Should Canada Spearhaed an Effort to Launch Enough Simple Mass Into Orbit to Deter A Major Impact

LOL I love seeing the Americans here getting all up tight because the OP named Canada.

Before you all continue bashing our space program, lets remember who gets into space on a nearly 29 year old "space shuttle", which has exploded twice.

Hey, I know, maybe the Americans ought to rent an asteroid deterrent system from Russia! Ohhhhhh snap!

Originally posted by one4all
Should the World be working together to put a piece of material up in space that has enough pure mass to act as a launchable ASTEROID in earths terrestrial defense from incoming rocks?

This seems to be the on PHYSICS THAT IS FOOLPROOF.
And we are only losing potential mass and therefore defensability while we figure this out,time launching equals mass in space and we have a long way to go.

Any opinions?

I think this would be a fantastic plan for Canada to pursue! Be sure to also make it carbon friendly not to offend the Kyoto crowd.

You think all the big rocks are going to fall back down on your head?now thats retarded.

How big is the crater from a nuclear bomb anyways?I mean the biggest real one not the biggesst feasable?Can you see it from space?

Because you can sure as hell see a lot of other holes in our earth from real power.

Laser beams and nukes,this is why we are in so much trouble in the first place.Hollywood for goodness sakes.

Lets get real here as well,my x-box 360 could probably power a rocket module,its NOT THAT EXPENSIVE OR DIFFICULT TO GO BACK INTO SPACE SO WHY ARENT WE?

Expensive to put mass into space?Most of the cost used to be developement and research,its all done and is cheap now,as opposed to mass extinction I think its fairly cheap.

Originally posted by one4all
You think all the big rocks are going to fall back down on your head?now thats retarded.

Your kidding right?

Gravity WILL eventually force them back down to earth, just as satellites do. Yeah some will burn up during re-entry but many others will not...

Originally posted by one4all
How big is the crater from a nuclear bomb anyways?I mean the biggest real one not the biggesst feasable? Can you see it from space?

Because you can sure as hell see a lot of other holes in our earth from real power.

If a nuke and asteroid impact within our atmosphere then there will be nuclear fallout. Thats a no brainer pal and thats why I said nukes should be launced FROM A SPACE PLATFORM!

Originally posted by one4all
Laser beams and nukes,this is why we are in so much trouble in the first place.Hollywood for goodness sakes.

Are you saying SDI does not exist? Why bring hollywood into the equation? Your arguments are pathetically lame!

Flagged and Starred because as soon as I saw the thread title - before reading any comments - it occurred to me that this could be a useful means of preventing a massive meteorite impact.

Kudos to one4all for coming up with the idea.

The idea needs working on but it's a good starting suggestion. I think Arthur C Clarke would approve.

Originally posted by one4all
Lets get real here as well,my x-box 360 could probably power a rocket module,its NOT THAT EXPENSIVE OR DIFFICULT TO GO BACK INTO SPACE SO WHY ARENT WE?

Expensive to put mass into space?Most of the cost used to be developement and research,its all done and is cheap now,as opposed to mass extinction I think its fairly cheap.

Could you explain to us how a video game console can power a rocket module into orbit? This ought to be interesting.

Originally posted by Ferris.Bueller.II
Could you explain to us how a video game console can power a rocket module into orbit? This ought to be interesting.

My guess as a layman is that the Apollo launches likely had less computing power available than is now found in the average high-end games system.

And is there not a scheme that has been floated to launch or direct a companion body out to a perceived asteroid threat and use its gravity to cause the unwanted visitor to veer off course, and miss us in the cozmic pinball challenge?

[edit on 14-11-2009 by JohnnyCanuck]

Originally posted by JohnnyCanuck

Originally posted by Ferris.Bueller.II
Could you explain to us how a video game console can power a rocket module into orbit? This ought to be interesting.

My guess as a layman is that the Apollo launches likely has less computing power available than is now found in the average high-end games system.

And is there not a scheme that has been floated to launch or direct a companion body out to a perceived asteroid threat and use its gravity to cause the unwanted visitor to veer off course, and miss us in the cozmic pinball challenge?

I'm not a rocket scientist, but I don't think the computer powers the rocket module. I think it has something to do with combustible materials burning in some way.

I say screw it, too many stupid people in this world anyways. Canada stands the best chance of survival because of our population to size ratio.

If Ottawa gets taken out by a meteorite, then it just gives us in BC the chance to form our own federal government that actually cares about us

Originally posted by ZombieOctopus
lets remember who gets into space on a nearly 29 year old "space shuttle", which has exploded twice.

Canadians.

Canadians get to space on the space shuttle that has exploded twice.

In the meantime waiting for a large asteroid to come and smite us all on this chunk of rock, don't you think we should be looking to our close orbit as well where we have much reliance in our society? The very thing that allows ATS to work like it does by having the international community involving itself.

ATS Thread- Real Threat: The Space Junk

I honestly think before we go about shoving more crap up there we should at least be taking steps to clean it up.

Originally posted by Ferris.Bueller.II
I'm not a rocket scientist, but I don't think the computer powers the rocket module. I think it has something to do with combustible materials burning in some way.

Excellent...you're learning. Next, we'll tackle the word 'obtuse', afterward, perhaps you can add to the thread.

The poster's idea remains...how come we could accomplish so much with so little at the end of the 60's, but all of our new technology doesn't seem adequate to the tasks at hand. Including a carom off an asteroid.

Originally posted by one4all
Lets get real here as well,my x-box 360 could probably power a rocket module,its NOT THAT EXPENSIVE OR DIFFICULT TO GO BACK INTO SPACE SO WHY ARENT WE?

Expensive to put mass into space?Most of the cost used to be developement and research,its all done and is cheap now,as opposed to mass extinction I think its fairly cheap.

X-box ? Are you on crack ?? I dont think you have even fathomed what you talking about with any foresight. If you did, you would realize how ridiculous it is!

X-box may have more than adequate computing power required to control the launch vehicle but it also weight much more than what is actually required! The computer code and processors required to control the rocket would be a small fraction of its total weight and this hardware and software already exists in plenty and would be the easy part! You do realize that an asteroid would have be many hundreds of thousands of tonnes to be of any real use right? Do you know the weight of the average satellite ? About 4 tonnes and it costs millions to get that into orbit. The average launch cost for a simple satellite is anywhere between $50 million to $400 million depending on orbit and mass of the satellite. The cost of fabricating the satellite is extra! The Space shuttle launch which is nearly 40 years old cost about half a Billion dollars to launch!
NASA -Achieving Affordable Access to Space

Do you know how much Hydrogen, Oxygen and refrigerant is used to power even a single rocket ? How much the rocket engines cost ? Not to mention the cost of building the engines, generating the fuel ?? And even if all this was done, there is no way to transport a LARGE object weighing in the thousands of tonnes into Earth Orbit in one go. You'd have to send them bit by bit and then assemble them in space! Now to get all those masses into space would require many hundreds of large launch vehicles that would take decades to build by all the space faring nations in the world! That is an extremely cost endeavor! Not to mention, tracking all the masses that you send to space would mean operating a large tracking station that is manned round the clock and has observatories around the world to constantly monitor the masses to prevent them from colliding against each other or colliding against satellites or loosing their orbits! You would also have to take into account any launch failures that would either not position the mass at the appropriate orbit or veer off course inside the atmosphere and required to be destroyed! Also, you have to consider how high exactly would you want to place all your masses. The higher the orbit, the costlier the launch! Now, even if you find a way to get all those masses to join together somehow to form a single body you would need to keep in mind the gravity this body would generate and its effect on the Earth, nearby satellites and even the Moon! Finally, you would need some way to propel this body in the direction you want it to go, that would require IMMENSE amount of fuel because it would have massive inertia and you would have to overcome that to sling-shot around Earth's orbit and then head towards whatever asteroid or Comet that you want to destroy or deviate!

Instead of all this ridiculous nonsense and wasted effort. It would be incredibly cheaper to build a few dozen 100 Megaton Nukes and use a couple of already existing ICBM's to launch these relatively small masses into space and direct them to the desired target ! It would cost a fraction of what your Mad plan would have cost and the chances of success would be much much higher!

[edit on 14-11-2009 by IAF101]

Originally posted by Tomis_Nexis
Rather have Canada then the US, they couldn't even stop three commercial airliners from causing hell, never mind tracking an asteroid.

I have listed a few of Canada's accomplishments below since AccessDenied is blind to it:

National Research Council Canada's engineer George Klein invented the Storable Tubular Extendable Member (or STEM, for short). It has been used on most of the early and current manned and unmanned space missions.

National Research Council Canada's Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory is designing and building a highly specialized supercomputer to upgrade and improve the world's largest radio telescope that is located in the USA.

National Research Council Canada's scientists invented and developed the Canadarm and the Space Vision System that is has been used on NASA space shuttle missions and the International Space Station

Canadian engineer Eugene Maynard, working for NASA in the USA, is considered to be the person at NASA most responsible for the design of the lunar module. The lunar module was the spacecraft that landed astronauts on the moon for all Apollo missions. It is also the spacecraft that allowed the Apollo 13 crew to remain alive and return safely after the explosion that forced them to cancel a landing on the moon.

Canadian research engineer Jim Chamberlin worked for Avro and was assigned to NASA in the USA. He became head of engineering for Project Mercury, the first American manned spacecraft. He not only helped build Mercury capsules, he also helped solve problems encountered during space flights. He was responsible for selecting the moon orbit approach for the Apollo missions rather than the expected direct flight from earth approach. He also helped to solve problems with the Apollo command and service modules.

...to name a few.


[edit on 14-11-2009 by Tomis_Nexis]

You really are a piece of garbage for saying something like that. Something unprecedented happened to this country, and you make a comparison only a retard could state.

canadas space achievements are laughable compared to the US and Russia. China has even done more than Canada.

Originally posted by ZombieOctopus
LOL I love seeing the Americans here getting all up tight because the OP named Canada.

Before you all continue bashing our space program, lets remember who gets into space on a nearly 29 year old "space shuttle", which has exploded twice.

Hey, I know, maybe the Americans ought to rent an asteroid deterrent system from Russia! Ohhhhhh snap!

How do you get into space? A moose? your space program blows ohh snap.

Originally posted by eikmun

canadas space achievements are laughable compared to the US and Russia. China has even done more than Canada.

Well, not only China but the French, Europeans, Japan, India, Israel, Iran, have all pretty much done more than Canada in terms of space capabilities. And this despite being the 3rd country to send a satellite into space! As usual the Canadians slacked off and let America do the heavy lifting!

IIRC, the computers aboard the apollo mission had the same computational power as..... a modern pocket calculator.

Hitting an object with energy is way smarter than mass. E=MC2.

Mass only has potential, and kinetic energy But if you convert the mass into energy (fission, fusion), you get mass times speed of light squared.

God damnit, i pretty much stopped reading after you mentioned the X-box. The original layout off the Cell CPU would probably be way better

hey at least they are preparing

we're all so worried about reality TV... so disconnected from our own world...

reply to post by IAF101


The Chinese even made air bubbles in space, i doubt the other nations have that capability yet