Visiting Plymouth Rock Via Dual Orions

Folks:

Arrgggghhh!

Trading more rocks for the price of a billion dollars of hardware thrown away.

What more can I say?

tinker

Where's the mass shielding for the Orion vehicles from galactic radiation and solar events or are these going to be suicide missions?

Marcel F. Williams

These asteroid mission ideas just always fail to impress much.

There are a number of robotic missions that have been proposed over the years that could accomplish a sample return. Probably not at the volume of a manned flight, but certainly a scientifically worthwhile amount.

Marcel, all that and more, explained in the whitepaper.

http://www.lockheedmartin.com/data/assets/ssc/Orion/Toolkit/OrionAsteroidMissionWhitePaperAug2010.pdf

I think this would be a really cool mission. This is a great precursor to a more permanent presence and traveling farther and solving those issues. I think version 2 should include a backhoe and a crew from Joe-Bob's General Contracting to core out one of those asteroids and turn it into a spaceship.

well the mission goal is great - new target, further away, tons of science, tons of new know-how, and most importantly once you're done you move on to the next target.

But in effect, this proposal is about Ares V and Orion, not about the mission.

We do need a long duration space bus, and we might need a heavy launcher. But not these two, not at these prices.

This time we have to do it affordably, and for the first time we're getting close.

EarthShine: "There are a number of robotic missions that have been proposed over the years that could accomplish a sample return. Probably not at the volume of a manned flight, but certainly a scientifically worthwhile amount."

Too bad Queen Isabella didn't have robots to explore the new world. That would have been so much better... not.

An asteroid is not the moon, and certainly not Mars, but the island that Columbus first landed on wasn't all that impressive either. There are reasons to go there other than scientific. Exploration is a worthy pursuit in and of itself.

Thanks for the link to the White Paper!

One aspect that is not addressed is the long term exposure of the human brain to heavy nuclei over several months. Astronauts infrequently experience this aboard the ISS and the brains of lunar astronauts were also exposed to heavy nuclei for several days beyond the Earth's magnetosphere. Bombardment of the brain by heavy nuclei is detected by humans through retinal flashes.

Maybe we should send some monkeys to L1 and see how well they do having their brains zapped by heavy nuclei for several months-- if PETA doesn't mind:-)

Marcel F. Williams

"so much better... not"

That's so 1991.

Did you come through a time warp?

You should know computers and robots have made some advancements in the past 19 years.

Well, perhaps SpaceX will have an upgrade for their Dragon capsule?

Seriously, for deep space, this is a clooge, which, while it may work, currently depends upon lift technology that is unlikely to be there in time to use it.

So... what *can* launch an Orion?

And... perhaps, if this was "live", having an extra cargo-carrying unit already on-site in orbit of/with a rock, would give some extra "oomph".

I seem to recall that the heat-shield for an Apollo CM was supposed to be pretty decent at attenuating solar radiation even if it wasn't a *full* shield.

The Apollo flights, again if my memory hasn't melted down completely, were performed between sunspot maxima.

I thought it was more like a billion dollars per Orion spacecraft x2 ? Plus launch vehicles x2, plus mission support...

This is a great mission for the Orion huggers, flags and footprints...

Can you fit a full exercise countermeasures suite of treadmill, resistive exercise, etc? And if its a 9 month or year long mission, how do the astronauts do when they come through the 9-12 G reentry?

I think that it makes zero sense. It seems like it is someone looking for a mission for their spacecraft.

It makes a lot more sense to use the ISS spacecraft and systems as the basis for developing a long duration vehicle, use an advanced propulsion system, develop a rotating partial-G vehicle...maintain it once it is in space, re-outfit it and maintain it in orbit.

I do not see the logic behind the Orion design for long durations or throwing away the vehicle on every mission.

Spam in a slightly larger can for 195 days? How about adding a space hab module? How about not wasting billions of dollars on one more space effort that will just have to be canceled down the road? How about taking the time to do the research to learn how to do an NEO mission without undo risk to the crew and with a reasonable chance of success? The white paper was fun in the same way an organ grinder's monkey is fun when it begs for money. Go grind somebody else’s organ.

There are reasons to go there other than scientific. Exploration is a worthy pursuit in and of itself.

In another time this would be true, but today all of our space efforts should, in my opinion, be put toward economic development.

I don't think that all efforts need to be put towards economic development. I think putting resources into developing technologies that can help to reduce the costs of exploration is worthwhile, and I think a series of "test flights' to test enhanced capabilities is a worthwhile pursuit as well, even if there is no immediate economic payback. If at some point we can reach the NEOs or go into orbit around Venus or Mars or go on a flight past Jupiter, and its done within the limits of the new system we are developing, I think that is technological development that enables exploration.

Just going to a new place with a double Orion does not represent an advance of technology. It is just old technology (mainly 40 year old technology) re-purposed. When the mission is over, we have some new photos, a sample of a rock, and a couple people have had a new experience but we are no closer to improving access in space.

Lockheed Martin is of course trying to bolster the case for Orions.

The mission proposal is legitimate, however, and I wouldn't oppose it. Learning how to work with small asteroids could be a life saver in the event of a Tunguska scale object.

But I doubt that two Orions, or just two Orions are the best way--maybe a mission module and one or two Orions and a space-tug. And I'm also still not convinced that Orion is our crew vehicle of the future, or perhaps not our main crew vehicle of the future.

Didn't see any price tag in the white paper. Scientifically a 5-day human landing doesn't add much if anything to a robotic probe. That doesn't mean we shouldn't do it; it does mean that there's little point in doing it with Orion, spending tens of billions of dollars on such a mission; we'd just end up in another post-Apollo crash. We should build a LEO infrastructure supported by low-cost reusable launch systems first, then use it as a base for further low-cost exploration with fully reusable systems. Hey, that's what von Braun wanted in the 50's!

For NASA HSF to succeed at this kind of mission, they need to 'follow the money'. Oh wait, there isn't any money!

"In another time this would be true, but today all of our space efforts should, in my opinion, be put toward economic development."
Dennis, I can't disagree with you but aren't thousands of high paying scientific, engineering and manufacturing jobs stimulating to the economy? Remember the old adage, every dollar spent for space exploration is spent here in the U.S, not the moon, Mars or asteroids.
Or do you advocate spending money for road construction, census workers and bailing out state governments who over spent and promised pensions that were unrealistic?

Interesting mission concept, great comments above!

I read the white paper and have to admire the enthusiasm of the folks at Lockheed Martin. I'm only an amateur but picked up the following points in their paper which I guess are up for debate as adding pretty major dependencies & constraints:

1) They talk about using a heavy lift launcher & a man rated EELV, but don't consider using existing launch vehicles or use of partner assets (e.g., Soyuz or Ariane). There's also a mention of an additional booster to escape Earth, so that's three new launchers/boosters we are talking about that need development, testing & integration.

2) The preferred configuration seems to be two Orions mated nose to nose, one of which would be stretched & heavily modified and looks like a new vehicle to me, except for the shell and some systems. I think the paper downplays the amount of modifications that would need to be done for the stretched Orion & the main Orion - could be the equivalent of developing two new capsules, not just reusing existing designs.

3) Habitable volume constraints mean that LM are looking at a crew of 2, "maybe" 3. Could be thought of as too small to get the scientific payback or to be viable from a safety perspective? E.g., their mission profile assumes both astronauts would conduct an EVA, leaving the Orions unmanned.

4) Consumables storage constraints means they can only plan for one or two EVAs - there isn't an airlock proposed & the whole Orion complex would need to be pumped out. I can't imagine going all the way to a mini asteriod over 4-5 months and then only being able to 1 EVA (with 1 for contingency) is going to be really viable.

5) They make mention of adding a module like a MPLM to the two Orions & suggest a partner nation or a commercial company might contribute this. Bumps up the cost quite a bit - I can imagine this would have to be designed from scratch, as the current designs/assets around are based on LEO constraints, not extended durations in deep space.

6) No return contingency. The modified Orion would not have re-entry capabilities & the mission profile doesn't include ISS docking as a Plan B. After possibly 9 months in deep space, we'd have to assume the capsule and its heat shield would work prefectly, with only one go possible.

Having said all that, it does make great reading and I bet they wouldn't be short of volunteers to have a go!

I agree Cessna but, since we re-classified an entire planet to non-planet status, let's just re-classify the Moon as an asteroid and we can kill two birds with one stone.