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Posted: Apr 29 2010 12:38 pm

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20100429/sc_space/hugenasascienceballooncrashesinaustralianoutback

Well there goes god knows how many millions in taxpayer dollars. I think space exploration is a worthwhile cause, but jesus christ......how does this kind of shit happen when you have (supposedly) some of the smartest people in the world designing the stuff? I hope this wasn't a case of someone just not tightening a screw all the way or something.

Posted: Apr 29 2010 01:08 pm

Well they have to do that every once in a while. Otherwise no one will buy the "balloon" explanation for the Roswell crash and various UFO sightings.

Posted: Apr 29 2010 01:21 pm

SoldierHawk wrote:

Well they have to do that every once in a while. Otherwise no one will buy the "balloon" explanation for the Roswell crash and various UFO sightings.

Well if it was just for show, it could have used more pyrotechnics. This just looked like some backyard video of a redneck trying to build his own space ship.

Posted: Apr 29 2010 01:38 pm

Ice2SeeYou wrote:

SoldierHawk wrote:

Well they have to do that every once in a while. Otherwise no one will buy the "balloon" explanation for the Roswell crash and various UFO sightings.

Well if it was just for show, it could have used more pyrotechnics. This just looked like some backyard video of a redneck trying to build his own space ship.

That's exactly what they want you to think. You just keep drinking your Kool-Aid with the rest of the ignorant masses while I uncover the vast global conspiracy that this story implies.

On an unrelated note, I'm out of tin foil. Anyone have some they could loan me?

Posted: Apr 29 2010 01:43 pm

SoldierHawk wrote:

Ice2SeeYou wrote:

SoldierHawk wrote:

Well they have to do that every once in a while. Otherwise no one will buy the "balloon" explanation for the Roswell crash and various UFO sightings.

Well if it was just for show, it could have used more pyrotechnics. This just looked like some backyard video of a redneck trying to build his own space ship.

That's exactly what they want you to think. You just keep drinking your Kool-Aid with the rest of the ignorant masses while I uncover the vast global conspiracy that this story implies.

On an unrelated note, I'm out of tin foil. Anyone have some they could loan me?

Sounds like M3GA has indeed won.

Posted: Apr 29 2010 01:54 pm

on a related note:

Quote:

Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Glider Disappears Mysteriously

The Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2—designed to attack global targets at Mach 20—has disappeared nine minutes into its first test flight, just after separating from its booster. Contact was lost, and it hasn't been found yet.

The Falcon was supposed to splash down in the Pacific Ocean after a 30-minute, 4,100-nautical-mile test flight. Not to be confused with the unmanned X-37B space shuttle—which launched on April 22—the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 blasted off last week from the Vandenberg Air Force Base on a Minotaur IV rocket.

Instead of completing its flight, however, the Air Force lost all contact with the aircraft. According to DARPA's Johanna Spangenberg Jones:

Preliminary review of data indicates the HTV-2 achieved controlled flight within the atmosphere at over Mach 20. Then contact with HTV-2 was lost. This was our first flight (all others were done in wind tunnels and simulations) so although of course we would like to have everything go perfectly, we still gathered data and can use findings for the next flight, scheduled currently for early 2011.

Just that: The telemetry data signal vanished, and the aircraft is nowhere to be found. Being a semi-secret project, nothing else has been disclosed. The only logical explanations are 1) a massive structural failure, 2) Nazi UFOs or 3) somebody lost it in a beer garden. I will pick number two for the time being.

The hypersonic glider is built by Lockheed Martin under a DARPA program. It's designed to launch conventional weapons against any target in the planet in just one hour. This capability makes it a perfect substitute for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. Unlike ICBMs loaded with conventional heads, the plane can't be mistaken with a nuclear missile, so it won't make other nuclear powers to hit the red button. Maybe.

http://gizmodo.com/5526308/air-forces-falcon-hypersonic-glider-disappears-mysteriously

Posted: Apr 29 2010 02:02 pm

username wrote:

on a related note:

Quote:

Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Glider Disappears Mysteriously

The Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2—designed to attack global targets at Mach 20—has disappeared nine minutes into its first test flight, just after separating from its booster. Contact was lost, and it hasn't been found yet.

The Falcon was supposed to splash down in the Pacific Ocean after a 30-minute, 4,100-nautical-mile test flight. Not to be confused with the unmanned X-37B space shuttle—which launched on April 22—the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 blasted off last week from the Vandenberg Air Force Base on a Minotaur IV rocket.

Instead of completing its flight, however, the Air Force lost all contact with the aircraft. According to DARPA's Johanna Spangenberg Jones:

Preliminary review of data indicates the HTV-2 achieved controlled flight within the atmosphere at over Mach 20. Then contact with HTV-2 was lost. This was our first flight (all others were done in wind tunnels and simulations) so although of course we would like to have everything go perfectly, we still gathered data and can use findings for the next flight, scheduled currently for early 2011.

Just that: The telemetry data signal vanished, and the aircraft is nowhere to be found. Being a semi-secret project, nothing else has been disclosed. The only logical explanations are 1) a massive structural failure, 2) Nazi UFOs or 3) somebody lost it in a beer garden. I will pick number two for the time being.

The hypersonic glider is built by Lockheed Martin under a DARPA program. It's designed to launch conventional weapons against any target in the planet in just one hour. This capability makes it a perfect substitute for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. Unlike ICBMs loaded with conventional heads, the plane can't be mistaken with a nuclear missile, so it won't make other nuclear powers to hit the red button. Maybe.

http://gizmodo.com/5526308/air-forces-falcon-hypersonic-glider-disappears-mysteriously

I'm guessing that Starscream shot it down.

Posted: Apr 29 2010 02:36 pm

Ice2SeeYou wrote:

username wrote:

on a related note:

Quote:

Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Glider Disappears Mysteriously

The Air Force's Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2—designed to attack global targets at Mach 20—has disappeared nine minutes into its first test flight, just after separating from its booster. Contact was lost, and it hasn't been found yet.

The Falcon was supposed to splash down in the Pacific Ocean after a 30-minute, 4,100-nautical-mile test flight. Not to be confused with the unmanned X-37B space shuttle—which launched on April 22—the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 blasted off last week from the Vandenberg Air Force Base on a Minotaur IV rocket.

Instead of completing its flight, however, the Air Force lost all contact with the aircraft. According to DARPA's Johanna Spangenberg Jones:

Preliminary review of data indicates the HTV-2 achieved controlled flight within the atmosphere at over Mach 20. Then contact with HTV-2 was lost. This was our first flight (all others were done in wind tunnels and simulations) so although of course we would like to have everything go perfectly, we still gathered data and can use findings for the next flight, scheduled currently for early 2011.

Just that: The telemetry data signal vanished, and the aircraft is nowhere to be found. Being a semi-secret project, nothing else has been disclosed. The only logical explanations are 1) a massive structural failure, 2) Nazi UFOs or 3) somebody lost it in a beer garden. I will pick number two for the time being.

The hypersonic glider is built by Lockheed Martin under a DARPA program. It's designed to launch conventional weapons against any target in the planet in just one hour. This capability makes it a perfect substitute for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. Unlike ICBMs loaded with conventional heads, the plane can't be mistaken with a nuclear missile, so it won't make other nuclear powers to hit the red button. Maybe.

http://gizmodo.com/5526308/air-forces-falcon-hypersonic-glider-disappears-mysteriously

I'm guessing that Starscream shot it down.

Either that or his ghost possessed the thing and it's scrambling detection.

Posted: Apr 30 2010 07:29 am

Ice2SeeYou wrote:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20100429/sc_space/hugenasascienceballooncrashesinaustralianoutback

Well there goes god knows how many millions in taxpayer dollars. I think space exploration is a worthwhile cause, but jesus christ......how does this kind of shit happen when you have (supposedly) some of the smartest people in the world designing the stuff? I hope this wasn't a case of someone just not tightening a screw all the way or something.

Space exploration isn't worthless because when this planet is too crowded, or too tapped to support new human life anymore, we need somewhere to go. In fact, NASA plans on having limited, self-sustaining colonies on the moon by 2050. It's pretty interesting stuff and far more worthwhile than the vast amounts of taxpayer money that's wasted in the middle east every day.

And shit happens. Things you didn't anticipate go wrong sometimes, especially considering the forces involved, and the fact that they can't really test anything before launching it. You can account for everything and be the smartest mother fucker in the world, but physics will still rape you when a little O-ring somewhere decides to warp because the humidity at 30,000 feet is 2% more than you thought it was an hour ago.

Posted: Apr 30 2010 07:56 am

Don't get me wrong, I agree that space exploration is worthwhile. While I doubt that they'll have true space colonies or find an intelligent alien race in my lifetime, I do appreciate the fact that ultimately, space is where humans are headed. I'd hate to see my country fall behind others and miss out on whatever resources or opportunities are out there waiting to be claimed. Even military superiority here on earth will probably boil down to who can build the first Death Star and have it hovering over their enemies.

Posted: Apr 30 2010 10:03 am

do you guys think the planet will eventually get too crowded? or will it even out eventually in terms of birth/death ratio?

Posted: Apr 30 2010 10:08 am

username wrote:

do you guys think the planet will eventually get too crowded? or will it even out eventually in terms of birth/death ratio?

I'm mostly concerned about how many elderly people we're going to have in another 30 years or so. We'll be inundated with shitty drivers, and 80% of parking spaces will be handicap spaces.

Joined: Oct 01 2009 Posts: 5316

I find it funny that NASA always makes these wild accusations of having bases on the moon by 2050, seeing as they were saying back in the late 80's by 2000, that Mars exploration and coloniization would be prevelant. Outside of a few probes, we haven't done jack shit, and I know that has a lot to do with the cutting of their programs, but nonetheless they never really seem to be trying, they put their resources towards a lot of things that to most people seem meaningless.

Posted: Apr 30 2010 08:25 pm

Doddsino wrote:

I find it funny that NASA always makes these wild accusations of having bases on the moon by 2050, seeing as they were saying back in the late 80's by 2000, that Mars exploration and coloniization would be prevelant. Outside of a few probes, we haven't done jack shit, and I know that has a lot to do with the cutting of their programs, but nonetheless they never really seem to be trying, they put their resources towards a lot of things that to most people seem meaningless.

I'm sure the people at NASA are 1000x smarter than I am, so I'm not going to tell them the things they're working on are a waste of time. But it's still pretty amazing when you think that the first moon landing was in 1969. That was 40 frickin years ago. And since then, we've done nothing anywhere close to that level of awesome (from an everyday man's point of view, that is).

Joined: Oct 01 2009 Posts: 5316

That's what I'm talking about.

Don't get me wrong, like you said...NASA knows what it's doing, but no one's on their ass like JFK was with the moonlanding. What if Kennedy never made that comment, do you believe we would've still made it? I don't doubt the ability, I just doubt desire.

They can talk about Mars exploration all they want, but until they made the needed steps to get people interested, then I doubt we're going in that direction any time soon.

Posted: Apr 30 2010 11:51 pm

I say just copy what Titan Maximum did and make Mars a retirement planet for grandparents.

Posted: May 01 2010 05:45 am

We haven't done anything since the moon landing because anything more than that is still beyond our technology. We haven't bothered to land on the moon again since the 70s because it's pointless until we have the means to set up a temporary/permanent colony and truly explore the place, which is what they're working on now.

The other option is landing on Mars, but that also isn't possible with our current technology yet. The simple reason is Mars at its closest possible point to Earth is 55 million km away which would take 9 months to reach with out current rockets. Also, once you land you have to spend 3-4 months on the planet to wait for Mars and Earth to be in optimal positions again before you can leave with a return trip of another 9 months. So that's 21 months total in space which isn't possible without artificial gravity and shuttles big enough to carry 21 months worth of supplies.

I think the longest possible time someone can be in space without anti-grav so far has been 4 months. So that's why we haven't done much in terms of manned space missions. There's just nothing we can do at the moment.