ClncClarence

The Saturn V was a rocket NASA built to send people to the moon. (The V in the name is the Roman numeral five.) The Saturn V was a type of rocket called a Heavy Lift Vehicle. That means it was very powerful. It was the most powerful rocket that had ever flown successfully. The Saturn V was used in the Apollo program in the 1960s and 1970s. It also was used to launch the Skylab space station.

This is from the NASA website dude. It was built to go to the moon. Yeah, it was used a few times for LEO missions, but that was objectively NOT what it was designed for.

Excargodog

but it was a job it would have done MUCH BETTER than the STS. It put up the 169,000 pound Skylab (which deorbited and burned up when the STS was too slow being developed to support it).

The initial Apollo missions were ALL Low Earth Orbit certification missions.

The uncrewed ones used the SaturnIV and never left orbit.

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/a...-Uncrewed.html


Apollo 7 never left orbit and was again used for qualifying equipment:

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/a...s/apollo7.html

All subsequent missions used a low Earth orbit parking orbit for at least a couple of revolutions before reigniting their engine for the trans lunar insertion so, yeah, the Saturn V had indeed been designed with the capability to insert large payloads into low orbit.

The final Saturn V launch put the Skylab in orbit (which, yeah, WAS NOT the mission it was originally designed for) proving it was certainly capable of doing that and far MORE capable than the more expensive STS:





https://www.nasa.gov/feature/40-year...h-s-atmosphere

I’d give some serious thought to quitting while you are behind if I were you...

rickair7777

They could be... if someone wanted to spend a lot of money at-risk, which they don't. Normally mfgs don't invest anything in the next step until the current step is all wrapped up and good-to-go.

In this case the fed was paying them to mfg very large quantities before trials even started, knowing full-well they'll pour it all down the drain if it doesn't get certified.

Also there's *normally* a bureaucratic backlog in DC, once you submit all the paperwork it takes months at best but typically years for them to get around to looking at it. That's won't be happening in this case, if the mfg submits their data at 1700 on Dec 24, the FDA staff will be working on it at 0300 on the 25th.

Gordie H

You are not wrong to be skeptical....
​​​​​​https://www.forbes.com/sites/william...h=692eac644616

I'll be looking for this author to "ok" a vaccine before I take it. I do hope to get vaccinated next year.

RustyChain

That was a shocker. Clicked on a thread about covid vaccines to read about people arguing about rockets. WTF?

rickair7777

The informative vaccine thread is actually here: Vaccine Development Summary

This thread is not that.

Excargodog

Thread drift obviously, but the thread was about why we need an alternative to vaccines in the not altogether unlikely event that we can’t get a vaccine sufficiently efficacious and/or delivered logistically (or willingly) to enough people to beat COVID that way.

But as rickair has noted, there is a thread for that (although thread drift occurs there as well)

Excargodog

Approximately $785 million worth of mink have been ordered destroyed by the Danish government:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberth...million-minks/

The reason is that the mink farms - which have been hard hit by the virus - have apparently induced a mutation that increased the coronvirus resistance to the very antibodies that some pharmaceutical companies are hoping to develop through immunization. While not as liable to mutation as influenza, the virus still does mutate, and they are trying to deny the virus 17 million new hosts to spread that and other mutations.

Denmark is a major world fur producer.

rickair7777

A little more clarity... deliveries were slowed intentionally to maximize shelf life because trial data is taking longer to accumulate than expected.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-a...-idUSKBN27L0QT

Excargodog

Human to animal transmission has been documented in a number of species and - at least in this one species - animal to human transmission.

https://www.aphis.usda.gov/aphis/our...v-2-animals-us

Reservoir animals are an important factor in the life cycle of a lot of illnesses that affect human beings including yellow fever, influenza, malaria, etc. They provide not just a reservoir to reinfect areas but a sort of Petri dish where the disease can mutate and develop resistant strains. The fact that tigers can catch coronavirus is probably no big deal. The fact that dogs and cats can, would raise the issue of whether or not we might eventually need veterinary COVID-19 vaccines.

https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/...8/8/680/380472