Comments on: What ever happened to the Manned Space Stations? (Feb, 1965)

By: Paul Connor

Paul Connor — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 18:12:23 +0000

Don’t worry, Branson is on the job, he’ll be running commercial space flights within 10 years.

By: bertfw

bertfw — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 13:45:18 +0000

“I’ve never seen a pole dancer that small before!”

By: Jim Dunn

Jim Dunn — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 13:27:43 +0000

Believe it or not, two members of von Braun’s team are still alive and kicking in Huntsville. Konrad Dannenburg and Ernst Stuhlinger recently spoke about how the launch of Sputnik spurred America’s space efforts.

http://www.al.com/news/huntsvi.....038;coll=1

By: Firebrand38

Firebrand38 — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:31:26 +0000

Well, in the fullness of time since this article, it turns out that there wasn’t a lot you needed a space station for:

Astronomy see Hubble

The Manned Orbiting Laboratory was a fascinating but little known project that was canceled in 1969 the whole story can be found in this 2MB on-line history at http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA459973 Look in Chapter 7

Earth Observation was handled by the launch of Landsat I in 1972 http://landsat.usgs.gov/project_facts/history/

What Von Braun’s main beef at this time was that he supported a mode called Earth Orbit Rendezvous for Apollo. A huge ship would be assembled and fueled in Earth orbit (with help of a space station) fly to the moon, land, takeoff and fly back. The Lunar Orbit Rendezvous chosen led to the LM landing apart from the CSM, taking off, rendezvousing and having the Command Module returning alone. See http://www.nasa.gov/centers/la.....zvous.html

As for a TV station in orbit requiring a crew to maintain it, Dish Network seems to manage without it.

Basically, von Braun (a rocket engineer) wanted to build a space station but never developed the market for it.

By: jsl151

jsl151 — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 16:31:50 +0000

Nice article, but the word “money” is absent.