CHAPTER XVII --A TELEGRAPHIC DISPATCH
The great works undertaken by the Gun Club had now virtually come to an end; and two months still remained before the day for the discharge of the shot to the moon. To the general impatience these two months appeared as long as years! Hitherto the smallest details of the operation had been daily chronicled by the journals, which the public devoured with eager eyes.
Just at this moment a circumstance, the most unexpected, the most extraordinary and incredible, occurred to rouse afresh their panting spirits, and to throw every mind into a state of the most violent excitement.
One day, the 30th of September, at 3:47 P.M., a telegram, transmitted by cable from Valentia (Ireland) to Newfoundland and the American Mainland, arrived at the address of President Barbicane.
The president tore open the envelope, read the dispatch, and, despite his remarkable powers of self-control, his lips turned pale and his eyes grew dim, on reading the twenty words of this telegram.
Here is the text of the dispatch, which figures now in the archives of the Gun Club:
FRANCE, PARIS,
30 September, 4 A.M.
Barbicane, Tampa Town, Florida, United States.
Substitute for your spherical shell a cylindro-conical projectile.
I shall go inside. Shall arrive by steamer Atlanta.
MICHEL ARDAN.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Tuesday, January 3, 2012
Private companies need taxpayer money
From Florida Today: Private companies need taxpayer money
Private companies cannot and will not make the commitment to explore space without massive government subsidies. Their business paradigm is making a profit, and space exploration is much too risky for a private company to invest the necessary resources. Unless of course, taxpayers will shoulder the cost and liability, leaving private companies to reap all of the profits.
Take, for example SpaceX. When launching rockets from its facilities in the South Pacific, it had a dismal success rate. Now, it essentially has been given Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and has had two successful launches of the vaunted Falcon 9. These launches came about after several delays, and there have been cancellations of other tests that will ensure reliability and safety for this launch system.
Now, SpaceX plans to combine two test flights of its unmanned Dragon cargo ship into a single mission in February to dock with the International Space Station.
It cost American taxpayers $100 billion to design, build and maintain the ISS, which provides much-needed research in space. Is NASA really going to risk that investment so SpaceX doesn't have to perform test flights that will cut into its profit margin?
This shows why privatization of the space program will never work. Space exploration always has been about research, science and gaining knowledge for the betterment of mankind, not for profit at the expense of taxpayers. If private companies like Space X wish to conduct space exploration to make a profit, let them do it on their own dime.
Why should taxpayers “give” them launch facilities we paid for, then pay them to launch government satellites? In a free market, SpaceX would shoulder all of the financial burden of providing a cheaper method of launching satellites into space. That is why until now, only governments have invested the capital necessary to explore space.
And we as taxpayers have benefited in the form of technological advancements we use in our daily lives.
Will China shame the US back to strong space program?
From The Youngstown Vindicator: Will China shame the US back to strong space program?
Many of today’s maturing baby boomers cling to fond childhood memories of elementary-school assemblies where they’d sit knee-to-knee on freshly waxed floors and peer intently onto small-screen black and white TV sets to witness the dawn of the American space age. During those exciting Mercury, Gemini and Apollo launches in the 1960s and early ’70s, enthusiasm, adventure and national pride united them.
A sense of fierce competitiveness with the then Soviet Union also energized those children and most all Americans. After all, the Soviets, through their launch of Sputnik I in 1957, essentially shamed the United States into its massive, multi-trillion-dollar goal-oriented journey into outer space. When Ohioan Neil Armstong made his historic “small step for man” but “giant leap for mankind” onto the lunar surface in July 1969, America celebrated its come-from-behind victory with boundless elation and gratification.
Much has changed in space science and in the world order in the ensuing five decades. The Soviet Union has crumbled, its leading nation Russia has long lost its superpower lustre, China has emerged as a daunting global force and the government-sanctioned manned space program in the United States has become a mere shadow of its former robust and glorious self.
So much so, in fact, that some may wonder whether history may repeat itself in the 21st century. This time, could it be China that will shame the United States back into a serious program of space exploration and conquest?
CHINA’S AGGRESSIVE 5-YEAR PLAN
Just last week, China announced plans for an aggressive state-sponsored program to launch space labs and prepare to build space stations over the next five years.
The country says it will continue its exploration of the moon using probes, start gathering samples of the moon’s surface, land an astronaut on the lunar surface and “push forward its exploration of planets, asteroids and the sun.”
Contrast those ambitious goals with those of the U.S. space program. Funding for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has been decimated in the current federal budget, plans for a return to the moon and other ambitious missions have been scrubbed or substantially cut back, thousands of talented NASA workers have lost their jobs and America’s working space program largely has been privatized.
Just last week, NASA announced that a private California company — SpaceX — will attempt the first-ever commercial cargo run to the International Space Station in February. The unmanned Dragon capsule will fly to the space station and dock with a load of supplies. While we wish success for the project, any failures or problems will undoubtedly reflect more profoundly on the pride of this country, not the profits of the Paypal-tied company.
Indeed China cites the effect on national pride as well worth the cost of its massive investment. Its space program already has made major breakthroughs in a relatively short time, and it is on track to replace the U.S. as the leader in space-station development.
Will we care? To be sure, much has changed in the U.S. since the launch of Mercury I, not the least of which is decreasing awe over 60 years of almost routinized manned space travel. One thing that has not changed, however, is that fierce competitiveness and drive for achievement that energized millions of American schoolchildren of the ‘60s.
Washington bureaucrats and congressional delegations would do well to remember that when debating the dollars and sense of the future course of America’s once-proud space agency.
Many of today’s maturing baby boomers cling to fond childhood memories of elementary-school assemblies where they’d sit knee-to-knee on freshly waxed floors and peer intently onto small-screen black and white TV sets to witness the dawn of the American space age. During those exciting Mercury, Gemini and Apollo launches in the 1960s and early ’70s, enthusiasm, adventure and national pride united them.
A sense of fierce competitiveness with the then Soviet Union also energized those children and most all Americans. After all, the Soviets, through their launch of Sputnik I in 1957, essentially shamed the United States into its massive, multi-trillion-dollar goal-oriented journey into outer space. When Ohioan Neil Armstong made his historic “small step for man” but “giant leap for mankind” onto the lunar surface in July 1969, America celebrated its come-from-behind victory with boundless elation and gratification.
Much has changed in space science and in the world order in the ensuing five decades. The Soviet Union has crumbled, its leading nation Russia has long lost its superpower lustre, China has emerged as a daunting global force and the government-sanctioned manned space program in the United States has become a mere shadow of its former robust and glorious self.
So much so, in fact, that some may wonder whether history may repeat itself in the 21st century. This time, could it be China that will shame the United States back into a serious program of space exploration and conquest?
CHINA’S AGGRESSIVE 5-YEAR PLAN
Just last week, China announced plans for an aggressive state-sponsored program to launch space labs and prepare to build space stations over the next five years.
The country says it will continue its exploration of the moon using probes, start gathering samples of the moon’s surface, land an astronaut on the lunar surface and “push forward its exploration of planets, asteroids and the sun.”
Contrast those ambitious goals with those of the U.S. space program. Funding for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has been decimated in the current federal budget, plans for a return to the moon and other ambitious missions have been scrubbed or substantially cut back, thousands of talented NASA workers have lost their jobs and America’s working space program largely has been privatized.
Just last week, NASA announced that a private California company — SpaceX — will attempt the first-ever commercial cargo run to the International Space Station in February. The unmanned Dragon capsule will fly to the space station and dock with a load of supplies. While we wish success for the project, any failures or problems will undoubtedly reflect more profoundly on the pride of this country, not the profits of the Paypal-tied company.
Indeed China cites the effect on national pride as well worth the cost of its massive investment. Its space program already has made major breakthroughs in a relatively short time, and it is on track to replace the U.S. as the leader in space-station development.
Will we care? To be sure, much has changed in the U.S. since the launch of Mercury I, not the least of which is decreasing awe over 60 years of almost routinized manned space travel. One thing that has not changed, however, is that fierce competitiveness and drive for achievement that energized millions of American schoolchildren of the ‘60s.
Washington bureaucrats and congressional delegations would do well to remember that when debating the dollars and sense of the future course of America’s once-proud space agency.
From the Earth to the Moon: Chapter 16: THE COLUMBIAD
CHAPTER XVI -- THE COLUMBIAD
Had the casting succeeded? They were reduced to mere conjecture. There was indeed every reason to expect success, since the mould has absorbed the entire mass of the molten metal; still some considerable time must elapse before they could arrive at any certainty upon the matter.
The patience of the members of the Gun Club was sorely tried during this period of time. But they could do nothing. J. T. Maston escaped roasting by a miracle. Fifteen days after the casting an immense column of smoke was still rising in the open sky and the ground burned the soles of the feet within a radius of two hundred feet round the summit of Stones Hill. It was impossible to approach nearer. All they could do was to wait with what patience they might.
"Here we are at the 10th of August," exclaimed J. T. Maston one morning, "only four months to the 1st of December! We shall never be ready in time!" Barbicane said nothing, but his silence covered serious irritation.
However, daily observations revealed a certain change going on in the state of the ground. About the 15th of August the vapors ejected had sensibly diminished in intensity and thickness. Some days afterward the earth exhaled only a slight puff of smoke, the last breath of the monster enclosed within its circle of stone. Little by little the belt of heat contracted, until on the 22nd of August, Barbicane, his colleagues, and the engineer were enabled to set foot on the iron sheet which lay level upon the summit of Stones Hill.
"At last!" exclaimed the president of the Gun Club, with an immense sigh of relief.
The work was resumed the same day. They proceeded at once to extract the interior mould, for the purpose of clearing out the boring of the piece. Pickaxes and boring irons were set to work without intermission. The clayey and sandy soils had acquired extreme hardness under the action of the heat; but, by the aid of the machines, the rubbish on being dug out was rapidly carted away on railway wagons; and such was the ardor of the work, so persuasive the arguments of Barbicane's dollars, that by the 3rd of September all traces of the mould had entirely disappeared.
Immediately the operation of boring was commenced; and by the aid of powerful machines, a few weeks later, the inner surface of the immense tube had been rendered perfectly cylindrical, and the bore of the piece had acquired a thorough polish.
At length, on the 22d of September, less than a twelvemonth after Barbicane's original proposition, the enormous weapon, accurately bored, and exactly vertically pointed, was ready for work. There was only the moon now to wait for; and they were pretty sure that she would not fail in the rendezvous.
The ecstasy of J. T. Maston knew no bounds, and he narrowly escaped a frightful fall while staring down the tube. But for the strong hand of Colonel Blomsberry, the worthy secretary, like a modern Erostratus, would have found his death in the depths of the Columbiad.
The cannon was then finished; there was no possible doubt as to its perfect completion. So, on the 6th of October, Captain Nicholl opened an account between himself and President Barbicane, in which he debited himself to the latter in the sum of two thousand dollars. One may believe that the captain's wrath was increased to its highest point, and must have made him seriously ill. However, he had still three bets of three, four, and five thousand dollars, respectively; and if he gained two out of these, his position would not be very bad. But the money question did not enter into his calculations; it was the success of his rival in casting a cannon against which iron plates sixty feet thick would have been ineffectual, that dealt him a terrible blow.
After the 23rd of September the enclosure of Stones hill was thrown open to the public; and it will be easily imagined what was the concourse of visitors to this spot! There was an incessant flow of people to and from Tampa Town and the place, which resembled a procession, or rather, in fact, a pilgrimage.
It was already clear to be seen that, on the day of the experiment itself, the aggregate of spectators would be counted by millions; for they were already arriving from all parts of the earth upon this narrow strip of promontory. Europe was emigrating to America.
Up to that time, however, it must be confessed, the curiosity of the numerous comers was but scantily gratified. Most had counted upon witnessing the spectacle of the casting, and they were treated to nothing but smoke. This was sorry food for hungry eyes; but Barbicane would admit no one to that operation. Then ensued grumbling, discontent, murmurs; they blamed the president, taxed him with dictatorial conduct. His proceedings were declared "un-American." There was very nearly a riot round Stones Hill; but Barbicane remained inflexible. When, however, the Columbiad was entirely finished, this state of closed doors could no longer be maintained; besides it would have been bad taste, and even imprudence, to affront the public feeling. Barbicane, therefore, opened the enclosure to all comers; but, true to his practical disposition, he determined to coin money out of the public curiosity.
It was something, indeed, to be enabled to contemplate this immense Columbiad; but to descend into its depths, this seemed to the Americans the ne plus ultra of earthly felicity. Consequently, there was not one curious spectator who was not willing to give himself the treat of visiting the interior of this great metallic abyss. Baskets suspended from steam-cranes permitted them to satisfy their curiosity. There was a perfect mania. Women, children, old men, all made it a point of duty to penetrate the mysteries of the colossal gun. The fare for the descent was fixed at five dollars per head; and despite this high charge, during the two months which preceded the experiment, the influx of visitors enabled the Gun Club to pocket nearly five hundred thousand dollars!
It is needless to say that the first visitors of the Columbiad were the members of the Gun Club. This privilege was justly reserved for that illustrious body. The ceremony took place on the 25th of September. A basket of honor took down the president, J. T. Maston, Major Elphinstone, General Morgan, Colonel Blomsberry, and other members of the club, to the number of ten in all. How hot it was at the bottom of that long tube of metal! They were half suffocated. But what delight! What ecstasy! A table had been laid with six covers on the massive stone which formed the bottom of the Columbiad, and lighted by a jet of electric light resembling that of day itself. Numerous exquisite dishes, which seemed to descend from heaven, were placed successively before the guests, and the richest wines of France flowed in profusion during this splendid repast, served nine hundred feet beneath the surface of the earth!
The festival was animated, not to say somewhat noisy. Toasts flew backward and forward. They drank to the earth and to her satellite, to the Gun Club, the Union, the Moon, Diana, Phoebe, Selene, the "peaceful courier of the night!" All the hurrahs, carried upward upon the sonorous waves of the immense acoustic tube, arrived with the sound of thunder at its mouth; and the multitude ranged round Stones Hill heartily united their shouts with those of the ten revelers hidden from view at the bottom of the gigantic Columbiad.
J. T. Maston was no longer master of himself. Whether he shouted or gesticulated, ate or drank most, would be a difficult matter to determine. At all events, he would not have given his place up for an empire, "not even if the cannon— loaded, primed, and fired at that very moment—were to blow him in pieces into the planetary world."
Had the casting succeeded? They were reduced to mere conjecture. There was indeed every reason to expect success, since the mould has absorbed the entire mass of the molten metal; still some considerable time must elapse before they could arrive at any certainty upon the matter.
The patience of the members of the Gun Club was sorely tried during this period of time. But they could do nothing. J. T. Maston escaped roasting by a miracle. Fifteen days after the casting an immense column of smoke was still rising in the open sky and the ground burned the soles of the feet within a radius of two hundred feet round the summit of Stones Hill. It was impossible to approach nearer. All they could do was to wait with what patience they might.
"Here we are at the 10th of August," exclaimed J. T. Maston one morning, "only four months to the 1st of December! We shall never be ready in time!" Barbicane said nothing, but his silence covered serious irritation.
However, daily observations revealed a certain change going on in the state of the ground. About the 15th of August the vapors ejected had sensibly diminished in intensity and thickness. Some days afterward the earth exhaled only a slight puff of smoke, the last breath of the monster enclosed within its circle of stone. Little by little the belt of heat contracted, until on the 22nd of August, Barbicane, his colleagues, and the engineer were enabled to set foot on the iron sheet which lay level upon the summit of Stones Hill.
"At last!" exclaimed the president of the Gun Club, with an immense sigh of relief.
The work was resumed the same day. They proceeded at once to extract the interior mould, for the purpose of clearing out the boring of the piece. Pickaxes and boring irons were set to work without intermission. The clayey and sandy soils had acquired extreme hardness under the action of the heat; but, by the aid of the machines, the rubbish on being dug out was rapidly carted away on railway wagons; and such was the ardor of the work, so persuasive the arguments of Barbicane's dollars, that by the 3rd of September all traces of the mould had entirely disappeared.
Immediately the operation of boring was commenced; and by the aid of powerful machines, a few weeks later, the inner surface of the immense tube had been rendered perfectly cylindrical, and the bore of the piece had acquired a thorough polish.
At length, on the 22d of September, less than a twelvemonth after Barbicane's original proposition, the enormous weapon, accurately bored, and exactly vertically pointed, was ready for work. There was only the moon now to wait for; and they were pretty sure that she would not fail in the rendezvous.
The ecstasy of J. T. Maston knew no bounds, and he narrowly escaped a frightful fall while staring down the tube. But for the strong hand of Colonel Blomsberry, the worthy secretary, like a modern Erostratus, would have found his death in the depths of the Columbiad.
The cannon was then finished; there was no possible doubt as to its perfect completion. So, on the 6th of October, Captain Nicholl opened an account between himself and President Barbicane, in which he debited himself to the latter in the sum of two thousand dollars. One may believe that the captain's wrath was increased to its highest point, and must have made him seriously ill. However, he had still three bets of three, four, and five thousand dollars, respectively; and if he gained two out of these, his position would not be very bad. But the money question did not enter into his calculations; it was the success of his rival in casting a cannon against which iron plates sixty feet thick would have been ineffectual, that dealt him a terrible blow.
After the 23rd of September the enclosure of Stones hill was thrown open to the public; and it will be easily imagined what was the concourse of visitors to this spot! There was an incessant flow of people to and from Tampa Town and the place, which resembled a procession, or rather, in fact, a pilgrimage.
It was already clear to be seen that, on the day of the experiment itself, the aggregate of spectators would be counted by millions; for they were already arriving from all parts of the earth upon this narrow strip of promontory. Europe was emigrating to America.
Up to that time, however, it must be confessed, the curiosity of the numerous comers was but scantily gratified. Most had counted upon witnessing the spectacle of the casting, and they were treated to nothing but smoke. This was sorry food for hungry eyes; but Barbicane would admit no one to that operation. Then ensued grumbling, discontent, murmurs; they blamed the president, taxed him with dictatorial conduct. His proceedings were declared "un-American." There was very nearly a riot round Stones Hill; but Barbicane remained inflexible. When, however, the Columbiad was entirely finished, this state of closed doors could no longer be maintained; besides it would have been bad taste, and even imprudence, to affront the public feeling. Barbicane, therefore, opened the enclosure to all comers; but, true to his practical disposition, he determined to coin money out of the public curiosity.
It was something, indeed, to be enabled to contemplate this immense Columbiad; but to descend into its depths, this seemed to the Americans the ne plus ultra of earthly felicity. Consequently, there was not one curious spectator who was not willing to give himself the treat of visiting the interior of this great metallic abyss. Baskets suspended from steam-cranes permitted them to satisfy their curiosity. There was a perfect mania. Women, children, old men, all made it a point of duty to penetrate the mysteries of the colossal gun. The fare for the descent was fixed at five dollars per head; and despite this high charge, during the two months which preceded the experiment, the influx of visitors enabled the Gun Club to pocket nearly five hundred thousand dollars!
It is needless to say that the first visitors of the Columbiad were the members of the Gun Club. This privilege was justly reserved for that illustrious body. The ceremony took place on the 25th of September. A basket of honor took down the president, J. T. Maston, Major Elphinstone, General Morgan, Colonel Blomsberry, and other members of the club, to the number of ten in all. How hot it was at the bottom of that long tube of metal! They were half suffocated. But what delight! What ecstasy! A table had been laid with six covers on the massive stone which formed the bottom of the Columbiad, and lighted by a jet of electric light resembling that of day itself. Numerous exquisite dishes, which seemed to descend from heaven, were placed successively before the guests, and the richest wines of France flowed in profusion during this splendid repast, served nine hundred feet beneath the surface of the earth!
The festival was animated, not to say somewhat noisy. Toasts flew backward and forward. They drank to the earth and to her satellite, to the Gun Club, the Union, the Moon, Diana, Phoebe, Selene, the "peaceful courier of the night!" All the hurrahs, carried upward upon the sonorous waves of the immense acoustic tube, arrived with the sound of thunder at its mouth; and the multitude ranged round Stones Hill heartily united their shouts with those of the ten revelers hidden from view at the bottom of the gigantic Columbiad.
J. T. Maston was no longer master of himself. Whether he shouted or gesticulated, ate or drank most, would be a difficult matter to determine. At all events, he would not have given his place up for an empire, "not even if the cannon— loaded, primed, and fired at that very moment—were to blow him in pieces into the planetary world."
Monday, January 2, 2012
A Big Year For Space Exploration
From NBUR Boston NPR: 2011: A Big Year For Space Exploration
Some might be inclined to think 2011 was a pretty bad year for space, what with the U.S. space program shutting down. While the Atlantis marked the last mission in NASA's decades-long space shuttle program, the agency still managed to have other significant launches this year. Crafts visited Mercury, a massive asteroid known as Vesta, and the moon. Another left for Jupiter, and the Voyager 1 spacecraft sailed out of our solar system. Guest host Rebecca Sheir talks to Neil deGrasse Tyson, head of the Hayden Planetarium, about whether all that made 2011 a good year for space exploration.
Transcript
REBECCA SHEIR, HOST:
2011 was, of course, a big year for a lot of things, but not just here on Earth. In the spring, NASA's Messenger probe became the first spacecraft to arrive in orbit around Mercury. Over the summer, we saw groundbreaking photos of a giant asteroid nearing Earth. A craft left for Jupiter in August, another for Mars in November, and throughout the year, Voyager 1 sailed farther and farther out of our solar system. What excited Neil deGrasse Tyson most about space in 2011?
NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Everything.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
SHEIR: He's head of New York City's Hayden Planetarium. And he says a lot of space watchers shed a tear over the biggest astro event of the year, the end of NASA's Space Shuttle program, which eclipsed some other big events in space science.
TYSON: I would say for me, the most ambitious among these missions is the Mars Science Laboratory dubbed Curiosity. And the Mars Science Laboratory is going to do experiments to see if the conditions on the Martian surface can sustain organics, which would be the building blocks for life. It's a whole other round of questions that we now get to ask about the surface of Mars.
SHEIR: Let's move on to a slightly larger planet, then, Jupiter. We've got Juno, that's the spacecraft heading up there. It won't be there for another five years, really?
TYSON: Yeah. Jupiter's far - you know, these things are far away, and we don't know how to move very fast. Interesting thing about Jupiter, Jupiter actually gives more energy out than it receives from the sun. There's a huge, monstrous magnetic field and radiation belts. So any time you go to investigate it, first, you have to have specially, what they call hardened electronics that can survive in these harsh environments. And then you want to actually make the measurements, things like the magnetic field, the radiation flux, the chemistry of the atmosphere.
And so these missions to Mercury, to Jupiter, they're all equipped with the sweep of experiments just to try to give us some understanding beyond just the spec view that telescopes give us.
SHEIR: So looking at exoplanet research, scientists announced this month they'd found Kepler-22b, a planet outside our solar system orbiting a star in the so-called Goldilocks Zone where water might be present. Now that it's been found, what would you say is next?
TYSON: Yeah. So we knew that we'd find planets around other stars, but the Holy Grail among the planets would be an Earth-like planet, and you've got it. And so now, that's where you might send radio signals to see if there's any intelligent life there. One problem there is that, first, Earth-like planet in the Goldilocks Zone is 600 light-years away. So you could send a signal today, and we'd get a reply 1,200 years later.
SHEIR: Oh, no.
TYSON: And what were we doing on Earth 1,200 years ago, you know? So right now, it's sort of a philosophical interest that there might be life there, but it's not much we know how to do about it if there is.
SHEIR: Neil, what do you hope will be accomplished in space science over this next year?
TYSON: Oh, one year is not - I got to think in longer timeframes than that. You're thinking like annual report question.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
TYSON: I have to think cosmically, excuse me. So in the next five, 10 years, 20 years, I think we'll be equipped to answer definitely whether life ever thrived in our backyard. I think the Mars Science Laboratory will lead that effort. By the way, and if our backyard does not have life, the galaxy is vast. And if you looked at an image of how far we have explored and how far our radio signals have reached, that's what we call a radio bubble, it's 80 light-years across, that bubble is tiny compared with the 100,000 light-year diameter of our Milky Way galaxy. So I'd be disappointed, but I'd say let's keep looking.
SHEIR: Neil, deGrasse Tyson is director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space in New York City. Thanks so much, Neil, and Happy New Year.
Some might be inclined to think 2011 was a pretty bad year for space, what with the U.S. space program shutting down. While the Atlantis marked the last mission in NASA's decades-long space shuttle program, the agency still managed to have other significant launches this year. Crafts visited Mercury, a massive asteroid known as Vesta, and the moon. Another left for Jupiter, and the Voyager 1 spacecraft sailed out of our solar system. Guest host Rebecca Sheir talks to Neil deGrasse Tyson, head of the Hayden Planetarium, about whether all that made 2011 a good year for space exploration.
Transcript
REBECCA SHEIR, HOST:
2011 was, of course, a big year for a lot of things, but not just here on Earth. In the spring, NASA's Messenger probe became the first spacecraft to arrive in orbit around Mercury. Over the summer, we saw groundbreaking photos of a giant asteroid nearing Earth. A craft left for Jupiter in August, another for Mars in November, and throughout the year, Voyager 1 sailed farther and farther out of our solar system. What excited Neil deGrasse Tyson most about space in 2011?
NEIL DEGRASSE TYSON: Everything.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
SHEIR: He's head of New York City's Hayden Planetarium. And he says a lot of space watchers shed a tear over the biggest astro event of the year, the end of NASA's Space Shuttle program, which eclipsed some other big events in space science.
TYSON: I would say for me, the most ambitious among these missions is the Mars Science Laboratory dubbed Curiosity. And the Mars Science Laboratory is going to do experiments to see if the conditions on the Martian surface can sustain organics, which would be the building blocks for life. It's a whole other round of questions that we now get to ask about the surface of Mars.
SHEIR: Let's move on to a slightly larger planet, then, Jupiter. We've got Juno, that's the spacecraft heading up there. It won't be there for another five years, really?
TYSON: Yeah. Jupiter's far - you know, these things are far away, and we don't know how to move very fast. Interesting thing about Jupiter, Jupiter actually gives more energy out than it receives from the sun. There's a huge, monstrous magnetic field and radiation belts. So any time you go to investigate it, first, you have to have specially, what they call hardened electronics that can survive in these harsh environments. And then you want to actually make the measurements, things like the magnetic field, the radiation flux, the chemistry of the atmosphere.
And so these missions to Mercury, to Jupiter, they're all equipped with the sweep of experiments just to try to give us some understanding beyond just the spec view that telescopes give us.
SHEIR: So looking at exoplanet research, scientists announced this month they'd found Kepler-22b, a planet outside our solar system orbiting a star in the so-called Goldilocks Zone where water might be present. Now that it's been found, what would you say is next?
TYSON: Yeah. So we knew that we'd find planets around other stars, but the Holy Grail among the planets would be an Earth-like planet, and you've got it. And so now, that's where you might send radio signals to see if there's any intelligent life there. One problem there is that, first, Earth-like planet in the Goldilocks Zone is 600 light-years away. So you could send a signal today, and we'd get a reply 1,200 years later.
SHEIR: Oh, no.
TYSON: And what were we doing on Earth 1,200 years ago, you know? So right now, it's sort of a philosophical interest that there might be life there, but it's not much we know how to do about it if there is.
SHEIR: Neil, what do you hope will be accomplished in space science over this next year?
TYSON: Oh, one year is not - I got to think in longer timeframes than that. You're thinking like annual report question.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
TYSON: I have to think cosmically, excuse me. So in the next five, 10 years, 20 years, I think we'll be equipped to answer definitely whether life ever thrived in our backyard. I think the Mars Science Laboratory will lead that effort. By the way, and if our backyard does not have life, the galaxy is vast. And if you looked at an image of how far we have explored and how far our radio signals have reached, that's what we call a radio bubble, it's 80 light-years across, that bubble is tiny compared with the 100,000 light-year diameter of our Milky Way galaxy. So I'd be disappointed, but I'd say let's keep looking.
SHEIR: Neil, deGrasse Tyson is director of the Hayden Planetarium at the Rose Center for Earth and Space in New York City. Thanks so much, Neil, and Happy New Year.
From the Earth to the Moon, Ch 15: THE FETE OF THE CASTING
CHAPTER XV --THE FETE OF THE CASTING
During the eight months which were employed in the work of excavation the preparatory works of the casting had been carried on simultaneously with extreme rapidity. A stranger arriving at Stones Hill would have been surprised at the spectacle offered to his view.
At 600 yards from the well, and circularly arranged around it as a central point, rose 1,200 reverberating ovens, each six feet in diameter, and separated from each other by an interval of three feet. The circumference occupied by these 1,200 ovens presented a length of two miles. Being all constructed on the same plan, each with its high quadrangular chimney, they produced a most singular effect.
It will be remembered that on their third meeting the committee had decided to use cast iron for the Columbiad, and in particular the white description. This metal, in fact, is the most tenacious, the most ductile, and the most malleable, and consequently suitable for all moulding operations; and when smelted with pit coal, is of superior quality for all engineering works requiring great resisting power, such as cannon, steam boilers, hydraulic presses, and the like.
Cast iron, however, if subjected to only one single fusion, is rarely sufficiently homogeneous; and it requires a second fusion completely to refine it by dispossessing it of its last earthly deposits. So long before being forwarded to Tampa Town, the iron ore, molten in the great furnaces of Coldspring, and brought into contact with coal and silicium heated to a high temperature, was carburized and transformed into cast iron. After this first operation, the metal was sent on to Stones Hill. They had, however, to deal with 136,000,000 pounds of iron, a quantity far too costly to send by railway. The cost of transport would have been double that of material. It appeared preferable to freight vessels at New York, and to load them with the iron in bars. This, however, required not less than sixty- eight vessels of 1,000 tons, a veritable fleet, which, quitting New York on the 3rd of May, on the 10th of the same month ascended the Bay of Espiritu Santo, and discharged their cargoes, without dues, in the port at Tampa Town. Thence the iron was transported by rail to Stones Hill, and about the middle of January this enormous mass of metal was delivered at its destination.
It will easily be understood that 1,200 furnaces were not too many to melt simultaneously these 60,000 tons of iron. Each of these furnaces contained nearly 140,000 pounds weight of metal. They were all built after the model of those which served for the casting of the Rodman gun; they were trapezoidal in shape, with a high elliptical arch. These furnaces, constructed of fireproof brick, were especially adapted for burning pit coal, with a flat bottom upon which the iron bars were laid. This bottom, inclined at an angle of 25 degrees, allowed the metal to flow into the receiving troughs; and the 1,200 converging trenches carried the molten metal down to the central well.
The day following that on which the works of the masonry and boring had been completed, Barbicane set to work upon the central mould. His object now was to raise within the center of the well, and with a coincident axis, a cylinder 900 feet high, and nine feet in diameter, which should exactly fill up the space reserved for the bore of the Columbiad. This cylinder was composed of a mixture of clay and sand, with the addition of a little hay and straw. The space left between the mould and the masonry was intended to be filled up by the molten metal, which would thus form the walls six feet in thickness. This cylinder, in order to maintain its equilibrium, had to be bound by iron bands, and firmly fixed at certain intervals by cross-clamps fastened into the stone lining; after the castings these would be buried in the block of metal, leaving no external projection.
This operation was completed on the 8th of July, and the run of the metal was fixed for the following day.
"This fete of the casting will be a grand ceremony," said J.
T. Maston to his friend Barbicane.
"Undoubtedly," said Barbicane; "but it will not be a public fete"
"What! will you not open the gates of the enclosure to all comers?"
"I must be very careful, Maston. The casting of the Columbiad is an extremely delicate, not to say a dangerous operation, and I should prefer its being done privately. At the discharge of the projectile, a fete if you like— till then, no!"
The president was right. The operation involved unforeseen dangers, which a great influx of spectators would have hindered him from averting. It was necessary to preserve complete freedom of movement. No one was admitted within the enclosure except a delegation of members of the Gun Club, who had made the voyage to Tampa Town. Among these was the brisk Bilsby, Tom Hunter, Colonel Blomsberry, Major Elphinstone, General Morgan, and the rest of the lot to whom the casting of the Columbiad was a matter of personal interest. J. T. Maston became their cicerone. He omitted no point of detail; he conducted them throughout the magazines, workshops, through the midst of the engines, and compelled them to visit the whole 1,200 furnaces one after the other. At the end of the twelve-hundredth visit they were pretty well knocked up.
The casting was to take place at twelve o'clock precisely. The previous evening each furnace had been charged with 114,000 pounds weight of metal in bars disposed cross-ways to each other, so as to allow the hot air to circulate freely between them. At daybreak the 1,200 chimneys vomited their torrents of flame into the air, and the ground was agitated with dull tremblings. As many pounds of metal as there were to cast, so many pounds of coal were there to burn. Thus there were 68,000 tons of coal which projected in the face of the sun a thick curtain of smoke. The heat soon became insupportable within the circle of furnaces, the rumbling of which resembled the rolling of thunder. The powerful ventilators added their continuous blasts and saturated with oxygen the glowing plates. The operation, to be successful, required to be conducted with great rapidity. On a signal given by a cannon-shot each furnace was to give vent to the molten iron and completely to empty itself. These arrangements made, foremen and workmen waited the preconcerted moment with an impatience mingled with a certain amount of emotion. Not a soul remained within the enclosure. Each superintendent took his post by the aperture of the run.
Barbicane and his colleagues, perched on a neighboring eminence, assisted at the operation. In front of them was a piece of artillery ready to give fire on the signal from the engineer. Some minutes before midday the first driblets of metal began to flow; the reservoirs filled little by little; and, by the time that the whole melting was completely accomplished, it was kept in abeyance for a few minutes in order to facilitate the separation of foreign substances.
Twelve o'clock struck! A gunshot suddenly pealed forth and shot its flame into the air. Twelve hundred melting-troughs were simultaneously opened and twelve hundred fiery serpents crept toward the central well, unrolling their incandescent curves. There, down they plunged with a terrific noise into a depth of 900 feet. It was an exciting and a magnificent spectacle. The ground trembled, while these molten waves, launching into the sky their wreaths of smoke, evaporated the moisture of the mould and hurled it upward through the vent-holes of the stone lining in the form of dense vapor-clouds. These artificial clouds unrolled their thick spirals to a height of 1,000 yards into the air. A savage, wandering somewhere beyond the limits of the horizon, might have believed that some new crater was forming in the bosom of Florida, although there was neither any eruption, nor typhoon, nor storm, nor struggle of the elements, nor any of those terrible phenomena which nature is capable of producing. No, it was man alone who had produced these reddish vapors, these gigantic flames worthy of a volcano itself, these tremendous vibrations resembling the shock of an earthquake, these reverberations rivaling those of hurricanes and storms; and it was his hand which precipitated into an abyss, dug by himself, a whole Niagara of molten metal!
During the eight months which were employed in the work of excavation the preparatory works of the casting had been carried on simultaneously with extreme rapidity. A stranger arriving at Stones Hill would have been surprised at the spectacle offered to his view.
At 600 yards from the well, and circularly arranged around it as a central point, rose 1,200 reverberating ovens, each six feet in diameter, and separated from each other by an interval of three feet. The circumference occupied by these 1,200 ovens presented a length of two miles. Being all constructed on the same plan, each with its high quadrangular chimney, they produced a most singular effect.
It will be remembered that on their third meeting the committee had decided to use cast iron for the Columbiad, and in particular the white description. This metal, in fact, is the most tenacious, the most ductile, and the most malleable, and consequently suitable for all moulding operations; and when smelted with pit coal, is of superior quality for all engineering works requiring great resisting power, such as cannon, steam boilers, hydraulic presses, and the like.
Cast iron, however, if subjected to only one single fusion, is rarely sufficiently homogeneous; and it requires a second fusion completely to refine it by dispossessing it of its last earthly deposits. So long before being forwarded to Tampa Town, the iron ore, molten in the great furnaces of Coldspring, and brought into contact with coal and silicium heated to a high temperature, was carburized and transformed into cast iron. After this first operation, the metal was sent on to Stones Hill. They had, however, to deal with 136,000,000 pounds of iron, a quantity far too costly to send by railway. The cost of transport would have been double that of material. It appeared preferable to freight vessels at New York, and to load them with the iron in bars. This, however, required not less than sixty- eight vessels of 1,000 tons, a veritable fleet, which, quitting New York on the 3rd of May, on the 10th of the same month ascended the Bay of Espiritu Santo, and discharged their cargoes, without dues, in the port at Tampa Town. Thence the iron was transported by rail to Stones Hill, and about the middle of January this enormous mass of metal was delivered at its destination.
It will easily be understood that 1,200 furnaces were not too many to melt simultaneously these 60,000 tons of iron. Each of these furnaces contained nearly 140,000 pounds weight of metal. They were all built after the model of those which served for the casting of the Rodman gun; they were trapezoidal in shape, with a high elliptical arch. These furnaces, constructed of fireproof brick, were especially adapted for burning pit coal, with a flat bottom upon which the iron bars were laid. This bottom, inclined at an angle of 25 degrees, allowed the metal to flow into the receiving troughs; and the 1,200 converging trenches carried the molten metal down to the central well.
The day following that on which the works of the masonry and boring had been completed, Barbicane set to work upon the central mould. His object now was to raise within the center of the well, and with a coincident axis, a cylinder 900 feet high, and nine feet in diameter, which should exactly fill up the space reserved for the bore of the Columbiad. This cylinder was composed of a mixture of clay and sand, with the addition of a little hay and straw. The space left between the mould and the masonry was intended to be filled up by the molten metal, which would thus form the walls six feet in thickness. This cylinder, in order to maintain its equilibrium, had to be bound by iron bands, and firmly fixed at certain intervals by cross-clamps fastened into the stone lining; after the castings these would be buried in the block of metal, leaving no external projection.
This operation was completed on the 8th of July, and the run of the metal was fixed for the following day.
"This fete of the casting will be a grand ceremony," said J.
T. Maston to his friend Barbicane.
"Undoubtedly," said Barbicane; "but it will not be a public fete"
"What! will you not open the gates of the enclosure to all comers?"
"I must be very careful, Maston. The casting of the Columbiad is an extremely delicate, not to say a dangerous operation, and I should prefer its being done privately. At the discharge of the projectile, a fete if you like— till then, no!"
The president was right. The operation involved unforeseen dangers, which a great influx of spectators would have hindered him from averting. It was necessary to preserve complete freedom of movement. No one was admitted within the enclosure except a delegation of members of the Gun Club, who had made the voyage to Tampa Town. Among these was the brisk Bilsby, Tom Hunter, Colonel Blomsberry, Major Elphinstone, General Morgan, and the rest of the lot to whom the casting of the Columbiad was a matter of personal interest. J. T. Maston became their cicerone. He omitted no point of detail; he conducted them throughout the magazines, workshops, through the midst of the engines, and compelled them to visit the whole 1,200 furnaces one after the other. At the end of the twelve-hundredth visit they were pretty well knocked up.
The casting was to take place at twelve o'clock precisely. The previous evening each furnace had been charged with 114,000 pounds weight of metal in bars disposed cross-ways to each other, so as to allow the hot air to circulate freely between them. At daybreak the 1,200 chimneys vomited their torrents of flame into the air, and the ground was agitated with dull tremblings. As many pounds of metal as there were to cast, so many pounds of coal were there to burn. Thus there were 68,000 tons of coal which projected in the face of the sun a thick curtain of smoke. The heat soon became insupportable within the circle of furnaces, the rumbling of which resembled the rolling of thunder. The powerful ventilators added their continuous blasts and saturated with oxygen the glowing plates. The operation, to be successful, required to be conducted with great rapidity. On a signal given by a cannon-shot each furnace was to give vent to the molten iron and completely to empty itself. These arrangements made, foremen and workmen waited the preconcerted moment with an impatience mingled with a certain amount of emotion. Not a soul remained within the enclosure. Each superintendent took his post by the aperture of the run.
Barbicane and his colleagues, perched on a neighboring eminence, assisted at the operation. In front of them was a piece of artillery ready to give fire on the signal from the engineer. Some minutes before midday the first driblets of metal began to flow; the reservoirs filled little by little; and, by the time that the whole melting was completely accomplished, it was kept in abeyance for a few minutes in order to facilitate the separation of foreign substances.
Twelve o'clock struck! A gunshot suddenly pealed forth and shot its flame into the air. Twelve hundred melting-troughs were simultaneously opened and twelve hundred fiery serpents crept toward the central well, unrolling their incandescent curves. There, down they plunged with a terrific noise into a depth of 900 feet. It was an exciting and a magnificent spectacle. The ground trembled, while these molten waves, launching into the sky their wreaths of smoke, evaporated the moisture of the mould and hurled it upward through the vent-holes of the stone lining in the form of dense vapor-clouds. These artificial clouds unrolled their thick spirals to a height of 1,000 yards into the air. A savage, wandering somewhere beyond the limits of the horizon, might have believed that some new crater was forming in the bosom of Florida, although there was neither any eruption, nor typhoon, nor storm, nor struggle of the elements, nor any of those terrible phenomena which nature is capable of producing. No, it was man alone who had produced these reddish vapors, these gigantic flames worthy of a volcano itself, these tremendous vibrations resembling the shock of an earthquake, these reverberations rivaling those of hurricanes and storms; and it was his hand which precipitated into an abyss, dug by himself, a whole Niagara of molten metal!
Sunday, January 1, 2012
China ramps up space exploration as U.S. program shrinks
From SmartPlanet: China ramps up space exploration as U.S. program shrinks
On Thursday, China unveiled a five-year plan for its space exploration program that includes putting laboratories in space, building space stations and collecting samples from the moon.
As for that last goal, they’ll start collecting samples with probes, but, as previously announced, they eventually want to put a person on the moon — though that will not happen in the next five years.
China’s bid to become a global player in the space race comes just as the U.S. program is being scaled back in scope and funding.
However, so far, China’s accomplishments in space put it where the U.S. was in the 1960s. Its major breakthroughs include becoming the third country after Russia and the U.S. to send a human into space and completing a spacewalk.
Still, the plan signals that the country, which has consistently stuck to its space program development timeline, will continue on a slow and steady course to accomplish its aims.
“I think it is a comprehensive, moderately paced program,” John M. Logsdon, former director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University, told the New York Times. “It’s not a crash program.”
The Times article continues:
By contrast, NASA’s direction tends to shift with every change of presidency. President George W. Bush called on NASA to return to the moon by 2020. President Obama canceled that program and now wants the agency to send astronauts to an asteroid. NASA shut down its 30-year space shuttle program after a final flight in July.
Details of China’s five-year space plan
China’s space program is run by its military, and so some of its plans have both civilian and military uses.
Global positioning system
Among the many goals released in the government white paper is an ambitious plan to further develop its global positioning system, called the Beidou Navigation Satellite System, which began this week to log data on navigation, positioning and timing in China and the surrounding region.
The country’s goal by 2020 is to have 35 satellites in orbit that collect data from around the world. Such a system would be comparable to an existing Russia system and close, though not as advanced as the U.S. system. While it would help the Chinese military, it would also be used for civilian purposes such as helping drivers navigate.
Sending more spacecraft into orbit and more people into spaceflight
The country also laid plans to achieve two larger goals: developing new launch vehicles that could send heavier spacecraft into orbit, and advancing conditions for human spaceflight.
To those ends, they plan to launch space laboratories, manned spaceships and space freighters. Additionally, they will work on space station technologies used in medium-term stay of astronauts, regenerative life support and propellant refueling.
Deep-space exploration and upgrades of satellites
China fleshed out its lunar exploration goals, with a plan to launch orbiters that would make soft lunar landings, do roving and surveying, and collect moon samples. Meanwhile, the country will also develop technology to monitor space debris and study black holes.
Lastly, China plans to further work on small satellites that can monitor the environment and forecast disasters.
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