Author Topic: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight  (Read 16603 times)

Offline nooneofconsequence

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #20 on: 08/29/2009 08:11 pm »
No surprise Bolden would be talking up the russians. Obama would like most to "de-nationalize" our too single sourced HSF out of LEO by multiple national partners, like the ISS out of Freedom - we're back at that stage again.

Hopefully it will be a better managed, less underwritten, more sensible approach than the Clinton administration. The rubric of developing space industrial capacity is a rotten one given the experience with the ISS (horribly capital inefficient). This has to be a lot better this time to work.

One example would be just to lob propellants to a depot - this, while not as sexy as developing say a lander, would be highly efficient, practical, and fast. Sure there will be others.

But you can't mix diplomacy like Clinton did - diplomats are totally unconcerned with engineering/efficiency/speed/effectiveness. They actually prefer perpetual, on the edge disasters, because they get to stay in control longer. Aaagh!
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato

Offline pm1823

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #21 on: 08/30/2009 02:08 am »
Quote
1)Russians budget in US$ compared to Nasa

In 2030+? Fortune-teller needed.



Offline A_M_Swallow

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #22 on: 08/30/2009 03:25 am »
Russia is now an oil state.  Other oil states like Saudi Arabia have lots of money.

Offline BestRed1

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #23 on: 08/30/2009 03:45 am »

Accusing a US Marine General of being "in love with Russia" is a little beyond the pail.


[/quote]

You weren't there, were you? I heard the man. I'm ex-military myself and his comments made me want to puke! He made it very clear to about 1000 people that he's in love with the Russians. 1000 tax paying Americans, many of which have dedicated their lives to the space program.

I'll never forget his comments as long as I live. We hardly ever get to hear directly from the NASA administrator. His comments were an insult to every dedicated professional standing there.
We're boldly going where everyone has gone before: Nowhere!

Offline Patchouli

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #24 on: 08/30/2009 04:04 am »
Partnering with Russia would greatly benefit a human mission to Mars and might be the only way it will happen  anytime soon.

The US space program and aerospace industries' strengths are they can field an HLV in the 90T payload range quickly and could with funding could have some low cost RLVs ready soon.
They also have better facilities for testing hypersonic reentry shapes esp lifting bodies and experience with inflatable structures.
Despite the economy the US still has more money then anyone else to spend on space exploration.

The Russian's strength they do have more experience with long duration spaceflight ,nuclear power in space,and robust life support systems.
They also have more experience with kerosene and lox engines but the US is catching up again thanks to Spacex.

Really there is no better partner then Russia for an international mission to Mars.

It also would be good to bring the Eu ,UK and even Japan into the program as they have their own unique talents that could prove useful.
Plus more money to offer.

Offline hop

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #25 on: 08/30/2009 04:16 am »
I'll never forget his comments as long as I live. We hardly ever get to hear directly from the NASA administrator. His comments were an insult to every dedicated professional standing there.
This sort of statement would be more convincing with a transcript or recording.
Russia is now an oil state.  Other oil states like Saudi Arabia have lots of money.
Terrible comparison. Oil and gas are Russias major exports, but they are a far smaller part of the total economy than the gulf states. While some parts of Russia have gotten rich off of oil, the country as a whole is in pretty bad shape. To the extent that the government is getting reach, it's not at all clear they have much interest in spending it on space. Not all major oil producers are rich either, e.g. Nigeria, Iran, Venezuela to name just a few.

Offline Comga

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #26 on: 08/30/2009 04:47 am »
I'll never forget his comments as long as I live. We hardly ever get to hear directly from the NASA administrator. His comments were an insult to every dedicated professional standing there.
This sort of statement would be more convincing with a transcript or recording.

Yes, BestRed1, can you provide or point us to a record of what he did say?  So far all I have seen are summaries or very short quotes.
What kind of wastrels would dump a perfectly good booster in the ocean after just one use?

Offline cleo

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #27 on: 08/30/2009 09:03 am »
I'll never forget his comments as long as I live. We hardly ever get to hear directly from the NASA administrator. His comments were an insult to every dedicated professional standing there.
This sort of statement would be more convincing with a transcript or recording.

Yes, BestRed1, can you provide or point us to a record of what he did say?  So far all I have seen are summaries or very short quotes.

Isn't the whole notion a 'bit' over the top?  A NASA administrator 'loving Russians' is now an 'accusation' and a slight on the character of a person?!  Perhaps he just likes Russian literature, music OR their approach to engineering.  And a US Marine *can* love Russians.  As people and a culture.  We are not back in the McCarthy era, I hope? 

Our HSF is really in trouble if that is one of the sentiments among NASA's ranks as a motivation.  I can understand normal patriotism, but some of the sentiments expressed prior are bordering on jingoism and are not healthy.

Offline pm1823

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #28 on: 08/30/2009 09:45 am »
Do you still talking about Mark Bowman's suggestion made in his speech on "Gagarin's Readings" about advantages in international mission to Mars?
There is nothing to discuss, because it were just velleities.
http://www.roscosmos.ru/NewsDoSele.asp?NEWSID=7227 (in Russian)

Offline BestRed1

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #29 on: 08/30/2009 01:45 pm »
I'll never forget his comments as long as I live. We hardly ever get to hear directly from the NASA administrator. His comments were an insult to every dedicated professional standing there.
This sort of statement would be more convincing with a transcript or recording.

Yes, BestRed1, can you provide or point us to a record of what he did say?  So far all I have seen are summaries or very short quotes.

There was no media coverage on 8/20/09 other than internal MAF video services. The video tape was played continuously on our closed circuit TV system throughout the next day, 8/21/09.

I know that there are many MAF employees that visit this website. One of them turned me on to it and I just recently decided to sign-up. Maybe one of them will put their twist on this so you get more than just my perspective.

I wish there were someplace I could point you to so you could form your own opinion about his comments. This pathetic speech motivated me to respond here to give you some insight into this man's views. Yes, I'm paraphrasing and interjecting my opinion but I stood there shocked after this speech. About six of us stood there chatting about how sad it was that a former Marine General would tell American workers, whom are all about to be laid off, that he thought it was great how we were providing funding to the Russians.

Sorry, I don’t know how to interpret those comments any better.

We're boldly going where everyone has gone before: Nowhere!

Offline James (Lockheed)

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #30 on: 08/30/2009 02:04 pm »
Concur with Red's comments. And there are a LOT of Michoud guys on here, partly because Chris was the only reporter to give a damn about how we turned around the delivery schedule and wrote about it, for example,
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2008/06/maf-effort-sees-external-tanks-back-on-track-to-support-sts-125/

and writes when we have a good tank performance, when the rest of the media only care about foam loss drama,
http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2008/12/maf-close-out-2008-phenomenal-performance-of-et-129/

This site has a lot of respect here.

Offline SpacexULA

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #31 on: 08/30/2009 02:50 pm »
About six of us stood there chatting about how sad it was that a former Marine General would tell American workers, whom are all about to be laid off, that he thought it was great how we were providing funding to the Russians.

Sorry, I don’t know how to interpret those comments any better.

I doubt he said "I am so glad I are firing you guys and handing the money to the Russians, god I love the Russians.  But I especially love rubbing your faces in this, I really do"

Hopefully someone sticks a post it note on his door, so on Monday he can clarify his position.  Some how I think if you caught him at the water cooler, he would say the way you took it is by NO stretch what he meant.
« Last Edit: 08/30/2009 02:53 pm by SpacexULA »
No Bucks no Buck Rogers, but at least Flexible path gets you Twiki.

Offline mr_magoo

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #32 on: 08/30/2009 03:23 pm »
I suppose he might have done that, if he was a cartoon villain like boris from bulwinkle.  More likely he's just an adminstrator trying to make lemonade from lemons.  This is the hand he was dealt.

Offline BestRed1

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #33 on: 08/30/2009 04:24 pm »
About six of us stood there chatting about how sad it was that a former Marine General would tell American workers, whom are all about to be laid off, that he thought it was great how we were providing funding to the Russians.

Sorry, I don’t know how to interpret those comments any better.

I doubt he said "I am so glad I are firing you guys and handing the money to the Russians, god I love the Russians.  But I especially love rubbing your faces in this, I really do"

Hopefully someone sticks a post it note on his door, so on Monday he can clarify his position.  Some how I think if you caught him at the water cooler, he would say the way you took it is by NO stretch what he meant.

SpacexULA, Well maybe he should consider his audience before making the kind of remarks that he did. At his level he's mostly a politician and as-such should learn not to insult his audience.

What did the hard working people at MAF do to tick you off? So we're the sucking sound that has been coming from NASA for the last 25-years? You can blame politicians as far back as Nixon for this problem and Obama will just continue the legacy. He's more concerned about creating the largest government sucking sound in US history; 100% US government provided healthcare. If that continues to develop, NASA won't have enough funding to launch a bottle rocket. More engineers will wind up teaching high school physics than at any other time in US history, repeating the NASA and contractor brain-drain that occurred when Nixon killed the Apollo program.

We're boldly going where everyone has gone before: Nowhere!

Offline nooneofconsequence

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #34 on: 08/30/2009 04:27 pm »
Cool down. He's just being politically inept. Just like Admiral Truly was. What I feared of his appointment. Perhaps he'll learn fast.

My guess is that he thinks he's being inspirational by thinking of partnership to lower some costs to afford others at MAF, but because he didn't lead with that, he gave a different impression. It's hard to see how he could do that, given all that's up in the air at the moment, so my guess again is he feels embarrassed, wishing to be inspiring, and simply talked way out in front of his headlights than he should have (same again with Truly).

There's this blurryness of vision that afflicts many who rise to the top - they think in terms of generalities - in this case, that outsourcing parts of the space program to Russia, ..., [perhaps even China?] is good, because then we may do other things as well that aren't outsourced.

They forget who's sitting right in front of them, what they want/need to hear, and how they feel about it. It's so horrible when it happens, as it takes the enthusiasm of the visit and shoves it in like a knife to the gut.
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato

Offline BestRed1

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #35 on: 08/30/2009 04:47 pm »
Cool down. He's just being politically inept. Just like Admiral Truly was. What I feared of his appointment. Perhaps he'll learn fast.

My guess is that he thinks he's being inspirational by thinking of partnership to lower some costs to afford others at MAF, but because he didn't lead with that, he gave a different impression. It's hard to see how he could do that, given all that's up in the air at the moment, so my guess again is he feels embarrassed, wishing to be inspiring, and simply talked way out in front of his headlights than he should have (same again with Truly).

There's this blurryness of vision that afflicts many who rise to the top - they think in terms of generalities - in this case, that outsourcing parts of the space program to Russia, ..., [perhaps even China?] is good, because then we may do other things as well that aren't outsourced.

They forget who's sitting right in front of them, what they want/need to hear, and how they feel about it. It's so horrible when it happens, as it takes the enthusiasm of the visit and shoves it in like a knife to the gut.

Nooneofconsequence, you're right! I remember the high hopes when Truly came on the scene and the many stupid comments that he made.

I'm very frustrated in that I truly believe the huge losses of the skilled Apollo work force that occurred in the 70's is about to happen again at the end of Shuttle. It seems as if we learned nothing from it. With the break-neck speed that our politicians seem to work at, everyone will move on to other careers. They won't consider taking the risk to come back into a very demanding line of work. This industry can change every time a politician doesn't like a project that doesn't have any work in his or her state.

It will take 10-years to retrain the people necessary to get back into space. It happened after Apollo and its happening again.
« Last Edit: 08/30/2009 04:53 pm by BestRed1 »
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Offline BestRed1

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #36 on: 08/30/2009 05:55 pm »

Very well stated nooneofconsequence. I hope its not over. I'm anxiously awaiting what comes from the Augustine Commission. More so, how the politicians will respond to the recommendations.
We're boldly going where everyone has gone before: Nowhere!

Offline nooneofconsequence

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #37 on: 08/30/2009 06:18 pm »
Hard to tell. A lot of this is long overdue, due to the past two incompetent administrators (we wanted to believe they weren't, but they were in different ways).

Here's the reality - we can't afford much more than a Soyuz program, operations costs are close to 2x to high on labor, and five plus firms with operations in Alabama, Louisiana, Utah, and California will inherit a follow on project that's probably a quarter of what Shuttle was. MAF is essential for this, even if HQ isn't mindful of this, most everyone else is.
"Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something" - Plato

Offline Patchouli

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #38 on: 08/30/2009 06:55 pm »
Hard to tell. A lot of this is long overdue, due to the past two incompetent administrators (we wanted to believe they weren't, but they were in different ways).

Here's the reality - we can't afford much more than a Soyuz program, operations costs are close to 2x to high on labor, and five plus firms with operations in Alabama, Louisiana, Utah, and California will inherit a follow on project that's probably a quarter of what Shuttle was. MAF is essential for this, even if HQ isn't mindful of this, most everyone else is.

Even Orion on the Delta IV-H or Dragon would be far more capable then the Soyuz.
Actually both vehicles even exceed Soyuz's replacement PPTS.
http://www.russianspaceweb.com/ppts.html
Orion has 6 months autonomous unmanned capability while Dragon can operate for up to 2 years.
Plus Dragon is fully robotic and Orion's SM is capable of operating as a separate vehicle.
http://www.spacex.com/dragon.php
http://www.lockheedmartin.com/products/Orion/OrionToolKit/

Both of these vehicles only cost a small fraction of the 18B a year NASA gets.

Once Ares is replaced with NSC or Jupiter the money woes will be largely history.
No more need for the J2X and five segment SRB and mass constraints would be removed from Orion which would reduce it's R&D and operating costs.
« Last Edit: 08/30/2009 06:57 pm by Patchouli »

Offline Danderman

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Re: NASA suggests teaming up with Russia for Mars flight
« Reply #39 on: 08/30/2009 08:29 pm »
Well..................... NASA Administrator Bolden is in love with the Russian's so this shouldn't be a shock to anyone! Just a week ago he told the employees at the NASA Michoud Assembly Facility that he thought it was great that we were paying our Russian partners to keep our space station going after the Shuttle dies.  You could have heard a pin drop in the place. Laying off American space workers while paying hostage money to the Russians to keep our station alive, wow, what a great America we live in today!

WAKE UP PEOPLE! The Russians DON'T HAVE ANY MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It won't be a parternship, we'll pay for it all or at least 95% of it.

More like: "At least we can still get to ISS via the Russians once the Shuttle is retired", which is called "realism".


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