try and do this on its own…for its own prestiege. I think lunar exploration is a good thing. Even setting up a research facility like the one in antartica is a good thing. However, I think a better way to go about this, from every angle (economic, political, technical), is NOT for AMERICA to do this…but for the US to partner with other countries and do such a far reaching mission jointly. Wouldn’t it generate some goodwill in the world if America partnered with many other countries, in a TRUE partnership for the exploration of the moon and the setting up of a research station there? Wouldn’t it defray the costs and allow us, as a species, to do so much more? Wouldn’t bring us closer together if MANY countries participated, be it in money, technical skills, labor, resources, etc??
Its the only way anything significant in space will ever get done…IMO.
Anyone interested in the future of robotic exploration would do well to read Donna Shirley’s Managing Martians. She was the project manager for Sojourner, the little rover that hitched a ride on Pathfinder and captured everybody’s imagination. Her book is not just about the technical and scientific challenges; it’s also about the horrifying bureaucratic and political hurdles that any mission of this kind must overcome. Well worth reading. Based on this, the idea of blanketing Mars with hundreds of automated devices seems pretty unrealistic. (Oh, and making a couple available to the public as prizes or for fundraising seems neat, but the several-hour transmission delay, the short operational duration, and the risk of damaging the device makes the notion unworkable, in my mind.)
I agree with Cobalt that after a certain point private enterprise has to take over. Mars evangelist Robert Zubrin in one of his books goes through the overhead a government contractor builds into a job, and suggests that if something costs a hundred million on the government rolls, actual practical expenditure is more like twenty or thirty million. I don’t know enough to know how much he’s overstating his case, but the theory is sound. I like the idea behind Greg Benford’s novel The Martian Race: Establish a twenty-billion-dollar prize that goes to the first team to land a party on Mars, have them stay a period of time, and return. Then let the entrepreneurs have at it.
But in general terms, yeah, we’re long overdue for a return to serious space exploration. It’s not just the practicality of new areas of growth and economic development; it’s the sheer romantic vision of it.
It seems to me we should be working on a space elevator before we start going wild sending humans hither and yon. From my understanding, it’s an accomplishment that could be achieved in about the same time frame as sending humans to Mars and would have a LOT more long-term use.
And doing it with manned exploration is more realistic?!?! I’m with Una Persson and (more or less) Brutus on this issue [an interesting alliance, eh?!] The history of the space program shows how we have accomplished so much for so little money with unmanned probes and accomplished so little with so much money with manned ones. I can understand why we might have wanted to try to orbit the earth and put a man on the moon. But, the Space Shuttle has been pretty much of a useless boondoggle and the Space Station is looking like even more of a disaster. About the only thing that is coming out of it is the creation of a nice big man-made black hole: money goes in and nothing escapes back out!
If you must do this stuff, at least call it “technology development” instead of “science” because precious little science has been done with manned space flight compared to unmanned. And, when you factor in relative costs, the comparison becomes simply ridiculous! Worse yet, the politicians are told they are funding science when they fund this stuff and thus shortchange real science in favor of this.
As for spin-offs, sure there will be spinoffs. But, that doesn’t show that we still couldn’t use the money in way more productive ways.
Ahh, another space exploration thread that I can sound like a broken record on.
NASA doesn’t make bold leaps. It makes sure everything is tested in advance. Look at the moon missions. Apollo 7 was the first real launch, but we didn’t actually land on the moon until Apollo 11. The earlier missions made sure we could send people to the moon and back, then made sure we could release a lander, allow it to descend toward the moon, and launch back for rendezvous with the command module, etc. All this had to be preceded by the Gemini missions, which showed that you could dock moving spacecraft at all, which were preceded by the Mercury missions, which showed that human spaceflight could even be done.
So, then: Mars.
The most efficient Mars mission will take three years: 6 months departing flight time, two years for the launch window to open again, and 6 months back. We know of no resources on which to survive there, so everything for three years has to be loaded on the ship. Don’t you think we ought to practice that mission in a place that only takes three days to get to? And use the ISS to see if you can go six months in microgravity and still set up base camp?
As to those other posters who claim the money would be better spent somewhere else: you think we spend money on NASA? Divide their roughly 14 billion dollars among 280 million Americans, the government spends about 50 space bucks a year on your personal behalf, and almost all of it goes to Americans (what, you thought they used the bills as kindling for the rockets?)
Out of every federal dollar the government spends, about two-thirds of a penny goes to NASA for everything they do: Manned space, unmanned space, astronomy, cosmology, aeronautics, etc. The total NASA budget wouldn’t make a pisshole in the snow of the rest of the Federal Budget.
Let me say, not that anyone said anything else, this is not a new idea. For the last decade (at least) there have been serious and knowledgable voices saying that a return to the moon is the next logical step in Space exploration.
Up until now it seemed pie in the sky, so to speak, a debate that usually was framed eitherreturn to moon, build a base and space infrastructure leave from there to Mars or go straight to Mars.
As to the money I think it it is the best of both worlds: Corporate welfare for the aero-space industry, a New deal-like jobs program, some minor international political benefits and a rise in National morale. This does not even begin to touch the usual reasons given: scientific progress, new technologies, leading mankind boldly into the future & firing young people of all nation’s imagination – all of which I buy.
It’s a ploy to help divert the public attention away from what he’s doing to the country. It’s a classic maneuver that has worked throughout history (with the notable exception of the Russo-Japanese War). As the investigations heat up in Washington over 9/11 and who knew what when, BushCo is going to need all the diversionary tactics they can muster.
Alternative energy sources don’t require extensive research, they require a market. Nobody wants it. When gas hits $2.00 in the US there will be a cry from the SUV crowd for hybrids which are the next obvious frontier. The future you want today will come from a different market. That market is space exploration. The need for energy conservation and new energy sources can be found in Moon colonies and Mars’s expeditions.
:eek: 