Nasa is considering a Manned Mission to Venus before Mars!

[PakledHostage]

As for PR, I'd say Orion EFT-1 and the #ImOnboard campaign probably wins that pretty easily, and it was only an unmanned test flight for some future manned mission. There was just an insane anount of celebs and people involved all the way through 2014.

That's a weak argument and you know it. It speaks more to the gullibility of the media and the willingness of celebrities to sing for their supper than anything else. Orion EFT-1 was an unmanned engineering test flight. It was analogous to checking to ensure that HMS Endeavor's dinghy would float while planning Cook's first mission to the south Pacific. In the 18th century, people could easily grasp that a ship's tender may be the means of getting from land to the mission's mothership and back, but it wasn't going to take the crew all the way to Australia. The media and much of the public didn't seem to understand that point about Orion.

My point is that funding is limited. I am not disputing that there is some benefit to the ISS, but putting all of our eggs in one basket is a bad idea. A manned mission to Mars or Venus may be great spectacle but a great spectacle doesn't justify the inevitable leaching of funding away from other valuable projects. And don't over-estimate the public's interest in manned space flight. Even by the time of Apollo 13, much of the general public stopped caring about manned lunar missions. The networks didn't even carry Apollo 13's television broadcasts. A small fraction of the money that gets spent on the ISS and manned space flight would fund several robotic planetary science missions. If Voyager, MSL, Spirit, Opportunity, Cassini/Huygens, Hubble, Kepler, Rosetta/Philae are any indicator, the scientific return and inspirational value of those robotic missions will be very high, even when compared to that of manned missions.

[Karriz]

I don't think there's any need to argue over manned vs unmanned; both will be done simultaneously, and if other goes away, it doesn't effect the budget of the other one in any way. Obviously there's a need for a sustainable roadmap; we can't send people to Mars, let alone Venus, just yet.

I personally think reusable launchers is what will make space exploration more affordable. That's what more companies and space agencies should be developing right now.

[EzinX]

Ok, so the next problem with Venus. So you've got your balloon habitat. You've got carbon, oxygen, nitrogen...but is 20 ppm of water vapour high enough of a concentration to gain protons? You need hydrogen in order to make decent rocket fuel, or to make plastics, drinkable water, etc etc etc. I suppose you could bring hydrogen from Earth but I really like the idea of ISRU that is able to get you limitless rocket fuel.

Apparently, the pressure is "only" comparable to 920 meters deep on the Earth's surface. The Seawolf class submarine has a crush depth at 720 meters - so it isn't unreasonable to think you could build a large, "seawolf sized" interior space for your mining apparatus.

One thing that is really cool is that the "cloud city" of Rapture totally works in the upper atmosphere of Venus. You just need a thin layer of plastic to separate the living areas from the outside, right? And, since breathable air is a lift gas, you could have reasonably small balloons suspending the thing. You could easily have gigantic ballrooms and other interior places with vast windows looking out on the murky haze. That's kind of a problem, though - the view isn't anything to write home about.

Edited December 23, 2014 by EzinX

[Rakaydos]

How resisant is graphine to Sulpheric acid? If you can crack CO2 into oxygen and graphine baloons, you should be able to expland your living space.

[Tiberion]

That's a weak argument and you know it. It speaks more to the gullibility of the media and the willingness of celebrities to sing for their supper than anything else. Orion EFT-1 was an unmanned engineering test flight. It was analogous to checking to ensure that HMS Endeavor's dinghy would float while planning Cook's first mission to the south Pacific. In the 18th century, people could easily grasp that a ship's tender may be the means of getting from land to the mission's mothership and back, but it wasn't going to take the crew all the way to Australia. The media and much of the public didn't seem to understand that point about Orion.

My point is that funding is limited. I am not disputing that there is some benefit to the ISS, but putting all of our eggs in one basket is a bad idea. A manned mission to Mars or Venus may be great spectacle but a great spectacle doesn't justify the inevitable leaching of funding away from other valuable projects. And don't over-estimate the public's interest in manned space flight. Even by the time of Apollo 13, much of the general public stopped caring about manned lunar missions. The networks didn't even carry Apollo 13's television broadcasts. A small fraction of the money that gets spent on the ISS and manned space flight would fund several robotic planetary science missions. If Voyager, MSL, Spirit, Opportunity, Cassini/Huygens, Hubble, Kepler, Rosetta/Philae are any indicator, the scientific return and inspirational value of those robotic missions will be very high, even when compared to that of manned missions.

I wasn't the one that brought up PR value, I was just saying that EFT-1 had the most PR "heat" - it wasn't just celeb endorsements - they trucked that orion mockup or the inflatables around the country to airshows and all sorts of events and people turned out. Its pretty clear that manned spaceflight will enjoy more public support, for all that matters. It doesn't affect the quality of the missions, though it could affect how easily congress would cut funding or cancel something, though not much I think.

And I totally agree about not putting all our eggs in one basket. I wasn't the one arguing against manned missions and suggesting we limit ourselves to robotic exploration either. Which is like putting humanities eggs in a basket and then just sort of studying them with a camera.

There are so many challenges ahead for Humans in space, it's going to take a diverse set of missions to guve us the capability to move among the stars. We have to explore and understand our solar system, which robots are quite suited for. We have to refine how we move and live in space, better propulsion and life support, shielding, and all of the technological hurdles. And we have to learn how humans will adapt, how we must train and how we'll change as we live in space for longer and longer periods.

They are all important, and we can't just abandon part of it because the others are cheaper and easier to do. If budgets and political nonsense are the way, we have to fight it. I think most of us reading this are from a free society where democracy in action can in theory be used to change things. Just look at how the Planetary Society has pushed back against the eroding planetary sciences budget over the last year.

NASA isn't perfect and maybe the Venus plan is too crazy to happen anytime soon. Maybe stupidity will reign once more and the SLS/Orion projects don't lead us down the path to Mars. We still have to try, to take those risks. I am conservative about a lot of things, but this isn't a place we can afford to be.

Let's go back to talking about Venus, eh?

[maccollo]

Well the amount of atmosphere that you need to cross from that height is the same as earth, but the venus gravity and circunference is lower, So I will said 6500 to 7000m/s.

Low Venus orbital velocity is around 7.2 km/s, so you rocket might need something like 8.5 km/s. That is substantially higher than 6.5 km/s.

[Technical Ben]

Nasa you just jumped the shark. Go home, your drunk.

[Albert VDS]

@AngelLestat: Our discussion is getting to diluted with side comments.

To boil it down to the core of what we mean:

We both want manned mission, for science and inspiration.

You want Venus because you think it's much cheaper to solve climate change.

I want Mars because I think it's cheaper and the biggest chance of answering the question of life.

In a perfect world we would do both those mission, I would want to see it.

The sad thing is we don't even have any prospect of seeing one getting funded.

I don't. Look at how much attention Rosetta and Philae have received recently. And MSL. And Spirit & Opportunity. Hubble. Kepler. I grew up during the Voyager grand tour era. I wasn't the only one who was captivated by it. Every couple of years we were treated to beautiful new images of our solar system. Short of something going wrong, I don't recall the manned space program ever being as prominently in the spotlight as the robotic planetary science missions.

Here in the Netherlands everyone knows who André Kuipers is, hes the astronaut who had 2 visits to the ISS and the record for longest continues European ISS flight. Tell them about New Horizons, Dawn, Opportunity, etc, etc. and they will say they never heard of those mission. If André Kuipers has a lecture then it will be sold out, anything else space related would not see that level of attention.

I do agree that the images that probes send back inspire people, just look at the out cry when they wanted to cancel Hubble, but astronauts get more attention because people can relate to them.

This discussion should not exist. NASA shouldn't have such a shabby budget. It shouldn't be in a position where it spreads it work force of the whole country just to make sure nothing gets canceled.

And it shouldn't be in a position where it "randomly" chooses missions with not defined goal insight. It stuff like NASA finishing an unneeded $349 million tower and maintaining it, just because a senator of Mississippi forces them to do it.

It's stuff like where NASA is forced to add design constraints by other agencies. Those things need to change or else we will be stuck with a NASA which is spread out thin and side tracked by the rest with not goal insight.

[AngelLestat]

Yeah, instead of people going "Why are we going to the moon, we were already there, there are things more important to solve here", people will be going "What the hell are you people doing spending all our tax money on sending people to Venus when we could be doing something actually useful?!"

More usefull than improve our climate models and understand with certain our current fate with the global warming, which may save us all?

Not mention that is much cool than a moon mission.

NASA is not an entertainment company. The PR is secondary, and you can put PR spin on any kind of mission.

Is not an entertainment company, but once a while they need to inspire and gain the people interest. Because PR you like it or not, its what define how much budget you receive for certain mission.

Read my Karriz answer.

I don't think there's any need to argue over manned vs unmanned; both will be done simultaneously, and if other goes away, it doesn't effect the budget of the other one in any way. Obviously there's a need for a sustainable roadmap; we can't send people to Mars, let alone Venus, just yet..

That is the thing they dont understand. They think that there is a fixed budget and you need to choose what to do.

Noo. In fact if this mission cost billions, it may open a new budget for another manned mission with even higher cost, this without touch the anual nasa budget.

If you said: "not.. I dont want it..." they will spent that money in other military toys, right now the budget difference between military and nasa is 50:1

But some people (some scientist included) had the wrong ilussion that if they reject the budget for these manned missions, the goverment will said: "-well I give you the same money, use it as you want." That is delusional.

Nasa will answer, "-well then lets sent 100 probes missions", goberment.. "-why you need so much? noo.. we cant tell people that we spent money in 100 different mission to do the same thing or similar things".

Not to mention that those 100 mission will be out of radar from the 99% of word population. At the end they will said "-take.. here you have enoght for 2 probe missions.. good luck."

Ok, so the next problem with Venus. So you've got your balloon habitat. You've got carbon, oxygen, nitrogen...but is 20 ppm of water vapour high enough of a concentration to gain protons? You need hydrogen in order to make decent rocket fuel, or to make plastics, drinkable water, etc etc etc. I suppose you could bring hydrogen from Earth but I really like the idea of ISRU that is able to get you limitless rocket fuel.

For the first mission they will bring the fuel with them. You can make hydrogen from the atmosphere for sure, but we didn´t test nothing yet to collect sulfure acid (the hardest part) and extract the H2, we can convert the co2 to be used as fuel, but not sure how usefull it will be.

Apparently, the pressure is "only" comparable to 920 meters deep on the Earth's surface. The Seawolf class submarine has a crush depth at 720 meters - so it isn't unreasonable to think you could build a large, "seawolf sized" interior space for your mining apparatus.

The manned sumbmarine Trieste reach 11.000mts of depth back in 1960 in the pacific, so pressure is not the issue.

One thing that is really cool is that the "cloud city" of Rapture totally works in the upper atmosphere of Venus. You just need a thin layer of plastic to separate the living areas from the outside, right? And, since breathable air is a lift gas, you could have reasonably small balloons suspending the thing. You could easily have gigantic ballrooms and other interior places with vast windows looking out on the murky haze. That's kind of a problem, though - the view isn't anything to write home about.

The only issue that I see to colonize venus is water. You can get it.. but is not easy. You can recycle once you have it all the times you want, but you will need to use in process as "rocket fuel" which you need to gather it again.

How resisant is graphine to Sulpheric acid? If you can crack CO2 into oxygen and graphine baloons, you should be able to expland your living space.

Graphene (Carbon) is good resistent to sulfure acid lower than 75% and very bad for higher concentrations, some micro doplets may reach 85% in venus.

The best elements to counter high concentrate sulfure acid are:

Viton, pvc, polypropylene , ceramics, noryl, teflon, kynar, tantalum, hastelloy -->full time

Neoprene, zirconion, nylon, latex --> only for limited time, maybe months.

Low Venus orbital velocity is around 7.2 km/s, so you rocket might need something like 8.5 km/s. That is substantially higher than 6.5 km/s.

But you start with 85% of gravity, and it drops faster than here at earth, because you already are at 50km.

Can you remember me how to calculate the low orbit speed?

We both want manned mission, for science and inspiration.

You want Venus because you think it's much cheaper to solve climate change.

I want Mars because I think it's cheaper and the biggest chance of answering the question of life.

In a perfect world we would do both those mission, I would want to see it.

The sad thing is we don't even have any prospect of seeing one getting funded.

But that is the error, they dont not compete for funding.

If they found that they can go mars first, then is ok for me.

But if we dont have yet the technology to go there, instead wait 15 or 20 years more, I want a manned mission to venus first.

And it does not mean that if you make a venus mission first you lost the mars mission.

Because the first gets more public attention and they will want more. Also technology used in the first can be used in the second.

Edited December 23, 2014 by AngelLestat

[PakledHostage]

That is the thing they dont understand. They think that there is a fixed budget and you need to choose what to do.

Noo. In fact if this mission cost billions, it may open a new budget for another manned mission with even higher cost, this without touch the anual nasa budget.

If you said: "not.. I dont want it..." they will spent that money in other military toys, right now the budget difference between military and nasa is 50:1

But some people (some scientist included) had the wrong ilussion that if they reject the budget for these manned missions, the goverment will said: "-well I give you the same money, use it as you want." That is delusional.

Nasa will answer, "-well then lets sent 100 probes missions", goberment.. "-why you need so much? noo.. we cant tell people that we spent money in 100 different mission to do the same thing or similar things".

Not to mention that those 100 mission will be out of radar from the 99% of word population. At the end they will said "-take.. here you have enoght for 2 probe missions.. good luck."

Let me just make sure that I understand you clearly: Spending hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars to send people to Venus to spend a month performing atmospheric measurements and climate studies from a balloon is rational while believing that spending all that money on a manned mission will divert funding from smaller unmanned projects is irrational?

I have already provided examples of joint ESA/NASA robotic missions that have been cancelled or mothballed because there's a lack of funding. Maybe you can explain how you envision those programs being funded as a by-product of your Venus mission? And maybe you can explain what people floating around in a balloon in Venus' atmosphere can do that a robotic Venus mission couldn't?

[AngelLestat]

You give me the reason about who has more common sense in space economics just by mention the word "trillions".

With that start, it will be very difficult to explain you why is like that.

The ISS cost from its start to now is 153 billions, this taking into account that they use mostly the space shuttle to make it. (not cost effective at all)

Mars direct cost is 30 Billions.

My estimated cost of this mission until phase 4:

60 Billions, this include the remaning development cost of the new NASA launcher (which will be used for mars missions), the first probe mission to venus, the second 1 month manned mission, and the third 1 year manned mission.

80 Billions as top, who wanna bet?

Edited December 24, 2014 by AngelLestat

[PakledHostage]

You give me the reason about who has more common sense in space economics just mention the word "trillions".

...

The ISS cost from its start to now is 153 billions, this taking into account that they use mostly the space shuttle to make it. (not cost effective at all)

.

I used the phrase "hundreds of billions or trillions". Used that way in colloquial English, it implies an upper limit. Also, one trillion is less than an order of magnitude greater than the number you gave for the cost of the ISS. Unlike some other European languages, milliard and billiard do not come between million, billion and trillion in English.

But please, can you use your "greater common sense in space economics" to answer my earlier questions?

Edited December 24, 2014 by PakledHostage

[The Jedi Master]

The hellhole planet? Good one, NASA, good one.

[Dispatcher]

Steps. Space station with a permanent human presence: we would achieve this, assuming that we can maintain it in orbit. Moon base(s). Mars base(s). Then we will have learned more how to "fly the friendly skies" of Venus in relative safety.

[NERVAfan]

Let me just make sure that I understand you clearly: Spending hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars to send people to Venus to spend a month performing atmospheric measurements and climate studies from a balloon is rational while believing that spending all that money on a manned mission will divert funding from smaller unmanned projects is irrational?

I have already provided examples of joint ESA/NASA robotic missions that have been cancelled or mothballed because there's a lack of funding. Maybe you can explain how you envision those programs being funded as a by-product of your Venus mission? And maybe you can explain what people floating around in a balloon in Venus' atmosphere can do that a robotic Venus mission couldn't?

I don't think it's quite that clear-cut, but there definitely is an argument in that direction -- but only a long-term human presence would make the difference, IMO, flags-and-footprints probably won't (just as Apollo didn't).

Right now there's very little funding because politicians don't consider space important. A long-term human presence might change that if it was seen as important by the public (part of the problem of Apollo IMO is that the goal was stated as just 'get to the moon' so there was no clear direction after that was achieved).

So there is not a "zero-sum" fixed amount of money available to space stuff that can be applied either to manned or unmanned projects. Politicians will never value unmanned missions very highly unless, perhaps, they relate clearly and directly to a near-term goal (not "people on Mars by 2040, maybe" but something like Apollo's "this decade").

[NERVAfan]

If Venus has 84% of the gravity of Earth, why is it practical for a SSTO to reach orbit from 52 kilometers on Venus? What's the delta-V requirement for that maneuver?

SSTOs are pretty borderline on Earth - even the small advantage from Venus's lower gravity makes a big difference.

(I'm pretty sure you could do an SSTO quite easily with engines with Merlin 1D's TWR and the old Atlas' balloon tank construction. It would just have less payload than a F9 so not much point... and the structure would probably be too light to re-use so F9 is probably cheaper in the long run.)

Regardless of whether going to Venus is a good idea or not, I'm just wondering how you get from your cloud city back to orbit without needing a spacecraft about the size of the one that got you from the ground on Earth to orbit. Balloon launchers have been proposed for Earth but they don't pass the pencil test.

I think balloon launchers would work just fine on Earth, the advantage over regular launchers just isn't big enough to be worth it.

If you leave your earth return vehicle in Venus orbit, you wouldn't need the rocket to be all that big - you could use a quite small capsule since you'd only have to be in it just for launch and docking. F9 can launch Dragon (which can carry up to 7 people IIRC) on Earth, so you could use something significantly smaller to launch say a 4 person capsule on Venus.

Ok, so the next problem with Venus. So you've got your balloon habitat. You've got carbon, oxygen, nitrogen...but is 20 ppm of water vapour high enough of a concentration to gain protons? You need hydrogen in order to make decent rocket fuel, or to make plastics, drinkable water, etc etc etc. I suppose you could bring hydrogen from Earth but I really like the idea of ISRU that is able to get you limitless rocket fuel.

Sulfuric acid has hydrogen in it - H₂SO₄ - and there's more of it. (You don't necessarily see it listed on the Venus atmosphere composition in the same way you don't generally see water vapor listed for Earth -- because it's so variable, whereas all the other gases are very well mixed so the composition is quite uniform up to very high altitudes).

Apparently, the pressure is "only" comparable to 920 meters deep on the Earth's surface. The Seawolf class submarine has a crush depth at 720 meters - so it isn't unreasonable to think you could build a large, "seawolf sized" interior space for your mining apparatus.

I don't see any real point to mining on Venus. If we ever have a permanent colony there -- not just a temporary mission or an ISS sized outpost -- we will probably have asteroid mining by then anyway.

One thing that is really cool is that the "cloud city" of Rapture totally works in the upper atmosphere of Venus. You just need a thin layer of plastic to separate the living areas from the outside, right? And, since breathable air is a lift gas, you could have reasonably small balloons suspending the thing. You could easily have gigantic ballrooms and other interior places with vast windows looking out on the murky haze. That's kind of a problem, though - the view isn't anything to write home about.

I don't know about that. Do we have any good pictures of what it looks like at the 50-55km level? It might be more like "luminous clouds" than "murky haze" - remember the sunlight is 2x more intense at Venus' distance from the sun.

Edited December 24, 2014 by NERVAfan
removed extra quoting, added response to other post

[Kibble]

If you leave your earth return vehicle in Venus orbit, you wouldn't need the rocket to be all that big - you could use a quite small capsule since you'd only have to be in it just for launch and docking. F9 can launch Dragon (which can carry up to 7 people IIRC) on Earth, so you could use something significantly smaller to launch say a 4 person capsule on Venus.

The lightest rocket that has launched a maneuverable piloted spacecraft is Soyuz at 300mt GLW. A LVO rocket may be lighter due to lower gravity, and ferocious mass-optimization, but it would be comparable. No reasonable rocket can launch 300mt, but if you can launch it dry and fuel in situ, that's much more favorable - Soyuz is only 20.8mt dry. If it had a big enough cargo bay, Shuttle could launch it!

Do we have any good pictures of what it looks like at the 50-55km level? It might be more like "luminous clouds" than "murky haze" - remember the sunlight is 2x more intense at Venus' distance from the sun.

50km is above the clouds - Venus' albedo is extremely high, so it might even strain your eyes to look down! But for the same reason, solar panels can be double-sided and the nadir side will get like 90% efficiency.

[Nibb31]

Is not an entertainment company, but once a while they need to inspire and gain the people interest. Because PR you like it or not, its what define how much budget you receive for certain mission.

No. NASA's budget is voted by Congress. Congress votes NASA's budget based on how many jobs it will create/maintain in their state.

The PR is secondary, as an attempt to prove to the public after the fact that the money was well spent, but that has very little impact on where the money gets assigned by congress.

Proof is SLS and Orion: These programs are supported by Congress because they create jobs in Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Ohio, and a couple of other states. Congress doesn't care where these rockets are going or what they are going to launch. All they are interested in is that the money that the Government gives NASA trickles down into their states. NASA is currently doing a lot of PR about Mars or the ARM to justify SLS/Orion, but none of those missions are funded because Congress only cares about the jobs.

The public opinion has very little bearing on NASA spending. If anything, the public is uneducated and either doesn't care or wants the Government to spend less on NASA. Just read the comments on Youtube or Google+.

Also, NASA doesn't get to decide where it spends the money. Congress assigns budgets to various programs. Which is why NASA gets so much more money for SLS/Orion than it does for Commercial Crew, although the Commercial Crew program is much more urgent because the ISS is ending in 2024.

[jwenting]

No. NASA's budget is voted by Congress. Congress votes NASA's budget based on how many votes it will create/maintain in their state.

The PR is secondary, as an attempt to prove to the public after the fact that the money was well spent, but that has very little impact on where the money gets assigned by congress.

Proof is SLS and Orion: These programs are supported by Congress because they generate votes in Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Ohio, and a couple of other states. Congress doesn't care where these rockets are going or what they are going to launch. All they are interested in is that the money that the Government gives NASA trickles down into their states. NASA is currently doing a lot of PR about Mars or the ARM to justify SLS/Orion, but none of those missions are funded because Congress only cares about the votes.

The public opinion has very little bearing on NASA spending. If anything, the public is uneducated and either doesn't care or wants the Government to spend less on NASA. Just read the comments on Youtube or Google+, or here.

Also, NASA doesn't get to decide where it spends the money. Congress assigns budgets to various programs. Which is why NASA gets so much more money for SLS/Orion than it does for Commercial Crew, although the Commercial Crew program is much more urgent because the ISS is ending in 2024.

there, fixed that for you.

[Nibb31]

People vote for jobs, taxes, guns, healthcare, education, security, and all sorts of down-to-earth things. Whether a congressperson chooses to fund Mars, Venus, the Moon, or ARM as a destination for NASA is way down in the list of things that people vote for. Especially when most representatives don't have any particular view on the subject and are more interested in trashing their opponent and following the party line. Does your representative publicize his stance on NASA policy in his programme?

Typically, only representatives who have NASA centers or space industry in their constituency have any interest in space policy. That handful of representatives defines the party line, the others follow. The vote of the general public is pretty much irrelevant at that level.

Edited December 24, 2014 by Nibb31

[AngelLestat]

is rational while believing that spending all that money on a manned mission will divert funding from smaller unmanned projects is irrational?

I have already provided examples of joint ESA/NASA robotic missions that have been cancelled or mothballed because there's a lack of funding. Maybe you can explain how you envision those programs being funded as a by-product of your Venus mission? And maybe you can explain what people floating around in a balloon in Venus' atmosphere can do that a robotic Venus mission couldn't?

Ok, lets try again, NervaFan answer was goof enoght. I will try to clarify a little more.

About what a manned mission can do than a robotic cant.. plus why sent people, I explain this already in many previous post. You can quote me from there, but read them all.

Here some data.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA

Take a look the % fed budget and year.

Right now the % fed budget is in free fall because lack of public interest, the only 2 times that increase was over the apollo program and ISS.

That's what people wants. There is where you get extreme budgets. If NASA keeps doing unmanned missions the budget will decrease with the time, so you will have less mission over time, but if you find something to inspire the world you can get several times that budget which will not decrease your future budgets, In fact it will increase them. Also you have the excuse that you do to understand the risk that earth face and what to do to save us.

Steps. Space station with a permanent human presence: we would achieve this, assuming that we can maintain it in orbit. Moon base(s). Mars base(s). Then we will have learned more how to "fly the friendly skies" of Venus in relative safety.

why you think venus winds will present a problem?? Even high winds in earth 200km/h does not present a problem with high altitude manned ballons. And earth winds has turbulance, you have also vertical winds.. You dont have that in venus.

Of course we need to be sure, for that reason we will sent a unmanned mission first.. But previous missions at that height show not signs of turbulance.

I can explain from many angles why is like that. With evidence and all kind of data. Fly with airships in Venus is much much much safe than at earth.

The hellhole planet? Good one, NASA, good one.

Here an importat fact why this is shocking to so many..

In the space competition between Russia and USA, they choose to focus in one planet, this was because the few probes sent to mars by Russia fails, and the probes sent to Venus by Nasa also fail.

So they thoght that it would be a waste of money and sign of weakness try to reach the achievements already accomplish by the other.

Also like USA always was the media master. They sale to Venus like a Heal Planet who had not purpose, and mars like the human destiny.

But Russia knew the possibility to colonize venus cloulds even back then at 1970.

http://i.imgur.com/IEHMEni.jpg

And now Nasa realize that Mars has more drawbacks than they thoght before.. So now they try to change perspective.

snip.

lets leave it that way.. its clear that we have two very different ways to think about politics, public opinion and budgets.

The time will tell who is right. Although the past, gives me the reason to me.

[Kibble]

Steps. Space station with a permanent human presence: we would achieve this, assuming that we can maintain it in orbit. Moon base(s). Mars base(s). Then we will have learned more how to "fly the friendly skies" of Venus in relative safety.

How does operating a Moon or Mars base relate to operating a Venus base? A Moon base has much more in common with Space Station - short flight times, low gravity, close proximity meaning minimal radio communication delays, and relatively friendly abort modes, except instead of Soyuz for crew transfer you need Saturn V. A Mars base shares some challenges of Venus (flight times, light lag, dismal abort modes), but those are challenges for any interplanetary mission. If anything, a piloted Venus orbiter could be a precursor to a Mars base (because Venus has somewhat shorter trip times and is generally closer to Earth), but the actual bases ave little in common, and neither is much easier than the other.

[PakledHostage]

Take a look the % fed budget and year.

Right now the % fed budget is in free fall because lack of public interest, the only 2 times that increase was over the apollo program and ISS.

Well then I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. You haven't made a convincing argument. If anything, you've succeeded in supporting my point. The joint ESA/NASA missions to Jupiter's moons and Saturn/Titan that I gave as examples were conceived and later cancelled during the ISS era. The ISS era is one of the two times that you highlight where there was an increase in funding for NASA. If increased funding for manned missions should also result in increased funding for robotic missions then we should have seen the effect during the period of increased funding for the ISS.

And just to be clear, I am all for manned space exploration. However when significant mission opportunities are being cancelled due to lack of funding while the international community continues to spend tens of billions of dollars each year on manned missions to LEO, then I would argue we have to re-consider our priorities.

[cantab]

I think balloon launchers would work just fine on Earth, the advantage over regular launchers just isn't big enough to be worth it.

They've been used for sounding rockets at least, the combination being known as a "rockoon". One problem with simple balloon-based launchers is controlling the launch bearing, which means they need a wide clear area on the ground. With a more sophisticated airship this wouldn't be such an issue.

[Dispatcher]

How does operating a Moon or Mars base relate to operating a Venus base? A Moon base has much more in common with Space Station - short flight times, low gravity, close proximity meaning minimal radio communication delays, and relatively friendly abort modes, except instead of Soyuz for crew transfer you need Saturn V. A Mars base shares some challenges of Venus (flight times, light lag, dismal abort modes), but those are challenges for any interplanetary mission. If anything, a piloted Venus orbiter could be a precursor to a Mars base (because Venus has somewhat shorter trip times and is generally closer to Earth), but the actual bases ave little in common, and neither is much easier than the other.

Doing these seemingly unrelated steps first will actually give us the experience (and an easier to support funding rationale) necessary to eventually get crewed vehicles to Venus orbit (let alone down into and up out of the atmosphere there). Most of the problems associated with getting TO and FROM Venus are similar to the problems that would be faced at the Moon and at Mars. As for distances; if we can succeed with Mars space missions, we would more likely succeed with Venus space missions.