Orion Spacecraft Not “Quite” Ready

In order to make an olmlette, you have to break a few eggs. NASA is getting a good head start with its Orion Space Program after a less than stellar capsule parachute test.

Orion’s secondary goal is to return to the moon with the primary goal of going to Mars.  It borrows many ideas from the old Saturn V project only it would be sleeker and more modern…like a Delorean after Doc. Brown puts a flux-capacitor in it.  There are 2 rockets…a cargo vehicle and a passenger vehicle. So the idea seems to be a good one.

I loved ( past tense ) the Space Shuttle.  In elementary school I watched the launch of Columbia.   I was a space-cadet in the truest form so I knew a ton about the shuttle before it ever went up. “This…”, I thought, “was just the beginning”.

The Shuttle as a technological marvel was incredible…back in the 80’s.  Now it’s sort of has the flair and safety of that old ’79 Ford Pinto in Grandpa’s backyard.  Plus, the thing is only good for low-orbit missions.  Other countries with a space program find it far more cost effective to use standard rockets like the Atlas to send satellites into space.

Already there are objections to the Orion program, but I am not one of them. Since a child I’ve always had my eyes to the stars imagining I would someday touch them.  Such an infinite playground given by God demands exploration.   So to that end I say let’s do it.

Mars, unlike other planets in our solar system, holds interesting potential in terms of exploration…and perhaps even terra-forming and tourism many decades or centuries from now.  I see tourism to the moon in the next few decades at least.  I just hope when I get off the at the Mars spaceport I don’t encounter mutants like that 3 breasted chick from Total Recall.  But then again those would be neat pictures to place on Facebook…

So as the Shuttle winds down for 2010, and the Orion takes over in maybe 2014, the space program might get a bit more interesting as we start actually going somewhere!

But I’d maybe work on a Plan B for that parachute…or at least put a kickass set of airbags in it.