More space news!

[tkdguy]

ISS to crash into Pacific Ocean after 2020

[Querysphinx]

Space hotel by 2016?

No luxuries however. No showers, no alcohol.

Beat me to it.

[McCoy]

ISS to crash into Pacific Ocean after 2020

Stupid.

So, so, fricken stupid!

Skylab, Mir, now the ISS, spend $BILLIONS to create a scrap of infrastructure in LEO, then throw it away rather than maintain it.

A species this stupid DESERVES to be confined to a single planet!

[Escafarc]

Stupid.

So, so, fricken stupid!

Skylab, Mir, now the ISS, spend $BILLIONS to create a scrap of infrastructure in LEO, then throw it away rather than maintain it.

A species this stupid DESERVES to be confined to a single planet!

Agree.

[Xavier Onassiss]

Stupid.

So, so, fricken stupid!

Skylab, Mir, now the ISS, spend $BILLIONS to create a scrap of infrastructure in LEO, then throw it away rather than maintain it.

A species this stupid DESERVES to be confined to a single planet!

They've revised the article to note that the ISS mission may be extended to 2028. Then they'll crash it into the ocean.

But it'll be how old then? At some point, when it's too old to use any longer, it pretty much has to be de-orbited. Leaving it up there presents a risk of other objects colliding with it, potentially producing tons of hazardous orbital debris. There's already too much of that stuff up there.

[dmjalund]

or it could be bought by an eccentric billionaire and sent to a lagrange point so he can retire there ( )

[megaplayboy]

So, apparently, there's a planet made out of diamond out there(no link, feeling lazy right now). Kinda nifty.

[Querysphinx]

or it could be bought by an eccentric billionaire and sent to a lagrange point so he can retire there ( )

I'm not sure a billion dollars would provide him with the energy delivery system he'd need to chuck that thing into a lagrange orbit, or even a geosynchronous one.

[McCoy]

They've revised the article to note that the ISS mission may be extended to 2028.

At which time construction will be just a few weeks from completion.

But it'll be how old then? At some point, when it's too old to use any longer, it pretty much has to be de-orbited. Leaving it up there presents a risk of other objects colliding with it, potentially producing tons of hazardous orbital debris. There's already too much of that stuff up there.

What's too old? You have modular construction. Add new modules, scrap ones that are not cost effective to maintain, find ways of using the "junk" to make needed things more cost effectively that boosting them from the ground.

or it could be bought by an eccentric billionaire and sent to a lagrange point so he can retire there ( )

I'm not sure a billion dollars would provide him with the energy delivery system he'd need to chuck that thing into a lagrange orbit, or even a geosynchronous one.

LEO is halfway to anywhere in the solar system. A small continuous boost (ion engine) could tow it to Clarke orbit or a Lagrange point. Or a solar powered rail gun shooting pelleted "junk" from no-longer-serviceable modules.

[Neverway]

Over in the Champions forum Steve has a thread asking about the consequences of Super Tech on the world. See: http://www.herogames.com/forums/show...ook-technology


One of the speculated technical "jumps" is efficient, small fuel cells. With that on my mind, an article in New Scientist about new battery technology caught my eye. I'm a cheap loser who only leeches news items and that article is pay-pe- view so I went off to Google to see what was up. I found this article from late 2007 talking about research that extends the life of a Lithium Ion battery tenfold: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2008/j...re-010908.html


Note that Mr. Cui is thinking about forming a company to make money off this dicovery. Another article (amongst several on the subject) has the charge life estimates down to +40% though: http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/23893/page1/


Note that Mr. Cui has now formed his company, I take this to be a good sign that the article isn’t about something that costs $10Bil and has only been seen under clean room lab conditions. More recently we see this from August 2, 2011: http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/38205/


Hopefully this means battery technology is about to step up a substantial amount to the point where small consumer electronics (phones, iPods, etc) will be able to operate for weeks between charges. Converge your tablet computer, your music player, and your phone into a single device, power it off of one of these batteries, and you'll have one of those Sci-Fi handhelds that do everything and never run out of power. Or at least a close approximation.

[Xavier Onassiss]

At which time construction will be just a few weeks from completion.

As far as I can tell, new modules for the ISS are all in the "cancelled" or "proposed" categories. There is a new robotic arm scheduled to be added in 2012. Aside from that, the ISS was complete as of STS-134.

[Old Man]

or it could be bought by an eccentric billionaire and sent to a lagrange point so he can retire there ( )

Tessier-Ashpool FTW?

[tkdguy]

Closest supernova in 25 years

[L. Marcus]

Run for the hills! Run for the hills! She's blown!

[L. Marcus]

... Aw, sugarbeans! Looks like the James Webb space telescope might feel the axe!