New Space Settlement image

MW: If your talkin' luxury liner then your talkin'
about a big space station. But if your talking about
O'neill type space colonies then at mininimum these
would have to be at least 2 kilometers in diameter
just to make sure that 99.9% of the people who inhabit
themwon't feel nausea. Medical research back in the
1970s showed that rotation rates higher than 1rpm for
a 1G simulated gravity were not healthy-- so you have
to have a structure with a diameter of at least 2
kilometers. I cover the entire surface of a
cylindrical cosmodrome with shielding (soil and
water)-- even the window area (water about 5 meters
deep). Of course, I prefer a cosmodrome about 30
kilometers in diameter and about 100 kilometers long.
Only the mass production of structures that size will
ever attract people from Earth to live their forever,
IMO. And, of course, the center of the cosmodrome will
be pressurized with air almost 2 kilometers to, of
course, 30 kilometers deep which will add even more
cosmic radiation protection.

But even a rotating a space station will still have to
be at least 2 kilometers in diameter if you want to
produce 1G gravity. But this can easily be done with
two modules attached from opposite sides by one
kilometer cables from the rotating axis of a central
structure.

Marcel F. Williams
12/18/00

--- "Tom Tucker (Olympia)"