From: John K Clark (jonkc@att.net)
Date: Sun Feb 02 2003 - 13:29:07 MST
"Technotranscendence" <neptune@mars.superlink.net>
> The Saturn Vs seemed to fit that bill, if you ask me.
Could be, or something simpler and smaller, use a gas pressure fuel system;
turbo pumps are expensive complicated and unreliable, fuel tanks are simple
cheap and reliable. True, the vehicles would be heavier but the true measure
of efficiency is not weight versus thrust but cost versus payload. This
really highlights what a complete and utter failure the entire shuttle
program is, and this was obvious well before the present tragedy.
The Shuttle was supposed to dramatically lower the cost of getting into
space but turned out to be more expensive than the Saturn and unlike the
Saturn was limited to low earth orbit, not exactly prime space real-estate.
They say the Shuttle does science but the stuff it does seldom makes it
to respected peer reviewed journals, it's a caricature of science, they take
ant farms into space, blow bubbles, bring science fair projects from high
school kids, and take geriatric senators on joy rides. It's not science but
nothing really wrong with any of those things except it cost about a
billion dollars a flight. It doesn't even have entertainment value, people
in tin cans just 200 up have spun around the earth for over 40 years
and people are board with it. NASA could produce ten times as much
good science with a quarter of its present budget if it would just stop
manned space flight.
John K Clark jonkc@att.net
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