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FrozenGate by Avery

Space Discussion Thread

Hi, Rivem. How did your last semester go? Thanks for the Juno article. It was interesting. Hope to see you here more often.
 





paul1598419 said:
Hi, Rivem. How did your last semester go? Thanks for the Juno article. It was interesting. Hope to see you here more often.
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Last semester was pretty rough just in terms of the course load, but it turned out alright. Everything was upper division engineering and the last of my fundamental theory classes. Next semester should really get into practical design work and more advanced systems.

Currently debating a transfer due to terrible scheduling at my school. I should be graduating next spring, but turns out I won't be able to take a few required courses until spring 2019. Definitely a difficult decision since the transfer at this point would probably only save a semester and some money. :(

Other than that, I'm happy to be mostly free for the summer. It's been a long school year with a lot of trouble in between, and I've barely touched a lot of my hobbies. Glad to be back! :D
 
Yeah, I remember how life goes on even in the midst of a grueling academic schedule and working full time as well. Like John Lennon said, "life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."
 
Manned Mars rover "concept":

Pretty neat, but far from what would actually be sent there. Pretty much just a promo item. Definitely looks like fun though :D
 
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Rivem said:
Manned Mars rover "concept":

Pretty neat, but far from what would actually be sent there. Pretty much just a promo item. Definitely looks like fun though :D
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Yeah, it's really just something they roll out at events to get people interested. Still cool though! :)
 
diachi said:
Yeah, it's really just something they roll out at events to get people interested. Still cool though! :)
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It's apparently going to be a KSC exhibit. It'd be fun if they let visitors drive it around. They've also got their own "Space Camp" (forgot what it was really called) that has kids that I'm sure would love to drive it.

NASA tends to do this when exciting things aren't really happening. They sent an Orion concept vehicle around the country after the shuttle program was cut. I guess they've got to keep the public interested and motivated.
 
I don't know as there is much NASA can do to keep their funds from being cut with who's in power. I think wealthy people are going to make out well. Too bad as I believe NASA has given this country much to be excited about. Remember watching the moon landing in 69 on TV. It was amazing to watch.
 
paul1598419 said:
I don't know as there is much NASA can do to keep their funds from being cut with who's in power. I think wealthy people are going to make out well. Too bad as I believe NASA has given this country much to be excited about. Remember watching the moon landing in 69 on TV. It was amazing to watch.
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I think it's more complicated than that. While funding is political, space exploration has become normal nowadays. Manned space exploration had always been the most exciting area, but it's died down a lot. Robotic exploration has hit public interest several times, but it doesn't stick as much.

NASA is at a point now where they aren't showing huge results, but they're working towards HUGE projects within the next decade. I think their main goal with this kind of thing is more to get younger people and the gen public interested in what they're doing so that they can have new scientists and funding down the line vs right now.
 
I'm kinda bored myself with the current state of space exploration. The only 3 things which would really grab my interest again would be:
1-A robotic mission to explore under the ice of Europa and look for life.
2-A manned mission to Mars.
3-A mission back to the moon just to show we can still do it.
 
I could get excited abut another manned moon mission. I think we are still a long way from a manned mission to Mars. Hope to still be alive for that one.
 
Yeah, nothing really interesting regarding space programs as Razako said above. We really do need to get back into space research and programs to better understand what's around us! :)

-Alex
 
A mission to Europa would probably be the most exciting in terms of information gathered.

A manned mission to mars would mostly be a PR thing, finally setting a human down on another planet, but would probably discover little new information. We know quite a lot about mars from orbital research and rovers, far more then they did about the moon back then.

If there is more to see on mars, we could just send more rovers and such, possibly larger ones to cover more terrain, but having people in them would make things much more complicated and costly, yet add little to the research capabilities.
 
A mission to mars would be big from a "We can do it!" perspective. It would show that we can actually land humans on another world without killing them. I agree that Mars is somewhat boring scientifically, but it's realistically the only other planet I could see a manned mission to. Mercury is basically just like an alternate version of the moon, except much hotter. Venus would kill anyone trying to land on it. The other planets are all gas giants which we can't land anyone on for obvious reasons.
 
Yeah. NASA is actually saying that their SLS/Orion spacecraft are going to do moon orbit missions fairly soon. Apparently the goal is to build a small space station in orbit around the moon as support for further expeditions. Look up "NASA Deep Space Gateway" to learn more.

A Europa probe would be very interesting scientifically though. I'd love to be involved in that engineering challenge too.
 
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Mars is the only planet you could send humans to if you want them to walk around in space suits similar to the moon landings. There is little problem in actually doing that apart from the cost, which might be a tad high. I heard Trump actually wanted to do such a thing for PR purposes but NASA did not seem it feasible to complete within his current term.

An unmanned mission to europa would be much more exciting though in term of possible results.

Sending someone to mars would yield 'man walks on lifeless planet for the first time', but a mission to europa could potentially yield 'extraterrestiral life confirmed'.

Surely it could also be a complete bummer and find no signs of life under the ice of that moon.

I think it would be worthwhile to study everything in the solar system for signs of life, and we have good candidates: europa obviously, but also moons like enececladus or ganymede.

Visiting those moons could confirm life is not unique to earth, and if any life is found we could learn a great deal about early evolution.
 
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