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Hurricane Threatens Shuttle Program
evenprime writes "Hurricane Frances may end NASA's space shuttle program. John Logsdon, a member of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board and the head of George Washington University's Space Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., has said: 'If there were serious damage to one or two of the orbiters or the facilities needed to
process and launch the orbiters, I think it would raise a very large question about
the continuation of the shuttle program.'"
Dammit, dammit, dammit! Right now, Bush's ideas for a new space program are simply a pipe dream with some funding. If we lose our infrastructure for a manned space program, we may lose the space program all together! While I know of several people who would be happy about that, I wouldn't. Cutting off manned travel is short-sighted. Without manned travel, we're guaranteeing that the cost of sending probes will always be high. We're guaranteeing that we'll run out of raw materials in less than a century. We're guaranteeing that we will not have enough energy to sustain our civilization. And most importantly, we're guaranteeing that we will NEVER reach another star system.
Look up at the sky! You see that big ball of bright flame? That's a fusion reactor that generates at least 8e23 watts. That's enough power to send a five year Alpha Centauri mission every second. You know how you can do the same by staying on Earth? It's simple: YOU CAN'T. To those of you who think a manned space program is a waste of resources because exploration happens more effectively with robots: You are a selfish bastard planning your own demise.
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Just a little while ago an article about missing the broadband boat (which admittidly I did not read) and now the space shuttle. I realize that we have not cancelled our space program, but this is concerning to me.
We are losing our low paying jobs to other countries and supposedly replacing them with higher paying research/science positions. How can we do this with a government that is not committed to science (Shutting down a space program) and is not committed to infrastructure like broadband. If we give up on the low paying jobs don't we then need a strong commitment to the high paying jobs of the future?
I tried for 5 years to come up with a clever sig...only to realize that I am not clever.
Nothing like an overreaction to get folks upset...
"Hurricane Frances may end NASA's space shuttle program."
Please.
Even if the orbiters were damaged, or the launch platforms damaged, they can always be re-built, repaired, or whatever.
Even if it looks like the eye will hit KSC dead-on, they've still got enough time to stick an orbiter on the 747 and get one of them out of there...
Besides, the launch structures withstand regular beatings from the shuttle launches, and they've survived for years...
The VAB might take some damage, perhaps some of the other support buildings, but it's going to take more than a hurricane to destroy KSC & the shuttle program completely.
/sig
I think the point is that Cape Canaveral has never been hit directly with such a strong hurricane.
I am sure that the area has has its share of 100+ MPH winds before, but the article stresses how the area isn't really prepared for the shelling that Frances(is) will give it.
Of course, this can all be speculative bullshit and the hurricane can end up going south and then into the gulf, thereby leaving the Kennedy Center high and dry (figuratively speaking).
Absolutely right. The shuttle was built on a lie: that each shuttle could turn around a flight a month for less than the cost of a LEO unmanned disposable rocket. The contractors and NASA both knew the shuttle desiugn we got couldn't do any of that. And it's only got a 98% survivability rate. Which officially puts it in the "Sucks to be us" category of LEO space travel. It's time to get the government out of the shuttle business and, oh, I don't know, outsource it to the winner of the X Prize? I have a LOT more faith in Rutan and company doing a shuttle right than I do the government.
"Wow. Now THAT'S a lot of angry Indians." - Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer
I really doubt it... Do we pack up all operations in California every time there is an earthquake ? Hurricanes have been hitting the eastern seaboard and Florida for thousands of years - the Indians never left, the colonist never left, people still live in South Florida post Andrew, Nasa and CCAFS will still launch rockets from the cape after this hurricane. I live in Titusville right directly accross from the VAB and use to work at CCAFS and I can tell you that the facilites are very, VERY well constructed - the engineers who designed those buildings were thinking about hurricanes (and direct impacts from errant rockets).
Hi,
NASA has been under budgeted, over managed, and terribly inefficient for decades. Having the government run space flight might have been a good idea during the cold war, when it was important to remind the world that everything the Russians can do we can do better. Today, it is not.
There are cheaper ways to get to LEO (Low Earth Orbit). There are private enterprises which try to get to space in a way that is economically viable. Economically viable means that you don't have to beg Congress for dollars and then use whatever contractors, locations, etc. you need to provide the right pork to the right congress-person. Instead, you can focus on doing what ought to be done.
What do we need manned flight to LEO for? It's close enough that we can remote control everything that a robot can do. Robots that are cheaper and more expendable. Let us send robots and find ways to use it to build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to the skies.
Eventually, we'll need manned space flight to get to resources that are too distant for a remote controlled mission. But now is not the time. Now what we need is less public excitement and more investor excitement. Less spectacles and more value creation.
Just my 2c worth,
Ori
-- Support a free market in the field of government
Essentially, the US is living beyond its means. Its deficit is unsustainable in the long term, as is the value of the US dollar. If China or Japan decides to pull the pin, your economy goes down the toilet for years to come.
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> Even if the orbiters were damaged, or the launch platforms damaged, they can always be re-built, repaired, or whatever.
...it's going to take more than a hurricane to destroy KSC & the shuttle program completely.
Sure, they can, but not without a huge expenditure that NASA really can't afford right now, especially when many politicians (and pundits, and some scientists) are already calling for the end to Human Spaceflight altogether.
> Even if it looks like the eye will hit KSC dead-on, they've still got enough time to stick an orbiter on the 747 and get one of them out of there...
It's looked like that for several days now, and they haven't done this. A good reason is that the shuttles are being retrofitted with safety improvements, and aren't really in a state to be put on a 747, let alone flown hundreds of miles away.
> Besides, the launch structures withstand regular beatings from the shuttle launches, and they've survived for years...
Sure, the launch structures, maybe. But the hangars that the Space Shuttles are housed in are only rated for a Category 3 hurricane. They might also survive a Category 4 or 5 Frances, but then again, they might not.
>
I love the shuttle, but KSC doesn't need to be entirely destroyed for NASA to decide that the program is too expensive to salvage.
Manned space programs take many years to develop. Even if Bush 43 had made it his biggest priority, even 4 years later we wouldn't have a new orbiter ready yet.
A replacement orbiter should have been appropriated for and begun development during the Bush 41 or Clinton administrations. If they had done that, we'd have a new class of orbiters by now.
"We're sorry, but the website you're trying to reach has been disconnected."
Shuttle Program == Manned Space Program
Shuttle Program == USA Government Manned Space Program.
I don't see China abandoning their program if the shuttle is gone; neither do I see any other interested parties doing so.
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I still don't get how anybody can even THINK of abandoning manned space travel. Sure, humans are fragile and expensive. Sure, it's cheaper to send robots. But CRIPES, people. It's an adventure! It's a new experience for the human race. That, IN AND OF ITSELF, is more than enough justification for continuing.
I know all the arguements about how we should fix our problems down here on earth before we pour $$ into space, but I've got news for those people. We're never going to fix those problems. They are caused by human beings. If we wait for the day when everything is hunky dory on this planet, we might as well give up any exploration of any kind.
Dreams are IMPORTANT. That sense of wonder you felt as a little kid looking up at the sky, that's IMPORTANT. Exploration tests us, pushes us, forces us to grow beyond what we thought possible. It seems to be the only way we do that without killing each other in the process. Keeping the mind engaged and interested is essential to who we are as a species.
That's how I feel, anyway. I know there are those who's end vision for the human race seems to be having us all sit in front of the TV while robots do all the work necessary to sustain our physical existance. Well, no thanks. I'll head for the frontier. There's a thought from one of Frank Herbert's books which I consider relevant to both our present and the more degenerate visions of our future:
"It's because there is no Dune there are no Fremen."
"I object to doing things that computers can do." -- Olin Shivers, lispers.org
They are saying the hurricane could be the worst thing to happen to NASA since the fall of the Soviet Union? I personally think it would be great if they were forced to re-think their strategy...after all, "necessity is the mother of invention"
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The infrastructure, personnel and procedures needed to MAINTAIN orbiters is ENTIRELY different from those need to BUILD shuttles. The shuttle building program has been shut down for over a decade.
My bet is the contractors that built the shuttles wouldn't even TOUCH a contract to try to build another set of them. The engineers and other staff involved in the shuttle building have probably retired or died by now.
"We're sorry, but the website you're trying to reach has been disconnected."
From NASAs perspective, a disaster of this scale may be just what they need to raise public awareness and get a wad of "pity cash".
"Don't waste your time or time will waste you" -MUSE
The building was constructed during the Apollo era and has a roof designed to withstand 105 mph winds, Diller said.
Even newer facilities are at risk. The immense hangar where the space station components are tested and stored prior to launch is designed to withstand 110 mph winds.
The cause of most mistakes are that when taking under consideration the requirements for [insert whatever here] is that someone made an "assumption" rather than supporting all information with facts. When these buildings were built, I'm sure somewhere in the Flordia a hurricane came through with winds in excess of 110mph. What would ever make you think it *is* impossible for one to come through the Space Center? I'm mean you spend billions of dollars and do not protect it from hurricanes on the Flordia coast?
Why is this even news worthy? It's always been a risk, it will continue to be a risk.
Because up until this week, it's been a theoretical risk. Now, the risk is real. A storm of this intensity has never hit the Cape dead-on, and this will come DAMNED near close to dead-on.
As of 5:00 this morning, Patrick AFB (just south of CCAS and responsible for the AF side of things on the Cape) issued a warning that the storm was to pass 60 miles away, with 100+ mph winds.
So, yeah, if the article were in June, saying "Hey, a hurricane could take us out," I'd agree that this wasn't really newsworthy. Problem is, it's not "a hurricane could take us out," it's " this hurricane could take us out. In 48 hours."
Scrap the florida space station! WTF decided to put a launch center in the middle of hurricane heaven anyways?
pack it all up and move it to some that isnt destined to be overrun with mother natures wrath 2-4 times a year.
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As much as nostalgia for the 60's counts for, publicly funded manned space exploration has been dead for a while. Heck, the way our fearless leader in the White House runs things, the only way they'll resume REAL interest in NASA is if one of their probes finds hydrocarbon deposits on the Moon or Mars.
Cynicism aside, resource hunting is going to be our only real shot to get private companies to follow in the the footsteps of the X-prize. It's a sad fact, but the 60's space race was fueled completely on Cold War fears and the simple novelty of our newfound abilities as a species. If we're really going to get off our asses and resume exploring with the same urgency we had then, it's not going to be ideology driven.
Take a look at the "Discovery" of the "New World". Do you think the Spanish, English, and Portugese would have spent all their bling on tall ships if the only result was finding an uninhabitable wasteland? No, they were convinced by the astronauts of the time that the New World contained resources galore, and the rest is history.
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Not true. 10,000,000 tons of water, and a near-infinite supply of radiation/meteorite shielding...at a minimum. :-)
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So, would you honestly have us hamstring our entire economy based on speculation?
/sarcasm
Ever heard of risk management. You take a risk, assign it a probability and a cost then by looking at the products you can make you decision about whether to mitigate the risk.
e.g. Probability of asteroid impact = 100%
Cost of asteroid impact = 2 trillion (?)
Result = 100% * 2 trillion = 2 trillion
example 2:
Probability of nuclear war = 1%
Cost of nuclear war = 100 trillion (?)
Result = 1% * 100 trillion = 1 trillion
example 3:
Probability of global warming = 1%
Cost of global warming = 100 trillion (?)
Result = 1% * 100 trillion = 1 trillion
Now replace the words 'trillion' with the word 'millions of human lives' and decide if you want to even ATTEMPT to do something about the POSSIBILITY of a problem.
All you're suggesting is to ignore the issue until it becomes an issue or not. If it becomes an issue all indications are that it will be too late. If it doesn't become an issue then what... you bolstered the economy? Welllllll done!
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