#space exloration

[astronauticalaspirations]

Juno & NASA's Plutonium Shortage

[costsmorethanspace]

What costs more than space exploration? Astrology.

According to research done by Telefono Antiplagio, described by the Telegraph Andas "an Italian voluntary service that helps the victims of con artists," and the European Consumer Organisation, Italian citizens spent a total of €6 billion on magic and occult services--primarily astrology--in 2010.

As reported by Space News, the budget for the Italian Space Agency in 2010 was about €700 million. That sum included the €385 million Italy contributed to the European Space Agency that year for all kinds of activities, including the training of Italian astronauts Luca Parmitano, Samantha Cristoforetti, and Paolo Nespoli. A large part of the remaining funding went to development of the Vega launch vehicle.

Many thanks to reader  Mark Booth, who suggested the astrology aspect and provided a good source.

(Photo: "Personification of Astrology" by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, and official portrait of Luca Parmitano Paolo Nespoli.)

[costsmorethanspace]

What costs more than space exploration? Safety razors.

According to the Boston Globe, Gillette, the Proctor & Gamble subsidiary based in the Boston area, spent $750 million developing and testing the three-bladed Mach 3 safety razor, which debuted in 1998. Other sources cite a total development cost of $1 billion; as best as I can tell, those larger estimates include the cost of the marketing campaign associated with the product's launch. Gillette's Mach 3 was followed relatively quickly by Schick's four-bladed Quattro razor (the subject of litigation filed by Gillette), and later by Gillette's newer, five-bladed Fusion razor (a product predicted well in advance by the Onion). 

According to a NASA study, the total development cost for the Falcon 9 rocket, which conducted its maiden flight in 2010, was $299.9 million. (Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics calculator, 299.9 million in 2010 is the equivalent of about $225 million in 1998, the year the Mach 3 debuted). SpaceX has reported that the cost of developing its first rocket, the Falcon 1, was approximately the same.

Using Mach numbers to measure the speed of rockets is always a little tricky, since there is no sound in space, but at a rough level and using the colloquial definition, the top speed of the Falcon 9 rocket on a relatively standard mission is about Mach 23.

Photo adapted from Wikimedia Commons.

Hat-tip to reader AW, who suggested this one not long after I had (coincidentally) begun drafting the post.

[costsmorethanspace]

What costs more than space exploration? Tanks the US military doesn't want or need.

As reported in the Washington Post last week, the Pentagon has said that it isn't interested in new additions to it tank fleet, but has been overruled by Congress. Congress added an extra $181 million to the budget for the purchase of Abrams tanks (like the one pictured above) and an additional $140 million for Bradley Fighting Vehicles (colloquially called tanks, though technically not classified that way by the Army). That's a total of an additional $321 million beyond what was requested for tanks, even though the US Army Chief of Staff told Congress "We don't need the tanks. Our tank fleet is 2 1/2 years old average now. We're in good shape, and these are additional tanks that we don't need."

NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE, also pictured above) launched in 2009 and proceeded to carry out a successful mission to complete an all-sky survey in various infrared bands. Its results were between 10,000 and 500,000 better than existing data sets at those wavelengths. It found 33,500 new asteroids and comets, including 19 potentially hazardous asteroids (asteroids that might possibly impact the Earth). In total, the WISE mission cost approximately $320 million; now the retired satellite may be recommissioned to aid in a new search for asteroids that might some day be visited by human or robotic explorers.