I almost forgot… it’s been 41 years.
What my generation can’t do with computers and a template to build on, these men did with technology that seems ancient today. The Landing Module computer had less than 4,000 programmable words (yes, words– all commands were phrased like “Verb 884″ or “Noun 284″)… and the Saturn’s guidance computer ran on a two megahertz CPU.
Truly, the Apollo astronauts were pioneers.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 has had its first successful flight… with a dummy Orion replacement on board, to boot. Video highlights here (ignore the dirt dauber trying to nest in the camera housing, they aren’t that big… really).
This highlights something I’ve believed ever since I began edging into libertarianism (and Tam has pointed out the same thing)– private enterprise beats the pants off governmental agencies in the spaceflight arena. Think about it– NASA can’t even keep up a reliable transport to the ISS (much less the Moon), but private enterprise can conceive, build, and launch a new transport in less than five years.
Of course, it still looks like astronauts will have to hitch rides from the Russians, but maybe it’ll be a one time thing now.
O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power through-out the universe displayed.
“How Great Thou Art”
Via Linoge, a wonderful little app. Even in our local neighborhood, the distances and times involved are tremendous. Most plans for a Mars mission are timed for around 2 1/2 to 3 years. A mission to Venus would last about a year. With our current technology, the outer Solar System is out of reach, much less the rest of our galaxy. Now begin to imagine the rest of space.
Heck, we live in suburbia. Boring G2 dwarf in a boring neighborhood, with a few oddball planets. Compared to some stars out there, our Sun is a pipsqueak:
And then you get to the fact that our universe is huge:
Thy pow’r thought the universe displayed…
I saw the Ares launch this morning. I was all excited, thinking the new era of rockets was here, and then I found out when the next test launch will be.
2013. 47 months.
This is worse than waiting for the next Bond movie or the Zombieland sequel. Almost 4 years? I don’t even have a calendar that goes that far out to mark. And I bet Western Union won’t hold a message 46 months for me, will they now?
Well, now we’ve done it. Mike will be loading the catapult right about now. Remember, folks… picnics at the bullseye are not advised.
On a more serious note, if I hear one more “Our government should have taken that money and…” I will be spending time in a padded cell. Look, NASA is probably the one government agency that provides a return on investment. If we had given THEM the billion dollars in pork, we’d have flying cars now.
This is a Delta IV Heavy liftoff from the Cape. I looked this launch up, and it carried a DSP satellite into orbit on 11 November 2007.
I’ve seen the same type of shot before, but it’s still amazing that the camera survives.
