henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (07/23/90)
South Korea's Institute of Space Science and Astronomy announces plans for a Korean-built-sounding-rocket launch next year and a Korean launch of a small satellite in 1996. Negotiators at the Bush/Gorbachev summit discuss possibilities for space cooperation including a Soviet cosmonaut on a shuttle mission and a US astronaut visiting Mir. One complication is that neither side wants to do it purely as a public-relations stunt [that's novel!], so it will not happen unless worthwhile science can be done that way. Hydrogen leak halts Columbia/Astro-1 countdown at T-6h, schedule slip likely. [As usual, I'm not going to spend bytes on detailed coverage of already-obsolete news that has been reported well by others.] First space-accident jury trial in history absolves Thiokol from most damages being sought by insurance companies hit by the Palapa/Westar boost-motor failures in 1984. The jury found no liability for damages because of detailed prelaunch testing that found no problems in a design used 18 times before without trouble. However, the jury did find that the failures breached the warranty and Thiokol is thus liable for small failure-under-warranty payments to the insurance companies. First commercial Atlas suffers slight damage in a pad accident, as a high-pressure helium line fails and slightly damages the interstage structure. On-pad repairs are probably possible but the schedule is going to slip a bit. Arianespace gets the job of launching Helios, the first non-superpower spy satellite, in 1993. Helios is based on the Spot 4 bus. It's being built by Matra for France, Italy, and Spain. Mir's Kristall add-on industrial module is finally launched. Alexei Leonov comments that leaving Mir unmanned for budget reasons is not a good idea, because considerable effort is required to prepare it for unmanned operation and there are failures that could disable it if no maintenance were available. MIT Lincoln Lab shows off the first space-qualified laser-communications transmitter, intended for a USAF intersatellite-link experiment aimed at 220 megabits/s communication at a 40000km range with 30 milliwatts of laser power. US Navy to buy ten UFOs from Hughes. Relax, those are "UHF Follow-On" comsats to replace the older FltSatCom and Leasat birds. It's being done as a very commercial deal, with Hughes providing launches (on Atlas via General Dynamics) and paying heavy penalties if launches are delayed or satellites are lost. Northwest Airlines and Honeywell to flight-test Soviet Glonass navsat receiver, as part of a longer-term effort to build receivers that can use both Navstar and Glonass. German Ministry of Research and Technology is told by technical advisors not to pursue use of Glonass, on the grounds that it is less accurate than Navstar and the Soviets are reticent about certain important details. Letter from Geoffrey Landis observing that the price-tag difference between LLNL and NASA Moon/Mars proposals is not primarily the result of technical differences, but of different assumptions. First and foremost, the LLNL study assumes "generic waiver of procurement regulations", which even the contractors estimate would give a factor of 2-3 reduction, plus whatever is saved on the government side due to reduced supervision. Second, the LLNL program is "success oriented", with little subassembly testing beforehand and little provision for failure. [Color me skeptical, but NASA tends to plan things the same way nowadays... witness the complete absence of backup hardware in current space-station plans.] LLNL also generally assumes zero or very low costs for contractor supervision, management, and ground-based R&D. -- NFS: all the nice semantics of MSDOS, | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology and its performance and security too. | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry
aws@vax3.iti.org (Allen W. Sherzer) (07/25/90)
In article <1990Jul23.021414.5126@zoo.toronto.edu> henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: >Letter from Geoffrey Landis observing that the price-tag difference between >LLNL and NASA Moon/Mars proposals is not primarily the result of technical >differences, but of different assumptions. True but so what? The primary difference between the US space program and the Soviet space program is also different assumptions. >First and foremost, the LLNL >study assumes "generic waiver of procurement regulations", which even the >contractors estimate would give a factor of 2-3 reduction, plus whatever >is saved on the government side due to reduced supervision. Again, true. This is a major difference which is important. LLNL is willing to take risks and accept the consequences. NASA is unwilling to assume any risk at all. I have worked with several government agencies (NASA was not one of them) and all of them like the FAR's because it keeps their buts well covered. The fact that LLNL is willing to do what it takes tells me that they are focused on accomplishing the task and not building empires. >Second, the >LLNL program is "success oriented", with little subassembly testing >beforehand and little provision for failure. True. However, each component will receive full integration testing. Test procedures will be just as complete as Apollo. Overall risk for crew is also about the same as Apollo. >[Color me skeptical, but >NASA tends to plan things the same way nowadays... witness the complete >absence of backup hardware in current space-station plans.] The difference is that NASA is doing no integration testing before final assembly. The Great Exploration allows for ground based testing of every module. >LLNL also >generally assumes zero or very low costs for contractor supervision, >management, and ground-based R&D. Again, they are focused on doing the job, not covering their ass. This is the sort of spirit we need to accomplish this goal. Allen | | In War: Resolution | | Allen W. Sherzer | In Defeat: Defiance | | aws@iti.org | In Victory: Magnanimity | | | In Peace: Good Will |