
SpaceX’s Dragon capsule successfully returns from ISS resupply mission - andruby
https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/17/spacexs-dragon-capsule-successfully-returns-from-12th-iss-resupply-mission
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mulletbum
I know everyone keeps saying this, but the fact that this type of thing is
happening and it has almost become boring is just fantastic! We are on the
cusp of the most ground breaking time in the space industry. I cannot wait to
see what happens next. Space-X makes me wish I was 18 again so I could change
my field of work.

~~~
imbusy111
Change into what exactly?

~~~
ChuckMcM
Astronaut. Back when I was at a point to choose a career to get me into space
the only choice was "join the military, get flight status, apply to NASA."

SpaceX can launch its own rockets into space, so they could conceivably launch
their own crews. Certainly the 'space tourist' business from Blue Origin and
Virgin Galactic have employees as 'operators' for the equipment, they just
have less capable equipment.

The fact that SpaceX exists and is competing in the crew option means that
"Dragon Pilot for SpaceX" can be a thing. Before now, that was just science
fiction.

~~~
joshvm
One positive note for astronaut wannabees - the average astronaut age is
relatively high, mid 30s is the average and 40s is not uncommon. You have
plenty of time to build up a respectable science career and get fit!

Although all astronauts have stellar (ha) resumes, most are not test pilots.
Mission specialists come from all areas of science: the current cohort include
a marine biologist, geologist, oceanographer and a ton of aero/astro engineers

Then you remember that you're also competing with Jonny Kim:

> The California native trained and operated as a Navy SEAL, completing more
> than 100 combat operations and earning a Silver Star and Bronze Star with
> Combat “V”. Afterward, he went on to complete a degree in Mathematics at the
> University of San Diego and a Doctorate of Medicine at Harvard Medical
> School.

~~~
mulletbum
Yeah, I am in my 30s. It takes a lot of years to build up to be someone who
SHOULD be inside one of those capsules.

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treetoppin
Stories like this remind me that we are standing at a key decision point for
human presence in space. At the culmination of the commercial resupply and
commercial crew contracts that NASA has been fundinf there will be several
privately held entities that have the capacity to send people and pressurized
cargo to and from low earth orbit. Now will be the first time that all of us
space dreamers will have the opportunity to see if capitalism can find a
reason to send humans into space. Very exciting, but its going to be a time to
either put up or shut up.

~~~
bane
I think the up-down space industry is not necessarily where the future lies.
Fighting gravity wells is a huge and someday not terribly useful expense.
Bootstrapping an end-to-end mine-to-manufacture space industry is probably
where we'll be in the much longer term.

Right now we have to haul 100% of our mass into orbit. But what if we derived
that mass from sources that weren't at the bottom of a huge gravity well? If
we can shift most of that mass to those sources, convert the raw materials to
finished goods and start to construct habitats in space, we can move that 100%
up/down to just us and a few things we can't space-derive.

Building out that manufacturing and supply line is where the future really is
and it will allow us to handle component assembly on scales far outside of the
reach of any space-launch system no matter how cheap. Moving a million tons of
steel and composite from one point in space to another is just a matter of
delta-V to get it going and to get it to stop moving. Getting it up from the
ground may be an impossible endeavor.

The entire ISS weighs only 450 tons. But an Aircraft Carrier weighs 100,000+
tons. Even with a 90% launch cost reduction, it's impossible to build Carrier-
sized habitats without breaking national economies.

How does this get funded? Also not sure, but I have a sense that there's
enough rich people who wouldn't mind living in orbit and dropping down to any
point on the planet in about an hour if their physical presence is required
and getting back "home" a couple hours later. But with enough industry, a
contract signing ceremony to build a factory in France could simply be shifted
to an intra-orbital flight to an orbital factory for a tiny fraction of that
cost and time.

There's potential efficiencies in space. And a lot of very valuable R&D
waiting to happen to make it work. And I think that R&D hill is where the
medium-term money is.

~~~
kowdermeister
According to Musk, the goal is $1100/Kg.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy#Launch_prices](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Heavy#Launch_prices)

The 100k ton carrier is possibly not needed up there, why would we need that?
Let's build 10 ISS, that's 4500 tons, putting materials up there would cost
$495.000.000, a minor project budget in military speak :) With 10 ISS material
you could build a nice doughnut shape station we pictured in the 70's.

~~~
bane
Aircraft carriers, while we think of them as huge ships, aren't really all
that large if you want to spend a lifetime on board one. Habitats have to be
_huge_ in order to not make the inhabitants bored out of their minds.

To put it into perspective, a 100,000 ton carrier houses around 5,000 people
in tight quarters (the flight deck is just under 5 acres). and needs constant
tending and provisioning for supplies. As an analogy to a space habitat they
also make a kind of sense since they also have to house flying craft. There
are only about a dozen carriers in the world at this size...or about a million
tons.

Hollowed out asteroids with internal habitation spaces on the order of
hundreds of internal cubic km would probably provide enough diversity to keep
generations reasonably happy. The hollowing out process could supply raw
material to space-based factories that would then build more habitat things
and inter-habitat ships. Capture a couple comets and you have water, oxygen
and other things. A small asteroid, something like 243 Ida has a total volume
of over 25,000 km^3. Even if a couple km of shell were left, we're talking
millions of tons of raw material.

~~~
neolefty
Nitpick: Can you actually hollow out an asteroid? It seems easier to use it to
build an independently hollow structure.

Asteroids probably resemble piles of gravel -- maybe with ice mixed in -- more
than chunks of stone or metal.

Update: Yes, this bugs me about _The Expanse_ books. Spinning up Ceres to
provide internal gravity ...

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Spinning up Ceres to provide internal gravity ..._

Spinning a rock can be done over long periods of time. In _The Expanse_ , it
was a decades-long project, that earned the Tycho Corporation some serious
engineering cred.

~~~
lhopki01
Spinning up asteroids can't be done. The speed you'd need for significant
gravity would rip the asteroid apart.

~~~
TeMPOraL
[citation needed]

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TeMPOraL
Did anyone notice that SpaceX launch streams stopped showing on HN's
frontpage? That's a testament to their work; we all treat both their launches
_and landings_ as normal now.

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justifier
is there a timetable on a drone landing for the dragon capsule?

~~~
wolf550e
Red Dragon is cancelled, but watch Elon's update[1] on September 29th for the
Mars plan. There should be a good discussion thread on reddit.com/r/spacex/ if
you don't want to watch the Livestream.

1 - [http://www.iafastro.org/elon-musk-at-iac-2017-in-
adelaide/](http://www.iafastro.org/elon-musk-at-iac-2017-in-adelaide/)

~~~
SuoDuanDao
Hey, that's my birthday! Hope I get something good :)

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addHocker
From Impact-boom to elevator-bling in 2 years. Not bad, Mr.Musk, not bad at
all.

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Fjolsvith
And NASA couldn't do this?

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bbojan
NASA could have totally done this, just not at that cost.

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RobertoG
Sometimes I have the feeling that the problem with NASA is not bureaucracy but
subcontracting.

Maybe, it acquired too many leeches feeding from it to move fast and lean
since the Moon landings times?

Perhaps somebody more informed in the organizational differences between then
and now care to share his opinion.

~~~
mikeash
NASA definitely moved fast for Apollo, but I wouldn't call it lean.

I think its biggest problem is that it's such a political animal. They can't
just do things in the obvious and straightforward way. The work has to be
spread around so that each congressman's district can get a piece of the pie.

