Slashdot Mirror
Saving Hubble
tassii writes "In this article on Space.com, Hubble Space Telescope operators plan to ask Russia for help in keeping the observatory alive and will even consider accepting private donations, which have already been offered. The upgrades are already built, waiting for installation. The Wide Field Camera 3 and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph cost a combined $167 million and will provide unprecedented peeks into the formation of the cosmos, astronomers say. Maybe there is still some hope for the Hubble."
I'm glad to hear this. With Bush's talk lately of putting millions into the manned space program, and the cancellation of a shuttle service mission to Hubble, it was beginning to look like the cash for un-manned "boring" space programs was going to dry up.
Having other countries involved, especially one with decades of expertise like Russia, and encouraging private investments (more like donations really) is exactly what space exploration needs.
We need to focus less on government sponsored, election engineering, military application thoughts and more on collaboration for world betterment. And world betterment can come from scientific discovery, not just decreased drug costs and disposal of cash crop models (though these are high on the list too).
I hope Hubble continues working for decades to come. It's a nice piece of equipment.
Nice thought but... The ISS is hot (IR), noisy (radio) and so close to earth that optical-QRM elimination would be a nightmare. HST's performance would suffer significantly were it parked next to. If it were attached, there would be the additional problem of vibrations transmitted from the ISS to the HST, blurring images.