Interlude: Letters to the Editor
- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 30th December 1977
Sir,
I once again opened my copy of your illustrious magazine to find the article behind your cover story on the supposed new Soviet heavy lifter [Flight International, 16th December 1977, “Groza Matures Soviet Heavy Lift Capability”]. It was disappointing to see your publication once again falling for the Soviets’ laughable attempts to match what the Apollo program has already achieved, and the negative contrasts against the new Shuttle. This argument misses the sea change that the reusable Space Shuttle will offer in cost when it enters service, as we prepare to enter a new commercial flowering in spaceflight. Such consistent exaggeration of Soviet capabilities and undermining of Western and American ones such as the Space Shuttle and Shuttle-C system verges on communist propaganda. I hope to see better from your publication in the future.
Reginald DeWitt, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 13th January 1978
Sir,
With regards to the recent letter from Mr. DeWitt [Flight International, 30th December 1977] regarding the “sea change” in launch costs that can be expected with the advent of the American Space Shuttle, I feel compelled to respond to counter the perpetuation of this myth. Any major reductions in cost could only be achieved through an unrealistically high flight rate, of the order of a hundred or more missions each year. With the planned fleet of four shuttle orbiters, this implies each orbiter flying on average one mission every two weeks. The refurbishment of an orbital space plane and its associated solid rocket boosters on this timeframe is simply not possible with the current state-of-the-art, whilst the manufacturing facilities at NASA’s subcontractors are nowhere near sufficient scale to produce the necessary external tanks.
NASA have implicitly accepted this fact through their promotion of the non-reusable Shuttle-C. However, as mentioned in your recent article [Flight International, 16th December 1977, “Groza Matures Soviet Heavy Lift Capability”], the limitations imposed by having to adapt the flawed Shuttle Transportation System to an unmanned configuration has left the NASA with a heavy lift vehicle that is both late and under-powered compared to its Soviet equivalent.
It is to be hoped that the United States does not come to regret its costly flirtation with re-usability.
Albert Banks, Portsmouth, UK
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 27th January 1978
Sir,
Your correspondent Albert Banks [Flight International, 13th January 1978] appears to share an unfortunately widespread habit of underestimating the skills of American engineers. He apparently doesn’t grasp the basic principle that a vehicle like the Space Shuttle, which can be re-used, is inherently cheaper to operate than one that is thrown away after each launch. By presenting exaggerated and unfounded assumptions of the need for hundreds of flights per year to earn back development costs, he presents a strawman argument that ignores this basic fact. The Groza rocket, so beloved of armchair engineers, has surely cost the Russians at least as much to develop as the Shuttle, but unlike Shuttle they will have to build a complete new vehicle for every mission. By ending this costly practice with the Space Shuttle, the United States will lower prices and stimulate demand, creating a vibrant free market commercial space industry for the next decade.
Reginald DeWitt, Pittsburgh, USA
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 3rd February 1978
Sir,
Once again, I see Mr. DeWitt promoting his over-simplified opinions in your magazine as if they were backed up by more than inflated rhetoric [Flight International, 27th January 1978]. Despite his disparaging of so-called “armchair engineers”, he himself displays no signs of familiarity with a rigorous engineering analysis, preferring instead to recycle tired old slogans about the power of free markets.
Perhaps, however, the opinions of Mr. DeWitt and his ilk can be excused as a psychological protective measure to compensate for what is rapidly becoming obvious: that the United States is falling behind in space. While NASA launches model spaceplanes from a 747, with the aim of an eventual manned return to Earth orbit, the Soviets continue to push forward with an ambitious programme for lunar exploration. The recent Zond 13 mission can leave little doubt - even in minds as obtuse as that of Mr. DeWitt - that the USSR is close to accomplishing a manned mission to the lunar surface that will exceed Apollo in scale and ambition. They have achieved this, not by chasing fantasies of aeroplanes in space, but through the application of solid engineering approach coupled with a vigorous industrial policy that achieves value through mass production.
Perhaps photographs of a cosmonaut placing the hammer-and-sickle on the Moon will be enough to wake NASA and others from their fever-dreams, but based on the evidence of certain correspondents to your magazine, I will not hold my breath.
Albert Banks (B.Eng, FBIS), Portsmouth, UK
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 30th June 1978
Sir,
Thank-you for your excellent coverage of the Zond 14 lunar mission [Flight International, 23nd June 1978, “Zond 14 Points to Soviet Manned Lunar Ambitions”]. This development makes me wonder if it is not perhaps possible to re-activate the Saturn V production line in response to the Soviet challenge? NASA is already planning to make good use of Apollo hardware in their space station plans [Flight International, 17th February 1978, “NASA Proposes Skylab-B As Next U.S. Space Station”]. With the lessons being learnt with the Space Shuttle, perhaps it would even be possible to apply reusability to the Saturn first stage, bringing costs down further. Such a reusable first stage, lifting heavy payloads and even the existing planned Shuttle, would seem to be an excellent way to re-capture the innovative fires of Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo which defeated the Soviets in what must now be regarded as the first space race and would set an electrifying groundwork for doing so in what must soon rapidly become the second.
Tony Newbold, Solihull, UK
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 14th July 1978
Sir,
Although reasonable people may debate the extent to which the Space Shuttle will reduce launch costs, the notion recently proposed by Mr. Newbold [Flight International, 30th June 1978] of building new Saturn V’s, or even - to compound the absurdity - giving it a reusable first stage stretches credulity beyond breaking point. This is an idea that belongs in pulp science-fiction, not a serious aviation magazine.
Reginald DeWitt, Pittsburgh, USA
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- Letters to the editor, Flight International, 21st July 1978
Sir,
I find myself in the unusual position of agreeing wholeheartedly with a letter from your esteemed correspondent Mr. DeWitt of Pittsburgh [Flight International, 14th July 1978]. Let us not waste ink in giving column inches to crackpot ideas like re-usable Saturn stages, when the West is facing the very real challenge of the USSR’s space ambitions.
Albert Banks, Portsmouth, UK
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With thanks to @e of pi for his contributions to this post, and for all the "Space Twitter/Spitter" posters who inspired it!