Tuesday, September 6, 2011

The Case for Two Asteroids and a Planet



Donald F. Robertson has been writing about space for some time and said he had posted a recent article about the suggestion we go to an asteroid with humans.
Here is the link and I will list some others as well.
- LRK -

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By Donald F. Robertson
Wed, 31 August, 2011


There are three realistic options for our next exploratory destination in space: a return to the Moon to establish a permanent presence; the current plan to visit a near-Earth asteroid; and what early space engineer S. Fred Singer calls “PhD missions.” These are trips to the martian moons Phobos and Deimos without immediately trying to land on Mars — an idea that has not been seriously considered in recent years.

Our next major project in space should be a return to our nearby and newly intriguing Moon — this time to stay. We know how to get there and visit. Now we need learn to live and work for extended periods on an airless surface dominated by regolith, while still relatively close to home and the potential for support and rescue. We can study our nearest neighbor in depth, not least to understand our star system’s history of major impacts. We should begin to use lunar resources, like oxygen and probable heavy metals from the cores of large asteroids that have struck the Moon, to support activities in low Earth orbit. Doing so would establish regular transportation routes to a single location with regular launch windows, and the earliest beginnings of inner solar system trade and commerce.

If we decline to take this logical incremental step, the martian moons make a better destination than a near-Earth asteroid.

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Some earlier posts to Space Review when there was a discussion about going back to the Moon.
- LRK -

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Chasing The Military Dollar
by Donald F. Robertson

Returning to Earth's Moon: Is There Room For Commerce?
by Donald F. Robertson

From Point A to B before C
by Donald F. Robertson

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If you go to his website there are a number of links to articles written before 2010 which means we might well have been thinking we might really go back to the Moon to stay and develop its resources.  If you are looking for things to consider about our possible use of space, check them out.
- LRK -

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Space Exploration: a reality check
This article originally appeared in Space News
© 2006 by Donald F. Robertson

A Scientific Justification for Human Lunar Exploration
This article originally appeared in Meme Therapy.
© 2006 by Donald F. Robertson.

MARS TRAINWRECK
This article originally appeared in slightly different form in Space News
© 2002 by Donald F. Robertson.

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Recently we have seen more images of the Apollo landing sites from the instruments on the LRO
- LRK -

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Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera
Skimming The Moon

Low periapsis Narrow Angle Camera image of the Apollo 17 Landing Site

[Thanks LRO - LRK -]
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That said, you can find more about the Apollo landings in a number of books.
Hope you have this one.
- LRK -

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‘Man must explore’ Dave Scott

Exploring the Moon - The Apollo Expeditions is a story of one of the great adventures of our time. David Harland concentrates on the final three lunar landings (Apollos 15, 16 and 17); each of which spent three days on the Moon and used the famous 'lunar rover' to get around. He focuses on the exploration carried out by the Apollo astronauts whilst on the lunar surface and combines the words of the astronauts themselves with the photographs they took. It is a lunar travelogue, a minute-by-minute account of what the astronauts did, said and felt, enhanced by their subsequent reflections.

Also at Amazon.com
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Call it what you will, practice for an asteroid mission because someone said go to an asteroid.
You wouldn't want to practice to go back to the Moon. No, no, no!
- LRK -

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NASA PRACTICING ASTEROID MISSION IN ARIZONA DESERT


Analysis by Irene Klotz 
Tue Aug 30, 2011 03:46 PM ET


A team of about 150 engineers, scientists, astronauts, researchers and students started work this week on the first of several deep-space mission scenarios, part of an annual NASA field expedition called Desert Research and Technology Studies, or Desert RATS.
Staged from Black Point Lava Flow in the northern Arizona desert, the project is an opportunity to flesh-out plans, test equipment and practice techniques for a variety of proposed human space exploration missions. This year's campaign includes four asteroid mission scenarios, reflecting NASA's shift from lunar exploration to a planned asteroid visit, targeted for the mid-2020s.
NASA's Mission Control Center is participating in this year's simulation, along with Europe's Space Research and Technology Center in Norway. A communications time lag, which simulates what astronauts and ground controllers would experience during an actual mission at an asteroid, is part of the exercise.
"Fifty seconds does not sound like much, but it's crazy-long to have a conversation," Jeff Stone, the NASA mission operations director who leads a 12-person team in Houston, said in an article in last week's Aviation Week and Space Technology. "It takes a whole different mindset."
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I wonder what is wrong with a ~2.7 second signal to the Moon and back.  - LRK -




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WHAT THE MIND CAN CONCEIVE, AND BELIEVE, IT WILL ACHIEVE - LRK -

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