Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from beak.andrew.cmu.edu via trymail for +dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr11/tm2b/space/space.dl@andrew.cmu.edu (->+dist+/afs/andrew.cmu.edu/usr11/tm2b/space/space.dl) (->ota+space.digests) ID ; Tue, 17 Apr 90 02:11:50 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Tue, 17 Apr 90 02:11:21 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V11 #272 SPACE Digest Volume 11 : Issue 272 Today's Topics: Navstar GPS Constellation Status Update Re: Interstellar travel NASA Headline News for 04/16/90 (Forwarded) B-58 as launcher Re: SPACE Digest V11 #268 Arecibo (sp?) message Re: SPACE Digest V11 #269 Re: jobs in space Re: Pegasus launch from Valkyrie (or ... ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 16 Apr 90 13:15:00 ADT From: LANG%UNB.CA@vma.cc.cmu.edu Subject: Navstar GPS Constellation Status Update Navstar GPS Constellation Status Blk NASA Orbit II PRN Internat. Catalog Plane Launch Seq SVN Code ID Number Pos'n Date Status (90-04-10) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Block I 1 4 1978-020A 10684 (C-4) 78-02-22 Not usable since 85-07 2 7 1978-047A 10893 (A-4) 78-05-13 Not usable since 85-09 3 6 1978-093A 11054 A-3 78-10-06 Operating on Rb clock 4 8 1978-112A 11141 (C-3) 78-12-10 L-band signals turned off 89-10-14 5 5 1980-011A 11690 (C-1) 80-02-09 Not usable since 84-05 6 9 1980-032A 11783 A-2 80-04-26 Operating on 2nd Rb clock 7 81-12-18 Launch failure 8 11 1983-072A 14189 C-2 83-07-14 Operating on Cs clock 9 13 1984-059A 15039 C-1 84-06-13 Operating on Cs clock 10 12 1984-097A 15271 A-1 84-09-08 Operating on Cs clock 11 3 1985-093A 16129 D-1 85-10-09 Actually near position C-9; operating on Rb clock without temp. control Block II II-1 14 14 1989-013A 19802 E 89-02-14 Operating on Cs clock II-2 13 2 1989-044A 20061 B 89-06-10 Operating on Cs clock II-3 16 16 1989-064A 20185 E 89-08-18 Became available 89-10-14; operating on Rb clock II-4 19 19 1989-085A 20302 A 89-10-21 Became available 89-11-23 II-5 17 17 1989-097A 20361 D 89-12-11 L-band signals enabled 90-01-06 II-6 18 18 1990-008A 20452 F 90-01-24 Became available 90-02-14 22:26 UT; testing underway II-7 20 20 1990-025A 20533 B 90-03-26 Testing underway Notes 1. NASA Catalog Number is also known as NORAD or U.S. Space Command object number. 2. Bracketed orbital plane position = satellite no longer operational. 3. An earlier version of this table had PRN 16 in plane D. Note correction. 4. PRN 8 L-band signals were re-enabled on 90-02-20 at 16:15 UT for testing; satellite is set unhealthy. ================================================================================ Richard B. Langley BITnet: LANG@UNB.CA or SE@UNB.CA Geodetic Research Laboratory Phone: (506) 453-5142 Dept. of Surveying Engineering Telex: 014-46202 University of New Brunswick FAX: (506) 453-4943 Fredericton, N.B., Canada E3B 5A3 ================================================================================ ------------------------------ Date: 16 Apr 90 06:43:36 GMT From: bfmny0!tneff@uunet.uu.net (Tom Neff) Subject: Re: Interstellar travel One possible explanation for the Fermi paradox that nobody can disprove is that when you achieve interstellar travel, somebody comes and kills you. Let's hope that's not it. -- Stalinism begins at home. }{ Tom Neff }{ tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET ------------------------------ Date: 16 Apr 90 19:57:14 GMT From: trident.arc.nasa.gov!yee@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) Subject: NASA Headline News for 04/16/90 (Forwarded) ----------------------------------------------------------------- Monday, April 16, 1990 Audio: 202/755-1788 ----------------------------------------------------------------- This is NASA Headline News for Monday, April 16..... Workers at Kennedy Space Center have removed a malfunctioning Auxiliary Power Unit from the orbiter Discovery and reinstalled a replacement. Leak checks of the system are now being conducted at Launch Pad 39-B. While the pad work is underway...batteries from the Hubble Space Telescope are being charged at the Vehicle Assembly Building. The 130-hour battery charging started early and should be completed by Friday. Meanwhile...the Columbia was rolled over from the Orbiter Processing Facility to the Vehicle Assembly Building early today. The move was to have been completed last Friday, but a hydraulic leak was discovered in the Columbia's forward landing gear. The delay puts preparation for the next mission slightly behind schedule, at this time. * * Representatives from the United States Department of Agriculture and Park Seed Co. say the growing of tomato seeds which flew in space for six years aboard the Long Duration Exposure Facility presents no food safety risks. The SEEDS project became an issue last week when it was reported there might be some danger when eating the vegetable. Dr. Alvin Young, of the USDA, says the tomatoes are safe to consume. Park Seed Co.'s research scientist Dr. James Alston said he's planning to eat the tomatoes grown from the seeds. Alston said he ate a variety of vegetables grown from seeds flow on the STS-6 mission in 1983 with absolutely no complications. * * Aerospace Daily says the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel last Friday reported they take exception to a proposal to eliminate one of two airlocks on Space Station Freedom. The panel has urged the airlock be restored. * * The Soviet space organization say they plan to replace their MIR space station in eight or nine years with a larger facility which can hold 9 to 12 cosmonauts. Other sources indicate it may not happen because of severe economic problems in the Soviet Union. * * * * * * * * ----------------------------------------------------------------- Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA Select TV. All times are Eastern. Thursday, April 19..... 11:30 A.M. NASA Update will be transmitted. Tuesday, April 24.... 9:00 A.M. STS-31 Countdown Status Report 10:00 A.M. APU/HST Status Report 11:00 A.M. Pre-launch News Conference Wednesday, April 25.... 4:00 A.M. STS-31 Launch coverage begins All events and times are subject to change without notice. ----------------------------------------------------------------- These reports are filed daily, Monday through Friday, at 12 noon, EDT. ----------------------------------------------------------------- A service of the Internal Communicatiion's Branch, NASA HQ. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 16 Apr 90 13:36:07 PDT From: Ken Harrenstien Subject: B-58 as launcher Cc: KLH@NIC.DDN.MIL There's a recent book titled "Soviet SST -- the technopolitics of the Tupolev TU-144" (forget author, sorry; it's OK but not great). While talking about the history and problems of sustained supersonic flight it includes some discussion of the B-58 as the first large supersonic aircraft, and I was left with the strong impression that this plane was much too fragile and high-strung to even consider adapting it for other roles. Like the SR-71, at top speed it was on a knife edge and any sudden imbalance (engine flameout, at worst case) would produce a lot of little airplane pieces on the ground. Perhaps Mary Shafer can get some real stories from someone who was around back then... Just to keep the thread alive, how about simply towing a Pega-RPV up? The disposable wings (made by Rutan, of course) could be optimized either for height or speed. The idea of a pair of F-15s slinging a Pega-BB through Mach 2 is wild enough, I hope. --Ken ------- ------------------------------ From: AZM@CU.NIH.GOV Date: Mon, 16 Apr 90 09:29:21 EDT Subject: Re: SPACE Digest V11 #268 > From: (Henry Spencer) > Subject: Re: Fermi Paradox > > In article <1025@larry.sal.wisc.edu> scherb@larry.sal.wisc.edu.UUCP (Frank > Scherb) writes: > >Why not consider the idea that the Galaxy is so big that given about > >a million years of exploration you still only see a very small piece > >at best? ... > > Exploring from a central point, this would be true. But it shouldn't > take more than a thousand years at most for a major colony to become > a starfaring civilization itself. Take for example the human outpost on the planet Earth. After a recorded history of nearly fifty thousand years, after a developmental stage that may have been as long as 3,000,000 years, the human race is no closer to interstellar travel than was Og, neanderthal stone-user. Instead of throwing sticks with rocks on the ends of them, we have advanced all the way to throwing rockets with sticks of dynamite on the ends of them. > If we figure major colonies ten > light-years apart, and assume travel time is short compared to the > thousand-year buildup time, that's a light-year per century, or > about ten million years to cross the galaxy. There's been plenty > of time for that; the galaxy is old. > -- Certainly, and if we figure that somewhere across the universe, about 12 or 13 billion light years ago, a race of beings developed to the highly technological state where they could venture out into interstellar space, and their wisest scientists said, "you see that 30th magnitude star out there at the other extreme of the universe, well I believe that if we set out now, in just 12 or 13 billion years, a very primitive civili- zation, capable only of self- and others-destruction will have developed, and we will want very much to communicate with them and see if they can teach us to kill each other and every other species with which we come into contact, so we had best put our most intelligent scientists onto our finest and most costly starship, and set out for that place immed- iately. After all, they'll be waiting for us, and we wouldn't want to disappoint them. They'll probably have fixed dinner and all." Derdin Valpar aka Marc Arlen AZM@NIHCU ------------------------------ Date: 17 Apr 90 03:12:54 GMT From: cs.utexas.edu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!physics.utoronto.ca!neufeld@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Christopher Neufeld) Subject: Arecibo (sp?) message All this talk of radio wave SETI brings up something I've been wondering about for a while. Many of us have heard of the graphic image sent by the Arecibo fixed radio dish a while back. It used the familiar prime by prime grid of binary states to make a low resolution picture. This message, if I remember correctly, was sent to a cluster of stars some ten or twenty thousand light years distant, at a cost of a few dollars worth of electricity. My question: why wasn't the message sent to closer stars, since cost couldn't have been an object? Was it fear of space invaders? (No smiley, this is a serious question). -- Christopher Neufeld....Just a graduate student | "Like most neufeld@helios.physics.utoronto.ca | intellectuals he is cneufeld@pro-generic.cts.com Ad astra! | intensely stupid." "Don't edit reality for the sake of simplicity" | Marquise de Merteuil ------------------------------ From: AZM@CU.NIH.GOV Date: Mon, 16 Apr 90 09:10:45 EDT Subject: Re: SPACE Digest V11 #269 > Subject: Drake Equation (was Re: Interstellar travel) > > pjs@aristotle.jpl.nasa.gov writes: > > > >Nope, that's the Drake equation. The Fermi paradox basically says, > >"Where is everybody???" The Drake equation suggests that the galaxy should > >be teeming with life, given the number of stars we have. > > The Drake equation is an attempt to quantify how many technologically > advanced civilizations there are in the galaxy. If they (i.e. Drake, > Sagan, et al.) could come up with a high enough estimate, they could > justify doing what they wanted to do anyway: a radio search for alien > radio signals. > > What the Drake equation really does is to identify our areas of > uncertainty a little more precisely. Instead of one big uncertainty, > we now have a couple of reasonably certain numbers, one or two numbers > we can guess at with some degree of certainty, and a lot of numbers > which are totally unknown. What the Drake equation apparently does is to provide yet another area of nonexistent knowledge wherein person's like Drake and Sagan can be- come the planet's resident experts, and thereby derive unconscionably high incomes by doing speaking engagements, radio, and television shows based on their self-generated knowledge in fields that are in reality only forums for speculative thinking, i.e., verbal comic books. Derdin Valpar aka M. Arlen AZM@NIHCU ------------------------------ Date: 16 Apr 90 13:55:11 GMT From: pilchuck!seahcx!phred!petej@uunet.uu.net (Pete Jarvis) Subject: Re: jobs in space In article andre@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Timothy Andre) writes: > >1) Is a PhD a requirement for being a Mission Specialist? No, but certainly enhances your chances. >2) What are my chances of actually becoming a Mission Specialist? Low, lots of competition. >3) I have been told that a private pilot's license or a ham radio license > would be helpful. True? Yes........ >4) How about experience in the Air Force Reserve? Another enhancement > ------------------------------ Date: 16 Apr 90 14:44:21 GMT From: mailrus!sharkey!itivax!vax3.iti.org!aws@tut.cis.ohio-state.edu (Allen W. Sherzer) Subject: Re: Pegasus launch from Valkyrie (or ... In article <1990Apr12.162005.7463@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: >>I was wondering if a FB-111 would do? My copy of Janes says it will carry a >>bomb load of 37,500 which is pretty close... >With such loads it is almost certainly subsonic, giving no advantage over >the B-52. It might give a cost advantage. I understand B-52's are pretty expensive and it is almost impossible to get parts. >The F-111 family is generally overweight and underpowered, and >is "supersonic" only by courtesy. :-) Which is why I proposed upgrading the engines to F-100's which would each add another 9,000 pounds of thrust. >It's vanishingly unlikely that any >of them could reach, say, Mach 2 with a heavy external load. Agreed. However, it MAY be cheaper to operate than using a B-52 or 747. This thread started as a way to reduce cost to orbit by increasing payload. There are two ways to reduce cost to orbit. One is to increase the payload and the other is to reduce operational cost. My postings on this address the latter way. IMHO if you don't use operational aircraft you will make it more expensive to put a pound to orbit. There were lots of mach 2 aircraft out there, but getting any operational just to add a few hundred pounds to payload won't get you anything. Allen ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Allen W. Sherzer | If guns are outlawed, | | aws@iti.org | how will we shoot the liberals? | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V11 #272 *******************