The Spirited Seventh Heaven ...

alissafalco

alissafalco

Well-Known Member
CDavid

CDavid

Well-Known Member
artvandelay said:
We still have a space program. NASA's newest capsule, Orion, makes its first unmanned orbital test mission at the end of this year. Orion's mission is to put humans on an asteroid and then to Mars. Also, SpaceX, Boeing, and Sierra Nevada are all building manned capsules/shuttles that will be used for low earth orbit missions. Netflix has a Bloomberg documentary detailing the competition between the three. It's a good, quick doc.
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Which rocket/capsule can deliver a U.S. astronaut to orbit or the ISS right now (or maybe before about 2020)? We have gone from putting a man on the moon - with serious proposals to 'scale-up' Apollo to reach Mars by the early 80's - to not even being able to put a man in space ourselves. That's not just sad, it needs a new word.

A space program isn't about having plans to go to space, it's about actually making the journey.
 
Cosmic Commando

Cosmic Commando

Well-Known Member
artvandelay said:
Atlantic City has been hurt by the new casinos and racinos in Pennsylvania, Delaware and NYC. I did read about a university that was interested in using The Atlantic Club as a new dorm/campus. Revel has been trying to find a buyer, but it looks like potential buyers are waiting for the bankruptcy first. Does Steve Wynn buy it and make his triumphant return to AC?
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There was a graphic out there that I think is behind the WSJ paywall now, but it showed the number of casinos/gambling facilities in the Northeast in 1990 versus today... there are casinos everywhere you look now. Atlantic City was the only player 25 years ago, but now everyone else has "caught up". Personally, there's five full casinos within an hour's drive of my house and two racetrack casinos.
 
ABQ

ABQ

Well-Known Member
PirateFrank

PirateFrank

Well-Known Member
artvandelay said:
We still have a space program. NASA's newest capsule, Orion, makes its first unmanned orbital test mission at the end of this year....
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Yikes. I hate off-topicality more than most so @WDW1974 please forgive me, but I'm going to have to jump on this. Simply stated - If we needed to put an american, tomorrow, onto the ISS -- we'd have to ask Putin to drive. That's not a space program! That's like saying you have a car and can drive to work....but what you really have is an empty driveway and a co-worker down the block that makes you look like a moron at the office on a daily basis and you have to pay him to drive you to work every day. Oh yes, you have plans to buy a car. You have $1,600 in the bank saved up to buy a $26,000 car -- someday.

And sorry...but plans to test an unmanned mission by year-end is what's known around here as 'blue sky.' During our golden age of space exploration, unmanned missions testing X-level spacecraft happened concurrently with an existing space program -- so that downtime between phases only occurred in very short periods or (in the case of Apollo I or Challenger) occurred when unforeseen disasters drove the downtime.

I seriously question whether NASA will put an american in low earth orbit before the end of the current administration's term. Like him or not, the guy currently in office doesn't like american exceptionalism -- and our space program was exceptional -- right up until the point where it no longer existed.
 
flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
Cosmic Commando said:
There was a graphic out there that I think is behind the WSJ paywall now, but it showed the number of casinos/gambling facilities in the Northeast in 1990 versus today... there are casinos everywhere you look now. Atlantic City was the only player 25 years ago, but now everyone else has "caught up". Personally, there's five full casinos within an hour's drive of my house and two racetrack casinos.
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What matters most is all it's direct neighbors to the south all have gambling now. PA, MD, Del all have tables+slots now. AC was a dive for decades, but they had the exclusive for the DC/NY corridor. That is long gone now.. and with all the new gambling closer to home there was no reason to goto the dive that was AC. Even the new mega casinos couldn't turn that because the regional stuff was nice enough.. and mega casinos just mean trying to charge mega prices -- they collapsed under their own weight.

Basically once you took away the sole crutch AC had.. it's been all downhill since.
 
artvandelay

artvandelay

Well-Known Member
CDavid said:
Which rocket/capsule can deliver a U.S. astronaut to orbit or the ISS right now (or maybe before about 2020)? We have gone from putting a man on the moon - with serious proposals to 'scale-up' Apollo to reach Mars by the early 80's - to not even being able to put a man in space ourselves. That's not just sad, it needs a new word.

A space program isn't about having plans to go to space, it's about actually making the journey.
Click to expand...
Don't get me wrong, I'm not happy that the USA does not have any options to get humans to the ISS. The decision to go with the space shuttle in 1972 instead of continuing with 'scaled up' Apollo missions was terrible. 42 years later they're finally building 'Apollo on Steroids' to go to an asteroid and hopefully Mars.

Imagine where humans could be today if we had continued with manned capsules and heavy lift expendable rockets? A base on the moon? Mars? Moons of Jupiter?
 
artvandelay

artvandelay

Well-Known Member
PirateFrank said:
Yikes. I hate off-topicality more than most so @WDW1974 please forgive me, but I'm going to have to jump on this. Simply stated - If we needed to put an american, tomorrow, onto the ISS -- we'd have to ask Putin to drive. That's not a space program! That's like saying you have a car and can drive to work....but what you really have is an empty driveway and a co-worker down the block that makes you look like a moron at the office on a daily basis and you have to pay him to drive you to work every day. Oh yes, you have plans to buy a car. You have $1,600 in the bank saved up to buy a $26,000 car -- someday.

And sorry...but plans to test an unmanned mission by year-end is what's known around here as 'blue sky.' During our golden age of space exploration, unmanned missions testing X-level spacecraft happened concurrently with an existing space program -- so that downtime between phases only occurred in very short periods or (in the case of Apollo I or Challenger) occurred when unforeseen disasters drove the downtime.

I seriously question whether NASA will put an american in low earth orbit before the end of the current administration's term. Like him or not, the guy currently in office doesn't like american exceptionalism -- and our space program was exceptional -- right up until the point where it no longer existed.
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I agree with almost everything you said, except one part and its small. Between 1975 (Apollo-Soyuz) and 1981 (Shuttle Columbia) the USA did not put a single person in orbit.
 
artvandelay

artvandelay

Well-Known Member
PirateFrank said:
And sorry...but plans to test an unmanned mission by year-end is what's known around here as 'blue sky.
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Orion unmanned test flight scheduled for December 4, 2014. It's a test of the abort system and re-entry. Using a Delta IV instead of SLS booster.
http://www.spacenews.com/article/ci...-nasa-preparing-for-orion-capsule-test-flight

Which do you think will happen first A) an American launch vehicle to take humans to orbit, or B) some kind of Star Wars ride ata WDW?
 
bhg469

bhg469

Well-Known Member
WDW1974 said:
Yep. It's not that there were not stories ... but they were not fully developed -- plot above being a key.

And what has bothered me for years is Disney CMs and fanbois creating them ... the worst being Master Gracey and the Mansion. I remember for years when fanbois would point out where a pole for the queue had been removed from the pavement a marking that they were sure was a wedding ring ... and then the 'net started and things got even worse.
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This made me cringe every time, especially people here that still call it a ring.
 
bhg469

bhg469

Well-Known Member
ABQ said:
Grrr....if only the NHL was part of the "every sport" you mentioned. Instead they dole out the cash to the NBA. gah!

and @artvandelay , we've got a little space action taking place right here in Nuevo Mexico http://spaceportamerica.com/fly-lease-build/ Hopefully one day something will actually launch.
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It's like the NHL is a red headed step child. At least TSN covers it well, obviously.
 
crispy

crispy

Well-Known Member
PhotoDave219 said:
..... Yeah. NASA was way easier to deal with than SpaceX. And I mean MANNED Space Flight. Orion is essentially Apollo all over again. I still think it will be eventually killed. Its depressing to stand at Canaveral National Seashore (its a gem, highly recommend) and look at what was 39-B.
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:cry:

For my 40th birthday next year, I am planning to go to Space Camp to fulfill a lifelong dream. We took our daughters to the Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville last year and visited the Redstone Arsenal. Seeing the decrepit buildings that once housed the infant space program was both sad and awe-inspiring. Seeing the Saturn V blew me away.

To bring this back to Disney, here's a picture of Wernher von Braun and Walt Disney:

 
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ChrisM

ChrisM

Well-Known Member
artvandelay said:
Don't get me wrong, I'm not happy that the USA does not have any options to get humans to the ISS. The decision to go with the space shuttle in 1972 instead of continuing with 'scaled up' Apollo missions was terrible. 42 years later they're finally building 'Apollo on Steroids' to go to an asteroid and hopefully Mars.

Imagine where humans could be today if we had continued with manned capsules and heavy lift expendable rockets? A base on the moon? Mars? Moons of Jupiter?
Click to expand...

The US hasn't had a true space program since Apollo. What we've had is a national job creation program that exists almost solely for Congressmen and women to dole out contracts to their constituents. And we call it NASA.
 

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