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None of those went beyond LEO, though. They were also remote controlled, rather than entirely automated.
by chton 12y ago
None of those went beyond LEO, though. They were also remote controlled, rather than entirely automated.
- avmich 12y agoAgree, they didn't go beyond LEO. However, at about the same time, Soviets launched several Zonds - which were stripped-down versions of Soyuz spacecrafts - to Moon fly-bys, in automatic mode. In 1988 USSR launched Buran - arguably a close technical sibling of the Space Shuttle - admittedly on LEO (would be really amusing to see a bird like that higher than on LEO), also unmanned. I wonder if that still allows to say "this is something that was not possible during Apollo/Shuttle programs".
- chton 12y agoI agree, the article may put this somewhat strongly. I guess we'll see with that first launch what is so special about it. A fully automated launch-to-landing sequence would have been hard to do in the sixties, but I also wouldn't go so far as saying impossible.
- avmich 12y agoRegarding remote-controlled part. Do you think author stresses the differences and really mean that full automation vs. remote control? It's usually convenient to rely on some support from Earth for complex missions - doesn't make sense to make spacecraft fully autonomous - and I haven't heard Orion designers explicitly mentioning that self-sufficient approach.
- chton 12y agoI do believe so. 'Full automation' has been mentioned related to Orion as early as 2010 (http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1007/21boeing/ http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n1007/21boeing/ : "Boeing's spacecraft design could accommodate missions with any number of crew members, even fully automated unmanned flights. "). Regular remote control would not be as interesting or noteworthy, ofcourse.