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NASA Preparing Manned Hubble Service Mission

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the second-chances dept.

danimrich writes "According to an article at Space.com, 'NASA's new Administrator Mike Griffin told reporters today [April 29] that he informed key members of Congress Thursday evening that he would direct engineers at Goddard Spaceflight center to start preparing for a space shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope on the assumption that one ultimately will go forward.'"

4 of 174 comments (clear)

  1. Hmmm. by James+A.+Y.+Joyce · · Score: -1, Troll

    Manned missions have a surprisingly high rate of failure/death, even more so than any other form of transport (aeroplane, boat, car, train, bus, etc.). Are they going to be taking a Space Shuttle up there or a different craft?

  2. Re:Good by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    losing is what Americans do best
    textiles/cars/education/wars
    space is just the next thing on the list

  3. Star Trek linked to pedophilia? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    This has very little to do with the article, but a few days ago the L.A. Times published an article regarding the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit that focused on their fight against child pornography ("Sifting Clues to an Unsmiling Girl"). They are the law enforcement organization that photoshopped the victims out of child porn photos in order to get the public's assistance in identifying the backgrounds (it worked). In any case, the article had this amazing claim:

    On one wall is a 'Star Trek' poster with investigators' faces substituted for the Starship Enterprise crew. But even that alludes to a dark fact of their work: All but one of the offenders they have arrested in the last four years was a hard-core Trekkie.

    Wow. All but one in four years. Seemed rather unlikely to me.

    So, I called the Child Exploitation Section of the Toronto Sex Crimes Unit and spoke to Det. Ian Lamond, who was familiar with the Times article.

    He claims they were misquoted, or if that figure was given it was done so jokingly. Of course, even if the figure was given jokingly, shouldn't the Times' reporter have clarified something that seems rather odd? Shouldn't her editors have questioned her sources?

    Nevertheless , Detective Lamond does claim that a majority of those arrested show "at least a passing interest in Star Trek, if not a strong interest."

    They've arrested well over one hundred people over the past four years and Det. Lamond claims they can gauge this interest in Star Trek by the arrestees' "paraphenalia, books, videotapes and DVDs." I asked if this wasn't simply a general interest in science fiction and fantasy, such as Star Wars or Harry Potter or similar. Paraphrasing his answer, he said, while there was sometimes other science fiction and fantasy paraphenalia, Star Trek was the most consistent and when he referred to a majority of the arrestees being Star Trek fans, it was Star Trek-specific.

    1. Re:Star Trek linked to pedophilia? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

      ... Star Trek was the most consistent and when he referred to a majority of the arrestees being Star Trek fans, it was Star Trek-specific.

      So paedophiles have no taste at all when it comes to science fiction, is what you're saying?

      Honestly, that bugged you so much that you actually called the Sex Crimes people to clarify it? Good grief man, they have actual serious work to do, they shouldn't be bothered with this trivial crap.