Gemini

[Guest Madtrapper]

Hi:Was anyone else following the Gemini`s return to earth that crashed yesterday.I find it incredible that Nasa with a plus 300 million dollar price tag would rely on a shute and one of 2 choppers to catch it.I was hoping for one of the choppers to snag it,now that would of been some amazing flying thats for sure.

[Guest Madtrapper]

>Hi:Was anyone else following the Genesis return to earth>that crashed yesterday.I find it incredible that Nasa with a>plus 300 million dollar price tag would rely on a shute and>one of 2 choppers to catch it.I was hoping for one of the>choppers to snag it,now that would of been some amazing flying>thats for sure. **Correction** Genesis not Gemini.....Doh!

[Guest Philip Olson]

Actually I think that what they did was great, sticking with a tried and proven thing like a parachute is usually the best way to go. In this instance it failed, rotten luck but it is a proven technology. Catching it with a copter is unique, but considering the amount of time and money it would have taken to create a re-entry method that would satisfy the requirements of this mission, I think they made a great decision. I have no doubt that if the chute had deployed that those pilots would have snagged the Genesis and it would have been a great end to a mission. Madtrapper, I am not saying this about you, just the population in general. :-) The one thing that bothers me about people and an incident like this is that when a space mission goes well most people do not even pay attention to it, no one says anything about all of the great successes that NASA has had, but they sure complain about the failures. Sad, very sads indeed! I hope that they are able to salvage something from the wreckage, it would be sad to have lost all of the data from those disks. Irregardless though I am sure that the great people at NASA will continue to expand our horizons and move us into the future.Take care,Philip Olsonhttp://www.precisionmanuals.com/images/forum/supporter.jpg

[Guest Madtrapper]

Hi Phil:I agree with you 100%.It does seem like nobody really care about anything unless it goes wrong.I remember(do that sometimes......lol)that in the sixties at school we would all go to the gym to watch the take off or landing of all the nasa missions.I wonder if schools still do that?I would of still posted this if it was a complete success....On another note....I live in Saskatchewan Canada and have been following The Da Vinci Project X Prize...They are going to launch from Kindersley, Saskatchewan on Oct 2nd/2004...... www.davinciproject.com .The majority of prairie folk in this province don`t have a sniff about this project or don`t care.But if it goes bad ,every coffee shop in this province will be buzzing .History in the making in Saskatchewan and we are going to miss it.......

[Guest MidnightMike]

Well, the good thing is that they retrieved some samples that are good, and yes, you are correct, most people become interested in events when a failure is involved.

[RobertVA 0]

Decades ago snagging a parachute was routine. The film take-up reel in photoreconnaissance satellites was in a reentry capsule that was ejected and snagged by a fixed wing aircraft before it reached the surface. The procedure wasn't publicized at the time because of national security / military intelligence issues.