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Neil Armstrong says US Space Program 'Embarrassing'
Space Travel ^ | September 22, 2011 | Staff Writers

Posted on 09/22/2011 9:06:34 PM PDT by lbryce

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To: GeronL
That’s one of the questions being pondered by NASA and Russian space experts following last week’s failure of an unmanned Russian cargo rocket. The U.S. fleet of space shuttles is retired and the Obama administration has no American alternative coming online for years

BTW, i think the private venture, Space-X, might have a Dragon vehicle ready to go in November to resupply the space station if need be IIRC. BTW, if I was NASA/Russia, I would just launch another Progress to keep them supplied up there, taking a risk that the failed launch was a fluke and just let the investigation of that launch go on.
21 posted on 09/22/2011 9:56:58 PM PDT by Nowhere Man (General James Mattoon Scott, where are you when we need you? We need a regime change.)
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To: lbryce
President Barack Obama canceled the Constellation program that would have returned humans to the Moon and called on NASA to instead focus on new, deep-space capabilities to carry people to an asteroid by 2025 and Mars by 2030.

He fails to decry Obama, as the one statement he makes about Obama's actions lacks any kind of outcry directed at him.

I'd like to see what Obama has actually done to support his supposed long off goals. Does anyone know?

22 posted on 09/22/2011 9:58:26 PM PDT by Bellflower (When the word "holy" is used it must be used with respect and reverence for The LORD.)
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To: Nowhere Man

good point, but do the Russians have another Progress (which I am sure NASA is paying for at this point) ready?


23 posted on 09/22/2011 10:06:27 PM PDT by GeronL (The Right to Life came before the Right to Happiness)
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To: Nowhere Man

It takes guts. It takes dedication and first and foremost, it takes sacrifice.

Something that I haven’t seen in a long time. I’m not old enough to remember the manned landings. For me the ‘dreams’ of my generation was the Voyager probe. Amazing to be sure, but depressing to think that the best manned flight memories are of Challenger and Columbia. Low earth orbit is the farthest that man has gone in my life, and that’s, frankly pathetic.


24 posted on 09/22/2011 10:06:31 PM PDT by BenKenobi (Honkeys for Herman! “10 percent is enough for God; 9 percent is enough for government")
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To: GeronL

SpaceX is going to dock with the ISS November 30th of 2011.

So really, NASA is irrelevant. We’ve got a space company that can already do everything that’s needed.

Now, it’s just a matter of getting things stepped up to go to the Moon again.


25 posted on 09/22/2011 10:11:25 PM PDT by BenKenobi (Honkeys for Herman! “10 percent is enough for God; 9 percent is enough for government")
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To: lbryce

Remember that “reset” button Hillary Obama gave to the Russians?
That was to make up for the embarrassment caused to the poor Bolsheviks after we won the space race, and subsequently the cold war.
Theres no better way than to atone than to freeze our space program.
This is how B.O. is not “weaponizing” space.
Or maybe this is just an episode of Outer Limits.


26 posted on 09/22/2011 10:14:30 PM PDT by barstoolblues (proud member of the sunzab itches club)
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To: BenKenobi

I’d like to see the private sector get to the moon before the Chinese.


27 posted on 09/22/2011 10:14:56 PM PDT by GeronL (The Right to Life came before the Right to Happiness)
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To: GeronL
good point, but do the Russians have another Progress (which I am sure NASA is paying for at this point) ready?

Good question, actually. Yeah, you do have a point, I was just "assuming" they had another one in stock and/or ready. I know it is dangerous to assume but I think it would be wise to have a second and third ready to go for "just in case."
28 posted on 09/22/2011 10:15:09 PM PDT by Nowhere Man (General James Mattoon Scott, where are you when we need you? We need a regime change.)
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To: Nowhere Man

The European “ATV” or “Automated Transfer Vehicle”

the third ATV is set to launch in Feb of 2012. It is apparently sitting in French Guiana where the ESA launch site is.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automated_Transfer_Vehicle

Each ATV weighs 20.7 tonnes at launch and has a cargo capacity of 8 tonnes:[3]
1,500 kilograms (3,300 lb) to 5,500 kilograms (12,000 lb) of dry cargo (re-supply goods, scientific payload, etc.),
Up to 840 kilograms (1,900 lb) of water,
Up to 100 kilograms (220 lb) of gas (nitrogen, oxygen, air), with up to two gases per flight,
Up to 4,700 kilograms (10,000 lb) of propellant for the re-boost maneuver and refueling the station.


29 posted on 09/22/2011 10:19:00 PM PDT by GeronL (The Right to Life came before the Right to Happiness)
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To: Soothesayer9
So did we bring anything back from the moon other than rocks?What about Mars? I love the Mars rovers but please...we need to have a *financial* reason for pumping billions into the space program.

If I understand you correctly, it seems you have a rather provincial perspective on the way you look at the world. Retrieving 'moon rocks' was hardly the raison d'etre for landing on the moon. There were much bigger issues to why we made the effort, most of which can not be quantified by any *financial* justification you seem to think is the only point of it all.

30 posted on 09/22/2011 10:28:42 PM PDT by lbryce (BHO:Satan's Evil Twin)
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To: lbryce

Armstrong always was the master of understatement.


31 posted on 09/22/2011 10:33:48 PM PDT by El Gato ("The second amendment is the reset button of the US constitution"-Doug McKay)
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To: Nowhere Man
I remember Gene Cernan was told my President Nixon that “he would be the last man to walk on the Moon in the 20th Century.”

And he was.

But it's the 21st Century, and with current plans and abilities, or lack thereof, it will be half over before someone does it again. He'll probably be Chinese, maybe with luck, Indian.

32 posted on 09/22/2011 10:38:48 PM PDT by El Gato ("The second amendment is the reset button of the US constitution"-Doug McKay)
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To: Soothesayer9

We went to the Moon to hunt for the mysterious black monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.


33 posted on 09/22/2011 10:43:19 PM PDT by Pelham (Islam. The original Evil Empire)
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To: BenKenobi
Low earth orbit is the farthest that man has gone in my life, and that’s, frankly pathetic.

Sure is.

I OTOH remember watching that first landing mission. I saw the first step off the lander's ladder at my wife's grandparents' farm.

I also remember watching the lift off from the moon during the Apollo 15 mission. That was in the "day room" at AF ROTC field training at Vandenberg AFB, CA.

Then there was Apollo 9, with the reading from Genesis from Lunar Orbit on Christmas Eve. Watched that one from my basement, during a lull in our Christmas Eve festivities. The only holiday we celebrated with my Dad's family. I remember my Uncle Jim, (Dad's brother in law) being as fascinated as I was. He was of the pre-WWII generation. Too Old for WWII, too young for WWI.

So, with those memories, my take on the situation, and the current space program is that it makes me sick to my stomach.

34 posted on 09/22/2011 10:56:14 PM PDT by El Gato ("The second amendment is the reset button of the US constitution"-Doug McKay)
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To: lbryce
President Barack Obama canceled the Constellation program that would have returned humans to the Moon and called on NASA to instead focus on new, deep-space capabilities to carry people to an asteroid by 2025 and Mars by 2030.

He will have run out of places to go on vacation on Earth by then.

35 posted on 09/22/2011 11:05:32 PM PDT by Rome2000 (OBAMA IS A COMMUNIST CRYPTO-MUSLIM)
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To: Pelham
We went to the Moon to hunt for the mysterious black monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

We might have, if we'd also had that Hilton station in orbit, with the Pan Am shuttle to take us there. It's 10 years after 2001.

I want my dammed ride to the station!

I've been waiting for it since 1968. How the hell am I supposed to get my ashes spread into orbit, which was my backup plan if the commercial shuttle wasn't ready before I got too old to fly on it.

36 posted on 09/22/2011 11:19:39 PM PDT by El Gato ("The second amendment is the reset button of the US constitution"-Doug McKay)
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To: lbryce

What does any of that have to do with NASA’s main objective: reaching out to Muslims?


37 posted on 09/23/2011 1:28:26 AM PDT by icanhasbailout
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To: icanhasbailout

Well, if NASA is indeed embarrassing as Niel Armstrong contends, it would then serve as the perfect bureacracy in which to reach out to Muslims who are nothing if not embarrassing.


38 posted on 09/23/2011 1:34:12 AM PDT by lbryce (BHO:Satan's Evil Twin)
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To: lbryce
Between 1405 and 1433 Ming China sent seven overseas missions under Admiral Cheng Ho. The project was then scrapped by the Imperial government, and China lost - perhaps forever - her chance to be a world power.

Between 1969 and 1972 the USA sent six missions to the moon. Then the project ws scrapped, and the rest is - or will be - history.

"Where there is no vision, the people perish" [Proverbs xxix:18] as I'm sure all good Freepers know.

39 posted on 09/23/2011 2:41:06 AM PDT by John Locke
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To: lbryce

Notice how the writer feels it necessary to identify Neil Armstrong as the first astronaut to walk on the Moon? Speaks volumes.


40 posted on 09/23/2011 3:24:18 AM PDT by Tallguy (You can safely ignore anything that precedes the word "But"...)
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