Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V12_0/V12_051.TXT

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Date: Thu, 12 Jul 1990 01:40:49 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: SPACE Digest V12 #51

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 12 : Issue 51

Today's Topics:
             Re: Bush Approves Cape York
    Re: Oppose manned Mars exploration -- support robotics
              Re: buying Soyuzes
            Re: NASA's lobbying on the net
             Re: one opinion....
           Need solar photo info ( Again )
         Re: Hubble Space Telescope Update - 07/06/90
               Re: Meaning of Palo Alto
           Re: grim tidings for the future
              Re: man-rated expendables
                buying Soyuzes
            Re: An HST update and comment
              Re: buying Soyuzes
              Re: "Outreach Program" kit
           Re: grim tidings for the future
               engine flying experience

Administrivia:

    Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to
  [e-mail].  Other mail, esp. [un]subscription notices,
  should be sent to [e-mail], or, if urgent, to
             [e-mail]

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 05:36:36 GMT
From: pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!munnari.oz.au!mel.dit.csiro.au!yarra!melba.bby.oz.au![e-mail]  (Gregory N. Bond)
Subject: Re: Bush Approves Cape York

In article <jerbil.647545471@chamber> [e-mail] (Joseph R. Beckenbach) writes:

       As for people and infrastructure, that would have to be built.
   A nearby town or three would definitely spring up, and host a few research
   universities;  I also assume that the Australian military would very much
   enjoy getting in on the act, or at least around it.

Well, the ENTIRE reason it was proposed in the first place, is that a
spaceport is a pretty damn good way to increase property values.  You
can bet they will build towns, that's the whole point.  Don't ever
think these people do it for the space.  They are property developers,
first and only.  Australia's first private university was started a
couple of years ago on the same premise - not because it would make
money, or that they had some philanthropic impulse, but because the
developer could make a killing selling the surrounding land as housing
or commercial or industrial estates.  It hasn't happened yet, and the
project (as opposed to the Uni) is in deep trouble.

And the local property market is in a really bad slump at the moment,
and there is no cash around for more property.  I cannot possibly
imagine where they will get the cash.  My captive property analyst
agrees.

And, if by some miracle they get the funding, it will be killed stone
dead because any possible site is too environmentally important, or
too close to the Great Barrier Reef, or next to some Aboriginal sacred
site, or....   Don't talk about logic; mindless Christic-like pressure
groups will do it in.  You should have heard the stink a few years ago
when they wanted to build a _road_.  And that was before the green
movement gained the enormous power it now has.

And the military:  They got no say.  It is 100.000% private, not
$0.01 of government money.  The military (which in Australia is not
the huge services/government/contractor monster that it is in the
U.S.) will have to pay like anyone else.  And there is _NO_ role in
space for the Australian military.

Re: suitcases of money for the Queensland govt:  Well, they eventually
made enough mistakes that people finally noticed and the govt called a
nice discreet enquiry.  Only trouble was, the inquirer refused to shut
up, and exposed a very large amount of corruption, and that government
is no more.  So you gotta do things the right way, more or less.

Greg, an unhappy pessimist regarding this project.
--
Gregory Bond, Burdett Buckeridge & Young Ltd, Melbourne, Australia
Internet: [e-mail]    non-MX: [e-mail]
Uucp: {uunet,pyramid,ubc-cs,ukc,mcvax,prlb2,nttlab...}!munnari!melba.bby.oz!gnb

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 19:19:32 GMT
From: groucho![e-mail]  (Steve Emmerson)
Subject: Re: Oppose manned Mars exploration -- support robotics

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail]
(Jerry Anderson) writes:

>I strongly disagree.  It is not a question of what can be done with the
>money available, it is a question of fighting for more money.  As long as
>there is no manned presence in space, the space budget will dwindle year
>after year.

What evidence do you have for this assertion?

>Nobody gets excited when a vacuum cleaner lands on Mars.  If you want money,
>get a live TV broadcast of Colonel Joe Middleamerica planting the U.S. flag
>on Mars - in living color and during prime time.

I submit that the public is irrelevant.  Only congress and the administration
matter.

Steve Emmerson        [e-mail]        ...!ncar!unidata!steve

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 22:13:14 GMT
From: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!emory!mephisto!prism![e-mail]  (Matthew DeLuca)
Subject: Re: buying Soyuzes

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Doug Mohney) writes:
>I think they made an offer of $500 million to launch Freedom on their
>heavy-lift monster. Two Energnas <sp> == 17 inital hardware flights for the
>Shuttle. And it all gets up there at ONCE!

And then this large, unproven (total of two flights to date, I believe)
rocket blows up, taking half your space station with it.  Launch on Energia
is fine, but I'd like to see some more flights first.



--
Matthew DeLuca
Georgia Institute of Technology      Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards,
Office of Information Technology     for they are subtle, and quick to anger.
Internet: [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 12 Jul 90 03:58:59 GMT
From: network.ucsd.edu!celit![e-mail]  (Dave Smith)
Subject: Re: NASA's lobbying on the net

It hardly seems to me that NASA "dominates" sci.space.  Henry Spencer
dominates sci.space and is hardly a NASA cheerleader.  I think having
the NASA people on the net is very valuable and having people who
really know something about what's going on in NASA is great.

The propaganda bulletins that come out don't bother me particularly,
either.  They're written as press releases and anyone above the age of
five knows how much faith to put into press releases.  At least here
we get to see them as coming from NASA, rather than rewritten by some
hack as "journalism" and passed off as objective.

--
David L. Smith
FPS Computing, San Diego        |        ucsd!celerity!dave or [e-mail]
All opinions disowned by me and FPS unless financially lucrative (to me, not
the litigator)

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 06:15:18 GMT
From: pacbell.com!pacbell!sactoh0!unify!csusac!csuchico.edu![e-mail]  (Ralph Reid)
Subject: Re: one opinion....

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Teddy Fabian) writes:
>
>
>I've been reading with interest the comments of various individuals
>here regarding the status of several of NASA's projects, and I've
>wondered about just what motivates those individuals to be so critical
>of NASA??
> . . .


NASA (like other bureaucratic systems) has screw ups from time to
time.  NASA has some big projects which are widely publicised, such
as the Teacher in Space project, which do not work out quite the way
they were planned.  NASA promises much, but cannot always deliver;
and, because NASA is so often in the public spotlight, widespread
criticism results.  Many people are disappointed when promises are
not fullfilled, and NASA does not always fullfil its promises.

--
Ralph.
ARS: N6BNO
Compuserve: [e-mail]
email: [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 10 Jul 90 12:14:31 GMT
From: zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!uupsi!sunic!chalmers!mathrt0.math.chalmers.se![e-mail]  (Bengt Alfredsson)
Subject: Need solar photo info ( Again )

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



    I want information about

    how to take photos of the solar eclipse.

    Do I need some filter for my camera ?

    What kind of film ?


    Please send me some ideas, I am ready for a Solar Eclipse Tour...

    If someone have send mail ( not news) to me last week, please
        send it again because the system was down.....  :-(

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
      Bengt Alfredsson         |  |        |               Computer
                            ___|  |    __  |/       Science and Engineering
  Mail:                    |   | -+-  |__| |\  Chalmers University of Technology
  [e-mail] |___|  |__ |__  | \ 412 80 Gothenburg, Sweden
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 12:22:14 GMT
From: vtserf![e-mail]  (Ron Jarrell)
Subject: Re: Hubble Space Telescope Update - 07/06/90

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ron Baalke) writes:
>
>     The biggest event with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) in the past week
>was a spacecraft safing event (specifically, a software sunpoint with the +V3

Just what's involved in the Hubble "safing" itself?  I understand that
it involves most of the systems shutting down to avoid something
silly like being pointed at the sun, but how bad is it really? It seems
it's going to take some time to reset it all.

Ron Jarrell
Virginia Tech

------------------------------

Date: 12 Jul 90 00:27:37 GMT
From: well![e-mail]  (Hank Roberts)
Subject: Re: Meaning of Palo Alto



The tree -- one very tall redwood -- is still there and still alive. It has
been fitted with a system of water pipes and 'mist' nozzles by the City of
Palo Alto to make up for the fact that it is no longer surrounded by other
redwoods and so does not get the benefit of fog condensed around them. Info
from an article in one of the San Francisco newspapers in the last month or so..

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 01:46:00 GMT
From: usc!samsung!xylogics!bu.edu!mirror!frog![e-mail]  (John Woods)
Subject: Re: grim tidings for the future

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Greg Titus) writes:
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (David Becker) writes:
> >Michael V. Kent writes:
> >When _was_ the last time NASA blew up an experimental rocket or engine?
> >(Challenger was defined as operational)
> Doesn't matter what they call it.  They're all experimental.
> By the time the entire shuttle program is ended, the SMEs will still not have
> been run for as much aggregate time as the engines on a Boeing 747 on a
> *single* New York to Tokyo round trip.

Yes, but the *design* will be decades old.  NASA ought to be blowing up
NEW rocket designs, like in the good old days.
--
John Woods, Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA, [phone]
...!decvax!frog!john, [e-mail], ...!mit-eddie!jfw, [e-mail]

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 16:32:52 GMT
From: usc!cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: man-rated expendables

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Doug Mohney) writes:
>>[manned Pegasus]
>>There's plenty of people who'd be willing to scrunch up a little for
>>half an hour for the sake of getting into orbit...!
>
>And you'll look like hamburger if anything goes wrong....me thinks I'll wait
>til the successors of the X-30 go up.

You may spend the rest of your life on the ground if you wait for that.

Incidentally, what makes you think the X-30 is less vulnerable to "major
malfunctions" than rockets?  At least the rocket technology is something
vaguely resembling mature.
--
NFS is a wonderful advance:  a Unix    | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
filesystem with MSDOS semantics. :-(   |  [e-mail]   utzoo!henry

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 16:30:45 GMT
From: usc!cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: buying Soyuzes

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Allen W. Sherzer) writes:
>>I think the Sovs won't sell just a Soyuz; they'd want to sell the whole
>>sheebang, from capsule to booster.
>
>I suspect they would sell, they need the money...

PSI and others say that nowadays at least, the Soviets will quote you a
price on *anything*.  If they don't like the idea, the price will simply
be high.  With them (unlike NASA), money is an effective lubricant.
--
NFS is a wonderful advance:  a Unix    | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
filesystem with MSDOS semantics. :-(   |  [e-mail]   utzoo!henry

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 19:17:33 GMT
From: groucho![e-mail]  (Steve Emmerson)
Subject: Re: An HST update and comment

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Eric Jaderlund)
writes:

>More important though are the comments by Jim Gunn at the end so DON'T hit
>n until you look at it.

Gunn's comments were very much appreciated and provided something to
think about -- especially when considered together with the previous
"NASA-spirit" posting.

Too many bureaucrats/managers?  Too few scientists/engineers?

Steve Emmerson        [e-mail]        ...!ncar!unidata!steve

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 20:28:42 GMT
From: mojo![e-mail]  (Doug Mohney)
Subject: Re: buying Soyuzes

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Henry Spencer) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Allen W. Sherzer) writes:
>>>I think the Sovs won't sell just a Soyuz; they'd want to sell the whole
>>>sheebang, from capsule to booster.
>>
>>I suspect they would sell, they need the money...
>
>PSI and others say that nowadays at least, the Soviets will quote you a
>price on *anything*.  If they don't like the idea, the price will simply
>be high.  With them (unlike NASA), money is an effective lubricant.

I think they made an offer of $500 million to launch Freedom on their
heavy-lift monster. Two Energnas <sp> == 17 inital hardware flights for the
Shuttle. And it all gets up there at ONCE!

Unfortunately, this brilliant idea will probably be pissed on by NASA and
Congress because A) It will take business away from the Shuttle, and
American companies B) There could be "technology transfer" (This, despite
the fact the Europeans would sell them the same hardware, and the coming
glut of Soviet researchers in the U.S. will be able to read about all
the technology in american college libraries) C) It'd be pretty damned
embarassing for all sides if there was a launch failure.

------------------------------

Date: 12 Jul 90 03:11:06 GMT
From: agate!dirac![e-mail]  (Paul R. Chernoff)
Subject: Re: "Outreach Program" kit


I can't believe that NASA/RAND are serious about this.  With an August 1990
deadline, how can they expect to get any well thought out *new* ideas
about space exploration, manned or unmanned?

It looks to me like one more NASA P.R. job, and a poorly designed one at that.

(God knows, the way things are going, NASA could certainly use some
*good* PR.)

# Paul R. Chernoff                       [e-mail]     #
# Department of Mathematics              ucbvax!math!chernoff           #
# University of California               [e-mail]    #
# Berkeley, CA  94720                                                   #

------------------------------

Date:    Wed, 11 Jul 1990 9:36:23 EDT
From: [e-mail]
Subject: Re: grim tidings for the future
X-Vmsmail-To: SMTP%"[e-mail]"

I heartily agree that NASA shouldn't be in the trucking business.  But I
am waiting for somebody else to take over that work.  As soon as there is
any competition from private industry to speak of, the business will be
going to them.  Just give it some time.  But don't cut NASA funding and
don't send us any more politicians because that isn't going to help anything
at all.
--scott
   who dislikes Cyber equipment

------------------------------

Date: 11 Jul 90 15:53:13 GMT
From: swrinde!cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: engine flying experience

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Ted Fabian) writes:
>How many 747s with four engines are flying at any one time??  maybe
>fifty??? or a hundred and fifty?? or more??

Way low.  The delivered 747 fleet was 600-700 last time I saw the numbers
(orders have now passed 1000!), and that is an expensive aircraft which
earns no money while sitting on the ground, so it is safe to assume that
well over half of them are in the sky at any time.  (Engine experience
with other widebodies is also relevant, since it's mostly the same types
of engines.)
--
NFS is a wonderful advance:  a Unix    | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
filesystem with MSDOS semantics. :-(   |  [e-mail]   utzoo!henry

------------------------------

End of SPACE Digest V12 #51
*******************