Tue, 06 Jun 2006
Back to the future!
NASA have just
announced that they're planning to start unmanned orbital
test flights of the CEV (Crew Exploration Vehicle) in 2012, with
the first manned flights starting in 2014. The CEV (artist's
impression above) is the Shuttle replacement that's designed
allegedly to get NASA back into the manned space exploration
business after an embarrassing forty year long diversion into
putting lipstick (i.e. wings) on a flying pig. Meanwhile, the
Shuttle's last flight is scheduled for 2010.
Betcha the CEV is overdue, over budget, and doesn't perform to
spec. While by then the Chinese space program should be working
on their first space station, and who knows where the Russian
Kliper program will be?
I'm getting a really retro feeling off this next-generation space
program. Smells like ... sailing ships!
Meanwhile, the
price of developing CEV's launch vehicle is rumoured to have
tripled, there's reason to believe that it may be much more
difficult than anticipated to produce defect-free nanotubes
needed to build a space elevator, and the environmental
health risks of space travel turn out to be so large that
hithero insignificant factors like galactic cosmic ray
bombardment may stop us getting past the inner solar system
(at least, without cheap, easy and effective treatments for
cancer).
[Discuss
space]
posted at: 12:27 | path: /space | permanent link to this entry
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