Me thinks you are a bit jealous.
William Shatner to blast off into space today.
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People have died slipping on steps at their homes.
It's hard to live in this world without walking up and down steps. There is / was no need for civilians to ride on the Shuttle. Bad analogy.
Of what? Good for them that they were able to go. It is a cool thing, but I don't think they are astronauts and I don't think they were on a mission.
Just thinking as I couldn't go because I am not rich, that I would give my left testicle to go. Just sayin'
That's about the size of it. "Going into space" is a very broad term. Many people easily confuse this up / down 10 minute "carnival ride", with low Earth orbit space travel. They're not even close. In speed, altitude, complexity, and danger. Orbital flight involves achieving orbital velocity of 17,500 MPH. And even more importantly, reentry. Which is an extremely dangerous maneuver that cannot be avoided in any type of orbital space flight.
It involves thermal protection being designed into the spacecraft, that is capable of withstanding thousands of degrees of temperature. The monstrosity Shatner / Bezos & Co. rode in would have been turned into a cinder under those circumstances. If you recall the 7 Shuttle Astronauts who flew on the Columbia mission, died during reentry. NASA said it was the biggest obstacle they were worried about in saving the Apollo 13 Astronauts, in their ill fated mission back in 1970.
I'm not trying to downplay what these guys did. But it is what it is. Shatner is a good guy. And I'm glad for him, in that he was able to experience what he did, when he did. Most of us will never make it to 90. The odds are against it. And most likely none of us will ever be able to experience what he did.
For the rest of us, there is the “ Slingshot”.
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Everyone has a different definition of 'need'.
There was a need for the good PR this would bring NASA because interest in the space program was waning. There was a need to keep pushing the idea that women could/should be astronauts. There was a need to keep pushing kids towards studying science.
No, she didn't have a military background but that wasn't a requirement anymore. She went through astronaut training. She was trained to perform certain tasks and run tests. She wasn't just a passenger on there for a stunt.
Probably more dangerous than the Blue Origin flight
I think its pretty cool a 90 year old guy got to go into space for a few minutes. This is actually one thing about this whole 4 minute space travel I see some value in.
For everyone else, It is an expensive ride and what about the CO2 emissions that the wealthy so complain about?
They always grant themselves an "exemption" Private jets, now rocket ships ... *LOL*
Disneyland which serves 100s of thousands of people on rides would be closed down if it created that kind of pollution.
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For everyone else, It is an expensive ride and what about the CO2 emissions that the wealthy so complain about?
They always grant themselves an "exemption" Private jets, now rocket ships ... *LOL*
Disneyland which serves 100s of thousands of people on rides would be closed down if it created that kind of pollution.
)
The only reason for her being on board that thing was a big PR stunt. One that went horribly wrong. They had a "contest", because they thought it would be "cool" to put a teacher in space. They were all lured in by NASA's perfect Shuttle launch record... Up until then. She "won" the big prize. Her backup "winner" watched her die from the bleachers..... As did her parents, friends, and tens of thousands of kids everywhere, who's teachers tuned in live, in schools across the country.
Instead of getting a "lesson taught from space", many of these kids ended up having to receive grief counseling because of what they saw. They, along with many, were beginning to think low orbital space flight was "routine". NASA had made it seem that way with it's hectic launch schedule, and quick turn around time..... Until it all caught up with them, and their luck ran out.
The Shuttle was a good, necessary program. It helped give us the ISS. But it, like ALL space flight, is extremely dangerous. Having her on it was unnecessary, and only helped prove how dangerous it is, and always will be. And it's not, "walking up stairs".
Getting some good PR and getting teachers and kids involved is a worthwhile thing though, as with no public support the space program becomes a target for cuts... It didn't turn out well in this case, but that had nothing to do her being on board. It was a tough lesson for sure, but hopefully every organization venturing into space has learned from it.
That total, complete disaster was anything but, "good PR". The risk far outweighed the reward. They just didn't know it, or else decided to roll with the odds, and crapped out. She ended up paying the price. I don't believe she fully understood the dangers.
NASA said in the very beginning they expected to lose one vehicle in every 50 launches. I can't help but wonder how much they empathized that to her.... Or if they did at all. She was the first batch, in a total of 14 people who died in that program.
There was never an official LOV statistic published for STS. Early on NASA commissioned a study which gave estimates between 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 100,000. A different study gave a failure rate of the SRB at 1 in 40.
Interestingly a much later study that looked at the early Shuttle flights gave an LOV probability at 1 in 10 for the first five years of the program.
manicrodder
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Well to be precise, only about 19% of the people make it to 90 so yeah, the odds are against it. Even worse for 100, only 1%. Not too bad for 70, about 73% chance and a 51% chance of making to 80.
https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html
Its not like he was digging ditches and lifting cement blocks his whole life. Makes it a lot easier to make it to 90.
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