Australian Space Agency Thoughts/Opinions

[Denver Vidler]

Should an ASA exist? Would it benefit Astronomers? Should it cut lose of Government Bureaucracy? or should it have an element of a Private Company, being self-sufficient with a two sided board of directors...one group scientific and one focused on business and financial stability? I'm interested in all thoughts and oppinions!

[TrevorW]

Yes for one reason

if we don't start now we'll be left in the cold when they start slicing up the realestate

yes it should be jointly funded

and yes the board should consist of a mixture from science, business, and even a few JOAT's, lateral thinkers.

and we can call it the Australian Space Society (ASS) for short

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

Could be setup as an organisation initially then apply for funding to improve opportunities and grow the organisation. It then could be contracted to the government to supply training for Australian Astronauts and maybe incorporate Australia's rocket facility.

Never know worth a try, although it will take a lot of co-operation and effort to get the ball rolling.

[Jazza11 (Jeremy)]

I think it would be great but in my opinion the government would need to put a few billion dollars into it in the first few years to get people trained and build facility's but personal i dont see it happening soon

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

Yes it would be nice, but as the population in Australia is so small considering, the cost per capita it is highly unlikely for an off the shelf government space program to commence.

It would need a co-operative environment organisation to pool national resources together to show the government a viable solution. Small steps to enventually build up to a viable space program where the government would consider it a real project to fund.

It may need some business injection in some way and some media access as well.

[DistroMan (Trevor)]

Only as long as we don't end up with flashing neon billboards in space ruining the night sky.

[multiweb (Marc)]

There is just not enough working population in Oz for the governement to pool and fund any space program I reckon. What is it now? 10millions?

[Fossil (Jonathan)]

I would like to offer a different view, and suggest that we don't set up our own ASA. My preference would be for an international approach (similar to the ISS) where member countries co-operate with each other. This would eliminate the enormous amount of duplication required for each country to have its own 'ASA', different countries could concentrate more on their specialities and contribute to the overall effort, concentrating efforts to co-operatively solve problems rather than each country individually trying to solve the same problem by itself, etc.
I do not like the idea of 'slicing up real estate'. No individual or country 'owns' any of it, we are just temporary custodians passing through. Think where we would be today if all the money, time and effort wasted on wars was put towards advancing humanity. The same goes for space, none of us will ever 'own' any of it, (I always liken our wars to fleas fighting over the ownership of a camel) so we may as well co-operate and put in a joint effort.

[TrevorW]

Jonathon good point a co-operative approach say for the asia indian pacific region may be the go however if we don't act he who gets there first

owners keepers losers weepers

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

The International Space Station is the first real step in International system, but each country has it own system to get time on the space station. There are too many different cultures to deal with to come up with a world wide society so it is up to each country to pool resources to get people in space.

At this stage Australia requires to send people to the US or Europe or Russia to have any chance to go into space. So to be realistic we need our own society to help poeple get directly into space.

The only stumbling block as I have set up a couple of organisations is that conflicts and power want by individuals. I really needs co-operation without conflict.

[Jules76 (Julian)]

It's a pity we never really built upon the knowledge and experience gained from testing and firing rockets and satellites during the 50's and 60's at Woomera. The foundations were laid then, NASA even used the area during the Gemini space program and it was also the location of Deep Space Station 41 used for tracking NASA probes into space. All of which has long been dismantled and shipped back to the US.

Unforunately it was all pretty much left to waste by successive governments and with the space race slowing down and the cold war ending, you can't really blame them. All it gets used for thesedays is for research and testing by various countries who need somewhere to do it.

I guess what I'm saying is, as far as building facilities go, we have the foundations already in Woomera. But beyond that, we have a long way to catch up which means a lot of money and something I don't think we'll ever see in our life time.

[MrB (Simon)]

Originally Posted by multiweb

There is just not enough working population in Oz... What is it now? 10millions?

Heard something on the news the other day that we are now at ~22 million.

[astroron (Ron)]

I think he meant people in or able to be employed

[mswhin63 (Malcolm)]

[QUOTE=Jules76;502619]Unforunately it was all pretty much left to waste by successive governments and with the space race slowing down and the cold war ending, you can't really blame them. [QUOTE]

Unfortunately there is no real forward thinking by any government usually waste time looking after their next 4 years in office.

[picklesrules (Nicholas)]

that's the major problem with something such as a space program governments don't seem to think much about after there 4 yrs in office and don't tend to plan for the future, also if we want any real movement in space it has to be a international effort it just wont happen otherwise,.

[norm]

I would love to see an ASA on home turf, but I can't see either government (labour or liberal)with the initiative or the vision to pour the money into such a scheme.
If it was soley on R/D and space research, it might be a hard sell - governments don't have long term vision, unless something is in it for them.
It would have to be a joint venture either with some rich person with a passion in aerospace or a multi-national corporation with a business objective of deploying commercial satellites and the like.

Although we'd be miles behind NASA and ESA, I do believe we have the minds to get something like this off the ground.

I could see a market for space travel, even if its just at the edge space to start with. Once the technology and hardware is proven, it could be a regularly thing. Eventually (maybe not in my lifetime) this becomes an affordable experience.
If the likes of Richard Branson can get something off the ground, surely some local entrepenuer could do the same.

Norm

[MrB (Simon)]

Originally Posted by astroron

I think he meant people in or able to be employed

D'Oh!!
Yes ofcourse.

[mac (Matt)]

In my opinion, space tourism using current launch technology seems like a waste of money and an environmental nightmare. Keep the space programmes for science, until an eco-friendly launch device is invented! Like a big rubber band slingshot.

[DavidU (Dave)]

AU is way to small to do this. NASA's expendature is probably equal to our GDP.
Don't even think about it.
We can't even support manufacturing to any degree looking at the big picture.
AU is going to be just a mine & tourist destination. Anyone with great ideas in the big picture have already gone overseas.
My dad who has a OAM for manufacturing engineering gave away the AU dream.
Don't get me started !