Orbital Basing : Key to Low Cost Space Operations?

Gerard A. Sears

Expert InsightsPublished 1967

Orbital basing avoids the heavy costs of recovery gear (and R&D and launch costs associated with it), refurbishing after the rigors of reentry, and relaunching. Based on today's estimates of post-1970 mission traffic, orbital basing would reduce operation costs by a factor of 2, the saving to be applied to R&D on recovery and reuse of the launch vehicle or other orbital bases. That the spacecraft must operate coplanar with the orbital base is not a serious constraint for most missions. 24 pp. Ref.

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Sears, Gerard A., Orbital Basing : Key to Low Cost Space Operations? Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1967. https://www.rand.org/pubs/papers/P3570.html.
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