Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V13_7/V13_769.TXT

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Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #769

SPACE Digest                                     Volume 13 : Issue 769

Today's Topics:
               ESA Press Release No.21
               Re: Launch failure today
             Re: Access to Space
               Re: future astro funding
        Re: IGY and the dawn of the Space Age
              Re: Fred's Operatic Death
              Magellan Update - 06/19/91
              Re: Fred's Operatic Death
              Re: Fred's Operatic Death
                   Heroism

Administrivia:

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Subject: ESA Press Release No.21


  ESA Press Release No.21; Paris, 18 June 1991

  ESA/NASDA AGREEMENT OM MUTUAL ACCESS TO ERS-1 AND J-ERS-1 DATA

  A cooperation agreement  between the  European Space  Agency (ESA) and
  the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) will  be signed
  on Thursday, 20 June 1991 at 11 a.m.  in the ESA pavilion at the Paris
  Air Show  in Le  Bourget, by  Mr.  Jean-Marie  Luton of  ESA,  and Mr.
  Masato Yamano, President of NASDA.

  This agreement deals essentially with mutual  access to  data from two
  Earth Observation satellites, ESA's ERS-1  and Japan's  J-ERS-1, whose
  launch dates should be in late July 1991 and early 1992 respectively.

  The distinctive  feature of  this agreement  is  that  it  applies the
  principle  of reciprocity,  enabling the  signatories to   have direct
  access to data from both satellites, via the ESA and Japanese networks
  of ground stations.

   for anyone interested, there's a NASDA
    PR Telephon number: (81.3) 5470-4283  Y

------------------------------

Date: 19 Jun 91 07:12:23 GMT
From: sequent!muncher.sequent.com![e-mail]
Subject: Re: Launch failure today

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Christopher Neufeld) writes:

>   Well, I just saw a throwaway bite on the evening news relating to the
>destruction by range safety of an unmanned rocket. The footage had a
>round decal with Orbital Sciences Corporation on it... "prospector".

The Joust suborbital vehicle for microgravity experiments.  I believe
NASA calls the series "Prospector" (I might easily have the names
backwards).  OSC has had tons of problems with it.  Not good news.
Fortuneately, it looks like the payload itself was recovered intact.



--
Nick Szabo            [e-mail]
Embrace Change...  Keep the Values...  Hold Dear the Laughter...
These views are my own, and do not represent any organization.

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Date: 19 Jun 91 07:03:26 GMT
From: sequent!muncher.sequent.com![e-mail]
Organization: Sequent Computer Systems, Inc.
Subject: Re: Access to Space
References: <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Matthew DeLuca) writes:
>
>If you couldn't talk to Europe instantaneously, would the demand for
>computers in Europe be less?

Nobody in Europe would be able to buy a symmetric parallel processing
computers.  They don't make them.  Sequent and our arch-competitor in
the U.S. Pyramid do.  Wealth has been created.  Over many industries,
_gobs_ of wealth has been created by being able to communicate
information on new products and services, news, science and culture
from continent to continent.

Anyway, judging from the rest of your post you are interested in
personally attacking me, not in thinking about the issue or in
contributing towards progress in space.  That's my lot in life for
posting uncomfortable facts and opinions.  I may cringe at your
insults, but it is the space program itself that suffers from the
attitude you have exhibited.


--
Nick Szabo            [e-mail]
Embrace Change...  Keep the Values...  Hold Dear the Laughter...
These views are my own, and do not represent any organization.

------------------------------

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Date: 17 Jun 91 17:01:55 GMT
From: ssc-vax!bcsaic!hsvaic![e-mail]  (Dani Eder)
Organization: Boeing AI Center, Huntsville, AL
Subject: Re: future astro funding
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Robert W. Nelson) writes:
>
>(3) NASA funding will not increase significantly beyond inflation.
>The budget agreement made last October does not allow for savings
>in military funds to be transferred to domestic programs. Congress
>is not going to cut veterans, and I strongly doubt that HUD will
>be cut considerably.
>
>With two giant programs coming on line in NASA, and without significant
>increases in the total NASA budget, it seems to me that all other
>"nonessential" programs within NASA, including Space Science and
>Applications,  will have to take deep cuts. I don't see any other
>way around this. If you see a hole in my reasoning I'd like to know.

The veterans of WWII are now in the 64+ age bracket (age 18 in 1945 is
64 now).  This means that they are or soon will be in a peak
dying off period.  Once they are dead they no longer need VA hospitals.
Therefore there should be a large drop in the need for VA hospital
funding, as a major chunk of veterans are in their peak hospitalization
period, and we thankfully have not created a large number of new
veterans since then.

Dani Eder

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Date: 19 Jun 91 15:10:12 GMT
From: rex!rouge![e-mail]  (Fraering Philip)
Organization: Univ. of Southwestern LA, Lafayette
Subject: Re: IGY and the dawn of the Space Age
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:

>Explorer was a JPL satellite with James Van Allen's instruments.  It was
>launched on Von Braun's Jupiter C.  At that time both Huntsville and
>JPL were part of the U.S. Army.   Huntsville's mission was building
>IRBM's and ICBM's.  There is a famous photo of Von Braun, Van Allen, and
>William Pickering of JPL holding aloft a model of the first U.S. satellite
>in triumph.   The teamwork between explorers and rocket builders has gone
>downhill since then....

Notice the way he says it as if Von Braun was just a 'rocket builder' and
not an explorer. Nick, please stop all this 'aggresive terminology
assignment' to people, it just makes more and more people want to _not_
read what you have to say.

Phil Fraering
[e-mail]
"Life. Don't talk to me about _    _."
                               life

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Date: 19 Jun 91 16:28:53 GMT
From: agate!spool.mu.edu!caen!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!news.arc.nasa.gov!skipper![e-mail]  (Mary Shafer)
Organization: NASA Dryden, Edwards AFB, CA
Subject: Re: Fred's Operatic Death
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I wrote:

>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (James Davis Nicoll) writes:
>>>  'Do NASA employees post self-serving propaganda (also 'should NASA...')'
>>>  argument deleted.
>
>>I have the damned feeling I've seen this thread before. How did the
>>tiff that ended with Ms Shafer briefly leaving sci.space start?
>
>Wit Nick Szabo claiming that NASA employees should only post stuff that
>Nick thought was OK.  That is, it was OK for the informational stuff
>to appear, but if one disagreed with Nick .....

Nick has informed me that "Public employees slandering [him] on the
net are cruising for a bruising."

It was not my intent to slander Nick and if his feelings, amour propre,
or net reputation were damaged by my comment, I apologize and retract
my comment.
--
Mary Shafer  [e-mail]  ames!skipper.dfrf.nasa.gov!shafer
           NASA Ames Dryden Flight Research Facility, Edwards, CA
                     Of course I don't speak for NASA
            "Turn to kill, not to engage."  CDR Willie Driscoll

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Date: 20 Jun 91 07:46:15 GMT
From: elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!jato!kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov![e-mail]  (Ron Baalke)
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Subject: Magellan Update - 06/19/91
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Crossposted by: Ron Baalke from NASAMAIL P board
(All NASAMAIL board P items are O.K. for unlimited distribution per JPL PIO,
unless the postings indicate otherwise)


                     MAGELLAN STATUS REPORT
                          June 19, 1991

     The Magellan spacecraft and its radar system are performing
normally. All star calibrations and momentum wheel desaturations
were successful.

     The weekly command sequence was uplinked to the spacecraft
Tuesday and begins execution today. It continues the two 55-
minute periods in each orbit of hiding behind the high-gain
antenna for thermal control and mapping of the area from 45
degrees south latitude to the south pole.

     Next week's sequence will shift again to left-looking radar
mapping, and reduce the hide periods to 32 minutes each as
controllers begin to fill in the superior conjunction gap, the
area not mapped in the first cycle when Earth and Venus were on
opposite sides of the sun.
                              _____
      ___    _____     ___
     /_ /|  /____/ \  /_ /|     Ron Baalke         | [e-mail]
     | | | |  __ \ /| | | |     Jet Propulsion Lab |
  ___| | | | |__) |/  | | |__   M/S 301-355        | "Imagination is more
 /___| | | |  ___/    | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | important than knowledge"
 |_____|/  |_|/       |_____|/                     | Albert Einstein

------------------------------

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Date: 19 Jun 91 20:46:58 GMT
From: news-server.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!watserv1!watdragon!watyew![e-mail]  (James Davis Nicoll)
Organization: University of Waterloo
Subject: Re: Fred's Operatic Death
References: <[e-mail]>, <SHAFER.91Jun181157, <SH
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Mary Shafer) writes:
>I wrote:
>
>>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (James Davis Nicoll) writes:
>>>>  'Do NASA employees post self-serving propaganda (also 'should NASA...')'
>>>>  argument deleted.
>>
>>>I have the damned feeling I've seen this thread before. How did the
>>>tiff that ended with Ms Shafer briefly leaving sci.space start?
>>
>>Wit Nick Szabo claiming that NASA employees should only post stuff that
>>Nick thought was OK.  That is, it was OK for the informational stuff
>>to appear, but if one disagreed with Nick .....
>
>Nick has informed me that "Public employees slandering [him] on the
>net are cruising for a bruising."
>
>It was not my intent to slander Nick and if his feelings, amour propre,
>or net reputation were damaged by my comment, I apologize and retract
>my comment.

    Physical punishment for slander? US jurisprudence is getting
tougher than I thought.

    Given the nature of the USENET, wouldn't it be libel, rather than
slander? Perhaps Mr Szabo could help me on this: is flogging the punishment
for that, too?

    From The American Heritage Dictionary:

        Assault: noun. 1: A violent physical or verbal attack
                   2: An unlawful attempt or threat to injure
                another violently
                   3: Rape

             verb. 1: To Attack violently

                                James Nicoll

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Date: 19 Jun 91 19:12:08 GMT
From: aio!vf.jsc.nasa.gov![e-mail]
Organization: NASA Johnson Space Flight Center
Subject: Re: Fred's Operatic Death
References: <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>, <[e-mail]>
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In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Douglas Creel) writes:
>>
>>Good for you.  Fighter pilots have a vital role in defense, and
>>
>>Nick Szabo            [e-mail]

Fighter pilots

>
> A tiny fraction of the defense budget? The ATF program will wind up costing
> upwards of $90 billion. A similar program for the Navy will probably cost

Fighter pilots, not Aircraft.  Fligter pilots don't get paid a whole lot.  They
are a very small portion of the DOD budget.

Astronauts are a very small part of the NASA budget.  The Shuttle is a large
part.

--

Mike Kent -      Lockheed Engineering and Sciences Company at NASA JSC
        2400 NASA Rd One, Houston, TX 77058 [phone]
        [e-mail]

------------------------------

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Date: 19 Jun 91 18:38:42 GMT
From: agate!spool.mu.edu!mips!cs.uoregon.edu!ogicse!sequent!muncher.sequent.com![e-mail]
Organization: Sequent Computer Systems, Inc.
Subject: Heroism
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In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Douglas Creel) writes:

>[projects using fighter pilot]
>A tiny fraction of the defense budget? The ATF program will wind up costing
>upwards of $90 billion.

Do the arithmetic.  The defense budget over the lifetime of ATF
will likekly be on the order of $9,000 billion.  Of that, 1% will be for
ATF using your figure.  1/100 probably qualifies as a tiny fraction.  On
the other hand, astronaut programs consume close to 50% of the NASA budget,
and are demanding further increases.  If we count the science programs that
have been constrained to fit the astronaut programs (eg Hubble, Galileo,
Astro, etc.) we are talking about the bulk of NASA efforts.  Meanwhile,
for those two groups that use space to solve problems on Earth -- commercial
space and defense -- the amount spent on astronaut-related programs
is less than 5%, and then only when the flights are subsidized more than
50% by NASA.  Earth customers of space are obtaining very few benefits
from astronauts.   For this reason, I do not see astronauts as heroes
risking their lives to do an essential job.  Rather, they are people
like you and me who want to go into space, and are willing to spend
billions of dollars of other people's money to do so.  I do not consider
that heroic.




--
Nick Szabo            [e-mail]
"What are the _facts_, and to how many decimal places?"  -- RAH

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End of SPACE Digest V13 #769
*******************