New Mars Forums

Not soon anyway 

Well DAWN is back on the programme list again as of today

UPI, NASA reinstates DAWN

BBC Hypersonic Jet ready to be launched

The Scramjet Engine known as Hyshot III will be the first of a series of International Scramjet launches in Australia. If all goes well it will be launched Saturday.

Robcwillis this is going to definitly veer into what is politics but any consideration of the use of international partners to develop the Moon/Mars Initiative will have to be a political discussion.

Russia has used its leverage over the ISS to inflict costly (to the USA) victories in public and financial causes. The US has learned that with international partners things cost more and the compromises that are needed usually lead to a weakened project. The ISS is in the wrong orbit to support the Moon Mars programme so the Russians could launch to it.

But also incidentally other space powers have discovered that working with the USA is a bad thing and are less likely to want to do so in the future. ESA and JAXA both have major science modules sitting in a warehouse slowly reaching obscelescence. Certainly in the case of the ESA science module the original plan and up until guite late in development was to launch this module from an Arianne and it was to be able to move itself into position it was also to have its own power and atmosphere. In short a spacestation within a spacestation. But due to NASA and its order that all modules must be delivered by the Shuttle a lot had to be cut out of the plan. And with the problems of the shuttle all the money spent is at the moment wasted.

Add to this other things like the current furore over the JSF and you see that for NASA getting partners would not necassarily be as easy as it was for the ISS programme.

It was not that they where big battles but there where a lot of small ones and it spread the police thin.

France I see has a problem that this new law is trying to correct. The problem is that for employers with a working week set at 35 hours exactly and with real difficulties in getting rid of under performing employees plus the very large social benefits and laws that have to be upheld by employers is making the products these employers firms make expensive. This hurts and so France has economic doldrums. So these employers dare not hire more people as the French economy is in real trouble.

Unfortunatly the only way to improve the economy is to make France more productive and competitive. This means changes to the laws and social programs of France and it is easier to do this with new employees coming into a firm.

There will be more of this Im sure it is natural if France is to become more competitive. It will happen whatever as France like any country cannot afford so many on the dole.

Yes but with the landers weight being increased the orbiter part was dropped and it was never really more than a proposal. It has now been decided that it would make a good idea to have it in place.

At the moment the ATV does not need to fly there is nothing on the ISS for it to service a progress capsule is perfect for the supply run.

At the moment with the small crew compliment and no science modules the ATV would just be a supply run overkill. ESA just does not have to rush now does it.

Ah but we can just dream...

Why would warfare occur if we had an ftl drive system.

The usual reasons of course Greed, Need and pleasure.

There will always be something that you have that someone else will want and short of the harder method of going to look for it they just decide to take it from you.

Sad is it not

To get cheaper access to space we need a system that is 100% reusable, Quick turn around with little need for large standing army. This in short is what the shuttle is not, It can never be the cheap means to get to Space it is designed wrong for that job. Its cargo capacity is too small compared to the energy expended to get it into space and it is too fragile.

There are a lot of concepts of TSTO shuttles that have been floated. TSTO reusable shuttles are about the best we can expect with the technology that we currently posess that would make for a good means to carry light cargo and passengers to space. There will always be a need for the heavy lift option rockets until we have something like a space elevator.

Needless to say all this is going to remain paper exercises until there is a need to develop it wether economic or a case of national interest.

And China is forced to put its next manned mission back by 6 months

China forced to put back next mission by six months

Can China do a manned mission to Mars  :  Yes
Can it do it anytime soon   :    No

China has taken the steady footsteps in its progress it is looking at the long view but there is a lot holding China back and one of these is lack of of indigenous knowledge. It launched its Long March and Shenzhou from information garnered from the Russians and a lot of the space technology of China is copies or straight purchases from Russia. This information was garnered when Russia was in a seriously bad economic situation and so it came relatively cheaply, actually China benefitted militarily and economically from Russias economic doldrums. This information transfer has stopped now that Russia is back on its feet and is beginning to feel its own feet. China now has to rely on its own internal engineers and though she has a lot of engineer graduates they lack experience.

The next problem for China is simple cost. China has a lot of things it must spend its cash on and though China is reaping rewards from its financial boom it is only increasing the demand for basic infrastructure increases and the as of yesterday promises given to Chinas influential countryside majority. Space though a great morale booster and a way of saying we are a big nation respect us it does not mean they have the billions to spend in developing a Mars manned programme.