SpaceX is on the warpath

The horror!

First they send a cargo capsule to the ISS and return it back to Earth. And now these upstarts are poised to do it again!

If someone doesn't stop them, commercial space travel will actually kill government space programs.

How can you kill something that is already dead?

Please no "AMC's Walking Bad" references.

Quote: P90

How can you kill something that is already dead?

Wooden stakes, silver bullets, sunlight.

Quote: Nareed

The horror!

First they send a cargo capsule to the ISS and return it back to Earth. And now these upstarts are poised to do it again!

If someone doesn't stop them, commercial space travel will actually kill government space programs.

What percentage of the payload (by cost) is going to state run space programs and what percentage is commercial?

Quote: thecesspit

What percentage of the payload (by cost) is going to state run space programs and what percentage is commercial?

No clue.

But since the Shuttle joined the other dinosaurs at the museums, all supply flights have been either in Sov- I mean, "Russian" craft, two SpaceX Dragon capsules and at least one Japanese and one European capsule.

Off all these, I think SpaceX's are the only ones that can re-enter and splash down intact.

Quote: Nareed

If someone doesn't stop them, commercial space travel will actually kill government space programs.

I think some of the ultra-secret military programs, the really risky manned programs, and the pure science experiments will stay with the government. All of these points are debatable, but I don't think they can be transferred entirely to commercial sector.

The return of a man to the surface of the moon will probably be done by a government. It is debatable if a tourist flight will circle the moon in 20 years. Virgin has established that people will readily pay $200K to go past the 100km threshold, even if only for a few minutes.

Dennis Tito ,creator of the Wilshire aggregate market index, shelled out $20 million for the privilege of becoming the first space tourist, spending nearly eight days in space. Of the 7 current space tourists, the price has only gone up. Guy Laliberté paid $40 million in 2009.

The assumption is that people will initially pay $3m-$5m to circle the earth a few times in a trip that will probably be less than 48 hours.

I don't think the technical challenges of circling the moon are orders of magnitude harder than circling the earth. There are some ultra tourists that I am sure will pay $100 million to be part of that project. In many ways it is more exciting than owning a yacht.

Quote: pacomartin

I think some of the ultra-secret military programs, the really risky manned programs, and the pure science experiments will stay with the government.

Oy vey!

The military stuff, yes. Everything else, no.

Quote:

The return of a man to the surface of the moon will probably be done by a government.

LOL! (man, that is really annoying, isn't it?) The same government that ordered the tools to build Apollo destroyed? Really? The same government that cut the Apollo program short? Seriously?

To quote Larry Niven: We can put a man on the Moon, but we can't put a man on the Moon.

Quote:

It is debatable if a tourist flight will circle the moon in 20 years.

And it's ridiculous to suggest private space travel will be solely and exclusively devoted to tourism. Were it not for the interest it generates, the whole Virgin Galactic thing would be nothing but a distracting side-show. Really, you fail to grasp who the people who run SpaceX, T-Space, Bigelow Aerospace and others are: space travel enthusiasts.

Elon Musk, for instance, set out to colonize Mars, not to build a launch company. But he found out he needed to start by lowering the cost of launchings first. Ergo SpaceX.

Give it time and you'll see.

Assuming control-happy governments don't kill the private space industry, that is.

The problem here is that there isn't really a lot of people who are that into space, and not a lot of people with that kind of money. It's not just money, it's also the risk and the need to spend months just preparing for it. Dennis Tito is an aerospace engineer himself, he was into it, he knew what he was getting into, it wasn't just a rich man's fancy.

So "tourism" income is not a viable means of funding space programs.

Quote: P90

So "tourism" income is not a viable means of funding space programs.

Exactly.

To be more precise, space tourism won't be very attractive until 1) it's a whole lot more affordable and 2) there is somewhere to go and something to do when you get there. The number of people who would pay just to go into orbit for a short time to work on the ISS, for example, is very small, even if the trip were worth considerably less than it is now.

Back in the dawn of the Shuttle era, when it still seemed like a good idea, there was much hype about setting up manufacturing in space, without much detail on why and what for. As far as I know, there aren't many known advantages to making stuff in weightless conditions. Other than that, the only "advantage" to manufacturing in space is the limitless amounts of very hard vacuum easily available; and, really, that isn't saying much.

But then when you have lavish and limited launch systems, like the Shuttle or the Soyuz, even elementary experimentation is prohibitively costly. Not to mention that actual manufacturing would be hellishly expensive, and any products made would sell for outlandishly expensive prices.

But once the prize to orbit a kilo of mass goes down, that being SpaceX's short-term goal, things change.

There's also the matter of resources. While we're not even near to running out of anything vital, it may be possible to exploit mineral deposits in places like the Moon or the asteroids. The Moon in particular would be great, because launching things into space from its surface could be done very cheaply using an electromagnetic launcher.

Oh, well. There's a lot more.

Quote: Nareed

To be more precise, space tourism won't be very attractive until 1) it's a whole lot more affordable and 2) there is somewhere to go and something to do when you get there. The number of people who would pay just to go into orbit for a short time to work on the ISS, for example, is very small, even if the trip were worth considerably less than it is now.

About as close I'll get. And far cheaper.

Dragon successfully splashed down at 12:22 Pacific time.

BTW while NASA has hired SpaceX only to ferry cargo to an from the ISS, the Dragon is designed to carry people into orbit and back to Earth.

Not that anyone cares, but SpaceX sent yet another Dragon capsule to the ISS

Also grasshopper is leaping to new heights. Who needs a space elevator.