Agreed, I never meant to imply that the skimmer was supposed to be manned. The crew stays in orbit and teleoperates the skimmer without significant comm lag.
A Sound of Thunder: The Rise of the Soviet Superbooster
- Thread starter nixonshead
- Start date
That stage will need to be modified for a year and a half of hard space exposure, not to mention dormancy
Given its designed to take the L3M from LLO to final decent, its likely that with the stack required for a venus flyby which is a Zarya (with or without reactor) and TKS it might not be enough to slow down for earth reentry.
It is certainly possible with even 60s to 70s tech, but, well, given that the spacecraft and suits would have to be made to resist similar pressures like those found at 1.1 km under the sea, temperatures that could melt lead and sulfuric acid rain, it would be a very heavy spacecraft and spacesuit + a lot of drag in trying to fly to orbit from the surface.
It would require Nova class rockets with nuclear engines just for the landing/takeoff craft. Plus a molten salt reactor for cooling.
THIS. A key difference between Venus and Mars is that any manned ship going to Mars should be able to land on Deimos and/or Phobos.Well if we're talking just a flyby I'd agree with most of this. (Except maybe probe versus Cosmonaut in the Soviet era) But there was an idea that became more prominent OTL in the late 90s of a non-landing mission to Mars specifically, (but some studies included a Venus flyby) which concentrated on both retrieving Martian soil samples and an extensive study of the Martian moons as a precursor for ISRU for a landing mission.
Garrison
Donor
Yeah I definitely doubt anyone is going to do it unless there actually was Dilithium on Venus and that would make this a very different TL.
I like how everybody went from N1 being retired to continued flight to another Zarya station, to manned flybys of other planets, which is still expensive and pushing Soviet willingness far. Now we are talking orbital missions and possible landings on the Martian moons
A Venus flyby is relatively useless, same with orbital missions, the clouds block the land so it would be photos of clouds, and nothing would be learned besides stuff probes already know. Mars is kinda the same unless landings are involved (Mars or its moons)
The Soviets are dealing with huge economic instability due to Gorbachev's reforms, and space is not a focus, in OTL the soviet space program was slowing down by the late 8ps, and that was just with Buran-Energia and MIR with Soyuz and Progress flights. ITTL the Soviets have an active lunar program and monster LEO vehicles like TKS with rockets like Groza (N1) flying lunar and shuttle missions.
If anything ITTL Soviet space will start to slip considering the last post was in 1987, i can see the Soviets barely keeping their moonbase active and possibly a small LEO station. But flights to other worlds will not have the funding or priority until the Union recovers, or in the case of a full collapse like OTL, never have priority
A flyby would require a commitment of at least 3 N1 launches and severe modifications for all parts involved, like fuel storage for a year without boiloff, a stronger reentry capsule, and radiation protection and backups for the manned habitation component.
An orbital mission would likely mean 4 or 5 N1 launches, same modifications as above but more fuel.
A Mars orbital mission WITH landings on the moons would need at least 6 if not 7 N1 launches, the habitation and reentry capsule, along with the fuel for injection, braking, Earth return burn and slowdown at Earth, plus the lander for the moons and the fuel required for orbital transfers between orbits
With the economic slowdown of the Soviet Union occurring, this would mean 1 to 2 years of N1 flights would be dedicated to a one-time publicity stunt, development time would mean a mission date no earlier than 1993, which would be affected by the economic issues
And don't forget the elephant in the room, if your going through the trouble of sending PEOPLE to Mars orbit, why not land on the surface? Landing on Mars's moons would be impressive but lets be realistic, its nothing compared to landing on MARS itself. Which would make history and really fuck with the americans. Though it would be hilarious if it somehow overlapped with a US Freedom mission to the moon "Americans return to the moon, Soviets at Mars" would be hilarious
Been reading Fear, loathing and Gumbo on the Campaign Trail 72, i wonder if the Soviets could still pull off the concept of MBA Communism (Like China), the issue would be finding a legit replacement for Gorbachev who had these thoughts in OTL
A Venus flyby is relatively useless, same with orbital missions, the clouds block the land so it would be photos of clouds, and nothing would be learned besides stuff probes already know. Mars is kinda the same unless landings are involved (Mars or its moons)
The Soviets are dealing with huge economic instability due to Gorbachev's reforms, and space is not a focus, in OTL the soviet space program was slowing down by the late 8ps, and that was just with Buran-Energia and MIR with Soyuz and Progress flights. ITTL the Soviets have an active lunar program and monster LEO vehicles like TKS with rockets like Groza (N1) flying lunar and shuttle missions.
If anything ITTL Soviet space will start to slip considering the last post was in 1987, i can see the Soviets barely keeping their moonbase active and possibly a small LEO station. But flights to other worlds will not have the funding or priority until the Union recovers, or in the case of a full collapse like OTL, never have priority
A flyby would require a commitment of at least 3 N1 launches and severe modifications for all parts involved, like fuel storage for a year without boiloff, a stronger reentry capsule, and radiation protection and backups for the manned habitation component.
An orbital mission would likely mean 4 or 5 N1 launches, same modifications as above but more fuel.
A Mars orbital mission WITH landings on the moons would need at least 6 if not 7 N1 launches, the habitation and reentry capsule, along with the fuel for injection, braking, Earth return burn and slowdown at Earth, plus the lander for the moons and the fuel required for orbital transfers between orbits
With the economic slowdown of the Soviet Union occurring, this would mean 1 to 2 years of N1 flights would be dedicated to a one-time publicity stunt, development time would mean a mission date no earlier than 1993, which would be affected by the economic issues
And don't forget the elephant in the room, if your going through the trouble of sending PEOPLE to Mars orbit, why not land on the surface? Landing on Mars's moons would be impressive but lets be realistic, its nothing compared to landing on MARS itself. Which would make history and really fuck with the americans. Though it would be hilarious if it somehow overlapped with a US Freedom mission to the moon "Americans return to the moon, Soviets at Mars" would be hilarious
Been reading Fear, loathing and Gumbo on the Campaign Trail 72, i wonder if the Soviets could still pull off the concept of MBA Communism (Like China), the issue would be finding a legit replacement for Gorbachev who had these thoughts in OTL
I see what the problem is... we need to look towards missions beyond Mars, like landings on Jovian and Saturnian moons.
not good enough
We must look at other solar systems, a mission to Alpha Centauri would surely put the Imperialist United States behind in space
The only Moon worth landing on is Titan
also thats the plot of my favorite space book
Say what you will about it, but Baxter clearly knows the popular feeling of space travel by the masses and the disconnect between scientists and people, or just the scientists from the reality of the situation, the less said about moonseed the better
So both nations have run into their own safety breaking points; the US less severely than OTL, the Soviets far more severely than OTL. (P.S. you knocked it out of the park in describing the more human side of both of these accidents) Meanwhile, Europe is the only party that's on the ascendancy. Admittedly a nuclear reactor disaster wasn't even on my mind when I read all this.
At the same time we're really creeping up to the historical date when the USSR is no more, and we don't have any hints that the factors leading to it were any different.
If a collapse actually happens ITTL, I wonder how Groza would tie into their commercialization plans.
Also, all that potentially unused lunar hardware is making me excited for the prospects of an International Lunar Surface Station; in this world, the Soviets would be the masters of both long-duration spaceflight and routine lunar operations, both crucial to lunar bases. We have a very unqiue opportunity sitting right here...
At the same time we're really creeping up to the historical date when the USSR is no more, and we don't have any hints that the factors leading to it were any different.
If a collapse actually happens ITTL, I wonder how Groza would tie into their commercialization plans.
Also, all that potentially unused lunar hardware is making me excited for the prospects of an International Lunar Surface Station; in this world, the Soviets would be the masters of both long-duration spaceflight and routine lunar operations, both crucial to lunar bases. We have a very unqiue opportunity sitting right here...
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With no US Shuttle disaster would that mean Nigel Wood will become the first Briton in space TTL?
The Delta livery is classic, its a shame that todays rockets lose alot of the logo's, SpaceX keeps their fairings and rockets clean, which i can't blame them for as they reuse the cores and repainting for every flight would be a pain
The older ones look like a NASCAR with all the logo's
Maybe, depends on that astronaut-specific payload still flying
Before Challenger payload specialists were often representatives of corporations and countries for their satellites being launched, Indonesia almost had a woman in space but Challenger moved that payload to another rocket, so she was cut. This payload specialist program had a bunch of international people, a saudi prince was flown, iirc Canada's first guy in space was mission specialist, but can't remember if his flight deployed a Canadian satellite.
On Challenger's final mission, astronaut Jarvis was a representative for hughes aerospace (iirc), he was bumped by two congressmen flying in his spot, as a result, he was bumped into STS-51L and killed.
One of those Congressmen is the current administrator of NASA (Nelson), the other guy (Garn) did a speech with the Challenger families and Jarvis's wife apparently wanted Garn dead (Garn flew on Columbia, the last mission before Challenger)
ITTL Challenger is lost in 85 or 86 (cant recall) due to a wing foam strike, its likely that the commerical payloads were dropped due to the compressing of flight rates with less Shuttles. He most likely got cut as the british payload was removed from the flight line due to priorities for Skylab and Freedom missions. It sucks but this happened with alot of astronauts irl
John Young was grounded after he made some remarks about NASA for lax safety protocols, he only retired from NASA in the 2000's
I wonder what the EELV program would look like ITTL, the Challenger incident ended commercialization but this was happening as early as 84ish
Historically the Challenger disaster ended launches for a while, as by 86 most rockets were used up and spare rockets were mostly put in storage, some like Atlas's were destroyed, the US launch market only really got back to normal in 88 and 89, with the new designs like Delta 2 and Atlas's being made
This also led to Ariane and ESA dominating the launch market with GTO missions and cheaper overall costs
Personally, i think that ITTL the US rocket industry would be in a better spot, Delta and other rocket classes would keep flying with less of a gap due to shut down production lines and that fun logistical stuff
Maybe Ariane stayes second to the US market (depends how the US regulations are though)
What do you guy's think?
Historically the Challenger disaster ended launches for a while, as by 86 most rockets were used up and spare rockets were mostly put in storage, some like Atlas's were destroyed, the US launch market only really got back to normal in 88 and 89, with the new designs like Delta 2 and Atlas's being made
This also led to Ariane and ESA dominating the launch market with GTO missions and cheaper overall costs
Personally, i think that ITTL the US rocket industry would be in a better spot, Delta and other rocket classes would keep flying with less of a gap due to shut down production lines and that fun logistical stuff
Maybe Ariane stayes second to the US market (depends how the US regulations are though)
What do you guy's think?
People tend to lose the human aspect, Nixonheads posts were both good and heartfelt. Its sad that Challenger is remembered for the Teacher and not the 6 other people.
Nixon Said the USSR might survive under either a reformed union or the New Union treaty, Groza might be used as a super GTO transport, add support structure for a bunch of satellites in the fairing and you could launch 5 Satelities in one go
IRL NASA had alot of issues with Russian experience in space, NASA tended to have complicated ideas while the Russians did simple stuff, When the Shuttle-MIR missions and the ISS started NASA had some funny idea's for certain things (hand assembled truss for one).
My favorite was that early plans for Shuttle missions involved a minimum energy rendevous taking at least 4 or 5 days and at most 7ish days to get to the station, considering missions were usually about a week-long, this is alot of travel time, This was later lowered to a 2 day rendevous
It would be funny in this timeline for NASA to have a bunch of idea's for lunar surface activity, and the russians giving them the truth of it
Granted, I'm not an expert on anything I say here, so take it with a grain of salt the size of the steppe, but NASA's complicated ideas were stemmed in trying to save costs, a product of complicated political meddling that comes inherently with being a governmental agency; it wasn't that these complex ideas failed, but because safety tests weren't done, corners were cut, people deciding "fuck it", and so on so forth. This is what led to pretty much every notable American space disaster. Apollo 1 had a faulty door that prevented the astronauts from escaping. Columbia had it's wing tiles wrecked, which wasn't considered to be a substantial issue. Challenger had it's o-ring screwed with by the weather and higher-ups ignored the warnings and gave the go-ahead.
The Soviets had these exact same issues. Nixonshead notes in multiple posts that the Soviets, OTL and ITTL, often skipped tests to just do it, which often resulted in failure. OTL's Soyuz 14 is the prime example of this, as were the numerous failures of the N1 and other rockets because they refused to ground-test the engines the way the US did.
The Soviets had these exact same issues. Nixonshead notes in multiple posts that the Soviets, OTL and ITTL, often skipped tests to just do it, which often resulted in failure. OTL's Soyuz 14 is the prime example of this, as were the numerous failures of the N1 and other rockets because they refused to ground-test the engines the way the US did.
It is not that they didn't want to test the N1 and its engines, they could not. They were lacking the facilities required and in the case of the engines, they were single use only. The ones they tested worked but the production ones they got had an occasional fault in there.