“I assume these rockets are filled with ice-cold fuel, like the recent abort.”

Technically, the Atlas V 401 is fueled by kerosene, liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen, so the fuel is actually way colder than ice (−423.17 °F/−252.87°C). When the liquid hydrogen leaks out (and it will) and mixes with the oxygen in the air, you get ice formations. And you’re right, heating it up only makes this process worse.

8)

If something goes wrong in a launch, I guess these pictures (webcams? they got USB ports? there’s money, I think they strap iPhones to them zoomsticks) may be a big part of the available evidence on how to not do that again.

Sounds more like a space race situation then..

But do the various national teams talk & share info with each other at all?

Do they all cover the same ground with the same instruments?

If so, doesn’t that seem a bit of a waste & unnecesary duplication?

Personally, I’d rather see some co-operation, eg. we’ll cover this ground, you can cover that, we’ll use this instrument & you can use this other one, etc ..

Which nation will be the second to the Moon or the third and who will remember that?

Wouldn’t it be more memorable, more a “first” and, more importantly, more productive to be part of the first international joint mission to the Moon with, say, an Indian, a Japanese and a Chinese woman-man-woman all stepping out onto the regolith together?

The several Moon satellites from various nations as of late are all independent of each other.

& too, are all these recent lunar probe missions – LRO, Kaguya, Chang’e-1, Chandrayaan-1 completely separate and duplicating each others work and instruments or is there some co-operation, collaboration and deliberate focus on different areas and instruments for each?

Is this more a ‘space race’ type situation or more a ‘Babylon-5 /Deep Space 9′ type one???

Flying Sardines, I thought the answer to your question would be self-evident. Neil’s out there. He’s waaaaaaaaaaaaaay out there. He’s so out there that he’s tilting at Zionist windmills.

Yeah, I was setting things up for somebody to use that line!

Actually, ‘Neil’ is who seems to be one of the worst fruitcakes ever to post here was predicting the LRO to fail suspiciously – y’know so it doesn’t capture “evidence” that the Moon landings were all faked …’Neil’, for those who don’t know already, also seems to think the ISS and HST are fake “props”, that spacesuits don’t work, that 9-11 was done by the US gubermint, that the Holocaust never happened, that … well it would be easier to list the Conspiracy “theories” he doesn’t believe in. Assuming he’s for real & not just a very unfunny Poe ..

Anyway I was asking to see if “Neil’ still thinks its going to fail in suspicicous circumstances and what he “thinks” about the LRO-LCROSS mission so far.. It could prove entertaining in a head-shaking, face-palming sorta way!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reports_of_Streptococcus_mitis_on_the_moon