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NASA Considering Early Retirement of Shuttle Program
Rei writes "While publicly assuring the public that it has no plans to do so, leaks have indicated that NASA has been quietly investigating plans to get rid of the Space Shuttle as soon as possible, and finish the International Space Station with disposable rockets, even as NASA works on achieving Return to Flight in 2005."
And i do mean finally!
Why rely on several decades old tech for long term dependancies? Some R&D never hurt anyone (except the budget, but that's a separate discussion).
I'd be appaulled if they DIDN'T consider retiring the fleet as an option. To NOT do so would be pig headed. There could very well be a better way, regardless of how great the shuttle program has been, and how much it means to me as someone who grew up having the best "show and tell" pictures because my dad worked on the shuttle.
There's alot of brilliant people over there that don't make it a habit of ignoring all the options, and all the possibilities. Thats what lets them acheive such great heights. I'd be sorry to see it go though.
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
if the retirement (what a lovely euphemism) is in lieu of a new program, great.
If the scrapping is in lieu of nothing... that's not so great.
I do think a vehicle capable of re-use is important to the goal to get us off the planet; if they need to use rockets to get the ISS done while a new vehicle is built, so be it.
-- james
Hey, let's face it. Who has money for new technology or updating technologies in existing space shuttles? The nation has much more important priorities, like conquering other countries and pissing off the rest of the world.
Besides, the pursuit of science is useless unless it can serve a political purpose, right?
could the recent privatization of space travel have something to do with this?
NASA is irresponsible if they DON'T do this occasionally (just not constantly) and such an investigation doesn't mean anything with regards to the formal "plans". If you have any knowledge of a strategy team or executive in a large company, you'll know just how often weird things that are "out of plan" are considered and subsequently dismissed... I guess it gives the rumor mill something to do.
I'd much rather my tax dollars were spent with Burt Rutan and Scaled Composites...
Lose Weight and Feel Great with Isagenix
All the more reason to develop the space elevator.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
Even as magnificent as they are, it would take a Saturn V 30 years to go to Neptune with a Holmann Transfer. Considering that the planets won't align for a Voyager-esque event for another 150 years, we need to work on something similar to NERVA. Its probably not feasable to make rockets too much larger than the giant Saturn V's (360 feet tall).
Oops, I mentioned nu-cu-lur. Mod down -5: Evil.
Why reusable? Every kilogram of the craft that is "reused" is a kilogram of payload that it couldn't take up and leave in orbit.
Would there be any benefit (time/safety/cost-wise) in converting one or more shuttles for robotic operation, and create a smaller, man-rated vehicle for transporting personnel?
Really.
They rocked the world back in the 60's and early 70's.
They still rock the world with their unmanned space exploration.
But for about the past 20 years it seems that their manned space flight plan consists of very expensive (and sometimes deadly) joy rides.
I say we (US Tax payers) Give Burt Rutan 500 Million (the cost of a *one* shuttle mission) and stand back.
What would really be a great thing would be for NASA to get out of engineering, and just let contracts for delivery of pounds or people to orbit. Let the vendors figure out the details.
See what I've been reading.
All the real science is done by uncrewed satellites and probes. And may I preempt the usual argument, which is that the Hubble could only be repaired because of the existence of the shuttle. If the shuttle hadn't existed, we would have been in an entirely different alternate history. Maybe more money would have flowed to space science, if the vast majority of NASA's budget hadn't been going to nationalistic propaganda exercises like the shuttle. When communications satellites are launched, the owners simply assume there's some risk of failure, and they insure against it.
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- Manned - requires 99.999% success rate EXPENSIVE(think aircraft / ICBM building)
- Unmanned - requires "only" 99.9% (99%?...) less expensive (think ship building. No, really, that's how the Soviets looked at it.)
Obviously, need a two-tier system, not one do-everything, do nothing well system.As far a reusable/disposable, for the time being, whichever is more economical. Be sure to show your work calculating continuing program costs for reusable designs.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
its insightful.
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India has the neccesary "intellectual" labour and which it doesn't, the US can easily transfer the skills; and technology
The cost definitely can be lower.With good discussions, I'm sure the Indian government can be easily persuaded to chip in.
Make that with any discussions,which country does not want the glamour of "space pioneers".
Timang tinggi tinggi
parang sudah asah
alang alang mandi
biar sampai basah
Seeing that there are lots of replies about giving Burt Rutan 500 million or what ever and see what he can do...kinda silly. No disrespect to Mr.Rutan but he just did was NASA had done 50 years ago. Their sub-orbital flight went what 328KM? Sorry can't remember the exact figure. Some one care to look up the elevation of the orbit of ISS? I don't think even Burt Rutan can make that leap on $500 million....but I do have to admit it would be cool to watch him try. Anyways, I say let NASA do its thing. Atleast they are looking at all the options..
Let the flaming begin.
Insert funny smart-ass comment here.
Ok I get it, a few people died publically, caused a media stir but cmon people. They died for a cause more nobel than shooting a fucking iraqi defending his home. How is that nobel but not death in the pursuit of science.
Ask any astronaught if they want the program retired. If the risks are unacceptable to them. You'll get a resounding no.
I mean ffs we have people risking their lives to fish for crab in the north pacific. A whole lot more chance of dying as a crab fisherman or a warzone doctor, but people do it.
Lets stop making policies based on a few lives. I for one would happily die in the pursuit of science.
Funny the russians always had this figgured out. Maybe thats why we're talking about using their dilapidated technology.
I pose, if two russians died to make it safer for one american, is it better or more ethical than two americans.
This administration seems to think so.
Really?
Do you honestly think that NASA would have gotten anywhere close to the same amount of funding without the shuttle than they did with it? I doubt it. A disturbingly large number of the population of the U.S. think the whole space program - shuttle, robots, satellites, etc.) is a waste of money. There may have been some interest, for a while, but this would have disappeared (along with funding) when people got bored and looked away. The only way NASA can keep getting money is to stage high-visibiity projects, such as the Shuttle, which may not do fantastic science, but are interesting to look at and have people directly involved.
A short history of science funding in Congress:
Large science projects get killed in committee
Large science projects with people in them get funded (sometimes).
Large science projects with people in them that benefit large compaines in multiple locations (pleasing multiple constituencies) get funded (often).
Large science projects with people in them which make lots of money for someone that allow us to poke our fingers in the eye of another country get funded (always).
See, I don't think there's a point in restarting Saturn V production.
The thing is, with the aerospace components we've got now, with the alloys and welding techniques, it would be about as smart to restart Saturn V production as it would be for Porsche to dig up the plans for the 914 and restart that production line. I mean, sure the 914 was a cool little machine at a good price, but when Porsche decided to make an "economical" sports car, they started over and made the Boxter instead.
It stopped making sense to restart the production lines after 1980. By that point, all of the non-custom components were completely obselete, the electronics were dated, etc. By 1984, we had all of the Saturn V-related facilities completely repurposed for the shuttle, so even if we could build a Saturn V, we'd have nowhere to launch it.
It's OK that we can't make a Saturn V anymore. It'll cost just as much to redesign the Saturn V around more modern parts than it will be to make a brand new design, with a few microcontrollers instead of heavy 60's vintage computers, more optimal aerodynamics and staging, etc, some ability to recover portions of it, etc.
We can still make J-2 rockets (they re-used everything but the nozzle to make the X-33's rocket engines) and a F-1-performing rocket isn't that hard to get started, either. Remember, part of the reason why the SSME is so damn expensive and tempremental is because it's got staged combustion. The F-1 was much simpler.
The problem is, people are far too attached to the *machine*, instead of the *idea*. I mean, sure, the Saturn V was the last machine that NASA has built that really lived up to its promises. The shuttle is a *beautiful* machine that has some nice properties, but has been strung along for the past 20 years and really never lived up to its promises. So, instead of asking why we can't build the Saturn V, we need to be asking why we can't get stuff up to space cheaply and safely.
Gentoo Sucks
That really isn't a fair comparison between the Cassini program and shuttle program.
A much more accurate comparison would have been between the Apollo program and the Shuttle program, both of which involved manned spaceflight.
The Apollo program achieved an incredible goal, namely that of putting a crew of two on the moon, and was both an incredible engineering accomplishment as well as accomplishing some very useful science that is still being sorted through to this day.
While you can cite some very good references to useful science that was produced on the shuttle, there is another very important comparison that needs to be made:
Skylab vs. The ISS
Skylab + Apollo did an incredible amount of pure scientific research, and the internal volume of useable lab space was almost identical to what is now available on the ISS.
The Shuttle + ISS program is incredibly expensive, and while they have proven the ability to do major space construction projects with the ISS (needed if we ever get L-5 going), there has been comparatively little actual science.
What are you doing posting on a forum hosted on the internet - whose infrastructure is supported mostly by US Government funded institutions? Using HTML, created in an institution ( CERN ) funded by many governments. Dialling in on a telephone/ADSL line, the infrastructure for which was created by the Govt.?
For that matter, why are you using a computer? Stick to your log cabin and complaining about the new railroad : )
An equivalent question: "What happened to the rapid adoption of 90nm wafers that was going to bring us all 6GHz processors by late 2003?" Or "what happened to fusion power, which has been 20 years away since 1960?"
The answer to all of them: it turned out to be a shitload harder than we expected.
New operating regimes (higher speed, pressure, temperature, smaller manufacturing scales, whatever) sometimes bring new problems, and things have to slow down until the scientists and engineers solve them or find workarounds.
At the same time, nobody in 1960 even considered that you might be able to buy a gigaflop CPU for $300 at walmart in 2004. Nobody predicts the future very well.
I stole this sig from someone cleverer than me.
Here is my humble opinion of what NASA should do:
... billions saved and better repair/upgrade options.
1. Use the shuttle to bring the largest components of the space station. The remaining components use rockets. Retire the shuttle once we meet international goals. Shuttle done.
2. We have a space station now. Worthless? No! The next space ship we create is reusable. The point is when your done with a mission dock to the station. Take small capsules back to earth. Take capsules up to the station. The capsules are soley designed for orbit insertion of human cargo and the safety of that cargo. Each new crew reuses the station and the ship docked to it. Possibly even refuel the new space ship from the station if it is safe enough.
3. Since the new space ship does not have to reenter the earth's atmosphere make it modular. So, for each new mission snap in removable modules that can be stored at the space station. Maybe some modules could be for storage, fuel, habitation,robotics module, moon base modules. Since there is no reentry tiles ( mention in another post ) we can have an even larger space ship to replace the shuttle.
4. Now, with the new ship docked to the station: undock with crew and modules and fly over to the moon or other orbits.
5. Built a large observatory on the station to give the station more value. Need new telescope parts send it up with the next cargo shipment. The ISS crew will upgrade it no problem. OK, it does about 90% of what Hubble does
6. If you get the vehicle far enough from earth go nuclear.
7. Throw any space junk at the sun.
Moral of the story: If you put something in orbit leave as much of it in orbit as possible. Getting humans into orbit and back to earth is a special problem with safety being number one. Solution for Humans: Capsules. Solution for stuff: Cargo ships. Seperate human cargo from non human mechanical cargo. Furthermore, with cargo and humans seperate there can be a disconnection of the humans with the profit motives of puting up cargo.
I think you mean to say ..."develop something new, and then retire the old birds."
-Rob