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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Skyman, post: 2476764, member: 28299&quot;]The Soyuz is like an old Ford pickup.&nbsp; It may not be glamorous, but it gets the job done.&nbsp; No one has lost their lives on it since it was still in it&#039;s early teething period in the late 1960&#039;s early 1970&#039;s.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>The reason that the cosmonauts use a stick to push the instrument panel is the way that they are seated in the spacecraft.&nbsp; In US spacecraft, astronauts are launched seated on their backs with their legs above their heads.&nbsp; In Soviet/Russian spacecraft astronauts at launch are seated upright with their knees tucked up close to their chests.</p><p><br /></p><p>The really sad part about the US manned space effort, is that we knew in 2003 that the shuttle was too risky, courtesy of the Columbia disaster (the SECOND shuttle disaster).&nbsp; Here we are THIRTEEN years later, and we STILL can&#039;t launch people into space.&nbsp; In the 1960&#039;s in EIGHT years, we went from launching one person on a suborbital trip that went about 300 miles downrange in ~ 15 minutes, to sending three humans to the Moon, landing two of them on the Moon, and returning them safely, with missions lasting up to 14 days.</p><p><br /></p><p>Orion was planned as your generic government replacement capsule.&nbsp; It was originally designed to be used with the Constellation system to take people back to the Moon.&nbsp; The Obama administration decided to go to Mars instead (because the MAJOR costs associated with this would occur long after Obama was out of office), so they canceled the Constellation system, but Congress decided that the Orion capsule would still be built.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>The one good thing the Obama administration did with regards to US manned space travel, was to push for commmercialization of low earth orbit (LEO) launch capabilities.&nbsp; Various companies bid on producing a LEO spacecraft, and over the intervening years that has winnowed down to two; Boeing, with the CST-100; and SpaceX, with the Dragon 2.&nbsp; The CST-100 will get to orbit on an Atlas V rocket (which uses Russian rockets in it&#039;s first stage).&nbsp; The Dragon 2 will get to orbit on a Falcon 9 rocket.</p><p><br /></p><p>Both spacecraft are designed to be reusable, last I heard on the order of 10 times per space capsule.&nbsp; It is both amusing and sad, and IMO quite telling, that Boeing, which was given roughly TWICE as much money as SpaceX, is actually not as close as SpaceX in launching it&#039;s manned vehicle.&nbsp; Theoretically sometime in 2017 the Dragon 2 will launch, with the CST-100 launching roughly a year later.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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