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That's pretty sick....very technical. I wonder if it will work.
I like the "Dare Mighty Things" at the end of it.
So many potential points of failure, any one of which could crash the whole thing. If all goes well, in some respects this could be the most impressive thing NASA has ever pulled off.
The most incredible think NASA has ever done my friend was on July 20, 1969......
Art, in terms of technological advancements, I think compared to the technology we have NOW, this is just as challenging as the moon landing may have been in '69, though obviously not as important historically.
What he said...Quote:
Originally Posted by Art at ISP
....
if it flunks, thats a buttload of your tax dollars, pissed away as usual....
To the point, NASA's budget is a sad .5% of the entire national budget. In fact, the cost of the war in Iraq for ONE MONTH is more than the ENTIRE budget of NASA's history combined.
That alone makes me want to vomitQuote:
Originally Posted by Phil D.
Do you have a source for that, Phil? According to this NASA Presentation, the budget for FY 2013 alone is $17.7 Billion. Yes, overall, NASA makes up a small part of the federal budget, but the situation is not nearly what you claim. If you take a look at the NASA budget over its history, except for the early Apollo years, it has almost never been more than 1% of federal spending, but it certainly hasn't been neglected. When adjusted for inflation, NASA spending has been $790 Billion over its lifetime.Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil D.
Oh yeah, that. :biggrin:Quote:
Originally Posted by Art at ISP
Dont know how accurate that 0.5% statistic is...
However, to put it into parlance that resonates well with what you (and I do,):
-if your flight planning could curtain 0.5% more fuel efficiency, are you implying you wouldn't tap into that? If I could tap into 0.5% more efficiency in terms of overhead, staff efficiency and output, that is a lot.
Just using Moose's 2013 17.7 billion figure, 0.5% of (17.7 billion U.S. dollars) = 88.5 million U.S. dollars
Every dollar counts.
I'm not saying its not a fantastic endeavour, but to what end? We still havent figured out Earth and how to live on it yet and now we're exploring for the sake of exploring? time to tighten belts all around.
Urg, I do hate political talk. lets get back to the jets....
Historically, the Moon Landing is more significant. I think we can all agree. But technologically, I think this takes the cake. Its much more complex and its all automated. The lunar landings were all done manually with the assistance of primitive computers. I think the margin for error with the Mars landing is very close to 0%, where with the lunar landings, things could be adjusted on the fly.
On the contrary, the space program is where so many of our nation's innovations come from that allow our technologies to advance. When faced with the challenges of space flight, the brilliant engineers then come up with simply amazing solutions that always have practical applications in the civilian world... especially in medicine.
Each year NASA comes out with a book called Spinoffs, which is a deep look into all the things that we use on a daily basis in our lives that can be attributed to the space program.
You want to talk about jets...then that means you want to talk about the technologies that NASA and the space program made easier and safer. ;)
As for the budget, Mario, I think Moose was debating the comparison to the monthly cost of the Iraqi war (I'll have to do some research, but I could be wrong). The .5% of the annual budget is a fact.
I recommend you watch the videos in this thread... http://nycaviation.com/forum/threads...light=dreaming
It's not just "for the sake of exploring".
Of the $3,690,000,000,000 national budget for 2011, NASA received $17 billion. The national defense budget and Social security were both $738 billion each. Tax administration is almost at the same level as NASA at $12 billion.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...budget.html?hp