

35 years of orbital launchers - LombardiLegacy
http://www.space.com/12991-nasa-space-shuttle-enterprise-35-years.html

======
Roboprog
Good riddance, shuttles. I wonder how much exploration and exploitation was
held back by 30+ years of being stuck on manned low earth orbit.

No mission to Mars? Only a very few asteroid missions (why not dozens)? Only a
very few ionic propulsion systems? It would have been nice to have permanent
robotic geologic and atmospheric stations throughout the entire solar system
by now, rather than playing around in orbit.

Want to learn about our planet? Observe what happens to other planets, in
detail, when you change the size, composition or temperature, and put the data
into a matrix or two to start solving for the variables.

~~~
LombardiLegacy
This is my opinion exactly. I am a big fan of Elon Musk and SpaceX. I often
feel that we have accomplished nothing since the 60's and 70's in terms of
spaceflight which is very disappointing. It's also disappointing to see how
much money we have spent. Now Musk is doing everything NASA did and more at
literally like 1 thirtieth of the cost. I really hope we begin to invest more
as a society, but from the private sector.

------
geuis
The title is incorrect. The article is primarily about the Enterprise, the
first shuttle that was built in the late 70's and used as a testbed for the
technologies that would go on to be used in space-worthy shuttles.

An "orbital launcher" is something that gets a payload to orbit. That could be
a rocket, a space plane, a space elevator, a pitcher with a very strong arm,
etc. The Enterprise was most certainly not an "orbital launcher".

~~~
LombardiLegacy
Good point. My bad on the title. Didn't think that one through. Hopefully most
people still understood.

