Return-path: X-Andrew-Authenticated-as: 7997;andrew.cmu.edu;Ted Anderson Received: from hogtown.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 ; Wed, 19 Jun 91 03:45:36 -0400 (EDT) Message-ID: Precedence: junk Reply-To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU From: space-request+@Andrew.CMU.EDU To: space+@Andrew.CMU.EDU Date: Wed, 19 Jun 91 03:45:31 -0400 (EDT) Subject: SPACE Digest V13 #666 SPACE Digest Volume 13 : Issue 666 Today's Topics: Re: Help for science writer INFO: Clandestine Mars Observer Launch?? Re: Beanstalk analysis reprise Re: Moonbase movie *Plymouth* to air Sunday? Re: satellite refuelling Re: The Reasons for a Station? Was Re: Rational next station design... Re: Extra Terrestrial Intelligence Administrivia: Submissions to the SPACE Digest/sci.space should be mailed to space+@andrew.cmu.edu. Other mail, esp. [un]subscription requests, should be sent to space-request+@andrew.cmu.edu, or, if urgent, to tm2b+@andrew.cmu.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 31 May 91 00:58:23 GMT From: cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!uwm.edu!linac!mp.cs.niu.edu!rickert@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Neil Rickert) Subject: Re: Help for science writer In article <1991May31.004212.18479@cbfsb.att.com> rizzo@cbnewsf.cb.att.com (anthony.r.rizzo) writes: >The implication of such misuse is that American corporations >are designing products on the basis of worthless analyses, >done by incompetents. Unfortunately, all involved, including Hey don't get so upset. This is only mathematics. For years, corporations have been doing the same quality of analysis in more serious areas such as economics and finance. -- =*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*=*= Neil W. Rickert, Computer Science Northern Illinois Univ. DeKalb, IL 60115 +1-815-753-6940 ------------------------------ Date: 31 May 91 02:29:27 GMT From: att!fang!tarpit!bilver!dona@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Don Allen) Subject: INFO: Clandestine Mars Observer Launch?? This information is presented for your persusal and is a continuation of my policy of informing the public what is currently available. As usual my *disclaimer* is simply to present the data and let you form your own opinion(s). Please feel free to agree,disagree,discuss or ponder :-) As I do not have a great amount of time available to pursue follow-ups exclusively, comments to me should be directed via mail. The following article comes from the ParaNet UFO Echo. -----Begin Included Text---------------------------------------------- Message #6059 - INFO.PARANET Date : 28-May-91 23:31 From : ParaNet(sm) Information Service To : All Subject : Clandestine Mars Observer Launch?? ***************************************************************** I M P O R T A N T N O T I C E concerning the following text file ***************************************************************** ParaNet makes no endorsement of this material and the views expressed herein are not necessarily the views of ParaNet. This information is provided as a public service only. This file is SHARETEXT material. This means that you are free to distribute it to anyone you like, as long as it is not used for commercial purposes, you do not charge for it, you do not remove this header, or change the contents in anyway. Additionally, we ask that you contribute to ParaNet, if possible, to assure a continuation of this valuable, educational SHARETEXT service. The suggested contribution is $75.00 and entitles you to full access to our comprehensive library and our network of electronic affiliates all over the world. Other services are available. Mail your contribution to: ParaNet Information Service P.O. Box 172 Wheat Ridge, CO 80034-0172 ParaNet(sm): Freedom of Information for a better world! (C) 1991 ParaNet(sm) Information Service. All Rights Reserved. **************************************************************** ParaNet File Number: 01156 **************************************************************** On May 26th, our own Don Ecker was seen on Hard Copy, a television news program, discussing the recent visit to the United States by Marina Popovitch, a Russian Colonel who has knowledge of the ill-fated Phobos II space probe sent to Mars to send back information on the red planet and one of its moons, Phobos. According to Popovitch, the probe was destroyed by a long cigar-shaped object as it approached the orbiting satellite. Although this information is speculative and not confirmed, a recent article appearing in a science publication did confirm that a strange shadow was seen prior to Phobos II spinning out of control and breaking contact with earth. Obviously there is a lot yet to be learned about what really happened up there. ParaNet has received information that Richard C. Hoagland, the noted author of The Monuments of Mars - a book detailing a possible surface anomaly on the planet, that NASA has covertly launched the Mars observer spacecraft to speed to Mars to find out what is going on up there. Below is a reprint of that article. Our members are encouraged to provide any information that would substantiate or disavow these claims. ================================================================= U.S. MARS MISSION? [Extracted from SpaceNews, 5-13-91, a publication normally concerned with amateur radio topics.] WWCR's radio broadcast "For The People" on 03-May-91 carried a report by Richard C. Hoagland, who believes the United States might have a spacecraft on its way to the planet Mars in order to investigate the "Cydonia Message" first discovered in photos taken by Viking 1 in 1976. Hoagland believes the Mars observer spacecraft was deployed by the Space Shuttle "Atlantis" on mission STS-38. According to official records, STS-38 carried an AFP-658 satellite into orbit. An AFP-658 satellite measures 65 feet long and 15 feet in diameter. Hoagland believes this payload was actually a booster rocket for the Mars observer spacecraft which was later mated with the Mars observer spacecraft on a following STS mission. Observers reported seeing Atlantis and its satellite deployment during mission STS-38. Some observers reported seeing both objects illuminated by a reddish glow, which has yet to be explained. On later orbits, the deployed satellite appeared to have vanished. Hoagland feels that if such a spacecraft were on its way to Mars, it should be transmitting on X-band using pseudo-random noise encoding. Hoagland is trying to get in touch with scientists who have deep space X-band receive capabilities to see if signals can be detected coming from Mars. The reception of intelligent radio signals from Mars could indicate that either the US or the Soviet Union have Mars observers sending valuable data back to scientists on Earth. Cydonia is a Martian desert located in the northern hemisphere of Mars. It contains a mile-long, 1500 foot humanoid "face" and a system of five-sided pyramids. Through images taken by Viking 1, the "face" was found to contain such detail as an eye socket, eyeball and pupil, nose and mouth. The facial proportions are those of early man. An investigation into Cydonia could help to confirm these findings and shed light into their meaning. END PARANET FILE NAME: SPACENEW.TXT -- -* Don Allen *- InterNet: dona@bilver.UUCP // Amiga..for the rest of us. USnail: 1818G Landing Dr, Sanford Fl 32771 \X/ Why use anything else? :^) UUCP: ..uunet!tarpit!bilver!vicstoy!dona 0110 0110 0110 Just say NO! Illuminati < MJ-12|Grudge|TLC|CFR|FED|EEC|Bush > WAR = "New World Order" ------------------------------ Date: 31 May 91 06:18:04 GMT From: cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!torsqnt!geac!torag!w-dnes!waltdnes@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Walter Dnes ) Subject: Re: Beanstalk analysis reprise wreck@fmsrl7.UUCP (Ron Carter) writes: > Note: This analysis is of the static case. It ignores > tidal considerations which are important to objects in the > Earth-Moon-Sun system. A working beanstalk will require > damping mechanisms to compensate for tidal forces. Dynamic > momentum-transfer devices such as vertical Lofstrom loops > or space fountains could also transmit forces from far up > the tether back to the earth, reducing the tether's taper > and the amount of material required. I get to play the devil's advocate again. I don't like to destroy people's dreams, but a reality check is in order here. Your calculations seem to be based on an airless earth, i.e a good vacuum. Don't forget that we have an atmosphere. I briefly considered cross-posting this followup to sci.geo.meteorology, but decided not to since it's all in support of a theoretical space discussion. Some questions to consider... 1) You've allowed for longitudinal forces. What about perpendicular forces ? What happens when the beanstalk gets hit by a 100 km/h (60 mph) wind ? How about a 250 km/h (150 mph) jetstream somewhere in the stratosphere ? Can you supply some typical "Asurf" values along with the taper as a function of height. I work in the Atmospheric Environment Service, (Canada's weather service) in a unit that calculates meteorological parameters for construction. Just down the hall from me, our industrial meteorologist does recommendations for CSA-S37, the design standard for antenna towers in Canada. I'd like to ask her to calculate the wind loading on the lowest (and thinnest) portion of the beanstalk. 2) Since a geosynchronous orbit sits on the equator, you won't have to worry about icing... *AT SEA LEVEL*. At higher elevations in the atmosphere it will be a worry in two ways. Heavy icing will strain the beanstalk by sheer weight alone. Icing will also increase the cross-section that wind loading works on. 3) Surface temperatures at the equator can hit 40C to 50C. You can expect -40C to -50C up in the atmosphere, and some utterly farcical values (both hot and cold) in the vacuum of space. How will your materials react to this gradient ? How will the outer-space portion of the beanstalk react to extreme diurnal cycles (day/night) in a vacuum ? 4) Besides a beanstalk, you'll also be operating the world's biggest damn lightning rod. What happens to the crystalline structure of the beanstalk after a few hits ? I'm assuming, of course, that the beanstalk isn't so thin at low levels that the first good strike evaporates several meters of the beanstalk. 5) What about charged particles in the van Allen belts "doping" the crystalline structure of the beanstalk ? Questions 4 an 5 are important because you need the great strength of a pure "whisker". Chemical impurities and crystal irregularities will decrease the strength to the breaking point. I remain a skeptic re: tethers/beanstalks. I hope against hope that I'm proven wrong, but I think that the real-world problems are insurmountable. Walter Dnes ------------------------- waltdnes@w-dnes.guild.org 73710.3066@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Date: 1 Jun 91 08:51:52 GMT From: cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think.com!mintaka!ogicse!plains!person@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Brett G Person ) Subject: Re: Moonbase movie *Plymouth* to air Sunday? Is this a pilot? Could be a neat series. Especially if the moonwere to suddenly be ripped out of oorbit and.... H ope they make it a series. We could use a good SF network show again. -- Brett G. Person North Dakota State University uunet!plains!person | person@plains.bitnet | person@plains.nodak.edu ------------------------------ Date: 1 Jun 91 20:31:32 GMT From: sequent!muncher.sequent.com!szabo@uunet.uu.net Subject: Re: satellite refuelling In article <1991May31.125909.16811@iti.org> aws@iti.org (Allen W. Sherzer) writes: >Again, it's like the early days of avation and the Kelly Act. Without it and >the incentives it provided (multi-engines, advanced navigation and large >cargo areas) we wouldn't have the aerospace industry we have today. These technologies, and many more besides, came out of WWI and WWII, not the Kelly Act. I question whether the Kelly Act -- which was targeted towards the U.S. government business of mail delivery, _not_ passenger service -- had any positive impact beyond mail delivery. As for satellite refueling from Earth, it is at best a marginal proposition for a very small number of satellites, at worst another excuse for a large and wasteful government pork barrel. It would not contribute in any significant way towards the furthering of space industry, and if undertaken in the huge $multi-billion proportions that Frank Carey has proposed, would create a severe detriment and disincentive to the development of space industry. Real infrastructure is developed by mutual agreement and business partnership of the parties concerned, not by dictation from politically motivated central planners pulling numbers out of the blue. -- Nick Szabo szabo@sequent.com "If you understand something the first time you see it, you probably knew it already. The more bewildered you are, the more successful the mission was." -- Ed Stone, Voyager space explorer ------------------------------ Date: 27 May 91 13:34:48 GMT From: att!news.cs.indiana.edu!news.nd.edu!mentor.cc.purdue.edu!pop.stat.purdue.edu!hrubin@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (Herman Rubin) Subject: Re: The Reasons for a Station? Was Re: Rational next station design... In article <2069@mpirbn.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de>, p515dfi@mpirbn.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de (Daniel Fischer) writes: > In article <1991May23.043144.13714@agate.berkeley.edu> gwh@tornado.Berkeley.EDU (George William Herbert) writes: > >Here are the missions that I want to see done that I think can be done only > >or best by a station: > > > * Long-term Human studies > This kind of study is being performed by the Soviets since two decades; they > have had people up for 1 year and flown a doctor on a 200+ days mission. What > could be learned by repeating these boring adventures that they don't already > know and are likely ready to join? One year is long term? One item of great importance is the effect of low gravity on conception, pregnancy, and development. This will not be found on earth. Another question is the ability of at least a moderate human community to operate for an extended period of time. Now we could isolate a community on earth, but not in zero g. > > * some Microgravity (not all) > Microgravity reasearchers prefer quick return of their samples and do *not* ask > for superduper manned stations that can be served only once in a while. Why should manned stations be served only once in a while? Until this is not the case, we do not have a manned space program. > > * most Biological science > What Biological science? Again the Soviets have done all that before,especially > with the Biosputnik spacecraft where many foreign experiments were flown. > Adding up points 1 & 3 one could also ask: why should we be interested at all > in the response of biological systems to microgravity as all life as we know it > has developed under 1g conditions? Seems like a lousy circular argument: "We > need man/animals in space so that we can learn how badly space affects them..." There is far more of the accessible universe which is very low g than 1 g. I am including, as a particular part, the asteroids, which are capable of supplying more far more living space than earth. Now whether we can maintain a satisfactory low g ecology has not even been investigated; this means, among other things, growing food, recycling wastes, light and heavy industry. What do we know? We know what has happened to humans, animals, and seeds carried up to orbit with high acceleration, and returned to earth with high acceleration. Maybe we do need some gravity, and possibly periods of acceleration can do this. Biological systems developed in acquatic conditions, but leaving the sea made a big difference. We know essentially nothing, and we can not learn it on earth. -- Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399 Phone: (317)494-6054 hrubin@l.cc.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet) {purdue,pur-ee}!l.cc!hrubin(UUCP) ------------------------------ Date: 27 May 91 19:06:58 GMT From: usc!nic.csu.net!csun.edu!corona!swalton@ucsd.edu (Stephen Walton) Subject: Re: Extra Terrestrial Intelligence In article <1991May26.182739.26492@agate.berkeley.edu> fcrary@earthquake.Berkeley.EDU (Frank Crary) writes: > >Clusters are only violent and short lived on an astrononical time scale. >On the scale of a civilization, they are quite constant. Doubt if you'd want to take the risk of a colony being wiped out by a nearby supernova. If we learned anything from SN 1987A, we learned that there is essentially no outward warning that a star is about to blow. Besides, unless your putative colony ships take terraforming technology along, there won't be any oxygen-atmosphere planets in open clusters. Earth started with an N2-CO2 atmosphere which only reached its present composition perhaps half a billion years ago. -- Stephen Walton, Dept. of Physics & Astronomy, Cal State Univ. Northridge "Lately it occurs to me/What a long, strange trip it's been" ------------------------------ End of SPACE Digest V13 #666 *******************