Space Elevator?

[Spartan Erik]

http://science.howstuffworks.com/space-elevator1.htm

Only costs $6 billion to build (as opposed to $20 billion spent on shuttles)

Man.. the world is becoming more and more like Halo! :biggrin:

 

[Fedlerner]

wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
:O
i can't belive it

 

[bigguy]

That's quite the write up. I can believe it or something like it will be done.

 

[vitaorsa]

what a whole lot of bulls*&t...

 

[Spartan Erik]

what a whole lot of bulls*&t...

Why do you think that?

 

[Anubis]

Pretty nice =P

 

[TheJeffsta]

Waste of time to think about building and actually building.

Whats the point, it will end up failing and possibly cause more trouble than it is good.

Next I suppose they are going to say that we can fly out to space and talk to King Martian and fly back to Earth in 5 minutes - Yeah Right!

Whats the elevator supposed to do? Make us spend 5 years trapped in an elevator and all that!

 

[HyDr@]

wont be 5 years, more like hours to days.

Also, its impossible to do it at the moment, some material and technology is not cracked yet, check wikipedia for space elevators!

The construction of a space elevator would be a vast project, requiring advances in engineering and physical technology. NASA has identified "Five Key Technologies for Future Space Elevator Development":

1. Material for cable (e.g. carbon nanotube and nanotechnology) and tower
2. Tether deployment and control
3. Tall tower construction
4. Electromagnetic propulsion (e.g. magnetic levitation)
5. Space infrastructure and the development of space industry and economy

Also I really don't think its a waste of time, to be honest Its going to safe our species one day.

 

[TheJeffsta]

How is it going to save our species? and from what? King Martian blasting his high-tech. alien weapons to Earth?

 

[Spartan Erik]

How is it going to save our species? and from what? King Martian blasting his high-tech. alien weapons to Earth?

Haha you say this now.. but one day we'll find some sort of rare metal deposit on some planet, and you bet there will be space exploration.

And what if earth is doomed to be destroyed by an asteroid? At least we'll have a method of evacuating SOME people.. plus in several million/billion years our sun will die out and our planet will freeze and get sucked into a black hole and destroyed

 

[DizzyTechnology]

Very optimistic outlook on life, don't 'cha think?

Just kidding, though. This seems like an interesting idea eventually. I can't imagine, though, that

5. Space infrastructure and the development of space industry and economy

would be number five on the todo list...

 

[SEÑOR]

All im saying the future is gonna be so cool. I hope they find a way to make life expectancy longer, so i can live long enought o see things like the space station be finished, and space exploration will be easier.

I was recently and Nasa and they have plans to have ships kinda like in starwars. Where its a small ship like a flat ship with a little circle thing going up at the front(cockpit) and the speed wont be an issue.

 

[ƒorte]

I'm all for this.. space exporation is awesome.

If built, the ribbon will represent a modern world wonder, and will be the tallest structure ever built. Consider that the world's tallest freestanding tower in 2005 is the CN Tower, which rises 1,815 feet 5 inches (553.34 meters) over Toronto, Canada. The space elevator would be 180,720 times taller than the CN Tower! :O

 

[t2t2t]

Ps. Because of hatefull of my quotes, i wont quote
Going up? Nowher but!

I wanna see a space elevator but i think that it would be probably too expensive

EDIT: Snakes on a space elevator

 

[Cubeform]

The space elevator has been discussed years ago. The only problem I could think of is if the cable breaks, but there's redundancy for that, right?