Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from holmes.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr1/ota/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Sun, 7 May 89 03:17:01 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Sun, 7 May 89 03:16:52 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #414 SPACE Digest Volume 9 : Issue 414 Today's Topics: Space salvage (was RE: Colonization problems) Re: asteroid almost hits earth Wireless electricity and Tesla Shuttle audio Re: Brilliant (but old hat) Pebbles Govt. vs. Small Launch ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 4 May 89 13:59:48 CDT From: pyron@lvvax1.csc.ti.com (c, it's not just a good idea, it's the law) Subject: Space salvage (was RE: Colonization problems) haven!aplcen!aplcomm!stdb.jhuapl.edu!jwm@purdue.edu (Jim Meritt) writes: >(BTW: Would MIR count as adrift and qualify under international salvage >laws, since it has been abandoned?) Got some plans we should know about? Salvage laws only came about when there were enough ships to make it worth while. Besides, I can leave my ship at anchor (the analogy here) and go into town if I leave the correct set of lights burning. But if you want to try something, I'll post your bail!!! Dillon Pyron | The opinions are mine, the facts TI/DSEG Lewisville Computer Services | probably belong to the company. pyron@lvvax1.csc.ti.com | (214)462-5449 | We try, we learn, sometimes we die. | We sit on our butts, learn nothing, | and we still die. ------------------------------ Date: 4 May 89 19:13:52 GMT From: vygr!mae@sun.com (Mike Ekberg, Sun {GPD-LEGO}) Subject: Re: asteroid almost hits earth In article <2635@ssc-vax.UUCP> eder@ssc-vax.UUCP (Dani Eder) writes: > >If an asteroid misses the Earth by 500,000 km, that is about 80 Earth >radii. Let us comapre this to more familiar events and see how this >compares. The mean radius of a car is about 2 meters. 80 times 2 >meters is 160 meters (525 feet.). If a car crosses a 4 way intersection >while you are that far away, do you call it a near miss? I think not. >The collision cross section of an irplane is 20 meters in the horizontal >radius and 4 meters in the vertical direction. A crossing at 1600 >meters horizontal separation (1 mile) is hardly a near hit, as is >320 meters (1000 feet) in the vertical direction. > Carried to an absurd length(reducio ad absurtum(sd?)), let's assume that instead of a another car crossing an intersection a couple of blocks away, a 747 crashes. Or an atomic bomb goes off? (Phewww! just missed me (:-). Please note in the following re-post: "His[ Eugene Shoemaker, a respected US Geological Survey scientist] calculations suggest that asteroids packing the explosive energy of one megaton should enter the atmosphere on an average of once every 30 years, larger asteroids with a 20-megaton punch every 400 years, and a 1 km, 10,000 megaton comet or asteroid once in 100,000 years." Maybe we should consider a cheap form of insurance, like a radar satellite or two pointing out instead of in(of course the shuttle would carry them right)? Note the Siberian comet/asteroid was estimated at 12-megaton, about 80 years ago(so we have 320 years {:->). # mike (sun!mae), M/S 8-04 "I'd rather sniff French shit for 5 years then eat Chinese shit the rest of my life" -Ho Chi Minh- ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 4 May 89 18:02:26 EDT From: Henry_Edward_Hardy@ub.cc.umich.edu Subject: Wireless electricity and Tesla In: Subject: Re: wireless electricity, cs.utexas.edu!oakhill!dover!fullmer@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Glen Fullmer) writes, > Didn't Nikola Tesla transmitted wireless power sufficient to light a light bulb over a considerable distance sometime near the turn of the century? In her biography of Tesla, Margaret Cheney writes, > With his giant oscillator he believed he had set the earth in electrical resonance, pumping a stream of electrons into it at a rate of 150,000 oscillations per second. The resulting pulsations had a wavelength of about 6,600 feet. Tesla concluded that they expanded ever outward over the bulge of the earth, first in increasing circles and then in ever smaller ones yet with growing intensity, and converged at a point on the globe directly opposite from Colorado Springs -- that is, slightly west of the French islands of Amsterdam and St. Paul in the Indian Ocean. Here, according to his experimental results, a great electrical "south pole" was created with a stationary wave that rose and fell in unison with his transmissions from his "North Pole" at Colorado Springs. Each time the wave receded, it was reinforced and sent back more powerfully than before to the antipode. > > Had the earth been capable of perfect resonance, the results could have been catastrophic, but since it was not, the effect, he believed, was merely to make available at any point on the Earth energy that could be drawn off with a simple piece of equipment. This would included the elements of a radio tuning unit, as ground connection, and a metal rod the height of the house. Nothing more would be needed to absorb household electricity from the waves rushing back and forth between the north and south poles. He did not, however satisfactorily prove this claim... > > It has been reported by various writers that during his power transmission experiments in Colorado, Tesla succeeded in lighting up a bank of two hundred 50 watt incandescent lamps wirelessly, at a distance of twenty-six miles from his station. In his own writings, however, no such claim is ever made, nor is there other evidence that he did so. What he actually wrote was that, by the use of the magnifying transmitter, he had passed a current across the globe sufficient to light more than two hundred incandescent lamps. Our library computer here at the University of Michigan, MIRLYN, lists the following books about Tesla: Cheney, Margaret. Tesla, man out of time / Margaret Cheney. -- Englewood Cliffs, N.J. : Prentice-Hall, c1981. xvi, 320 p., 16 pages of plates : ill. ; 24 cm. Includes index. Bibliography: p. 291-308. ISBN 0-13-906859-7 : $14.95 (est.) Martin, Thomas Commerford, 1856-1924. The inventions, researches and writings of Nikola Tesla, with special reference to his work in polyphase currents and high potential lighting, by Thomas Commerford Martin. New York, The Electrical engineer, 1894. xi, 496 p. front. (port.) illus., diagrs. 24 cm. Includes three lectures by Tesla: I. Experiments with alernate currents of very high frequency, and their application to methods of artificial illumination, delivered before the American institute of electrical engineers at Columbia college, N.Y., May 20, 1891.--II. Experiments with alternate currents of high potential and high frequency, delivered before the Institution of electrical engineers, London, Feb. 3, 1892.--III. On light and other high frequency phenomena, delivered before the Franklin institute, Philadelphia, Feb., 1893, and before the National electric light association, St. Louis, March, 1893. Microfiche (negative). 1968. 10 microfiches. 11 x 15 cm. O'Neill, John J. (John Joseph), 1889- Prodigal genius; the life of Nikola Tesla, by John J. O'Neill. New York, N.Y., I Washburn, inc. <1944> 4 p.L., 3-326 p. front. (port.) 23 cm. Rauscher, Elizabeth A. Electromagnetic phenomena in complex geometries and nonlinear phenomena, non-Hertzian waves and magnetic monopoles / by Elizabeth A. Rauscher. -- Millbrae, Calif. : Tesla Book Co., 1983, c1982. 141 p. ; 28 cm. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-9603536-9-0 (pbk.) : $15.50 Tesla, Nikola, 1856-1943. Moji pronalasci = My inventions / Nikola Tesla ; preveli Tomo Bosanac, Vanja Aljinovic ; urednik Branimira Valic. -- Zagreb : Skolska knjiga, 1977. 108 p. : ill. ; 29 cm. English and Serbo-Croatian in opposite columns. Text originally published in Electrical experimenter in 1919. Published on the occasion of the celebration of the 120th anniversary of the birth of Nikola Tesla organized by the Yugoslav Academy of Arts and Sciences. Tesla, Nikola, 1856-1943. . ..Colorado Springs notes, 1899-1900 / Nikola Tesla ; . -- Beograd : Nolit, 1978. 436, <1> p. : ill. ; 29 cm. Bibliography: p. 435-<437> Tesla, Nikola, 1856-1943. Experiments with alternate currents of high potential and high frequency : a lecture delivered before the Institution of Electrical Engineers, London / by Nikola Tesla ; with an appendix by the same author on The transmission of electric energy without wires : reviewing his recent work, and presenting illustrations from phootographs never beforep ublished : with a new portrait and a biographical sketch of the author. -- New ed. -- Hawthorne, Calif. : Omni Publications, 1979, c1904. ix, 162 p. : ill., port. ; 23 cm. Reprint. Originally published: New York : McGraw-Hill, 1904. Tesla Centennial Symposium (1984 : Colorado Springs, Colorado) Proceedings of the Tesla Centennial Symposium held at Colorado College, Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States of America, August 9-12, 1984 : celebrating a century of electrical progress. Colorado Springs, Colo. : International Tesla Society, Inc., c1985. * Henry Edward Hardy * * University of Michigan Computer Consultant * * sysop, Arbor Intelligent Systems * * President, Althing Communications * * * * Henry Edward Hardy@ub.cc.umich.edu * * Henry Edward Hardy@um.cc.umich.edu * * "Arbor" on MacNet * ------------------------------ Date: 4 May 89 17:14:39 GMT From: ncrlnk!ncrcce!johnson@uunet.uu.net (Wayne D. T. Johnson) Subject: Shuttle audio In article <24815@ames.arc.nasa.gov> mike@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Mike Smithwick) writes: >Remember, that if you live near any of the NASA installations, they'll >probably be broadcasting the shuttle communications on some of the >ham radio channels. You may want to invest in a cheap police scanner >and monitor this yourself, without the nitwit commentary from Hollywood >stars. > What about Shortwave, does any one know of a frequency that we could tune into on the shortwave band. It would seem to me that there are far more SW receivers that VHF and SW has a much larger coverage. -- Wayne Johnson (Voice) 612-638-7665 NCR Comten, Inc. (E-MAIL) W.Johnson@StPaul.NCR.COM or Roseville MN 55113 johnson@c10sd1.StPaul.NCR.COM These opinions (or spelling) do not necessarily reflect those of NCR Comten. ------------------------------ Date: 4 May 89 22:31:46 GMT From: nprdc!malloy@ucsd.edu (Sean Malloy) Subject: Re: Brilliant (but old hat) Pebbles In article <2354@csd4.milw.wisc.edu> roberts@csd4.milw.wisc.edu (Timothy Roberts) writes: > I like big science. I detest weapons based in space. The > Peace Shield will make a lot of engineers rich and destabilize > the current nuclear standoff. It may sound facetious, but to quote a bumper sticker I saw recently: STOP SDI -- MAKE THE WORLD SAFE FOR NUCLEAR WARHEADS Sean Malloy | "The proton absorbs a photon Navy Personnel Research & Development Center | and emits two morons, a San Diego, CA 92152-6800 | lepton, a boson, and a malloy@nprdc.navy.mil | boson's mate. Why did I ever | take high-energy physics?" ------------------------------ Date: 5 May 89 06:41:55 GMT From: agate!web%garnet.berkeley.edu@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (William Baxter) Subject: Govt. vs. Small Launch From hearings of the House of Representatives Committee on Science and Technology, J61 S42 100th No. 68, September 15, 1987, "Commercial Launch Industry" Testimony of Mr. KOOPMAN of American Rocket Co., Mr. KADAR of Conatec, Inc., and Mr. CHAFER of Space Services, Inc. Mr. NELSON. So, I take it from your testimony that the government has not been forthcoming in suggesting the government range cost, the tooling and equipment cost. Mr. KOOPMAN. In our case, sir, in American Rocket's case, we have just received a relatively detailed and precise estimate of the range costs for our activities through our first two launches. So, in our case the Air Force has been forthcoming. Mr. NELSON. And the rest of you? Mr. KADAR. In our experience with costing from the U.S. Government, we have never had the opportunity to try any with NASA. We are still waiting for a MOA, but we have had very quick response from the Army and the Navy personnel in departments at the White Sands Missile Range. The costs they have given us are excellent. They are in as much detail as we would like to see them. They put us in a very competitive mode, and once we get NASA's costs rolled into there, then we can get up and running. Mr. CHAFER. We submitted what undoubtedly will be the model for your ISA as well several months ago in order to get a number from NASA. We have gotten one, but it is not an official number. It's a "we think we can do it for this" kind of number. We are still looking for that official number because that drives our launch site choice, and are having some problems bidding fixed price launches to people in the United States and around the world with us having to take the risk of the dosts. So, we are still waiting for an official number from NASA. Mr. NELSON. If the model agreement is not changed, are what you saying is it is going to be bad news for you? Mr. KOOPMAN. Yes, sir. Mr. KADAR. It is too open ended. We are liable for everything. ... Mr. WALKER. As I understand it, your testimony has been that there is, indeed, a market for your product. Is that fair-- Mr. KADAR. Yes. Mr. KOOPMAN. Yes. Mr. WALKER. And that the main thing which stands in the way of you marketing your products successfully is in large part government. Mr. KADAR. Directly and indirectly. Mr. WALKER. Directly and indirectly? Mr. KADAR. Undirectly through the insurance requirements placed on us, directly from a slow process to get proper agreements effected. Mr. WALKER. Getting away from---I understand you have testified, and I don't want to go over a lot of additional ground here. But getting away from the specifics of arguments that you may have internally about Air Force agreements and so on, if we were to develop a policy right now, if we were to build upon the present policy, what are the three things you need most from the Congress and from the Government to assure that a large percentage of our launch capacity in the next 5 years is coming from the commercial sector? Mr. CHAFER. A statement that the Government won't compete with private launch providers; a statement that realistic regulatory aspects will be placed on us with regard to insurance liability and user agreements; and a statement that on a case-by-case basis, as the Government requires it, they will buy commercial launch services on a turnkey basis. Mr. KADAR. I have to agree with the three points that Mr. CHAFER made. They are exactly the problems we would like to overcome. Mr. WALKER. Let's take that final point. If you knew that NASA was going to buy commercial launch services rather than fly its own vehicles, that could be a mahor incentive toward moving you into the commercial market? Mr. KADAR. Absolutely. Mr. KOOPMAN. Sir, I mentioned before that we have a situation with the financial community where there is still a large perception that the government does not really mean what it says about buying launch services. I have been told point blank that not only do they not believe that the government will buy launch services from us, but that in addition, they will never let us fly a nonmilspec rocket. I think that a simple, clear direction that wherever possible that--for example, to use the analogy of the airline business, that the fovernment buy tickets to get from here to Los Angeles and not airplanes, that that alone and a powerful, simple statement by the Congress to that effect would be one of the most positive direct and immediate things that this Congress could do to encourage the development of this business. Mr. WALKER. Well, I can understand why the industry does not believe it. I for one don't believe it either at the present time. I think we have been pushing. We have sent all kinds of signals that that is what we want to have done, and the fact is that I still have the feeling that there are an awful lot of people who are trying to frustrate the will of Congress and a number of other people in terms of how they fly in the future. And that does not give very much of a financial incentive to the investment community. Mr. KOOPMAN. And the second thing--again, I am not a lawyer and I can't opine on what in fact needs to be changed. I suspect that very little, if anything, needs to be changed in order to have a much more equitable division of risk. But it is clear that the division--right now if with none of myu people around our launch complex, a government employee breaks into the complex and sets off something which drops on downtown Santa Barbara, under the current agreement this is 1,000 percent American Rocket Co.'s responsibility. I don't think that that is the way to encourage a commercial launch undustry in this country. Mr. WALKER. Each of you represents a segment of the industry. We have you on a panel here of small launch providers. But you are probably experts as well in something which I think has a good deal of bearing on the work of this subcommittee. And that is, if we were to give you the kinds of incentives that you need to become providers on a day-to-day basis of launch services, how much of the gap that we are now hearing about in terms of on-orbit capabilities could the commercial sector pick up? I assume that you all are familiar with the newspaper articles that have been out, the Newsweek articles and all of that. Is the commercial sector now in a position of being able to fill that gap with the appropriate incentives? Mr. KOOPMAN. With the appropriate incentives if you include the three of us sitting here, plus at least the three larger players who come on in the next panel, Mc-DAC, Martin Marietta and General Dynamics, I would say absolutely yes. And I wouldn't want to make a prediction, but I would think that if you want to put this country back on its feet, so to speak, in the launch business, that with the proper incentives, you are looking at a very few years before we are once again leaders in the world. ---- William Baxter ARPA: web@{garnet,brahms,math}.Berkeley.EDU UUCP: {sun,dual,decwrl,decvax,hplabs,...}!ucbvax!garnet!web ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V9 #414 *******************