Sunday, August 20, 2023

One-way to Atira

Earlier I dismissed Atíra from most Ecliptic uses, which I followed by tagging it for a Venus supply. Here in this trilogy-making post, we'll consider how to get there in the first place.

The main problem I had was the inclination relative to Earth+Luna: 25.618°. Earth is already the lowest-inclination relative to everyone else but 25.618° is extreme for the major and minor planet[oid]s, also; I have to dig to Pallas' 34.83° before I find anything higher.

But... suppose when Atira hits aphelion 0.983 AU, it is also near-directly above the North Pole. Say: Ellesmere or New George or Greenland or Svalbard. Could bargain down to Baffin or New Zemlya. That puts the Orion pulse-rocket into play.

Getting back to Earth would be a pain ... for Atira. Orions don't do well with air, nor with ices I daresay (we may allow our Moon again). But Atira exists to give up its mass to a Venus orbit. It is from that orbit, a manageable 3.39°, this crew returns to Earth - should they wish to.

BACKDATE 8/23. Earlier I'd slated something about foodproduction for this Sunny Day but I elected to rewrite this instead. UPDATE 5/18/24: Luna's out; her own orbit around the Earth throws off the delta-Vs for any inner-system body.

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