Elon Musk to unveil spacecraft to ferry astronauts

Associated Press ^ | May 29, 2014 5:52 PM EDT | Raquel Maria Dillon

[Olog-hai]

SpaceX, which has flown unmanned cargo capsules to the International Space Station, planned to unveil a new spacecraft Thursday designed to ferry astronauts to low-Earth orbit.

The Southern California-based rocket builder, founded by billionaire Elon Musk, is one of several private companies vying to develop “space taxis” for NASA to replace the retired space shuttle fleet. …

[Jack Hydrazine]

I posted a thread a little earlier about the same thing.

SpaceX Dragon V2 Unveiled Tonight (7:00pm PDT/10:00PM EDT)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3161460/posts

[Islander7]

Ugh! First “gay” marriage, now “ferry astronauts”. When will ever end?

[BenLurkin]

Just think about it — you’ll be spending 20 days alone with him in a capsule the size of an SUV’s interior.

[NormsRevenge]

I hear they are giving up on the burnt t’ar engine’

Good luck, we need to go back into space

[NormsRevenge]

Frisk him for batteries

[Captain7seas]

no need for this. We can rely on our Russian friends to send our astronauts up and we only have to pay them $71 million a pop. -no brainer.

[originalbuckeye]

I believe Elon Musk, Obama donor extraordinaire, is the reason NASA has been turned into a shell of it’s former self. Nice to have friends in high places who will grease the skids for you!

[Jack Hydrazine]

You can watch it here.

http://www.spaceflightnow.com/live/

[jltate]

NASA has been a joke since we retired our heavy lifters in the 1970s in favor of the “reusable” space shuttle. They’ve been a shell for decades. Instead of putting money into R&D for better lifters they put up an almost worthless space station that isn’t even ours.

Each shuttle launch cost just under half a billion 2011 dollars. For about 3x the price you could get 5x the payload into orbit with a Saturn V.

The Falcon Heavy will be second only in payload to the Saturn V at 117,000 pounds to orbit compared to the Saturn V’s 310,000, yet at $120 million it will be about 1/10th the expected cost.

Whatever Musk’s political beliefs, SpaceX is an amazing company and I wish I had the expertise to work there.

[Bobalu]

All of the new space entrepreneurs are standing on the shoulders of giants. Here are the two biggest giants. Werner Von Braun and Sergei Korolev

Both of these men were scientific titans. I admire Sergei Korolev the most as his legacy is not stained by the blood of Jewish prisoners forced to labor to build rockets to kill innocents.

I cannot think of Von Braun without seeing the image of those poor tortured prisoners. "I was just following orders" and "I was only interested in the peaceful use of space technology" are not good excuses. I know God can forgive someone like Von Braun but I have a hard time absolving such sins.

May both of them rest in peace...too bad they did not live to see the fruits of what they did.

Both men felt that we could be on Mars before the 20th century ended.

I predict that SpaceX will be first to land a man on Mars.

[SoCal Pubbie]

No love for Robbert Goddard?

[exit82]

I would like to be sitting poolside under a dome in an orbiting hotel watching the Earth go by someday.

Someday.

I remember watching 2001:A Space Odyssey in 1968 as a 14 year old, and believing this could come true in ten or fifteen years. The next year, we landed on the moon.

[Bobalu]

I did not realize the two men looked so similar until I saw the images I posted above....odd isn’t it.

[Lurkina.n.Learnin]

Bump for later

[Bobalu]

Goddard is indeed a cool fellow.

I just limited the post to the two men who led the space travel efforts of the superpowers during the late 20th century.

[SoCal Pubbie]

Goddard invented the liquid fueled rocket motor plus he was American!

[Jack Hydrazine]

Watch what happens when they get the Raptor engine qualified to fly (1,000,000 lbs. thrust). Put nine of those babies on a rocket, then 18 more to two rocket boosters like the Falcon Heavy and you’ll have 27,000,000 lbs. thrust to work with! It will be able to lift more than the Saturn V.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Okay. It’s 19:00PM PDT. Where is it?

[Vince Ferrer]

Starting now...