From: utzoo!decvax!cca!REM@MIT-MC@sri-unix Newsgroups: net.space Title: re where to build Article-I.D.: sri-unix.3400 Posted: Tue Sep 21 17:15:56 1982 Received: Wed Sep 22 06:37:37 1982 From: Robert Elton MaasWhen planning for the stresses on a structure while fully built, you have only one configuration to check, the final structure. When you build something that will be spun up to make artificial gravity, you have two, during spin-up, and in stable spinning. But when you build something on Earth or in any other gravity field, you have all those intermediate states during construction. Most collapsing structures that kill people occur either during construction or during Earthquakes. Hardly any people are killed by structures that just colapse suddenly during normal operation. Thus construction in space will be much safer than construction on Earth, assuming nobody is dumb enough to spin up a structure while it's still being built. Actual operation will be about the same as on Earth, which is adequate. (You don't have to plan for Earthquakes or hurricanes or tornadoes or blizzards or heavy rain causing ground liquification in space either, so in that respect space habitat will be safer than on Earth.) In space your only unpredictable hazards are collisions with objects such as meteors spacecraft and mis-tossed industrial materials.