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The Eagle Landed

Thirty-six years ago today, John F. Kennedy's goal of sending a man to the moon, and returning him safely to the earth within the decade, achieved a key milestone, as Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin gently set their lunar excursion module (named "Eagle") on to the rocky, and dusty, surface of the moon. They had yet to "return safely to the earth," but they would, a few days later.

Unfortunately, while many at the time believed that this was just the beginning of many such explorations, ones that would establish bases on the moon, and send humans beyond, to Mars and perhaps other places (the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey had been released the year before, featuring a rotating space station in low earth orbit, a Pan Am space transport to reach it, a lunar base, and manned mission to Jupiter all occurring in that seemingly distant year), the program was already ending. The goal had never really been to open up space, so much as to win a race against the Soviets, to demonstrate our technological superiority, as a proxy battle in the Cold War between democracy and totalitarianism (sadly, it wasn't viewed as a war between capitalism and socialism, else we might have taken a more promising approach). But with the knowledge that we were winning that race, and the budget pressures of Johnson's Great Society and the Vietnam war, the decision had been made years before to end procurement of long lead items necessary to advance much beyond a few trips to the lunar surface.

Only six missions would actually be successfully performed (Apollo XIII didn't get to the moon), with the last one just three-and-a-half years later, in December of 1972. Some of the leftover hardware would go toward the Skylab program in 1974, and the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, whose thirtieth anniversary occurred just a few days ago. After that, there were no flights into space by Americans until 1981, when the first Shuttle flight occurred--a six-year hiatus.

It's become common wisdom now that the Shuttle was a mistake, and indeed it was, but not for the reasons that many think. And unfortunately, so was Saturn, in that it didn't provide an affordable or sustainable means of opening up space. But we're misreading the lessons of that past, because we view Apollo as successful, and the reason for that success as Saturn, so many today want to turn their back on the Shuttle, and return to what they view as a proven method--putting capsules up on large expendable launch vehicles.

While it is past time to retire the Shuttle, it's a profound logical error to attempt to extrapolate to a general class (reusable space transports) from a single flawed example, and somehow conclude that they are intrinsically a bad idea. Shuttle was a good idea in concept (a reusable vehicle, flown often), but it failed in execution, because we weren't willing to spend the money in its development that would have been necessary in order to make it fully reusable, or operable.

And while it did achieve Kennedy's (narrow) goal, in terms of opening up space Apollo was in fact a failure, and replicating its approach with modern hardware is likely to be as well, because throwing away launch vehicles is an intrinsically bad way to perform large-scale space activities, and to become a spacefaring nation, and no number of design concepts will get around that fact. Until we learn the true lessons of history, our government space program will continue to disappoint those of us who desire great things from it, and who want to go ourselves.

Fortunately, though, unlike the 1960s, we can now see a means by which we can do so without having to hope for bureaucrats to make the right decisions as to how to spend taxpayer money. Before too many more Apollo XI anniversaries roll by, I suspect that there will be many non-NASA personnel on the moon, visiting it with their own money, for their own purposes. And they won't be getting there in little capsules on large vehicles, that are thrown away after a single use.

But for all that, it was still a monumental achievement, and one of the greatest events in the history of the universe. Go celebrate it properly tonight.

Posted by Rand Simberg at July 20, 2005 06:36 AM

Comments

Skylab was '73.
Shuttle was a good idea in concept (a reusable vehicle, flown often), but it failed in execution, because we weren't willing to spend the money necessary in order to make it fully reusable, or operable.
Was the shuttle's major flaw the ET, or the overly ambitious payload up/payload down perfomance target, which forced the incredible but fragile SSME and TPS on the system?

A smaller payload would have driven up flight rates, which would have been a Good Thing, no?

Posted by Ducan Young at July 20, 2005 08:57 AM

In my view, the single biggest shuttle flaw was the requirement for it to have a large capacity to shift its landing zone during descent, a requirement imposed by the military. That led to huge heavy wings (as opposed to a more efficient lifting body, which had a cascading effect throughout the vehicle.

The cargo-down requirement didn't help either.

Posted by George at July 20, 2005 09:28 AM

Hear hear, Rand.

Posted by Daniel Schmelzer at July 20, 2005 09:30 AM

I don't think that one can say that the Shuttle had a single major flaw. It had several.

Posted by Rand Simberg at July 20, 2005 09:32 AM

Several problems, and most of them mentioned already. Too much cargo up, too much cargo down, too much crosstrack capability. NASA tried to buy a tractor-trailer, then use it as the family car. What they needed was something more along the lines of a spacegoing long-cab pickup truck.

Posted by Mike McDaniel at July 20, 2005 09:45 AM

Too much cargo up, too much cargo down, too much crosstrack capability.

Actually, that wasn't NASA's fault, or choice. It was driven by Air Force requirements (even though they didn't have to contribute anything to the development costs). It was a horrible policy decision for the nation, but hindsight is always twenty twenty.

Posted by Rand Simberg at July 20, 2005 09:49 AM

Actually, if one had to choose a biggest flaw, it was the requirement that a single vehicle address all of the country's launch needs.

Posted by Mark R. Whittington at July 20, 2005 09:52 AM

Last night while her mother was putting her to bed, my three year old daughter asked, "Why don't people go the the moon any more?"

Tragic.

Posted by Andrew Ward at July 20, 2005 09:58 AM

Just for fun

http://moon.google.com

Posted by Brock at July 20, 2005 10:03 AM

Flaws in Shuttle concept:

(1) Making the Shuttle system partially reusable instead of fully reuseable. Recall that many knowledgeable people at the time, including Von Braun, wanted the Shuttle system to have fully reusable components.

Basically, the Shuttle system we have is too compromised and unambitious. Thus was so even when the Shuttle was new, back in 1981.

(2) Settling on the Shuttle as NASA's only significant launch system, instead of having more than one so-called man-rated launch system. This would have meant keeping the Saturn/Apollo launch system alive as well as the Shuttle.

Lesson for the present and future: America needs to have more than one human-carrying space vehicle, instead of a single, man-rated space vehicle that will try to do it all. To again put all man-rated launch eggs in one basket would be to repeat a big part of the Shuttle mistake.

(2.a) America needs a cargo launcher as least as big as the Shuttle. This heavy cargo lifter need not carry people. America also needs a smaller launch system which can carry people and also be launched on rather short notice.

In addition, it may be logical to have one or more man-rated launch systems to take people to low orbit and an Apollo-like vehicle for lunar expeditions. The neo-Apollo capsule may be launched unmanned. Astronauts may rendezvous with the capsule in orbit to journey on to the Moon.

Fully reusable winged systems are better for quick trips up and down from LEO. Return fron lunar orbit has more onerous heat shielding requirements. A capsule may be better for returns from the Moon.

Diversity is good, don't we all agree, on space as well as on earth. The USA needs a diversity of spacecraft!

(3) Another big flaw in the Shuttle concept of use is that the Shuttle has been wedded to the International Space Station. There has be a divorce between the two. Supporting the ISS should NOT be the primary reason for existence of future American launch systems

//////////////////////////

"... or the overly ambitious payload up/payload down perfomance target, which forced the incredible but fragile SSME and TPS on the system?"

The Shuttles would have had more or less the same engines and thermal protection system even if the return payload requirement had been relaxed.

As for lack of funding: yes, in an alternate Universe, NASA might have found the dollars and the will and the skill to morph the Space Transportation System into a fully reuseable system with flyback liquid fueled boosters instead of solid rockets and the metallic shingle thermal protection system intended for the cancelled X-33.

In another alternative part of the Multiverse, NASA might be just about to deploy a fully reusable two-stage variant of the X-33 to relieve the Shuttle system.

Unfortunately, we don't live in either of those parallel Universes. We have post-Apollo NASA. That's our world.

Posted by David Davenport at July 20, 2005 10:30 AM

Zoom in all the way to find out what the moon is made of.

Posted by Kalle (kafir forever) at July 20, 2005 10:31 AM

The real failure in the shuttle was in the wasting of that main tank. They should have just left them attached a little longer, flung them into orbit, opened the valves to let remaining fuel boil off into space and then used them as building material.

If they'd have done that we'd have huge tracts of space station real estate up there and the cores of all kinds of intrastellar spacecraft.

But - they should have stayed with that big, disposable Saturn - capable of manned and unmanned flight - and let the economies of scale go to work on that thing. Saturn V-A, B, C...Q would have been reliable and cheap and provided the same type of building material as the Shuttle Main tank - after all, that's essentially what Skylab was and I beleive the initial plans for Skylab were to actually refit a Saturn 2nd or 3rd stage in orbit rather than on the ground.

Posted by Keith Feinstein at July 20, 2005 10:49 AM

Several design trades have been made to build space stations out of ET's. Out here at Michoud we have designs for just about everything to be buildt out of ET's.

Posted by Mike Holt at July 20, 2005 11:30 AM

Several design trades have been made to build space stations out of ET's. Out here at Michoud we have designs for just about everything to be buildt out of ET's.

Posted by Mike Holt at July 20, 2005 11:30 AM

Multiple launch vehicles? Think really big. If the issue is getting equipment into orbit, why not take a page from Arthur C. Clarke and build a space elevator?

Time to think outside the launch vehicle box.

Posted by Chuck at July 20, 2005 11:39 AM

When they dragged out the Old Timers for the CAIB hearings, you got the definite impression that NASA was not dragged kicking and screaming to the idea of making shuttle a Titan III emulator, and that the Air Force requirement was as much a convenient coincience as anything else.

Posted by Duncan Young at July 20, 2005 11:53 AM

The Shuttle was such a major part of NASA that they wouldn't develop vehicles that competed in any niche it served. If not for the Challenger disaster we wouldn't even have our current stable of expendables.

The goal of building a universal re-usable space launcher is in profound conflict with the philosophy of continued engineering revolutions and incremmental improvements aimed at obsoleting your current technological artifacts.

Sometimes an engineer's greatest attribute is the ability to behold that which he hath wrought, reflect on it, and say, "It sucks in so many ways, and I can see how to beat it."

One thing that made the pre-Shuttle program so successful was that nobody thought they were designing and end-state transportation system, and remained fully aware that the current vehicle would be tossed aside for a better one down the road. Each vehicle's design was focused instead of burdened with accomodating the set of all possible tasks a space vehicle could conceivable do, sometime in the distant future.

If you really need an orbital pick-up truck 10% of the time, think of something that can deliver tools, four dudes and some food, not a $500 million cargo-bay retrofit to a two-story brick house.

Posted by George Turner at July 20, 2005 12:37 PM

Unfortunately, while many at the time believed that this was just the beginning of many such explorations, ones that would establish bases on the moon.........the program was already ending.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unfortunate, indeed. The future is not what it used to be. sigh!

Posted by Michael Savoy at July 20, 2005 12:43 PM

When you go to http://moon.google.com make sure you zoom in on to the closest setting for a bit of a larf

Posted by GW Crawford at July 20, 2005 01:01 PM

[ If you really need an orbital pick-up truck 10% of the time, think of something that can deliver tools, four dudes and some food ... ]

Don't forget the PortaPotty!

Posted by David Davenport at July 20, 2005 01:01 PM

> Multiple launch vehicles? Think really big. If the issue is getting equipment
> into orbit, why not take a page from Arthur C. Clarke and build a space elevator?

Why not take a page from Scotty and build a transporter?

Or a Stargate. If you want science fiction...

Posted by at July 20, 2005 08:48 PM

>Why not take a page from Scotty and build a >transporter?
>
>Or a Stargate. If you want science fiction...

Because a space elevator doesn't violate known laws of physics, unlike your examples. The thought of actually building one gives the materials folks the screaming heebie-jeebies (To say nothing about figuring out how to keep it safe from all the crud in LEO...), but the physics behind the concept is quite sound.

Posted by Cybrludite at July 21, 2005 05:03 AM

>The thought of actually building one gives the materials folks the screaming heebie-jeebies

Yep... I've been interviewing them for many months, and if it can be done at all it's going to be harder and take longer than many space elevator enthusiasts think. OTOH, the DuPonts and BASFs and Mitsubishis of the world should cover the R&D, because there are big civilian markets on earth for ultra-strong fibers long before you get to the strength needed for a space elevator. Contrast with big rocket engines, which needed 25 years of military budgets from Peenemunde to the R-7 and Atlas. If we hadn't wanted to blow things up fast from far away, would we have reached orbit even today?

I had a long talk with Freeman Dyson recently. As he's always said of Orion, once you grant the premise of nuclear pulse propulsion, "the rest is good old mechanical engineering." That's what's attractive about space elevators: IF the cable/ribbon material proves possible, most of the other challenges are in engineering regimes less X-treme than rocketry.

So I counsel patience for the doubters: it's not as if SE work is a big money pit taking resources away from rockets. And what's wrong with a back-burner alternative, just in case the Cheap Reliable High-Flight-Rate rocket system keeps retreating like fusion power...?

Posted by Geezer at July 21, 2005 05:25 AM

...what's wrong with a back-burner alternative, just in case the Cheap Reliable High-Flight-Rate rocket system keeps retreating like fusion power...?

While there's nothing wrong with that at all, this seems like a strange comparison. Fusion power is a physics problem, that has received billions in funding over the years. Cheap reliable high-flight-rate rockets are fundamentally a market and investment problem. Had as much money as has been invested in them as fusion has gotten, we'd likely have them now.

Posted by Rand Simberg at July 21, 2005 05:37 AM

Randy Simberg wrote:
>While there's nothing wrong with that at all,
>this seems like a strange comparison. Fusion
>power is a physics problem, that has received
>billions in funding over the years.

And the materials for making an SE are a 'market' problem also. The materials are being developed for markets OTHER than the SE. Carbon nanotubes of sufficent strength and length are being developed, along with CNTs for dozens of other reasons. Last I'd checked the outlook was less than a decade for sufficent CNT strength/lenght methods.
Just about everything 'else' for a working SE is very-near-term or off-the-shelf stuff.

Now, having shown my support for SEs, I have ALSO been arguing the "cheap-and-easy" rockets can be done with what we already know, debate on the SE blogs/boards/lists.

Randy

Posted by RandyCampbell at July 21, 2005 12:46 PM

"Fusion power is a physics problem... Cheap reliable high-flight-rate rockets are fundamentally a market and investment problem."

That distinction does not necessarily imply that we know how to make the latter happen sooner than the former.

Posted by Geezer at July 22, 2005 06:34 AM

That distinction does not necessarily imply that we know how to make the latter happen sooner than the former.

Well, if it doesn't imply that to you (or at least, you choose not to infer it), I'll state it forthrightly. We do.

Posted by Rand Simberg at July 22, 2005 06:36 AM


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