Yep,

Its true:

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011...tation-in-2020/

J

And it's coming from FOX news so you know it's true

__________________
Bob Harrington
NAR #62740 L1
AMA #46042
CMASS & RIMRA Member

It will be 30 years old by then. What's the useful life of an orbital space station?

And other nations contributed to the ISS - it was not a US-only endeavour...

__________________
Kevin Drayson

CAR S369 L4 RSO
TRA L3 09738
NAR 90969

I miss Bat-Boy.

__________________
-Fred Shecter NAR 20117 (L2)
Southern California Rocket Association, NAR Section 430

Take the US out of the equation and there would never have been an ISS. Take out any other single country and we'd still have the ISS, with maybe the exception of Russia. With no ISS, MIR would probably have been used until it killed somebody.

__________________
I love sanding.

This was announced almost 2 years ago by NASA (not Fox, bat boy or even conhetro-negro).

This is real. This is planned. You know why? There is no budget to do otherwise.

Russia needs our cash and has no funds to overcome our country's incoherence to station.

Station was always a boondoggle. But, it is OUR boondoggle. Want to save station? Simply propose a way to keep it orbiting with a minimal staff or better yet NO STAFF until our current budget debacle passes in 4-6 years.

Nuc-u-lar propulsion as an option?

Stop sanding and launch rockets!

Just Jerry

The ISS is in a crappy high inclination orbit that is not really useful as a way station for lunar and planetary flights. I wish we had done it ourselves and put it in a more equatorial orbit. Thanks Klintoon......

NO THANKS ON SEVERAL LAYERS: Defense, space, globalization, immigration, drug legalization, regulation, teaching our school children to understand and seek oral sex, more . . .

Good news: Clinton Gingrich Dole tax rate decreases and revenue increases and budget balance MOMENTARILY.

In an era of massive unfunded mandates (medical entitlements) out the a$$.

Jerry

....along with the huge dot-com (.com) boom.

__________________
I love sanding.

Maybe the VASIMIR microwave/plasma propulsion engines that NASA is planning to test aboard the ISS for station-keeping could be used to slowly change the plane of its orbit to a more "KSC-friendly" 28.4 degree orbital inclination? If that could be done (it likely could, although the quantity of VASIMIR engine propellant that the plane change would require would probably be a bit "hefty"), the Russians could still (technically) launch Soyuz and Progress vehicles to the ISS's new orbit (probably with heavier payloads, too) from the new equatorial Soyuz launch complex that was recently completed at Kourou, French Guiana. Also:

Whether such a change would be politically palatable to the Russians is another story. In addition, they probably wouldn't like having to create new Soyuz and Progress spacecraft preparation facilities at Kourou. As an alternative, maybe we could pay the Russians for their modules that form parts of the station? If the deal also involved paying them enough to build and launch a basic Salyut/Mir core module of their own, maybe they would go for it?

__________________
Black Shire--Draft horse in human form, model rocketeer, occasional mystic, and writer, see:
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperba...an-form/8075185
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6122050
http://www.lulu.com/product/cd/what...of-2%29/6126511
All of my book proceeds go to the Northcote Heavy Horse Centre www.northcotehorses.com.
NAR #54895 SR