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NASA Admin Says Shuttle and ISS are Mistakes
Teancum writes "NASA Administrator Michael Griffin was recently interviewed by the USA Today Editorial Board regarding the current direction of the U.S. Space Program, and in the interview he suggested that the past three decades have been a huge mistake and a waste of resources. As a total cost for both programs that has exceeded $250 Billion, you have to wonder what other useful things could have been developed using the same resources. Griffin quoted in the interview regarding if the shuttle had been a mistake "My opinion is that it was... It was a design which was extremely aggressive and just barely possible." Regarding the ISS: "Had the decision been mine, we would not have built the space station we're building in the orbit we're building it in.""
Sure, that $250 billion could buy us another year in Iraq!
But seriously, the ISS is not a waste of money. When you think of all the research done there, the international goodwill spread there, it is well worth the cost. I do wish the degree of internationality was a bit larger. Simply having Americans and Russians isn't very diverse -- it would be nice to see China/India/other aspiring space powers to join in the fun (and help with the bills).
I wonder if he is aware of the recent wars that the US has gotten involved with. Talk about real wastes of money. At least the Shuttle program, and the ISS to a lesser extent, have furthered our knowledge of science and engineering, rather than just our ability to mindlessly destroy.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
I RTFA and can see what he's saying that the shuttle and ISS were basically mistakes, and I agree. However, I'm not so clear about his proposed alternatives. Is he shilling for Bush's "Man to Mars" mission and saying that should have been our goal since the 1970s? That would certainly be a wise career move (at least for the moment) but what purpose would it serve to send a man to Mars? We can't even get some of our unmanned probes to the Martian surface successfully. Maybe we could try to get a probe there and back to Earch first.
Remember spaceship one used knowledge and tech that NASA developed/figured out.
They were first to do it privately, not first ever.
Losers whine about their best, Winners go home to fuck the prom queen
It's fairly well known that the space shuttle was a compromise between NASA and the military. In order to get the budget, they agreed to design requirements that involved weird payloads and the ability to launch them into polar orbit. That in turn drove the design to be what it is today.
In terms of the space station, it seemed to quickly turn into an exercise to divide up the money according to country and state. I'm not even sure what science goes on up there any more. These days the reduced crew seems to spend their time repairing the place. Crazy.
they wouldn't have accomplished jack, if NASA hadn't come up with the tremendous knowledge base that current teams get to draw from.
NASA could put a tiny ship with barely any payload into low orbit decades ago. Not really all that comparible.
Your post was rated insightful? More like overly-rehashed nonsense.
Absolutely. Flood that money into the private market and let it take their chances with space exploration.
I can't believe a NASA Administrator (read: advocate) would be so candid. But the point here is not that space exploration is bad, or science is bad or we are bad at science or we shouldn't invest in science. The point is Government is bad at science. Government is bad at running a multi-hundred billion science program. Government is inefficient. Government is bad at ensuring safety and reliabilty.
What we need is less government involvement, whether it is domestic government or foreign governments. Yes, japan, china and india can help stem the costs - private japanese, indian and chinese firms. Not more mismanaging governments. Other space exploration will just be run by the same types that run the UN. Gross incompetence, malfeasance and inefficiency.