

Posted: 1/23/2023 8:20:14 PM EST
[Last Edit: MrGoodkat]
Early in the program, the United States was publicly telling the world that the shuttle would reduce the cost of space travel, but the soviets could see that this was clearly bullshit and that it would ultimately be more expensive than rockets. Because of this, the soviets were convinced that the shuttle was actually being built for military purposes. The main reason was that the shuttle was able to land with it's full payload capacity. In other words, it was able to bring cargo both to and from space. The soviets believed that it's real purpose was to bring weapons such as lasers into space, test them, and return them to earth. They thought that the shuttle would be able to intercept soviet spy satellites and bring them back to earth. I did not know it was able to land with a payload. This actually makes a lot of sense to me. Do you think this was the true reason it was built?
Obviously the Buran was built to counter this perceived military threat. What do you think? ![]() Did The Soviets Build A Better Space Shuttle? The Buran Story ETA: This channel is great by the way. His videos are incredibly professionally done and very educational. |
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"The Freedoms and Liberties you have exercised and enjoyed all these years were not given, but were secured by blood. Once given away, it will take blood once again to re-secure them." -Rob Schneider
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The Space Shuttle swamp was far, far too big to hide an ulterior motive like that.
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if buran was so good why didn't it get sold by a oligarch? China might find something like that useful.
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Take it easy and if it's easy take it twice
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"This Video Caused An International Incident! ( Spaceship Discovery )"
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The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe.
The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. |
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Avatar stolen from Ranger Up.
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New a couple guys that worked at the cape building the original space shuttle. Neither one of them believed it would survive it's first mission
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I think the commies watched Moonraker a few too many times.
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100%-PureBlood-100%
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There was a long duration exposure satellite that had many different types of materials on it designed to catalog orbital debris impacts. It damn near filled up the shuttle's payload bay. The intent was to bring it home for study. So I guess I always assumed that was the case.
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Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. View Quote Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. |
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"The Freedoms and Liberties you have exercised and enjoyed all these years were not given, but were secured by blood. Once given away, it will take blood once again to re-secure them." -Rob Schneider
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. It’s pretty much that simple. |
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The thing I find myself saying about The Shuttle a lot lately.
It was intended when they were designing the thing that it would be flown once a week. The Shuttle never came anywhere near that cadence. Falcon 9 roughly achieved that cadence last year. Lessons learned I suppose... |
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Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: It’s pretty much that simple. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. It’s pretty much that simple. If it were obvious to the soviets from the beginning of the US shuttle program (or at least early on in the program) as the video claims, why wouldn't it be obvious to us? |
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"The Freedoms and Liberties you have exercised and enjoyed all these years were not given, but were secured by blood. Once given away, it will take blood once again to re-secure them." -Rob Schneider
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Originally Posted By Hesperus: The thing I find myself saying about The Shuttle a lot lately. It was intended when they were designing the thing that it would be flown once a week. The Shuttle never came anywhere near that cadence. Falcon 9 roughly achieved that cadence last year. Lessons learned I suppose... View Quote The video also makes note of that. He claims the soviets knew that the US would not launch at that frequency so that also led them to believe it had military reasoning behind it. There apparently was also supposed to be a second launch site in California planned that would put the shuttle over the populated cities in the USSR within one earth orbit and therefore able to deliver nuclear weapons faster than Russia's nuclear strike capabilities. At least that what the video says. |
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"The Freedoms and Liberties you have exercised and enjoyed all these years were not given, but were secured by blood. Once given away, it will take blood once again to re-secure them." -Rob Schneider
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: If it were obvious to the soviets from the beginning of the US shuttle program (or at least early on in the program) as the video claims, why wouldn't it be obvious to us? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. It’s pretty much that simple. If it were obvious to the soviets from the beginning of the US shuttle program (or at least early on in the program) as the video claims, why wouldn't it be obvious to us? Soviets didn’t have the cash flow to keep pumping into it. It flew once. If it were obvious that it’s not viable, they wouldn’t have built one. |
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Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. View Quote Simple sounds true. |
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Live your life as you would wish to have lived, when you come to die. Confucius
When words lose their meaning, a people can move neither hand nor foot. Confucius |
Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. View Quote Terrible cost analysis and budget overruns? That sounds very likely. The space shuttle was supposed to be great, but it ended up holding us back for decades. |
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Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Soviets didn’t have the cash flow to keep pumping into it. It flew once. If it were obvious that it’s not viable, they wouldn’t have built one. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. It’s pretty much that simple. If it were obvious to the soviets from the beginning of the US shuttle program (or at least early on in the program) as the video claims, why wouldn't it be obvious to us? Soviets didn’t have the cash flow to keep pumping into it. It flew once. If it were obvious that it’s not viable, they wouldn’t have built one. Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? |
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"The Freedoms and Liberties you have exercised and enjoyed all these years were not given, but were secured by blood. Once given away, it will take blood once again to re-secure them." -Rob Schneider
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The shuttle was supposed to be a little different and cheaper but the Air Force wanted to do [CLASSIFIED] stuff with it
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? View Quote It could be many things. Maybe we knew the costs but kept writing the checks until it was too late for anything but to proceed forward. Our government has shown precedence of doing that with many projects, after all. Maybe Russia was just posturing and was as paranoid as ever. It was the Cold War after all, both sides were assuming everything had to be weaponized in one way or another. |
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One of the big advertisements for the shuttle was the ability to supposedly bring satellites back down for repair and reuse. It was designed to accommodate the largest satellites on the drawing boards at the time.
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http://www.guntechtips.com
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. There were many ideas and plans, most of them were never pursued. Maintenance of spy satellites alone was enough to justify its budget. |
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? View Quote View All Quotes View All Quotes Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. Yes, that is what google says. But, that doesn't explain anything. If the US was saying reusable craft would be cheaper and the soviets could clearly see that they would be more expensive, what is our reasoning for pursuing reusable craft? Maybe it is as simple as terrible up front cost analysis and budget overruns. Or maybe it's not. It’s pretty much that simple. If it were obvious to the soviets from the beginning of the US shuttle program (or at least early on in the program) as the video claims, why wouldn't it be obvious to us? Soviets didn’t have the cash flow to keep pumping into it. It flew once. If it were obvious that it’s not viable, they wouldn’t have built one. Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? I guess I can only speculate. I suspect the optimists within the bloated Shuttle program believed that with enough volume, costs would come down per launch. |
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This message is brought to you by the number e, whose exponential function is the derivative of itself.
If you’re not on an ATF list, you’re not trying hard enough. |
White privilege = being held responsible for the acts of your ancestors by blacks who accept no responsibility for the acts of their children.
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http://www.guntechtips.com
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? View Quote Lies that Congress wanted to believe. The Apollo program also claimed that they would reduce the cost of payload to $10,000/lb. The exact same number claimed for the Shuttle and again for the Venture Star. Pure speculation. |
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Originally Posted By Southernman077: Too bad the roof fell on Russia's version. https://www.buran.fr/bourane-buran/img/hangar12-grand.jpg View Quote They really don't care about preserving stuff like we do. I did enjoy my time at the Kennedy Space Center, even if the rest of the family wasn't as amused at looking at old rockets. |
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Some shuttle missions and payloads are still classified so they probably were not completely wrong.
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Originally Posted By TacticalGarand44: I guess I can only speculate. I suspect the optimists within the bloated Shuttle program believed that with enough volume, costs would come down per launch. View Quote Studies said yes, with a high-enough flight rate, even STS would become relatively cheap. It was the fixed facility and personnel costs that mostly made the shuttle so expensive. You need to divide those over a high flight rate to justify them. You could have thrown away the ET and used the SRBs and still have greatly reduced the cost if you could have flown enough. The problem is the shuttle design as executed was insufficiently operationally robust to meet that flight rate even if it had the payloads to justify the launches. And since you couldn't fly it unmanned, you can't work the bugs out without killing crews. |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: The video also makes note of that. He claims the soviets knew that the US would not launch at that frequency so that also led them to believe it had military reasoning behind it. There apparently was also supposed to be a second launch site in California planned that would put the shuttle over the populated cities in the USSR within one earth orbit and therefore able to deliver nuclear weapons faster than Russia's nuclear strike capabilities. At least that what the video says. View Quote They built that second launch site at Vandenberg at great expense. Shuttle never launched out of there. SpaceX is launching literal metric tons of stuff out of Vandenberg these days. |
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Originally Posted By ParityError: The shuttle was able to land with its full payload aboard because the pre-orbit emergency plans involved returning to earth either by gliding back to the launch site or over to Europe. The doors couldn’t be opened in the atmosphere, so they would have had to carry their payload back with them. View Quote Beat me to it. Without any kind of payload separation or crew ejection, a mid-launch abort means landing with full payload and fuel. |
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The shuttle program was largely funded by the USAF/CIA to repair/retrieve our spy satellites. The bay of the shuttle and the CANADA arm was sized and built for that task. Space exploration/experimentation was NASA's side of the equation. They knew from the beginning it wasnt going to save money.
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It's a big club, and you ain't in it
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Originally Posted By MrGoodkat: Sorry...I'm not talking about the Buran. The video claims that early on in the US Space Shuttle program, it was obvious the the soviets that the US shuttle would be more expensive per launch than rockets...but the US was saying the opposite. This led them to believe it's true motives were military in nature. I'm asking how the Russians could see this discrepancy in our claims of cost, but we could not? View Quote Because it was designed to be a grift machine, just like everything else the government did after the 60s. We knew it. But saving money doesn't fill the offshore bank accounts of all involved in the project |
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Not Shuttle, but a craft that used some Shuttle tech.
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Originally Posted By Hesperus: Not Shuttle, but a craft that used some Shuttle tech. ![]() ![]() View Quote That's what became of the Vandy Shuttle Pad. |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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Let me put my way back hat on and get all the important facts wrong.
The USAF had decided to provide additional money to NASA if they flew a design based on the lifting body. So what was learned on the X-20 Dyna-Soar (flown by the 6 million dollar man) was used for the shuttle. This allowed the design of the X-37B - or what I think as the mini-shuttle. The Buran was a failed copy of the shuttle; and my guess unless you are lifting a crazy amount of stuff to orbit on that beast would cost too much to sustain. |
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The last thing a tyrant wants is their ideas to be judged on the battle field of truth and justice.
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Trying to read some of the spelling in this thread is like
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Originally Posted By bradbn4: Let me put my way back hat on and get all the important facts wrong. The USAF had decided to provide additional money to NASA if they flew a design based on the lifting body. So what was learned on the X-20 Dyna-Soar (flown by the 6 million dollar man) was used for the shuttle. This allowed the design of the X-37B - or what I think as the mini-shuttle. The Buran was a failed copy of the shuttle; and my guess unless you are lifting a crazy amount of stuff to orbit on that beast would cost too much to sustain. View Quote Not the X-20 |
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The fucking soviets put a 23mm cannon in one of their manned spy satellites.
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“The undeserving maintain power by promoting hysteria.”
—Frank Herbert |
Part of the reqs for the shuttle program and the reason it has such a large payload and giant fucking wings was specifically to steal soviet satellites and land with them in a single orbit so the soviets wouldnt even know it happened.
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Originally Posted By Obo2: Part of the reqs for the shuttle program and the reason it has such a large payload and giant fucking wings was specifically to steal soviet satellites and land with them in a single orbit so the soviets wouldnt even know it happened. View Quote How the hell do you secure it in one orbit? It's not designed to interface with the locks in the payload bay! What if they start putting self-destructs onboard? It usually took several orbits to secure something actually DESIGNED to be carried by the shuttle. I have always thought that one to be more rumor than truth. |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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They were going to steal a malfunctioning Soviet space station. It got called off, but they were ready to go. I think the Soviets actually go wind of it.
Nude photos of Hillary Clinton -or- the shuttle article, take a chance? |
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THIS SPACE FOR RENT
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Originally Posted By HeavyMetal: How the hell do you secure it in one orbit? What if they start putting self-destructs onboard? I have always thought that one to be more rumor than truth. View Quote Adjusting to the orbit of an existing satellite isn't hard, if that's what you are asking. They repaired the Hubble a few times with the shuttle and it wouldn't have been that complicated to take the satellite down with them if they really needed to. |
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Originally Posted By HeavyMetal: How the hell do you secure it in one orbit? It's not designed to interface with the locks in the payload bay! What if they start putting self-destructs onboard? It usually took several orbits to secure something actually DESIGNED to be carried by the shuttle. I have always thought that one to be more rumor than truth. View Quote I wont claim to have thoroughly researched it but I'll say that scott manley tends to research his videos pretty well and that is where i got it from. Pretty sure it was this vid ![]() Failed To Load Title |
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Originally Posted By Pallas: They were going to steal a malfunctioning Soviet space station. It got called off, but they were ready to go. I think the Soviets actually go wind of it. Nude photos of Hillary Clinton -or- the shuttle article, take a chance? View Quote You should have read down to the bottom of Hillary's tits... |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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Originally Posted By Ayada: Adjusting to the orbit of an existing satellite isn't hard, if that's what you are asking. They repaired the Hubble a few times with the shuttle and it wouldn't have been that complicated to take the satellite down with them if they really needed to. View Quote How do you secure the load inside the cargo bay? You have to know the exact dimensions and for something that large, you have to have interfaces designed to secure it to the payload bay. You can't just leave it laying loose because the doors close. You have to remove the solar arrays, the antennas and have a way to attach the remote manipulator arm too. It's fantasy. Might be barely possible with the cooperation of the Soviets and significant preparation. Likely take two flights at least including one to prep the station. |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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Originally Posted By Obo2: I wont claim to have thoroughly researched it but I'll say that scott manley tends to research his videos pretty well and that is where i got it from. Pretty sure it was this vid ![]() View Quote Ok so watching again it wasnt necessarily to recover a soviet craft but a craft in a single orbit without the soviets knowing. |
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Originally Posted By Obo2: I wont claim to have thoroughly researched it but I'll say that scott manley tends to research his videos pretty well and that is where i got it from. Pretty sure it was this vid ![]() View Quote That's not talking about stealing soviet shit in less than one orbit. Did you actually watch it to the end? |
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Preferred Pronoun: Space Lord Mutherfucker
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