Asteroid Belt First

--- In spacesettlers@y..., "Ed Schonert" wrote:

> My idea is for first expeditions to travel in paired vehicles at
ends of
> a 500 meter connecting cable. This could provide them with
artificial
> gravity for durations of voyage & first asteroid excavation. I
estimate
> weight of such a cable at 5% of total weight of the 2 vehicles for
one
> 'g' of artificial gravity.
>
> Hallelujah - Praise Spacesettlers ! ! ! Ed S.

Hi Ed,

I don't think it will be necessary to send people to the first
asteroid excavation missions. Robotic probes will most likely be
used first, as assaying will be necessary before any excavation
project can begin. There may be many such missions before a suitable
near earth asteroid can be selected; once a suitable candidate is
found, the same robots which assay the rock should set up the
infrastructure to dismantle it. A great deal of the excavation
process will be performed through a combination of autonomous robots
and teleoperated robots anyhow, and it makes sense to me to kill two
birds with one stone. Such a system will simplify enormously the
transportation requirements and the work involved.

:) ed