CEV Devils advocate

gawin · Dec 1, 2005

all this debate and talk about capsules VS space planes and CEV their is a couple of things that stand out in my mind. The fact that in the 60's and 70's we used a capsule to go to the moon. Now this is going to have the effect on people that we have been their done that. regardless as to the fact that it is probably the cheapest and safest route to the moon at this time. The John Q Public is going to say.... Why are we spending billons of dollars doing the same thing we already did with basically the same system. These are the same people who elect the people who vote on the funding of these projects. Nasa needs to do something to engross the publics attention and frankly this will not do the trick. The other main concern i have is with them using / developing a launch system based off an ET. wile again this will be the cheapest and fastest solution to the problem. we again run into John Q Publics thinking on this. They see the ET as the cause of the shuttle disaster and also see that 2 billon was spent to redesign the thing only to have it still shedding possible life ending material and that the latest is that they found more cracks on the tank. Now try getting people to spend more money on a new system based off this same technology is not going to sit well with many voters. these people will not take the time to understand that as long as the payload isn't side mounted that shedding will not be a problem. all they will see is that same orange foam that is causing all these problems. I for one am excited to see us planing on going back to the moon as i was only a few days past my first birthday when we did it the first time. But i do not believe that using these methods even though they are the most efficient and safest routes at this time will capture the publics attention and will lead to a major lack of funding and possibly the cancellation of the projects.

spacester · Dec 2, 2005

In a Representative Democracy, we elect leaders to represent our best interests, so we can go about our business in life. These Representatives are nominally obliged to hire competent administrators and listen to their advice as they together go about the people’s business. In the case of a highly technical endeavor such as space flight, especially given a less than stellar record of producing results, we all seek a NASA Administrator who is good enough at his job to be the guy willing to say: “Here’s how it’s going to work” AND to be right when he says it. We need a guy who can take the risk of trying to sell a capsule program to a public enamored with space planes. And we need to listen to him when we finally find him. If the Public cannot accept the Dr. Griffin’s statement that the laws of physics haven’t changed since Apollo and that Apollo was a good strategy and that CEV is the vehicle to get us where we want to go, well, that’s a problem with the Public, not with the Administrator. Their ignorance cannot be allowed to guide policy. So the system actually seems to be working in this case. Go figure. The proper response IMO: we all should write our Congresspersons and Senators and tell them to give Mike Griffin everything he asks for, including the $500 Million he needs to make Shuttle Ops work in the real world. His predecessor assumed savings that will never show up but Mike isn’t going to fudge the numbers any more so they need to give him what he asks for and let’s finally get this space age in gear. It will be the best half-a-billion they ever spent. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

gawin · Dec 3, 2005

I think that going to the moon sparks a lot of interest but doing it virtualy the same way it was done 30 years ago that it just will not capture the public eye. the big problem is NASA gave the public a "space plane" aka the shuttle and they see anything less then that as old and out dated. to the general public it would be like giving you a new corvette to go for a drive across the US then telling you on your next trip you have to do it in a VW bug. NASA needs to pull a rabbit out of thier hat to get the publics eye. people easaly remember the problems but are very forgetful of acomplishments. I dont have an answer to this on how they could do it with the funding they have and the tech they have avalable. I wish i did. I want to see a moon landing that i will actualy remember seeing.

digitalman2 · Dec 3, 2005

Personally, I am glad common sense has taken over and NASA is building a system that can work and be done in a reasonable time using materials and technologies that will not take another 20 years to bring to a production-level status. To wait that long for an operational vehicle would mean throwing away any chance at leadership in space exploration and allowing other nations to take that role. Like Dr. Griffin said recently, "Of the spacefaring nations, only russia and china currently have vehicles capable of reentry to earth from the moon." I really don't know how the idea of a space plane can be so popular with some. If you want to talk of public interest, then if hollywood has had any impact on perception of space vehicles then surely space planes are so like watching black and white movies. Most sci-fi all uses very different and sometimes exotic shaped vehicles but hardly ever do you see something like a plane except for small fighter-type craft. Therefore, if you really want to capture the public attention, restore your access to space with a simple vehicle, help seed the commercial access to space market, and then later you can devise plans to build an impressive sci-fi worthy in-space only vehicle. I do believe that having a simple operational system for achieving LEO, Lunar and other misssions will allow NASA to have more resources available for continued research into advanced propulsion, materials, power generation and various other technologies needed to build more advanced spacecraft in the future. But at least they will be in the position where they can do the research and build test models for evaluation and not have the pressure to rush the technologies out into production before they are proven to actually work. I have watched in awe every shuttle flight since the beginning and yet it is clear we can do better. It seems to me a system that costs $4.5 billion a year whether you fly or not certainly would beg for change give

vt_hokie · Dec 3, 2005

As a kid growing up in the 1980's, I remember reading books about the space shuttle, and invariably they would highlight the amazing capabilities of the vehicle vs. earlier spacecraft. They would of course point out that gone are the days of primitive splashdowns - now we can return in a more civilized fashion in a reusable space plane. So, it's kind of hard to accept the return to the "parachute down in a tin can" approach to spaceflight. After 2010, we will no longer have the up/down mass capability offered by STS, nor will we have a spacecraft capable of carrying 7 or 8 people into space. If the heavy lift launch vehicle ever materializes, we will have the up mass capability, but still no way to return things such as the MPLM. Returning to the moon would be a cool thing to see, but what's the cost, and what's the real return on investment for sending 4 astronauts on a weeklong excursion to the moon a couple of times a year? I was a lot more excited by the promises I grew up with as a kid than I am by our current direction in space. CEV is a far cry from what I expected to see in the new century!

dobbins · Dec 3, 2005

"the big problem is NASA gave the public a "space plane" aka the shuttle and they see anything less then that as old and out dated." Actually much of the public sees the Shuttle as dangerous and unreliable after two fatal incidents, a host of launch scrubs, and several safety related groundings.

dragon04 · Dec 3, 2005

Personally, I don't believe that John Q Public in general much cares whether we go back to the Moon or forward to Mars. In fact, the more elaborate, expensive and spiffy looking you make the spacecraft, I personally believe NASA would run the risk of alienating the taxpaying public even further. I don't truly think it's a stretch to say that the large majority of Americans really don't care if we put men in space, period. To echo what I've posted before, there's really no imperative that the average American can latch onto that would make them intersted to the point of being pro-manned flight activists. As far as ET based launch vehicles go, I think it woould be easy enough to show people that one would be comparing the CEV apple to the STS orange regarding the foam shedding problem. As you've pointed out, the CEV sits above the foam, not next to it. If anything, that might be a selling point to continue the use of boosters that use an ET. I'd like to believe that the public could get enthusiastic about the next generation of spaceflight, but I'm afraid the reality is that no matter what, most couldn't care less to begin with. SO that brings us back to designing, building and implementing the least expensive system possible to minimize the expense to the taxpayer. As long as we do that, and have a safe, reliable and robust system, we're at least not wasting the disinterested public's money. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "2012.. Year of the Dragon!! Get on the Dragon Wagon!". </div>

rsp1202 · Dec 3, 2005

Just as a matter of perspective, the U.S. Eighth Air Force during WWII bombing missions over Germany suffered the highest casualty rate of all Allied forces: 12%. Out of over 10,000 missions, aircraft losses totaled over 4,000, or 41%. Out of over 100 shuttle astronauts and 100 shuttle flights, the comparative figures are about 14% and 40%. If you lose that many good people and close to half your fleet -- especially when no one's shooting at you -- something's wrong.

rsp1202 · Dec 3, 2005

That's based on over 100 shuttle flights/five orbiters total.

ve7rkt · Dec 4, 2005

Sorry, but those stats are all wrong. In WW2 you're comparing 10,000 missions flown to 4,000 aircraft lost; you should then compare the Shuttle's >100 missions flown to 2 craft lost, giving better than 2%. There have been far, far, far more than 100 shuttle astronauts. It should be somewhere between 600 and 700 seats filled, I think. Most flights had 7 astronauts aboard. Again, that gives you something better than 2%.

rsp1202 · Dec 4, 2005

Eighth AF losses based on figures taken from: http://www.taphilo.com/history/8thaf/8aflosses.shtml and: http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?path=/GovernmentPolitics/MilitaryPresenceinGeorgia&id=h-2692 If those numbers are incorrect, than please provide your own. I'd like to know. Number of active astronauts in astronaut office at any given time is average taken from: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/spacenews/factsheets/pdfs/astro.pdf Five shuttles, two lost: 40%. Average number of astronauts in astronaut office at any given time: approx. 100; 14 shuttle astronaut deaths: 14%.

najab · Dec 4, 2005

>If those numbers are incorrect, than please provide your own.Your raw numbers are right, it is your interpertation that is incorrect. There were over 4,000 aircraft lost in 10,000 missions - but some of those missions might include several hundred aircraft, the biggest nearly 1000. So the number of actual flights was likely well over 100,000,000.

ve7rkt · Dec 4, 2005

Average number of astronauts in astronaut office at any given time: approx. 100; 14 shuttle astronaut deaths: 14%. Average number of cars in my family's driveway: 2 Number of cars that my family has destroyed or scrapped in the last 30 years: 4 So, 200% of the cars my family owns, die. The average number of astronauts in the astronaut office at any given time... isn't important. If you're going to look at how many people have flown and died, you need to compare that to how many people have flown in total, not how many people are waiting for a ride.

rocketman5000 · Dec 4, 2005

how about a person dying an average of one in every 8 flights. That is the safety record of playing Russian Roulette from a statistical standpoint.

ve7rkt · Dec 4, 2005

Out of 114 flights, 2 flights resulted in death and destruction of vehicle. That's 1.75%, or 1-in-57. I may have miscounted, but I count 678 times shuttle astronauts have taken the risk of a flight (4x2, 2x4, 37x5, 21x6, 49x7, 1x8). 14 of them died. The death rate among shuttle astronauts is 2.06%, or 1-in-48. (The remaining 98% will, I assume, die the way the rest of us do) Not great, but hardly "Russian roulette". Otherwise put: If you're a normal human being in the United States, this is how you're going to die. Heart disease - 28.5% Cancer - 22.8% Stroke - 6.7% Chronic respiratory diseases - 5.1% Accidental injury - 4.4% Diabetes - 3.0% Influenza, pneumonia - 2.7% Alzheimer's - 2.4% Kidney diseases - 1.7% Systemic infection - 1.4% Suicide - 1.3% Liver diseases - 1.1% High blood pressure - 0.8% Homicide - 0.7% Anything else - 17.4% If you're a normal human being in the United States and you climb aboard a Shuttle for a single flight, this is how you're going to die. Heart disease - 27.9% Cancer - 22.3% Chronic respiratory diseases - 5.0% Accidental injury - 4.3% Diabetes - 2.9% Influenza, pneumonia - 2.6% Alzheimer's - 2.4% SPACE SHUTTLE LAUNCH OR REENTRY - 2.1% Kidney diseases - 1.7% Systemic infection - 1.4% Suicide - 1.3% Liver diseases - 1.1% High blood pressure - 0.8% Homicide - 0.7% Anything else - 17.0% (note: may not add up to 100% due to rounding errors.)

CalliArcale · Dec 5, 2005

My primary thought on this is that if we're going to the Moon (or Mars) for the sole or primary purpose of capturing the imagination of the American public, we are wasting an enormous amount of money. We shouldn't be doing this just because it's cool. If we're trying to capture the world's imagination, that's not quite as silly -- after all, it has military implications. But it's still an awful lot of money and risk for a publicity stunt. No, this needs to be about more than that. It needs to be about explorating, about broadening our horizons, about creating a permanent human presence on another world. It needs to be about the future. It's going to be hideously expensive, so I feel we need to go for a solution which is more cost-effective than sexy. And it'll be dangerous, so a simpler design could help reduce the risk. CEV may look dorky, but it's simple and it will be reliable. That's the beauty of a ballistic capsule design -- it adheres very much to the KISS principle. Sure, the crossrange capability sucks, but given the speeds and energies involved in reentry, crossrange capability is really the least of your worries. Besides, people are gonna go to the Moon. The Moon! How much cooler can you get? I don't care how dorky their spacecraft looks. <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> They're going to the Moon! Okay, going to Mars would be cooler than going to the Moon. <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" /> But either way, it's far more important to make this new program work than it is to make it look good. I mean, Space Shuttle is sexy, and as much as I love the Shuttle and the ISS, it does have us stuck in LEO. If capsules are what it takes, I'm all for it. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff." -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink" </div>

n_kitson · Dec 5, 2005

<blockquote>In reply to:<hr /> We shouldn't be doing this just because it's cool. ... The Moon! How much cooler can you get?<hr /></blockquote> An apparent contradiction <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

CalliArcale · Dec 5, 2005

Do I contradict myself? Very well, I contradict myself. (I am large, I contain multitudes.) <img src="/images/icons/tongue.gif" /> I guess what I mean is that we shouldn't worry about making the transportation mechanism cool. Going to the moon should be cool enough; if that doesn't catch people's attention, nothing will. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff." -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink" </div>

starfhury · Dec 5, 2005

"I guess what I mean is that we shouldn't worry about making the transportation mechanism cool. Going to the moon should be cool enough; if that doesn't catch people's attention, nothing will." See that's the thing. The transportion mechanism. That right there is our problem in a nutshell. The shuttle is a more capable transport mechanism than the CEV proposed to replace it. The proviso is that we limit this to Earth to LEO. The CEV is going off on a tangent we don't need right now. It's a huge waste of money. There's nothing on the Moon or Mars we can put to any great use in the next twenty years. Sure going to the Moon is cool and going to Mars would be cooler, but doing either does nothing for us. We can continue to robotically explore the Moon and Mars. What has landing on the Moon done for us in the past thirty years? ISS and it's follow ons are more important to our future today than returning to the Moon or pushing on to Mars. We need to consolidate some of our beachheads before we try for a major break out. For that we need staging areas. We can't stage everything from Earth. Unlike Apollo, even the ESAS recognizes they have to stage out of LEO. For that we need orbital platforms and ground to LEO transport mechanism. Sure this might not seem as exciting as going back to the Moon or the long haul off to Mars, but they are the very things that will make either of those scenerios more likely. The chance for economic progress is obvious and established by those willing to pay upwards of twenty million dollars just for a visit to an unfinish "scientific" space platform. With a space platform for assembling and repairing satelites on orbit, more people will see space as worthy of economic development. We can't do that if we are hopping over the place at great expense to send off a few scientific expeditions per year if that. I think the point of the shuttle and space planes for that matter was that given sufficient development, land <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

Swampcat · Dec 5, 2005

"Earth to LEO and orbital platforms which can independently operate there own missions The Moon and Mars will follow naturally." I understand what you're saying and there's some logic to it. However, there are two flaws in your argument. First, the STS has proven to be a difficult vehicle to maintain and two lost vehicles, whatever the root causes of those accidents, suggests that its safety and reliability is highly questionable. We need something else and we need it relatively soon if we are to maintain a capability to put humans in space, even it's only to the ISS. Secondly, the ISS was not designed to perform the missions you mentioned in support of expanding beyond LEO. Had it been placed in a more or less equatorial orbit and outfitted with satellite repair facilities and a centrifuge, just to mention a couple items, then you might have something. It remains to be seen if ISS actually results in any worthy science beyond the effects of weightlessness on the human body, something that we have a pretty good understanding of already. And maintaining it as a tourist destination is hardly something the government should be spending taxpayer's dollars for. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

dobbins · Dec 6, 2005

Robots are not as capable as humans are and won't be for a very long time, if ever. A RLV isn't economically viable now and won't be without far higher flight rates than we will see for a very long time. The people who created astronautics, Tsiolkovsky, Oberth, Goddard, Von Braun, and Korolev all made it plain that the Moon was a primary goal. The first V2 launched, the first really capable rocket had the logo of the movie "Frau im Mond" (Woman in the Moon) painted on the side of it. Flying the Shuttle or shuttle clones forever is no more of an option than flying Mercury capsules forever was. It's time to leave LEO and move on in our exploration. 33 years of running in circles is more than enough. The development of lower cost access to LEO is belongs to the private sector, lowering the cost of anything isn't something government is good at.

Swampcat · Dec 6, 2005

"...lowering the cost of anything isn't something government is good at." You got that right <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" />. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> ------------------------------------------------------------------- "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government."Thomas Jefferson </div>

n_kitson · Dec 6, 2005

<blockquote>In reply to:<hr />Robots are not as capable as humans are and won't be for a very long time, if ever<hr /></blockquote> There are a number of flaws in this argument: - You fail to take into account that for the same money as a human mission you can place between 10 and 20 robots on the moon. A single robot may or may not be as capable as a human, but a flotilla of 10 or 20 can be. - Humans create added complexity and mass to the mission. You constantly argue that wings are wasted mass. True, but by sending humans you are adding a massive amount of wasted mass in the form of life support for both the outbound and inbound journey. All that inbound matter - four people and their life support - can be replaced by surface and sub-surface samples if robots did the job. - Robots can explore far more than humans can. No, don't go and use the MER argument. MERs cannot travel far on a single day due to the issues of time lage in control. The Mars Science Laboratory is already being designed to overcome this. Imagine how far 10 to 20 robots can travel, using the science lab technology (or some of the new tech Darpa is gaining access to following the Desert Challenge, or Nasa with the Grand Challenges) and having a much shorter time lag to deal with. Humans on the other hand are limited to traveling a couple of hours away from the hab, at best. - Robots of the Mars Science Lab style can be sent over much more intimidating obstacles than humans can. See how careful Nasa is with shuttle astronauts? Do you really think they are going to be risk-friendly enough to let child-of-Armstrong scramble over a rock in her multi-million dollar space suit? No doubt many will disagree with the points above. In that case please challenge them with coherent arguments. I would dearly love to see manned space exploration of the moon because, as Calli pointed out, "it's cool" to go to the mo

najab · Dec 6, 2005

>But, as much as I want it, I cannot see any way in which it is currently justifiable. Here's one:

starfhury · Dec 6, 2005

I'm no advocate of robotic only missions, but sorry a robot could have return the rocks just as easily as astronauts at less expense. The point is not to have NASA or government lower the cost for as some have pointed out that's unlikely to happen. The point is for them to invest in and bring about change that private investment can not do initially with out bankrupting themselves. At this point space is too expensive for any private concern to do all up at thier own expense. This is where NASA and the government can step in and provide the initial frame work to build and expand. You just have to look at the satellite market to see that commercial launches exceed military launches, but if the government had not initiated development of the launchers and first satellites, the enormous cost of doing so would have prevent any private company from benefiting. Now commerce makes more use of satellites than the military does. Let's compare what NASA is planning with ESAS and the return to the moon versus building a better means of moving mass up and down from LEO and orbital platforms there. First, NASA will benefit greatly from it. The cheaper it is for them to do business, the more business they can in fact do. ESAS is going to focus billions of dollars over the next few years to get 4 people back to the moon. This ostensibly to explore and maybe set up some sort of permanent presences. What do we get for this great expenditure? More glory for America perhaps and not much to take to the bank. At least LEO and GEO are easier to reach, but more than that as staging areas, any sort of missions could be assembled and eventually sent off to where ever as needed. As long as we are not able to efficiently get to LEO we are hobbled and will remain so. Since the road to LEO is one of the toughest nut to crack, this is where NASA must spend the better part of it's funding and this is where they can make their greatest contribution. This makes a shuttle <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

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