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Fred Kiesche at Martian Soil links to a Leonard David column on something I myself touched on last fall: what happens if and when the MERs “die”. (Oh, well, okay, so my entry on the topic was a bit of morbid humor on the fate of the Astrobots, but it’s the same basic idea…) It sounds like the Aldrige Commission is starting to do some of the case-building that will be needed to cement public support for the Moon-Mars plan. They’re tackling the “better spent here” criticism with an old-fashioned appeal to tangible interests…
…and they’re taking on the “trillion-dollar” sticker-shock hysteria:
That’s an appealing assertion, but NASA is going to have it’s work cut out for it demonstrating that it is capable of carrying out the plan on an allowance. Which, conveniently, is exactly what Sean O’Keefe is beginning to do:
It’s good that he recognizes this, and that he appears to be taking steps to remedy the credibility issue — it will make the “trillion dollar” criticism that much less credible if NASA does (as was anticipated when O’Keefe was brought in) manage to get its finances in order. In reference to a spate of flying saucer reports coming from that country, Mark Whittington asks (no doubt tongue-in-cheek) what interest “space aliens” have in Iran. Curiously, this Iran “saucer flap” news follows a number of recent news articles on new reconnaissance and strike UAVs, some of which are described as “UFO-like” objects. In addition to UAVs, there is increasing interest in the military use of high-altitude and heavy-lift airships — some of which have, shall we say, exotic shapes which are easily mistaken by the credulous for something otherworldly. Given this possible explanation for what (if anything) might actually be behind these reports, the why behind it all is left as an exercise for the reader. Disclaimer: lest someone interpret this post as an endorsement of ufology, it isn’t intended as such, nor do I have an interest in or respect for that subject. The three-dolphin rhumba is getting some attention in light of the Moon-Mars plan. The thrust of the article is that sexual urges and the associated interpersonal relationships between crewmembers could be distracting and possibly even dangerous on long missions, such as the manned missions to Mars proposed as part of the Bush plan.
Why two? Why not an even split? Hey, why not five women and one very, very lucky engineer… Ahem… Anyway…the boffins have apparently developed some, er, “creative” solutions to this “problem”:
I’ll bet the conversations around the JSC water-coolers this week have been pretty interesting.
Ouch… (And here is a PG-rated site with links to much more information on the subject.) Cragg Hines opines in the Houston Chronical on the Hubble decision and a possible robotic servicing mission. After calling Sean O’Keefe a “piece of work” in the very first sentence, he proceeds to dismiss the robotic mission concept as a CYA move designed more to blunt the criticism of O’Keefe’s unpopular decision than to produce tangible results. After a recitation of the usual arguments against abandoning Hubble, he then turns to Dr. Bob for his unsurprisingly sympathetic opinion:
His assessment of the fuse-changing capablities of ground-based robots could be accurate, but it isn’t relevant to the prospects of a Hubble servicing mission. For one thing, we already know — having done it a few times before — how to send spacecraft into orbit, and to change orbits once there. Sending a robot across a nearly-empty environment where navigation is a matter of well-understood physics and mathematics is vastly different from pushing one down the basement steps, forcing it to deal with a complex, human-optimized environment with unpredictable obstacles. For another, unlike the basement fuse box, Hubble does not presuppose a great deal of dexterity on the part of those servicing it. It is already designed to be retrieved by a robot (a robot arm, to be more precise) and serviced by astronauts with dexterity diminished by the bulky gloves of their pressure suits. It may be reading too much into what was likely an off-the-cuff comment, but it’s important to reject the “utter nonsense” portion of his quote. There doesn’t seem to be anything that makes a robotic servicing mission impossible as such (though how difficult it might be depends on what exactly it would be expected to accomplish), and the idea merits serious consideration rather than a contemptuous dismissal. In his antipathy towards anything that might further the case against a manned servicing mission, Zubrin misses the commercial potential in the technology and skills developed for a robotic Hubble rescue, which the hypothetical fuse-changing robot or even a restored Shuttle mission would lack. As much as I agree with the goal of getting humans to Mars, it should be done in tandem with (or by means of) a broader development of human activities and especially commercial activities in space if a human presence on Mars and elsewhere in the solar system is to be sustainable. Whether or not one agrees with the decision not to fly Shuttle to Hubble, the decision has been made, and will be difficult to overturn. Out of that decision, however, there appears to be emerging an opportunity for broadening the base of economic activity space. Sabotaging such an opportunity, when there is only a small chance of overturning the decision, is an unwise gamble. UPDATE: Speaking of satellite rescue robots, Orbital Recovery is in the news today (4/29), with the announcement of additional financial support for the development of their orbital rescue system. [via HobbySpace]
I’m told there is a drug company (GlaxoSmithKlineBeecham?) running a commercial with a company rep discussing drug development. He compares the cost of development of a new drug to a Shuttle mission, arguing that drug development cost less than or about the same amount as one Shuttle mission. At the end, he claims that while drug development isn’t rocket science (groan), it is more important. By way of explaining why newer drugs are so expensive, the ad apparently points a finger at space as a symbol of wasteful government spending. Since I don’t watch television, I can only repeat this secondhand. Has anyone else seen this ad? Employees at NASA and other government agencies are apparently under the gag regarding the upcoming global warming scare movie The Day After Tomorrow:
Hm. Maybe they just have the good sense to avoid being associated with another schlockfest of Armageddon proportions. UPDATE: NASA is defusing the rumors. Jeffrey Bell came out last week with another questionable op-ed on space, having to do with the adaptation of Shuttle hardware into heavy-lift vehicles to support the Bush space plan (which still doesn’t have a good name). Fisking the whole thing would take too much time (which is still in short supply around here), so I’ll just focus on a few of the bigger howlers. Ben Muse comments on a recent study (abstract only) of incorporation in the 19th Century U.S. whaling industry:
Near-shore “targets of opportunity” followed by later “trips lasting years at a time” sounds curiously like the possible near-term future of humans in space.
The lesson to be learned from these whaling operations is that the standard corporate model — here, a form of organization in which the business is owned by many small shareholders and managed by a group of their representatives — may not be the most effective form for enterprises in which those doing the actual work operate of necessity with a great deal of autonomy. Time differences, variable communications delays, cost of communications, etc., point towards a similar situation with future startups on Mars, mining operations in the Main Belt, and the like. Despite fears by some of the “corporate dominance of space”, the conclusions of the study suggest that one of the results of the “social experimentation” involved in space migration may be the bypassing of the traditional corporate model in favor of smaller enterprises, funded by small groups of financiers and operated by employee-investors with a financial stake in the success of the undertaking. |
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