NASA Prepares Discovery for Launch

eggoeater writes "Yahoo! reports that Kennedy Space Center is buzzing with excitement over the likely launch of Space Shuttle Discovery this Spring. It's been just over two years since the Columbia tragedy and the Discovery has been outfitted with many new safety features, including the removal of the foam from the external tank and pressure sensors on the wings that would detect an impact. Quote from launch director Michael D. Leinbach: 'It's all converging on what looks like May 15 to start flying the shuttle again.'"

Comments

Re:Oh finally!

[Keamos]

The problem with servicing the Hubble is that Congress is fucking retarded--they'll get rid of Hubble, saving a tiny bit of money, and then 5 years down the road they'll build another one, for 100x the cost it would've been to just service the Hubble in the first place.

Re:Sounds good, but expensive.

[ZeroZen]

I'm sure it doesn't matter. Domestic investment is VERY important to the americans, just look at the softwood lumber dispute, or maybe even this beef thing.

They'll spend whatever it takes, as they always have, to show up the competition. That's how it started, and innovation always comes from competition and need.

Re:BOFH?

[bogaboga]

They (NASA) should emulate the Russians with simplicity. This reminds me of the US$10,000,000 dollar pen while the Russians simply used a pencil. As Americans, we over engineer, and in the process, waste resources. If one looks at the details of the vehicle the Russians are designing for Mars, there is simplicity at work with very complex issues to handle. In the process of over engineering, we add complexity and then brag about what our achievements are. I guess it is because of the one biggest evil in capitalism - MONEY. Somewhere somehow, a bureaucrat or his/her colleagues is getting money, not caring that much about the Union of States (USA).

I guess in the very near future, these Russians will suprise us with another space achievement at a cost we can not dream about...then we will worry about who might get hands on this technology.

70s technology

[luvirini]

The basic problem of the shuttle come from the fact that it is mostly 70s technology with some glueover.

Thus the materials are so much heavier than corresponding would be today an so on.

The Way NASA has been trying to keep this program alive by more clue is likely to end in further embarassments.

Too bad there is not enough focus to do great things, instead NASA has just become another CYA organisation.

Re:70s technology

[jokumuu]

Seems to me they lost track of their vision somewhere as organisation. I am not saying there are not dedicated people as such there, there are many, but the organisation itself has lost it's goals.

Re:70s technology

[Long-EZ]

I find it to be amazing that 95% of NASA can be so talented, intelligent and motiated, and the organization can be so completely ruined and its effects minimalized by the 5% who are plugged into the funding and end up calling the shots based on the political process. When the entire organization exists to spend money, the science is often an unintended result, at least from the perspective of the people who are writing the checks and setting policy.

NASA is now too political to be anything but a festering mound of poot. I feel sorry for the many technical people who are trying to do good work in that environment. I couldn't do it. Hopefully, the best and the brightest will get a good job in the new commercial space ventures that are popping up and can finally have their dreams realized.

Re:BOFH?

[luvirini]

Well the problem is, being a centralised bureucracy like NASA is, makes an organisation extremly everse to risk.

The number of people who died in pioneering flight are extremly many, compared to those dying of space flight.

Unfortunately to advance something you have to take risks, calculated ones, but risks nevertheless.

NASA as organisation is not currently capable of that.

Re:Oh finally!

[Long-EZ]

You are laboring under the practical geek perspective. You definitely aren't seeing it from the congressional perspective. Their job is not to do as much science while spending as little money as possible. That would be practical. They're political. Their job is to spend as many tax dollars as possible, in their own districts. So, they make deals. I'll vote for your pork if you vote for my pork. Taxpayers vote for the biggest pork politicians, and the cycle repeats.

The only cure is to stop voting for more pork, and I don't see that happening. As a nation, we're far too short sighted and self interested.

So, if congress is the boss because it controls the purse strings, how do you think NASA will behave? Just like any employee, they quickly realize the boss's goal and agenda and make it their own. So, the people who manage NASA are not in the business of cost effective space exploration. In fact, quite the opposite. They're in the business of spending tax dollars in several congressional districts.

And that's why we need private space exploration and development, and we finally have it. Many companies now see the possibility and they have the vision and motivation to do what NASA couldn't.

It's sad that NASA did so much in the early years and then the political process ruined it late in the Apollo era. Despite some very bright scientists, engineers and astronauts, they just can't help being a government bureaucracy. Why? As usual, it has everything to do with the movement of little green pieces of paper. Lots of little green pieces of paper.

Re:Big Dumb Boosters

[LWATCDR]

I think Helnlein got this wrong. A better model would be Airliners.
1. Is correct.
2. is right.
3 Exceedingly complex, expensive, reliable, and efficient.

Modern jet airliners are not basic or cheap. But they are reliable and efficient. All this talk of going back to Big Dumb Boosters is like saying Lets stick with DC-3s they are so much cheaper and simpler than 777s.

Re:Oh finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

If you were on one of these shuttles, I bet you would welcome safety standarts that keep your ass alive up there if something goes wrong.

I suspect most astronauts don't personally mind a 1% risk of death per mission. But if there's one more accident then the shuttle program will definitely be over. Congress would probably require NASA to be reorganized, and manned spaceflight put on the back burner.

Re:Oh finally!

[Long-EZ]

You're right in saying that the successful commercial ventures are not going to have lofty goals. They'll concentrate on the bottom line and compete to offer the best services at the best prices. Where science wins is on the cost end. A university astronomy department can build a satellite to study cosmic microwave background radiation and try to learn about the origin of the universe, but it does them no good if NASA only accepts one external science package a year to fill a payload. It's not likely that a university will get a 50 million dollar grant to pay for a commercial launch when they're competing with DoD spy satellites for low volume launch capabilities. But, when space is commercialized, launching your satellite might cost 50 thousand dollars in a commodity space launch market, and scientists can have a few bake sales and maybe get a small grant and fly their hardware.

Free markets work. It's only a problem when monopolies are allowed to squeeze everyone else out through unfair competition.