Nasa slams Elon Musk’s SpaceX for launching a Tesla car into the heavens

originally posted by: Reydelsol

originally posted by: bigfatfurrytexan
a reply to: Reydelsol

And this means there will be no additional debris the size of a car free floating in our solar system?

The sheer size of the solar system and the amount of space between the sun and the asteroid belt (where the car will pass near) is so massive that entire argument is irrelevant. You could crush down the entire earth and it would not fill a fraction of that space.

The sheer size scale is like a simple loose atom on a football field.

While there's some truth to the vastness of space, orbital mechanics follows some rules which might make space seem not so vast when you launch things into orbit. Even an orbit around the sun doesn't mean it won't crash back into the Earth, though it might take a long time to do that.

Elon Musk’s Tesla in Space Could Crash Into Earth

Each long loop around the sun brings the sports car a bit closer to a fiery meeting with our home world, researchers calculate.

a reply to: Reydelsol

I know very well the shape and dimensions of the space within our solar system. Knowing of that factor however, does not change my read of this situation, and regardless of that knowledge, I still have to disagree with you that in one thousand years or so, it will FEEL that small, and that this object, this car, will still be as much of a non-issue in the fullness of time, as it is today.

a reply to: badw0lf

First of all, I should very much like to know what you were implying by your suggestion here:

ugh.... stay in your 2 bedroom home and keep the telly on.

safer that way.

Second, I would also like to know what your suggestion was meant to add to the thread, other than a personal response, of little to no value to the discussion at hand?

It would be terrible irony if in 75 years or so Musk's Tesla collides with one of his own colonist transport ships in the first extraterrestrial hit-and-run.

It would be karma if it hits something of NASA's.

a reply to: BrianFlanders

yes we want to see men and women on mars and if a third of annual defense department budget was instead diverted to nasa and deep space exploration in 10 years we could probably have people on mars and definitely the moon.

we need to curtail spending on stuff like f-35 system with cost over runs if contracts can't deliver systems on time and budget cancel contracts and take back money.

we had good programs but past potusi and conus neutered them all meanwhile throwing stupid amounts of money at lockheed for cost overuns on f35 quagmire.

if they had done that 20 years ago last year when that asteroid worth 20 trillion dollars flew by we could possibly have caught it and nasa would never had to worry about money again nor us.

a reply to: burgerbuddy

Yeah it's the best defence we have at this moment.

And wasn't that car heading for Mars but failed trajectory now heading to the kuyper belt ?

What's next tesla roadster disturbed the kuyper belt and asteroids are heading to earth?

originally posted by: 0bserver1
And wasn't that car heading for Mars but failed trajectory now heading to the kuyper belt ?

No. It was planned to go into a heliocentric orbit that would take it near Mars, but it's now heading into the asteroid belt instead, before heading back in on its orbit.

Her concerns are very valid, and it's her job to seek protection of Earth from space contamination, and other planets from our own contamination.

Read this article, it's a lot better-worded: spacenews.com...

Lisa Pratt, an astrobiologist who had been a professor in Indiana University’s Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, was named the agency’s new planetary protection officer in January, and formally started on the job in early February. The position oversees NASA activities to ensure that they do not contaminate other worlds with terrestrial life or risk contaminating the Earth with any extraterrestrial life forms.

[...]

Pratt said her office is also interested in working with potential commercial missions to Mars and other worlds subject to planetary protection protocols. Such discussions, she said, were limited prior to the Feb. 6 launch of a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying a Tesla Roadster sports car into a heliocentric orbit that goes beyond the orbit of Mars.

Her office received many questions about NASA’s role in planetary protection for that mission, she said. “The answer was little or nothing,” she said. “We were supporting their launch, but we did not have a planetary protection plan in place.”

She called for more collaboration with commercial ventures on the issue, and suggested that such missions need not be subject to the same stringent requirements as government missions, calling for “reasonable protocols and processes” for commercial missions.

What if Tesla impacted Mars and contaminated it with earthly life?

I fully agree with her.

a reply to: wildespace

Then we'd better hope she's wearing her ''Special'' armorized anti space gear when she arrives. She could be the worlds first test case, for Humanity!

Do you think there is a legitimate need to stop the car? If so, do you know if anything is being done? Sounds terrifying.

You call him space man, post apocalyptics will call him the Red Knight satellite.

The Muskrat obviously isn't considerate of future humans. Think of all the religion that will form around this space junk some day.

originally posted by: AdKiller
You call him space man, post apocalyptics will call him the Red Knight satellite.

The Muskrat obviously isn't considerate of future humans. Think of all the religion that will form around this space junk some day.

Red Dwarf 'for real'.

Funny..