Comments on the Route to Orbital Space Colonization

Comments on the Route to Orbital Space Colonization: (My message # 16. I have also put more than twenty messages on my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )
by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson, June 19, 2006
* October 1957: It is hard to believe, but (instead of the advanced United States) it was the backward Soviet Union, under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, which began the space age by using the Soviet R-7 rocket to put Sputnik 1, a small human-made satellite that went beep, into orbit around the Earth. Thus the Soviet Union beat out the much more advanced United States, a sleeping giant, and started the Space Race. Some, but not all, of the people of Spaceship Earth were awakened by this amazing event. Humans now had the ability to put objects into space. It is amazing that the thinking of American leaders had not led to Americans leading civilization into the Space Age. Something apparantly was wrong with American leadership and is wrong with the thinking of Americans that caused them not to lead in the conquest of space.

*October 1958: The U.S. Congress approves the formation of the National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA),( a bureaucracy that would build boredom.)

* September 1959: The Soviet Union purposely crashed its Luna 2 space probe onto the surface of the Moon. (Another waste, but it proved that humans now had gained the ability to send things to the Moon.)

* October 1959: the out-of-balance Soviet Union, under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, uses Luna 3, a space probe to take the first photos of the far side of the Moon, again beating out the technologically advanced United States. Thus, for the first time, humans saw images of the far side of our Moon. (Through the competition of the good Space Race, human knowledge was increasing, and by sending robotic things into space we humans got knowledge that humans could not get without the machines.)

* April 1960: Tiros, a weather satellite, is put into orbit around the Earth to begin observing weather on Spaceship Earth. (Robotic probes can increase human knowledge. The jobs of some space colonists might be to service and repair in orbit the weather satellites and other robotic spacecrafts.)

* April 1961: the economically crippled Soviet Union, under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev, orbits Yurii Gagarin, the first man in orbital space. (Another tremendous achievement for the Soviet Union in the good Space Race with the United States (still trying to catch up.) With the first man in space, the Soviet Union demonstrated that humans in spacecrafts can survive in the vacuum of space for short periods of time.)

* May 1961: President John Kennedy makes the wonderful announcement that we will send a man to the Moon and bring him back safely before the end of 1960's. (Humans tend to like exciting missions that will increase their abilities and the frontiers of civilization and knowledge. The mission of the orbital space colonists, using the power of the competitive free market, will be to demonstrate that humans can build small, privately owned settlements in orbital space , some of which will grow into great, civilized, orbiting cities.)

* July 1962: Telstar I, a television satellite, is placed in space so that television broadcasts can be sent between Europe and the United States. (Progress is being made. Some of the orbital space colonists will be employed servicing and expanding the television and communication system in orbital space so that the people of our Spaceship Earth will come to think of themselves first as Earthlings and only secondarily as local nationalities, just as the people of the original 13 colonies gradually came to think of themselves as Americans first and as residents of their current state secondly.)

* December 1962: Mariner II, a space probe flys by Planet Venus. Now we know that humans can send things into space, can send things to the Moon, and can send things to Planet Venus. (More progress being made ! )

* June 1963: The backward Soviet Union sends the first woman, Valentina Tereshkova, into orbit. (Good news because space colonization can't really happen without women. In healthy, orbital space colonies, I recommend that the ratio of men and women should be about equal.)

* March 1965: A Soviet cosmonaut does the first space walk in orbital space. (Many space walks will be necessary in the building of the coming orbital space colonies. Cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov demonstrated that humans can live in a spacesuit in the vacuum of space.)

* April 1965: Early Bird, Intelsat I, becomes the first commercial communication satellite in orbit. It is put into a geosynchronous orbit about 22,000 miles (?) above Spaceship Earth so that it orbits the Earth at the same speed that the Earth turns. Thus Early Bird hovers above the same area of Spaceship Earth. (Much more free enterprise is needed in orbital space. After the governments establish the first competitive, free enterprise colonies with the purpose of learning how to live and thrive in the orbital space, competitive free enterprise with private ownership will become the main foundation of the coming and growing, orbital space colonies.)

* July 1965: Space probe Mariner IV takes close up photos of Mars, proving humans can send things to Mars, (another triumph. This means it will be possible to establish space stations with supplies and later space colonies in orbit around Mars, and it will be much cheaper to go to a space station that has supplies than to go to Mars and then go down to the surface of Mars. It will be good to establish space stations located so that it is easy and cheap to visit the two small moons of Mars, which have very weak gravity wells and are thus a good souce of building materials.)

* February 1966: Luna 9, a soviet Moon probe, bounces down unto the Moon and takes pictures of the lunar surface.

* March 1966: Neil Armstrong and Dave Scott dock two spacecraft in Earth orbit. (In the coming orbital space colonies much docking and re-arranging of the privately owned space habitats and privately owned spacecraft will be needed.)

* April 1966: The Soviet Union's space probe Luna 10 uses rocket braking to slow down enough to go into orbit around the Moon. (In the coming orbital space colonies, the space habitats and the space crafts will be able to use rocket power to alter their orbits and re-arrange the configuration of the individual space colonies.)

* September 1968: The Soviet Union's Zond 5 orbits the Moon.

* December 1968: Astronauts Bill Anders, Jim Lovell, and Frank Borman in Apollo 8 are the first humans to orbit the Moon. They orbit ten times. (The United States is improving in its space capabilities.)

* July 20, 1969: US Apollo 11 Astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin are the first humans to step onto the Moon, while Michael Collins orbits overhead all alone in Moon orbit. (A huge triumph for the technologIcally advanced United States. We Americans are beginning to have abilities in space..)

* December 1970: The Soviet Union lands its probe Venera 7 by parachute onto the surface of hot, hot Planet Venus. (Using Sunshine reflectors and other shielding and cooling devices, it should be possible to put a spacestation in orbit around Venus, where there is a huge abundance of orbital solar power.)

* April 1971: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 1 into orbit around our Planet Earth. ( A poor translation that is easy to remember could be "firework salute 1.) Spacecraft Salyut 1 orbited our Planet Earth for about half a year.

* October 1971: Because of the Soviet failure to boost Spacecraft Salyut 1 to a higher orbit, Spacecraft Salyut 1 fell back to Earth. ( his type of destruction is common and is bad for the advancement of orbital colonization. It is expensive to transfer stuff from Earth to space. To advance the colonization of space, we humans need spacecraft and stuff and garbage kept in orbit for re-cycling and re-use.)

* May 1973: The United States used its last heavy lift Saturn V Rocket to launch Skylab, its first marvelous and roomy work shop space station into low Earth orbit, (but later American high-ranking vandals would ignorantly destroy it in July 1979. Also it is sad that American leaders decided to shut down our successful Saturn V heavy lift rocket which could advanced us rapidily as Spaceship Earth's leading nation in the colonization of our solar system. Because of this error, we still in 2006 haven't started the orbital space colonization that we could have started back in the Twentieth Century. We were successful in going to the Moon, and then we had a failure in American leadership that lead the American space program into great waste and sleep.) Skylab orbited our Planet Earth roughly about every hour and a half at a low orbital altitude of roughly about 430 kilometers ( or roughly about 260 miles.)

* December 1973: The United States' space probe Pioneer 10 enters the Jovian mini solar system and takes photos of Planet Jupiter and some of its moons. (It would be good to add orbital space colonies to Jupiter's system of moons. If we had kept our Saturn V heavy lift rockets, seeding our solar system with space stations and then colonies wouldn't be so difficult. Without heavy lift rockets, space colonization is more difficult.)

* February 1974: Unhappily for orbital space colonization, space station workshop Skylab was shut down, but happily it was left in low Earth orbit. Skylab's orbit had been roughly about 430 kilometers (roughly 260 miles) above the surface of the Earth, but because of drag from the slight presence of atmospheric air molecules, the altitude of Skylab would decrease slowly over time. Unhappily, the plans to put a propulsion unit on Skylab and boost it to higher orbit was not done by the foolish American leaders.

* June 1974: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 3 into orbit around our Planet Earth. It was in orbit for about 7 months.

* December 1974: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 4 into orbit around our Planet Earth. Salyut 4 orbited our Planet Earth for about 2 years and 1 month.

* January 1975: Spacecraft Salyut 3 instead of being boosted to a higher orbit falls back to Earth. (Waste is common in governmental programs.)

* July 1975: In Earth orbit, the American Apollo spacecraft links up with the Soviet Union's Soyuz spacecraft. (Oh, can we ever make the Klingons our friends ?)

* October 1975: From its Venera 9 space probe, the Soviet Union sends television pictures from the surface of hot, hot Venus. (A television and film industry will probably grow up in the orbiting space cities of the fantastic future.)

* June 1976: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 5 into orbit. Salyut 5 orbited our Spaceship Earth for more than one year and a month.

* July 1976: Viking 1, a probe from the United States, sends photos from the surface of Mars. (We can send things to Mars and receive communications back. It would even be possible to put a spinning space station into orbit around Mars from which a colony could grow. Orbiting a planet is easier than landing on a planet.)

* February 1977: Spacecraft Salyut 4 fell back to Earth. (Waste is common in governmental programs.)

* August 1977: Spacecraft Salyut 5 is destroyed. (Waste is common in governmental programs.)

* September 1977: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 6 into orbit. Salyut 6 orbited our Spaceship Earth for almost five years.

* July 1979: American high-ranking vandals ignorantly destroyed the marvelous space station workshop Skylab by crashing Skylab into an area of the Indian Ocean and Australia. Instead of being vandals, they could have boosted Skylab into higher orbit and then sold it to the highest bidder. (But they chose to destroy Skylab ! Oh, unhappy time for orbital space colonization.)

* September 1979: Pioneer 11, a space probe from the United States, reaches the mini-solar system of the gas giant Saturn and sends back photos of Saturn and its rings. (If we had kept our Saturn V heavy lift rockets, we could have put a spacestation in orbit around Saturn.)

* July 1982: Soviet Spacecraft Salyut 6 is destroyed. (Waste is common in governmental programs.)

* April 1982: The Soviet Union put spacecraft Salyut 7 into orbit. Salyut 7 orbited our Spaceship Earth for almost nine years.

* April 1984: Astronauts James van Hoften and George Nelson make a repair of an orbiting satellite. (There should be a lot of repair work in orbital space for the coming orbital space colonists.)

* January 1986: After a slow eight year trip in space, the space probe Voyager 2 reaches the large Planet Uranus and takes pictures of the planet and some of its moons. (This proves that we can send things to the planets of our outer solar system. In the future we can send the building blocks of orbiting space colonies to our outer planets. We could already have done so if we had not discontinued our heavy lift rockets.)

* February 1986: The troubled Soviet Union does a good thing and sends a spacecraft up out of the Earths gravity well to form the core of humanities new space station known as Mir, which word "Mir" has several meanings in English, two of which are "peace" and "world." Over the years, the Soviets would gradually send up more spacecraft to be joined to humanities' growing Mir Space Station. The Soviets used their Proton Rocket to launch one-at-a-time many of the spacecrafts that would become part of this slowly growing space station. The Mir Space Station would take about an hour and a half to orbit our Planet Earth at an altitude of about 390 kilometers (or roughly about 240 miles.) Later, this important spacestation would be destroyed in March 2001 by high ranking Russian vandals.

* March 1986: The Soviet Union sends its space probe Vega 1 to Comet Halley. (In the future, space colonists will go to comets and mine them for water and other raw materials.)

* May 1986: Two cosmonauts make transfers between the two small spacestations: Mir and Salyut 7. (Think of these two small space stations as several habitats in large, future, orbiting space cities where many transfers will be normal.)

* February 1991: Spacecraft Salyut 7 fell back to Earth. (Waste is common in governmental programs.)

* 1991: The out-of-balanced and troubled Soviet Union collapses. (With a gradual turn toward competitive, free market capitalism and local democracy the former Soviet peoples should become better able to achieve their higher potential, but the transitions turn out to be very slow and troubled. The Russians and former Soviet space facilities may have a comparative advantage in offering to launch spacecraft and habitats into orbital space for the coming space colonies of all the nations of our Spaceship Earth?)

* 1998: The construction of the International Space Station begins. Now the human race has two orbiting space stations: Space Station Mir and the International Space Station. (This is a step forward for the starting of orbital space colonization.)

* March 2001: The fabulous Space Station Mir is stupidly destroyed by Russian high-ranking vandals. (Instead of boosting the Mir Space Station to higher orbit or selling it to the highest bidder, Russian high-ranking vandals instead plunged this historic space station into the South Pacific Ocean. This destruction is a big set-back for orbital space colonization. With destructive vandals in positions of authority, it is indeed difficult to get the human race off its Spaceship Earth and into the coming space colonies. The destruction of Space Station Mir leaves the human race with only one measly International Space Station.)

Success Can Take Longer Than Expected

Success Can Take Longer Than Expected (My message # 15. I have also put more than twenty messages on my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )
Saturday, June 17, 2006 by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson

* The colonization of our solar system has been one of my advocacies, starting when I was inspired by a classmate back in the sixth grade in Havre de Grace, Maryland. We would go to the school library and check out and read the various books on Astronomy, and we would make drawings of spaceships, planets, moons, and so forth.

* Because of my extensive reading about astronomy and related subjects starting in the sixth grade, I soon noticed that I knew more about our universe, our Milky Way Galaxy, and our solar system than most of the adults around me. Apparently, most of the adults around me had not been studying the universe they lived in.

* Because of the knowledge I gained from the astronomy and related books, I predicted in 8th grade in 1954 that we would land on the Moon in about ten years. My 8th grade teacher didn't believe me. She hadn't been reading the same material I had read. But I was overly optimistic. I thought ten years would be a reasonable amount of time to land a person upon the Moon, but it took about fifteen years instead, We humans succeeded in July 1969.

* The predicted achievement of landing on the Moon that I and various writers and others knew could happen was helped along by the backward Soviet Unions launching of Sputnik in 1957 under Nikita Khrushchev and then President Kennedy's and President Johnson's rising to the Soviet's space achievement challenge.

* Competition with the Soviet Union pushed the United States upward to do that which some of us knew that the United States could do if the will power was found. The Soviet Union helped the United States to get the will power to achieve in space, as some of us knew the United States could achieve.

* After the United States sent men to the Moon several times, using the tremendous power of the Saturn 5 Rocket, the United States seemed to quit. It was as if the leaders of the United States did not have knowledge of what we have the ability to do in space. They did not know that it was now time to begin the colonization of space. They did not know that it was best to start with orbital space colonization.

* The leaders of the United States abandoned our successful Saturn V Rocket and replaced it with the faulty concept of the Space Shuttle. What a huge mistake !

* Our space progress has probably been so poor and so slow because the leaders of the United States do not understand orbital space colonization, and they don't seem to understand why the space shuttle was such a bad idea.

* Now it is 2006. It is about 49 years since the backward Soviet Union started the Space Age in 1957 by orbiting Sputnik, and after these 49 years we still only have a finger-tip hold in space with our faulty but important International Space Station. The faulty design of the International Space Station is further evidence that the leaders of the United States do not understand space colonization.

* We should already have many successful orbiting space colonies, but the leaders of the United States and the leaders of the other nations on our Spaceship Earth don't have the necessary knowledge of orbital space colonization. They don't know that we have the ability to colonize our solar system. The colonization of our solar system will be the big achievement of the 21st Century.

* We Earthlings will build a space faring civilization into the fantastic future within this 21st Century. I am predicting great, orbiting cities that will grow from small orbiting settlements.

* Who will be the new national leaders in the conquest of space, like Nikita Khrushchev of the backward former Soviet Union and like President Kennedy of the United States ?

* Our beginning colonies in orbital space should already exist, but they do not. Our success in space is taking longer than expected by us who know that we can build the orbiting space colonies. Therefore it still remains the fantastic future for the people of our Spaceship Earth.
* I predict that by starting small, the great orbiting cities of our solar system will be a great achievement of the people of this new 21st Century.
* The great, orbiting, human civilization is our destiny in the 21st Century.

US Competitive Free Market Orbital Colonization Act

US Competitive Free Market Orbital Colonization Act (My message # 14. I also put more than twenty messages on my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )
Monday, June 12, 2006 by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson
* We are now in need of a United States Competitive Free Market Orbital Colonization Act !
* We already had the US Homestead Act of 1862 which provided 160 acres of land to anyone who would farm that land give-away to people who would colonize the West for the United States.
* We should now subsidize the colonization of orbital space by giving space habitats to the people who will live in them. This give-away will jump start the United States into the colonization of the high frontier of orbital space, starting with growing, orbital space settlements around our Earth and around our Moon.
* In orbital space colonization, the United States should lead the human family of our Spaceship Earth to its destiny of colonizing our solar system in this Twenty-first Century. We should promote the spirit of peace. We Americans come from all the nations of the Earth. We Americans are the Earth united.
* Such a modern homesteading act should leap-frog the people of the United States into the coming fantasic future of the "High Orbiting Civilization." We will show how it can be done successfully and peacefully. This will be a great education for us.
* We. the people of the United States, would learn by pushing up our knowledge of technology and democracy.
* Some of our goals as freedom leaders on our Spaceship Earth should be the goals of uniting the peoples of our Spaceship Earth in peace, progress, knowledge, and prosperity.

NASA, Start Free Enterprise in Orbital Space

NASA, Please Start Free Enterprise in Orbital Space! (My message # 13. I also have put over twenty messages in my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )
Sunday, June 11, 2006 by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson
* The United States Government allowed the old Soviet Union to make the first successes in space. 1957: Sputnik; later, 1961: Gagarin, the first man in orbital space.
* When it comes to the privatization or orbital space, the capitalistic United States should rush to establish the first private ownership of space habitats in orbital space (perhaps modeled on the laws of condominium ownership?)
* When companies and individuals can buy their own orbital space colonization habitats in a spinning, orbiting space settlement, we should expect the successes and dangerous adventures and the excitement to increase in orbital space. We should expect an increase in the speed of progress.
* The dictatorial government of the collapsed Soviet Union discovered that privately owned farming can produce more food than government owned farming.
* The principle of private ownership in the spinning, orbiting American space settlements should also lead to much more success than NASA has experienced without private ownership.
* Likewise, privately owned space habitats can lead to better research into how to live and prosper in orbital space, than can governmental controlled research.
* Perhaps a movie studio might want to purchase a space habitat in a spinning, orbiting space settlement if NASA gives them a good price. One or more movie studios could make documentaries on whatever space adventures might arise.
* Perhaps an agricultural company could buy a space habitat from NASA and do research in growing greenhouses in the coming spinning, orbital space colonies.
* Perhaps individuals could purchase space habitats from NASA at affordable prices so that they can do research into how to survive in orbital space.
* Perhaps ...
* Owners of space habitats have greater motivation to learn how to live and prosper in the orbital space colonies than government employees have.

Orbital Space Colonization Needs Women

Orbital Space Colonization Needs Women
Friday, June 9, 2006 by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson (This is my message # 12. I have also put more than twenty messages on my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )

* Humans are sexual creatures.
* The sex drive in humans is powerful and is part of the foundation of human civilization.
* Orbital space colonies without women are colonies that have not really begun.
* For every man that the governments send up from our Spaceship Earth to the International Space Station, the governments should also send a woman.
* Men and women together should build the high frontier of orbital space, the new fantastic future, high civilization.
* The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has turned our finger-tip hold in orbital space at the International Space Station into such a boring activity. Where is the romance? Where is the excitment ? Few would want to watch this real-life movie.
* The vicinity of the International Space Station would be a place to start the first orbiting space colony, which should be turned into an exciting pioneering and dangerous adventure watched by millions. A lot more women would help. Romance would help. Adventure would help.
* The International Space Station needs help. It needs adventure. It needs freedom. Currently, it is an important bore!

Orbiting Green Houses and Aquariums 4 Recycling

Orbiting Green Houses and Aquariums for Recycling
Wednesday, June 7, 2006 by Michael Goodspaceguy Nelson (This is my message # 11. I have also put more than twenty messages on my other blog at http://colonizespace.blogspot.com )

* Start small. Start simple. Save trash. Save garbage. Save human waste.
* Start near the International Space Station and other locations desired by the space colonists.
* Start recycling. Save everything.
* Privatize the small human containers in space and start building small green houses and small aquariums around them. Connect the containers and slowly spin the assemblage to simulate different levels of gravity.
* Stop destroying. Stop throwing back down onto our Spaceship Earth that which cost us so much money to put into orbital space.
* Experiment with the building of warehouses and netting and ballons for the storage of junk and waste and trash in orbital space.
* Experiment with the building of large air and water containing structures in orbital space around the smaller experimental and privatized orbital dwellings.
* Build outer structures around the inner structures.
* Then build additional outer structures around the first outer structures, putting the greatest pressure levels inside the inner structures.
* Our National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the other space agencies should immediately start switching their funding towards actual orbital research into how to live and prosper in orbital space.
* The best bang for the research dollar is to be obtained by actually doing the research in orbit. The research and training on the ground of Earth is so wasteful.
* It is time to get serious about advancing the technology of recycling everything.
* We should have started orbital space colonization right after our successful trips to the Moon under the leadership of President Kennedy and President Johnson.
* To advance the technology of recycling, begin small by building privately owned green houses, privately owned aquariums, privately owned warehouses, and privately owned junk yards near the International Space Station and other locations desired by the colonists, such as above the equator.
* The International Space Station would be one of the good places to begin and advance the colonization of orbital space because this space station produces a lot of waste that can be used in advancing the technology of recycling.
* We humans need to have places to live other than just on our Spaceship Earth. Earth might suffer from nuclear war or from a large and destructive asteroid impact. We would be wise to spread out throughout our solar system now that some of our people know how.
* Huge green houses and huge aquariums in the spinning, orbiting space settlements will make the space settlements so much nicer.