.

The video has many interesting themes, but most of them are cut short, as if this is a teaser version of a much more detailed and longer version that shows the "rest of the story" for most of the segments.  For example, the daughter of James Van Allen is in the middle of describing her father's trip to Russia when the interview with her abruptly ends with her childhood sense of the Cold War "not being so cold."  

It would be nice to have more background behind the claims that modern space flights are hampered by the Van Allen Belts problem.  I have heard these assertions but where is the "official" version? Is there that much of an information suppression that no one in any position of current active projects is willing to make any public statement that our present-day astronauts cannot penetrate the Van Allen Belts because the X-rays generated, by the particles inherent in the Belts coming in contact with the metallic spacecraft surfaces, would have a lethal intensity of radiation?

The testimony of one man in the second half (his name was not shown written) that during the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe, he contacted the manufacturers of space suits used in the Space Program (NASA) asking if their suits could be used at Fukushima, is most revealing.  He says they all told him the space suits have absolutely NO protection against radiation built in to them, and that they highly recommended AGAINST using such suits at Fukushima, or at any other nuclear radiation sites.  

Nowhere in this video do they mention the fact that in all hospitals today, X-ray rooms and radiology specifications for walls and employees' safety entail the use of lead sheets of various thickness.  An X-ray tech, whose job it is to shoot images of patients who are generally lying on a table, before the camera is powered up, must go stand behind a protective wall that has a lead sheet surface (generally covered by paint so the lead is not visible as lead).  The entrance door to the X-ray room has a layer of lead about 0.125" thick (1/8th inch), just as all the walls, floor and ceiling of the rooms do, meaning that a door 3'-6" wide and 7' tall will weigh an EXTRA 176 pounds (lead weighs 0.4 #/cu.in.), due to the lead layer covering its surface on one side. If you have ever pushed one of those X-ray room doors open or closed, you would have noticed it has a reluctance to move, and that is due to its mass, or weight, and its consequent inertia.  The hinges, for example, of such doors must be double ball bearing hinges with oversized screws. and a reinforced jamb and even a stronger wall is necessary in order to hold the additional weight of the door.  

A space suit would therefore have about that much more weight (or mass in weightless environment), and would be so much less maneuverable, due to the extra mass of any lead layer to protect the person wearing it. How to make such a layer flexible is a whole different problem.

I have never heard of any space suits that have a lead layer to shield the wearer from radiation.  Such a thing would be enormously cuмbersome, and difficult to use.  And I have heard mention of how spacecraft would weigh considerably more with such a layer, perhaps about 40% more.  The additional cost of rocket fuel and reduction in payload would be enormous, since (as one man in this video says) you get less than twice the additional payload from an increase of twice the rocket fuel. (The dead weight of the initial fuel load is counted as "payload" for the launch itself).

Therefore, all the various images we see of astronauts doing "space walks" around the Shuttle or Space Station (the Oscar-nominated "Gravity" for example), are showing space suits with absolutely zero protection for radiation.  Therefore, any such activity would have to take place BELOW the Van Allen Belts.  Traveling to the moon requires passing THROUGH and going BEYOND the Van Allen Belts.  To do so, would mean any human being without any radiation protection -- meaning enormous lead shielding (unless there is some other means!) -- would be FRIED to a CRISP, and return as a "crispy critter" (I have a friend who is an X-ray tech and that's his term for victims of car fires whose remains he has to X-ray for forensic research and docuмentation.)  In the military, they say, "You would be toast."


.

They have those lead shields in hospitals for the staff you idiot because they would be exposed day after day for years and it might, marginally, increase their chance of cancer.  Then they would sue the hospital.

The hospital are scared of the lawyers and need to show they took precautions.  Lead is cheap so they line everything in the room with it.

So, just how bad was the radiation measured there?  Well, it wasn’t something to dismiss (and was academically quite interesting), but it also wasn’t something that would strike fear into the hearts of mission planners:

Peak radiation exposure while traveling through the inner, more powerful belt reached 13,000 millirem per hour, (or 13 rem per hour).  So, if an astronaut were to park in worst part of the inner Van Allen belt for an hour with no shielding, he or she would receive a radiation dose nearly three times the annual “safe” dose for DOE workers and may have bumped up their lifetime risk of a fatal cancer by a percentage point.

Fortunately, however, the time the Apollo astronauts spent traveling through the highest radiation zone of the inner Van Allen belt (at a screaming 11,000+ miles per hr) was fractional – their doses averaged 120 millirem per day.

Go ahead and compare this to the above graphs.

So, it is clear that the Apollo astronauts’ radiation doses in this case were much less than a common CT scan and far less than what a modern astronaut on the International Space Station receives during a 6-month tour (~7,000 millirem).

Hence, simply passing through the Van Allen Belts is anything but lethal.

http://astrowright.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/surviving-radiation-in-space/


The idiocy here is unsurpassed.  Fake snow that does not melt?!?  US Naval cօռspιʀαcιҽs about Obama ordering 5 carriers to the same spot?  Right mouse click for goodness sake and consider the alternative explanations before posting your nonsense.

You will convince yourself of any old horsesh!t just because you want to and it justifies your stupid view of the world.

So just incase I did not make it clear.  I am going to go out on a LEM here and say "yes.  Apollo astronauts visited the moon and none of the missions were faked".

I urge you to resolve—as a Lenten penitential practice for a start—to emulate the holy goofiness that some of the greatest saints* have urged upon us all since Christianity's earliest centuries.
____________
* I'll get back to you later with a few names. It's the merest of coincidences that I can't think of any at the moment.

What is this comment supposed to mean?  Are you mocking the saints?  

"Holy goofiness"?

They went six times and conducted lots of experiments.

What reason is there to go again?   It is just a huge piece of orbiting basalt with no water and no life.  I only went to San Jose, Costa Rics once because it is a massive shithole.  Rest of the country is nice but it would not visit San Jose again if you paid me.

It is expensive to mount lunar missions and they are relatively dangerous compared to going into orbit.  Apollo 13 astronauts were very nearly killed.

There is huge political kudos in doing it the first time but then the public loses interest and it is no longer a vote winner.

By Apollo 13 the TV networks were not even giving the moon missions full coverage.  By 17 everyone had lost interest.

The best scientists and minds and mission planners want to be boldly going where no man has gone before, not repeating a 40 year old mission in a greener rocket.

It is expensive to mount lunar missions and they are relatively dangerous compared to going into orbit. Apollo 13 astronauts were very nearly killed.

There is huge political kudos in doing it the first time but then the public loses interest and it is no longer a vote winner.

It seems everyone has lost interest in the space station too, but AFAIK, they still go there. (Not sure, though, as I've lost interest.) That isn't exactly free.

If the danger element were scaring them away, why talk and plan about a trip to Mars? Are we expecting to find something way more exciting than what's to be found on the moon?

Perhaps I'm not your average voter, but putting people on Mars doesn't sound very exciting to me.

They went six times and conducted lots of experiments.

What reason is there to go again?   It is just a huge piece of orbiting basalt with no water and no life.  I only went to San Jose, Costa Rics once because it is a massive shithole.  Rest of the country is nice but it would not visit San Jose again if you paid me.

It is expensive to mount lunar missions and they are relatively dangerous compared to going into orbit.  Apollo 13 astronauts were very nearly killed.

There is huge political kudos in doing it the first time but then the public loses interest and it is no longer a vote winner.

By Apollo 13 the TV networks were not even giving the moon missions full coverage.  By 17 everyone had lost interest.

The best scientists and minds and mission planners want to be boldly going where no man has gone before, not repeating a 40 year old mission in a greener rocket.

I'm sure there are plenty of younger people who would be plenty interested. Besides a few Baby Boomers who remember the moon landing being broadcast at their elementary school, and a bunch of nursing home residents, who alive today could be "sick of" the concept of men on the moon?

For a HUGE percentage of the living population, it's only been something we've watched docuмentaries about, or read about in history books.

That's like saying we'd all yawn if there were a cινιℓ ωαr going on, just because in 1861 we "been there, done that, have the T-shirt." Or more accurately, it would be like saying we Americans are even 1% prepared for a cινιℓ ωαr, since we had one in 1861. As if historical events count for personal experience!

Heck, the Old Testament Israelites had to taste God's wrath personally each generation. It didn't matter how awesome the last smiting was; they went astray and had to taste God's wrath for themselves.

So I don't think that argument holds a lot of water.

I think the biggest issue with the Moon landing is: why haven't we gone back?

Saying it's a "shithole" is a pretty weak argument. It's the MOON for crying out loud. Why not build some kind of station there? If we can build an orbiting space station, why not build a moon base?

You telling me that wouldn't capture the imagination of the world? Yeah right.

I'm sure we've developed SOME kind of better propulsion/rocket technology, at least more reliable. We certainly have better computer hardware. That alone should help with monitoring/safety/auto-pilot issues.