Space Forum / Space Policy / January 2004

So how many spacecraft are in orbit around Mars today, both living and dead?
I count 4 for sure: MGS, Odyssey, Mars Express and the Viking 1 orbiter.  I
can't find any info online as to whether the Viking 2 Orbiter and Mariner 9
have entered the Martian atmosphere.

<http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/01/20040114-1.html>
I watched the speech, and this fact sheet contains pretty much all the
same stuff, minus some good stirring rhetoric (those White House speech
writers do good work!).

Seems every mention of the Beagle's likely demise has a comparison of
its small budget  to the much more expensive and so-far successful MER
mission.  
It was a good try by the Euros, and should be realized that it was an

I have a better explanation!  It's been hijacked by al-Qaeda.

Does anybody else think that the idea of reviving the Saturn V rocket for a
return to the Moon would be like going back in time to the 1960's?  I'm
sure that they'd make some tweaks to the hardware to bring it up to date,
but at the time that the Saturn flew, the important bugs ...

The pressure leak on the ISS has been found, and it was a hose running
between two pieces of equipment.  I assume that it must have been on the
exterior of the station, or else a pressure hose wouldn't lose air.  The
hose has been removed, and a replacement will be delivered on ...

Seems pretty obvious to me what NASA's long-range plans should be.
First, to put semi-permanent sensor-packed sats in orbit around the
nine planets and other interesting bodies like Europa and Titan.
Then, if/when something becomes particularly interesting, drop a

The Bush Administration is embarking on a complete redirection of the United
States space program toward space exploration and technology development.  I
am convinced that they are doing this for sound, public policy reasons.  But
no White House undertakes a major new initiative ...

Actually I have no real factual basis for this. But when you look at
the details, they're not too dissimilar. NASA uses as much publicity
as possible to build support for its plans, much as the ASI Reference
mission is designed to make its profits from the proceeds of

In the beginning there was the X-38/Crew Return Vehicle, whose job it
was to return the ISS crew, a sort of 7 person Soyuz replacement.
After the price tag for CRV went from $500 M to $1.5 Billion, the CRV
program dissolved, and the vehicle was replaced by the CTV, the Crew

OK, cheesy subject line. But what I'm curious about--the date is fast
approaching when it is likely that we will have TWO functioning rovers
on Mars, but unlike for Viking, they'll be moving around -- which
leads to the problem of understanding where they are.

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/01/08/bush/index.html
"...an official said. NASA's target for a moon mission is 2018. "
'If the Chinese are going, we're going. Only we're going to get there first'
Hmm, that's two years before the target date of a manned Chinese moon

Umm, does anyone else find it funny that the leading manned spacefairing
nation on earth is now (effectively) ....... Kazakhstan ?

Anybody have a time as to when this is? Need to set the VCR...