REB made comments about reusing energy from a reentering spacecraft. There's nothing wrong with thinking outside of the box. However I see no simple method to reuse this energy. If you use a tether then you have to somehow shield the tether from heating. Truth to tell, not killing the crew returning from Mars is a very difficult problem all by itself. The entry corridor is narrow, the heat loads are high, there is radiative heating that's hard to model and a significant decelleration load. The Apollo CM worked beautifully. However it was a simple design, built like a bank vault (I've been in one) and provided an overly wild ride. The Apollo astronauts had nerves of steel but I suspect most of them were feeling a bit anxious during reentry from the Moon.
Gary
Space/Science » in reply to You post made me remember something I thought about a few months ago
re: You post made me remember something I thought about a few months ago
The whole thread (24 posts)
- Jeff Bell's pessimistic outlook for "Plan Bush"
- Interesting debate debunking Bell's views
- Fact and fiction
- You post made me remember something I thought about a few months ago
- re: Eye opener