Luna C/I: Moon Colonization and Integration

News and features on what's happening on the Moon in the next 20 years, and why

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Picture of the Week: Sweet Seventeen December 16, 2008

That is a NASA file image of astronaut Harrison “Jack” Schmitt (now an active supporter of helium-3 mining on the Moon) in Mare Serenitatis alongside he and Eugene Cernan‘s rover during the Apollo 17 mission, in which astronauts spent by far the most amount of time exploring the surface, roving for 21 miles instead of the hundreds of yards previous astronauts had been limited to.

NASA Chief Mike Griffin's Interesting 50th Anniversary Comments October 8, 2008

Recently, Michael Griffin (Administrator, a.k.a the chief, of NASA) made some interesting comments to the Agency France-Presse (AFP) when discussing the 50th anniversary of NASA and NASA’s current state:

MoonPop: "Space Oddity" September 30, 2008

It’s time for another session of MoonPop (my ongoing series of features on Moon colonization and integration in pop culture), and while this one has a few asterisks, often the interpretation of pop culture is just as signicant as the pop culture itself.

Today, in honor of the first-ever Chinese spacewalk, we take a look at the David Bowie classic “Space Oddity“, first released in 1969 (supposedly to coincide with the 1969 moon landing, and also supposedly after his seeing the 1968 film release “2001: A Space Odyssey“, itself in part a previous MoonPop feature). The video of the A-side version of Space Oddity annoys me to such a great deal (too much drugs, not enough competency on that one…) that I’m going to feature a more palatable user-made animated video instead (congrats, Gonetia):

Check out the end of this post for a neat, rare 1969 video of the B-side version of the song.

The song, while inspiring to anyone thinking about space and (as noted) generally thought to be inspired by space’s place in the pop culture of the 1960′s, is also concurrently about something else entirely. The song was featured by the BBC during their coverage of the 1969 moon landing, despite the drug-trip symbolism, which itself is confirmed in Bowie’s follow-up to “Space Oddity”, “Ashes to Ashes“:

“Do you remember a guy thats been
In such an early song
Ive heard a rumour from ground control
Oh no, dont say its true
(…)
Ashes to ashes, funk to funky
We know major toms a junkie
Strung out in heavens high
Hitting an all-time low”
-”Ashes to Ashes”, David Bowie, 1980

The BBC’s usage of “Space Oddity” was surprising, given the rather negative tone of the song. In fact, this song outright gave me the creeps when I was a kid growing up (though technically, at 24, some older segments of the population may still consider someone my age to be a ‘kid’).

“Space Oddity” is deeply rooted in both the events (the moon landing) and the pop culture (“2001: a Space Odyssey”) of that time, and as we enter into two decades (2010-2020; 2020-2030) that are going to have both a likely private space boom, and then the full swing of the ‘base race’, we should expect to see more pop culture creations like “Space Oddity” come around in vivid form. Hell, Bowie himself is still kickin’ (as Tesla, no less), so maybe we can lobby him for a tune to fit this new era (perhaps about an internet junkie this time?).

As promised, as a wrap-up for this edition of MoonPop, here’s that rare B-side version video of the song. Enjoy:

A Look at John McCain's Space Plan August 29, 2008

After recently taking a look at Barack Obama‘s detailed space plan, it’s now time to sit down and take a gander at his counterpart John McCain‘s own plan for our spacefaring future.

While McCain’s plan is only about a third of the length of Obama’s (989 words to 3,486), there’s still enough information and context that can be discerned from it to give an idea of what a McCain administration’s space policy could shape up to be like.

• Batting leadoff is this first-sentence statement : “For the past 50 years, space activities have contributed greatly to US scientific discovery, national security, economic development, and national innovation, pride and power.” The placement of “national security” second on that list is notable, and not a surprise given McCain’s military background.
• The plan goes on to briefly discuss Sputnik, the reaction to it, and how that led to a dominance in American science and technology, noting: “The end of the Cold War and the space race has greatly reduced the profile of space exploration as a point of national pride…”, creating a “degree of ‘mission-rut’” for NASA.
• After noting “Much of our communications infrastructure is dependent upon space based assets that are essential to the quality of our everyday lives and the economy”, the report goes on to detail how China, Russia, India, Japan and Europe are all “active players” in space exploration.
• McCain then writes briefly about the increasing activity in the commerical sector and mentions the Google Lunar X Prize and space tourism, specifically noting the “importance of investments in key industries such as space to the future of our national security, environmental sustainability, economic competitiveness, and national pride as a technological leader”; again, a distinct foreign policy lean with national security being first on the list and “competitiveness” and “pride” being in there also.
• An entire paragraph is devoted to discussion of the following quote regarding the Nixon administration’s mulling of the cancellation of Apollo and non-approval of the Space Shuttle:

“[That policy] …would be confirming in some respects a belief that I fear is gaining credence at home and abroad: That our best years are behind us, that we are turning inward, reducing our defense commitments, and voluntarily starting to give up our super-power status and our desire to maintain world superiority.”

-Casper Weinberger, Office of Management and Budget Deputy Director, 1971

• McCain then states, rather significantly, that “Three and a half decades later this seems equally valid, if not more so given the increased number of countries that are making significant investments in space.”

The report then concludes with a little on McCain’s contributions to the space program as a Senator and on NASA’s current policies and projects.

McCain’s last statement about Weinberger’s quote, combined with the foreign policy leaning of the plan, clearly illustrates that McCain sees Constellation and the rest of NASA’s programs as key to American international standing, prestige, and competitiveness.

This is somewhat of a contrast to Obama’s plan, which has a focus that is notably more domestic, primarily discussing the private sector. A perhaps even more notable contrast is that while Obama’s plan discusses international cooperation quite a bit, it is something that is not mentioned a single time in McCain’s plan.

The differences in the two plans are fascinating, and more than I would have expected, illustrating that this is definitely a subject that both candidates take very seriously, and that they both have their own distinctive styles towards handling.

Picture of the Week: Moon Princess August 26, 2008

MoonPop: "WALL-E" (News) July 13, 2008

“Outlet Mall, coming soon!”
-A ‘Buy N Large Corp’. billboard on the Moon, next to the American Flag at Mare Tranquillitatis, in the film “WALL-E“

I had a chance last week to finally catch Pixar’s latest masterwork, “WALL-E”. Much like with “Iron Man” earlier this summer, a movie that a whole heck of a lot of people ended up seeing happened to also be a movie with a look at the Moon; and in WALL-E’s case, a look specifically at the Moon colonization and the potential outcomes of it.

It’s a simple, and brief, moment in the film, but a memorable one: In a fly-by of the Moon, the site of the American flag in the Sea of Tranquility is seen as having a billboard adjacent to it advertising a future outlet mall (which, given the circumstances and setting of the film, the builders apparently never did get around to).

The placement of the sign directly next to the flag site could suggest that the fictional Buy N Large Corporation in the film was intending to plow right over the site for their new mall; or that they simply plopped that sign down there for attention.

The strange thing about all of this is that this isn’t really that far from the truth, as things are developing now. The Sea of Tranquility is rich in Helium-3, a resource extremely rare on Earth but plentiful on the Moon that could be valuable for fusion power. So within 15-20 years, we could very well be seeing mining operations going up right next to the Apollo landing sites.

With the generation of kids seeing WALL-E today being the ones who will have the newscasts of their lives dominated by Moon colonization, it should be interesting to see how this one moment in an extremely visible film gets referenced and remembered, as commerical development of the Sea of Tranquility and the rest of the Moon becomes an imminent reality (and potentially, a major public debate).

Alt. Eagle June 5, 2008

The Eagles are coming, the Eagles are coming!
-Bilbo Baggins, “The Hobbit”

The successor to the Apollo missions’ Eagle lander is the above: the Altair lander (christened as such last December). It’s named after the twelfth-brightest star in the sky, a star which is within the Aquila (‘Eagle’ in Latin) system.

First going into use in missions around 2019 (that’s only 11 years, folks), the Altair features neat little additions (compared to the Apollo modules) such as an airlock and a ‘food warmer‘ (woot for microwaves and their rough equivalents).

Fun fact: early rumors that the lander would be called Artemis (twin sister of Apollo in Greek mythology) turned out to be false; though I’ll say, that’s an awfully cool name, and should by all means be used somewhere else (perhaps in exploration, as Artemis was the goddess of hills and forests) :)

Picture of the Week: Rock Bottom May 17, 2008

The above is a small crater near the Apollo 11 landing site on Mare Tranquilitatis. I find this picture to be, I guess ironically, Earth-y in an interesting way: more than many moon surface pictures I’ve seen, I can almost feel like what it’d be to scramble around on that incline. That sky is beautiful; I’m wondering what that little faded streak of blue at the top is…

You can find more pictures from Apollo 11 here, straight from NASA.

Atlas' Back: Mare Tranquillitatis April 19, 2008

For the first edition of Atlas’ Back, a semi-regular series of features touring selenographic features of the moon, we have ourselves a look at Mare Tranquillitatis: The Sea of Tranquility.

The name being the latin form of “Sea of Tranquility”, Mare Tranquillitatis is the most famous of the Maria, the basaltic plains originally mistaken for actual seas by early astronomers (hence the name, which is latin for “seas”). The above map has the landing sites for Ranger 5, Apollo 11 (the first manned landing), Apollo 16, and Apollo 17 (the last manned landing up to this point) marked, illustrating the massive historical signifigance of this sea in the sky.

With the amount of attention and activity directed towards Mare Tranquillitatis, there’s plenty of images to go around. A few visual highlights to give you a feel for the mare:

Buzz Aldrin on Mare Tranquillitatis.

A view of the mare from the window of the Apollo 11 lander, right after landing.

An Earthrise photo, taken from Apollo 11 prior to landing (different from the famous “Earthrise” photo, featured recently and significantly in the film “An Inconvenient Truth” and widely regarded as having helped found the environmentalism movement; that was taken from orbit during the earlier Apollo 8 mission).

From a distance; Mare Tranquillitatis is the expansive dark patch in the upper left there, with the Apollo 11 landing site being in the lower left corner, as can be seen clearly via the handy Google Moon (a Google Earth counterpart currently geared around the Apollo landings).

The mare is about 300,000 sq km (roughly the same size as the Phillipines), and as that bit of size research turned up, is apparently also a very good site for Helium-3, with (as that abstract notes) about 50% of the mare being minable. Though, my initial reaction here would be to think of Mare Tranquillitatis as a site for the moon’s first protected historical park, and not, say, strip mining.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this brief tour of Mare Tranquillitatis; there’s many more tours of this sort to come, both from me here, and from many others elsewhere, as this last photo below (of the mare) illustrates pretty well. Stay tuned for the next edition of Atlas’ Back…

• An Introduction to Moon Colonization (2009):

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