X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson
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Sun, 22 Oct 89 18:50:11 -0400 (EDT)
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Date: Sun, 22 Oct 89 18:49:47 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: SPACE Digest V10 #156
SPACE Digest Volume 10 : Issue 156
Today's Topics:
cost of space
Re: Try thinking before stinking
Aldrich named Associate Administrator for Aeronautics and Space technology; Crippen to head shuttle program (Forwarded)
Final Frontier magazine recently put the cost of space into perspective
in down to earth terms. While this year's budget request for Freedom
seems large at $2.1 billion, that's roughly on fourth the amount
americans spend on pornography each year and half what they spend on
perfume. "The cost of the entire Voyager program from launch in 1977 through Voyager 2's encounter with Neptune in 1989 comes to $556 million. That's
just six million more than junk bond trader Michael Milken 'earned' as
personal income in 1987....Moviegoers shelled out a combined total of $503 million through the end of 1987 to Star Wars, Return of the Jedi and The Empire
Strikes Back." Stealth bomber costs $531 million and current plan is to
build 132 of them.
"One space shuttle flight--if you divide NASA's 1989 budget for shuttle
operations by the number of missions flown this fiscal year--costs $400
million. That's about the same amount Coca-Cola spends each year on
advertising....direct mail advertisers spent a total of $19.1 billion
in 1987...roughly twice the amount NASA spent in that same year."
NASA's ten-year SETI program is priced at about $80 million, about
the same as the Pentagon's 1986 phone bill ($84.8 million).
------------------------------
Date: 16 Oct 89 20:02:29 GMT
From: agate!earthquake.Berkeley.EDU!gwh@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (George William Herbert)
Subject: Re: Try thinking before stinking
In article <15547@netnews.upenn.edu> santerel@delany.cis.upenn.edu.UUCP (Walter Santarelli) writes:
>hampered the Galileo mission. The RTG's which everyone is arguing over
>have been slowly depleting over the past 4-6(?)years while the vehicle
Oh really? I saw that the rtg's were replaced with new ones a few
months ago. Check your sources.
****************************************
George William Herbert UCB Naval Architecture Dpt. (my god, even on schedule!)
maniac@garnet.berkeley.edu gwh@ocf.berkeley.edu
----------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: 16 Oct 89 20:24:43 GMT
From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: Aldrich named Associate Administrator for Aeronautics and Space technology; Crippen to head shuttle program (Forwarded)
David Garrett
Headquarters, Washington, D.C. October 16, 1989
RELEASE: 89-162
ALDRICH NAMED ASSOCIATE ADMINISTRATOR FOR AERONAUTICS AND SPACE
TECHNOLOGY; CRIPPEN TO HEAD SHUTTLE PROGRAM
NASA Administrator Richard H. Truly today announced two key
appointments to become effective following the successful
completion of the STS-34 Galileo Space Shuttle mission. Arnold
D. Aldrich has been named Associate Administrator for the Office
of Aeronautics and Space Technology (OAST) and Captain Robert L.
Crippen, USN, has been named Director of the Space Shuttle
Program.
In his new position, Aldrich will be responsible for the
direction of NASA's aeronautics and space technology programs as
well as for the institutional management of NASA's Ames Research
Center,Mountain View, Calif.; Langley Research Center, Hampton,
Va.; and Lewis Research Center, Cleveland. Aldrich is currently
Director, National Space Transportation System (NSTS), and
provided the program leadership in the safe and successful return
to flight of the Shuttle.
In his new role, Crippen will have full responsibility for
the operation and conduct of the Space Shuttle program and will
report directly to Dr. William B. Lenoir, acting Associate
Administrator for Space Flight. Crippen is currently Deputy
Director, NSTS Operations.
Administrator Truly commented, "I'm delighted that NASA has
two outstanding executives in Arnie Aldrich and Bob Crippen who
are so well prepared to take on these important new
responsibilities. It speaks well for the inherent strength of
the NASA organization. These management changes bode well for a
strong future in NASA's aeronautics and technology programs, as
well as insure stability in the Space Shuttle leadership."
Aldrich has been associated with the U.S. manned space
program almost since its inception, joining the NASA Space Task
Group, the forerunner of NASA's Manned Spacecraft Center (later
the Johnson Space Center, Houston) in 1959 after graduation from
Northeastern University. From 1966 to 1975, he held increasingly
responsible positions in the Apollo program.
In 1975, Aldrich joined the Space Shuttle program office
where he managed various aspects of the program until his
appointment as overall Shuttle program manager in 1985. In
November 1986, he was named to his current position as Director,
NSTS.
Aldrich is an Associate Fellow of the American Instutute of
Aeronautics and Astronautics and a Fellow of the American
Astronautical Society. He has twice received the Presidential
Rank of Meritorious Executive, as well as the NASA Distinguished
Service Medal, the Arthur S. Fleming Award, the NASA Outstanding
Leadership Medal, the NASA Exceptional Service Medal and numerous
other honors.
Crippen, a native Texan and a graduate of the University of
Texas, is a former Navy carrier pilot and became a NASA astronaut
in 1969. He was in the astronaut support crew for the Skylab 2,
3 and 4 missions as well as the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.
Crippen has the distinction of having flown on a record four
Shuttle missions, having served as pilot of the first Shuttle
flight in April 1981 and commander of three subsequent missions
in June 1983 and April and October 1984.
Crippen is a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics
and Astronautics and a Fellow of the American Astronautical
Society. Among his many awards are the NASA Exceptional Service
Medal, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, the Department of
Defense Distinguished Service Award and four NASA Space Flight
Medals.
------------------------------
Date: 11 Oct 89 23:22:11 GMT
From: portal!cup.portal.com!mmm@uunet.uu.net (Mark Robert Thorson)
Subject: Re: Galileo--- history repeats itself
The Christic Institute is (or was) on the net; I remember seeing some
postings from them in sci.environment. Perhaps someone could post their
net address and invite them to give a statement? (Perhaps sci.space.flame
could be created in advance for this purpose?)
I thought I heard that they are funded by a number of Christian churches,
hence the name. Of course, this could just be a cover story.
------------------------------
Date: 12 Oct 89 14:38:50 GMT
From: crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen@uunet.uu.net (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
Subject: Re: Will NASA Contaminate Jupiter?
In article <3437@aplcen.apl.jhu.edu>, jwm@stda.jhuapl.edu (Jim Meritt) writes:
| Question 2: How fast could a biological contaminant, even assuming it
| was in perfect condition, actually get around the planet? Is
| "contaminate Jupiter" a bit of an exaguration that at best should
| be "mess up a tiny neighborhood"?
I doubt that anything from earth could even live on Jupiter, but
here's a worst case thought. Assume a microbe which can replicate every
minute given adequate food. Assume something in the atmosphere is
"adequate food," and that the feeding process does not require
sunlight, such as the bacteria which live in aviation fuel, etc. Assume
wind velocity high enough to circle the planet in a few months. Well,
no one has been there, but I have seen guesses that the winds are
there, so that's not a big assumption.
Start doing the power series, and you find the whole planet
contaminated in less than a year. Make the breeding rate slower and you
barely touch the number. Fortunately the assumption that ANY of Jupiter
would be edible is unlikely.
I think that if we had a good idea of what conditions were on Jupiter
and a reason to do it, we could engineer a bacteria which would
survive. Developing a bug which survives is the least dificult part of
genetic engineering. The hard part is making the bug do something
useful, avoiding side effects, controlling growth, and other
containment issues.
--
bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen)
"The world is filled with fools. They blindly follow their so-called
'reason' in the face of the church and common sense. Any fool can see
that the world is flat!" - anon
------------------------------
Date: 12 Oct 89 17:39:05 GMT
From: eugene@eos.arc.nasa.gov (Eugene Miya)
Subject: Re: comm capacity (voyager inter-stellar space)
In article <2500@ibmpa.UUCP> szabonj@ibmpa.UUCP (Nick Szabo) writes:
>The "Voyager Interstellar Mission" is a new twist. There are a large
>number of people working on Voyager right now, and quite naturally they
>need something to do.
> DSN discussion removed for space.
>
>A question for astronomers and planetary scientists on the net: does
>the "Voyager Interstellar Mission" have enough scientific merit to sacrifice
>data from Galileo and Magellan?
>
>If not, IMHO Voyager workers should be transferred to Galileo, Magellan or
>wherever they want to go, and retrained as necessary. They are heroes
>and deserve our best. We can let the Voyagers fly free, checking in
>as schedules allow, content in the knowledge that they have completed our
>greatest space mission ever.
Well, let's see. I worked 3 years on Voyager, a year on a VOIR
[Now Magellan] proposal which ended up in the can [they're still all
friends], and also for the Deep Space Network's Tracking and Data
Acq. Office during that time.
I think you are basically talking a drop in the bucket of data.
Voyager is going into a phase like the three Pioneers (controlled at Ames),
and a fair number of heliocentric missions. (As well as energy
projection tests, and high bandwidth Earth satellites). I think
that earth based systems have their advantages and dis-advatanges
(as does TDRSS). This would take too long explain, but I know
people are planning in the 2000 to 2010 and out to the 2030 time frame
(take a moment to think about how old you will be in 2030).
Getting the money is one thing. The expected bit requirements
and capacities are minor.
Anyway Voyager workers HAVE moved to Galileo [a project I never
worked on (do know co-workers on it)] and Magellan. When I started working
at the Lab, people were winding off of Viking. The joke was "where
do Viking Project people go?" Think a moment about this:
Answer: Valhalla. 8)
If you have known this joke (I posted once before) without hearing it from
me, then you had inside information. So transfers and layoffs,
using resources are no biggie. There are big problems, but
they get discussed in meetings in Pasadena and Washington.
So I would not worry. These were and are problems faced 10 years ago.
It takes this kind of timing to work on solutions. I can refer
one to NASA internal deep space documents. [Not necessary worth
anything, BTW]
Back to astonomy, this is a space policy question. [Who has time to
read talk.space?]
P.S. The people who work and have worked on Voyager aren't heros.
Another gross generalization from
--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eugene@aurora.arc.nasa.gov
resident cynic at the Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers:
"You trust the `reply' command with all those different mailers out there?"
"If my mail does not reach you, please accept my apology."
