SPACE

[SimonB]

Don't forget In The Shadow Of The Moon tonight at 8 on Channel 4.

[PVB]

Don't forget In The Shadow Of The Moon tonight at 8 on Channel 4.

Ta for the heads up. I have it on DVD, but will watch it on Channel 4 HD anyway.

[zip accident]

I don't believe any form of sub-c travel is really feasible for interstellar flight - I mean, even assuming a pretty unlikely 0.1c, we're into transit times measured in thousands of years (using my previous guess of two to three orders of magnitude closer than the nearest star for habitability).

Well, that depends on needing earthlike planets. If our descendents (ha!) can happily live in zero g habitats, then all you need a star for is heating, and mineral resources. If you can get by without the heating, then you don't need to come further in than the equivalent of the Oort/pluto in the Solar system. There are billions of years left in the universe, if we get into space in reasonable numbers, then somebody, sometime, is going to go travelling.

If there are travellers in the Oort, they ought to have noticed us by now, so I suspect there aren't.

[Dio]

I think you're totally bonkers .

[zip accident]

I think you're totally bonkers .

[Darkflame]

Youd certainly need heat/energy in some way.
So it would be more a star-hopping probability then planet-hopping.

That said, does Alpha Proxima have a planet?
(don't have Celestia on this pc to check)

Well, you can pretty easily work out if that's feasible or not now (assuming our figures for the density are right).

Well, it needs to be captured and converted to energy.
So I guess the question is if the "capture" process is more costly then the theoretical energy you can get from it.
It wouldn't do as the primary source of movement, but if your getting to such a speed were the dust becomes a problem, then presumably thats also enough hitting your ship to harvest it without too much effort.

I don't think we can make assumptions that density is uniform or the same stuff yet either. (well, obviously its not uniform over the whole universe, but on the ""small"" scale). I think humanity would need probably a few millenniums of stela travel before and probes before we get anything inter-stela.

Well, I don't really believe in it myself, generating the magnetic fields may be forever beyond practicality, but:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bussard_ramjet

Neat idea, but does indeed seem implausible.

[zip accident]

That said, does Alpha Proxima have a planet?

You mean Proxima Centauri I think.

[PVB]

If you can't wait until the Shuttle launch then you can watch another Ariane 5 launch tonight.

http://www.arianespace.com and http://www.videocorner.tv/index.php?langue=en

May 30, 2008.

Arianespace postpones the Ariane 5 launch with Skynet 5C and Turksat 3A

Tonight's heavy-lift mission with Skynet 5C and Turksat 3A has been postponed after a software test with the Ariane 5 ECA launch vehicle showed a non-nominal result.

The decision was taken by Arianespace to ensure a thorough validation before it approves the launch.

Both the Ariane 5 and its Skynet 5C and Turksat 3A payloads are in a safe condition.

Arianespace will announce the new mission date as soon as possible.

[axel000]

STS-124 crew is in transit to the launch pad right now, on nasatv

[TFO]

STS-124 crew is in transit to the launch pad right now, on nasatv

Not exactly riveting right now...

"And what are they doing?"
"Well, Number 5 on your screen is checking the seal...and Number 6 is....um....checking the seal."

[the seal is good ladies and gentlemen - the seal is good]

[TFO]

Just over 10 minutes to launch...

[PVB]

Just over 10 minutes to launch...

Launch in 53 minutes according to NASA:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shutt ... index.html

Edit: The "T-Minus ten minutes...." is just the countdown to a countdown 'stage'.

http://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/laun ... wn101.html

[TFO]

Edit: The "T-Minus ten minutes...." is just the countdown to a countdown 'stage'.

http://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/laun ... wn101.html

Bollocks.
I'm sat here getting excited about a secondary countdown.

[PVB]

Edit: The "T-Minus ten minutes...." is just the countdown to a countdown 'stage'.

http://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/laun ... wn101.html

Bollocks.
I'm sat here getting excited about a secondary countdown.

Just under 38 minutes to go.

[PVB]

Not long to go now.