Cosmos 1 Solar Sail set for launch
Cosmos 1, the world's first solar sail, is set to launch within minutes (as in, from
now) from a Russian nuclear submarine in the Barents
Sea. The spacecraft, which was developed by a private
US-Russian consortium spearheaded by the Planetary Society, will be shot into orbit aboard a
converted intercontinental ballistic missile, after which it will unfurl eight
ultra-thin, 14 meter long triangular sails and begin its orbit around the Earth. If all goes as planned, the
craft should be visible with the naked eye from the ground. We're still trying to figure out what it's going to, um,
do.
[Via The Australian]
Filed under: Misc. Gadgets
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Smgfan @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Oh, it's for traveling to the stars...
tips @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
It's going to orbit the earth, cranking...
http://www.reallyrics.com/lyrics/C005300010028.asp
Chris @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
It's going to prove the viability of solar sails as primary method of propulsion for a spacecraft. ;)
Brian @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
what, now flying in space and being awesome isn't enough? for shame.
Bollocks Mate @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
....
THIS IS THE BIGGEST WASTE OF MONEY EVER INVENTED!
Why do we need to do this sort of shite? What a load of bollocks.
All that money and time wasted thinking about some poxy place out there in space where we have no way of ever doing anything about.
All that money and time that could used here to feed the hungry, fix the roads, figure out what to do with our garbage.
In fact, they should use the space technology to jettison our trash in to the galaxy. Of course, knowing our rotten human luck and stupidity, some alien cunt is going to fling that nice bag full of rubbish right back to us and cause a meteor-like impact on Earth and we're fucked anyways........
Hahahahahaha.......!
Andrew @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Not that I really want to respond to the pseudo British lager rant above, but I just have to say: why is it when people complain about wasting money on space instead of giving it to the poor people/chipmunks/whales etc. they never complain about wasting money on videogames or cell phones, or nuclear weapons or agricultural subsidies - many things which are not as cool as going into the great black yonder (okay, video cames and cell phones are still pretty cool)?
Why is that, huh? Why oh why? And when can I go to Mars?
Jake T @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
If we sent all are garbage into space we'd run out of garbage... what do you think that garbage is made out of? STUFF! Garbage is made out of stuff and stuff is what our planet needs more of.
Spike_J_Wolfwood @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
I think that this is an very important event. If successful it opens the doors for more cost efficient space travel since once it's launched it requires little fuel. Who knows, this may be the best way to eventually launch a Dyson Swarm project within the next century or so.
macxprt @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Can't we just jettison our garbage into low orbit and let it burn up on reentry?? It would solve the issue of space debris from garbage launching and it would make for some awesome fireworks all year long!
popeye @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
I'll second that emotion #6, #5 is total cobblers. All the money spent on football and other sport is certainly 'well' spent, right then? All that piss you swill and the destruction that you lay waste to with your hoopty ride under the influence could be better spent on the poor et al. wanker.
Rob @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Believe it or not, it's actually potentially possible for space to be profitable; it just needs a sufficiently large investment. The moon has lots of Helium-3, for instance, which would make nuclear fusion much easier.
s-hit @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
watch were going to waste all our mony on shitty things and will ind up hitting a comet at us and when we do have the tech to stop it we cant, were out of money! son ov a b_________
furtim @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Well, not to mention that throwing money at the world's problems isn't really going to solve them anyway. The real problem is that all the money that's already being thrown at the world's problems is mostly tied up in middlemen who are either incompetent or corrupt. And that's not even counting the *legitimate* administrative costs is solving the world's problems. Unfortunately, as the astute Captain Malcolm Reynolds once noted, half the human population is middlemen, and they don't take kindly to being eliminated.
The double tragedy here is that the same middlemen are also keeping us from doing anything cool with the money we earmarked for space.
wxrman @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Guess they lost it...
Latest reports state over 2 hours of "dead air"
boe @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
This could be used for sat technology - phones, TV, weather.
As for launching are garbage into space, what the hell are poor people going to pick through if we get rid of that? Think before you say such callous things!
Chris @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
As for launching trash into space, do you know how many tons of garbage that is? It costs in the range of $10,000 per pound to lauch.. Think about that.
Cuba @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
You can't send garbage into space unless you are replacing it with something else from space with an equal mass. If you didn't, eventually it would change the Earth's mass.
That would be bad.
Jazzay @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
o see you didnt get the memo, we can do whatever we want to the earths resources and it wont affect us one bit!
o wait, thats not right...
James @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
The earth needs to lose weight. Lets start by getting rid of Texas.
uclatommy @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
LOL launching trash into space and letting it burn up on re-entry. I laughed hard.. Thanks for that comment. Anyways, it would cost too much to send that much weight up into space. Its cheaper just to burn it on the ground.. A better solution would be to find a way to turn all that decomposing garbage into fuel.
And that comment about wasting money, it sounds like this was a privately funded project so it seems they didnt use any of your money. But I agree somewhat that some space projects were too expensive and the benefits from those projects may not have been worth it. But in general, furthering human knowledge is usually not a waste of money.
Kenneth @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
#17 - please tell me you were joking! lololololol
Bollocks Mate @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
..... I'll jettisoned the lot of you if I can help it.......
What? Huh? Oh......
So you want to leave this planet that badly, eh?
Well I hope they work out some way to take you all up there sooner than later.
And then when all of you geeks are up there freezing your arses off gazing at frozen space, there'll be plenty of girls down here who'll get lonely and want to jive with the rest of the remaining men on Earth..... and I'll be here to feast! Hahahahaha.......
So yeah go, man, go, we don't need you - the Earth would be a better place with you lot gone - no one will miss ya - we're all going to say "What a bunch of stupid gullible tarts for wanting to go up there where there is nothing!"
Will @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
lol this thread cracks me up...you people are funny.
I hope I can get off this rock before you ignorant b*stards turn it into one big toilet.
Xaos @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Well, looks like this indeed was a waste of money...
'MOSCOW - The Russian space agency on Wednesday said the attempt to launch a solar sail space vehicle was not successful because the booster rocket's engine failed 'soon after it blasted into space.
The booster failed 83 seconds after its launch from a Russian nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea, the space agency said.
Its spokesman, Vyacheslav Davidenko, said that "the booster's failure means that the solar sail vehicle was lost."
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050622/ap_on_sc/solar_sail;_ylt=AgzL9E1mz4OdrGCKF752omIPLBIF;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl
RobERT @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Thank you Russians. No wonder they lost the Cold War.....
W.ll.am @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Because one spacecraft failed the Russians suck? How many american launches have failed with dire consequences?
The space shuttle is the biggest waste of money in any space program. Old style rockets put satellites up in orbit for cheaper and with better consistency than the space shuttles.
pacey @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Old style rockets can put satellites up cheaper, but there has to be a way to maintain the satelites when once they are up. Until the satelites that can fix other satelites are perfected, we still need something like the space shuttle. Also, if we plan on doing anything manned we need a shuttle like vehicle to get us into space.
Bollocks Mate @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
FAILED!
FAILED!
FAILED!
What a waste of money!
http://planetary.org/solarsail/latest_update.html
FAILED!
FAILED!
FAILED!
Andrew @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Alas, bollocks, your plan to get all the guys to leave earth so you might get laid at last will have to wait a little longer...
benhc911 @ Dec 19th 2005 2:14AM
Russia lost the cold war? wtf!!?? If Russia lost, so did the States, they bost wasted tons of money intimidating each other, no one really died, except for some spies maybe. lost my ass.