NASA and the Private Sector - Page 23

On May 26 2012 23:25 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
Yes they do:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Dragon_(spacecraft)


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX#Concept_vehicles

Space Exploration Technologies extended its winning streak on Tuesday, announcing it landed its first customer for the planned Falcon Heavy rocket.

The customer is Intelsat, one of the granddaddies of the space age and the leading provider of satellite services worldwide.

Tuesday's announcement follows the company's so-far successful test flight of a Dragon cargo capsule, which reached the International Space Station on Friday following launch last Tuesday aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Dragon, the first privately owned vessel to reach the station, is scheduled to leave on Thursday and splash down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of southern California later that day.

The trial run clears the company, also known as SpaceX, to begin flying NASA cargo to the station under a 12-flight, $1.6 billion contract. The company also holds more than two dozen other contracts for Falcon 9 flights.

SpaceX is building a new launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California to fly Falcon Heavy, which is expected to be able to carry about twice as much payload into orbit as currently available rockets. It also plans to fly Falcon Heavy from Cape Canaveral.

On May 27 2012 04:35 Bowdz wrote:

In addition to the above, SpaceX and Elon have been very open about the long term goal of putting humans on Mars within 10-20 years (with 15 years being Elon's estimate). Both individually and as a company, they have a clear vision as to where they are going and how they are going to get there.

On May 30 2012 08:47 JimmyJRaynor wrote:


even getting a human 500 KM+ off the earth's surface will be a major accomplishment.

this has only been done by NASA 8 times from 1969 to 1972 and is the target of many conspiracy theories.

its been 40 years and counting.

i predict SpaceX won't be able to put a human more than 500 KM away from the earth's surface.

they'll probably make the same excuses that were used for the cancelling of the Constellation Program... "no money".
Constellation had the stated goal of going to the moon and mars. i dont think even 1 human got airbourne from that cancelled money pit.

On May 30 2012 09:17 Gorsameth wrote:


Not once have i heard a convincing argument why we want to go there in the first place
the cost of escaping earth gravity is so high compared to the fact there is not a single thing out there worth going to.

On May 30 2012 09:18 JimmyJRaynor wrote:


it was not until a series of "useless and wasteful" experiments with absorbic acid were performed that the cause of scurvy was clearly defined in the mid 20th century. These experiments were labelled a "waste of time and money" by skeptics.

your high brow 5 syllable words sound better if you do not end your sentences with prepositions.
i mean in space... "where is the bathroom at?"

SpaceX is a private company and if they want to explore space its their risk and their reward. That is the nature of all new research. You do not know what you do not know.

On May 30 2012 09:53 Gorsameth wrote:


I love you tin foil hat people.
My question to you is simple. Why do we want to go to space with current day technology. Your talking about exploring space but that just isnt doable at this time. Rockets are much to inefficent and slow plus we know what is out there in our solar system. And we can find it all right here on earth.
Just give a simple reason why. Not vague notions of stuff they may or may not find.

ps. Love that your changing you post every other minute.