This is an updated list of our readers’ favorite posts, based on the number of times each post was visited during the times indicated below.

Although the State of the Wave posts are very popular, the lists below include only Daily Wavelet posts.

The timeframes of the readers’ lists below are: I) All-Time Favorites (the first daily post was published on 5/11/08), and II) Favorites over the Last 7 Days. To see readers’ favorite posts for each previous month, click HERE.

Both lists below give only the top 5 favorites in each category in order of reader preference.

Both lists are updated every other week on Friday afternoons.
All posts below are clickable and their publishing dates are given.

Updated 10/3/08

I. ALL-TIME — Readers’ Favorites

1) 10 Reasons Why China is Good for Space — 6/22/08
2) How Great Explorations Really Work — 7/10/08
3) Taikonaut to Take a Walk — 6/13/08
4) NASA’s Challenging Future..! — 8/1/08
5) The Way MEPs Really Work — 6/16/08

II. THE LAST 7 DAYS — Readers’ Favorites

1) 10 Reasons Why China is Good for Space — 6/22/08
2) Major Wars Threaten Future Space Initiatives — 7/12/08
3) Celebrating the Telescope and Mexican Soap Operas…! — 9/28/08
4) Taikonaut to Take a Walk — 6/13/08
5) The Mackinac Bridge…A Spectacular 1950s Secondary MEP — 7/18/08

Earth’s greatest hits don’t just include “Rock Around the Clock” by Bill Haley and the Comets; most actually cosiderably predate him, such as the the 6 mile-wide asteroid that took out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, and even the 1908 Tunguska impact in Siberia where a 5 megaton explosion leveled 2,000 square miles of forest.

Tunguska-size events — caused by an object one half the length of an American football field — may occur every few centuries or so but when they do, can dramatically impact regional agriculture possibly triggering famine. Our current knowledge of possible future impacts includes Asteroid 99942 Apophis which has a small probability of hitting in 2036 but would produce a 500 megaton explosion — about 10 times larger than the largest H bomb ever tested — and unimaginable destruction. And astronomers estimate that over the next 15 years, several dozen Near Earth Objects (NEOs) will be discovered that could produce local or regional devastation on Earth.

Because, given enough warning time, we are far from helpless against such gobal threats, former Apollo astronaut Rusty Schweickart and the Association of Space Explorers International Panel on Asteroid Threat Mitigation recently (9/25/08) recommended to the United Nations the establishment of a global organization to “assist the international community in preventing loss of life and property” from space impactors.

After detecting a potentially threatening NEO, questions will arise about what nations are at risk and who should be evacuated, if and how the NEO should be deflected, and who is authorized to make mitigation decisions with accompanying liability and financial responsibility. In all cases, “timely adoption of a decision-making program is essential to enabling effective action.”

Schweickart suggests that within 10 -15 years, an international Mission Authorization and Oversight Group could develop policies and procedures and eventually make recommendations about any looming NEO threats to the United Nations Security Council for action.

Assuming the United Nations proves to be the appropriate entity for this type of responsibility, this global asteroid organization might eventually expand into non-asteroid space functions until it becomes a truly global space agency, similar to our Interspace model (see also TWTW). Another possibility is that by the 2015 Maslow Window, an Interspace-type global organization might become the centerpiece of a Grand Alliance for Space, in which the major international space powers cooperate peacefully and productively in the colonization of space. In this case, Rusty’s global asteroid mitigation group would be a natural outgrowth of the Grand Alliance.

This is a list of our readers’ favorite posts for September, 2008, based on the number of times each post was visited during September.

For current lists of readers’ favorite posts for all previous months please click HERE.
For updated lists of readers’ favorite posts for the last 7 days and for all-time, please click HERE.

Although the bi-weekly State of the Wave posts are very popular, the lists below include only Daily Wavelet posts.

All lists below give only the top 5 favorites in order of reader preference. All posts below are clickable and their publishing dates are given.

SEPTEMBER, 2008 — Readers’ Favorites

1) 10 Reasons Why China is Good for Space — 6/22/08
2) NASA’s Challenging Future..! — 8/1/08
3) Gallup Polls Support Maslow Window Forecasts — 6/20/08
4) How Great Explorations Really Work — 7/10/08
5) Taikonaut to Take a Walk — 6/13/08

ALSO…

21stCenturyWaves.com is again happily participating in the Carnival of Space (#73), this week hosted by Alice’s Astro Info. If you’d like to sample a number of excellent space-related weblogs, please click HERE.

Space News reports (9/30) that building bases on the Moon followed sometime later by human spaceflight to Mars, is a logical sequence for NASA, according to NASA boss Michael Griffin. Indeed, those advocating near-term human Mars missions may not be “fully cognizant of the difficulties of sending astronauts to Mars.”

To be safe, Griffin recommends that a human mission to Mars should be simulated by a stay at the space station (like interplanetary flight to Mars), and 6 – 9 months on the Moon without resupply (like being on Mars). This strategy’s been supported by the National Academy of Sciences and others in the past. In fact, going back to the Moon might be more fun than it sounds because a recent National Research Council report suggests we know more about the Moon than any extraterrestrial world, but “we have barely begun to solve its countless mysteries.”

Griffin’s strategy is reminiscent of how the Apollo program worked: every key step was rehearsed in a relatively safe environment before men landed on the Moon. For example, Borman’s Apollo 8 crew in December, 1968 was the first to achieve lunar orbit, but it did not simulate a landing. That was reserved for Stafford’s Apollo 10 crew who flew to within 14 km of the surface. And before astronauts flew to the Moon, the rendezvous operations of the Command and Lunar Modules were perfected in Earth orbit on Apollo 7 and 9.

NASA carefully rehearsed each key step before astronauts landed on the Moon in 1969. Click .

However because of the Soviet-American race to the Moon, not everything was done systematically by the book. For example, George Mueller initially drew the ire of Wernher von Braun by suggesting “all-up” testing of the Saturn launch vehicle to save time.

Great Explorations over the last 200 years offer a unique perspective on the next step into space. The rhythmic, twice-per-century sequence of the hugely popular explorations was: Lewis & Clark/North America, Dr. Livingstone/Equatorial Africa, the Polar Expeditions, and Apollo/Moon. The lesson of the last 200 years is that although all four sites were riveting to the public, their chronological sequence was determined primarily by accessibility of the most interesting, unexplored site given the technology of the time.

So maybe we should bypass the Moon and go directly to Mars — the next logical Great Exploration target — because six Apollo crews already landed on the Moon almost 40 years ago. However, the Moon’s proximity (relative to Mars) and increasing international interests in Moon colonies (and even tourism) suggest the global public may soon be riveted by the spectacle of the irreversible, large-scale expansion of human civilization to the Moon.

But for Mars fans there is one lingering problem. If we take the history of the last 200 years seriously, it’s clear that even Great Explorations have only brief moments in the Sun — generally less than a decade — before ebullience fades, public support declines, and/or a war tragically intervenes. And based on the last 200 years, the next Maslow Window is likely to open near 2015 and close in the mid-2020s, assuming wildcards do not shorten it.

Assuming the U.S. (or someone) is able to return to the Moon by 2020, the bad news is that will leave only a few years at most to develop Mars systems, rehearse the crews, and execute the first human missions to the Red Planet. If we miss this Window the next one opens late in the 21st Century (~ 2071)!

But maybe the Moon will be enough for a while. In 1984, the wonderful German rocket scientist Krafft Ehricke — who ironically under NASA EMPIRE contract in 1963 described mid-1970s launch windows for manned Mars as “realistic” — once told me in San Diego that Earth-bound parents would someday love being able to go into their backyards on cool, clear nights and point to the exact spot on the Moon where their children were serving!