Space Blogging
Lots of cool space stuff at Hobbyspace:
Anousheh Ansari, Iranian-born space tourist, is currently blogging from the International Space Station.
Armadillo Aerospace (brainchild of Doom-inventor John Cormack) have their latest test video up, this of the vehicle that will be competing for the Lunar Lander Challenge at this year's X-prize Cup. John says on hobbyspace that the video isn't very exciting... no? It bloody hovers in one spot on a rocket plume for 90 seconds! When was the last time you saw a rocket hover?
Bigelow Aerospace have announced they intend to launch the first private space station in late 2009-10, to be followed by a second, larger module in 2012, for a total capacity of nine people. Thus giving new rocket companies a new destination to fly to, and up to sixteen flights per year, thus increasing flight frequency, thus reducing cost-per-flight. There's also a plan to assist smaller nations to develop their own manned spaceflight programs, for a fraction of the cost of NASA or Russia's programs. I'm sure Malaysia would love a space program.
And finally, don't you hate it when someone starts promoting an idea you've already had? Al Globus reckons space settlement on lower-gravity planets would be complicated by the difficulties in raising children in low-G environments, thus mandating the use of large, rotational space stations that generate their own gravity for child raising in space. I already had that idea! I just hadn't gotten around to writing the series it was going to be in. I think they'll discover, in the future, that kids need gravity to grow just like plants do, we already know that long term weightlessness does nasty things to adults. I think kids in low gravity would develop brittle bones, poor cardio-vascular systems, and a whole host of accompanying health problems. So Mars settlement, for instance, would be complicated by couples wanting to have children, having to stick them on orbital stations until they stop growing -- like childhood boarding school.
Anousheh Ansari, Iranian-born space tourist, is currently blogging from the International Space Station.
Armadillo Aerospace (brainchild of Doom-inventor John Cormack) have their latest test video up, this of the vehicle that will be competing for the Lunar Lander Challenge at this year's X-prize Cup. John says on hobbyspace that the video isn't very exciting... no? It bloody hovers in one spot on a rocket plume for 90 seconds! When was the last time you saw a rocket hover?
Bigelow Aerospace have announced they intend to launch the first private space station in late 2009-10, to be followed by a second, larger module in 2012, for a total capacity of nine people. Thus giving new rocket companies a new destination to fly to, and up to sixteen flights per year, thus increasing flight frequency, thus reducing cost-per-flight. There's also a plan to assist smaller nations to develop their own manned spaceflight programs, for a fraction of the cost of NASA or Russia's programs. I'm sure Malaysia would love a space program.
And finally, don't you hate it when someone starts promoting an idea you've already had? Al Globus reckons space settlement on lower-gravity planets would be complicated by the difficulties in raising children in low-G environments, thus mandating the use of large, rotational space stations that generate their own gravity for child raising in space. I already had that idea! I just hadn't gotten around to writing the series it was going to be in. I think they'll discover, in the future, that kids need gravity to grow just like plants do, we already know that long term weightlessness does nasty things to adults. I think kids in low gravity would develop brittle bones, poor cardio-vascular systems, and a whole host of accompanying health problems. So Mars settlement, for instance, would be complicated by couples wanting to have children, having to stick them on orbital stations until they stop growing -- like childhood boarding school.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home