“Platinum Moon” by Bill White. Published in 2010 by Higher Hill Publishing, it weighs in at 299 pages. A handful of editing errors - surprisingly few for a self-published title.
Just what I like, some near-future, near-Earth science fiction for summer. Some folks call it Solar Sci Fi, to distinguish stories set within our Solar system (which tend to have a slightly more ‘real’ flavor) from the galactic empire/battlefleets burning off the shoulder of Orion space opera fantasy which tends to be the norm these days.
Author Bill White sets the story at some point in the near future, where Soyouz and Shenzhous are somewhat available for purchase, but the U.S. still seems to be fixated on NASA as the end-all/be-all of space. The PGM-1 Lunar landing vehicle is in low Lunar orbit (LLO) after departing from the EML-1 Gateway station. An American ex-astronaut is at the controls, accompanied by a French and an Indian scientist, for the first human return to the Moon since 1972. Their goal: try to find chunks of asteroid remnants on the Lunar surface that could serve as a source of platinum for an energy-hungry Earth.
The enterprise is directed by one Harold Hewitt through his company Lunar Materials LLC (LuMat). Part D.D. Harriman, part P.T. Barnum, and all-entrepreneur-all-the-time, Harold Hewitt is an American citizen who has made more than a few enemies back home in his global scramble to assemble the pieces for his enterprise, and some of those enemies are in government. Nevertheless, across the globe people celebrate as humanity renews its path outward.
While venal politicians plot to thwart Hewitt’s efforts, an obligatory problem with the PGM-1 sets the stage for drama as now the crew is stuck on the Moon, destined to die a slow death as the oxygen is slowly consumed. Hewitt scrambles to not only try to figure out what happened on the Moon so it doesn’t happen again, but also what elements exist to try to cobble together a rescue mission to save the enterprise from the ignominy of losing its first crew on the Lunar surface.
And so the stage is set for thrilling international drama on both the Moon and Earth. The story is draped not only in NewSpace commercial finery, but also is endowed with new space concepts like international efforts and EML-1. Which is not necessarily a new idea, but scientists are coming to an increasing appreciation of just how much of a gift the 1st Earth-Moon Lagrange point is not only for cislunar space activities, but also trans-Lunar exploration efforts. Here, the author has done his homework, creating an architecture where there is a station, of sorts, in a halo orbit at EML-1 that serves as the logistics node for Hewitt’s efforts, as well as a comm sat in a large halo orbit around EML-2, on the other side of the Moon, that serves as a communication relay. For those who are all like EML-huh?, I suggest a trip over to the High Frontier section of the Lunar Library, where I’ve got a category set aside just for papers and books on the topic called HF EML-1. I suggest starting with ‘a sort of L-1 primer‘ by some guy Ken.
From the Time-Life book “Spacefarers“
There is also a sub-story on what might be considered something akin to a suborbital Rocket Racing League that involves the Dark Skies Flying Circus, and a young woman pilot with much potential, nicknamed ‘Frog’. Her story interleaves with the dramatic events unfolding on and near the Moon, and provides one of the many perspectives on what’s happening. It also fills out the book’s NewSpace creds by rightly pointing out the suborbital hops are going to space too (and could lead to something more).
All-in-all some nice summer reading, with a relatively brisk pace but long enough that it doesn’t go too quick. The character development may not be Hugo-esque in scope, but it’s adequate for the purpose. It introduces a lot of hardware, like Centaurs and Fregats, and describes how a few simple elements, like Bigelow Nautilus inflatables and Block D modules, can start us on the path that will carry us not only to the Moon, but to the asteroids and beyond. Propellant depots at EML-1 will enable all kinds of commercial activity the likes of which we can’t imagine, but will benefit therefrom nonetheless.
It’s just the sort of story I’ve been looking for, about the kinds of things we could be doing in space, but aren’t, at least for the moment. I rather enjoyed it, so I’m going to rate this one a Full Moon.
“Soviet and Russian Lunar Exploration” by Brian Harvey. Published in 2007 by Springer/Praxis, it weighs in at 317 pages all in. One or two minor editing errors. I can’t speak to the accuracy of the Russian details.
Most everyone knows about Apollo. There has been an endless stream of books published since that august achievement all those decades ago, and the Moon and Apollo are thoroughly intertwined in the American mythos. Less is known about Soviet efforts in that same timeframe, given the secretive and paranoid nature of that regime, and has mostly come out in dribs and drabs over the years through a variety of often surprising means. The definitive treatise on these efforts is most likely Asif Siddiqi’s “Challenge to Apollo: The Soviet Union and the Space Race, 1945 - 1974“, but its dense 1011 pages and scholarly tone make it a challenge for most.
A much more accessible primer on Soviet, and now Russian, Lunar efforts is definitely Harvey’s “Soviet and Russian Lunar Exploration”, which also fills in the post 1974 years. It’s lavishly illustrated with B&W images, tables and maps, and is a veritable who’s who of names both familiar and previously unheard, and some of the Russian acronyms are finally explained.
The story begins with a story published in Pionerskaya Pravda, a one-time Soviet youth indoctrination magazine, in October 1951. Written by a veteran of the first round of rocket enthusiasm in the 1920s and ’30s, Mikhail Tikhonravov outlined a trip to the Moon in a 1,000 tonne rocket that could be achieved within 10 to 15 years (or so he asserted). This led to an invitation to contribute to the Great Scientific Encyclopedia. He was posted at the Nauchno Issledovatelsky Institut #4 (NII-4, or Scientific Research Institut 4), which had no formal connection with the Opytno Konstrucktorskoye Buro #1 (OKB-1, or Experimental Design Bureau 1) (at least in the early years) but certainly had informal relations. It was at OKB-1 that Sergei Korolev, the Glavnykonstrucktor or Chief Designer of Soviet space efforts, headed their efforts in space exploration. More familiar names like Mstislav Keldysh and Valentin Glushko are introduced. The events and circumstances that shaped the early years are described, and how Tikhonravov became the father of the Soviet Moon programme, as well as rocket efforts up to 1957.
The next chapter looks at the first Moon probes. It offers frequent reminders that the early U.S. rockets were not the only ones to blow up on an irregular basis, but as with the U.S. programmes the use of telemetry allowed the failures to move higher up the rockets, and the Soviets were soon racking up first after first, and conducting a serious scientific programme in the process, like learning of the Solar wind. Their Cosmic Ships flew within 6,000 km of the Moon and impacted in Palus Putredinis. Their Automatic Interplanetary Station provided the first images of the Lunar farside, giving the Soviets first dibs on naming farside features.
In the third chapter we learn of early plans for a Moon landing, as the Soviets under Korolev’s guidance looked at ways to make their systems extensible to Lunar efforts. In the late 1950s and early ’60s Soviet efforts were focused primarily on Korabl Sputnik (Fellow Traveler Spacecraft) and Vostok, which was succeeded by Soyouz, which is used to this day. From the beginning the Soyouz complex was designed to be applied to Lunar efforts, and if Space Adventures can find another $100Mn passenger there will be an around the Moon flight in the not too distant future in a Soyouz capsule. Even as the engineers toiled at solving complicated hardware problems, other forces like geopolitics were at work, thereby complicating the task, and so it wasn’t until late 1966 that the Soviets came to a consensus on a plan to reach the Moon.
Just as the U.S. evolved from Pioneer flybys to Ranger impactors to Surveyor soft landings, so too did the Soviets evolve to a soft lander, although their engineering approach was quite different. Where the American Surveyors were gangly and a bit awkward looking, the Lunas were egg-shaped with petals that folded out. Rocket development efforts continued, and Lunas 4-6 proved problematic as well, but with Zond 3 the Soviets were able to fill out their farside maps. Lunas 7 and 8 had issues near the Moon, and it was about this time that the Soviet space program suffered a crippling blow, the death of their Chief Designer, Sergei Korolev. This seemed to redouble the efforts of the engineers, and the last two landers, Lunas 9 and 13, were successes. The next Lunas were devoted to working out the mechanics of Lunar orbit for eventual crewed missions (oh who am I kidding, they were going to be manned missions). Luna 10 announced the first arrival in Lunar orbit with a broadcast of the Internationale. Luna 11 had issues, but Luna 12 continued the mapping efforts and the list of potential landing sites was narrowed down. Luna 14 did some communications tests, and so the groundwork was laid for a crewed trip to the Moon.
Chapter five lays out the basic architecture of how the Soviets were going to fly around and land their cosmonauts on the Moon.
-The Universal Rocket - 500 (UR-500) would eventually become the Proton rocket, used to this day to deliver cargo to orbit. While considered rather reliable today, it did suffer many teething pains and had 14 failures in its first 29 launches.
-The L-1 Lunar orbiter, or Zond (probe), which led to confusion in the West with the previous probes that had flown to Venus, Mars and the Moon. These would carries the Soviet’s first computer, the Argon, on a spacecraft. It is described as a stripped down Soyouz.
Together, these two would provide the around-the-Moon part of the program.
-The other rocket to be used was Korolev’s N-1 rocket, which in 1960 could theoretically deliver 50 tonnes into Earth orbit, although the Lunar program would call for 95, leading to an upsizing in the number of rocket motors at the end of 1964. There’s speculation that Korolev had a more distant destination in mind when designing the rocket, and the hectic pace of the Apollo program may have contributed to the cutting of some corners. Suffice it to say that the N-1s had a 100% fail rate.
-The Luniy Orbitalny Korabl (LOK, or Lunar Orbital Spacecraft), which had many similarities to the Apollo Command & Service Module, and would remain in orbit and provide the return craft. It is described as a beefed-up Soyouz.
-The Luniy Korabl (LK, or Lunar Spacecraft) lander which would descend to the surface.
Together, these would provide the Lunar landing part of the program.
Also described are the Soviet spacesuits and communications network, as well as the many cosmonauts who would undergo training for these missions.
Chapter six tells of the the race before the race to be the first to land on the Moon, the race to be the first to fly humans around the Moon. The Soviets sent turtles and such on the Zond 5 as the first emissaries of Earth’s ecosystem to travel beyond the orbit of the Moon and return, followed soon thereafter by Zond 6, which awakened the Western press to how far along the Soviet efforts were. Still, the Proton rocket was proving fickle and difficult, and so to this day people around the world remember the Earthrise photo from Apollo 8 as the souvenir picture from the first flight around the Moon. This took the wind out of the sails of the Zond program, though both it and the N-1 rocket program continued to be funded. Renewed vigor was put into robotic probes. The Lunokhod (Moonwalker) series would rove the Moon to conduct its research. Luna 15 would provide an automated sample return mission, possibly before Apollo 11. But problems continued with the development of the N-1 rocket, and the Zond program was being wound down, though Zond 7 did fly. Political maneuverings led to the end of the N-1 program, and Soviet efforts shifted to space stations as the focus of their space efforts.
While American Lunar efforts quickly wound down after the Apollo program as scientists retired to their labs to digest and cogitate on what they had learned, the Soviets, on the contrary, continued their robotic efforts. While Luna 15 failed, Luna 16 did not and returned samples, all of 105 grams. Luna 17 delivered the first Lunokhod rover to the surface, and the world got its first taste of virtual near-real-time travel on another world. The mission lasted from 17/11/1970 to 04/10/1971, nearly a full year of results from traveling some 10.5 km across the Lunar surface. Towards the end of Luna 17s mission, Luna 18 was dispatched, but crashed into the Moon. Luna 20 soon followed, and would provide the Soviets their second sample return from the Moon, while Luna 21 delivered the next Lunokhod to the Moon in January 1973. Luna 19, in 1971, provided orbital imagery and data on sites of interest, as did Luna 22 in 1974, orbiting the Moon at the time of a joint Soviet/American Lunar conference. Luna 23 had landing issues in late 1974, and it wasn’t until the summer of 1976 that Luna 24 landed near Fahrenheit crater to provide the Soviets with their third sample return, of a much heftier 170 grams. And with that triumph, the Soviet Lunar program began to wind down. They proclaimed the 1970s ‘the decade of of the space robot’, and both Soviet and American scientists seemed to embrace the concept wholeheartedly, with a slew of missions to many of the planets.
The last chapter looks at some of the concepts that the Soviets studied in the late 1960s and early ’70s like Galaktika and Zvezda. Some interest was expressed by Soviet scientists in the 1980s and ’90s for a Lunar polar orbiter, but nothing ever materialized. In the first decade of the 21st century a Luna Glob mission was studied by the Russians, but to this day Russia has yet to return to the Moon, but running the most reliable crewed transport to LEO system in the world is a pretty big job, and luckily the Russians haven’t figured out yet that the wealth they’re acquiring from their natural resources should be invested in securing access to off-Earth natural resources. Unfortunately we Americans haven’t figured that out yet either, although the Chinese are certainly talking about it in the long run (though for the Chinese the word long can mean really looooong, like decades). Japan has always had issues with natural resources, energy resources in particular, which is probably why they seem to be focusing a bit more on solar power from space.
The book is rounded out with a list of all of the Soviet Moon probes, and where they are now. While each of the chapters is thoroughly footnoted, there’s a bibliographic note that covers some of the more authoritative sources, followed by a five page bibliography. Last up is the index. The only thing I can think of that I would ask for would be a short Russian-English glossary as well.
Overall, I’m very impressed with this book. It’s comprehensive, but not fluffy. The exposition is geared towards conveying facts and information, and it just pours out. I’d say written at about the undergrad level, it would be ideal for a course that covers governmental efforts to go to our Moon. While dense, I can see where it would be interesting to a broader audience interested in our Moon and curious about efforts other than Apollo. It provides a lot of detail on the scientific aspects of the missions, and provides many engineering details to chew on.
A must-read introduction for scholars in the field, as well as historians interested in what was happening on the other side of the Iron Curtain in space activities. For researchers it provides an extensive bibliography, and for others a gripping tale from a different perspective on the race to the Moon. I wholeheartedly give this one a Full Moon rating.
“The Big Splat, or How Or Moon Came to Be” by Dana Mackenzie. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. in 2003, it weighs in at 232 pages all-in. No errors noted.
Having looked at the origins of the Moon from a Christian creationist perspective, I figured it would be a good idea to take a look at what the scientific community thought about Lunar origins. So I turned to the Selenology (or Moon science) section of the Lunar Library and The Big Splat seemed to be a perfect choice.
In the Introduction, the author looks at Genesis Revisited, quickly summarizing the history of thought regarding Lunar origins, and the noting how the application of the tools of science changed the way we approach the idea of the source of our companion Moon. On our first visit to the neighborhood of the Moon, Apollo 8’s circumlunar swing on December 24th, 1968, the crew read from the text of Genesis, imparting a call to the spiritual nature of humanity’s endeavors, wherever they may occur.
In the first chapter, we look at how our companion Moon has waned from an integral part of timekeeping and spirituality in human culture to a marginalized object supplanted by the advent of science. Technological lighting methods diminished the Moon’s role as a nighttime guide. A better understanding of the Earth’s place in the Solar system led to the adoption of a Solar calendar, though there are still many cultures that abide by the Moon’s guidance. We learn of notable figures in history who helped divine her secrets, her characteristics and her cycles.
Chapter two continues the recounting of history, and we learn of Anaxagoras, Pythagoras, Aristarchus and Aristotle,as well as lesser known Lunar-associated figures such as Plutarch, Lamprias, and Pharnaces.
Chapter three moves the story to the early 17th Century, as science and reason were blossoming throughout Europe. Two gentlemen are the focus of the discourse - Kepler and Galileo, who did more to popularize space science amongst a broader audience than any other of their time. We end with Riccioli, whose basic nomenclature for Lunar features is the methodology we use to this day.
Later in the same century, science and mathematics took a big leap when Newton burst upon the scene, and in the next chapter we examine how his principles led to a leap in understanding the seemingly clockwork nature of our Solar system. By the next century the questions were moving away from how it works to where it came from. Folks like Buffon and Kant were postulating ideas on how the grand forces of physics could have led the Universe to today, but it was Laplace who became known for the ‘nebular hypothesis’, whereby the planets and their moons formed from a nebula surrounding and providing the feedstock for the nascent Sun. Also noted is the role of navigation in uncovering the fact that the Moon’s orbit is not as clockwork as one would assume it should be.
It was in the 19th Century that the next major hypothesis for the origin of the Moon was promulgated, by George Darwin, son of the more commonly known Charles. George worked on the science of tides, specifically tidal bulges, which occur when one massive body is in the vicinity of another. Everyone knows the Moon pulls on the water of the oceans to create the tides (in conjunction with the Sun), but it also pulls on the ground. He worked through the mathematics and realized that months were getting slightly longer, which begged the question of what happens when you run the time arrow backwards? This implies an intersection at some point in the past of the Earth and Moon, which implies that the Moon came from the Earth. What would be the physics that would make that happen, where the Moon would fission off from the Earth and escape to orbit. It was a tough slog to try to make the mathematics work, and the idea of a Daughter Moon never really found favor.
Another compelling theory is visited in the next chapter, that of the Captive Moon. This idea holds that the Moon formed elsewhere in the Solar system, went on an errant journey (perhaps nudged by Jupiter), and ended up captured in orbit by the Earth. In this chapter we learn of Thomas Jefferson Jackson See, who championed this explanation for the Moon’s origin. T.J.J. See may not have been the most pleasant of individuals to deal with, but his theory had a certain elegance of orbital mechanics to it, if only the numbers could be made to work, something that scores of scientists pursued over the next century. We’re introduced to the concept of the Roche limit, the distant from a large mass at which a smaller mass begins to feel gravitational differences between the point nearest the large mass and the point farthest from the large mass sufficiently large that it begins to tear the smaller mass apart. This is what is believed to have torn apart Comet Shoemaker-Levy-9 prior to its plunge into Jupiter. Ultimately, the mathematics of capture couldn’t be reconciled with reality, and it remained a plausible, but not proven theory.
Next up is the concept of a Sister Moon, where the Earth and Moon co-accreted near each other in space. We learn more about the work of Roche, as well as others that worked out the physics of accretion in early stellar systems including Safronov, who worked out many of the details of how accretion works.
So by the dawn of the space age there was still a lot unknown about our closest neighbor in space, let alone destinations beyond. It was widely held that the craters of the Moon were largely of volcanic origin, and that vast seas of ash and dust would swallow any spacecraft that presumed to pose upon the surface. It was during this popular wisdom that Baldwin published a book that threw a monkey-wrench into the works, alleging that the craters were actually the result of collisions. Being an outsider to the Ivory Tower of academic knowledge, his theories were controversial, but he had solid evidence on his side, as we had learned much about cratering from two worldwide wars. One scientist inspired by this book was Shoemaker, another Urey, both of whom would have a significant impact on Lunar science. On the eve of Apollo, the ideas were flying fast and furious as more and more bright people took the time to cogitate on the topic of our Moon.
Chapter nine covers the Apollo missions, and provides an overview of some of the bigger questions that seemed to be answered, like “How old is the Moon?” and “What is the Moon made of?” As the scientists worked over the samples, a general consensus began to arise as to the general steps the Moon took once formed to arrive at its present state. Left unanswered was the question of what caused the Moon to form.
In the next chapter the clues start to come together. A paper had been written in 1946 that called into question whether the Moon may have had some kind of glancing blow with the Earth. 1950 saw the publication of Velikovsky’s “Worlds in Collision”. Apollo proved definitively that most of the craters on the Moon were of impact origin, and as we looked around the Solar system we could see evidence of impact everywhere. Four scientists, Hartmann, Davis, Cameron & Ward, started homing in on the theory that reconciles so much of the evidence on hand that for many it is “the” way that the Moon formed.
It wasn’t until the mid-80s that all of the pieces started clicking into place, and the next chapter explores the Kona Consensus that developed out of a conference on selenogony, or the origin of the Moon. As paper after paper was presented, scientists realized that a cogent and rational explanation for the Moon’s origin was coming together. A report card prepared about the different theories shows why it was so compelling. The mathematics of the event had been well worked out in computer modeling. The chemistry was favorable, and readers get an introduction into the chemistry and mechanics of rock dating techniques.
The last chapter introduces us to Theia, the alleged impactor and mythical mother of Selene. Since no one was around to observe it (yet, time travel may not be beyond the realm of possibility, although I believe it is), there are many unknowns. One obvious question is ‘Where is the hole?’, to which George Darwin would probably answer ‘The Pacific’, but in reality the impact totally rearranged the Earth, incorporating both original bodies (proto-Earth and Theia) into both subsequent bodies (Earth and Moon). The author lays out the timeline of events, from impact to about 3.2 billion years (gigayears, or Gy) ago, when the Moon finally became somewhat quiescent, and then the present.
In the appendix, the question of ‘Did We Really Go to the Moon?’ is addressed. I am so over this particular topic, but like a parasite it seems it will evermore be rediscovered by new generations and need refuting time and time again, which is a complete waste of resources. The Lunar Library has a number of the Moon-hoax titles, which are bunk, and management would rather not waste acquisition budget on any more of them. The author presents several compelling examples, including the fact that it’s possible to actually contact the scientists with questions. Not mentioned is the fact that we found five (5) new minerals on the Moon which had not been seen previously (though Tranquillityite was later found in South Africa).
Rounding out the book are a nice glossary, some references, acknowledgements and an index.
What’s nice about this book is that it is written for a general audience. The author is completely frank about the fact that the science sometimes went over his head, and he is careful to frame things as ’scientists explain-this is how it’s done’. It makes a nice counterpoint to the Moon origin books previously reviewed, as the explanations are laid out at the end of a chain of logical steps. Objective evidence is offered in support of assertions, evidence that exists in physics irrespective of the presence of humans. The flow of the writing is easygoing and engaging, making for a pleasurable read. The author prefers the term Big Splat to the more commonly known Big Whack, and he has good reasons why.
I needed a break from the Lunar mineralogy, so I decided to delve into the Cultura Lunaris section of the Lunar Library to see if I could find something interesting. I’m not terribly interested in reviewing the Moon-hoaxer books, in part because I have no desire to attract that kind of commentary to my website. I probably should have gone with one of the “Moon in human history” books, but decided that it might be interesting to look at a Christian perspective on Moon science.
For full disclosure purposes, let it be noted that I was baptized at St. Eleanor’s in Collegeville, PA (and my dependent dogtag notes Catholicism as my religion), went to Anglican Church (on occasion) while dad was stationed in England, and was confirmed at Palm Valley Lutheran Church in Round Rock, TX. Still have the Bible, too. That having been said, let it also be noted that I have been an atheist since about the age of 12. I’ve done varying degrees of study of various religions from around the world, and have tried to guide my path through life using the ‘best practices’ that I’ve found therein. I do not see the ‘hand of a creator’ in our universe that others see, although I have to tell you that quantum mechanics does baffle me.
So I pulled a pair of tomes from the bookshelf by Mssrs. John C. Whitcomb and Donald B. DeYoung. We’ll start off with the first of the two, “The Moon: It’s Creation, Form, and Significance”, published in 1978 by BMH Books and weighing in at 180 pages all-in.
We begin with a foreword by a Mr. Larry Redekopp, PhD, an Assoc. Professor of Aerospace Engineering at USC. He summarizes the premise of the book as follows:
“By the title alone, the authors manifestly declare their underlying tenet which is carefully and distinctly elaborated in the text; i.e., they accept the entire Biblical record as authoritative in regards to beginnings, history, science, and ultimate meanings. The Bible teaches explicitly that the Moon was created instantaneously as a functioning body in the heavens and at a time simultaneous with the sun, planets, stars and galaxies, but three days subsequent to the creation of the earth. Furthermore, the Bible states clearly the intended purpose for the moon’s existence and its proximity to the earth. Their literal acceptance of these truths is amply evident in the text and comprises the cornerstone on which the geology, lunar data, observable phenomena, and origin of the moon are discussed.”
“The Once and Future Moon”by Paul Spudis. Published in 1996 by the Smithsonian Institution Press, it weighs in at 308 pages all-in. No errors noted.
I decided to re-visit this one for a review when I realized that I couldn’t remember when I first read it, having read so many Moon books subsequent to this one. Paul autographed the copy in the Lunar Library on October 17th, 2002, which IIRC was at the World Space Congress, where he had just gone head-to-head with Bob Zubrin on the relative merits of our Moon and Mars respectively. So I would have read it before then. I’m pretty sure it was back in ‘99 that I picked it up, back when I was still working the Wall Street Desk as a credit analyst for BNP, juste nouvellementBNP Paribas. This is an important point that will touched upon later.
“Lunar Mineralogy” written by Judith Frondel, published by Wiley-Interscience, and weighing in at 323 pages with index.
Whereas the last Moon rocks book reviewed here at OotC, “The Lunar Rocks” was in large part the story of the study of the first samples from the Moon, by the time this book was published there had been copious amounts of supplemental materials to study, and many early hypotheses had been dropped. Really, this one is best described as a catalogue of what was found in the samples.
The book begins with a chapter on the Geochemical and Geological History of the Lunar Rocks, and a general overview of the Moon’s environment, such as the atmosphere so tenuous that it can be considered a collisionless gas, or the frequent small Moonquakes that occur about 800km down, which appear to have a tidal association. Don’t worry though, there are no plate tectonics on the Moon.
Moon 3-D by Jim Bell, published in 2009 by Sterling Publishing, it weighs in at 148 pages. One edit error noted.
This book bills itself as bringing the Lunar surface to life, and boy is it not kidding. Through a variety of techniques the author presents a large number of 3-D anaglyphs relating to our Moon exploration of generations past and present. As I noted in this book’s filecard in the Lunar Library:
The craters - wow!
They just pop out at you, and your eyes start wandering across the view, trying to judge the relative elevations, looking for features of note, and generally just enjoying a more natural perspective on things.
The book facilitates this by building the blue-red 3-D glasses into the cover, so that the image will always be the correct distance from the glasses, and a convenient nose hole makes the process comfortable. A large number of 3-D images are presented throughout the book, accompanied by a lengthy text by the author
The first chapter looks at the Moon Lore associated with our Lunar companion, from ancient times to modern media, while the second looks at the Space Race, from Kennedy’s challenge, through the robotic probes that reconnoitered the Moon prior to Apollo’s arrival. The third chapter, Shoulders of Giants, takes an extensive look at the Apollo missions, visiting each one in turn and highlighting notable details. Next up is Old Moon, New Moon, which describes the aftermath of the Apollo program, the science being done, and follow-up missions that rounded out the 1970s.
The ‘Modern’ era of Moon exploration began with the Galileo fly-by of the Earth-Moon system, which offered a serendipitous opportunity to test out the instruments with a little Lunar science. In Back to the Moon, the author looks at the series of probes that started with Clementine, then Lunar Prospector, using the chapter to talk about some of the resources that have been identified, and finishing up with the latest round of spacecraft - SMART-1, Chang’e-1, Kaguya, Chandrayaan-1, and LRO. We end up considering the Future Moon, which chapter explores many of the considerations for moving forward and poses the question:
“Can we seize this moment to eventually become citizens of the entire solar system? Let’s find out!”
The next hundred or so pages are the photo galleries. While some 3-D images were scattered through the text, the Gallery goes hardcore, with the left page showing a smaller Lunar photo, two columns of descriptive text underneath, and on the facing page a 3-D image. Page after page after page. Craters and tools and rocks and machines and astronauts and more craters and oblique views and more craters and scientific instruments and even some ISS and Shuttle shots. Just mesmerizing stuff, and sure to keep the kids occupied for hours.
It finishes up with a bibliography and brief index.
At the Moon Day celebration here in Dallas, NSS of North Texas had a copy of this book as part of their Moon display, and time and again I heard the same response - Wow! Grown-ups, kids, it was all the same - Wow! I would like to note that Sterling Publishing was kind enough to donate two copies to our event to be given away as door prizes to a couple of very lucky individuals. Their support of our community was a part of the success of the event.
Alan Boyle over at the Cosmic Log recently featured a story recently entitled Space in 3-D that features links on where to procure/make a pair of 3-D glasses. If you’d like to check out some more Lunar anaglyphs, you can wander over to the National Air & Space Museum website where they have a number available for your viewing pleasure.
Not as many as in Moon 3-D, though. I counted 59, enough to keep you occupied for a while. Going on a family road trip? You might want to think about a copy for the back seat. At less than 50¢ per image it’s great value for the money.
I really can’t think of any reason to give this delightful book anything other than a Full Moon rating.
Written by Brian Mason and William Melson of the Smithsonian Institution, The Lunar Rocks was published in 1970 by Wiley-Interscience and weighs in at 179 pages all in. A couple of errors noted.
The book describes itself as:
“an attempt to provide a concise and coherent account of the scientific effort on the lunar [sic] samples and the interpretation of the results.”
Which it is, in spades. The Apollo program marks a definitive leap in our understanding of our Moon, and so what came before usually gets lumped into a single chapter, as is the case here. We start with the first great leap in Moon understanding when Galileo trained his instrument on the Moon and saw some unusal things that no one had noticed before. This started an optical arms race to try to produce better instruments to better see the Moon. In the early 1960s, the U.S. Geological Survey did some Lunar cartography, and identified four main periods in the Moon’s past:
While the mainstream media fixates on history from two generations past (what most would call the Apollo program), I thought I’d offer up some forward-looking visions of our Moon. One of the neat things about having an enormous collection of Moon-related materials is that I can just pop over to the media section of the Lunar Library and start pulling DVDs and VHS tapes.
We’ll start out with a trilogy of suspense movies which remain available only on VHS tape. Given the B-movie nature of these titles, it is questionable as to whether they will ever become available on DVD.
2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, and oft told is the tale of when Galileo turned his telescope from terrestrial objects to heavenly bodies, an ongoing view of amazement and wonder that helped to change the nature of astronomy forever.
Most astronomers have wandered far afield from Galileo’s first celestial destination, our Moon, and spend their time with black holes and galaxies and supernova and other objects far, far away. In many respects the Moon becomes the enemy of the deep-space astronomer, as it light pollutes the night sky and blocks a fair-sized chunk of it.
Some of us, though, become enamored of the ever same yet ever changing Moon as she circles us in the sky, and tend not to wander too far afield. This surprisingly large bunch of folks is typically found over at the Lunar Photo of the Day, run by the world-famous Charles Woods.
The study of heavenly bodies is of course a global phenomenon, and while I was in France back in 2000 for my studies at ISU, Bordas published the book ‘Découvrir la Lune‘, a debutant level guide to Moongazing that is now out-of-print. I was, unfortunately, too poor a grad student at the time to afford both it and Rükl’s ‘Atlas de la Lune‘. Years later, as my infatuation with our Moon grew along with the Lunar Library, I would oft regret that unmade purchase, and could sense there was something missing from the La Lune section of the Library.
To be released on May 19th, 2009, it weighs in at 124 pages. No errors noted.
I first learned of Jim Ottaviani’s work when I picked up a copy of the graphic novel Two-Fisted Science. Later I found Dignifying Science, and was quite pleased to learn that there was someone out there using the comic form as a way to teach about some of the scientists of history. Adding to his oeuvre, Mr. Ottaviani now brings us a fact-based graphic novel of the inside story of the first trip to the Moon, just in time for the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11. As with his previous works, he takes full advantage of the medium to teach all kinds of facts that sharp young minds will gobble up.
We open at T-minus 12 years. The location is the NACA facilities in Langley, Virginia. (Great place, by the way, and still doing interesting research, and with the coolest urinals I have ever seen) The department head is fiddling with the radio knob to get a good signal from the orbiting Sputnik, noting that President Eisenhower had called a Rand Corporation report on the ‘Preliminary Design of an Experimental World-Circling Spaceship‘ hooey. Not all the engineers saw it that way, and were already pondering the possibilities.
We open with a launch of a Saturn V, forever an emblem of the Apollo program. Space activist Rick Tumlinson provides his view of why it ended, and author Tom Clancy notes what we’ve foregone. A whole host of individuals in space business and activism were interviewed for this documentary, from James Muncy to Dr. Chirinjeev Kathuria.
We’re introduced to the Rocket and Space Corporation Energia (RSC Energia), which has been operating the Russian space program since the beginning, and we learn of the precarious position of the Mir space station subsequent to NASA’s practice runs for ISS in the 1990s. (which, admittedly, had left NASA a bit spooked about the aging Russian station)
Russia was still recovering from the collapse of the Soviet Union, and a small group of entrepreneurs shows up on the doorstep with a basket of cash. Their goal - commercialize the Russian space station and save a tremendous asset that’s already in orbit. Thus is born MirCorp.
Richard Branson, as you might guess, is on my list of people who I would love to interview for EVA Interviews: The Business of the new Space Age™. I haven’t yet asked him to be my guest as I have a few glitches in the process of conducting these interviews that I need to work out. Until then, I thought you might be interested in a taste of what such an interview might be like with a review of his latest book Business Stripped Bare: Adventures of a Global Entrepreneur.
So the LPSC conference threw me off my stride, and I forgot that the movie Moon was being screened in Dallas at the AFI film festival until Chris, one of my fellow NSS of North Texas chapter members, sent out a reminder that there was going to be a second showing last night. The tickets were sold out, but there was something called a rush line where I could wait to see if there would be any empty seats. Arriving about an hour before the show I was about number 30 in the line. This was not looking good. The line wouldn’t open until five minutes of eight after everyone else was seated. By quarter of eight there were about 50 people and some young lady came around with a camera to record us losers who hadn’t gotten tickets. The AFI coordinator came down to announce that there was a 99.9% chance that no one would get in…but we do have these other fine movies with plenty of room that are starting right now. Now I’m down to about number twenty. Folks behind me start peeling off, but hardly anyone in front.
Quarter after eight and I’m down to about fifteenth in line. The coordinator pops back down to announce that they are still seating folks with AFI passes and it looks like a full house…but these other fine movies are just starting, so if you can hurry you can see them. More of the cineastes peel off. Tenth…seventh…fourth. The trio in front of me is talking it over. I tell the guy I am here until the bitter end because the only reason I am there is to see Moon. Finally, it’s down to me and the young lady behind me. Are we together? Um…no, but we can be. He announces that there is one single seat left. Every fiber of my being is screaming that it is my duty as a gentleman to allow the lady to see the film. I… She allows that I was before her in line. I thank her profusely and bolt for the escalator. I got the last seat on the far left of the front row. Thank you again, Miss, if you’re reading this.
Continuing the recent spate of Moon-related movies, director Duncan Jones brings us the philosophical musings of Moon, starring Sam Rockwell as Helium-3 miner Sam Bell stationed on the far side of the Moon at Sarang Station. He’s nearing the end of his three-year contract, and good thing too, as he’s starting to get a little loopy from the isolation and lack of human companionship.
The work is not too bad. The mining machines, reminiscent of the spice harvesters from Dune, are largely automated, and Sam only needs to go out to visit them every now and then to collect the full canisters of He-3. On one such trip he starts seeing things, a strange dark-haired girl near the harvester, and the distraction leads to an accident.
Sam awakens in the infirmary, and that’s where things start getting convoluted. The plot is fairly complicated, and I don’t want to give too much away, but it has been revealed that one of the twists is the fact that Sam has to deal with a clone. There are plenty of plot twists and turns after that to keep you guessing as to just what exactly is going on, but slowly Sam puts the pieces together and the truth is rather ugly.
The bloodline of this movie spans the science fiction genre, and it pays homage to and evokes more films than I can name. The opening of the movie is an advertisement for the corporate operator of the Moon facilities, Lunar Industries. The structure of it gave me a wicked flashback to GaiaSelene: Saving the Earth by Colonizing the Moon. I don’t know if it was intentional, but just like the documentary, the ad’s first half talks about the energy issues we face here on Earth, and then the second half on how the resources of our Moon can address those issues, with the corporation claiming to supply 75% of Earth’s power from their Lunar Helium-3 operations.
Moving into the film, the design of the sets strongly reminded me of sci-fi classics like Space: 1999, Outland, and 2001: A Space Odyssey (the Director also mentions Silent Running and Alien in his Space Center Houston Q&A). There was a strongly industrial and corporate feel to the scenery that seemed very appropriate. When Sam was taking the rover out to the crawlers I was remembering scenes from Star Cops. There was one interior scene that might well have been lifted directly from Space: 1999, the similarities were so striking.
The main plot delves deeply into the director’s interest in philosophy, in this case as applied to clones. Here the film pays homage to films from Blade Runner to, dare I say it, Metropolis. There’s a fascinating sci-fi twist to it that I don’t think I can discuss, as the gentleman speaking before the movie said there’s a twist that we’re not supposed to disclose, and I honestly am not sure which particular twist he was talking about, but that they would hunt down and find anyone who did so.
There’s comedy hearkening back to Dark Star. There’s disquieting horror, and more than once you’re just like, whoa, dude, that’s inhuman. But oh so terribly corporate.
I should mention GERTY, since it’s voiced by Kevin Spacey and acted via emoticons. It’s Sam’s robotic assistant, traversing the base by means of tracks in the ceiling. This is one of the areas where they used CGI, and it’s quite discretely done (at least from the perspective of the far left seat of the front row). Mostly, though, the equipment was real life heavy-duty industrial type stuff.
I rather enjoyed it, and will certainly see it again when it comes to theatres this summer to delve a bit more into the philosophical side of it. The science was fairly high-fidelity, and it’s obvious that film-makers are starting to learn about the benefits of using the silence of vacuum space to their advantage. Still, a hatch does not make a clanging sound in a vacuum, and there are a few other inconsistencies as well. You have to admit that it is tough to replicate things falling in 1/6th gravity in terrestrial movie studios. Maybe they should rent out the Zero-G plane like the Mythbuster guys did.
As good as Moon is, it’s not quite a Full Moon (subject to revision when I can see it from a decent perspective). I’m going to go with a strong waxing three-quarter Moon rating for this fine film.
“Who Owns the Moon” by Virgiliu Pop. Published in 2009 by Springer as Vol. 4 in their Space Regulations Library, it weighs in at 175 pages all in. A handful of editing errors, mainly in the last half.
While this could be considered a follow-up to Virg’s earlier work “Unreal Estate”, which was as thorough a Title Search on who owns the Moon as you’ll find, really it stands alone by taking a different approach. While the prior book looked backwards at who was trying to do a land grab of Lunar real estate over the years, this one instead looks at how we can move forward by taking a look at how the law stands now, its context, including historical, and how it is interpreted.
After my last review, I wanted to read a bit of Moon science. As I perused the titles in the Selenology section of the Lunar Library, my eyes paused upon “The International Atlas Of Lunar Exploration“ by Philip Stooke, but I hesitated. It’s a big book, weighing in at 440 pages all-in. I was daunted, and that’s what decided it for me, so I dove right in.
I’m glad I did. This is a fantastic book. The volume of data conveyed is just stupendous, purveyed in a straightforward, no-nonsense and factual manner. The large volume of images is just overwhelming, showing the gradual accumulation of better and better images that helped pathfind the way for Apollo.
I’ve been trying to think of how to approach this review. From the title, it would seem to be a nice complement to existing Moonbase references like Eckart’s “The Lunar Base Handbook“, or Schrunk et al’s “The Moon: Resources, Future Development, and Settlement“. In the end, the content choices of the author may have left this book as an interesting historical footnote in the Moon-reference oeuvre.
For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,
Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;
Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails,
Pilots of the purple twilight dropping down with costly bales;
from ‘Locksley Hall’ by Alfred Lord Tennyson
These words kept winging through my head as I read “Solar Sails: A Novel Approach to Interplanetary Travel” by Giovanni Vulpetti, Les Johnson and Gregory Matloff. Published in 2008 by Praxis Publishing, it weighs in at 243 pages with the glossary. A fair number of errors scattered throughout, the kinds of errors you find when someone is not writing in their native tongue. (you should see my written French - deplorable)
The book starts at the beginning of humanity’s efforts to fly farther and higher than ever before, with the story of Icarus and Daedelus, and their primitively engineered Bronze Age efforts at flight. We forward to the classical age, when scholars like Pythagoras began the historical data gathering of motions of the Moon and planets, which may have inspired Lucian of Samasota’s “True Histories”, his story of a trip to the Moon and his witness of a titanic battle in the heavens. The authors also note Hero of Alexandria, whose aeolipile is a direct ancestor of the modern rocket, Chinese advances carried to the Occident by Marco Polo, British Naval ‘rocket ships’ that rampaged around Europe and the U.S. Eastern seaboard in the early 1800s. Various fantastickal writers are noted before we reach the end of the 1800s and Tsiolkovsky’s advances in working out the rocket equation and the many people who worked around the world to help make rockets a reality in the first half of the 1900s.
Chapter two delves into the physics of rockets and rocket travel. Nothing too deep, about high school level. Various types of rocket motors that turn the math into reality are considered, from chemical solids and liquids to nuclear. The next chapter looks at the myriad problems and limitations of the different rocket motors and some nuclear options. Next considered are some non-rocket in-space maneuvering techniques, from planetary gravity-assists to Mag-Sails to Interstellar Ramjets.
The book then takes a step back to look at one of the older technologies of humanity, that of using sails with our watercraft. Looking at some physics and history, we then wander into whether the Solar wind could be used to similar purpose. We get an introduction to some of the amazing properties of light, and it’s noted that Tsiolkovsky wrote on the subject of using Solar light pressure to propel a thin sheet at high speeds.
Next up is Section II, Space Missions by Sail. Here we look at the principles of how space sailing works, and the systems that would make up a sailcraft, including the ever important payload. There’s a rather lopsided comparison of rockets and sails, with simplicity the ultimate reason that Solar sails should be considered for application and use in space. Some different mission scenarios are considered, and the section closes with some more speculative applications, such as laser and microwave sailing.
Section III focuses on the Construction of Sailcraft. The elements of design are considered, and the different types of materials that might be used, including real world examples that were developed in the 1990s and into the 2000s. Maneuvering and attitude control are considered. There are descriptions of a number of projects that were undertaken to prove out the concept, including ODISSEE, COSMOS-1, and Russian Solar mirrors, and some emergent technologies are considered. The section wraps up with a look at what might lie ahead in the next 25, 50 and 100 years.
Section IV jumps into the Technical Aspects, and this is where the book jumps to the college level as the formulae start coming fast and furious. A thorough look is taken at light and its sources in space, giving consideration to such things as the affect of reflected light from Earth on Solar sail ops in LEO. Chapter 16 looks at how to model the thrust from Electromagnetic Radiation Pressure, while 17 looks at the orbits that would be traced by Solar sails. Finally, the space environmental effects are considered in how they would affect the sail itself, and some mitigating strategies.
So, Solar Sails is definitely a comprehensive treatment of the topic. There were a number of intriguing ideas, and I was most struck by the idea of a pole sitter spacecraft that basically orbits above a planet’s pole. This would have huge implications for a Lunar communications infrastructure that is trying to keep the farside of the Moon quiet for science purposes.
While reading the chapter on trajectories, I couldn’t help but note the similarity of many of the trajectories to those of spacecraft that make use of weak-stability boundary trajectories as outlined by Belbruno, Koon, Lo, Ross, and others. I can’t help but wonder if there might be some way for the two to be linked to greater effect.
The only complaint I would really have with the work is the distracting nature of the editing errors which pop up here and there. I’m actually a bit surprised that Springer and Praxis would let so many sneak through the editing process, as they are well-known for their higher level space books. It’s going to cost them a bit in the rating.
I’m particularly fond of the idea of Solar sails as a longer-term transport solution in space. I think it’s most immediate application will be the delivery of scientific packages to various targets of interest around the Solar system. A day when merchant fleets are delivering the wealth of our Solar system to Earth on argosies of magic sails seems a ways off, but I hope I’m mistaken. The open and close of Pierre Boulle’s novel “Planet of the Apes” takes place aboard a Solar sail yacht, evoking images of wealthy Earthlings cruising through our Solar system on sails of light.
Wherein your friendly Lunar Librarian looks at the best additions to the Lunar Library for 2008 and chooses the best of the best in each category.
This year the catch phrase is “value”. In a tight economy every ounce of value needs to be squeezed out of each dollar spent. One of the metrics we’ll be using this year is the MSRP compared with the number of pages (with some qualitative fudging for font size, line spacing, margins, &c.) or the number of minutes of video.
There were a lot of additions to the Lunar Library over the course of 2008 as it struggled with its sophomore slump[1], magnified by increased content responsibilities here at the parent OotC website. This was further impacted by your friendly Lunar Librarian taking the keys to the entire website[2] just in time for software upgrades and miscellaneous website issues to make things go kablooie. Still, I’ve soldiered through like I always do, and here we are at our third annual Best of the Moon. Like usual, we’re going to go through some of the miscellaneous categories before arriving at our Moon, so let’s get started.
“Rocket Girls” by Housuke Nojiri and Muttiri Moon, from 2007 and just released on DVD here in the U.S.
I am sitting here being gob-smacked by this incredible show. I heard about the series a while back, and even looked for the Japanese DVD while I was in Beijing on a business trip last year. The basic premise of Rocket Girls is that a private company, Solomon Space Authority (SSA), is trying to provide satellite repair services via crewed spaceflight. Trouble is, their upgraded booster isn’t working out and they’ll have to downgrade to a proven design with less performance. This means their astronaut is too heavy.
Young Yukari has grown up with her mother, a driven businesswoman, since her father walked out and disappeared the first night of their honeymoon in the Solomons. Her mother never looked back, but Yukari always has, and during the summer break from her exclusive high school she goes to the Solomons to track down her missing father and confront him. Via a strange set of circumstances, her petite frame and mass earns her a chance to be an astronaut for SSA. She gets a high-tech skintight spacesuit and the training begins. Soon, it’s time for the proving flight. One that shows how dangerous it can be to operate at the bleeding edge of technology in the relatively new (to humans) environment of space.
That is but the introduction for this fine twelve episode series. Based on the premise (and my past viewing of Stratos4, which I discussed at the Rocket Gyrls Reading Club), I expected far more cheese than was evident here. I was actually surprised by the strong portrayals of strong women with strong interests in things like chemistry, biology, and medicine. The note on the back that the producers had the cooperation of the Japanese Aerospace eXploration Agency (JAXA) is evident in a big way. There is a high degree of technical fidelity (comparatively speaking), once the story gets going, and it’s easy to envision being there. There’s real danger and challenges to overcome, and the girls learn valuable life lessons along the way. The climax is an edge of your seat dramatic thrill ride.
I haven’t enjoyed an anime this much since Planetes. The story is one of bravery and hope and scientific endeavor. The characters are sympathetic even if the little girl voices can be a bit grating at times. I particularly like the private enterprise aspect of the story, where businessmen and financiers step up to the plate and start doing the kinds of things in space that government space enterprises are just institutionally incapable of doing. While the concept of a triplet of 15-17 year-old girl astronauts might seem implausible at first, young ladies do benefit from certain physical advantages that, for example, make them such fine acrobats. I’ve also heard more than once from folks who are likely to know that women also have certain aptitudes that make them excellent space navigators. So I don’t find the idea entirely implausible (just mostly).
My question is why aren’t we doing this kind of quality storytelling here in the U.S.? Grounded in values like courage and determination, telling stories with philosphical profundity and characters that are firm in their convictions. I don’t really watch TV, so I’m not in tune with what’s on the kids’ channels except by occasional exposure. What I do see doesn’t have this kind of animation and story quality. When I place it in the context of other anime titles in the Lunar Library, the exceeding of my expectations raises it close to the top of the list.
I would really like to see more of this kind of near-Earth, near-future space story. Unfortunately they’re few and far between. This one is rated 13+ agewise, probably for some mild cussin’. There’s really not any nudity to speak of, other than, you know, high-tech skin-tight bodysuits. I may get in trouble for saying so, but I can see this as being of value for young ladies under 13. The level of maturity of the potential viewer is of course the judgement of the parents.
Girl Hug in space after fixing the Pluto probe
I use a different set of ratings for High Frontier fiction versus the New-to-Full Moon technique I use for Moon fiction. This is in honor of Joseph Louis Lagrange, who mathematically mapped out the Lagrange points, those special locations in space with unusual characteristics. The Sun-Earth L-1 (about 1.5 million kilometers Sunward) is where we have the SOHO instrument watching the Sun for us, and SEL-2 (on the starward side of Earth) is where we want to put our next big deep space probe.
The Earth Moon L-1 (EML-1, or as I affectionately call it, Emily) is the gravitational hilltop between the gravity wells of the Earth and Moon. EML-4 is 60º ahead of the Moon in its 360º orbit around the Earth, while EML-5 is 60º behind the Moon in its orbit. A kind of gravitational mesa, objects placed at L-5 will wander around near the point, but won’t leave the mesa top unless impelled to do so (meaning very cheap station-keeping). In theory, but in actuality the perturbations that the Earth-Moon system experiences preclude any kind of natural accumulation of stuff there, but Jupiter is second only to the Sun in its gravitational influence in the Solar system, and the king of planets has some big stable gravitational mesas pushed up at its L-4 and L-5 points, and there are found the Trojan asteroids.
On this scale, L-1 is the lowest rating, while L-5 is the highest rating in honor of O’Neill’s desire to put space colonies at the Earth-Moon L-5 point. I hesitate to give “Rocket Girls” the highest rating, but it is certainly a very strong L-4.
This time around we look at one of the more advanced topics in space, that of navigation. Unlike the movies, where spacecraft go zipping around, behaving more like aircraft in an atmosphere than boxes of thrusters in a vacuum, space navigation is a bit more complicated and typically involves hurtling through space at high velocity on a trajectory that is difficult to change in any significant way. A good grasp of mathematics is required to explore this field, and for advanced studies calculus is an absolute requirement, especially in things like matrices (which I never got my brain wrapped around). I rely a good deal on my ability to visualize the geometry of objects moving in three-dimensional space (which is where the need for matrices comes in when you’re dealing with different frames of reference) as a crutch when the math gets too hard.
Pretty much the first reference that everyone notes is from JPL, entitled “The Basics of Spaceflight”. This was part of the background reading recommended to participants in the Space Generation Forum back in 1999, where I first learned of it. Somewhere in the depths of the Lunar Library I have my original copy. In 2001 it was updated and web-ified, taking advantage of the power of hyperlinks to flesh out many of the concepts by linking to more thorough explanations of particular topics. Mini-quizzes check comprehension as the student works through the text, helping to make sure they don’t get in too far over their heads. This reference should be comprehensible to brighter middle-school students.
Once you’ve got the ‘Basics of Spaceflight’ down, it’s time to move on to a more advanced text, and the best one around is “Understanding Space: An Introduction to Astronautics”, edited by Jerry Jon Sellers. Developed by the folks at the U.S. Air Force Academy, this textbook is the best one around for easing people into the complexities of orbital mechanics and space navigation. It’s written at the undergraduate textbook level, but should be easily comprehensible to bright high-schoolers on a strong math track. I read through the 2000 edition as part of my extra studies for International Space University (ISU), but it has been updated with a hardcover 2004 edition. Better graphics and more of them for the explanations help make the concepts a bit more understandable. This one remains one of my favorites.
From here the reference books start getting tougher as the topics move from the circular restricted 3-body problem to things like perturbation theory and rotating frames of reference. Some tools to help with this are a pair of very different software programs available over the internet. The first is the open-source freeware program Orbiter. It has been around at least since my days at ISU, and is continually updated and added to by its growing community of fans. It takes great pride in the accuracy of its physics engine, and Bruce Irving of the Music of the Spheres blog has prepared an introductory tutorial which has an accompanying teacher’s guide. As Bruce describes it:
“Orbiter (written by Dr.Martin Schweiger of University College London) is great for demonstrating concepts such as planetary rotation, orbits, relative motion, forces, Newton’s Laws, and more. Advanced students can use it as a lab for experiments in physics, including orbital mechanics and atmospheric flight. Using some of the hundreds of avaialble free add-ons, students can explore the history of rocketry and Space flight, from Robert Goddard’s early rockets to Apollo, the space shuttle, and beyond. Orbiter is also expandable - users can even use free 3D modeling software to build and fly their own spacecraft.”
Bruce (who goes by the name Flying Singer at the Orbiter forums) was also kind enough to give a presentation on using Orbiter at the ISDC I helped put together, so a special shout-out to him for that.
Moving into the realm of what the professionals use, we have Satellite Tool Kit (STK) from AGI. We had a seminar on how to use the software as part of our studies at ISU, and I think that might have been where I first started getting really keen on space navigation as an area of interest. So much so that when the Team Project rolled around I wanted to work on the Trans-Mars Injection and arrival calculations, which I did. AGI has recognized the value that this program holds in the classroom, and so have created a Educational Alliance Program to provide educators with support resources. I wanted to use the Astrogator module for the Team Project, but we were too poor to buy the license.
Once you’ve got some hands-on experience with how orbital mechanics is used in space navigation, it’s time to whip out the definitive reference for this category, and that would have to be David Vallado’s “Fundamentals of Astrodynamics and Applications”, a meaty tome that weighs in at 958 pages all-in (the 3rd edition from 2007 has 1055 pages). It’s the most comprehensive treatment out there, and even includes a section on continuous thrust trajectories like the one used to take ESA’s SMART-1 mission to the Moon. It has an online support page for software and errata relating to the book.
One thing it doesn’t really touch on is a newer type of spacecraft trajectory that takes advantage of the warps in gravity caused by the planets, and the linkages between these warps. Researcher Ed Belbruno, author of “Fly Me to the Moon”, was one of the early ones to actually figure out how to make these work to our advantage, and used it to rescue a Japanese mission that had been inserted into a bad orbit. Using the warp in the Earth’s gravity well created by our Moon, he was able, over time, to put the spacecraft into a relatively usable orbit. These were termed ‘weak stability boundary trajectories’ which is a mouthful, but a very simple idea in practice. A good way to think of it is in terms of a surfer who has ridden his board to the top of a wave. Small adjustments in where he points the tip of the board will have a significant result in where he ends up at the end of the ride. The SMART-1 probe took advantage of this phenomenon when it rode up Earth’s gravity well and then slipped over the gravity ‘hill’ at the Earth-Moon L-1 point and rode down into the Moon’s gravity well.
The different gravity wells of the planets are linked by ‘ripples’ that are constantly moving as the planets move. These can be imagined as long waves in the Sun’s gravity well, and spacecraft can be sent sliding along the crests of these ripples, riding them (very, very slowly) to different points of the Solar system along what is, in effect, an interplanetary highway system. The significance of this is that we can create Hubble-ized space instruments (i.e. people can repair and upgrade them) that we can send out to Jupiter or Saturn to, for example, keep an eye on incoming objects from the Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt. When it’s time for servicing, the space probe is nudged back onto the interplanetary highway system and returns back to near-Earth space where it can be retrieved and serviced. In this way, we can get more value out of our space probes by reusing them and making them better instead of just throwing very expensive instruments into the void one after another.
These are the kinds of exciting new developments that are going on in the field of space navigation. Moonwalker Buzz Aldrin earned his doctorate for his work on the kinds of free-return trajectories that allowed us to conceive of a rescue for Apollo 13. We’ve come a long way since then as our mathematics, and computing heft, have advanced significantly, and so this is not a stale, dry field where we know everything, but rather one where there is significant work yet to be done. We can use these new understandings of space flight to change the way we approach how we design our space architecture.
And hopefully, there will soon be jobs for astrogators to take us to the Moon, the asteroids, Mars, the moons of Jupiter, and beyond…
This time around we’re going to look at a pair of high-speed topics - orbital debris and asteroids. This is a really exciting category in the Lunar Library, and not just for the drama movies! Asteroids can provide an enormous abundance of resources should we go out an learn to harvest them, just as we’ve learned to harvest many of the plants and animals of the Earth. This time around we’re doing it so that we can stop tearing up our own planet to get at these things that we need for our technological society. You’ll hear the ‘economic’ claim that dumping mega-tonnes of platinum or nickel on the market will collapse prices. From a basic Econ 101 theoretical perspective that might be true, but it has to be looked at in the broader context of economic and technological activity. One of the many constraints we have on mechanical efficiency in the objects we manufacture, from lightbulbs to internal combustion engines, is the economic necessity imposed on the engineers of constantly trying to find less expensive but almost as good substitutes. In an economy of abundance, the right materials can be used for each application for maximum efficiency. This will enable an enormous demand for re-engineering the products we have into the best that they can be, and for finding new applications for materials like platinum that have previously been constrained in their use by their rareness and therefore cost.
This is kind of far-fetched economics from our current perspective, but calls to mind the fact that we’ve cherry-picked all of the easy sources for most of this stuff throughout history, and we’re increasingly having to look further out on the margins for sources of obscure elements that are necessary for things like flat-screen TVs. There are several planets worth of materials available in the small bodies of the inner Solar system. We just need to learn how to go out there and get them.
There’s another purpose for doing this as well. The meteorite that recently burned up over the Sudan announced itself with less than 24 hours notice before its doom. (thank goodness we have a nice thick atmosphere) This is because when you use telescopes to look for asteroids, you’re looking away from the Sun. Things like radar (such as the Arecibo Dish) can look Sunward, but there are all kinds of issues there. I’m convinced we need instruments up out of all the garbage we’ve strewn out to GEO, that can look towards (but not at) the Sun on a regular basis to collect data.
Speaking of garbage strewn out to GEO, we’re going to start out this time around with orbital debris.
It was about a decade ago that the first pieces of the International Space Station (ISS) starting making their way to station on-orbit. It represents our toe-hold in space, and the latest evolution of flight models dating back to the 1970s, but unique in that the pieces have come from all over the world. It is our most advanced laboratory, yet one that we have a fundamental difficulty in reaching in a regular and reliable fashion. A lot of folks are working on solving that problem, but once it is overcome and we can start shoveling people up into space we’re going to find that there is a lot of work to be done, from sciences at space stations to freeflyer super-microgravity platforms to cleaning up GEO and prepping for solar power satellites. We need instrumentation in higher orbits (like EML-1) to look Sunward for near-Earth objects like asteroids. We need to start honing our Solar system exploration skills on the Moon. We need to start visiting asteroids to see how they can be tapped for useful resources.
But that’s a little ways off, and we’re still at the first stages of creating a spacefaring civilization. The International Space Station is the most prominent result to date of that ambition, but also has a lot of issues to deal with. It would be great to use it as a staging platform to organize trans-LEO sorties, but that’s not what it was ‘designed for’. Its usefulness as a science laboratory is compromised by the very presence of the astronauts bumping into things and creating ‘jitters’ in the microgravity environment, which is why many scientists have long advocated the use of free-flyer platforms instead for their microgravity materials sciences experiments. EML-1 makes a great staging location for that activity for a whole host of reasons beyond the scope of this article. A limit of twelve dockings per year puts a very low ceiling on the amount of traffic at the ISS.
Regardless, the International Space Station is a triumph from many perspectives. The international cooperation alone is mind-boggling when you conceive of how much organizational effort was/is required. The engineering is phenomenal, with all kinds of spinoffs in things like couplings and seals and materials and so on. What do you make a cable sheath out of that can remain flexible from -100 F to +250 F? Can that kind of sheath find application here on Earth? The science is also great, though of course we don’t hear enough about it. Kids have even contributed their fair share, and I get to that later in the article. So without further ado, let’s start looking at some of the educational materials we have available to learn about the ISS. READ MORE…
To be distributed in 2008 by Blue Works, it weighs in at 233 pages. One homonymic error noted.
The time is the near future. 13 year-old Blair Kelly has a new life ahead of her, much different from the Nebraska farm on which she has grown up, reveling in the tales of her pioneer forefathers who tamed the savage frontier as told by her grandfather. It is her correspondence with her grandfather that opens each chapter in the book, providing the thread that binds the narrative together. Her mother has been working as some kind of electrical engineer on the Moon, and has petitioned together with her father, a teacher, to transfer the whole family to our Moon and renew the pioneer spirit on the next frontier. While awaiting the final decision, she has to attend a year of Moon School to learn the basics of how to live on the Moon. It’s not always easy, but there is this cute boy, Carl, that she may end up seeing on the Moon… READ MORE…
Your friendly Lunar Librarian has long been an early adopter of technology, and is a maven of useful advanced technologies. Flexible Solar cells? Great stuff that. Aerogel? That’s the shizzle right there.
One of my favorite tools for educational outreach is a Space Blanket. I use this to explain the importance of high technology industry and why we do R&D. I ask if they have a roll of aluminium foil in their kitchen, and explain that it is formed by running the aluminum through rollers that squeeze it into a sheet. Low tech, but reasonably effective. The Space Blanket, on the other hand, is made using ion sputtering and vapor -phase deposition, allowing the creation of a layer of aluminum that may be only tens of atoms thick as compared with hundreds or thousands for aluminum foil. It’s a more efficient way of using the aluminum, and allows for large numbers of Space Blankets to be manufactured at a reasonable price. We then wrap up the kids like burritos to demonstrate the effect of having 85% of the body’s IR thermal emission reflected back to the body by the aluminum. The best was at one event where Raytheon had an IR camera on display so we could show the differences between exposed skin and the blanket. These can be found at pretty much any sporting goods store.
