Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by seniorsassycat on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:07PM
(#20152316)
> Notably, the fuel tanks used in this mission weren’t provided enough fuel to return from the Moon’s surface — an intentional limitation imposed in case the astronauts flying the test run were tempted to jump the queue and become the first people to walk on the lunar surface
I wish we lived in a universe where NASA didn't have the forsight to short fuel Apollo 10. Imagine a joyride to the lunar surface.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by cyberferret on Monday June 10, 2019 @10:20PM
(#20152588)
Conversely, I am glad I live in a universe where professional crew members stick to the flight plan and don't go glory hunting at the first opportunity.
AFAIK, "Snoopy" was too heavy to land and take off anyhow, the astronauts didn't have EVA capable suits, and there wasn't enough oxygen to replenish the LM cabin should they have opened the hatch to perform EVA. Any ride to the surface would have been suicidal folly, regardless of fuel quantity.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by dmurray on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @06:35AM
(#20154250)
I thought Apollo 10 was meant to be a dry run for Apollo 11, so it was set up identically. Why would they have differed on something so important as the weight of the LM?
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by cyberferret on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @08:02AM
(#20154648)
Almost every LM on every mission was completely different. I don't believe any two were the same. Each mission had different requirements that necessitated major redesigns to the LM. For instance, the later missions that used the Lunar Rover had significantly bigger and heavier LMs to accommodate the vehicle.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by rbanffy on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @12:24PM
(#20156880)
From a cursory look, they all look the same. I remember the LM went through lots of iterations before it was practical (and it's entirely possible Snoopy was too heavy) but it's hard to see too many differences between the versions that actually flew. What changed seemed to be landing weight and life support for the crew (later versions allowed multiple EVAs and remained landed much longer than Eagle).
Still, no EVA suits is one thing, but having no operable ascent engine is really terrible because, if something goes wrong with the descent engine (which is the thing being exercised here) the crew has no backup whatsoever in case they have no option but landing (maybe a guidance issue that requires the LM to stop - in general emergency landings in places with no breathable atmosphere are a mistake).
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by ConcernedCoder on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @12:15AM
(#20152971)
I'm positive NASA pilots are professional enough not to 'jump the queue', I believe the fuel limitation, like everything else, was fine tuned to minimize total weight on takeoff.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by omeid2 on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @01:37AM
(#20153223)
There is a thousands miles between taking some stamps with you and trying to land on a d̶i̶f̶f̶e̶r̶e̶n̶t̶ ̶f̶r̶e̶a̶k̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶p̶l̶a̶n̶e̶t̶ moon without proper planning and supply.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by JKCalhoun on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @01:41AM
(#20153238)
Agree. Reading the book, "Moondust", it's clear that more than a couple of the Apollo Commanders were going to land regardless of what the computer, radar or Mission Control advised.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by chrisshroba on Monday June 10, 2019 @11:53PM
(#20152892)
Is it really reasonable to think the astronauts would have disobeyed orders and landed on the moon? This seems like it would have so many negative repercussions on the astronauts involved that it seems outside the realm of possibility to me.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by wiggler00m on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:28AM
(#20153571)
Amazing story if true.
"[T]he crew were alleged to have stopped working. Gibson spent his day on Skylab's solar console, while Carr and Pogue spent their time in the wardroom looking out at the window."
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by NotPaidToPost on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @04:15AM
(#20153724)
Once you are the first man on the Moon they can ask you to resign for disobeying orders or even sack you if they don't mind the bad publicity at a time when NASA is showered in international glory. But you're still the first man on the moon.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by ahazred8ta on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:50PM
(#20152482)
The object is 2006-RH120, which was closer than the moon (0.002 au) in 2007 and will come within 0.025 au in 2028. It is currently on the far side of the sun.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by cyberferret on Monday June 10, 2019 @10:22PM
(#20152597)
I was disappointed in the lack of details too (as well as the mis-spelling of Gene Cernan's name). Is the LM in orbit around the sun? In an extended orbit around the Earth's orbital plane? Trapped in orbit around another solar body? That was what I was looking for from the article...
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by RawChicken on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @05:56AM
(#20154063)
The lack of knowledge in news articles regarding space topics is astounding.
If you want to learn more about Snoopy, Scott Manley makes a great video about it!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXVYZm9epmU
The orbit description starts at 3:30 but the rest is worth a watch, full of interesting footage and data!
As noted below, Scott Manley does a much better job covering it. YouTube is a much more efficient tool for connecting the knowledgeable and passionate with the interested learner. If anything the "imprimatur" granted by legacy media brand names gets in the way on topics where the public is generally badly informed, or where there is a lot of false knowledge floating around the culture.
The downside, is that knowledge has to compete with falsehood, so the complete elimination of falsehood is problematic, and it may take some time for the real knowledge to rise. I think it's better overall, more democratic and pro-freedom, if people participate by making their own choices to find the truth.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by mirimir on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @01:48PM
(#20157721)
Hey.
What's really funny -- and why I posted the link -- is that TFA doesn't actually point to the Sky News article. The Sky News link in this sentence ...
> The effort to discover its location began in 2011, undertaken by a group of amateur U.K. astronomers led by Nick Howes — the same who now claim they’re “98 percent convinced” they’ve discovered where it ended up, according to Sky News.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by protomyth on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @02:02PM
(#20157873)
Wow, when I went to the article it had an actual link to the Sky News article. I wonder what they have going on, because that is just wrong. It really looks like they decided they didn't want to point to Sky News and then switched to Newsweek without changing the actual text.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by mirimir on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:01PM
(#20158442)
Huh. That's even stranger.
I mean, why would they switch from a primary source to a secondary source? I wonder if there's some sort of relationship between TechCrunch and Newsweek.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by toddsiegel on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:37PM
(#20152192)
I just learned about this mission on Saturday, while visiting the Charles Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, CA. They have small display with pictures, and the audio from the mission.
I often think of NASA as exceptionally serious people, but it never seems to stop them from adding a bit of humor and fun to their work.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by trsohmers on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:53PM
(#20152247)
Well Apollo 10 was the last time NASA let the astronauts name the CM and LM, precisely because they named it Snoopy. I think it is well known that in general the early astronauts had a pretty good sense of humor (along with balls of steel), but ground control, not so much.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by WalterBright on Monday June 10, 2019 @11:48PM
(#20152879)
WW2 air crews named and painted their airplanes crazy fun things. There were some complaints about it, but the brass had enough sense to let the crews do what they wanted. It was a way for them to take a bit of the edge off of the terrible strain they were under. (Very high death rates.)
My dad was a bit superstitious, all his combat rides were named "Round Trip Ticket". It worked :-)
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by WalterBright on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:52AM
(#20153638)
They're the claimed enemy airplanes shot down. Some of those kills were shared with other airplanes. There were several gunners on the B-17, so the number there represents all of their work.
The painted bombs above it represent the number of combat missions.
My father was the navigator, which was up front. His gun pointed out the side, which made for rather difficult deflection shots. He said the favored attack by the Luftwaffe was head on, which made deflection shots as they passed that much harder. The nose of the B-17 is a plexiglass hemisphere, and he could see the Me-109's firing straight at them, and wondered how they could miss. Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, no armor.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by Rebelgecko on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @01:00AM
(#20153107)
Are you sure? NASA still seems to use Snoopy in an official capacity (e.g. the Silver Snoopy award). Starting in the 80s they even started sending every Silver Snoopy pin up into orbit before it was given to the recipient.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by trothamel on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:17PM
(#20152363)
There was a great relationship between Charles Schulz, and NASA, which showed up in some odd places. There's an award, the Silver Snoopy, that is presented by astronauts to non-management employees that have significantly contributed to human space flight.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by mbreese on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:30PM
(#20152415)
On Apple TV there is a 9 minute documentary about this relationship and specifically Apollo 10. It aims to answer the question: was Snoopy a secret astronaut?
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by pryce on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:40PM
(#20152202)
An impressive achievement if they did manage to locate it, certainly.
On the other hand, proposing that it merits retrieval is staggeringly vain- only the tiniest fraction of human enterprise has ever operated outside our planetary system (the Earth and our moon). Consider the mind-blowing opportunity cost of any mission sent to 'retrieve Snoopy', and take a moment to think of just some of the incredible projects one could do instead.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by cesarb on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:55PM
(#20152254)
> Consider the mind-blowing opportunity cost of any mission sent to 'retrieve Snoopy', and take a moment to think of just some of the incredible projects one could do instead.
For an opposite point of view, think of all the technological advances that would be necessary for a safe "retrieve Snoopy" mission. Even if the mission itself is pointless, all the developments leading to it could be useful. That is, what matters might be the journey, not the destination.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by iscrewyou on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:25PM
(#20152390)
I was thinking the same thing. The technology and science that could come out of a mission like that would be great! We’d be the First Nation to retrieve something far away from earth that belonged to us. A stepping stone for future mishaps on other planets.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by fuzz4lyfe on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:43PM
(#20152455)
"We choose to go (back) to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by pryce on Monday June 10, 2019 @10:14PM
(#20152570)
Millions of people have looked to the moon for tens of thousands of years, and wondered if someday, a human being might walk on it.
A truly transcendent category of goal, even if a large part of the underlying motive was pretty obviously demonstrating American superiority over the Communist 'other'.
I don't really put retrieving the 'Snoopy' module in this same category.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by pryce on Monday June 10, 2019 @10:23PM
(#20152602)
I did, thanks.
EDIT: for anyone interested in the history of the Apollo 10 mission, its commander (and only crew-member remaining living) Thomas Stafford also went to Moscow to serve as a pallbearer in the state funeral given to the Soyuz 11 crew after the tragedy, the only human beings known to have died in space.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by imglorp on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @07:56AM
(#20154615)
Not only the tech developed, but also studying the retrieved artifact: we don't have a ton of hardware that's spent 50 years in space. What happens to all this stuff in a vacuum getting radiated, baked and frozen that long. Metals, hoses and gaskets, insulators and wires, semiconductors, dielectrics etc.
If we're going to colonize the solar system, we have to learn how to build hardware to last in that environment.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by mLuby on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @02:04PM
(#20157896)
Agreed. Plus it's like a dry-run for a deep space rescue, and a bit like an easier version of an asteroid capture mission. For example, how do you grapple and maneuver with an object if you don't have matched docking ports? If the object is fragile? How do you efficiently enter LEO from interplanetary space without aerobreaking? Lots to learn from the effort!
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by naikrovek on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:06PM
(#20152307)
Are you sure? The Broken Window Fallacy only applies if the technical gains from such a mission could be used on nothing else afterward, which is obviously not the case.
The fallacy is a fallacy because the money spent fixing a broken window can't be spent again by the same person. He's spending money he would have spent anyway, so there is no net gain.
In a technological progression caused by, say, a public works project such as the mission to the moon, technology developed for the sake of that project can indeed be used on other things, and definitely was in the case of the moon landings, so it's not a fallacy when talking technical advancement.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by avmich on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:42PM
(#20152453)
Here we can possibly have an underestimation of how much value the module has. Having real historical artifact available in a museum over decades if not more could help provide inspiration to more generations of space explorers - and others.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by TeMPOraL on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:20AM
(#20153551)
The thing about opportunity costs arguments wrt. space, when used from the outside (vs. just reallocating existing NASA budget), is that the "incredible projects one could do instead" never materialize. It's a thinly veiled way of just not giving money to space exploration.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by russdill on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:57AM
(#20153658)
It would have to be done in stages anyway. The first stage would be to send a tug out that would return Snoopy to an Earth centric orbit. Such a mission would be unmanned and would take many years, on the order of a decade or more. That mission would be something low cost and low risk.
Getting it out if Earth orbit and back to Earth would be much harder. But who knows, maybe by then something like starship would be operational.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by kijin on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @03:14AM
(#20153525)
If Snoopy somehow stayed near (or returned to) the Earth-moon system, retrieving it might be similar to fixing the Hubble in space. Difficult, yes, expensive, of course, but evidently doable.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by kijin on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @04:16AM
(#20153726)
Fixing the Hubble involved sending a bunch of people on a space shuttle. We don't have the shuttle anymore, but now we have much better robotics. A mission such as retrieving Snoopy might be a great opportunity to develop and test robotic retrieval missions in space.
That technology could come in handy, for example, when we need to rescue people who are stuck in malfunctioning capsules. Or for mining asteroids and sending the resulting bulk material elsewhere in space. Or maybe for retrieving EOL satellites that are about to crash into one another and spread debris all over the place.
In America, doggy retrieves stick. In Soviet Russia, big firey stick retrieves doggy. :)
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by close04 on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @08:06AM
(#20154673)
> might be a great opportunity to develop and test robotic retrieval missions in space
Hubble was fixed so it can perform its mission: it was uniquely qualified to send high resolution images of the universe, which proved invaluable to our understanding of space.
If testing tech is your aim then Snoopy is just as good as anything else. In the end it may be more valuable left in space for future space archaeologists.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by kijin on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @09:58AM
(#20155419)
In space exploration, testing new technology is synonymous with developing said technology. I would rather they debut bleeding-edge space retrieval technology with a piece of antiquity with good publicity value than with something that is actually critical, such as a manned capsule or a suspected alien spacecraft.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by close04 on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @04:01PM
(#20158994)
Now that sounds more like a "Oh that would be cool" type wishlist than actually useful mission.
There are probably dozens of more suitable pieces of "space memorabilia" that could be used for such tests. And if there isn't you can easily put there a realistic mock-up of whatever you want to rescue. Look at Musk's flying Tesla for example. There's nothing that makes Snoopy uniquely qualified for it.
But there's only one Hubble. The single greatest tool for space exploration we ever had at our disposal. And one that had already cost $5bn by the time it needed the fix.
The 2 cases don't feel to similar at all, short of them being both in space.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by stcredzero on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:21PM
(#20152121)
This sounds bad, but it's a serious question: Was there any poop aboard Snoopy? It sounds silly, but it's at least an issue of comfort and dignity when people first enter the historic craft after recovery.
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by gus_massa on Monday June 10, 2019 @08:31PM
(#20152158)
Not exactly what you asked, but more information than you even wanted to know: (Scott Manley) "Space Poop Challenge - Floaters Are Way Worse in Space" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5y0mTqK54k
Re:NASA ‘Snoopy’ lunar module likely found 50 years after be...
by stcredzero on Tuesday June 11, 2019 @12:20PM
(#20156834)
... wait, to throw it into the sun.
Okay, nice try there! Everyone on HN should know the Canadarm can't achieve the approx 29 km/s needed to cancel orbital velocity around the sun in the vicinity of Earth.
I wish we lived in a universe where NASA didn't have the forsight to short fuel Apollo 10. Imagine a joyride to the lunar surface.
AFAIK, "Snoopy" was too heavy to land and take off anyhow, the astronauts didn't have EVA capable suits, and there wasn't enough oxygen to replenish the LM cabin should they have opened the hatch to perform EVA. Any ride to the surface would have been suicidal folly, regardless of fuel quantity.
Still, no EVA suits is one thing, but having no operable ascent engine is really terrible because, if something goes wrong with the descent engine (which is the thing being exercised here) the crew has no backup whatsoever in case they have no option but landing (maybe a guidance issue that requires the LM to stop - in general emergency landings in places with no breathable atmosphere are a mistake).
i'd like to be positive about that too, but the whole stamp controversy made me realize that astronauts are people, too.
[0]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_15_postal_covers_incide...
The moon is just a moon though; I'm sure NASA wouldn't mind.
--
[0] - https://www.space.com/39341-john-young-smuggled-corned-beef-...
[1] - https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/mutiny-space-why-t...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_Nowak#Charges_of_attempte...
Also, disobeying orders in space has happened before: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skylab_controversy
"[T]he crew were alleged to have stopped working. Gibson spent his day on Skylab's solar console, while Carr and Pogue spent their time in the wardroom looking out at the window."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_RH120 -- https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=3403148;orb=1;old=0;c...
As noted below, Scott Manley does a much better job covering it. YouTube is a much more efficient tool for connecting the knowledgeable and passionate with the interested learner. If anything the "imprimatur" granted by legacy media brand names gets in the way on topics where the public is generally badly informed, or where there is a lot of false knowledge floating around the culture.
The downside, is that knowledge has to compete with falsehood, so the complete elimination of falsehood is problematic, and it may take some time for the real knowledge to rise. I think it's better overall, more democratic and pro-freedom, if people participate by making their own choices to find the truth.
[edit: I see the TechCrunch brigade is out in force]
What's really funny -- and why I posted the link -- is that TFA doesn't actually point to the Sky News article. The Sky News link in this sentence ...
> The effort to discover its location began in 2011, undertaken by a group of amateur U.K. astronomers led by Nick Howes — the same who now claim they’re “98 percent convinced” they’ve discovered where it ended up, according to Sky News.
... actually points to https://www.newsweek.com/nasa-snoopy-lunar-module-space-1443... . Some editor wasn't paying attention, I guess. If they still have editors, anyway.
I mean, why would they switch from a primary source to a secondary source? I wonder if there's some sort of relationship between TechCrunch and Newsweek.
https://twitter.com/NickAstronomer/status/113779137705039462...
I often think of NASA as exceptionally serious people, but it never seems to stop them from adding a bit of humor and fun to their work.
https://schulzmuseum.org/
My dad was a bit superstitious, all his combat rides were named "Round Trip Ticket". It worked :-)
https://imgur.com/zuY1vGA
https://imgur.com/QqlYM
The painted bombs above it represent the number of combat missions.
My father was the navigator, which was up front. His gun pointed out the side, which made for rather difficult deflection shots. He said the favored attack by the Luftwaffe was head on, which made deflection shots as they passed that much harder. The nose of the B-17 is a plexiglass hemisphere, and he could see the Me-109's firing straight at them, and wondered how they could miss. Nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, no armor.
My favourite names are Gumdrop and Spider from Apollo 9.
https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/heo/sfa/aac/silver-snoopy-...
It’s pretty cute.
On the other hand, proposing that it merits retrieval is staggeringly vain- only the tiniest fraction of human enterprise has ever operated outside our planetary system (the Earth and our moon). Consider the mind-blowing opportunity cost of any mission sent to 'retrieve Snoopy', and take a moment to think of just some of the incredible projects one could do instead.
For an opposite point of view, think of all the technological advances that would be necessary for a safe "retrieve Snoopy" mission. Even if the mission itself is pointless, all the developments leading to it could be useful. That is, what matters might be the journey, not the destination.
A truly transcendent category of goal, even if a large part of the underlying motive was pretty obviously demonstrating American superiority over the Communist 'other'.
I don't really put retrieving the 'Snoopy' module in this same category.
EDIT: for anyone interested in the history of the Apollo 10 mission, its commander (and only crew-member remaining living) Thomas Stafford also went to Moscow to serve as a pallbearer in the state funeral given to the Soyuz 11 crew after the tragedy, the only human beings known to have died in space.
If we're going to colonize the solar system, we have to learn how to build hardware to last in that environment.
The fallacy is a fallacy because the money spent fixing a broken window can't be spent again by the same person. He's spending money he would have spent anyway, so there is no net gain.
In a technological progression caused by, say, a public works project such as the mission to the moon, technology developed for the sake of that project can indeed be used on other things, and definitely was in the case of the moon landings, so it's not a fallacy when talking technical advancement.
Getting it out if Earth orbit and back to Earth would be much harder. But who knows, maybe by then something like starship would be operational.
That technology could come in handy, for example, when we need to rescue people who are stuck in malfunctioning capsules. Or for mining asteroids and sending the resulting bulk material elsewhere in space. Or maybe for retrieving EOL satellites that are about to crash into one another and spread debris all over the place.
In America, doggy retrieves stick. In Soviet Russia, big firey stick retrieves doggy. :)
Hubble was fixed so it can perform its mission: it was uniquely qualified to send high resolution images of the universe, which proved invaluable to our understanding of space.
If testing tech is your aim then Snoopy is just as good as anything else. In the end it may be more valuable left in space for future space archaeologists.
There are probably dozens of more suitable pieces of "space memorabilia" that could be used for such tests. And if there isn't you can easily put there a realistic mock-up of whatever you want to rescue. Look at Musk's flying Tesla for example. There's nothing that makes Snoopy uniquely qualified for it.
But there's only one Hubble. The single greatest tool for space exploration we ever had at our disposal. And one that had already cost $5bn by the time it needed the fix.
The 2 cases don't feel to similar at all, short of them being both in space.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-48232627
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3csz4dj
Apple podcast url: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/13-minutes-to-the-moon...
RSS feed: https://podcasts.files.bbci.co.uk/w13xttx2.rss
Program page (with link to RSS etc.): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w13xttx2/episodes/downloads
https://www.iflscience.com/space/apollo-10-lunar-module-snoo...
Although I wouldn't expect this to be a problem on the lunar module.
Might be pretty serious indeed!
Okay, nice try there! Everyone on HN should know the Canadarm can't achieve the approx 29 km/s needed to cancel orbital velocity around the sun in the vicinity of Earth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHvR1fRTW8g
'doh, you got a reaction out of me anyhow!