Space Shuttles almost Ready to Re-Launch 279
stagmeister writes "CNN and Space.com are reporting that the Return to Flight Task Group, the overseeing committee that determines when the Space Shuttles can go back into space, has reported that the only items blocking the Shuttles are issues 'related to tank debris, orbiter hardening and tile repair.' They plan to re-meet in later this month to finalize their decision. However, 'NASA has made clear it intends to resume shuttle flights with the repair capabilities it has in hand without knowing for sure whether they would work in an emergency.' Would you want your children flying a space shuttle that hasn't been properly beta-tested?"
Definition of a non-story: (Score:5, Insightful)
From TFS:
Um....aren't those problems the reason the Shuttles were grounded in the first place???
Also from TFS:
Well...does this 'Return to Flight Task Group' have the authority to ground the flights?
From TFA:
Apparently, they don't.
Remind me exactly why we had a 'Return to Flight Task Group' again...
The Only Things? (Score:3, Insightful)
NASA needs to recognize that, despite its technical sophistication, the shuttle is too dangerous to operate. It would be better to ship smaller components into space and assemble the equipment in low earth orbit with robots rather than continue to force this orbiter to operate in a manner that risks humans.
The idea that if NASA abandons the shuttle that human spaceflight will stop is crap, despite what the television special claims. I'm sure that the NASA shuttle managers would like everyone to believe this propaganda, but the Europeans, Japanese, Chinese, and others are unlikely to give up on space flight just because NASA dumps the shuttle.
Spirit of exploration wins out over safety a lot. (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's face it, if the human race was as careful about other dangerous endeavors as it has been about space flight, we'd still be debating about whether it's a good idea to put those dang horseless carriages on the road, seeing as they don't think for themselves and all..
Re:There Anything Left? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hello, welcome to reality (Score:4, Insightful)
NASA, by its very essence, isn't able to test things in completely realistic environments. They spend huge amounts of time and energy doing what testing they can, but how in the world (or outside the world) can you test fixing a wing on a space shuttle? There are so many variables that it's insane to attempt
Sure, this makes NASA dangerous, but that's been known for decades. Space travel isn't as easy as driving to the supermarket just yet. Get over it.
There will always be risks (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, there are terrible airplane crashes every year, but do we shut down all commercial airflight until we can make it certain that flying has no risk?
On the flip side, we should do more to acknowledge the risks those space shuttle crews take every time they go up for even a "routine" mission.
TWR
Re:The Only Things? (Score:2, Insightful)
Which is what? Put payloads into low Earth orbit?
Can you tell me that the shuttle is safer than other payload delivery systems?
forget manned missions (Score:3, Insightful)
each flight costs $500 million! (Score:5, Insightful)
The Crew Exploration Vehicle appears to be on the right track, just as the shuttle concept was, lets just hope they dont make the same mistakes again! oh well, if they mess this one up too we can always look forward to the future European EADS Phoenix reusable launch vehicle!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_shuttle [wikipedia.org] How a good concept turns into bad reality
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EADS_Phoenix [wikipedia.org] What the shuttle should have been. Leave it up to the Europeans to get it right!
Oh, is that all? (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, so all that remain are the exact same issues that grounded the program in the first place.
So what have the actually done in the past couple years again?
-> Fritz
Re:each flight costs $500 million! (Score:2, Insightful)
Come on... (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh fuck off. The astronauts know damned well what they are getting into... certainly better than you with your irrelevant software analogy.
Overly conservative bureaucrats... (Score:1, Insightful)
If my children were very well-trained astronauts who are willing to give their life to fly in space, yes.
Too many people are too conservative with respect to launching the vehicle. Imagine if King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella refused to allow Columbus to "sail the ocean blue" until he could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that not a single sailor would be in any way discomforted. Imagine if Lewis and Clark or Magellan had similar burdens placed on them?
Be grateful that we have as impressive a record in space as we do. Challenger and Columbia amount to approximately a dozen deaths. Yes, each death is very sad and should be mourned appropriately (and they are), but I sincerely doubt the astronauts involved would want to cause a two and a half year hiatus.
Worst Spaceship Evar (Score:2, Insightful)
Most orginizations at some point realize when they've built a white elephant and move forward. NASA just can't grasp that SS was a crap idea as concieved.
I think it has undue mindshare because it looks kind of like what a spaceship should look like. Not like those ghay capsules, that, oh, managed to get us to the moon and never killed anyone in flight.
We should throw the SS away. If that means ISS crashes into the ocean, well, that's fine. Its back to basics time for manned spaceflight. And by that I mean - less press releases, more actual *flight*.
Re:Spirit of exploration wins out over safety a lo (Score:5, Insightful)
You're strapping yourself to a gigantic tank of highly combustible fuel in containers made minimally thin (often so weak and with a taper that if you turn them upside down when full, they'd burst), pumped at ridiculous speeds into combustion chambers running hotter than the boiling point of iron, with the entire combustion chamber being gimballed at high speed to keep the craft stable, and hope that the vibration doesn't damage anything important.
In space, you're exposed to extreme temperature variations (and thus thermal expansion/contraction, brittleness, freezing fuel/hydraulic lines, etc), high radiation levels, parts and liquids shifting in zero-G, etc. On reentry, most of that energy that you burned off getting into space must be burned off by your craft, creating temperatures of thousands of degrees that would easily melt most materials, and give even many superalloys the texture of rubber.
Hundreds of thousands to millions of parts, each one with failure potential. Escape velocity requiring enough energy that even the highest ISP exhausts only leave the craft at a fraction of the velocity you need to end up going. A dense lower atmosphere. It's amazing that we can get people off this rock at all, as opposed to simple suborbital hops.
Re:forget manned missions (Score:2, Insightful)
B. The ISS (International Space Station) is a DISASTER. The astronauts in it currently aren't so much living in the station as they are trapped in it. As I recall, something went wrong with their AIR SUPPLY and they are on reserves. Further, unless by "worked on" you mean "every once in a while the Russians bring food" you are, unfortunately, mistaken. The program has hit a huge obstacle in that no nations (certainly not the USA) are on course with any of the modules (and they may never be).
C. Pure Science should be the aim, and NASA should then try to get us (the public) excited about it. Beautiful pictures of the stars, stories about searching for gravitational fields, and talk of "ion propulsion" should get someone psyched.
Re:Worst Spaceship Evar (Score:3, Insightful)
Ignoring all the technical and engineering compromises that went on in the design, just getting approval to design and build the thing sounds like it was quite the hassle to me. Everyone wanted to build a part of it in their state, because there's lots of money and nice jobs involved. There were engineers, politicians, military planners, administrators, all fighting over what features the shuttle would have, how much it should cost, and what companies would get paid to produce it. The fact that it happened at all is pretty amazing.
And all of those difficulties repeat themselves anytime NASA talks about a shuttle replacement, which is why it's been so hard to get one made. Unfortunately it took a second major accident to force non-engineers to consider alternatives. Hopefully some of the current initiatives will produce actual spacecraft.
Meanwhile, it's important politically for NASA to keep manned spaceflight going, partially for the space station, partially for national pride, and partially because they have to justify their budget to congress.
The story of NASA since Apollo has basically been a bunch of engineers, a bunch of bureaucrats, and a huge disconnect in between. The bureaucrats control the money, so the engineers can't get much done without them. Sucks, but that's one of the prices you pay to live in a democratic country.
But yeah, I'll bet NASA is chock full of people who'd like nothing better to have the STS stop taking all the funding. It's just not a simple matter to retire it.
Would you want your children . . . . (Score:1, Insightful)
Hanggliding?
Engaging in unprotected sex?
Individuals take risks because they believe the REWARDS are great.
Safety is for the rest of humanity.
We've spent TOO much money making the shuttle safe. Strap me on a booster and let's go, baby!
Re:each flight costs $500 million! (Score:4, Insightful)
Exacly. And it will be improved by removing the heavy, useless wings; by eliminating the unneeded large payload capacity; by greatly reducing the heat shield size and complexity; by adding a viable escape system; by getting rid of uncontrollable solid boosters; and by dropping the high-strung engines that need a total rebuild after every flight that costs more than new engines.
In other words, it will be replaced by a much more reasonable capsule-like spacecraft on a simple single-use booster.
Re:The Only Things? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Saturn V did well. How many times did it fly? A dozen? Maybe a few more? Fire off a hundred of them, we'll see if the record stays consistent.
It's sort of silly to make comparisons of that sort to the shuttle, because there's not really anything else like it. I think the parent comment's main point was that, while not 100%, the shuttle is pretty damn good in the safety department, and seems to be within the realm of acceptable risk. And if you're not down with acceptable risk, then space flight is not the business for you to be in.
There are plenty of reasons to replace the space shuttle, but safety is not at the top of the list.
Beta test (Score:4, Insightful)
As to the overall stupidity of that comment, believe it or not, someone has to do the beta testing here. Yeah, it's a tragedy when lives are lost, but that's the nature of the space program: risks have to be taken, because some things just can't be done without real-world testing. Even when the space program is no longer experimental, lives will still be lost, because space, in and of itself, is a high-risk venture.
How about going back to the OLD FOAM? (Score:4, Insightful)
NASA became a worthless joke when they started practicing junk science and let the middle managers rule the roost. Time to shut it down and just fire everyone.
Re:Spirit of exploration wins out over safety a lo (Score:3, Insightful)
Anyway, I'd rather die attempting to explore the universe outside of our little planet than die from cigerettes, cocaine or bigmacs.
shuttle stats (Score:1, Insightful)
Safe = free from risk or danger
Space flight therefore, will NEVER be safe. One day it may become "less dangerous" to the point where people accept it as a normal mode of transportation, and accidents are an accepted part of the small risk of space flight.
Shuttle: flawed design of a craft whose major mission was to provide employment in the states of the Congressmen who pushed for it to be built. (Like the B-2).
Shuttle Stack: 3 main rocket engines provide the same output as 23 Hoover Dams when at 100% throttle. (This ignores the SRBs which are more powerful again!)
Shuttle Main Engines: Are sitting on gimbals which allow directed thrust! (OMFG - what were they thinking! Linear Aerospike motor was the way to go)
The shuttle was, and always will be an Experimental Vehicle. It was NEVER an Operational Vehicle. NASA was silly to treat it is as such.
Given the above facts, and a 1.8% failure rate, I'd say the Shuttle has done a simply amazing job.
Beta Tested (Score:2, Insightful)
author is a dumbass (Score:3, Insightful)
Idiotic question (Score:3, Insightful)
No, I wouldn't. That's why we don't send children into space, only consenting adults.
Re:Idiotic question (Score:3, Insightful)
Would you want your children flying a space shuttle that hasn't been properly beta-tested?
Honestly, I agree. In any other post on this site that article should be moderated as flaimbait.
It's a nice case of emotional misdirection which gets you emotionally against children flying spaceships into space, when that isn't the issue at all.
Besides; don't we expect any beta test of space flight to involve flight? So why claim that it isn't beta-tested so we can't/shouldn't fly. As another poster mentioned - space flight will be in beta for a long while to come.
And... suprisingly this post is on-topic =)
Let's examine the oh so terrible atrocity... (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's review:
1. Out of over 107 missions, into a region of existance we know little about, with a machine more complex than most other aircraft, with a crew riding thousands of tons of explosives, we've lost "only" 14 people, in 2 disasters. (That's a less than 2-percent failure ratio.)
2. There have been over 14-thousand fatalities in the airline industry since its start. (Over a thousand deaths in the past 3 years alone.)
3. In comparison to the two known non-US space-flight programs in operation on this planet, the Russian space-flight program with its current Soyuz ship (older than the space shuttle) has been plagued with more problems than death, and the Chinese, although modestly successful, are still back in the days of the Mercury and Gemini missions, flinging people into orbit in capsules with nothing else to do.
4. Despite widespread lack of knowledge on the public's part, the US space program has had wide-spanning benifits to the human race.
5. The number of countries capable of supporting a continual human space-flight program, are few. The number that can do so, and then afford to advance further to make it a process that is safe and as common as airline flights, comes to single digits.
6. The space shuttle remains the only solution available for providing support and maintenance to satellites. It is also the only platform able to move between orbits and locations, and actively interact with other space-based systems.
7. The money spent advancing space technologies, not only benifits us, but goes into our economy.
8. The government spends far more than the entire NASA budget that, without sounding like a hippie, have done little to advance our standing in the world and which have a deadly outcome. If NASA wants to spend millions and billions developing technology that makes our lives better and expands our knowledge, what's the problem? Money burned is bad, but money burned towards a good intention is better than money burned for naught.
9. Do I need to continue?