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Shuttle Set for Launch on Dec 18th, Says NASA
Tony J Case writes "Just a quick note for you guys - According to space.com, NASA's target date for the next shuttle launch is Dec. 18th, with a whole bunch of new guidelines."
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The new guidelines:
No night launches for the foreseeable future.
So they can see any stuff that falls off better.
A revamping of mission management from the ground after a shuttle crew takes off.
So when bad stuff happens, someone actually does something about it.
Jettisoning the external tank during orbital daylight.
So they can see any stuff that falls off better.
And under consideration:
Limiting shuttles to flights to the International Space Station or the Hubble Space Telescope.
So they can see any stuff that has fallen off better and so they have a place to stay when bad stuff happens.
Keeping a second shuttle on standby when a sister ship launches.
So when bad stuff happens and someone actually does something about it there's a way home.
To me it seems like most of these new guidelines are things that should have been taken care of before any accidents happened. Did you know that foam has fallen off the "bipod" of the shuttle's tank "on at least six other shuttle missions." Why was nothing done about this previosly?
Hopefully now they'll be willing to put the extra effort (read money) in that it will take to make space flights safe(r)
I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.
-Xenocrates
And I hope they never stop. No matter what disaster strikes or how trgic it all seems at the time. Hopefully they are looking at new safer technologies at the same time though.
I went to battle MC Escher but drew a blank
Fixed the whole wing thing. Bit embarrasing for it to happen twice!!
-- Karma Karma Karma Karma, Karma Chameleon - Boy George
I really can't believe they're actually resuming Shuttle flights. I was worried that we would bury our heads in the sand for a few years like we have after similar accidents in the past.
I'd still like to see an actual, cheap, reusable space vehicle though.. The shuttle isn't so hot on that front (no pun intended).
GeekNights!
Late Night Radio for Geeks!
Wouldn't all of the debris landing in the ocean make it harder to determine the cause of an accident?
My other sig is extremely clever...
Last time we lost a shuttle, it took almost 10 years to recover, this time we are pressing on. Smarter harder and quicker.
Lesson Learned moving on now.
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
Continuing to fly the shuttle,l and explore space is definitely the best memorial they could ever give to the people on Columbia.
it should, they have a good safety record, compared to everything else thats mobile.
SimonTek
Strap on a couple of extra SRB's and get rid of the damn external tank and it's foam. It's a bloated piece of equipment anyhow. And the SST main engines don't really do much for getting the SST into orbit anyhow.
Yes, this is a gross oversimplification, but I think it's a valid topic point without getting into the gross technical details of how to implement it.
Okay, so now you have to deal with the newly reported explosive bolt problem....but still...it seems like a better idea to me than riding atop a giant tank of liquid hydrogen and oxygen.
When so many people are at fault, nobody is at fault.
Maybe they should think of some better uses for the shuttle than literally shuttling stuff back and forth from the ISS.
It's time for something new and exciting.
Disagree all you want to, I'm just happy that the space program was not ended.
Fly on, NASA.
There is no reasonable defense against an idiot with an agenda
:wq
discovery.com is just now reporting a new problem with the shuttles; the force of the exploding bolts that detach the boosters has been found to be too close to the strength of the dome that catches them. they predict that this will ground them further.
Perhaps it's time for NASA to take a look at how the Russians handle things -- their track record for the last 25 years is much better. At least no fatalities, and guess who had to step in when the US didn't dare send up another shuttle to rescue the stranded ISS 'nauts.
Regards,
--
*Art
Images of the new shuttle crew undergoing rigorous training:
Training image 1
Training image 2
Details
Enjoy!
not to sound rude, but living in the military town i live in(3 bases) um people are gonna flame ya.
SimonTek
This is the best news I've heard all week. It is good to know that NASA has a timeline for the next shuttle launch. And I thought I was being optimistic thinking they would launch this time next year. This is a good omen amongst all of the scandals, lawsuits, and wars we've been reading about lately.
I can't help cheering at this news.
OK, a really bad thing happened, but let's learn from it and move on to bigger and better things. I really feel that launching the shuttle again is, symbollically if nothing else, a positive sign that NASA won't abandon manned space missions, something that seemed to be on the cards after the Columbia disaster.
Space exploration (or just working in space) is dangerous - it always has been and (for the forseeable future at least) always will be. There will always be setbacks and it's an expensive 'business', but exploration and curiosity is one of the things that makes us human (see my sig).
"Because it's there." - George Mallory, when asked why he wanted to climb Mt Everest, March 18, 1923 (New York Times)
Based on their previous adherence to launch schedules, the December 18th launch date translates to an actual launch sometime around April 15th, 2004. However, this date is also when the weather in Florida starts becoming more unstable and develops into the summertime rain patterns. Therefore, the April 15th date is a crap shoot, dictated by the weather.
On an entirely personal note, I would like to say that I hope things pan out well for all of the world's space programmes. There is so much to be gained, both obviously and potentially, from exploration and exploitation of our near space and solar system.
However, safety and quality of equipment must be a primary concern. I hope NASA (and maybe other agencies around the world) are researching new forms of reusable craft...
Dec 18th.. .. .. ..
2008.
You have 5 Moderator Points!
Which Helpless Linux zealot/MS basher do you want to mod down today?
Thank goodness its time for them to launch again. Nobody said space travel would be perfect and without casualties. Its a learning process. If something happens, fix it and try again. My hats off to all astronauts.
This is a test. This is a test of the emergency sig system. This has been only a test.
The explosion of the shuttle Columbia in February was a similar test of American resolve, but the test was much more concentrated... on the space program, particularly the shuttle program. On the heels of that disaster and through the months that have followed, our message is clear: we are not going to let calamity or insanity destroy our dreams for the impossible. We are going to continue to explore our universe, both near and far, and no minor disaster (minor on the timeline of human history) is going to offset the progress of human knowledge.
Face it, is the the American way. In fact, it is the human way: Life will go on, and we will always be there to try to make it better.
Unless a method unlike our rockets is developed, a cheap vehicle for leaving the earth is impossible.
It is unrealistic until we gain alot more experience, to expect space travel to be safe. All that can be done is try to minimize risk. Those travelling should be fully informed as to the dangers. I doubt many astronauts expect it to be fully safe.
Space travel is too important to mankind not to pursue it, even at great expense and some loss of human life. Congrats to them on keeping the shuttle going. If the program died, it might not be replaced in such a shortsighted world.
The amazing thing to me is how FEW atronauts have died in such dangerous conditions.
We live in a doubly amazing age. An era when machines became intelligent entities, and when the naked apes learned to leave this little rock called earth. Evolution is AMAZING!!!
HenryJamesFeltus.com
If something goes wrong? Merry Christmas!
[that was sarcasm not flamebait]
I should hope that they decide on another design soon enough and start building a replacement for the space craft. Its a huge project but w/ all the time/effort/money put into the space project they cannot and should not halt it.
Don't break up upon reentry .
Well, duh!
Dec 18, LotR: RotK, or the shuttle.
:D
Guess which I'm more excited about.
Remember a shuttle is for life, not just for Christmas.
Moderators, do your worst!
... to see that this useless vehicle is put back into operation, wasting money that could be spent for good space science and efficient transportation.
A winged vehicle has nothing but disadvantages, except looking nice on TV when landing:
- Wings impose a huge weight penalty
- Re-entry with wings is unstable and requires active control
- Wings are vulnerable due to their large surface
The space shuttle is anything but re-usable. The boosters are not re-used, the tank is lost anyway and after landing, the shuttle is completely dis- and re-assembled.
State-of-the-art expendable launchers can haul people into space (and bring them safely back) at a fraction of the cost: use a ballistic capsule with escape rocket and a parawing for enhanced flexibility during landing.
The shuttle's only purpose is to fly to the ISS. The ISS's only purpose is to justify the existence of the shuttle. For the Hubble telescope alone, the shuttle would never have been built.
Its going to make the shuttle one incredibly expensive taxi service for the ISS.
When the shuttle launches equipped to dock with ISS, it has an ammount of its payload bay consumed with the docking adapter.
If the shuttle is used for the originally slated US module launches, this would indicate a valid use (although still very expensive in comparison to a Soyuz module launch).
Now, here's my thinking. The Shuttle was a severe compromise of an originally good system (Flight launch Horizontal TakeOff and Landing) but ended up with the return vehicle pointlessly (and expensively) attached to an SRB+LOX rocket system.
NASA is now likely to resume using the Shuttle - apart from anything this is quite political with China probably joining the elite club of nations who have launched people into space later this year. What NASA ought to be doing is saving the pennies by retiring the shuttle - not neccesarily immediately, but soon and putting out to tender a contract for a brand-new cost-effective launch system.
The new system could be based around the original Ho.T.O.L concept which was mean to be the Shuttle.
At the same time, NASA can be doing lots of new research into aerodynamic re-entry to safeguard lives in the future (FYI 2 aero-re-entry incidents to date - 1, X-15 and 1, STS).
The major sticking point is simple: The U.S. government would have to get their wallet out!
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
Was it more expensive than the present US shuttle?
It glows when it falls off? A piece of foam GLOWS when it falls the 200 feet between it's attachment point on the external tank, and the shuttle?
Ya know, I think just maybe, NASA might have an slightly better idea of what their requirements and capabilities are, jackass.
Shortly after the Challenger disaster on January 28, 1986, a sick joke started circulating. "NASA" was reported to mean, "Need Another Seven Astronauts."
Unfortunately, as news reports come in about disregard for safety for Shuttle Columbia, it appears that such joke has a major element of truth. NASA bureaucrats (and probably politicians up to and including at the White House, as well) disregarded Morton Thiokol engineers in 1986, and we're now hearing that engineers warned NASA officials and the President prior to Columbia's launch that the Shuttle system itself was prone to such a disaster as witnessed yesterday. We know that Columbia was hit with something ("foam" or more likely, ice) during its launch on January 16th, and apparently, officials didn't take it seriously enough (Cain slew Abel; did Leroy Cain slay Columbia?). The excuse that "Columbia's crew was doomed from the start because they couldn't make repairs" is both silly and illustrates the current "can't do" attitude of today's NASA, which is far different than the NASA which both put humans on the Moon AND safely returned a crew to Earth after Apollo 13 had a "major malfunction" way up there.
For NASA's bureaucrats (and some politicians), it appears that risking astronauts' lives, NOT for the "unknown variables," but for glamour, expediency, and selfishness, is "acceptable." Perhaps this is to be expected in today's America where style and appearance are far more valued than substance and tangibility.
The joke way back in 1986, "N.A.S.A. = Need Another Seven Astronauts," has tragically turned out to be 2003's reality.
"New ground rules already are being adopted...
Among them: new methods for handling potentially deadly problems once a mission is under way. "
If it's launched, it can't be a ground rule!
Hint:Humour...
And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour Isaiah 3:5
Its good that America wants to keep sending people into space but I can't help wondering about the politicism of the date.
After all, rumoured to be around December this year, China is preparing to strap a hero of the communist state (a Taikonaut) to the front of an over-engineered Long-March rocket and send him for a couple of laps.
I hope that NASA isn't being asked or pressured to rush things.
In Communist China the rocket launches you!......oh wait......
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
"BEHOLD, CORN!!" - Dr. Weird, ATHF
No, much cheaper since the engines did not need to be reusable.
It was the collapse of Communism that did for Buran (ironic really since the costs of Buran had directly contributed to the busting of the Soviet economy). The Russians performed a miracle in keeping any part of their space industry going - let alone developing new vehicles (which they have managed), but the cost of that was the loss of the interplanetary programme and Buran.
Since Buran was every bit as much a political animal as the Shuttle, it had no support when the Soviet Union imploded. It was not widely missed, the ending of the Russian deep space programme was a major blow as it left NASA as the sole player in deep space exploration. And we all know how that budget has been dicked around with to keep the Shuttle going.
I hope that the Russia/ESA collaboration on probes will yield a new golden age in space exploration, there is a huge amount of talent in the former Soviet Union that produced some truly remarkable vessels; its time they got another chance.
Best wishes,
Mike.
right on. I think the shuttle is the only thing older than the G4 not to be replaced... and the G4 may have just given up on waiting.
Nice that they aren't sitting on their hands until they get a new ship, though.
*honk*
This is my sig. It's prescription, I swear. I need it for reading things... on the other side of things
Mixed feelings on this, the shuttle has to go, but till we pull our heads out and get something better (and vastly more simple) we are stuck. I worked with Commander Rick Husband's brother, who is an Airline Captain. Rick made a few visits out to our hangar and did some great PR after his first shuttle flight. By all accounts, he was a fantastic guy and a great ambassador for human spaceflight. We all followed the progress of his flight, and I was stunned when I saw the footage of the accident. These are real people on these missions, with family and friends, and I pray that NASA and the beaucracy that puts up the shuttle never has another disaster.
One safe shuttle mission.
Let's hope that Santa delivers.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
I don't know what kind of reference you used for that, but Russia has quite a few. I don't have my 20th yr anniversary picture book that Time put out (not technical at all), but it's got every documented fatalaty in there. Including all the Russian ones (from manned flights). Check your stats again. The NASA program, though highly dangerous, has a better track record that you give them credit for.
To Boldly Go. Simply put.
"Time is long and life is short, so begin to live while you still can." -EV
as well as Arizona... and parts of New Mexico.
Har!
What Would Jesus Do
(for a Klondike bar)?
I figure you've just been in a coma for the past 15 years, but the cold war ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 90's You should try to remember to use the past tense when writing about the USSR these days.
My bet is they're launching on 18 December so the astronauts can see Return of the King the night before.
I don't know about y'all, but if a government type came up to me and said:
"Hey there, howzit? Listen, we need someone to go to Mars and do some scientific-type stuff. Thing is, there's only a 50% chance you'll make it back alive."
I'd be the FIRST one in line, how about you?
Best of Luck, Earth! - Kulakovich
People, myself included, have faulted NASA for past mismanagement of safety concerns. But my real concern is that they spend billions upon billions of dollars and employ thousands of the brightest engineers and scientists, and still make some of the stupidest mistakes which cost lives and money, but most importantly time.
They have monopolized space exploration in the US far too long and provided a poor model for the rest of the world to follow, which has stifled innovation. They should be handing out research and exploration grants like the NSF does and performing reviews of the results to determine future funding. Not running a single space program for a single space station. All our eggs in one basket, as it goes.
Arguments about the airworthiness of the space shuttle to me are pointless. It is a big machine with lots of parts and carries some risk of failure. It has been show to be able to fly successfully a high percentage of the time. Nothing they do to it will fundamentally change that situation. But by being the only game in town there can be no comparison of risk and no judgements made based on that comparison.
NASA asks us, either fly or do not fly. This is not a free choice, to those of us that wish to see humans fly it means that we must choose the space shuttle regardless of risk or incompetence or anything.
NASA will undoubtedly want more money to increase the safety of the space shuttle flights, but to what end? Any machine can be better maintained or operated, if we collectively choose a single means, and spend our collective resources and will on that means we could be on a fools errand. Like driving a car into the ocean. Sure we can keep tuning our procedures and plugging the leaks, but it ain't gonna get us to the other side. So that basic questions of design or operation are essentially meaningless when one only tries or has a single means. Like voting for the only candidate, the choice presented to us is meaningless. To go or not to go. To live or to die. Of course we must go, as we must live.
Or do we? Maybe, when such a stark choice is put before us we must refuse to make it. Refuse the question. Should the shuttle fly or not? Ignore the question, it is inconsequencial to that which many of us care about. Space exploration is the purpose and the question, not the shuttle.
Exploration of space is dangerous and will not survive safety concerns of collective action. Liken it to any human endeavor of significant unknown and danger and you will find it must be done by individuals. Individuals that have clarity of vision and certainty of purpose. It must be done by people, not by institutions or incorporations. People who know the risks, people that see the dangers, people that take the leap because they see the oppurtunity. People that learn and reason.
If we are to keep NASA at all, then it must only be to find those people and give them a little bit of money or help. Like Queen Isabella giving Christopher Columbus enough money to get the supplies and men he needed. Not too much money though, because we know that to succeed in Space one will have to travel lightly, and the tendency of people with too much money is to buy things. We know that to succeed in space one needs to be quick, but the tendency of people with too much money is to spend time spending money.
I expect the shuttle to fly again, because there are a lot of people who depend on it for their livelyhood. I expect that the shuttle will fly again because looking at the world a certain way, it makes sense to continue to do what we have been doing for the last two decades. I expect the shuttle to fly again because it is a link in a chain that could mean the end of the space station. Because it would mean the end to an entire generation's way of thinking.
So there it is, the heads of NASA would like us to choose between their shuttle and nothing. Between the aspirations of mankind and bondage to this rock. It is a false choice.
NASA rushing to screw up again. What is the big hurry to get back to space with something as outdated as the shuttle. Why not use the time to reevaluate the whole situation, budget, goals, etc and then formulate a long term plan. The shuttle has proven that it has outlived it's usefulness. It is nothing but a money wasting anchor for NASA. Take the time, develop a new vehicle(s) which is not only usefull, but also cost efficient, safe, etc. Don't rush to commit the same mistakes again and again.
-Cnik
This is somewhat offtopic but I wanted to give you guys a different perspective on shuttle related issues.
I live in Nacogdoches (Nak-ah-doh-chez), Texas, the place where most of the shuttle debris fell. Once upon a time, NASA news hardly even made the paper. All that has changed. Everytime a NASA scientist sneezes, the local paper mentions it.
A few weeks ago I was fortunate enough to hear the local sherrif Thomas Kerss talk about the disaster plan he and other local officials dynamically implemented to handle the shuttle disaster and the ongoing recovery effort. There is no template for a disaster like this in any city office our county office in the nation, so local officials had to act fast to keep local residents safe, to manage the recovery effort, and to manage the press surrounding the event. They did such a great job that there is now a template for disasters like the Columbia disaster and its called the "Nacogdoches Plan".
The recovery effort that Sherriff Kerss and others implemented was especially lauded, as the Sherriff quickly received assistance from the Stephen F. Austin State University Geosciences lab and the SFA Forestry department (the finest in the nation). By using the maps provided by the geosciences lab, they divided the area where the shuttle fell into blocks of a few acres in size. They immediately dispatched deputies armed with GPS locators to locations where citizens were reporting fallen debris. The deputies would identify the debris, call in their location to central command, and central command would mark the detailed maps with the locations of debris and descriptions of what was there. For debris locations in public places and for important items, national guardsmen or law enforcement officials were dispatched to guard those places.
The recovery is ongoing and like some have said, they will be finding things for at least another decade. In fact, its rumored that they've found a mini-cassette that might provide insight into Columbia's last moments.
Seeing that the shuttle will fly again soon is fantastic news and is what everyone in this area has been hoping for. They talked about changing the landing flight path so that they won't go over populous locations but I'm not sure if that's been decided yet. I figured they start landing it in California as rule like it used to be. If not, I can guarantee that the majority of East Texans will be trying to catch a glimpse of the shuttle when it flies overhead on its way to Cape Canaveral.
Why is NASA still putzing around in low earth orbit with the space shuttle? NASA (and the rest of us) need to aspire higher and undertake a project that will serve to inspire the current generation in the same way that the Apollo project did in the 60s.
I'm a big fan of Robert Zubrin's Case for Mars proposal to send astronauts to Mars using current technology. For those of you who aren't familiar with this, read the book or visit the Mars Society website for more information.
Nasa admits a more realistic date will be in April sometime. The problem is that if they miss the December 18 launch date, orbital dynamics will prevent them from launching for a few months if they intend to catch up to and dock with the ISS. (something about alignment of the ISS and Sun would cause heating problems on the shuttle -- I'll find the article if anyone really cares)
The Russian Energia Booster (in current production) can lift 100 ton modules into LEO - this against the shuttles 30 ton payload.
Russia has already launched the major modules Zarya and Zvesda using the Proton launch system.
ESA is also in the future slated to launch a private module using the Arianne 5 launcher
It is feasable (but undesirable) that the ISS could be completed without further use of the Shuttle (Although this would require a gigant re-think) Perhaps US modules could be sent to Baikonur with HeavyLift
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
It was the collapse of Communism that did for Buran...
I seem to recall that Buran program never progressed beyond a few aerodynamic trials and an unmanned test flight that went twice around the earth. Seems I was told at the time that the frame of the orbiter was bent so far out of whack during reentry that they couldn't have launched it again if they'd wanted to.
They had less money...?
I think the best "new" guideline that they're considering is having a second space shuttle ready to go at a moments notice. /. posts :p )
Aside from the intended benefit of having a way to rescue any stranded astronauts it also provides for redundancy which I think most people here can agree is a good thing (except concerning
I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.
-Xenocrates
NASA is a big has been. It basically has wasted BILLIONS of US tax dollars on missions with nebulous scientific purpose. I mean come on...at ~1bil a pop, this is a fucking boondoggle for military contractors pure and simple.
MAYBE, the mars rover is of importance, but probably not. We already have enough sampled of the fucking geology and atmosphere...so we are going to spend 300 mil to see "hmm..maybe there was water there once".
The single truly important mission the shuttle has done is the hubble telescope, but also at an incredibly high price. (esp incl missions to fix and upgrade)
Don't get me wrong, I am all for space exploration. But NASA is just a piece of shit recycling missions that are purely Political PR and contractor pork.
I'm sick of seeing my paycheck go into the pockets of "the good ole boy network"...boeing,mcdonnell douglas,etc.., and to support a FUCKING FASCIST PRESIDENT AND CABINET BENT ON WORLD DOMINANCE. I wish King George could see my fucking middle finger in his face right now.
This country is fucking going to hell, and if the FUCKING STUPID US public want to keep electing officials who want to prey on fear of terrorism to take away our rights and create a police state, WELL THEN FUCK IT IM MOVING.
Not for the obvious reasons, though. There's a lot to be said for courange and resolve. But you need wisdom, too. You must be sure that the things that you "keep on keepin' on" doing are the right things.
I'm not saying that the Shuttle isn't one of those right things. (That's been discussed often enough, of course.) Just that your post sounded depressingly close to the arrogant, blinkered, domineering spirit that we're heard far too much of over the last couple of years. As someone who doesn't live in the self-styled "Greatest Nation In The World" (itself a piece of amazing presumption, and one that an awful lot of people round the world would disagree with for various reasons), I worry about what might happen if/when it discovers it's not the biggest kid in the playground any more...
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Shouldn't they reschedule the launch for the Fourth of July??
The boosters are re-used. Go and read Feynmann's addendum to the Challenger accident report. He mentions a number of problems where the boosters were malformed when they splashed on the ocean and they have to be "rounded" again. Apparently there used to be a number of problems at this stage, mostly due to the manamagent layers and the low-paid workers.
I haven't heard that story. Buran certainly flew unfinished (her avionics and life support systems were unfinished), but AFAIK she was then completed at Baikonur.
Anyone know for a fact?
Best wishes,
Mike.
5% of the entire federal budget doesn't sound like a lot? 5% of all of Defense, Social Security, Medicare, the US highway system, etc. is staggeringly huge. Just to put US footprints on the moon before the Russians. No (real) scientific goals. Give me a break.
Winter is a bad time to launch rockets. O-rings freeze and crack overnight. Foam freezes and causes significantly more damage than expected when little bits fall off.
Mid-December is too close to Winter for my tastes. Given the shuttle's notable weather sensitivity, I think launches from Florida should be made only between March and November. Build a Hawaii launchpad and perhaps year-round launches are reasonable, but Florida in mid-December?! These rocket scientist-turned-administrator folks haven't learned a damn thing!
I will gladly pay that amount (and more) to get back to the moon.
/. brotherhood of geekdom), think about how much better everything can be done with today's technology--and what other cool gadgets might emerge from the effort.
Even if you care nothing about space (in which case you should promptly be kicked out of the
And if that is not enough, try imagining a Beowulf cluster of those gadgets!!!
maybe they should ban cold weather launches?
like say december and JANUARY! please, ask any mechanic/tech. stuff breaks more in cold weather.
solution: help to save Irak, americans abandon Iraq please!
Americans arenÂt helping Iraq.
Shortly after is right. I am amazed at how fast this meme spread. I was hearing that sick joke in the lunchroom at my school 20 MINUTES after the explosion. It might have had something to do with the fact that my school was within sight of the launch (30 miles south of the cape), so we saw the explosion with our own eyes, instead of on TV. Did the joke appear as fast elsewhere?
It was my twelfth birthday. I loved the shuttle when I was a kid; to me it represented science. But I know that we need to replace it with something better, cheaper, simpler. People have been saying "to kill the shuttle is to kill the space program" since I was a kid. Sorry, but the shuttle has already killed the space program. Or at least frozen it during my lifetime. As long as the shuttle flies, the politicians will not pony up money for a replacement system. If America has no space presence, the embarrasment will force them to fund a new system.
I mean jeez, I live in the economic blast radius of the Cape and I'm asking for this. My friends' Dads all lost their jobs in '86. This year, the shuttle loss didn't really effect the local economy, at least outside of Titusville. Why? Well, Space is not the growth industry on the Space Coast that it used to be. How sad is that?
That's a fact. Indeed, the craft managed to land in 30 mph winds, 6 feet from the center line on the runway. NASA won't even attempt a shuttle landing under those conditions.
A more detailed account here
Suffice to say, had the will been there, they could have flown the Buran again.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
My opinion on this: The persuit of space is worth the loss of life. There are people willing to risk their life for these goals. I wish we could get the kind of zeal for the space program that religon has, i.e. have people willing to climb aboard a rocket that MIGHT kill them, instead of strapping a bomb to their chest that WILL kill them.
If we do not achieve a colony on mars or the moon soon, we will get hit by a rock, and the only known setient life form in the universe will be destroyed. And we will be to blame. Me, you, everybody.
I believe if we could redirect the energy given to religon to the persuit of colonizing mars or the moon, we could have it DONE (or at least have ships on the way) within a decade, easy.
M@
Krispy Cream is people
Whatever the Russians might what you to believe, the Energia is no longer in production. Also, as far as I know, it was only flown twice, w/ both flights during the 1980's. It is not a heavily tested vehicle.
It might be easier to resurrect than the Saturn V, but it's not a viable option.
Come on you are either incredibly stupid, naive, or brainwashed.
The US is a fascist police state bent upon pushing our values and "culture"(NOT) on all other societies on earth.
This kind of rhetoric just serves to show the inanity and ignorance of the typical American, who spouts political propaganda shoved down their throats by the multinational mass media.
The shuttle is a piece of boondoggle PORK shit, and nothing else. The 1bil. dollar missions are worthless, except to support the beauracracy of NASA and line the pockets of military contractors.
Get off your stupid ass patriotic bandwagon and see what the fuck our govt. is doing to our freedom...
You will fail miserably, because:
And no one cares about some stupid country in the Middle East if you still have SUVs flying around and the country (read corporations, which can easily be shown as being equal to the country using the 'what is good for GM is good for America' concept) is getting richer.
You will only end up being a 'surrender monkey' or 'liberal scum' or 'self-hating conservative' or 'traitor' or 'unpatriotic' etc.
You can't change it. Just accept it for they are more powerful than you.
So with all these new guidlines does that also include new funding? Or are we doing the cheaper faster stuff again.
I don't know about y'all, but if a government type came up to me and said:
"Hey there, howzit? Listen, we need someone to go to Mars and do some scientific-type stuff. Thing is, there's only a 50% chance you'll make it back alive."
I'd be the FIRST one in line, how about you?
I wouldn't go to Mars, because I'm not a suicidal maniac. Why suffer a 50% chance of dying and a 100% chance of months of isolation and discomfort to do something which a remote-controlled toy car could do? Ego?
Or, for the cost of a manned mission to Mars, a few dozen remote-controlled toy cars, outfitted with as many cameras, chemical analysis sensors, and seismographs as you like.
ASA
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
I'm just happy that the space program was not ended.
Yes, it was. Wait and see.
All employees must wash hands before seeking equitable relief.
Under NASA's own guidlines, the rate of use of the shuttles were beyond the safety limits. One of the major limiting factors being the high maintnance timeframes required betwen flights for a complete check and overhaul. And that was with 4 shuttles in rotation. Now there are only 3. I don't care how safe you make it, parts fail and when you take 25% of the fleet out...
Next, with a Saturn V (the rocket used for Apollo), one flight would have been able to carry almost all of the currently existing space station up there now! And would have cost 1/10 of one shuttle flight - with a 100% safety record. (This does not include the Apollo 1 and Apollo 13 because neither of those involved the Saturn V launch vehicle.)
If space men are all afraid of an unforseeable disaster, what can Nasa do about it?
I suggest you read Slashdot
...seems like the next New Year Eve fireworks will be the most expensive and spectacular ever...
They can't do that!
I thought that was the time of National Lord of the Rings Week.
Jonahweb.com has stuff.
-It's design is probably older than most of the posters here on this forum. When it was originally concieved as a horizontal take-off and landing craft, it was assumed that the wings would provide enough lift to get the orbiter to orbit. That didn't work, because the shuttle by itself cannot carry enough fuel and still lift a usable payload. The delta wing that the shuttle uses has a L/D (lift-to-drag) ratio of something horrid... like 5. (A sailplane typically has an L/D of 25+. And your average Cesna 172 has an L/D of about 10. In any event, they needed more thrust, but the shuttle was already designed... so they had to slap some solid boosters on it. BUT! It turns out that having a multi-stage lift system is more efficient than a single-stage to orbit system in terms of how the thrust is used. SSTO concepts (Single Stage To Orbit) are researched because of the inherent simplicity in the system, and because technology has progressed enough that engineers feel comfortable working the numbers on the designs. (If you asked companies to build an SSTO 30 years ago, they'd have laughed at you... or asked for huge sums of money.)
-The shuttle is currently the only vehicle in the world that can lift the payloads that it does. It's literally a workhorse. It is THE perfect vehicle for missions to ISS. No other vehicle can do what the shuttle does now.
-The shuttle is still a test aircraft. People get complacent with the technology because they see it work so often. The shuttle crews know this, the people that work on them know this, and the NASA administrators know this. It IS sad that people died, but they knew that the shuttle is not 100% reliable. It was built by the lowest bidder, from the cheapest parts, and from the cheapest labor that would get the job done.
-There were some replacement concepts for the shuttle. But because of congress' budgeting, the ideas were scrapped. About the only research being done by NASA in this area is on the linear aerospike engine. That's basically it.
-The shuttle is seen by NASA as something that won't last, but still has a good 30 years of life left. Though that attitude may have changed somewhat because of the Columbia destruction, that attitude will return after a few more STS missions where the shuttle leaves and returns safely.
-The shuttle has more than one million parts to it. Heck, the turbopump engines that are used in the shuttle main engines are some of the most technologically advanced and complex pieces of equipment ever built. Those fancy electric propulsion concepts like ION-F are simple in operation compared to an STS main engine. (Oh and don't say that electric concepts will work on earth... the pressure of the atmosphere keeps the gases from being ionized.)
-If you look at ALL of the vehicles that put objects into space, the shuttle has one of the better safety records. Which translates to why we don't use those other launch vehicles for manned flight - they are not rated for that use.
-Oh and back to the shuttle's age... the design is old. The parts that are used, and the standards that they were made to conform to, are nearly as old. Except for the replaceable/consumable items of course.
For the record: I actually AM a rocket scientist. Currently, I do modelling, simulation, embedded systems, and controls work for a small aerospace company (we're REALLY small). My background is in fluid mechanics and spacecraft propulsion though... this job is just holding me over for a bit.
Appears around that day too. I know which I'll be watching first.
Through technology, we have been able to make these activities SAFER, but not without risk of injury or death. People still die in mines, in auto racing accidents, on oil platforms, and while deep under the sea. People also die in space.
There's been a hot debate about whether this "needed" to happen. It probably didn't... but no matter what steps they take to increase crew safety, at some time, someone or everyone on the shuttle is going to die.
We chose to explore where we don't naturally belong. We also chose to inherit the risks involved in these activities.
Limiting shuttles to flights to the International Space Station or the Hubble Space Telescope.
So they can see any stuff that has fallen off better and so they have a place to stay when bad stuff happens.
There's no place like home like a telescope that fits inside the bay of the shuttle, with no place you could even stick your arm into, much less hang out while waiting for someone to come get you.
No, this sounds more like the public way of saying "no more military or commercial payload missions". They're not saying it outright, because the last thing NASA wants to do right now is remind the public that they haul up a -lot- of military and commercial satellites; it's not all mostly-useless scientific experiments.
Why the only-scientific-missions policy? Same reason. Just imagine the fallout if a shuttle blew up on a commercial payload mission. I can see the congressional hearing now: "Our brave astronauts lost their lives to bring us 500 channels?"
Please help metamoderate.
NASA's "Mars Rovers" homepage at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mer/ says the next rover is scheduled for liftoff June 25, 2003. Another cool portal for the rover missions is http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mer/
Why not liberate LEO? :)
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
Good to see NASA making efforts to eliminate foamstrike, but what about other objects? Birdstrike is a possibility for at least the first few thousand feet, but there's enough orbiting debris to take out a shuttle. Remember that paint flake that caused a pit in a shuttle windscreen a while back? If that had hit a wing leading edge, making just a tiny hole, the Columbia disaster would have occurred a decade earlier. And there are any number of objects in orbit larger than a paint flake and smaller than a spent booster.
MIR was waaaay over its shelf-time, but the severely cash strapped Russians kept it going; bravely or stupidly? The American press was going: 'it's a disaster waiting to happen' and they were all but forced by the Amercan Gvt to deorbit it, because there were concerns that keeping it going would impede the ISS funding. The FGB (functional cargo block) and living quarters in use on the iss are just modules VERY similar to the original MIR predecessors, and they function just fine (thanks to funding) Before this goes O.T.: this all sounds eerily familiar when you look at the shuttle: it should've been decommissioned by now, according to the original plans, but NASA plans to use it for years into the future... This does NOT look good....