** The Official Space Flight Thread - The Space Station and Beyond **

amigafan2003 said:
So in 2023 when they send the first totally automated crew (and untrained to fly) up to the ISS in Crew Dragon, the "passengers" wont be astronauts?
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Are they paying passengers/tourists? Then no, like Dennis Tito. If they can fix, conduct experiments, fly manually or otherwise be included in decisions, like repairing systems etc. that require extensive training/education then they are indeed astronauts :)

They would be something like astro tourists, or whatever name they eventually come up with.

Just like if in 100 years I could drive to an air & space port, hop on a spaceship and take a trip to the moon like I can take a flight to spain, I would be no more an astronaut then than I would be a pilot now.
 
JRS said:
There's not much about those missions that wasn't ballsy, even by spaceflight standards.
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Agreed, and to make it even more confusing apparently one of the criteria for it to be a spaceflight was to land with the spacecraft, because Gagarin parachuted down separate to the spacecraft, technically whatever international body that recognises spaceflight might have rejected it as an official flight.
 
amigafan2003 said:
But that's exactly what going back to the moon is preparing for - a permanent moon base, building habitats autonomously etc.

It not a case anymore of "lets do a. Right, now that's done, what shall we do for b?" Not looking beyond the next big this is precisely what has stifled space exploration so far. We're now doing a then b then c then d to ultimately end up at e.
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Well, for me (re)putting a man on the moon is 'part a' - let's consider moon bases, teleporters, warp-drives and worm-holes after we've done that.
 
Also, let's not forget that once we have a base on the moon that is capable of manufacturing fuel and launching ships, ones that aren't gimped by having to punch through Earth's atmosphere and gravity well, the asteroids are well within prospecting/mining distance. And once we start the mining > refining > production cycle that utilises those raw materials the solar system gets a lot smaller.
 
Malevolence said:
Also, let's not forget that once we have a base on the moon that is capable of manufacturing fuel and launching ships, ones that aren't gimped by having to punch through Earth's atmosphere and gravity well, the asteroids are well within prospecting/mining distance. And once we start the mining > refining > production cycle that utilises those raw materials the solar system gets a lot smaller.
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Don't start mining or we are going to have to call Isaac Clarke to sort everything out.
 
Malevolence said:
Also, let's not forget that once we have a base on the moon that is capable of manufacturing fuel and launching ships, ones that aren't gimped by having to punch through Earth's atmosphere and gravity well, the asteroids are well within prospecting/mining distance. And once we start the mining > refining > production cycle that utilises those raw materials the solar system gets a lot smaller.
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Not in my lifetime, maybe in the next 150 years.
 
3Kr8yPL.jpg


Where did he get his design inspiration?
 
JRS said:
...then Al Shepard and Gus Grissom weren't astronauts until their respective second flights since their first Mercury missions were suborbital lobs just like this one.
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Albeit there was, and still is with your typical Astronaut, vastly more training involved than what is given to New Shepard customers; i imagine even less on Virgin Galaxy. Plus Shepard's and Grissom's flights where another 80KM higher - not that it matters.

amigafan2003 said:
The definition will probably have to change when consumer spaceflight becomes normal...
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Yup as there is a massive difference between customers going up in New Shepard/Virgin Galaxy and trained Astronauts for orbit missions.
 
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deuse said:
That was boring to watch :(
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what do you want some giant boobed lass in a bikini so we can observe the effects as they enter free fall?

In reality a rocket is basically a lift that goes up and comes back down, just without the cables, it's basically a theme park ride like when you experience negative gravity on a roller coaster, you could probably get the same experience with a lift, it just has to fall at the same speed as a humans terminal velocity ?

there should be a time limit before you become an astronaut , or unless you have done a space walk then your not actually an astronaut , something like that.

to me it's like dipping your feet into the ocean and claiming you were an aqua-naut/scubadiver whatever,

they penetrated space for such a brief moment
 
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arknor said:
what do you want some giant boobed lass in a bikini so we can observe the effects as they enter free fall?

In reality a rocket is basically a lift that goes up and comes back down, just without the cables, it's basically a theme park ride like when you experience negative gravity on a roller coaster, you could probably get the same experience with a lift, it just has to fall at the same speed as a humans terminal velocity ?

there should be a time limit before you become an astronaut , or unless you have done a space walk then your not actually an astronaut , something like that.

to me it's like dipping your feet into the ocean and claiming you were an aqua-naut/scubadiver whatever,

they penetrated space for such a brief moment
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We all have our own opinion.
I watched the moon landing LIVE.
Nothing has come close to that yet.


Now hat was epic!
 
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