posted 10-18-2012 01:13 AM               

One example of this is the 'damaged finger' in the suit worn by Baumgartner. Was he really in danger? It is doubtful, but it does add to the impact of the story. Compared to Kittinger's which was cobbled together and not specifically designed for the job, Baumgartner had the benefit of a specially engineered suit that was most unlikely to fail.

posted 10-18-2012 02:13 AM               

RedBull Stratos was an incredible opportunity to teach a huge audience about the past and future exploration of high altitudes and space.

I can’t help but think this Stratos jump could have been more powerful and interesting had we learned the context behind the mission. In the end, I have to wonder how much we’re gaining if the public is excited by space exploration but doesn’t understand why it matters or the technology behind it.

I wonder whether this flight would have been perceived differently had Zenith Watches been the lead sponsor, just like Breitling for the 1999 global circumnavigation by balloon. People forget that Red Bull was not the only sponsor of Felix's jump, there were a number of aerospace and equipment manufacturers onboard as co-sponsors.

People are also forgetting that Felix pioneered a flight across the English Channel in 2003 using a specially engineered carbon fiber delta wing. No one considers Louis Bleriot's 1909 flight to be just a stunt - it is properly positioned as a milestone in pioneering aviation.

Finally, no one considers those climbers who regularly enter the 'deathzone' of the 14 peaks of the eight thousanders (peaks above 8,000m or 26,247ft) to be guilty of pulling a stunt. The first person to climb all 14 eight-thousanders, Reinhold Messner, said this in 2004:

"You could die in each climb and that meant you were responsible for yourself. We were real mountaineers: careful, aware and even afraid. By climbing mountains we were not learning how big we were. We were finding out how breakable, how weak and how full of fear we are. You can only get this if you expose yourself to high danger."

"Sometimes you have to go up really high to see how small you are."

posted 10-18-2012 06:02 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
Suggesting that risking one's life somehow disqualifies an activity as a stunt is just not true.

A stunt, by definition, is "an action displaying spectacular skill and daring." Baumgartner's jump most certainly qualifies as a stunt.

---

quote:

---

Stunts are not inherently bad. In some ways, those who continue to summit Mount Everest, especially those trying to set firsts are taking part in stunts, too. They can be admired but their effort is not advancing humanity's ability to climb high mountains.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by moorouge:
Without in anyway detracting from the courage and skill of all those involved, at the end of the day this was just a simple parachute jump.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by GoesTo11:
Project Excelsior was explicitly experimental: It was intended to probe the then largely unknown survivability challenges faced by pilots forced to abandon their aircraft at extreme high altitude. It was a clinical and necessary research project.
In contrast, the fact that in the half-century since Col. Kittinger's jump no serious attempt has been made to challenge it until now suggests that there was little significant knowledge held to be gained in doing so...or at least none worth the attendant risk.

---

This endeavour requires huge background support and finance, which has been just as much a barrier in the past as the altitude and the technology. Also, some have died over the past 50 years attempting this and deterring others from even considering this pioneering aerospace work.

Felix Baumgartner was pushing an experimental flight envelope. No one knew for certain if he would survive. Kittinger's jumps were subsonic. Felix's jump was designed to test the limits of high altitude survivability and whether humans could survive supersonic speeds unaided by a vehicle. If successful he would break records, as did Kittinger, as did Yeager. And yes, the sponsors would breathe a sigh of relief and benefit.

Was Chuck Yeager's 1947 supersonic flight just a stunt? I've never heard it called that, despite the fact that medically he was unfit to fly - talk about reckless! Similarly I've never heard Sqn. Ldr. Andy Green's 1997 Thrust SSC supersonic land speed record classified as a stunt.

It would appear that skydiving is incorrectly perceived as just a daredevil sport for performing stunts. Over the past decade or so, with the advent of skysurfing, wing-suit flying, and speed skydiving where participants regularly reach speeds of Mach 0.5 that perception is not only no longer true but a dangerous fallacy. The activity is highly regulated by the FAI and national associations, and if you think you can just show up on a dropzone with a dangerous attitude looking to perform reckless stunts, then you will very quickly find yourself permanently grounded with your licences revoked.

Wing-walking, barn-storming, fly-bys, and getting shot out of a cannon are stunts. Pushing the frontiers of human stratospheric flight to Mach 1.24 unaided by a vehicle, is not!

posted 10-18-2012 07:28 AM               

If anyone has actually bothered to look at the Red Bull Stratos website, you will see the following clearly articulated:

Red Bull Stratos Mission

The Mission

Red Bull Stratos is a scientific mission to 120,000 ft. Jumping from a stratospheric balloon one man will attempt to break the speed of sound in freefall.

Red Bull Stratos seeks to advance scientific discoveries in aerospace for the benefit of mankind.

"On the way up without even opening the capsule door you can find yourself in a life or death situation. So it's extremely dangerous." (Mike Todd, Red Bull Stratos Life Support Engineer)

Red Bull Stratos, a mission to the edge of space, will attempt to transcend human limits that have existed for 50 years. Supported by a team of experts Felix Baumgartner plans to ascend to 120,000 feet in a stratospheric balloon and make a freefall jump rushing toward earth at supersonic speeds before parachuting to the ground. His attempt to dare atmospheric limits holds the potential to provide valuable medical and scientific research data for future pioneers.

The Red Bull Stratos team brings together the world's leading minds in aerospace medicine, engineering, pressure suit development, capsule creation and balloon fabrication.

Today Felix and his specialized team hope to take what was learned from Joe's jumps more than 50 years ago and press forward to test the edge of the human envelope.

posted 10-18-2012 07:57 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
I didn't see any explicit mission goals to increase Red Bull's market share, share price, or boost the personal ego of Felix Baumgartner.

---

And when the Nabisco Lunos lands the next person on the moon and the spacecraft is covered with Nabisco logos, and the Nabisco flag is planted on the moon 'for all cookie eaterkind' and we have live video from the lunar surface of the astronaut dunking his cookies into milk at 1/6g will we call that science?

posted 10-18-2012 08:14 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Paul78zephyr:
Of course you didnt, those things are all implicit.

---

Yeah, right.

The laws of physics have a curious ability to deal decisively with insincere chancers pulling reckless stunts at extreme altitudes!

quote:

---

Originally posted by Paul78zephyr:
And when the Nabisco Lunos lands the next person on the moon and the spacecraft is covered with Nabisco logos, and the Nabisco flag is planted on the moon ... will we call that science?

---

posted 10-18-2012 08:34 AM               

The only SpaceX logo was on the nose cone, which was jettisoned before reaching orbit.

posted 10-18-2012 08:36 AM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
So the primary explicitly stated mission goals aren't actually really meant at all? That the mission team are just paying lip-service to noble goals, and are actually all rather shallow money/fame/record-chasing corporate stunt performers?

---

posted 10-18-2012 08:43 AM               

I think we can all acknowledge that Felix Baumgartner is not a scientist, nor was his initial interest in this jump driven by a scientific curiosity.

Unlike Joe Kittinger, Baumgartner was not recruited for this jump by an established organization already pursuing scientific research.

Instead, Baumgartner recruited scientists — and a sponsor — but for the primary purpose of making the jump possible. From there, scientific objectives were born (much like how Apollo was born out of politics before it gained experiments and geology as secondary goals).

Project Excelsior was aimed at advancing the military's understanding of high altitude ejection systems. Red Bull Stratos was aimed at breaking four of Kittinger's records set while taking part in Project Excelsior.

That scientists found a way to learn from Baumgartner's jump is not surprising. Scientists very often find ways to use non-scientific activities to advance their research. There are scientists who study the physics and physiology of sporting games, for example.

It's wrong to suggest that Red Bull Stratos was only a stunt, but it is also wrong to suggest that any science to be gained wasn't built around an activity that began as and was carried out as a stunt.

posted 10-18-2012 09:50 AM               

I am well aware of the dangers associated with high altitude. Because of this I think that history will record Kittinger's jump the more noteworthy despite the records broken by Baumgartner. The former really did jump into the unknown using very primitive equipment. The latter had the benefit of fifty years of development in high altitude pressure suits to protect him. No wonder the Stratos team had to hype up the jump, even to the extent of over emphasizing the effects of breaking the sound barrier.

posted 10-18-2012 03:10 PM            

Personally, anyone who dares to do something like what was done has my admiration. While his "spacesuit" may have zero applications at NASA, it may find a use at Boeing, Sierra Nevada or SpaceX.

posted 10-18-2012 03:58 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
Red Bull Stratos was a stunt that can be celebrated for pushing the barriers of the human adventure.

---

A LEO EVA e.g. Ed White (Gemini IV) and a Stratospheric EVA e.g. Joe Kittinger (Excelsior III) are not considered stunts, but another Stratospheric EVA e.g. Felix Baumgartner (Stratos) is deemed to be a stunt.

All three EVAs involved significant risk, science objectives, and high-speed freefall performed by highly trained professional pilots above the service ceilings of the Lockheed U-2 and SR-71. But why degrade Baumgartner's EVA by calling it a stunt, when White had to be ordered to stop joyriding and get back in the vehicle?

Felix Baumgartner is a trained military parachutist, BASE skydiver, and professional helicopter pilot, but has effectively been dismissed as a mere circus stunt performer. Neil Armstrong was a naval aviator, test pilot, and astronaut but nobody degraded his status when forced to eject/parachute from the stunt-like LLTV.

If people refuse to accept the stated Red Bull Stratos mission objectives, ignore the years of technical development required to create and accomplish the challenge, dismiss the risk and skill level, and degrade the credentials of the pilot because of their own inate prejudice about what constitutes the right stuff or what real piloting/aviation is, then there is not much left to say.

But would you approach Borman/Lovell/Anders and tell them to their faces that Apollo 8 was nothing more than a dangerous reckless cold war stunt that was less about hard science/exploration and more about putting one over the Russians? I don't think they would care much for the use of the term stunt no matter how well intended you were.

The Red Bull Air Races involve stunt flying. Supersonic skydiving from over 4 times the height of Everest does not. No one calls a Concorde/U-2/SR-71 flight a stunt and then praises the technical aspect of the flight, so why do that to the Red Bull Stratos flight?

To call the flight a stunt indicates that you don't fully truly appreciate what's involved. One can't call it purposeless, frivolous and performed for the sheer thrill of it, then go on to technically praise it. Those positions are diametrically opposed and contradictory on this flight. It is illogical to hold those positions simultaneously - that is why it is all or nothing.

Supersonic skydiving from extreme high altitude may look like a stunt to you, but to those of us who understand the scale of the technical challenge it is anything but. That's partly why it has taken 50 years to partially surpass Kittinger's flights, and until 2012 for one solitary human to go supersonic unaided by a vehicle.

posted 10-18-2012 04:23 PM               

The decision to fly Apollo 8 around the moon wasn't done out of an interest in science or for the betterment of humanity; it was done to beat the Russians to the moon.

For that matter, Apollo 11 didn't land on the moon to return moon rocks or deploy a seismometer; it was sent to beat the Russians to the moon. Had Apollo 11 failed to collect a single moon rock or deploy a single science experiment but still left footprints on the surface and returned the crew safely, it would have been declared a success.

I believe, as was suggested earlier, that the problem here is semantics. I don't view "stunts" to carry any negative connotation on its own and I can point to numerous stunts throughout history which are rightfully celebrated. An activity needn't be immersed in science to be worthwhile.

I have a great deal of respect for what Baumgartner achieved: he set about to accomplish a goal and achieved most of it (he successfully broke three out of the four records he was pursuing). He deserves the accolades he has received.

posted 10-18-2012 06:05 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by moorouge:
Might I ask how my post reveals "...a complete ignorance"?

---

"It was just a parachute jump ... just as countless thousands have done before". Are you serious? What of that tiny little matter of a 120,000+ft supersonic freefall? You think the business of maintaining a head-down stable attitude at 833.9mph is trivial? Try it and see how fast you enter a lethal flat spin! A tiny degree of body positional asymmetry and you are unstable. It happened to Kittinger and Baumgartner and both of them were extremely lucky to recover out of it in time. Surely you are familiar with the consequences of 'red-out'?

Who exactly are the "countless thousands" who have safely and successfully executed such extreme altitude skydives and just opened their parachutes in some fantasy world to float harmlessly to earth? That is utterly ridiculous!

If your oxygen supply malfunctions/fails, you're in trouble. If your pressure suit tears, you're dead. If you suffer ebullism, you're dead. If you develop a pulmonary/cerebral aeroembolism, you can die. If you develop hypoxic hypoxia, you can die. If you enter an irrecoverable flat spin, you can get killed. Lose situational awareness, you can get killed. If your main/reserve canopy deploys prematurely, you can get killed. If you suffer a double canopy malfunction, you're dead. If you're visor shatters, you're dead. If your visor fogs and you can't read your flight instruments, you're in trouble. Do I need to go on? Just a walk in the park, right? Still think this is just a stunt, do you?

posted 10-18-2012 10:16 PM               

But now at 40, in everything I have read while following this program over the last several years, he took this attempt very seriously. Red Bull and the Stratos team, not Baumgartner himself, recruited the team of famous, well known, and unknown experts who had the talents to make this successful. Felix himself admitted post flight that his only thought just before jumping wasn't about records or fame, but rather, " I don't want to die in front of all of these people." This alone speaks volumes about his motivations.

This project would have never gotten off the ground without the financial support of the sponsor. Just like Curt Newport would have never recovered Liberty Bell 7 without the support ( and subsequent revenue generating documentary) of the Discovery Channel. Burt Rutan's SpaceShipOne would have never flown without the backing of Paul Allen, whose name was applied to the side of the vehicle and his Vulcan Production Company aired the two part documentary to follow.

Each of these projects began with the dream of one participant...Newport, Rutan, Baumgartner. I'm sure there are other examples. Are any of their endeavours something that needed to be done to advance humanity? Probably not, but the person with the imagination and desire to do something unprecedented, or to do something just a little bit better, had the talent and influence to convince a financial provider to expend the funds to make them happen.

posted 10-19-2012 02:09 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
Your attitude to the flight and level of complacent disrespect for the dangers involved demonstrate a fundamental lack of understanding of the discipline.

---

I completely understand the discipline and dangers involved. Unlike you, I'm not taken in by the Red Bull hype. As an advertising exercise one estimate puts its value around $43 million, not bad for a stunt that captured the world's imagination with, given the technology involved, carrying a minimal risk.

This does not mean I don't appreciate Baumgartner's achievement. I just think Kittinger took the greater risk and deserves the recognition for this.

Robert makes the comparison with Apollo 8 as a 'stunt'. There is some merit in this. However, Apollo 8 went where no man had gone before with the attendant problems of testing in deep space the Apollo capsule, its navigation and communications. Baumgartner was following a trodden path. His jump was just higher and faster.

posted 10-19-2012 11:23 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
I think this post should settle the matter definitively.

---

It doesn't.

Red Bull might call it a scientific mission, but without any stated scientific goals, it sounds more like a mission simply to break a record. There's nothing wrong with that, really...since adventure has its place in aviation too.

If there was any valuable science to be gained by making a man free fall faster than the speed of sound, however, it would have been attempted before now.

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
But would you approach Borman/Lovell/Anders and tell them to their faces that Apollo 8 was nothing more than a dangerous reckless cold war stunt that was less about hard science/exploration and more about putting one over the Russians?

---

If you ask Frank Borman whether the Apollo program was more about beating the Russians or about exploration, he will tell you without hesitation that it was the former. A lot of great science was conducted with the Apollo program (not to mention Mercury and Gemini). But it was not the driving force behind the program (or Kennedy's goal).

posted 10-19-2012 12:34 PM               

Jumping over 10 school buses on a motorcyle might be a stunt. Maybe 200 years from now daredevils will break records of distance and speed between planets in our solar system and it will all be paid for by companies with giant logos painted on the side like some kind of galactic nascar. I hope so. Maybe at that point you could point to stunts in space, but not Baumgartner's jump.

And Apollo 8 is the equivalent of Columbus finding the new world. A first step to explore a place that had never been explored by man. The technology and experiences gleamed from that experience benefit mankind regardless if they the crew went because of political or ideological victory.

posted 10-20-2012 03:04 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by moorouge:
Baumgartner was following a trodden path. His jump was just higher and faster.

---

Baumgartner reached Mach 1.24 from an exit altitude twice that of the Armstrong Line, unprotected and unaided by a vehicle. Yet you make references to "hype" and "minimal risk"?

With a BSc and MSc in Analytical Science and a FAI skydiving licence, I'm quietly confident of seeing through anyone's hype/BS on the subject. When I was skydiving, we exited from 12,000-13,000ft. Baumgartner's flight was literally an order of magnitude higher (128,097ft), faster (833.9mph), and far more technically complex and challenging.

Who exactly on this "trodden path" in history manned a balloon higher, exited higher, or flew faster and supersonic unaided by a vehicle?

The flight was pioneering aerospace exploration pushing an experimental flight envelope.

quote:

---

Originally posted by mjanovec:
Red Bull might call it a scientific mission, but without any stated scientific goals, it sounds more like a mission simply to break a record.

---

The world was a very different place in aerospace terms in 1960. There were no reusable space vehicles e.g. space shuttle and no immediate prospect of commercial (passenger) spaceflight. We now know it is possible for a human to potentially survive a catastrophic vehicle failure circa 130,000ft and return safely to earth. What is, with current technology, the potential maximum limit of survivability? 150,000ft should be theoretically possible, is 200,000ft feasible?

posted 10-20-2012 05:18 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by yeknom-ecaps:
Listen to Chuck Yeager's comments on Felix's jump.

---

Many have indicated an intention to attempt this activity over the years, but all publicly declared projects have not been successfully completed.

posted 10-20-2012 07:56 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by issman1:
How exactly did his "research" benefit life on Earth?

---

quote:

---

...ultimately thwarted by NASA in a way not unlike Dennis Tito's historic ISS visit almost was

---

And NASA's initial objections to Tito flying were limited in scope. At the same time some in the space agency were raising (some valid) concerns, others were actively, but behind the scenes, championing the effort.

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
I wonder whether people's perception of the flight would be different if the name Red Bull was replaced with NASA, USAF, Zenith, Breitling, or Omega. Would the project be seen as more serious or worthy?

---

posted 10-20-2012 08:20 AM            

My criticism is exclusively about Glenn's role on STS-95. Flying him for the sake of it is fine - as he should have flown during Gemini or Apollo - but to suggest his flight was primarily research is misleading. It was the pretext.

posted 10-20-2012 11:09 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
A valid argument could be made that Apollo 8 was a stunt, if considered within the larger context of the Space Race, which itself was built upon a series of stunts aimed primarily at political one-upmanship.

The decision to fly Apollo 8 around the moon wasn't done out of an interest in science or for the betterment of humanity; it was done to beat the Russians to the moon.

For that matter, Apollo 11 didn't land on the moon to return moon rocks or deploy a seismometer; it was sent to beat the Russians to the moon.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mjanovec:
A lot of great science was conducted with the Apollo program (not to mention Mercury and Gemini). But it was not the driving force behind the program (or Kennedy's goal).

---

William Bradford, speaking in 1630 of the founding of the Plymouth Bay Colony, said that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties, and both must be enterprised and overcome with answerable courage.

If this capsule history of our progress teaches us anything, it is that man, in his quest for knowledge and progress, is determined and cannot be deterred. The exploration of space will go ahead, whether we join in it or not, and it is one of the great adventures of all time, and no nation which expects to be the leader of other nations can expect to stay behind in the race for space.

Those who came before us made certain that this country rode the first waves of the industrial revolutions, the first waves of modern invention, and the first wave of nuclear power, and this generation does not intend to founder in the backwash of the coming age of space. We mean to be a part of it--we mean to lead it. For the eyes of the world now look into space, to the moon and to the planets beyond, and we have vowed that we shall not see it governed by a hostile flag of conquest, but by a banner of freedom and peace. We have vowed that we shall not see space filled with weapons of mass destruction, but with instruments of knowledge and understanding.

Yet the vows of this Nation can only be fulfilled if we in this Nation are first, and, therefore, we intend to be first. In short, our leadership in science and in industry, our hopes for peace and security, our obligations to ourselves as well as others, all require us to make this effort, to solve these mysteries, to solve them for the good of all men, and to become the world's leading space-faring nation.

We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won, and they must be won and used for the progress of all people. For space science, like nuclear science and all technology, has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war.

The growth of our science and education will be enriched by new knowledge of our universe and environment, by new techniques of learning and mapping and observation, by new tools and computers for industry, medicine, the home as well as the school.

Many years ago the great British explorer George Mallory, who was to die on Mount Everest, was asked why did he want to climb it. He said, "Because it is there."

Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embarked.

Applied, interdisciplinary, physical and life science was fundamental to the development of the manned spaceflight program rockets, vehicles, materials, hardware, software, etc. Only by making that technical journey first on the ground and then in space, could the US hope to be peacefully pre-eminent through technological superiority.

Apollo was about being being technologically superior, bold, and first. By using brilliant scientists to build the most superbly engineered rockets, and then asking the best test pilots to fly them further, higher, and faster where no one had gone before.

Apollo 8 and 11 were about proving flight and landing capability and scheduled to be firsts, Apollo 12 proving pin-point landing capability to pave the way for Apollo 13-17. If scientific exploration (knowledge exploration) was not always the principal objective, then the US could have stopped risking lives after Apollo 11 and 12. Why continue flying unless the overall higher program objective had not been completed?

The Russians sought to dismiss Apollo 11 as a meaningless propaganda stunt because they wanted to demean, degrade, and downplay the endeavour. Yet we know they were feverishly chasing the exact same goal, but just could not match the US technically. In reality both sides seriously respected each others achievements in space.

HERE MEN FROM THE PLANET EARTH FIRST SET FOOT UPON THE MOON JULY 1969, A.D. WE CAME IN PEACE FOR ALL MANKIND

"HERE MEN FROM THE UNITED STATES FIRST SET FOOT UPON THE MOON JULY 1969 A.D. WE CAME TO BEAT THE RUSSIANS"

The Congress hereby declares that it is the policy of the United States that activities in space should be devoted to peaceful purposes for the benefit of all mankind.

posted 10-20-2012 11:33 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
Ok, let's go back to September 12, 1962...

---

Everything that we ought to really be tied into getting onto the Moon ahead of the Russians. ...the only justification for it ...is because we hope to beat them.

quote:

---

Ultimately, the manned spaceflight program was always about pre-eminence in the science of spaceflight and exploration, not performing stunts.

---

posted 10-20-2012 12:04 PM               

"Why should we spend that kind of dough to put a man on the moon? (break) But it seems to me what we've got to try and do, is for the reasons you suggested: we've got to wrap around in this country, a military use for what we're doing and spending in space. If we don't, it does look like a stunt and too much money...

I think it's the only way we're going to be able to defend it before the public in the next 12 months. We're not going to have anything spectacular ourselves and if the Russians don't have any, it's going to be open season next year (break). But I'd like to see what we could do to get the military, you said they're holding out, but we can, we can give this thing a military slant. In the final - we can justify the military or national security route much better than we can justify the prestige these days. (break)

Webb: Would you be better off thinking about '64 in the political year, if you just took a military man and put him in charge of this program?

President Kennedy: That is a way, I don't think that what we ought to do now, but I am concerned that I have a - I think this can be an asset, this program. I think in time, it's like a lot of things, this is mid journey and therefore everybody says 'what the hell are we making this trip for' but at the end of the thing they may be glad we made it. But we've got to defend ourselves now and I think that at least its occurred to me that unless the Russians do something spectacular, the only way we can defend ourselves is if we put a national security rather than a prestige label on this.

posted 10-21-2012 09:44 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Robert Pearlman:
It wasn't about preeminence in space; the U.S. already claimed preeminence, nor was it about science.

Webb, to his credit, very much believed that science should be the driving force for the nation's space program and that it shouldn't only be focused on beating the Russians in a race, but that was clearly Kennedy's primary interest and objective.

---

Every single spaceflight from the pioneering days of Project Mercury right through to the final flight of the Space Shuttle Program has been, in essence, a scientific mission. The Space Shuttle remained an experimental vehicle itself just as the Mercury capsules were, all focused on pushing the boundaries of human knowledge. Science experiments performed onboard or launched from spaceflights were in addition to the science of flight/operation of the vehicles themselves.

Going back to the pioneers of modern rocketry and astronautics: Tsiolkovsky's 1903 The Exploration of Cosmic Space by Means of Reaction Devices, Goddard's 1919 A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes, and Oberth's 1923 By Rocket into Planetary Space, these pioneers were envisioning a future for mankind in space.

World War II 1939-1945 saw the science of modern rocketry used for tactical and strategic military advantage. At the end of the war, Operation Paperclip was implemented by the US OSS/JIOA to deny German scientific knowledge, expertise, and equipment to the rest of the world.

President Eisenhower approved a plan to orbit a scientific satellite as part of the International Geophysical Year (IGY) for the period 1957-1958, a cooperative effort to gather scientific data about the Earth. The Soviet Union quickly jumped in and announced plans to orbit its own satellite.

When Sputnik I was launched in 1957, there was an inate US fear that the Russians could and would militarily dominate the ‘high ground’ of space and that the US absolutely had to counter that threat.

Eisenhower recognised that only by becoming pre-eminent in science and technology, could the US gain the real competitive edge necessary to catch, surpass, be militarily superior to the Russians, and ultimately be peaceful leaders in space and space exploration. This led to Project Manhigh, the 1958 National Aeronautics and Space Act, NASA, Project Excelsior, and Project Mercury.

Manned spaceflight was in its infancy during Kennedy's presidency. NASA Administrator James Webb and others were having to explain to Kennedy and the American people the vision of spaceflight. Kennedy, as a cold war leader and politician not a scientist, may have had private doubts and been focused on beating the Russians, but that objective was, in reality, to seek technical supremacy. Exactly what Webb and others were advocating that the program should be about - pre-eminence in science and technology.

How exactly does one practically go about beating the Russians and cementing the moral superiority of the Free World? Answer: By attaining and maintaining scientific technological primacy and pre-eminence. By developing and applying the best rocket science, materials science, engineering science, computer science, life science etc. As Webb reassured the president, the space program would deliver:

A basic ability in this nation to use science and very advanced technologies to increase national power – our economy all the way through.

While you’re President, this is going to come true in this country. So you’re going to have both science and technology appreciating your leadership in this field.

Kennedy said it best:

Its conquest deserves the best of all mankind, and its opportunity for peaceful cooperation may never come again. But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas?

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

You have to do the hard, serious science first and get it right, before you can ever think or dream of setting records or beating others. The laws of physics will quickly remind you of that fact if you ever lose focus, even for an instant.

Red Bull did not have to participate in the Stratos project in order to sell their product. They were doing just fine as they were, and there are far safer, easier, quicker, and cheaper ways to push their product. Had the company been about to go bankrupt and the Stratos project was a last ditch 'Hail Mary' play to revitalise the brand and save the company, then one might legitimately suspect them of asking a man to risk his life for the sake of publicity.

posted 10-22-2012 04:09 AM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
Red Bull Stratos was always about something more - about exploring technical limits, realizing human potential, and pushing the envelope.

---

posted 10-22-2012 08:34 AM               

It means a degree of dedication, organisation and discipline which has not always characterised... our efforts. It means we cannot afford undue work stoppages, inflated costs of materials or talent, wasteful inter-agency rivalries, or a high turnover of key personnel. (Everyone must give)... his personal pledge that this nation will move forward with full speed of freedom in the exciting adventure of space.

posted 10-22-2012 08:47 AM               

1. Felix, stunt or not a stunt, I think not but in either case, he has bigger cajones than anyone on this forum.

2. Apollo program just a stunt? Robert, no offense, but walk up to Buzz and tell him that. I have some frozen peas for that black eye.

posted 10-22-2012 12:26 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by cycleroadie:
I think not but in either case, he has bigger cajones than anyone on this forum.

---

posted 10-22-2012 04:27 PM               

What is clear is that during the hiatus between Mercury and Gemini in late 1963, in the face of mounting expense and waning support, Project Apollo was going to be a monumental act of faith and a leap into the unknown. Eisenhower, Kennedy, and McNamara all experienced doubts about the value of going to the Moon. Webb had argued in late 1962 that the real goal was space pre-eminence, but that argument had not allayed the President's concerns about the risky project.

During the September 18, 1963 meeting between Kennedy and Webb, the President referred to the perception of putting a man on the Moon as being an expensive stunt partly because of the program cost, partly because of the mistaken belief that scientific instruments could substitute for a manned lunar landing and at a lower cost, and partly because of Kennedy's incomplete comprehension of the technical challenge and the benefits that would result. Very few people in 1963 could have truly imagined the scale of the endeavour of putting a man on the Moon. Years later, the crew of Apollo 1 would ultimately sacrifice their lives for so much more than a mere stunt.

Webb tried to impress upon the President the enormity of the technical challenge:

"We’ll have worked to fly by though while you’re President but it’s going to take longer than that. This is a tough job, a real tough job."

“let us explore the stars together”

On November 16, 1963, Kennedy visited Cape Canaveral. NASA Associate Administrator Robert Seamans, who accompanied Kennedy on the visit, later commented that:

“Maybe for the first time, [he] began to realize the dimensions of these projects.”

"This Nation has tossed its cap over the wall of space, and we have no choice but to follow it. Whatever the difficulties, they will be overcome."

“The United States of America has no intention of finishing second in space. This effort is expensive—but it pays its way for freedom and for America.”

"Yet the vows of this Nation can only be fulfilled if we in this Nation are first, and, therefore, we intend to be first. In short, our leadership in science and in industry, our hopes for peace and security, our obligations to ourselves as well as others, all require us to make this effort, to solve these mysteries, to solve them for the good of all men, and to become the world's leading space-faring nation.

posted 10-22-2012 04:49 PM            

quote:

---

Originally posted by YankeeClipper:
Red Bull did not have to participate in the Stratos project in order to sell their product.

---

posted 10-22-2012 07:51 PM               

quote:

---

Originally posted by Paul78zephyr:
Eventually we know not what real milk is anymore.

---