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Scientists Debate Robotic Hubble Mission
An anonymous reader writes "Some scientists are questioning whether the robotic mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope is worth the risk and cost. After the Columbia disaster, NASA cancelled its shuttle mission to Hubble, and replaced it with a robotic mission. However, the price tag of the robotic mission is between $1 billion and $2 billion, almost the cost of a new space telescope. Optics expert Duncan Moore is unsure whether the mission will bring the most scientific return per dollar spent. Hubble director Steven Beckwith says the mission will lead to breakthroughs in space robotics."
I worked for NASA for 8 years straight out of MIT undergrad.
Though I left the rocket science "business", I have no regrets. It was a great company to work for and we did some amazing things.
That said, all science is good science, even this robotic HUBBLE mission. I helped with deployment of spacecraft and nothing was more satisfying.
This mission MUST go on else we will fail as scientists.
Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate. Ex-O'Reilly/MIT employee, now a full-time Google employee.
Its a visual/IR telescope. Hubble is for shorter frequencies (visual to UV), but both are definitely optical devices.
Stupid question, If it costs as much as another hubble up there , why are we not building another one and send it up again ?.
... Also sadly the guy in charge wants to last out till Sept 2005 (you know nothing good or bad happens in the last months of retirement).
Secondly, why isn't ISS going anywhere in comparison ?. Also that's a more international project for space. I hated the canadian reference
Last century, most of the world (with notable exceptions), expected america to do the Right Thing. That's past now (see the Thermonuclear reactor project) and in 4 short YEARS.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
... to have robots with hands in orbit! I mean, we could make giant shadow puppets on the Great Wall of China!
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she won't let you fly, but she might let you sing
However, the price tag of the robotic mission is between $1 billion and $2 billion, almost the cost of a new space telescope.
Heck, you could shave a few hundred thousand off that pricetag if you built a new HST around the "backup" primary mirror made by Kodak (which was figured and tested correctly). NASA would just have to get it from The National Air and Space Museum.
Here come da fudge!
I'd suggest that the folks at SpaceShipOne could do it for a lot less money. Heck, set up a contest for it - then you're encouraging innovation in the field. With the savings you could garner you could probably divert that to other projects... or buy more $10k toilet seats.
I can see de-orbiting an old, useless analog comsat as being sensible. But for stuff which would otherwise continue to usefully function for years or decades, write-off due to non catastrophic failure ought not to be the natural option. The US space program suffers from an attention deficit disorder.
Everybody's a libertarian 'till their neighbour's becomes a crack house.
Mod that parent up! (even though I only partly agree)
1) Yep.
2) Not quite, but we should finish the ISS using no more than 8 more shuttle flights, then all soyuz and USA/ESA expendable rockets. Hey, invite the Chinese to the party, too. Is it the INTERNATIONAL space station, or not? Snubbing the Chinese is a profoundly stupid thing to do; we'd be well served to have parts of the ISS coming up from China, Europe, Japan, Brazil, Russia, Canada, the USA, and anyone else with the mettle to fly vehicles there.
3) We should seriously consider buying soyuz from the russians even as we develop further launchers. Apollo had a -LOT- of things right, shame we scrapped it.
4) Going to Mars is only dumb if we don't plant roots there and establish a manned presence.
5) I wholeheartedly agree that hubble should be extened robotically. Worst case, we fund R&D for some kickass robotic technology that we can use elsewhere in space or even down here. The problem is that the max price for the robotic mission is projected at $2 BILLION (2,000 x 1,000,000). Sending a shuttle to fix it with carbon based units is a $900 Million proposition. I say take volunteers for a risky shuttle flight and fix it with humans, then spend a smaller budget on a robotic grand finale that would enhance hubble one last time followed by a remote controled electrodynamic tether that would bring hubble in to its inceneration.
The current state of the scope is that there is NO money for new telescopes other then the Webb telescope, but it's a radio scope and not an optical one (even though it's being sold as a Hubble replacement).
This was modded insightful? The Webb/NGST will be a near-IR telescope, not a radio telescope. As such, it is a partial replacement for the Hubble, as there is significant overlap in the wavelengths for which each were/will be used. If you consider perhaps the main purpose of the Webb/NGST to be high-z observations, then it's even more clearly a replacement for the Hubble.
Though, on the second thought, this problem doesn't involve robots.
... add in a robotic arm or two so it can do self-repairs
And of course, if it's the arms that need repairing...
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
If they're not going to fix it, I'd like to understand why they must crash it down into the ocean? If they're going to send a propulsion module up there, why don't they move the Hubble to a Lagrange point between the Earth and moon?
I realize that it will probably take years to get there but I've seen a few proposals for future space stations being placed at the Lagrange points - wouldn't it be nice if they had a high-quality (maybe not as good as when launched) set of optics waiting to be used in a station observatory? I realize that there is a (very) good chance of this never happening, but it seems a damn sight better than crashing Hubble into the Pacific.
myke
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
I don't quite understand what the debate is. Even if the mission fails and billions of dollars are "wasted", it will not all be in vain. Using robotics like this are exploring a new frontier of space exploration. The first few manned shuttle orbits weren't risky? Of course they are! The Columbia accident proves that they still are today. Money is valuable, but exploring new scientific frontiers is much more valuable.
- dshaw
This money might be better spent on terrestrial research right now.
Look a story down at the hydrogen development... this could change the world on a much bigger scale than anything...effecting us right here ont eh ground right away. 2 billion can do so much good right here.
Yeah, I sort of hate the idea of not looking toward the stars even for a moment, but look around here, things are pretty messed up, and I dont like the dependence on gas and oil. 2 billion could go towards alot of infrastructure for hydrogen cars.
There's nothing Intelligent about Intelligent Design.
If, as I understand it, the robots would be brought down and destroyed after the mission anyway, why couldn't NASA get some more use out of them?
Put cameras on them with a feed to Earth, this is not that hard to do. Have the two robots slug it out in orbit over the Pacific, maybe with the moon as a backdrop, and drop 'em into the Pacific after that.
It probably strikes as a bit off-the-wall, but could have several benefits...the sale of advertising during the program could pay a decent bit of the bill, and hey, we need to do SOMETHING to get people aware that yes, there actually is something out there past the atmosphere. Might raise support for funding in several ways...for one, not needing so much of it (the advertisers), and for another, raising public awareness.
Yes, I'm advocating a publicity stunt. That's what seems to get people's attention.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
It's about time we had robots that could fix orbiting devices. Two billion is a bargain. Oh, yeah, and it might just save one of the most scientifically energizing pieces of space hardware ever flown.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
The University of Arizona is currently working on the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT)- see: http://www.nd.edu/~science/core/binocular/index.sh tml. The thing has twin 8.4 meter mirrors- their light gathering power is equivalent to a single 11.8 meter telescope, and their resolving power is equivalent to a 22.8 meter telescope. It is supposed to have more light gathering power and much sharper images than Hubble http://www.nd.edu/~science/core/binocular/lbt_othe rtelescopes.shtml. Supposedly the LBT is be able to get around the blurring from the atmosphere by using adaptive optics- deforming the secondary mirrors to correct for distortions. They claim that the construction costs are $80 million. So, an order of magnitude more resolution for an order of magnitude less money. If it performs even close to specifications, it sounds like a good deal. The dedication ceremony has already taken place and the thing is supposed to be operational in 2006.
Wouldn't it then make more sense to spend the cash and resources on improving/fixing/replacing the shuttles, so that we can safely send humans to do the job?
I really think that NASA has a lot of dirty little secrets that no one on the outside knows about, and after this last accident they probably looked close and hard and realized that the number of places the shuttle could catastrophically fail is more than they originally thought.
If there was another shuttle failure (even if it did not result in the loss of life) I suspect that there would be a noticeable chorus to dismantle the agency, that cannot produce very much more than kitsch science and photo ops with school children on the ground.
Though unspoken, I think the three strikes and you're out rule may be in place here. NASA since apollo has always been an agency with self-survival first in mind, so I would not be surprised if they find a way to retire the shuttles to museums.
So much as replacing the shuttles - I do not think that this will even be considered for the next decade as the cost is too steep. It was hard to justify the shuttles when they were first built (and the reason that the space station was built) in the seventies.
But as can be seen, the space station can work with cheap Russian rockets that are more reliable than the shuttle.
The Hubble was designed so it could be serviced by the shuttle (the other justification for the shuttle). But if the Hubble was designed so that parts could be replaced by dockable unmanned rockets, we would not be in this position we are today with it. For an instant, if the power supply and gyros were on a small module that could dock using conventional rockets. But it is not.
When O'Keefe said that a repair mission to Hubble was "too dangerous," people should have recognized that that was code words for "we need to ground the shuttle permanently now."
The fact is that there are earth based telescopes that are catching up in performance to the Hubble. Add to that the fact that the Hubble is old technology, it's pretty obvious that it's time to move on.
It truly would be a better decision to take the many lessons learned from Hubble design and repair and put those in a new telescope, and send it to orbit on a unmanned rocket.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
The problem is which way will people whine about the most. When astronauts are lost NASA is bombarded with "Save the Astronauts!" slogans. Lots of BS about why we should send robots instead of people.
Then when the price tag for sending robots into space is talked about people start screaming "Why are we doing that? Send astronauts instead! It's cheaper."
It is decisions by committee and it works in the same way as if you were driving a bus down a multilane freeway at the beginning of rush hour with a cloth tied over your eyes. Your only method of knowing what to do is what everyone on the bus is trying to tell you. So everyone gets to scream out what they want the bus driver to do and then he tries to react to the orders. And just like the bus - NASA is going willy-nilly down the freeway trying not to hit anyone, trying to apease each and every person on the bus, and to reach the destination each and every one on the bus is screaming at them to go to. It is a thankless, almost impossible task to perform.
The people of America need to realize just how stupid their over-the-top reactions to problems with space travel are. This isn't Star Trek, BattleStar Galactica, Star Wars, or any of the other truly great (IMHO) space shows. The physics alone are no where near the same. Yet these TV/Movie shows are what are held up as being totally correct and truthful. Further, when someone dies (as in Star Wars when trying to take out the Death Star) no one goes "Wait! Oh my GOD! Think about the insurance! Oi-vey! What about the children? His/Her wife/husband? Friends, relatives, and countrymen? Who's going to pay for all of this?" Everyone goes "Oh Wow! Did you see that? His head flew off into the window next to where Luke was trying to save Obiwan!"
So what am I trying to get at? The country needs to decide, once and for all, whether it is worth the lives of our astronauts to send people into space. If it is - stop complaining and start supporting that way of going into space. If it isn't - stop complaining about the cost and lend your support to the cause. The main thing is - you can't have it both ways. Either people are going to die up there or we are going to probably bankrupt the country trying to build a robot capable of doing everything a human can do.
And don't think that just because businesses are starting to get into the space business that things are going to change for the better. The problem isn't going to go away just because you've changed who is going into space. It doesn't work like that. You are still going to have people dying up there if you send them up there. You just will have more of them dying at one time. Just like in an airplane crash.
So come on America! Make up your mind! People or robots?
Someone put a black hole in my pocket and now I'm broke.