Yesterday we talked about the abandoned Soviet lunar program. Today we'll talk about a needlessly-abandoned American space project. There's tons more interesting info under the jump, so stick with me. Now, contrary to popular belief, the Space Shutte is *not* the first reusable space craft. That honor and distinction go to the X-15:
From 1959 to 1968, the three X-15s flew 199 missions all together. 13 of the missions went above 50 miles altitude, which is the US definition for Space Flight, and two of them went above 100 kilometers, which is the international definition of Space Flight. A slightly modified one flew to 68 miles(!) which is still the world altitude record for an aircraft (not counting the shuttle). Details about the program: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-15
Now, the X-15 was sexy and cool, but it was obvious that it was just the first step on the space-plane ladder. They needed an orbital spacecraft, obviously, so the USAF designed the X-20. Nicknamed the "DynaSoar" (For dynamic soaring), it was intended to be launched on top of a rocket like this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Dyna_Soar_launchers.png do from one to three orbits, and come back down. Here's some animation from Dan Roam's old "Deep Cold" website of what it would have looked like:
There's a slight poetic licence taken here - the front windows would have been covered by a heat shield in orbit, that would have been ejected after re-entry, but otherwise this is pretty spot-on. Note that it keeps the final stage of the rocket attached to it in orbit as a Service Module. That would have been cast off before re-entry. Here's another video to give you a good idea what it would have looked like.
Again there's a bit of poetic licence taken here - the X-20 was never designed to dock with anything, the space station is a total fantasy that Mr. Roam made up, and of course the heat shields over the front window are missing. Still, I think this captures how damn cool the concept was - and of course I love that song.
What makes the X-20 more interesting than most paper studies of unrealized projects is that this was actually very far along in development when it was cancelled. They'd built mockups, done wind-tunnel testing, and they were just a few months away from drop-testing a full-sized glider model to train pilots when the project was canned. The USAF was very excited about this, and envisioned it's use as a research vehicle, as a surveilance aircraft, as a space-fighter, and ultimately as the forbearer of a whole line of X-20-derived space shuttles that would be larger, and have 2 to 4-man crews, presumably shuttling people to and from a USAF space station. Here's the unveiling of the X-20 for the news media:
So what happened?
Well, essentially the whole thing devolved in to a turf war between NASA and the USAF. The Air Force didn't care about research that much, and was content to let NASA have that aspect of space, but NASA feared competition from another government agency, and whined about it incessantly to Congress. They were particularly concerned that the USAF program, which was aggressive and designed for a rapid turnaround time between flights, would make NASA look bad. The Democratic Administration at the time was really sold on the idea of a peaceful civilian space agency to distinguish it from the military Soviet space program. (Though NASA was almost entirely staffed by ex-military types, and actual officers on loan from the various services, so it was Civilian in name only), and they felt that having a military space program would undercut NASA's propaganda value, so, ultimately, the insisted the USAF shut their project down, and the X-20 was abandoned.
The irony is that if the DynaSoar *hadn't* been cancelled, we probably never would have built the Space Shuttle. Why? Because the Space Shuttle has ended up being amazingly difficult, expensive, and dangerous to operate. Intended for economic access to space, it's a flying coffin that's killed 14 people, and which costs twice as much to operate as the 'wasteful' Saturn V, while only carrying about 1/3rd as much payload to orbit. It's a turd that probably would have been avoided if NASA had the X-20 to look at for practical information about how orbital space planes work. But since they really had no infomation, we ended up spending the last 30 years learning about it the hard way.
The first space flight of the X-20 was scheduled for january 1966. Astronaut James Wood was shechuled to make the first manned flight in July of that same year. Alas, none of that ever happened.
This was the first - but certainly not the last - time the Air Force would be screwed over by NASA
More information about the X-20 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X-20
the Deep Cold website http://www.deepcold.com/
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Comments
27 June 2009
6 min 20 sec
What we need to do is bury the hatchet with Russia, from a geopolitical view they are our natural allies not Europe or East Asia. We both come from the western traditions; both have fought to be free from domination of the old European powers. We have no natural border and land disputes it has only been false ideological differences that has made us adversaries.
If Russia and the USA combined our resources and knowledge we could colonize the moon and near earth Lagranian points in less than thirty years. It would take vision from both countries leaders and a willingness to forgo the old cold war ways.
Letting China and India dominate the moon will lead to the global war that we have been able to avoid for sixty years. I have no doubt that they would weaponize the moon if given the chance. It’s the one sure way to leap over the nuclear superiority of Russia and the USA.
The way to stop that outcome is not trying to deny space to countries it’s to have everyone there using space. We could not short of war stop India or China from building a moon base. It would be better to just have our own there to balance things out.
16 July 2009
6 days 14 hours
Two very important things will need to happen before we launch another space race. First, our lovely elected political hacks will have to admit that we've wasted a 50 year head start over everyone but the Russians. And secondly, we'd actually have to have the wherewithal to admit that we're in a space race with China or India so we could actually push the mission forward like JFK did.
27 December 2008
12 min 12 sec
Eh. Let India and China have it. Maybe they'll shame us in to getting off of our asses again.
16 July 2009
6 days 14 hours
It seems really scary to me that no one in power seems to want to think about the fact that India and especially China are going to be holding the ultimate in high ground in the next 50 years. We should be pushing for space just to head them off, just like we did with the Russians.
On the private side of the coin I remember reading a book when I was a teenager called "Firestar" which really was a possible blueprint for private enterprise to take over the US space mantle. *wink wink Bill Gates or Warren Buffett*
27 June 2009
6 min 21 sec
Virgin Galactic is just selling Evil Knievel rides not space flight. SpaceX and others are working for a private manned space capability. But sadly you are right the US government will clamp down on what they can do once it goes operational.
Our conspiracy loving friends like Richard C Hoagland would say the government has made a secrete deal with the aliens on the moon that we will not go beyond earth orbit. But the truth is really worse space is a game changer and governments hate game changers. If a government can’t control something they try to kill it look at what governments around the world do to the internet and even our own government wishes they never made it public.
There are enough people in congress that believe that man should not be in space that the idea of a real space program or a private one is a nonstarter. They will try to stop it in anyway they can. The Chinese or Indian’s might go to the moon but they will do it for the military and political power that it will bring them not to expand mankind into the universe. It’s just so sad that we could have had the stars but the world’s leaders only care for their own power instead of the future of mankind.
27 December 2008
12 min 13 sec
I agree entirely, but I think maybe I didn't make my point clear enough: No one in Congress believes Space has any use beyond satellites, and the science stuff is just bread and circuses as far as they're concerned. These people are quite happy with NASA, and feel it's doing it's job really well, basically being a high-prestiege, high-budget agency that brings a lot of pork in to their districts, and makes them look intellectual by supporting it.
What you need is a manned private industry space program - not Virgin Galactic, which is just a means to separate the idle rich from their otherwise-idle riches - but, alas, if such a thing happened, the US and UN and (probably) Russia would immediately try to squelch it.
27 June 2009
6 min 21 sec
People have told me that one of my problems is that I was born in the wrong century. My sense of honor and duty make me want to be a knight errant with no one worth saving and my wish to explore was more for the age of discovery than the modern world.
I want to go to Mars even though I am well passed my prime and if I can’t go myself I want to see people go to other worlds. That is what first attracted me to sci fi, I could explore the universe that I could see with my telescope with my mind if not in body. It frustrates me that so few people see the need to do this to explore space for the sear joy of exploration and discovery.
I truly believe that man will slowly die if we stop our drive to see what is out beyond the horizon. I know many people think this is a waste but I do not, it is one of the things that make use more than smart monkeys. If we do not explore space, colonize space we as a species will slowly die, we will have come to a dead end. Man will not continue to evolve if we just sit and wait for the Sun to burnout.
27 December 2008
12 min 13 sec
Well there's certainly no argument from me, but you're laboring under the impression that NASA is supposed to be exploring space. Clearly it isn't. It's job is to control and limit access to space, in exchange for it's continued existence as a political football.
The Imperial Dynasty in Japan has lasted 3000 years. Why? Because the Emperor is powerful? No. Most emperors have had little or no power. Rather, the dynasty survives because it's a symbol that's been passed back and forth between the factions that rule their society. The emperor doesn't rule any more than the Great Mace of Parliament rules the UK, but whomever owns the Emperor (Like a bird in a cage) rules Japan. Well, they did until 1945, anyway.
NASA is something like that: As long as they do their crappy job and don't make a fuss, they're alowed to continue. If they actually tried to do something more ambitious, they'd be shut down and replaced by an identical, but even more tractable agency. And if any one else says "We need thus and so," Congress simply says, "Why? We've got NASA for that..."
27 June 2009
6 min 21 sec
NASA has become just a pork generating agency, sure it has done some good science but the projects that get funded are all in what ever state has the most juice at the time. You will notice the last few unmanned missions were not run out of JPL the people with the most experience in unmanned exploration.
Because of the way it is funded NASA has become a political football. The Pentagon is funded with five year and ten plans so force levels do jump around like they did in the 70’s. NASA has to every year convince congress that not only new projects should be funded but on going projects are constantly being started stopped and started again. I know of a space probe in storage in Utah that just before its launch congress decided to defund it. The instrument on the Indian moon probe that discovered water was an instrument that was to be used on a NASA project that got killed. There is no logic to they way we explore space it is all determined by politics not science and it wastes tons of money.
The Air force not having a separate space program has hurt our space efforts and not saved one penny. Having to rely on the same boosters and the Shuttle has caused many problems for all the other space using agencies. (USAF, USN, NOAA, NRO). I think what we really need is get rid of NASA and reconfigure how we do space flight both manned and unmanned if we want to be serious about it. Just the military and civilian need of satellites means we can not get out of the space business, so why let an agency that has increased the cost of space instead of decreasing it should stay the primary agency for determining launch vehicles is beyond me.