[extropy-chat] good space shuttle article

[Bret Kulakovich]

This is wonderful, wonderful news.

Here is the original source of the article:
http://www.planetary.org/aimformars/study-summary.html
http://www.planetary.org/aimformars/study-report.pdf


The fact that we are open now to something different is the best news  
that could come from NASA. The notion of using 'what works' as a gap  
filler to get us through development of new vehicles is great. A  
capsule based approach will let us toss 6+ people aloft with each SRM.

Just for book keeping: The Russian Energia can lift 118 tons to LEO,  
so the article making this the world-dominating HLLV isn't exactly  
so. That, and their is a Russian plan to build a super-heavy lift  
that is already past the design stage, and just needs money.  
Additionally, the SRM is approved for human transport, but not "human  
rated" yet. We have yet to run an SRM standalone, which will require  
different throttling. In a solid propellant device, this may also  
mean different propellant.

There is also a Russian Soyuz-replacement called the Klipper, that  
could be rolling out soon:
http://www.russianspaceweb.com/



While we are re-hashing 60s and 70s design: our next big step should  
be nuclear, and we should go right for the Liberty Ship HLLV:

Main:
http://www.nuclearspace.com/a_liberty_ship.htm
Gas Core info:
http://www.nuclearspace.com/a_liberty_ship7.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaseous_fission_reactor

We have enough data and work on the NERVA and other projects to do  
this right.


]3


On Aug 3, 2005, at 12:55 AM, spike wrote:

>
> I don't wish to be a prophet of gloom, but I would consider
> it reasonably likely that the space shuttle will fly no more
> forever.
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/02/science/space/02nasa.html? 
> ex=1280635200&en
> =c97b63d7bb47af82&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss
>
> {8-[   Sigh.
>
> spike
>
>
>
>
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