space faq controversial questions archive name space controversy last modified date controversial questions these issues periodically come up with much argument and few facts being offered the summaries below attempt to represent the position on which much of the net community has settled please don t bring them up again unless there s something truly new to be discussed the net can t set public policy that s what your representatives are for what happened to the saturn v plans despite a widespread belief to the contrary the saturn v blueprints have not been lost they are kept at marshall space flight center on microfilm the problem in re creating the saturn v is not finding the drawings it is finding vendors who can supply mid s vintage hardware like guidance system components and the fact that the launch pads and vab have been converted to space shuttle use so you have no place to launch from by the time you redesign to accommodate available hardware and re modify the launch pads you may as well have started from scratch with a clean sheet design why data from space missions isn t immediately available investigators associated with nasa missions are allowed exclusive access for one year after the data is obtained in order to give them an opportunity to analyze the data and publish results without being scooped by people uninvolved in the mission however nasa frequently releases examples in non digital form e g photos to the public early in a mission risks of nuclear rtg power sources for space probes there has been extensive discussion on this topic sparked by attempts to block the galileo and ulysses launches on grounds of the plutonium thermal sources being dangerous numerous studies claim that even in worst case scenarios shuttle explosion during launch or accidental reentry at interplanetary velocities the risks are extremely small two interesting data points are the may loss of two snap b rtgs which landed intact in the pacific ocean after a nimbus b weather satellite failed to reach orbit the fuel was recovered after months with no release of plutonium in april the apollo lunar module reentered the atmosphere and its snap rtg heat source which was jettisoned fell intact into the feet deep tonga trench in the pacific ocean the corrosion resistant materials of the rtg are expected to prevent release of the fuel for a period of time equal to half lives of the pu fuel or about years doe to make your own informed judgement some references you may wish to pursue are a good review of the technical facts and issues is given by daniel salisbury in radiation risk and planetary exploration the rtg controversy planetary report may june pages another good article which also reviews the events preceding galileo s launch showdown at pad b by robert g nichols appeared in the november issue of ad astra both magazines are published by pro space organizations the planetary society and the national space society respectively gordon l chipman jr advanced space nuclear systems aas in developing the space frontier edited by albert naumann and grover alexander univelt p hazards from plutonium toxicity by bernard l cohen health physics vol may page nus corporation safety status report for the ulysses mission risk analysis book document number is nus there is no gpo published jan nasa office of space science and applications final environmental impact statement for the ulysses mission tier no serial number or gpo number but probably available from ntis or nasa june doe u s department of energy transuranic elements in the environment wayne c hanson editor doe document no doe tic government printing office washington d c april impact of the space shuttle on the ozone layer from time to time claims are made that chemicals released from the space shuttle s solid rocket boosters srbs are responsible for a significant amount of damage to the ozone layer studies indicate that they in reality have only a minute impact both in absolute terms and relative to other chemical sources the remainder of this item is a response from the author of the quoted study charles jackman the atmospheric modelling study of the space shuttle effects on the stratosphere involved three independent theoretical groups and was organized by dr michael prather nasa goddard institute for space studies the three groups involved michael prather and maria garcia nasa giss charlie jackman and anne douglass nasa goddard space flight center and malcolm ko and dak sze atmospheric and environmental research inc the effort was to look at the effects of the space shuttle and titan rockets on the stratosphere the following are the estimated sources of stratospheric chlorine industrial sources kilograms year natural sources kilograms year shuttle sources kilograms year the shuttle source assumes space shuttles and titan rockets are launched yearly thus the launches would add less than to the total stratospheric chlorine sources the effect on ozone is minimal global yearly average total ozone would be decreased by this is much less than total ozone variability associated with volcanic activity and solar flares the influence of human made chlorine products on ozone is computed by atmospheric model calculations to be a decrease in globally averaged ozone between and the influence of the space shuttle and titan rockets on the stratosphere is negligible the launch schedule of the space shuttle and titan rockets would need to be increased by over a factor of a hundred in order to have about the same effect on ozone as our increases in industrial halocarbons do at the present time theoretical results of this study have been published in the space shuttle s impact on the stratosphere mj prather mm garcia ar douglass ch jackman m k w ko and n d sze journal of geophysical research charles jackman atmospheric chemistry and dynamics branch code nasa goddard space flight center greenbelt md also see chemical rockets and the environment a mcdonald r bennett j hinshaw and m barnes aerospace america may how long can a human live unprotected in space if you don t try to hold your breath exposure to space for half a minute or so is unlikely to produce permanent injury holding your breath is likely to damage your lungs something scuba divers have to watch out for when ascending and you ll have eardrum trouble if your eustachian tubes are badly plugged up but theory predicts and animal experiments confirm that otherwise exposure to vacuum causes no immediate injury you do not explode your blood does not boil you do not freeze you do not instantly lose consciousness various minor problems sunburn possibly the bends certainly some mild reversible painless swelling of skin and underlying tissue start after ten seconds or so at some point you lose consciousness from lack of oxygen injuries accumulate after perhaps one or two minutes you re dying the limits are not really known references the effect on the chimpanzee of rapid decompression to a near vacuum alfred g koestler ed nasa cr nov experimental animal decompression to a near vacuum environment r w bancroft j e dunn eds report sam tr june usaf school of aerospace medicine brooks afb texas how the challenger astronauts died the challenger shuttle launch was not destroyed in an explosion this is a well documented fact see the rogers commission report for example what looked like an explosion was fuel burning after the external tank came apart the forces on the crew cabin were not sufficient to kill the astronauts never mind destroy their bodies according to the kerwin team s medical forensic report the astronauts were killed when the more or less intact cabin hit the water at circa mph and their bodies then spent several weeks underwater their remains were recovered and after the kerwin team examined them they were sent off to be buried using the shuttle beyond low earth orbit you can t use the shuttle orbiter for missions beyond low earth orbit because it can t get there it is big and heavy and does not carry enough fuel even if you fill part of the cargo bay with tanks furthermore it is not particularly sensible to do so because much of that weight is things like wings which are totally useless except in the immediate vicinity of the earth the shuttle orbiter is highly specialized for travel between earth s surface and low orbit taking it higher is enormously costly and wasteful a much better approach would be to use shuttle subsystems to build a specialized high orbit spacecraft yet another concise answer by henry spencer the face on mars there really is a big rock on mars that looks remarkably like a humanoid face it appears in two different frames of viking orbiter imagery a much more facelike in appearance and the one more often published with the sun degrees above western horizon and a with the sun degrees from the west science writer richard hoagland has championed the idea that the face is artificial intended to resemble a human and erected by an extraterrestrial civilization most other analysts concede that the resemblance is most likely accidental other viking images show a smiley faced crater and a lava flow resembling kermit the frog elsewhere on mars there exists a mars anomalies research society sorry don t know the address to study the face the mars observer mission will carry an extremely high resolution camera and better images of the formation will hopefully settle this question in a few years in the meantime speculation about the face is best carried on in the altnet group alt alien visitors not sci space or sci astro v dipeitro and g molenaar unusual martian surface features mars research p o box glen dale maryland usa by mail r r pozos the face of mars chicago review press account of an interdisciplinary speculative conference hoagland organized to investigate the face r c hoagland the monuments of mars a city on the edge of forever north atlantic books berkeley california usa elaborate discussion of evidence and speculation that formations near the face form a city m j carlotto digital imagery analysis of unusual martian surface features applied optics pp extracts three dimensional model for the face from the d images m j carlotto m c stein a method of searching for artificial objects on planetary surfaces journal of the british interplanetary society vol no may p uses a fractal image analysis model to guess whether the face is artificial b o leary analysis of images of the face on mars and possible intelligent origin jbis vol no may p lights carlotto s model from the two angles and shows it s consistent shows that the face doesn t look facelike if observed from the surface next faq space activist interest research groups space publications
