A new Astronomy thread

[Northwest Slobovia]

It's official name is Kepler 16-b.

And that sounds WAY funnier than Tatooine.

Astronomy is a serious science. Real astronomers call it 2MASS J19161817+5145267-b. /nods






The 2MASS designation is not really a name but a location, Right Ascension: 19 16 18.17 Declination: +51 45 26.78. Tells ya where to point the telescope to find it.

[Monkeykind]

And that sounds WAY funnier than Tatooine.

Astronomy is a serious science. Real astronomers call it 2MASS J19161817+5145267-b. /nods






The 2MASS designation is not really a name but a location, Right Ascension: 19 16 18.17 Declination: +51 45 26.78. Tells ya where to point the telescope to find it.

Science? Serious?!

[Northwest Slobovia]

Astronomy is a serious science. Real astronomers call it 2MASS J19161817+5145267-b. /nods






The 2MASS designation is not really a name but a location, Right Ascension: 19 16 18.17 Declination: +51 45 26.78. Tells ya where to point the telescope to find it.

Science? Serious?!

Some days, yeah, we really live up to the pompous, self-important stereotypes. Arguements over nomeclature, priority, and other such trivia often really point out that science is done by mere humans.

Other days, yeah, we just get to play with huge, expensive toys and give things funny names for our own entertainment.

[New England and The Maritimes]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_CRS_Orb-3

Orbital Sciences failed to launch their Antares rocket, losing the Cygnus CRS Orb-3 and destroying launchpad 0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport. Luckily no-one was injured, but this is likely a setback for the Enhanced Cygnus program.

That's why you don't rely on private contractors for important projects.

[Monkeykind]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_CRS_Orb-3

Orbital Sciences failed to launch their Antares rocket, losing the Cygnus CRS Orb-3 and destroying launchpad 0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport. Luckily no-one was injured, but this is likely a setback for the Enhanced Cygnus program.

That's why you don't rely on private contractors for important projects.

Unless they're very good and it's not of the utmost importance.

[Northwest Slobovia]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_CRS_Orb-3

Orbital Sciences failed to launch their Antares rocket, losing the Cygnus CRS Orb-3 and destroying launchpad 0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport. Luckily no-one was injured, but this is likely a setback for the Enhanced Cygnus program.

That's why you don't rely on private contractors for important projects.

Like building every single rocket NASA has ever flown.

[Krasny-Volny]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_CRS_Orb-3

Orbital Sciences failed to launch their Antares rocket, losing the Cygnus CRS Orb-3 and destroying launchpad 0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport. Luckily no-one was injured, but this is likely a setback for the Enhanced Cygnus program.

That's why you don't rely on private contractors for important projects.

Outsource to other countries instead. It's cheaper and if they're more sophisticated than you are it removes the headache of having to develop anything yourself.

[Risottia]

Other days, yeah, we just get to play with huge, expensive toys and give things funny names for our own entertainment.

Not to mention fondling our partners in the rooms hosting the huge, expensive toys of OTHER fellow scientists.

[The Solar System Scope]

Tooooooyyyys....

[New England and The Maritimes]

That's why you don't rely on private contractors for important projects.

Like building every single rocket NASA has ever flown.

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

[Monkeykind]

Like building every single rocket NASA has ever flown.

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

That was decades ago.

[Risottia]

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

That was decades ago.

Yeah, the private sector has become more competent and responsible in the last years... oh wait.

[L Ron Cupboard]

Now the Virgin Galactic has crashed. A bad week for space flight, and possibly the end of Branson's space tourism project.

[Northwest Slobovia]

Like building every single rocket NASA has ever flown.

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

Sorry: From Wakipedia...

Saturn IC stage: built by Boeing
Saturn II: built by North American
Saturn IV-B: Douglas Aircraft
Instrument ring: IBM
CSM: North American
LEM: Grumman

NASA produced overall design parameters, but the ships were all built by stupid and evil(tm) private corporations. Same with Mercury, Gemini, and the Shuttle. That some of them crashed is just proof that it's an immature technology; a lot of early aviation pioneers also ended up as charred messes or greasy smears.

[Grenartia]

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

Sorry: From Wakipedia...

Saturn IC stage: built by Boeing
Saturn II: built by North American
Saturn IV-B: Douglas Aircraft
Instrument ring: IBM
CSM: North American
LEM: Grumman

NASA produced overall design parameters, but the ships were all built by stupid and evil(tm) private corporations. Same with Mercury, Gemini, and the Shuttle. That some of them crashed is just proof that it's an immature technology; a lot of early aviation pioneers also ended up as charred messes or greasy smears.

I also like how Nemmy only rams against corporations when it serves his own worldview. In other threads, he's railed against the state (i.e., the very thing that NASA is a part of, and even today, the only organization capable of running an honest-to-God space program of ANY size) and the military (i.e., the only organization which could possibly have produced the first astronauts, as it was the organization responsible for most of the advances in aerospace).

[Risottia]

As far as I know, the Apollo missions were not entrusted to a private corporation to cut corners and fuck up over and over again. They were done in-house by engineers from Caltech.

Sorry: From Wakipedia...

Saturn IC stage: built by Boeing
Saturn II: built by North American
Saturn IV-B: Douglas Aircraft
Instrument ring: IBM
CSM: North American
LEM: Grumman

NASA produced overall design parameters, but the ships were all built by stupid and evil(tm) private corporations.

Building components =/= having a mission entrusted.
Then again, the Challenger exploded because of a NASA error.

[Monkeykind]

Now the Virgin Galactic has crashed. A bad week for space flight, and possibly the end of Branson's space tourism project.

Unfortunately, this event caused someone to die, unlike the spaceship explosion.

[The Solar System Scope]

That's not good.

[Greater Soviet Ukraine]

Who plays Kerbal Space Progran?

[Abserdia]

I never thought i would see this...
It's so...
Just...
Amazing...

Who plays Kerbal Space Progran?

I wish i could, but i don't have the computer to play it. I do play Simple Rocket though, you should check it out.
It's like Kerbal Space Program, but in a 2D camera angle. You don't have as many parts in Kerb, but you can still go to the Smoon, Smars, or any other planet you can think of in our solar system!

[Greater Soviet Ukraine]

Second question, can this thread include rocketry?

[Monkeykind]

Second question, can this thread include rocketry?

It can include spacecraft engines etc.

[Northwest Slobovia]

Sorry: From Wakipedia...

Saturn IC stage: built by Boeing
Saturn II: built by North American
Saturn IV-B: Douglas Aircraft
Instrument ring: IBM
CSM: North American
LEM: Grumman

NASA produced overall design parameters, but the ships were all built by stupid and evil(tm) private corporations.

Building components =/= having a mission entrusted.

I'm kinda amused at the way you dismiss what corporations did as "building components". I mean, NASA did all the hard work: saying "hey, we need a rocket kinda like this" is really the difficult step in any space mission. The designing, building, and testing of said rocket is trivial. I mean, it's not rocket scien... Oh.

But seriously, I'm not sure what you mean by "mission entrusted". AFAICT from the "spaceport's" web site, Wallops Island is still a NASA facility. I can't quite tell what, if anything, happens differently in "private" launches vs "NASA" launches. And I'm not sure it matters, really: I mean, it looks like there was a problem with the first stage engine of Orbital's rocket. The folks handling the launch can't really do anything about that.

Then again, the Challenger exploded because of a NASA error.

Time to blame the evil capitalist pig-dogs.

[Northwest Slobovia]

Now the Virgin Galactic has crashed. A bad week for space flight, and possibly the end of Branson's space tourism project.

Unfortunately, this event caused someone to die, unlike the spaceship explosion.

Always a loss, yes, but the mission goes on.

[Northwest Slobovia]

Second question, can this thread include rocketry?

So long as it doesn't swallow up the rest of the thread, that sounds good to me.