{"id":1355,"date":"2009-12-15T00:22:14","date_gmt":"2009-12-15T06:22:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/?p=1355"},"modified":"2009-12-15T00:22:14","modified_gmt":"2009-12-15T06:22:14","slug":"more-youtube-videos-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/?p=1355","title":{"rendered":"More YouTube videos"},"content":{"rendered":"

This video is from the recently completed Space Elevator Games.\u00a0 It shows what ‘went wrong’ with a Climber pick-up before the problems were fixed and then it ‘went right’.\u00a0 Brian Turner, captain of the Kansas City Space Pirates<\/a>, is narrating.<\/p>\n

[youtube]http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=riEqeEj6YqI[\/youtube]<\/p>\n

.<\/p>\n

And one more Space Elevator-themed video.\u00a0 I think I posted an earlier version of this, but this is the ‘final version’…<\/p>\n

[youtube]http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=iXdorI3Mp40&feature=rec-r2-2f-1-HM[\/youtube]<\/p>\n

.<\/p>\n

In general, this video has it’s facts correct with a few exceptions.<\/p>\n

The main advantage of a Space Elevator is it’s scalability (i.e. it’s ability to scale up to carry huge amounts of material into space), not it’s relatively lower cost\/kilogram to get something into orbit.\u00a0 I can’t emphasize this enough.\u00a0 With a Space Elevator (and only with a Space Elevator), you can lift the enormous quantities of material you need to colonize the moon or mars or establish a significant amount of space solar power.<\/p>\n

Scalability people, think scalability.\u00a0 The video is correct in comparing the Space Elevator to the intercontinental railway for that’s what a Space Elevator is – a carbon railway to space.<\/p>\n

Another mistake in the video is at the end when he is fancifully showing space elevators begin stationed near Spain or Japan.\u00a0 While it’s possible to build a Space Elevator in those areas, the many problems which will occur (and have been described in the Edwards-Westling book<\/a>) will almost certainly preclude it.<\/p>\n

And finally, I must disagree with a third point of the video – that whoever builds the first Space Elevator will control access to space.\u00a0 Even if the United States (or Russia or the ESA, etc.) does not build the first one, they have the resources to build one later on.\u00a0 Certainly whoever builds one first will own a huge commercial advantage, but only until that second elevator is up and running.<\/p>\n

It might sound like I’m dissing this video – I’m not.\u00a0 It’s well done and has most of its facts correct.\u00a0 But we need to have all of our facts correct if we’re going to convince someone that this is an idea worth doing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This video is from the recently completed Space Elevator Games.\u00a0 It shows what ‘went wrong’ with a Climber pick-up before the problems were fixed and then it ‘went right’.\u00a0 Brian Turner, captain of the Kansas City Space Pirates, is narrating. [youtube]http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=riEqeEj6YqI[\/youtube] . And one more Space Elevator-themed video.\u00a0 I think I posted an earlier version […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,8,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-announcements","category-pictures-drawings-animations-music-humor-games","category-spaceelevatorcompetitions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1355\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spaceelevatorblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}