Posted on 03/06/2006 8:44:36 AM PST by narby
Looks like it's been done. Now the question is why did they shut it down?
You've got to see this.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1590674/posts
Yay! I get to be the net-Nazi!
Posted here...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1590823/posts
I think I searched for "space". Dummy.
I see no advantage in having a crew.
There is nothing they can do that couldn't be done remotely, and the environmental/life-support systems would only add weight and take up valuable space.
Something we could use on Iran, maybe?
I have a hunch that this might form part of our missile defense program; the US has talked before about actually shooting down ballistic missiles in space.
AWST works pretty tight with the feds. I don't think they publish stuff unless they've been given a green light. It wouldn't surprise me that this is a little warning to Teran, which would'nt know about this kind of stuff like I'm sure the Russians and Chinese already do.
Maybe...
The other detriment to having pilots is the artificial performace limits that would need to be set in order to avoid hazardous G-forces.
Aerospace ping
What do you have against humans in space?
Granted, for a military mission they're not necessary. But the cool thing about this is that we apparently have a method of getting humans in space that could probably be flown every day or two. Amortize the costs of getting into space when you can re-fly the same vehicle with just a fuel top-off every day or two and you see that this kind of thing would be extreemly useful.
Probably needs to be a tad larger to haul at least some cargo, but other than that I think this is the way to get humans into space, not Apollo V2.0. Let the big dumb rockets haul unmanned missions and this kind of stuff for crew transfer.
> AWST works pretty tight with the feds. I don't think they
> publish stuff unless they've been given a green light.
Not necessarily.
Someone went to jail after AWST ran the sat photos
of the Russian aircraft carrier many years ago.
Yes, it was leaked by someone with classified access,
but it wasn't authorized.
My guess is that technology overtook any real mission for Blackstar. You only have to look at the dramatic changes in the past six years...and realize that Blackstar was built in the late 1980s...with mostly 80's technology. It was probably state-of-the-art in 1995...but 10 years have passed...and it just isn't fitting into today's mission.
"Now the question is why did they shut it down?"
Because they've got something better. Either that or it's dis-info to make people THINK they're not using it anymore.
I'll vouch for this: when I worked on the X-30 National Aerospace Plane from 1988-1996, I went to General Dynamics and was given a 6-inch section of the Shuttle leading edge of the wing. It was so heavy, I could barely hold it with one hand. Then the manager there gave me a section, same size, of the new carbon-carbon composites, and it was light as a feather.
> I went to General Dynamics and was given a 6-inch section of the Shuttle leading edge of the wing. It was so heavy, I could barely hold it with one hand. Then the manager there gave me a section, same size, of the new carbon-carbon composites, and it was light as a feather.
Huh? The leading edge of the shuttle wing has *always* been a thin CC shell structure.
He told me it was from the leading edge of the wing and it was incredibly heavy, as opposed to the same section of carbon-carbon for NASP. That's all I know. Define it as you wish.
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