Is this article accurate at all?
http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?section=communique&newsid=4919
My rule of thumb about Izvestia and Pravda: anything reported there has about a 50% chance of being partiall or total fiction.
That said, there is some interest in lunar Helium-3. These guys even want ot create a private enterprise to mine lunar regolith for He-3. There’s also This presentationfrom G. L. Kulcinski appears to be the source of information that inspires the ASI guys. Apollo also demonstrated He-3 in regolith.
So, yeah, it’s there. I am not in a position to make any statement about the other charge in the article, namely, that this is a major factor in the President’s announcement.
Well, it’s true that He-3 is found on the moon, and that it can be used as a fusion fuel. However, we’re decades from being able to extract net energy from a manmade fusion on a commercial basis. We haven’t even achieved breakeven in our most sophisticated research labs yet.
Keep in mind that you are reading an American website that is reporting an article from The Hindu (India) which is reporting {i]Izvestia*, a Russian paper, speculating on American plans. The Hindu is hardly in the league of say The Times of India as far as science reporting goes (and that league isn’t terribly lofty to begin with) or that Izvestia (Russian for “spark”, meaning “the spark of the revolution”) was the Communist Party’s “organ” or ideological paper. Despite what ypour website said, it was never definitive about anything but the Communist Party stance of the day. To put it in perspective, Izvestia was the ideological counterpart to the ‘factual’ Pravda (which means “Truth”) – and Russians and Americans alike have long had a hearty scepticism about Pravda’s coverage, especially of science, technology and American plans. Let’s just say they have a “mythopoetic” approach to sci/tech in general.
Actually, now that I think about it, I’m surprised Izvestia is still published. It began as the political paper of the Petrograd (aka Leningrad or St. Petersburg) Soviet in 1917, and became synonymous with rah-rah ideological cheerleading. It was read by relatively few Soviets (compared to Pravda) even in its heyday, and though many older Russians yearn for the bygone stability and security of the USSR, I’m surprised it retained a following. If anything, I’d be less surprised if it were a sensationalistic neo-capitalist start-up cashing in on an old reputation.
But putting such speculationa aside, why would a Russian paper be the first to scoop a story about American plans, and why would they choose to cite The Hindu instead of the New York Times or some reputable European paper if it were valid?
The scientific basis seems weak, and I’d suggest that errors or exaggerations in translation are likely. Were I a reporter, I’d never report this kind of third hand story unless I was cherry-picking for skewed sensationalism. At the very least, I’d read the original Izvestia article and cite it directly
What he said (and paperbackwriter before him). Helium 3 is indeed recoverable from the lunar regolith, in theory, and it offers an excellent basis for fusion reactors, again in theory. But that’s decades away. If the article is suggesting that the Bush plan of a base on the moon has a vision of world domination more than a century off, I think the writer doesn’t understand American politics.
If you’re interested, though, the idea of monopolizing the He-3 supply forms a subplot of Ben Bova’s Moonbase Saga (Moonrise and Moonwar). Bear in mind, it’s science fiction: It’s technically accurate and scientifically responsible, but it’s science fiction nonetheless.
I just finished reading Izvestia website (you know how it is with languages - “Use it or lose it”) At first, it seemed a little bland and insipid, but not any worse than USA Today. It lacked the doctrinaire feel I remember from my misspent youth. I was actually planning to post a retraction of some of my stronger doubts about Izvestia’s credibility.
Then I got to the science articles, and the Russian mysticism I remembered: “Biblical Red Sea Miracle caused by Santorini explosion”, “Scientist says man will live to 800, and die only of accidents”, etc. The Soviets made the same claims in the 70s/80s. Some things never change.
Finally, I turned to the science supplement, and read an articles on flying to Mars
[their translation, not mine]:
Budget
In financial terms alone, the article makes no sense. NASA (with a $15.5B/yr budget, and an extra billion extra for Mars, per Bush) anticipates a hard fight funding its $20B Mars mission Russia’s current space agency budget is $300M/yr - 1/5th the reported cost of the Mars mission alone. How will they fund six times their current budget [they need to fund existing projects and ground operations, too] when they haven’t even been able to meet their full military payroll in years?
Suspiciously, $20B is the projected cost of the US mission. In the Bad Olde Days, the Soviets manufactured reality with a pair of scissors and a pot of glue. they created a patchwork of facts and figures that would seem vaguely familiar to their nontechnical leaders (and more than a few foreign sicentists)
Izvestia seems to be caught in a time warp. The article could have been written by the Soviets. As early as 1980, our space community was debating if we could meet Kennedy’s challenge to land on the moon in the same timeframe again, but in the USSR, progress was relentlessly forward. Sometimes it was “stalled by delays” but no ground was ever lost – that would be ‘demoralizing to the people’
**“The Space Plane”{/b]
For those who don’t know, this was a Soviet nickmname for their Buran (“snowstorm”) space shuttle. The Soviets liked to confuse things by claiming it could serve as a runway launched hypersonic transport (implied: bomber) because Reagan was planning a hypersonic transport initiative back then.
It was authorized in 1976, in response to the potential threat posed by the US space shuttle. Construction began in 1980. After it’s only orbital test flight (unmanned) 15 years ago, funding was immediately cut off. [The Berlin wall had just fallen], but it wasn’t officially cancelled until 1993 - two years after the USSR was dissolved. The one working model was put in storage. Two partially built shuttles were dismantled in 1995. Its production facilities became bus, syringe and diaper factories in 1998.
But if you believe Izvestia, Buran can still fly, and the 1980’s Soviet plan for a mission to Mars ca. 2015 is still ‘Green for Go’ despite 20 years of decay.
I’ll admit Buran was tres cool. They landed it, unmanned, by remote control in a 34 mph crosswind, and hit within 5 ft of the runway midline. We wouldn’t consider landing our shuttles in that kind of wind with our best pilot at the helm. Heck, make me land a Cessna in a 34 mph crosswind, and afterwards, you’d have to mop me off the cockpit floor with a gym towel (I’ve never liked landings)
Buran never flew a single manned mission; it’s been mothballed for 15 years; and it could never have reached the moon, much less Mars.