Re: meat aboard the roton

den Otter (neosapient@geocities.com)
Thu, 27 May 1999 01:18:48 +0200


> From: Doug Jones <random@qnet.com>
>
> Spike Jones wrote:
> >
> > Wait a minute Doug. When I heard that Rotary Rocket planned to man
> > the *first* roton, I nearly choked. I understand the reasoning behind
> > centrifugal pressurization and even autogyro landing, but the notion
> > of making the experimental vehicle manned, well the logic utterly
> > escapes me.
>
> The nutshell answer is, unmanned aerial vehicles fail about 2000
> times more often than manned vehicles, basically for lack of a human
> on the spot to make the right decision in an emergency.

I wonder what kind of safety precautions have been taken to protect the crew in case of an accident (or is this highly classified)? Liquid/gel buffers (or air bags) in combination with 'cocoon seats', fire-proof layers, a titanium shell around the crew compartment etc. could presumably make the vehicle very safe indeed (at moderately higher cost).The design of regular rockets and the space shuttle would permit even better safety measures, like a crew compartment that automatically "ejects" in case of a mishap (a la Challenger), and gently floats back to earth. For some strange reason, this part of the design has always been neglected. Similar techniques could be used for VIP transport in planes btw.