Asteroid Retrieval Is Not The Prime Intent of NASA's Asteroid Retrieval Mission
Redirecting Asteroid Not Top Objective of Asteroid Redirect Mission, NASA Official Says, Space News
“After a presentation in Phoenix to the NASA-chartered Small Bodies Assessment Group (SBAG), Lindley Johnson, head of the agency’s Near Earth Object Observations Program, said redirecting an asteroid to a distant retrograde orbit around the Moon is “not the top objective of the [ARM] mission,” which was trotted out in spring 2013 as a means to road test technology needed for a crewed Mars expedition and provide — in the form of the titular asteroid — a near-term destination for the Space Launch System rocket and Orion crew capsule NASA is building.”
Bolden’s Confusing Asteroid Mission Rationale (Revised), earlier post
“And this is subtle. I have this discussion with my science friends all the time and those who are purist. The president said by 2025 we should send humans to an asteroid. What he meant was, you should send humans to somewhere between Mars and Saturn, because that’s where the dominant asteroids in the asteroid belt are. But no, he didn’t say that. He said: humans to an asteroid.”
|
|
– NASA: Two SLS Launches Likely Needed For $3 billion+ ARM, earlier post
– Asteroid Redirect Mission Critique
– Congress, NAC, SBAG, Question Asteroid Mission, earlier post
– Report of the Small Bodies Assessment Group Asteroid Redirect Mission Special Action Team, 30 July 2014 (Draft), earlier post
– SBAG Asteroid Redirect Mission Special Action Team, July 2014 presentation, earlier post
– Asteroid Experts Are Not Very Fond of NASA’s Asteroid Mission, earlier post
I don’t get that second Bolden quote at all, even after clicking through. Is he suggesting that we send humans to an asteroid in the Main Belt?
he’s saying that that’s what the president meant when he said we should send humans to an asteroid.
Bolden is saying that the purists claim that the president meant we should go to a Main Belt asteroid, but that it is not what the president said. It’s perfectly true the ARM had not been proposed in its present form when the president proposed going to an asteroid, but IIRC the president meant a near-earth object, not a Main Belt asteroid. The original proposal for asteroid return described returning it to the ISS and did not involve Orion or SLS/.
But Bolden said “between Mars and Saturn”? Isn’t there something in that space? Like Jupiter? Aren’t the main belt asteroids inside the orbit of Jupiter?
If they just want to practice with the Orion, like Apollo 9, they could do it without an asteroid.
i can see how you read the quote like that.
it’s a bit unclear.
Maybe ring up mr. President and just go “hey, dude, did you mean like asteroid asteroid or some other rock ? because we have been spending billions here trying to figure it all out, if you could clarify it would remove a ton of confusion, cheers”
Congress demanded that SLS and Orion be built. Then they demanded that NASA assign them a mission. So NASA had to come up with a mission that required Orion (which had life support for only 4 weeks) but did not land anywhere, as Congress provided no money for landers. ARM does not make sense. But neither does anything else we can do with SLS/Orion within our available resources.
[snip] … ARM does not make sense. But neither does anything else we can do with SLS/Orion … [/snip]
There, fixed that for you.
Just select Phobos/Deimos as the target and get everyone happy and finally have a sensible decision. And as a precursor mission, “2021 trajectory” flyby Venus-Mars. There you go. Something great and inspirational down for the history books. And something useful for future manned exploration. Also after this year, I believe Ceres will be the new kid in town for top priority targets for the future…
Both Phobos and Deimos are tad heavy do drag back to DRO around the moon. You realize that the manned part of ARM wont be able to go anywhere further than a few weeks at best beyond low earth orbit ?
Whatta…?
You don’t have to drag Phobos or Deimos anywhere…!
They are already… 1. on a regular orbit & 2. around a planet.
Got it?
My point is that they should focus their efforts on flying some BA330+Dragon2+? -craft to Mars orbit (repeatedly) instead of doing some one-off asteroid capture (right… capture a 2 meter “asteroid” chunk or so) which won’t take us any closer to Moon or Mars or “beyond”.
(niin, perkele)
regular orbit, wrong planet. Cant get there from here, not with anything in the cards, perkele
But, by the time NASA is planning to fly (which is far from real life execution of course) to capture an asteroid in the mid 2020’s, we WILL have a full house of cards (a.k.a. options) to choose from to perform a decent manned expedition to Mars orbit.
I have full confidence in SpaceX and Bigelow for example, simply because they have delivered. No powerpoint but bent metal and launched hardware.
A wide selection of capable launchers and upper stages are already there. So, plenty of options to do the job (just choose mission architecture to also use them).
No new craft types (than already coming up in the pipeline) are needed to have an expedition on Mars orbit and/or the vicinity of its moons (unless you must want to dock with either of the moons, which does not need anything exotic except minor modifications to the capsules, or landing legs to a detachable BA330 with some RCS for example?)
Only obstacle is will. If there is will, money is there. And if money is there, the means are already there.
Priorities, priorities…
Do we want the 2020’s to be remembered mostly because of… A. a useless oil war somewhere around the world…? B. a useless huge bank/financial bailout package…? C. a first human expedition in the inner solar system and starting a new era in the human history…?
(not to dis you smokedreindeer, just feeling that you are too cynical and/or NASA-centric in your opinion, Nasa could buy things/crafts instead just playing the good old “not-invented-here” game in this context)
ARM has two versions , Plan A is a NEO retrieval mission, plan B is a boulder retrieval mission also from a NEO
The president’s plan was a human crew to a NEO not to the asteroid belt !
NEXTstep argues that with the EUS you could use SLS to loft dual manifested payloads , if so and if EUS is ready then I advocate this mission
http://yellowdragonblog.com…
The decadal survey through SBAG and the national academies would state that ARM would be better used to a small object not yet visited by science and that would be the moons of Mars or perhaps an iron/nickel asteroid
what everyone wants is the SEP tug that ARM really is,I wonder is several SEP tugs could move the ISS to GEO along with a Skylab -II
Skylab II at L-1 and at Deimos could be a way to merge the ISS and SLS budgets
http://yellowdragonblog.com…
“… move the ISS to GEO …”
GEO is not on the way to the Moon, Mars or Lagrange Points. A different design of spacestation would be appropriate for GEO, EML-1 and EML-2.
We where looking for a political and engineering method to merge ISS and SLS funding in mid decade(2025)
ISS would be de-crewed for the transit(van allen belts)
we would salvage ISS trusses and whatever could survive the transit
ISS modules buried with Lunar regolith could be some future use
EUS and Skylab-II along with a ARM derived SEP could be the
We want to keep intact part of the ISS international partnership
ISS/Skylab-II to a supersynchronous/Lunar crossing orbit gets us to L-1
Skylab-II with just the ISS truss structure might make for a great fuel depot space station( deorbit most of the modules?)
I have bloged recently that Skylab-II and the other ideas should continue with commercial crew and cargo………………very important
Treat this is buying a 17 year old second hand car. Do you use it to get to work every day or put it in a museum?
The Russians are building a new module for the ISS. Try putting that on the end of a Bigelow BA330-DS. Producing a brand new International Space Station at GEO. Possibly for less money.
My 17 year old car did not cost me $10,000 to orbit
the ISS and all other orbital assets should be seen as ISRU opportunities and a ARM derived SEP tug could collect large and small objects,DARPA thinks recycling of on orbit assets(Junk) makes since
The alarm on the ISS shows its parts are wearing out.
A uncrewed Orion on a Venus/Mars trajectory would be a fantastic test of avionics durability,perhaps the ARM could give a push since even with EUS the ARM and Orion might be overweight?(Venus flyby solves for this?)we get back a well flown orion and a boulder off of Deimos